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Welcome to the Behind the Shield podcast as always my name is James Gearing and this week
we are addressing such a raw and important conversation.
My guest is Bethel Kagan and her husband Frank was a 30 year veteran of the Florida Fire
Service.
In the last year of his life, Bethel watched Frank slowly unravel which ultimately resulted
in his suicide.
So this is a visceral perspective through the eyes of a loved one when a first responder
is in crisis.
And we discuss a host of topics.
From his journey into the fire service, his love of martial arts, the psychosis that began
to manifest, the negative side of psychiatric meds and Baker Act, the haunting red flags,
the change Bethel wants to make in the American fire service and so much more.
Before we get to this heartbreaking conversation as I say every week, please just take a moment,
go to whichever app you listen to this on, subscribe to the show, leave feedback and
leave a rating.
Every single five star rating truly does elevate this podcast therefore making it easier for
others to find.
And this is a free library of well over 900 episodes now.
So all I ask in return is that you help share these incredible men and women stories so
I can get them to every single person on planet earth who needs to hear them.
So with that being said, I introduce to you Bethel Kagan.
Enjoy.
Well, Bethel, I want to start by saying thank you so much for reaching out initially and
now taking the time and coming on the Behind the Shield podcast.
Thank you.
I appreciate you giving me this opportunity to be in your podcast.
Like what I had said before, initially when we first spoken, I'm just a stay at home
mom.
I was married to my husband for 20 years.
We've been together for 21 and you know, he was the one that was always in the forefront
and I was just home taking care of the kids, stay at home mom.
And now somehow I got thrust into this after he passed away.
So it's an honor.
I appreciate you.
Thank you, James.
And thank you for all your work.
Well, I think it's important.
You know, when we lose people, we can either just say, oh, that's sad, shrug our shoulders
and keep doing the same thing.
Or we can at least figure out is there an opportunity to learn from that and prevent
it happening in the future?
Absolutely.
I completely agree.
And I'm trying to turn my pain into a purpose and somehow hopefully throughout all this,
I can be a voice or even if I can just help save someone or maybe change their perspective,
right?
On like ending their life or anything like that, or even thinking about ending their
life by hearing this episode or any of your shows for that matter.
I think it's quite important.
Absolutely.
I agree 100%.
Well, very first question, then where on planet Earth are we finding you this afternoon?
I am.
I live here in South Florida, West Broward County, Pembroke Pines, sunny.
I was in Pines when I worked for Hialeah.
That's where I live.
My house is in Pines.
Really?
Yeah.
I'm in West Pines.
It has completely changed now.
I'm sure.
I think I was off 187th.
And I think if you went three more streets, you hit the Everglades.
And I'm sure there's probably a lot more construction now.
I'm on 172nd.
Okay.
So yeah, not too far.
So I would love to start at the very beginning of your journey.
Obviously, we'll walk through to when you and Frank met and then we'll kind of move
forward from there.
So tell me where you were born and tell me a little bit about your family dynamic, what
your parents did, how many siblings.
Okay.
I was born in the Philippines, originally Ilo City.
We moved here in 93.
So I kind of have grew up in the Philippines and pretty much like grew up here then.
My mom was a stay at home mom.
My dad was a ship cargo, a captain of the cargo ship.
So he traveled a lot.
And my mom would also go with him on the cargo ship to be with him and stuff.
So I grew up with my cousins and my aunts and uncles in the Philippines and our grandmother.
And they pretty much kind of like raised us.
And then we moved here into space in 93.
So there's five of us in total.
I'm number three out of five.
I'm one of five as well, funny enough.
But my wife is actually half Filipino.
I just spent a week with my in-laws and her mother is from the Philippines.
Oh, wow.
Where we're at?
I can't remember.
Because I know it's so many little islands.
I forget it wasn't Manila.
It was somewhere more rural, I believe.
So talk to me about the immigration story then.
Your parents' perspective and then your own unique perspective.
Because I think I talk about this a lot.
When you hear the word immigrant these days, it's almost like a nasty word.
And they're talking about illegals and borders and walls and stuff like that.
But this whole country, aside from the Native Americans, and even then if you go far enough
back, they were from Asia.
But this whole nation was built on immigration.
I think there are some beautiful stories mixed into the fabric of this nation.
So what were the highs of your immigration and your parents' immigration story and
were there any lows?
Well, actually, my parents, my dad, my mom and dad, we actually had to get a lawyer and
spend a lot of money in order for us to move here and to be with them.
So they worked hard.
My dad, when he stopped working for the cargo ship, there were times when he had to work
at the farm down here in Miami just to earn a living and then save their money.
So did my mom.
My mom would work as a caretaker for the elderly.
And they sacrificed a lot to bring us over here.
And they went through the legal way as far as getting a lawyer and getting all our paperwork
done.
We got denied several times when we were in the Philippines trying to come here.
Remember, this young is five years old, getting all our paperwork done, going to the consulate
in the Philippines over there, standing in line for hours just so we could come here
in the United States.
And thankfully, through the grace of God, I think in 93, that's when we finally got approved
for a visa to come here and move here.
And yeah, it cost my parents a lot of money to have us here.
And this is the greatest country in the world.
So what part of the states did you move into initially?
Was it South Florida immediately?
South Florida, Plantation, Florida.
And what made them choose that part of the states?
I think at the time, my dad's family lived in Miami and my dad had a business in Port
Everglades, which is by Fort Lauderdale.
So Plantation was like, you know, the up and coming suburb at the time before Pines.
So it was like a great community and he purchased a home there.
And that's where we lived until I met my husband, Frank.
So what about sports when you were a school age?
What were you playing?
Oh, my gosh.
No, I did not play sports.
I was not into sports.
I didn't know how.
Yeah, no, not.
Yeah, like I guess growing up in the Philippines, it was a little bit different back then when
I was growing up because we did not play sports.
It was almost like you want to be inside a house.
You don't want to be out in the sun and stuff like that.
It's just like, you know, you want to be girly kind of.
So yeah, I couldn't play sports, did not play sports.
It was almost unheard of for girls to play sports back then.
I mean, I'm sure it has changed now, but yeah, did not play sports.
I did not dabble into sports or any of that stuff, activities, physical activities until
I was in my 20s.
What about nutrition?
How does the food that you were raised on in the Philippines contrast to the food that
you found yourself immersed in in the States?
Over there in the Philippines, we ate rice, rice is like the staple.
So breakfast, lunch and dinner, we had rice and rice with everything pretty much.
It was, you know, we had like stew, soup and everything else.
Like over here, we have a lot more pre-packaged meals, I guess.
But over there, it was like fresh food and it was prepared for you for breakfast.
You get like a fresh batch of rice with eggs, meat and stuff like that.
I suppose over here, you eat like cereal or sandwich or a breakfast sandwich.
But yeah, over there, it's just like a heavy laden like good food.
Yeah, I got exposed to some of that when I was over there.
Her mum's a great cook.
So pancit.
Yeah.
So it's different.
Now what about career aspirations as you're going through the school system?
What were you dreaming of becoming?
Quite honestly, I was always that child that didn't know what I wanted.
I was like the dreamer, I guess.
Like I'll dabble on the idea of, okay, I want to be a teacher.
At one point, I wanted to be a nun.
You know, I just, I didn't know what I wanted to be when I grow up.
And I'm still trying to figure that out, to be honest.
I'm like one of those people that are like, okay, wherever it may be or whatever it may
be, maybe someday it'll just come to me.
And I've been blessed in that, I guess, aspect because, you know, I just go with the flow.
So let's sport back in time again to Frank's upbringing.
So tell me where he was born and tell me a little bit about, excuse me, a little bit
about his family as well.
Okay.
My husband was Frank, was born in Iceland, New York.
And I believe they moved here when he was seven, maybe because his dad had relocated
for his job.
So the whole family moved here, I think, when he was seven years old.
And they moved here in Humbert Hines at the time and he's been here since.
And his dad is from the Caribbean, from St. Martin, and his mom is from New York.
He's like New York, American, Italian.
Now same question again, I'm sure it's probably rare if you have this kind of conversations,
but have you heard any of their immigration stories or his dad's specifically?
All I know is like, you know, obviously, I think his dad moved here when he was like
19 or 20, and he started working immediately from the Caribbean, from St. Martin.
And I think he started working at the bakery.
I think he stayed with his uncle, but I can't really speak for him because, you know, obviously,
my version would be all mixed up and it may be wrong, so I don't want to speak for him.
Yeah, but his mom on the other side, I think she's a second or third generation American
Italian.
Okay.
Beautiful.
Well, then what about Frank's journey into the fire service?
Have you ever talked to him about why he joined in the first place?
Well, I think I just, you know, I'm so thankful because when he was in high school, he was
dating this girl, Dawn, and her father worked for the fire department in Miami Dade, and
he dated for, you know, a few years.
They were like childhood sweethearts.
And I think he got inspired by his girlfriend's dad.
And that's how he got started in the fire department.
So I'm really thankful for her family, for her and her family, because we're still friends
and she's an amazing woman.
So he joined his department in 1989.
Have I got that right?
Yes.
Okay.
So walk me through, you know, what you know of his kind of career before you met him and
then let's get to when you guys met.
Well, I mean, he started really, really young.
And I guess, you know, while he was in the fire department, he would be a personal trainer
on the side.
He also worked for an ambulance company.
He also worked for, I think it was one of those air rescue things.
I think that's what he said before.
So he worked at all those places prior to meeting me.
And he would also teach CPR classes and stuff like that while he was single.
Frank was 12 years older than me.
So he had a really colorful life prior to meeting me, or I guess prior to settling down.
So he had a lot of like little odd jobs here and there.
But all in all, though, at the end of the day, he loved being a firefighter.
That was his life.
That's who he was.
And he was so passionate about his career.
There's so many elements that contribute to what we're going to talk about later.
You know, someone reaching an emotional crisis.
And after all these conversations that I had, you know, the impact of our early years, our
transformative years on our emotional resilience later in life is undeniable.
You know, and that trauma can be absolutely horrific, like a sexual abuse, or it can be,
you know, something seemingly less traumatic, but still had a huge impact on that young
man or woman.
When you've had conversations with him, was there or were there any elements of his earlier
life that you think added to what ultimately happened?
Quite honestly, no, not really.
I just feel like, you know, he was a hardworking man.
He was sensitive, for sure.
He was empathetic.
So maybe perhaps that attributed, you know, to the whole career of like accumulation of
the job, what you see on calls, like for 30 years, it's a total accumulation of different
things that happen.
And obviously, in the fire service or first responder community, I mean, hopefully changes
now back then can really speak about your feelings or going to call or anything like
that.
It's almost like you're not man enough or you're a PSSY.
I don't know if I can say that.
You can say anything on here, just so you know.
So it like back then, it's almost like you're a pussy.
If you speak about your feelings, or if it bothers you a little bit.
So I believe like it's just an accumulation of things that occurred.
But I mean, he was very sensitive.
I know he was a sensitive person.
One of the most like he looked tough.
He was a tough guy, but he was definitely a sensitive man.
And was he into the martial arts and boxing before you guys met?
Yeah, he already was.
Yeah.
And he was a Golden Gloves champion at one point as well.
He was a Golden Gloves champion.
He even did tough men when tough men was around.
He did that too.
He also dabbled into Jiu Jitsu and MMA like striking and boxing and kickboxing and stuff.
So he was into all that stuff.
He was one of the toughest men I've known.
Was he training with Wagner Rocha?
Yes, he was.
We were with Wagner for a while.
Okay, because it's funny.
That's actually the father gym of my gym in Gainesville, Swamp Academy.
That's who gave my instructor his black belt.
Oh, wow.
Yeah.
So I think it was Wagner Rocha's competitor of the year.
I think that was 2014 or yeah, I think in 2014 because Frank loved to compete.
He was very competitive.
So Wagner awarded him as competitor of the year at the gym.
Amazing.
Yeah.
And he started Jiu Jitsu quite late.
He started, I think he was 44 or 45.
Brilliant.
All right.
Well, let's go back to when you guys met then.
Walk me through the first time meeting and then your honeymoon period as it were.
Okay.
Well, I guess we didn't really meet me.
So I was working at Hooters back in 99.
I picked up a shift over there.
It was Air and Sea Show.
And I just remembered it was a busy day that day at the beach place.
And I was in one corner of the room.
I had my own section and I heard like a bunch of like, you know, loud guys in one corner
of the room.
And I just ignored it, whatever.
And then two years later in 2001, my girlfriend and I and my cousin went to an event at the
Bank Atlantic Center at the time in sunrise.
And my girlfriend and Frank's friend were working at detail.
And Kevin was like, he started talking to my girlfriend Marissa, because I guess it
was like four young girls at this event and it's like a Christian like event.
And mostly it was older people that go to this event.
So he started talking to my girlfriend and we went to our section.
He calls Frank immediately and told Frank, oh, I think you're going to like this girl.
There's this girl that I want you to meet.
She's here with her friends, whatever.
So during like one of the intermission, we went outside of our section and then Frank
was out there.
We were introduced and that was January 2001.
And ever since then, we've been together.
And Frank was looking when we were dating, Frank was looking through some of the pictures
and he saw me in my Hooters uniform with really short hair at the time, too.
He's like, I remembered you back at the Air and Sea show.
He's like, that was you.
And he described to me exactly to the T like where I was that day and what I was doing.
I still remember it because I was just like, oh my gosh, these people are just so loud.
And I was just feeling overwhelmed at the time.
And I'm like, yeah, I was working that day.
He's like, yeah, he's like, I was there.
I remember you specifically.
So I just thought it was weird and fate with a loud people or firefighters.
Yeah, that was him and his friends.
I figured they were so loud.
But he said that he was running on a one day.
So he was going for a jog and they were already up there.
So he went upstairs to meet them and he saw me on the other side of the room.
Ah, gotcha.
Yeah.
Well, with the timeline, then I know in 2002, he won firefighter of the year.
So walk me through the rescue and what happened prior to that.
Well, actually, we were just dating then.
So he was like telling me this story that he said, you know, that he rescued this woman
and stuff.
And at the time, it was just to me, I'm like, OK, whatever.
Like you're firefighter of the year, great, whatever.
And I'm just like brushed it off.
I didn't realize it was such a big deal.
So it was like, oh, OK, that was nice.
I mean, lovely, brilliant, great.
But yeah, he was pretty proud of that moment.
He went to a call and then, you know, found this woman unresponsive.
I guess there was like a fire and there was a thick smoke and saved her.
But to me, I wasn't really paying attention to me at the time.
I was like, whatever.
Like impressive, sure.
But, you know, I was like, whatever.
Now, I wish I paid more attention, but could I shit over though?
So as you guys met, he's about 10, just over 10 years into his career then.
So, you know, retrospectively now with this, you know, sadly, widow's lens that you have,
where was he mentally at that point?
He was good until about 2019 when really I noticed a behavior change.
It was like completely like a 360 in 2019 where I was like, this is not the man I know.
I mean, there were moments where I was like, OK, he's he's acting a little bit obsessive.
But then again, to me, Frank was like such he was focused.
He had tunnel vision and he wants to do something.
Anything else doesn't matter, and he just focuses on that task until he achieves it.
He was an overachiever and he did achieve whatever he wanted to put his mind like to
get or achieve or whatever.
Right.
So in 2019, he just started saying things that did not make sense anymore.
And his behavior was a little bit erratic.
And I'm like, OK, he's not OK anymore.
Like we're having a crisis here.
So 2019 was really like a big year of the shit show, I guess.
Yeah.
It's interesting because we do such a good job of hiding it.
And this is what's so sad is you hear a lot of people and it's two things.
I felt like I was weak and everyone else seemed to be fine.
And actually, if you climb inside someone else's head, they're thinking exactly the
same thing.
Looking back at the person who was thinking that.
So in this profession, we have to wear a mask.
If we're on a call and it's a life or death incident, you can't be showing your emotions
on your face.
It's just going to freak the patient out.
So you have to have that.
But the problem is some of us are so good at hiding it.
The number of times that I've heard the comment, oh, that was the last person I expected
to do that.
Well, that's because they just hid it well.
It's true.
I mean, he had a great poker face.
You look at him, you would think that nothing bothered him.
Just the way he carried himself and the way he looked and just even responding to calls.
Everybody loved him because he was such a pillar in his work, in the department that
he worked for.
He had achieved a lot and he proved it too.
So he walked the walk and talked the talk and everyone looked up to him.
And the way he just carried himself, he was just a symbol of strength pretty much.
And then in 2019, that's when he just unraveled very quickly too.
Well let's go back just so that we can paint the kind of father he was as well.
So talk to me about the birth of the two children.
Oh, Frank wanted to choose the sex of our baby when we first got together.
He's very tunnel visioned.
He was a planner.
He wanted things a certain way.
And I was just like, whatever.
He talked me into having kids because I didn't want to have kids at first.
I'm like, I don't want kids.
So I have two younger sisters and I helped raise my younger sisters.
So I was like, I'm still young.
I don't want kids.
And he's like, no, it's going to be perfect.
I waited so long.
I'm like, you know what?
Yeah, I do love you.
Why not?
So he researched, he read the book, How to Choose the Sex of Your Baby.
And he wanted a son at first, just like all men does, right?
Like first born should be a son.
So like, can take care of your daughter, of this sister and be like a protector or whatever.
You want a junior.
So he tried to research about that.
Obviously that didn't work out.
We had a girl.
And then we had Frankie four years later.
But he, Frank was an amazing father.
He was the greatest dad to our kids.
Amazing, amazing dad.
I'm so blessed to have him as my partner and to be the father of our children.
He obviously wasn't paying attention at the reproduction chapter of his biology class
in high school.
Yeah, but you know, God blessed us with a girl first.
So yeah, beautiful.
Well, while he's going through that age now, you've met, you're having children.
Talk to me about the frequency that he was at work.
I mean, were they well staffed?
Were there any kind of, you know, forced overtime or was he volunteering for extra work?
Just because I mean, this is something that I talk about a lot.
One of the pieces of the puzzle of mental health is obviously sleep deprivation and
that can factor in as well.
No, actually, we're very lucky because the department that we worked for, you know, there
was no issue with forced overtime, really.
They were well staffed.
So Frank was, you know, there were over times available, but it wasn't like he was forced,
not unless there's like a hurricane or anything like that where, okay, it's mandatory.
But he was never forced.
There was never like a forced overtime for the department that he worked for.
So he had a good work balance there.
Excellent.
Yeah.
So then let's walk through to 2019 then.
So you've got, you know, this husband, this father, this respected firefighter, this respected
martial artist, and he seems to be thriving.
Talk to me about the beginning of that unraveling in 2019.
Well, actually, throughout his career in Sunrise, so he started also veering towards the politics
side of, you know, the department as well.
So he was also the union president for their department in the city, for the city of Sunrise
Fire Department.
So he was the union president and he also got involved in the pension.
So he was first, I guess, like a board member for the pension board for the fire department,
and then he became eventually became a chairman.
So he was in that position for a long time.
And in 2019, when he's when we started seeing him unravel slowly, it was like he started
talking a lot about the numbers and something was wrong.
There's corruption and all that stuff.
And that's when we were like, OK, something's not right here.
And he was very adamant about something that he found in the pension and all that stuff,
which to me, he's never spoken about stuff like that before.
And what he was saying just did not make sense to me.
And he wasn't sleeping as well.
And he was just borderline.
He had psychosis pretty much because he was saying that, you know, Sunrise was out to
get him.
The city was out to get him.
I was working for the city and the city controlled me and that, you know, he was going to meet
the president at the time it was Trump.
The president was going to come down here and meet him.
DeSantis was going to come and meet him and he was going to write a bill for the Senate.
It was just like a big jumbo of different things that he was just his mind was just
going a thousand miles an hour.
Nothing made sense to me anymore.
And that's I'm like, OK, something's wrong.
So how did that start affecting you, the kids, his work life?
You can talk to me about the kind of ripple effects of this trauma that was going on in
his own mind.
Well, initially, I tried to be as supportive as I can because obviously I'm not involved
in his work.
I don't know or back then I did not know the inner workings of the pension board.
I did not know the inner workings of the union work.
So and the politics as well.
So I was like, OK, I'll hear you out and hear what you have to say.
And I tried to be as understanding as possible.
But when he started rambling things off and accusing me of working for the city and that
the city's got to me and they're paying me and I was talking to different people from
the city, I'm like, that's not true.
I'm not doing that.
I'm here at home taking care of you and the kids.
We're so busy.
I'm so busy trying to take care of the household and our children, their after school activities.
I'm like, that's not true at all.
And he was so insistent and adamant about that.
I'm like, OK, this is not right.
It's not making sense.
And what you're telling me is not making sense as well.
And you don't have proof.
Like I was asking him for proof because obviously I believe him is my husband.
But he just kept saying things and just telling me all these things.
I'm like, I understand that.
Let's take one step at a time.
OK, if you think you have something on this company, break it down for me.
Let's talk it through and just slow it down.
But he was also speaking like a thousand miles per hour and nothing he said would make sense.
It was like almost like a run on sentence of just one thing after another.
And he wasn't sleeping.
So he was just like it just nothing made sense.
It was like it was kind of scary.
But I had to find a composure, I guess, to deal with him and just settle everything down
because if I would have fought with him at the time, it would have been like a shit show.
And I wouldn't be able to get through the bottom of things.
So I tried to like stay back as long as I could until I knew that, OK, something is
like when I had, I guess, like a sign that, OK, he's not well, he's going off, he's doing
random things.
I can't get a hold of him.
That's when I really got scared.
And what ended up having to happen?
Because I mean, this is, I think, an important conversation.
There's so many levels from suicides to psychosis to even homicide.
I just interviewed a firefighter from California when they had that murder suicide in their
station and it's all related to the same thing.
It's a psychosis.
But there can be an outward projection on the family.
There can be a point where the husband or the wife and the children don't feel safe
anymore.
Right.
Well, with Frank, actually, so he started not sleeping a lot.
And he was just like telling me that what scared me the most was him saying that this
SWAT team is going to come to our house and that they were going to all kill us.
And that's when I'm like, OK, this is not normal anymore.
It's not normal behavior that you're actually even thinking of that.
So I was telling him, like, either you move out or I move out because I did not feel safe
anymore because nothing made sense.
What he was saying was not making sense.
He was not sleeping.
He was driving all over the place.
I couldn't get a hold of him.
He would block me and he just seemed to like see me as a person that worked for the city
and hated the city at the time.
So I couldn't even speak to him one on one because everything he said to me was like
accusatory that I was the enemy.
And I was worried for our children, too.
Not once has he ever been physically abusive towards me ever, our whole entire marriage.
Even then, I did not feel like I was I did not feel a threat.
But the psychosis scared me.
Like his eyes changed the way he spoke to me, changed the way he would speak to our
daughter change.
It was almost a different person.
And you know, he would talk to strangers for like hours.
He would call the cops.
He would call 911 and tell them to send the news here over our house because he said that
he had something against the city.
So it was just.
It was a very tough time.
I didn't know what was going on as well, but I was just trying to just.
I guess trying to survive.
It was chaotic.
It was complete chaos pretty much because he was also a big act.
Yeah, he was big.
I did quite a few times before all this shit happened.
I think this is, you know, it's so important to have this conversation.
I want to get to something I've heard from a lot of people that have been right there,
not so much in the psychosis state, but certainly in the suicidal state.
But before we even do putting that compassion back into events like this, when you realize
someone's entire reality has been shifted.
So you and I believe that it's normal that we're sitting in our respective rooms in front
of a computer talking to a microphone.
That's our reality.
You know, but if I look out the window and I see Russians marching down the road and
that's truly what my brain is telling me is the truth, then from the outside, I'm going
to seem like a crazy person.
So you know, just when you realize that these people are sick, they are broken.
I mean, that in a compassionate way, then you can actually view it with a much more
empathetic lens.
But if we're just like, oh, what's wrong with him?
You know, he's a piece of shit now.
Then you never get to the root cause of why instead of saying what's wrong with you,
you say what happened to you?
How have you got to this point and how do we pull you back from it?
I completely agree.
I think that was the problem initially, right?
Because you know, he was saying all these things and we were like, what is wrong with
you?
That's not true.
And I think that was partly, I blame myself, I wish I knew now.
I think me asking him what's wrong with you instead of trying to help him navigate, you
know, his way through hell.
I guess that kind of made things worse at the time because it was like, he's clearly
needed help.
He was psychotic, but it was almost like me not knowing what I was doing kind of just
like we butt heads because I just wanted to just make him stop.
He wanted to express something that he thought in you and I was trying to like also argue
with him that what he saw or what he thought was not true.
And I wish, you know, I wish we have resources for stuff like that in school for our kids
or just every day.
I think that kind of things needs to be like in our society, we need to talk more about
that, be empathetic, be kind and be compassionate, especially when it comes to mental illness
because you're right, when you're mentally ill, that's what your brain's telling you.
So you believe it.
Unfortunately, we're not taught that at school or anywhere else.
And like, it's a little too late for me now to, you know, to learn that.
But I mean, moving forward, now I do.
But when my husband was going through that, that was, that was really tough because I've
never dealt with anything like that ever, ever.
What was the impact of the Baker Act on his behavior?
The reason I asked that firstly, I had a horrendous experience with my son when he was younger
that actually was Baker acted against, you know, for no reason basically whatsoever other
than he was just sad.
He was going through some stuff in his mother's house and was crying in class.
But that particular moment, the SRO and the principal made a fucking horrendous, you know,
decision mistake that now they've changed the law.
They'd be they'd be locked up for doing the same thing.
They'd be kidnapped my child.
So I saw the impact of that on him.
I mean, that trauma lasted years.
I mean, arguably till today.
But I've had people in the psychology world on here as well that say that, you know, even
the science shows that the Baker Act actually makes it worse, not better.
So what was what was your perspective of him and that experience?
In some ways, because he was so psychotic and he was so out of control.
Selfishly for us, it was almost like a relief because he's not driving around, not getting
into trouble, not doing things that he's not supposed to be doing.
And we're like, OK, he's in a controlled environment.
But for him at the time, I did see how it made it worse.
It made him angrier.
It made him feel less of a man.
And I'm sure it gave him PTSD.
For sure.
I know it.
I know it did.
But it did tell me how it made things worse for him, especially.
Just before he passed away, because he was in the hospital for almost a month just before
he passed away.
And he said he never, ever wanted to go back at the hospital setting ever again.
And he said that last stay at the hospital broke him.
Yeah, it did.
He said it's horrible.
And I'm just obviously relaying what he said to me.
Yeah.
What about the sense of burdensome?
The thing that I've heard, I touched on before, from so many people that you don't hear in
mental health conversations, again, when that brain has been miswired.
So now what's real to them from the outside looking in doesn't make any sense to us.
But they truly find themselves at a point where they believe that they are a burden
to their family, to their wife or husband, to their children.
And therefore, suicide actually becomes a courageous, selfless act, in contrary to all
the judgmental comments that people have usually.
Because a healthy brain is trying to understand what an unhealthy brain has done.
Did he ever kind of mention seeming like he was a burden to you guys?
Every day he would tell me.
Every day he would tell me, he would tell me that we were better off without him here.
And he was embarrassed.
And when he had put us through, he was embarrassed for our kids.
He was embarrassed for me.
And he was sorry for everything that he had done.
And he thought that our life would be better off without him.
And this is a problem.
If we try and hang on to that old way of looking at it, all we're doing is adding more guilt
and more shame to someone who's drowning in guilt and shame.
Absolutely.
And for him, he was a 30-year firefighter.
So he was also forced to resign from his position.
Because obviously, when he was manic, he wasn't following protocols.
Because he was in the right frame of mind.
So when they had told him to go for a fitness evaluation, he wouldn't do it.
He thought nothing was wrong with him and that we were all stupid.
He was a genius.
He was above the law.
So when he was forced to resign, I think it broke him.
He was also in jail.
So he got arrested as well.
My husband spent time at the North Broward jail for a few months because he was recording
his phone conversation with the fire chief.
And I think at the time, his assistant city manager posted it on Facebook without informing
them.
So he got those charges.
And I had also had to file a restraining order against him because he started staying at
a hotel with a random stranger at the time.
And like I said, he thought that I was working for this city.
And he was just so out of control.
I couldn't get a hold of him.
I didn't know who the guy was.
And everything, the guy was using him as a free meal, pretty much.
And the guy said that he was sent by Jesus and would pray over him.
And Frank thought that he was sent by God.
And he was a minister.
So he was his spiritual advisor.
That's what he had told me.
So I didn't trust the guy.
I didn't trust what he was trying to tell Frank.
In my head, I got paranoid.
I'm like, what if he told Frank to kill me?
Or, you know, just I just didn't know who this person was.
So when Frank posted the videos, he got charges for that.
And then when he, I guess, when he broke the injunction, he got arrested for that.
And then he spent time in jail.
But luckily, his case got transferred to mental health court where he was ordered to go down
to Miami and to spend some time there at the facility.
And that's where he kind of started coming down from his mania.
Because even in jail, he was quite manic and he was in isolation.
He had to wear the red jumpsuit when I had to see him report.
So he was that severe.
But I can see how obviously the department's hands would be tied if this was what was going
on.
And I totally understand that.
But looking back at it now, you have someone who's already in crisis and then their tribe
is stripped for them, that their purpose, their identity.
I mean, he was a proud firefighter.
And we have this with people that retire with somewhat good mental health compared to what
was Frank was enduring at that point.
And it crushes them being taken that bay door closing for the last time.
And now you're not on that rig.
You're not in that station.
So again, with hindsight being 2020, there may not be an opportunity to keep him employed
or maybe there will be an opportunity to just kind of hit the pause button on the whole
thing.
But understanding that when we do terminate someone who's struggling, again, we're adding
even more trauma to that person because their healing tribe was the people that they work
with in uniform.
And now you've snatched that from them.
And again, it might be justified.
It might not, but it's still something for us to acknowledge.
Absolutely.
I truly believe, like I said, I totally understand where the department was coming from.
Their hands were tied.
They felt like maybe their back was against the wall and what happened to Frank was the
first time that has ever happened in that department ever.
And here's this man who was a pillar within their department, who was a union president,
30 year employee, a captain.
He was pretty much the guy over there that everybody looked up to.
And it was unfortunate what happened.
And like I see both sides and I don't really blame them because obviously a lot has to
play into it.
But I wish it could have been better for sure.
Absolutely.
It could have maybe been other ways, you know, but then their backs were tied too and their
hands were tied and their backs were against the wall.
So it was a very complicated, I guess, situation.
But I do hope moving forward, you know, I do think that they have learned what not to
do and use Frank's what happened to Frank is like, you know, I guess an example of what
not to do or whomever may be in crisis next time.
Yeah.
Before we kind of progress on, Frank had pretty much hit 30 years.
Had you discussed retirement or was he still planning on working for a while yet?
Yeah.
So Frank was he had a plan.
He was a planner.
He wanted to see things a certain way and he always accomplished whatever he had in
his checklist.
So he had two years left.
He was already in the drop.
So he had two years left.
So he wanted to finish the whole seven year because they had a seven year drop at the
time.
And for him, like after he retired, he wanted to still work.
He wanted to maybe perhaps dabble into consulting because he was really good with numbers and
he was also in the pension board.
So he loved math.
He loved numbers.
And he wanted to also buy a property, well, build a property in St. Martin and have that
as like, you know, an Airbnb and just go back and forth and travel the world.
That's what he wanted to do.
Like you were supposed to enjoy retirement, be his own boss and do consulting and travel
the world and have rental properties as well.
That was his goal.
That was the ultimate goal that he wanted to do because he was fairly young.
Yeah.
Now this makes it even more tragic.
I mean, he was almost there when this all kind of started cascading down.
Right.
Absolutely.
And, you know, I think that's what hurt him because everything that he had to work hard
for all his life just pretty much came crashing around him.
He didn't have the retirement he wanted.
He didn't leave the city that he worked for, the fire department that he worked for in
his own terms.
And he left with feeling the stigma of him being sick, being so manic.
And that's what he was like so embarrassed about and so afraid that people will remember
him in that capacity instead of the good things that he did for the residents, for his brothers
and sisters in the department.
So I'm trying to change that perspective.
Well even the element of organizational betrayal, which may not have been deliberate in this
particular case, but it was certainly perceived in the way that he viewed it.
You wear that patch on your shoulder.
That's who you protect.
Again, it's your tribe, but it's everything.
And then if they turn their backs on you or you perceive that they turn their backs on
you, that's yet another layer to this Jenga, you know, kind of mental health model that
we're talking about.
Oh, definitely.
He thought that they turned their backs on him.
Like I had told him, I'm like, it's not that they turned their back on you.
Their hands were tied.
Their back was against the wall.
I, you know, I had to be in the middle and I had to look at it in a realistic way as
well.
Of course I want to, I want to take my husband's side, but at the same time, I'm a realist
and I saw where they were coming from, the other side of the spectrum as well.
So even though, yes, these are your friends, they also have a job to do.
They had to make sure also they, they go by protocol and all that stuff.
I just wish there was other ways into doing that and that, you know, we could have prolonged
him until he was a little bit better for, for them to force him into retirement.
Absolutely.
All right.
Well then let's talk about March 29th, 2022.
Unfortunately, that was the day that Frank decided to retire.
Frank decided to take his life.
I found him and I wish that they had never left the house.
I think he decided to like take his life maybe right after I left the house to go to the
store that morning.
He was just discharged from the hospital a week before that.
So that morning I was just telling him to get up because he was just laying in bed.
He didn't not want to get up.
He was big reacted a month before that because that's what he would just do.
He was just so depressed.
He did not want to get up.
So I told him that morning when I came home after we dropped, after I dropped off our
son, I was like, okay, you need to get up now.
You can't just lay in bed.
You did this before.
And look what happened.
You were big, I'm like, I think we have to change things and he didn't want to get up.
So I started crying and getting very frustrated with him because I just felt like the world
was closing in.
I didn't know what to do anymore.
He was just at the hospital for a month and then I'm like, what do we do?
Please get up, get up.
Let's go for a walk.
He didn't feel like walking.
He didn't want to do anything.
And I started yelling and crying and I'm like, I don't know if I can do this anymore.
I'm like, you have to do something.
You have to get up.
So eventually he did get up, but I was upset.
So I left the house and when it came home, I heard him in the garage and I thought, okay,
he's working out.
So we were in the garage the night before working out and I left him there.
I'm like, okay, I'll just go to the store real quick and then I'll come back and get
him when it's time to pick up our son.
I heard things in the garage, not thinking anything of it.
I just thought that maybe, okay, he decided to go work out.
So I left the house and when I came back, when it was almost time to pick up our son,
I found him.
I was a little too late.
I'm so sorry to even get you to go back there in your mind, but I think it's so important
that people hear the impact on the family and not maybe the person in crisis.
Because like I said, in their mind, they think they're doing something for their family.
They think they're doing the right solution, but it's everyone else, all of us around that
should be looking out for our brothers and sisters that are struggling and this is the
impact.
So what about the children?
You found him.
Talk to me about how the next few days and week went as far as telling your beloved kids
and the rest of the family.
Well, that was like around, I came home like around maybe 1 20, 1 30.
Our son, the school dismissal is at two o'clock and that's why I came home like around 1 30
because we would always pick him up from school because obviously he's retired now.
So we would pick him up from school and we were never late.
We're always there early.
And at that time when I found him, I had to call 911 and I like I didn't know what to
do.
Our daughter was at college at FSU, so she wasn't home.
And I was just like so freaked out.
I opened the garage door and neighbor came and ran and called 911 and police came, fire
rescue came and obviously they had to pronounce them.
But and then I started freaking out, I'm like my son, he's at school and this time it was
like around 2 15 maybe.
And I think that's when he started getting worried because two o'clock we were not there.
So he's I believe he started calling his sister over there in Tallahassee and she was trying
to call me and I couldn't talk to her.
And I think that's when like he felt maybe something was wrong.
But luckily one of the police officers I contacted to school and tried to find my son and just
kept him in the guidance consular's office I think.
And you know just they didn't say anything to him I don't think.
I think they just said something came up or whatever.
And Kayla was just wondering what's going on.
She was trying to FaceTime me trying to find out what's going on and eventually like I
had to pick up and that's when I told her.
And that was he was an amazing father and that really broke my heart because I had to
tell her on a phone on FaceTime and then picking up my son and telling him as well that his
dad is gone.
And it's just he said goodbye to his dad that morning you know he told him he loved him.
Not knowing that was the last time.
That was tough.
It's horrendous.
How as a family were you able to start navigating those first few weeks?
I mean talk to me about that road of grief that you had to go through.
I am so blessed and grateful for my family.
My mom and my sisters immediately came the very next day.
They flew in from Texas and they were all here to just help us get through this.
My daughter actually flew in that night from Tallahassee and so like we just banded together
and just like family just they just helped me so much.
I'm just so blessed that I have a family that they helped pick us up.
We're very close so that was a blessing.
Going back to Frank, had he tried counseling on some of these other things that we were
told about initially?
Yes, he definitely did.
He was going he was seeing his therapist once a week sometimes twice a week.
He was diligent in taking all his medications.
He was actually in the midst of doing his second round of ECT at the hospital.
He went and did a CTT and ECT Monday and he passed away Tuesday and that was I believe
his fifth session of ECT.
He was scheduled to go on a Wednesday and March 29th was a Tuesday.
So he was really diligent in doing all that stuff but unfortunately towards the end it
was just a treatment of persistent depression.
He just couldn't see himself getting better even at the hospital.
When he was at the hospital for that one month he thought that the city had sent an undercover
officer for him over there and he kept telling me that he thinks that he was going to spend
the rest of his life in a state facility because he didn't see himself getting any better.
We had talked about ketamine and other you know like we didn't try ketamine but he had
mentioned ketamine to me but he was hesitant about that too because he just thought so
hopeless.
He just didn't think anything would help by then.
This is what's so sad and it's of course not a guarantee by any means but the stigma around
because of our drug prohibition laws that prevents first responders, military, medical
people etc from accessing possibly the treatments that would have saved their lives.
The only reason I say that is I know I've had so many people on the show, I've got numerous
friends that were at the absolute end of their rope and it was an ayahuasca or an ibogaine
or a ketamine therapy retreat that ultimately helps them turn the corner and it's not a
magic pill.
They didn't just do one session and go oh I'm fine now but it allowed them to access
the thing beneath the thing as they say really kind of get to the genesis or the nucleus
of their trauma and then start unpacking it with the right kind of shaman counselor whoever
it is that they've chosen.
But how many people have we lost because that was the last thing that they went rather than
that being one of the first thing that they're offered and if it's of the magnitude that
clearly Frank was suffering from then arguably maybe talk therapy wasn't the first, the
right go to.
Maybe it needed something a little deeper than that if he had that depth of depression
and trauma.
I totally agree absolutely and it just still baffles me also with some of the medications
that he was prescribed.
I mean some of them it seemed like he was a zombie, it was just he would be catatonic
with some of the medications he was taking or it wasn't doing anything for him at all.
If anything some of these medications made him worse too.
So it was like a gamble as far as like prescribing him medications.
He went through so many medications and I don't know like I just feel so strongly about
it because I feel like he would see a doctor and he would tell them his symptoms or you
know after a month or so taking this medication it's not working blah blah blah.
They will prescribe them a different medication but there's no leaning off.
They just tell them okay you can discontinue your current medication right now and start
on this new one today or tomorrow.
Well what is it doing to your brain, your body chemistry like that medication is still
in your system.
How can we just make them take this new medication without making sure that's out of your system
and then start the new one.
How about we slowly start tapering off not just start with this new medication and sometimes
they're like you know 500, 700 milligrams per tablet and it's three times a day or
something like that.
Who does that?
I just feel like it's an experiment, a science experiment on a person, on a human being and
it shouldn't be outlawed.
It's just not right.
Well two things I've heard you know from a lot of people, a huge amount of people including
you know many many people in the psychology space that say you know the efficacy of these
psych pills are basically almost equating to the god what do they call that?
I just had the bloody word in my head and it fell out my my placebo.
So yeah so you know almost like a 50-50 flip a coin and then the other thing that I've
heard mentioned numerous times is that nearly all the school shootings that we have the
shooter was on a psychiatric med.
Now you could argue yeah because they were mentally ill.
You can look at it the other way and go did that cause someone who was merely just depressed
and turn them into psychotic and the thing is if you listen to a lot of the warning you
know label speeches on these avarice of these pills it says you know suicidal ideation all
these things you know may cause all that.
Well this is supposed to be fixing it.
Why is it causing it you know?
So I agree 100 percent you know if we're prescribing these pills they there is no doubt that that
was you know a big part of turning someone who was merely anxious and or depressed and
getting to that point of psychosis.
Right.
I think it really attributed to that path you know even towards destruction almost because
you're so knee deep into the medication and sometimes it completely numbs you and you're
almost catatonic and you're physically here but your mind that your mind body spiritual
connection is almost gone because it's being numb by the medication and you're just like
okay well maybe I'll just do this without really feeling and thinking anything anymore
because the medicine has completely stripped you of humanity almost.
Yeah well the other thing is if it's messing with your circadian rhythms if it's affecting
your sleep quality well that's another very kind of toxic you know element that you're
not even really aware of you know you think you're asleep but actually your sleep quality
is terrible because you're on these psych meds which are deliberately affecting your
brain so therefore for example some of the ones for ADHD they're stimulants if you're
taking that are you getting a deep deep sleep or you know are you getting a very shallow
sleep and you're waking up feeling like shit and you're a little bit more sleep deprived
and then you know a lot of our men and women then go and do a 24 hour shift you know and
it could be that could be alcohol could be all kinds of things but these are all the
cumulative elements that contribute to some of our people having this perfect storm of
psychosis or suicidal ideation.
Absolutely I mean the one thing also that he kept telling me was like he couldn't
sleep he wasn't sleeping then his he barely slept so I'm pretty sure even at the hospital
when he was at the hospital for that extended period of time for almost a month he said
he barely slept even though they gave him sleep medication and all that it still didn't
work for him.
Well it doesn't work sleep medication doesn't create good sleep it makes you unconscious
and that's a big misnomer I think a big misunderstanding so you know if you look at there's a
study on I think it was the Benadryl the drug in Benadryl and people took that you know
it's basically the sleep aid version of the over-the-counter ones and if I think I've
got the drug right in the study where they compared shift workers to people that took
that every single night they both had the much lower life expectancy because both of
them were experiencing sleep disruption so just because you're prescribed a medication
that makes you close your eyes doesn't mean you're actually getting the quality of sleep
that you need.
Yeah unfortunately that he wasn't sleeping and he was just beside himself you know he
was very frustrated with the way his life was turning out and here he was broken obviously
to me he had PTSD from everything that has happened the last few years and now he's dealing
with not sleeping hopelessness and everything else feeling like his world is just crashing
down on him it was just he was just done he was exhausted and he did tell me he he didn't
want to wish what he had on anyone else.
Prior to that had he ever talked about calls that bothered him?
Not really no he kept that separate.
Because I think I mean my career for example I had you know I mean I was what they call
a black cloud so I seem to get all the shitty calls never had a cardiac arrest save in 14
years I was just that guy but there was never really one call that bothered me there was
one I can think of with a child but you know if you ask me what was one of the worst things
it would be that one but it wasn't like I really had an issue with it I had a little
kind of mini flashback once one single time in Disney years ago when someone pushed a
stroller and looked exactly the way the kid was in this car but what I think a lot of
us do suffer from is the death by a thousand cuts it's not the one thing it's the cumulative
you know element of all the things and I only had 14 years so Frank had more than double
my career.
Yeah he did mention one call before it was also like a teenager but he made it PG 13
version you know so it wasn't this like gory or anything like that he just kind of like
washed over it and he went to this car the kid didn't make it so that's how he would
talk to me about some of the calls the tragic calls that he would get sometimes or he would
just say oh it was just a hardship they just need to sleep and stuff so he'd never he was
the type of guy that would just carry it within himself and find ways and how to deal with
it and not bother me or make me worry about his calls even though I'll be like how is
work you want to talk about anything he just pretty much kept that life separated from
the personal stuff.
So what about the tools that you and your kids use to navigate out of this horrendous
loss of your husband slash father what were some of the things that you leaned into you
said that you had you know everyone come surround you as far as a family did you find other
counseling, therapy, sports anything else that really helped?
Yes so right after Frank passed away obviously I we went to therapy and then my kids went
to therapy I went to therapy then the insurances because we were under his insurance and at
the time you know I did Cobra for like a few months but it became very expensive right
because Cobra is private insurance I had to get my own insurance unfortunately the insurance
the private insurance that I purchased for my children and I did not cover behavioral
health so therapy wasn't even included so I tried to reach out to different resources
thankfully here where we live the school had a therapy I guess you can like a services
and you know my son did go and initially he's like okay I'll go try it out whatever he went
and they're like okay he seems to be handling it well and I don't want my son to be forced
to go to therapy because to me if he if I see him handling it well and they say that
he's handling it well I don't want him to have a bad taste in his mouth being forced
to go to therapy I want therapy to be as a tool that it's okay to go to therapy but it's
not force or mandatory so they went to therapy for a little bit so did my daughter and then
she's like I don't think I need it because at the time she's already 20 and you know
she's also was going to school for psychology as her major and she's like and she's level
headed my thankfully our children are level headed and I could also see that they were
handling their grief really well they're very strong and very courageous and I think they're
very resilient so I was like okay as long as I have a good pulse on how they're behaving
and how they're handling their grief then we're good as far as for me I had to do a
lot of inner work so I sat with my grief and I let my grief become my friend for quite
a while for like about a year right after Frank passed I started going back to training
his Frank did you just say I also did a little bit of jujitsu but I I'm not a competitor
like him I just do it as a workout so I started going back to jujitsu just to train and stuff
and you know to me movement is therapy so I got more I feel like I got more out of that
than seeing an actual therapist I did you know I would see a therapist like once a month
or every other month or so it wasn't as consistent as going back on the mats and training yeah
that's funny you said about about the children that's how my son was after that whole debacle
we took him to counseling because it was you know completely detrimental and he just he
didn't want to be there you know we didn't force it upon him we just kind of you know
showed him that this is available for you he didn't connect with the counselor and and
that was it but you know he leans into his sports he went into running now he's big into
skimboarding so he's off he's 16 now so he'll drive to the beach almost every weekend and
spend you know three or four hours on his own just trying to break his neck on the sand
so yeah I mean that's really really important part of that I think is just kind of like
we're talking about with the therapies that you know sadly weren't as evident and available
to Frank when he mostly needed them but the toolbox that's available to us is much wider
than we that we think when we go to someone in a traditional medical route of which of
course there are some great practitioners out there but more often than not it's going
to be talk therapy and psychiatric meds are the two main options but also outside of that
everything as we touched on from psychedelics and you know and ketamine which obviously
even now today everyone can get ketamine therapy if you find the right place because it is
legal because of anesthesia but then you've also got equine therapy and diving and surfing
retreats and all these things so there's so many other ways that you are still actively
pursuing your mental health you just don't need to sit on a couch and talk about your
family but that might also be an invaluable part of that whole process.
Oh yeah I mean you know like I think we have this old stigma of therapy is a traditional
therapy of going to just the office and sitting there and talking about stuff when all in
all really it's therapy when it's making you feel good and if it's making you feel like
okay you're releasing some of the stress that's inside of you whether it's through movement
whether it's through painting or you know or cooking or anything like that that is therapy
and unfortunately like people don't talk about that it's not being we're not being educated
about the different ways how we can help I guess de-stress and take care of our mental
health through those options.
Absolutely well speaking of that like you said you know I hear this phrase all the time
people did the best with what they had at the time and I think that's a very fair statement
you know how we think about mental health in 2024 is very different than 2014 even you
know I think my my journey into this began around them when we started having suicides
and they were finally being spoken about.
As we sit here today though what are you hoping that fire departments listening will do as
far as creating change and improving the environment so maybe we can catch the next one who's falling?
I like for me my ideal world quote and quote I wish that you know fire departments will
have their own behavioral and wellness department within a department right they should create
a team of behavioral and wellness and instead of playing triage why don't we play preventative
measures put programs in place for these first responders or you know firefighters EMS guys
and like have them go attend a workshop have them attend some kind of I guess like retreat
anything something where you know how to deal with stress that you can debrief after a tragic
fall or even if it's not really tragic if it just triggered you in some capacity there
should be like a number or maybe just a safe space or a person within that department or
in that little team that you can go to and that's completely confidential and private
and you can just speak to that person or a team or if it's like a two team or whatever
is speak to them about it and not have to worry about stigma and not have to worry about
oh my gosh if someone in admin finds out about this I might lose my job or they're going
to count that against me so I think they need to create that kind of I guess I don't know
if it's a department but something like that does that make sense no it does it doesn't
it's it's good that in your area around sunrise they have the Florida firefighters safety
and health collaborative and that organization we started from departments you know all over
central Florida and south Florida have created a number of initiatives they have red line
rescue which is a kind of network of peer support from all over the I think it's certainly
the state so for example if you're a Miami firefighter but you don't want to speak to
someone from your area you can you know find a firefighter in Jacksonville and talk to
them but they've also got this initiative where they're training counselors to become
culturally competent so they actually go through classes they do ride-alongs they start to
understand what our shift work looks like you know how we talk you know all these kind
of things that then will make a responder comfortable when they walk in and they already
know you know what they do for a living so I think you know that's what's encouraging
is if you are in for example your area you have an incredible resource you know right
next to you and this is a group that's being you know questioned by people all over the
country because they're doing so well so you know I hope if they haven't already that that
you know sunrise and neighboring departments will reach out to those guys because you don't
have to reinvent the wheel they've got it figured out and if you're in a Davey and some
of these smaller cities they may not have the capacity to have an entire mental health
branch so then you form a coalition and let's say you know three cities get together and
one of them they all chip in and they create one for the three cities when I worked in
Anaheim we have what's called North Net and it was Anaheim city of Orange Fullerton a
couple of others and we trained together and we did a whole bunch of things together well
that's the same with this you know if you're not big enough then share mental health resources
but make a change make it happen because the biggest thing that I see is the barrier to
entry the most courageous thing a first responder can do is say I need help but the question
is have you created a road from I need help to actually getting help and not just any
help getting the right help not the EAP Russian roulette that I hear of so often yeah I hear
that the peer support the EAP it's like being scuffed upon or you know look down on because
it's they're like it's a joke from what I hear so yeah obviously that's not working
so what you're saying sounds like a brilliant idea and I do think that yeah if it's too
expensive for one city for one department to do that why not form a coalition and you
know get that set up get that started because it is okay to not be okay and this job is
really really tough on your mental health you've got to have the right support and you
shouldn't be stigmatized or penalized for asking for help or you know going through
the process of getting help because you want to serve other people as well not or being
forced to retire or resign or you know leave the department because you're having a mental
health crisis it should be protected until such time when okay this person really they're
done and they don't want to do it or whatever then that's fine but if they're going through
it if they are in the midst of a crisis please let's not discard them they're not dispensable
because we are dealing with someone's life here and how it can affect them eventually
down the road one thing I've said a lot recently you know if you hired someone and they stepped
through the net especially at the moment with the recruiting crisis that we have and they
were terrible from day one and now they're terrible in year two that's a different conversation
but if you had someone like Frank and so many of these others that you ask them what were
you like in their first year oh they were amazing they were always laughing and joking
they would cook they would and then you can compare that to now well that's what's happened
to them how come we got here and you know like you said if Sunrise was well staffed
then you know that's phenomenal and I don't know if do they have Kelly days in Sunrise
yeah yeah so you're 48 hour work week so that's still room for improvement I would love to
see the entire nation do a 24 72 as a standard so we can get more rest and recovery and time
home for our responders but also we've got to have that compassionate eye is you know
when you see and do what we do it is going to take a piece of us I mean how can it not
so the best thing that we can do is try and offset that with the rest recovery you know
the mental health support removing the barriers to entry so that we can you know not just
get them when they're they're broken but keep kind of you know putting them back together
again when they just get chipped a little bit you know the maintenance rather than the
crisis but more often than not and it's such a contrast to the military the military system
is not perfect and I've heard many horror stories but at least they have a health care
system that takes care of them during and after they retire as you mentioned you're
a first responder the moment you retire you have Cobra which basically no one can afford
for a year and then nothing so 30 years of wear and tear and emotional trauma and then
you just kind of chucked out the bag so we as a profession have to advocate for not only
our own health but the health of our family because how we are then obviously directly
impacts the people that we love absolutely I totally agree I just hope that you know
basing off what happened to Frank that a lot more changes are being put upon like you know
and it just I just don't want the same thing to happen to anyone at all and that at the
end of the day there's still a human being and you know there's a lot more than what
you see in the front and that like I said I understand where everyone was coming from
but it could have been dealt better yeah one again like we said at the beginning this is
the beautiful opportunity now rather than just shrugging our shoulders and go oh well
which I see a lot not saying that was the case in here particularly but or you can go
that was horrendous we can't bring that person back but we can sure as hell learn from it
and make sure it doesn't happen again or at least should I say reduce the chances of it
happening again of course you can't save everyone but try and save as many as you can and I
do think the department his department has put some parameters in place into you know
making sure that they don't make the same mistake that they did with Frank and you know
they're honoring him as well we did the kegan's climb on March 29 of 2024 and it was such
I was so humbled and grateful for the outpouring of support because it was a last minute event
and the amount of people that showed up you know to support us to memorialize Frank Captain
Frank Keegan was so humbling it was amazing so we're hoping that next year we're going
to get the word out and that these departments other departments will come and join us and
really you know put it in the limelight put it in the forefront right there about mental
health amongst the first responders and tell everyone it's okay to not be okay that there's
resources and that let's do better let's find more things or put together more programs
for these first responders right and keep exploring different options and how we can
help them and reduce the risk of suicide reduce the risk of our first responders feeling discarded
after a mental health crisis absolutely well I want to end on you know a high note talk
to me about what Kayla and Frankie are doing now well Kayla is graduating from FSU this
summer with a bachelor's in psychology and a minor in criminology she's applying to be
a licensed mental health counselor so she's trying to get her master's degree in that
at FIU keeping our fingers crossed and Frankie is actually a fire explorer for the city of
sunrise so he's um let's just say he's dabbling on that idea of possibly perhaps you know
going towards the path of the fire department and maybe perhaps just like his father but
I mean he's only 16 he'll be 17 you know whatever he wants to do I fully support it as long
as he's passionate about it and he's going to be a good person and he does well he's
a productive member of the society I'm all for it but it's it's amazing to see him you
know take that up because I do believe that after Frank passed away or even when Frank
was going through the crisis he did have a different opinion when it came to the brotherhood
of the fire department he felt that you know his dad was abandoned and betrayed by his
brothers and sisters and that they were not there for him and his perspective did change
after the memorial climb a month ago and right after the climb he became interested he saw
how everyone pulled through in a matter of less than a week to be there for his dad and
that's when he started the fire explorer program immediately beautiful well that underlines
one point that I'll kind of close with you know they say that we're you know very good
at burying our own we're just not good at preventing the deaths and you know people
say that the brotherhood and sisterhood is dead I disagree you know you go to memorial
events like that and you see it you go to the three four three hero challenge that I
do in in Florida every year you'll see that as well but I think the shift has to be made
that we've got to put that same camaraderie in the prevention side in advocating for the
work week that actually is healthy for us for staffing so that you don't get mandatory
and kept from your family again for you know the resources as you said to be in-house or
at least completely accessible so that when people need it they can go it's not you know
because the peer support is basically just friends checking on friends that's fantastic
but they're really just the gateway to the actual therapy that you need as well so I
think you know seeing that camaraderie seeing Frankie's faith restored in the fire service
is beautiful but now we have to do it so the Frankies of you know the next generation that
joins the fire service that we create a different fire service that allows him to thrive rather
than decay absolutely and that's what I'm hoping for you know moving forward now let's
create this path let's create some kind of momentum of destigmatizing mental health in
the first responder community we need to speak more about it's very uncomfortable for people
to talk about it because it feels like oh such a heavy burden or it's such a loaded
burden that you're weak because you're struggling with your mental health right now everyone
struggles it's just the more we push it down the worse it gets but if there are resources
and if you see people reaching out for help then it becomes okay because we're talking
more about it becomes some long lines and I do hope that you know the fire department
and police departments I hope that they make it more as a normal thing to go get help get
resources and just talk about mental health in general is just like anything else like
high blood pressure absolutely well I'm sure that you know there are a lot of people listening
that have the move I'm sure there's a lot of people that work with Frank that probably
you know have enjoyed hearing some of the kind of you know the the reminiscent memories
that you talked about if people want to reach out to you where are the best places to find
you online so we my daughter and I are starting we're gonna put together and we're gonna start
a non-profit organization called Kagan's Climb so she had started a Facebook page and an
Instagram page and they can reach me there or they can also email us over there as well
direct message I can also they can also reach me on my email which is vessel to zero zero
one at gmail.com if they want to reach out to me and talk more and explore other options
and how we can go about just spreading awareness I think that's the most important thing for
me is to spread awareness and you know de-stigmatize suicide and mental illness and mental health
absolutely well Bethel I want to thank you so much and as I always say you know when
when people are revisiting traumas like this I know that it's kind of you know pulling
the scab off the wound a little bit but there is also so much good that comes from hearing
a story like this especially when it's so raw I mean you're talking two years ago so
I want to thank you not only for your courageous vulnerability but for also being so generous
with your time and coming on the Behind the Shield podcast to tell Frank's story thank
you so much James and what you're doing if you're opening doors or actually ears eyes
whatever you want to call it for everyone you know to hear all these different stories
from different people right and we're so well I appreciate it and thank you I'm so humbled
to be a part of this show and like I said this is a brand new chapter for me I've never
been on a podcast I was never the type to be like speaking in front of other people
and making speeches and stuff and now it seems like this is the path where I'm starting to
go and travel and I'm hoping that you know through this platform that I can reach other
people as well and help other people and you know they need anything like any help at all
if they want someone to talk to that there's resources available and never ever feel embarrassed
or ashamed that they're struggling.