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Welcome to the Behind the Shield podcast.
As always, my name's James Gearing
and this week it is my absolute honor
to welcome back onto the show,
Kevin Berthier and Kevin Briggs.
Now you may recognize those names
from a famous picture on the Golden Gate Bridge
when a California highway patrolman
is talking to a young man in crisis
standing the wrong side of the railing.
Now I was absolutely honored to have Kevin Berthier
as my guest on episode 436
and that CHP officer Kevin Briggs on episode 371.
With this being World Mental Health Day,
there is no better episode to put out
than this discussion where these two men came together
on the Behind the Shield podcast
to discuss their individual journeys
and that incredible moment where their two paths met
and the friendship that was forged after.
So before we get to this incredibly powerful
and important 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 almost 1000 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 welcome back onto the show,
Kevin Berthier and Kevin Briggs.
Enjoy.
Okay, well, Kevin and Kevin,
I wanna thank you so, so much for coming back
onto the Behind the Shield podcast.
Kevin Berthier, you were episode 436
and Kevin Briggs, 371.
So we're talking four plus years ago now.
So I wanna begin just by welcoming you back onto the show.
Thank you, man, we're glad to be here.
Tremendously grateful to be here.
I would love to start the kind of the beginning
of each of your timelines.
We're gonna walk through not as deeply as we did before,
but then obviously get to March 11th
and then kind of walk through
the kind of post-traumatic growth journey
after that as well.
So Kevin Briggs, let's start with you.
Talk to me about when you reflect on early life,
what were the beautiful parts of your childhood
and what were some of the elements that you consider
contributed to some of the struggles later in life?
You know, I had a great upbringing.
Grew up in Marin County,
which is just north of the Golden Gate Bridge,
upper middle class.
That really was, I had, you know, my parents
and three siblings.
So it was great.
I had a very good childhood.
It really was.
Well, there was a major issue,
some abuse by a neighbor when I was eight to 10 years old
that is very haunting and very brutal.
But, you know, on the other side of that
with just my parents and my siblings and stuff,
it was great, great friends,
no complaints whatsoever.
What I found, especially a lot of us in uniform,
when there is a mental health struggle,
people immediately go,
well, Kevin was there with all the suicides on the bridge
or James was there at that horrible car wreck
where that little kid was killed.
And we forget that, you know,
we were a human being from in vitro on to now.
And there was a large part of our life
prior to the uniform.
I think some of those struggles,
if processed well can become resilience in uniform,
but if they're shoved down and not dealt with,
they can become a fracture to our foundation.
You mentioned about this beautiful family unit you have,
but obviously a pretty significant trauma
through this neighbor.
When you reflect now with this mature lens,
what impact did that healthy family life have
on allowing you to process that trauma
that you had with the neighbor?
I didn't process it.
I kept things separate.
You know, this wasn't one time.
It was very brutal.
And it was over the span of a couple of years.
My family didn't know about it.
I hid this for 45 years.
And it still significantly impacts me today.
It impacts me more than the testicular cancer I had,
more than the three heart surgeries,
more than the brain trauma,
my mother passing at age 49, all these things.
But you know what?
When you hurt somebody like that,
it's very difficult to get rid of that.
So until I wanted to really step into this
and go, I am gonna talk about it
and deal with this and get some help,
then it started to get better.
But it still, it impacts my life.
Staying with you, Kevin, for a moment,
one of the real, I mean, just heartbreaking realizations
after hundreds and hundreds of interviews now
is how prevalent sexual and or domestic abuse is
in a lot of our young people,
totally vulnerable and absolutely preyed upon
by some of these horrendous humans.
As you started speaking to more and more and more people
that had been through their own struggles,
did you see more and more childhoods
similar to what you'd experienced?
I really did.
And some people did not wanna talk about it.
And I was pushed to talk about it by movie producers.
Oh, we gotta talk about this.
And you know, and focus on it.
And I go, no, I am not ready to talk about it.
But when I was, I'm surprised, I really am,
about how many people will come up to me,
they are not ready to talk about it.
But they'll talk about it to me,
just to mention it, to get it off of their chest.
But they say, you know what, don't tell anybody,
don't bring this up.
I just wanna let you know what happened to me.
I said, when you're ready to talk about it, talk about it.
But please make it sooner than later
so you can get some help.
There is some really neat stuff out there.
Absolutely.
Well, I think this is the thing about these conversations.
I've got Navy SEALs and SAS soldiers and police and fire
and all other walks of life talking about it now.
So I think this is a beautiful thing
about the podcast medium is courageous,
vulnerable men like yourselves coming out
and putting your story out there is opening the door
for other people to talk about that abuse
and realize that they were a victim,
that they shouldn't be ashamed,
shouldn't have guilt about the part that they played
in this predatory action.
Absolutely correct.
But even though I know this and people tell me this,
it's still very, very difficult.
It's shameful, which it shouldn't be.
Wasn't my fault, but boy, that's hard to get in your head,
especially, and I was in the army
and did the paratrooper thing
and then worked in corrections and the higher patrol,
all these macho jobs where you don't show a weakness
and you really, you can't.
So it's a tough one.
It's a work in progress and I'm 61.
It's a work in progress.
One more question to you and then we'll switch to Kevin.
I don't even have to refer to you guys, Kevin, but the,
you have this kind of, you know,
veteran element when it comes to law enforcement,
as you said, you've been in the military,
you've been in corrections, you've been in highway patrol.
When you look back now, what is it
that you think is contributing
to so many sexual predators in society?
Because it seems to be, as they're pulling this curtain back,
so much worse than people thought.
Wow, that is a tough question.
That really is, whether it's something genetic
that is flawed, whatever that may be,
I don't have the answers on this,
but boy, it certainly is, you're taking lives away.
For those of you who have done this,
and I'm hoping there's none on this podcast, you know,
but you're taking, you took my life.
You scarred me, you know, it's very hard for me
to hug people, you ruin people by doing this.
You really do.
Absolutely.
Well, again, thank you for your vulnerability now.
Kevin Berthier, let's start at the very beginning of your journey.
So I know your childhood dynamic,
as far as the family element, was a lot different.
So talk to me about your early life and some of the traumas
that contributed to you, for example, finding yourself on the bridge that day.
Early life for me is a little different.
My mom, she knew because I paid attention
to everything that was going on in life,
she had to, you know, be honest with me and tell me that I was adopted.
So as early as age, probably five, I knew, you know,
it wasn't something that she waited for.
So that was good because they built the trust and bond within us.
But it kind of made me look at everything else and question everything else
in my life, because here I was born and raised into an African-American community.
And I was the one that only one that was adopted.
And it kind of it was it was triggering for me to go out into the world
and watch people that looked alike and they matched up.
I know I didn't look like anybody in my family.
And it's just I knew I had to.
People thought that, you know, from the outside looking in,
but from the inside looking out, I knew that I didn't belong here.
And so it was very triggering for me trying to figure out my way
and try to figure out, well, why?
Oh, why me? Why? Why did they?
Why did I have to get given up for?
And why did why did I?
Well, where's my family? Are they looking for me?
So just all the different questions.
I mean, as a child, you already questioned, why am I here?
What is my purpose?
And so to have all these other different whys that, you know,
kind of those are a lot of contributing to a lot of stress.
And as a kid, I shouldn't have to worry about, you know, all these different things.
And that was very triggering for me growing up.
I heard you both on, I think it was called Hope is My Middle Name podcast.
Very, very good interviewers.
It was amazing, the two of you again a few years ago now.
But you made a comment on that that I thought was so pertinent
because it's part of the solution.
You said a lot of African-American households,
if the parents themselves aren't able to take care of their child,
then it would be an auntie or a grandmother.
And you don't hear about that so much in some of the other cultures.
So talk to me about that, because I think that that, you know,
it takes a village, that multi-generational household is something from,
you know, history that I think we've got away from that is very powerful.
Yeah, I mean, I think I think that for me, it's a two part thing,
because for me, growing up, it was hard for me to identify
how not only did a mother and father give me up, how a whole family,
because I watched other in our community, the whole family takes part in the journey of,
you know, kind of kind of molding this child.
It's not just the mother and father.
You have the aunt, the aunt, uncle, you have the grandmother, the grandmother.
The grandfather, that's just part of our culture.
So it is very, it's very important because a parent is not always around.
I mean, a child is at school, a child goes to his friend, a child is in the community.
And it's a community of people that watch, look after this child.
That's why for me, it was hard for me to understand how not only did a mother
and father give me up, a whole family gave me up for adoption.
Yeah, I mean, such a powerful perspective.
And one of the phrases I hear a lot is, you know, don't ever compare trauma.
And so you have, you know, a young boy who was adopted,
and then you've got a young boy who was sexually abused by a neighbor.
You'd be like, oh, well, you know, that's worse than the other.
But the number of people I know, one parent left, both parents left, both parents left,
excuse me, they were adopted, they were fostered, whatever the dynamic was,
that feeling of why wasn't I good enough, clearly is equally important.
And that's why I think that trauma is equally as traumatic as, you know, in the overall,
you know, impact as a sexual abuse, domestic abuse, that kind of thing.
I'd agree with you 100% on that one.
Yeah. James, as you said, these traumas may be different.
You know, a head trauma or a diagnosis of cancer or a heart issues or being adopted.
All of these, of course, they're quite different.
It is quite different. So that's why, for instance, when I'm up,
was on that bridge talking to folks, I didn't compare all these things that happened to me.
Or say, you know what, look what happened to me and oh, poor me, poor me.
No, because it is about that individual. That's what this is about.
So when Kevin and I talk, it is about the audience and is it about the people there?
You know, yeah, it's our stories.
But what kind of takeaways can we give now and what can we provide?
So I think that's what the issue is here is, yeah, we've been through it and we're getting help.
We want you to be happy also. And that's what this is about.
I think that all I was going to add was that the other different,
but we both are questioning why I'm questioning why me,
why me, why I get adopted and sexually being sexually assaulted.
I'm sure he's questioning why me, why am I being sex?
So it's just the same why.
And I think that we want to, we've got to get, be careful trying to compare because it is the same.
We both are young trying to figure out why.
And so I think that that's a connection piece that people miss.
Absolutely. We'll stay in with you, Kevin Bathier.
Talk to me then again, you had, if my memory serves me right,
a good family dynamic with these adopted parents, but then a divorce came into play and then it fractured everything again.
Yeah, everything was pretty, I had a solid family dynamic.
My mom, my dad, two older sisters, very structured, very stable.
And that was pretty much that carried me from the time that I figured out that I was adopted into about age 13 until my parents divorced,
which pretty much at 13 was the first time that I actually felt adopted
because when my parents split, it changed the dynamic and I was forced to kind of pick a parent.
And it just changed the whole dynamic in our house and everything about our family dynamic was completely changed.
I mean, nothing was the same anymore.
And that's when I felt alone and I can go back to that feeling and saying that's when the first time in my life,
I've felt that I've been feeling alone since then.
With that feeling of being on your own,
which again, I think, you know, would argue the hierarchy of needs comes from, you know, safety and security.
What impact did that have on your mental health as you started getting into your teens and beyond?
I mean, it completely destroyed how I looked at life and how I thought about things.
And I think that that structure is needed moving forward as far as, you know, you're hit with different things as you grow up.
And if you're mentally not prepared and having that structure and having that positive background to help you,
you're kind of just kind of just taking all these things on and kind of trying to figure out how to do it on your own.
That being alone feeling caused me to go through life thinking that I'm doing everything by myself.
And that was a huge contributing factor because isolation is a huge issue when it comes to being depressive and being overwhelmed.
I mean, you start isolating and feeling alone going to make you feel isolated.
So I think that that is a huge contributing factor.
Absolutely. Well, Kevin, let's bring you kind of back into the timeline.
You mentioned being in the military, then you went into corrections.
So let's say let's talk about the kind of front door for CHP.
So you went to the California Highway Patrol at that point.
Tell me about the level of training that you had when it came to mental health.
And obviously, you know, the crisis element when you when you meet someone in the street that is clearly suffering or even trying to take their own life.
To be blunt with you, James, the level of training was was nearly zero.
It wasn't much at all. It really wasn't.
Yeah, you know, there was a lot to be desired back then.
This was this was 1990.
So, you know, it was some time ago.
Yeah, it wasn't much at all, if anything.
So it was tough. So as you progress through, obviously, you start developing your own toolbox.
But were there any kind of people in crisis that you remember where initially you felt ill prepared and that kind of pushed you to start discovering how to find this toolbox, how to find this training to be able to communicate with these people?
Every single person that I spoke with taught me something because I would ask them, you know, what did I do that helped this situation out?
And what did I do that maybe I can improve on that?
And and I did go through crisis intervention team training, CIT.
But that was some years into being on the highway patrol and then way later through the FBI crisis negotiator school.
But this should have taken place before I stepped foot on that bridge.
You know, I'm not talking about myself, I'm talking about the folks we talked to.
We're there to protect and serve. Well, if you're not trained, how are you going to do that properly?
So we Kevin and I, we get this chance to go out and speak.
Now, we're going to be at Mesa PD here in a bit talking to them about this.
And we welcome any opportunity because it's a chance to share ideas.
We speak to them. They talk to us some different things.
So it's about growing for all of us and how to communicate with someone who may be in crisis.
What was the prevalence of suicide attempts or completed suicide through your career?
And was there was there an increase in it or was it just so many already that people were oblivious to?
As far as on the bridge or I mean, just in your career in general, but obviously on the bridge as well.
Generally, suicides go up most years, a couple of years has been down.
But in the United States, we're losing around 49,000 people a year to suicide,
no more than traffic accidents, more than homicides, mental health professionals.
That profession is way down as well as doctors.
You know, we need a lot more of those folks. That's a that's a tough line of employment, though, to do this.
So, you know, kind of suicides are on the rise and the mental health professionals is going down.
So we have a lot to work a lot of work to do as a society.
We lose 40,000 people a year on the roads.
So there's you know, I'm assuming there's probably hundreds of thousands that have life threatening or life changing injuries as well.
We lose 49,000 people to suicide.
We have double, sometimes triple the amount of suicides in uniform than we do other classified line of duty deaths.
Why is it that this isn't front and center in, for example, this political campaign or any other area at the moment?
You know, I would have to say money, financial, there's not a lot of money in this.
And when there's not a lot of money in it, it's not going to get a lot of attention.
It's not glorious, that kind of thing.
So it's not getting the funding as you're going to hear an outcry if the roads are all bad.
And they are. They're work in progress.
But, you know, you hear a lot more about a murder than somebody who completed a suicide.
So until we can turn this around and put more focus on it and people think, you know, if we're going to talk about this suicide, we're going to raise the numbers.
No, we're not.
We need to talk about this and how to have this conversation.
Yeah, I think the other kind of nauseating irony is when we have a shooting in a school, it's all over the international media.
But all the young people that shoot each other in gangs all over the UK, all over the US, barely even make some news.
And, you know, it's literally picking and choosing the kind of child death that is cool or, you know, popular in the media.
But arguably, we lose a lot more kids in gang shootings on the streets of the same exact age than we do in our schools.
And that's because in the old days, we would say it sells papers.
Now it's going to sell commercials.
It's going to get people to watch that because they want to see what's going on.
So they're going where the money is.
That's what it goes around.
Yeah, unfortunately.
Absolutely. Well, before we go back to your journey, Kevin, the theory, have you got anything to add on the last couple of things we just spoke about?
Yeah, I mean, I just think 100 percent is the politics of it.
It's a business. This country is a business is made, you know, money runs, runs the country.
You think about suicide, you think about the facets of suicide or the facets of depression, right?
When somebody's mentally ill, they need therapy, which costs they need medicine, which costs they have to go to the hospital, which costs.
And if they die, that costs insurance funeral costs.
So it's easier to allow somebody to die or allow somebody to struggle in this country because it's a financially a game to watch people suffer.
That's just the reality. I mean, I hate to say it, but it's just the reality because whether they were there.
When they're suffering, that's a financial gain.
And then when they lose their loss, it's a financial gain.
We're not thinking about the emotional toll on society.
We thinking about the financial side and because that's how this country is ran.
It's not ran by emotions is ran by finances.
I think where it's most prevalent is the addiction crisis.
We know if you look at and I've talked about this so many times on the show, but it's interesting because almost all the law enforcement guests agree with the fact that the war on drugs,
the prohibition of drugs has just been an epic failure.
And if you look at the amount of money that's costing and yet we're getting more gangs and more homelessness and more overdoses.
At what point do we say, hey, enough is enough.
Let's be proactive.
So, for example, Portugal realized this in a very short amount of time, way shorter than the US.
And they took a lot of their money from the war on drugs and they put it into creation of mental health counseling, addiction counseling, job creation, housing.
And they reversed their crisis in less than 10 years.
But exactly what you're saying, you know, we have, for example, 70% of our population is obese or overweight and drug companies profit from that.
If we didn't have hypertension and diabetes and some of these other things, the drug companies would lose billions, if not trillions.
So where is the push to proactively make people healthier physically and mentally when, as you said, a lot of companies are profiting from that misery?
You're absolutely correct.
And when you're talking about the food, look at the fast food.
It's much easier to stop by one of those places than it is to go to the grocery store, pay some high prices and then come back and have to prepare it yourself.
So this is what we get.
We get these low value, high color foods and then you sit down and watch TV the next few hours and I'm right there with them.
I really have a work in progress.
But that is our society for a lot of folks.
It is.
Absolutely. Anything to add, Kevin, with the.
No, it's pretty much it.
All right. We're staying with you, Kevin, but then you you mentioned now, obviously, post divorce.
You know, your your stability has been fractured by that point.
Your identity arguably has been fractured by that point.
I know standing on that bridge was not the first suicide attempt.
So what was that kind of downward spiral that ultimately led to you standing on the Golden Gate Bridge?
Like I say, right after I was done, I pretty much felt alone and I started handling my I completely changed how I handled my mental health at the age of 13.
My parents split 14 years old was my first suicide attempt.
Before that, I only had ideations, only had, you know, you know, chronic, chronic, chronic thoughts, but not attempt.
And 14, when I finally attempt, see, it's different.
I tell people all the time you can think about suicide every day all day.
But the moment you attempt, it's different.
Your body knows your brain knows we can actually get ourselves out of pain.
And so a failed a failed attempt just means that you can do it.
And so you get you got the courage now to keep to really get yourself out of pain.
So now everything became death.
Everything became I can get myself out of pain.
If I'm in the elevator, I'm thinking that the elevator or go through the ground.
If I'm, you know, just simply driving in a car, I'm hoping one of the cars come, you know, careening the car like it's just everything is all over the place.
And so between the ages of 14 to 22, you know, I had about 10 attempts, you know, different, different episodes, different things, different things.
I can get my hands on overdose on medication.
I started cutting all these different things were going on because I'm just trying to figure out myself how to get myself out of pain.
I had no idea that I will become an adult because I had no aspirations or goals of becoming an adult.
I just knew that eventually I will get myself out of pain.
I will kill myself and then it will be over.
You had an infant daughter at the time when you were driving to the bridge.
I'm curious to see if this is something that you felt with hundreds of interviews now with people that were in this crisis point.
Some of them actually went through with their attempt like Kevin Hines and obviously survived, thank goodness, and became a voice now like so many do for this topic.
But I started seeing the same thing emerge from people's stories that I never heard from suicide awareness posters and, you know, the normal rhetoric.
And it really pushed against that kind of ignorant conversation around suicide that it's selfish, it's cowardly.
Think of your family. How could you?
Because these men and women through the perfect storm of all the contributing factors.
So, you know, whether it's unaddressed childhood trauma, sleep deprivation, the side effect of, you know, maybe psychiatric meds, alcohol, you know, all the things financial that come together.
That at that point, their brain became so miswired.
And I mean that term compassionately that they truly believed that they were a burden to their family.
They were the cause of the pain for their family.
So at that point, it made their suicide actually courageous and selfless, which we don't really hear people talking about.
Now, it doesn't make sense to the healthy mind, of course.
But at that moment, that reality is destroyed.
And if by identifying that, I think we can pull that red flag up and say, this is a warning sign for us.
You're a new father.
Was there an element of burdensome in your mind at that point?
Absolutely, because that's a that's a that's a new responsibility that nobody can prepare yourself that nobody's prepared for.
I mean, we as parents, you're never prepared for how it's going to feel to become a father.
I never I already had a million things on my shoulders.
Her coming into the world and financially, I wasn't prepared mentally.
I was prepared. Spiritsy.
I wasn't prepared and just I felt overwhelmed and unprepared.
And here I am with this new now found responsibility and I have nothing to provide, nothing to offer her.
So, yes, that was the ultimate triggering that led to my complete spiral out of control.
Kevin Briggs, anything to add to that kind of philosophy?
James, you really nailed it.
Yeah, you're gifted there, my friend, when you're talking about.
Absolutely. People feel like they're a burden.
This is from just my experience up on that bridge.
They stop their medications.
They feel like a burden.
They don't see tomorrow and they're hopeless.
We're staying with you, Kevin Briggs, for a moment.
Obviously, we're going to get to March 11th, 2005.
But prior to that, as you are starting to build your skill set of being able to communicate with people in crisis prior to Kevin,
what was some of the other successes?
And I'm not even saying that that resulted in the person not not completing.
But what was that evolution of communication as you progressed through?
You know, I started out with me talking a lot and I quickly found that that was not the right answer.
These folks, for the most part, wanted to be heard.
Sometimes they just really wanted to be left alone.
But if I persisted and once they opened up and they found that I wasn't trying to correct them, wasn't trying to fix them.
And I'm saying correct. I mean, correct in what they're saying there.
But trying to fix their issues, then they would open up.
And this is what folks generally want to do is they wanted to talk.
So let them talk. Be a sounding board, not trying to fix what's been going on because we can't really, you know, 220 feet up in the air.
What am I going to do? I'm not going to blow smoke up and tell you everything's going to be fine.
Probably not. Probably not for some time, but at least you're here to have that opportunity.
You know, sometimes it took years to get to this level to where you're at right now.
It may take quite a while to get that, but we are all a work in progress for different things.
So even today, the 61, I need to learn to shut up and listen better.
I'm working on it. Really.
Talk to me about the vulnerability piece. What I'm again seeing and even in this, you know,
I'm almost a thousand episodes now, you know, my own vulnerability in certain areas where it makes sense seems to help open the doors,
whether it's on a recording, whether it's one of my friends, it's, you know, going through some things,
but not pouring out your own entire story and like you said, not listening,
but meeting them at a certain point where for a moment you're being vulnerable enough so that they can feel safe to open up more.
That's for me, it's through validation. You know what?
They tell me they're going through a divorce. Maybe there's some legal issues that might be losing their job.
They can't make a house payment.
Brother, that sounds really tough.
You know, let them know and not suck it up.
Buttercup, have a nice day. Hurry up. Get back over here.
I got a donut to get. No, but be there.
And then, man, that's got to sound really tough and then normalize what we're going through.
You know what? Anybody going through all that would probably be thinking about suicide.
And that's a normal thought that someone may have going through all this stuff
because a lot of times people feel so alone that nobody gets it.
Nobody's going to understand them. Well, I may not understand you completely.
I've been through some things. We've talked about this.
Kev's been through a lot. You've been through a lot, but we probably don't really, really,
really understand what that individual is going through.
Maybe it's just one thing that was very, very traumatic.
You know, we don't know. But when they tell us to take that in, not to compare it, anything like that,
but let them know, man, I'm here for you today.
You know, and we'll try to get folks here for you tomorrow.
So I want to give them the courage to continue past this crisis today.
Absolutely. Well, Kevin, Berthea, I had Kevin Hines on the show.
I think we've done two interviews now.
And one of the most heartbreaking elements of his story is, again, he was on the same bridge as you
and he was just waiting for one person to say, are you OK?
And I heard you kind of touch on the same thing.
I forget if we got into that in depth prior, but talk to me about your journey to the bridge on March 11th.
And then, you know, that that element of if one person prior to Kevin Briggs coming,
if one person had actually asked you the impact that that might have had then.
Absolutely. March 11th, 2005.
This is before YouTube. This is before Google.
This is before we had the ability to have information at our fingertips.
So I didn't have no idea anything about the Golden Gate Bridge.
Didn't even know it was iconic for suicide attempts.
Didn't even know how to get there.
So I was hoping on my journey there that I would be able to ask somebody directions to where the Golden Gate Bridge was.
And they would look at me and ask me why I was going just significantly.
That's just how I had a plan, because I always believe anybody in a dark place, we want to we want to tell you why.
We just need the time and a place and a safe place to explain why we feel the way we feel.
And so I was just hoping that somebody would, you know, kind of look at me.
I mean, you just have this hope.
You know, people can't see on the inside of you,
but you're in such a dark place that you hope somebody somebody does see you.
You hope somebody glances at you the wrong, you know, the right way and just sees you at your most vulnerable place.
But nobody did. I think I asked I was asking the toll keeper that was at the Bay Bridge when I passed my money.
I asked her for directions and I was hoping that she would ask me, you know,
you have this hope not saying that it's an expectation, it's an hope, which is different.
Hope is different than an expectation.
And I had this hope of thinking that she would ask, but she never did.
And so that that was pretty much my last person that I kind of kind of came in contact before before I met Officer Briggs that that morning that afternoon.
So let's talk about that. You find this iconic bridge.
Talk to me about, you know, leaving your car and the trip to the railing and then obviously, you know, when when you two finally meet.
So I park, which is it's a park right in front.
And I didn't realize I am how that is never parks out there like that.
But on that particular day was a park right in front.
I parked left the keys there because I wouldn't this was not a test run.
I wasn't coming here to talk, get attention, anything.
This was a I was done.
I grabbed my prepaid phone because I was going to make one phone call just to say goodbye.
I said not not in my brain.
That was my plan. Grab my phone.
And I started walking. Once I started walking, I was trying to figure out one just one thing, one moment, one one piece of something that was going to stop me from jumping in.
You got to be in a lot of pain to go through your whole life at 22 years old and can't find one reason to live.
And so that's why I understand the type of pain that people are in because I couldn't find one moment, one nothing that was going to sustain me enough.
And so once I got to a to a to a spot, I looked over the railing.
So I was under going to deter me and I saw that it that it was nothing but water.
And that's when I knew that it was over and it was a sense of relief that came over me because I knew in that moment momentarily that I would be going, you know,
it would be over and I wouldn't have to explain anything or explain who I am or go through this day, go through these anymore days or nights or months or weeks or seconds in this much in this much pain.
I think one of the most heartbreaking things about your story and again, yours may be less acute, but Kevin was standing there in tears.
Kevin Hines, you know, someone asked him to take a picture of them and then goes off again.
But I think it, you know, we talk about mental health and there's there's five K's and there's, you know, the talk of EMDR and psych meds.
But what I think has also been missed is the fact that, you know, a community that was tight would have noticed that someone was hurting.
But with us being more and more separated, whether it's politically, whether it's devices, just all the things that lack of connection,
you can be in crisis standing on the Golden Gate Bridge and then people are not just ignoring you.
Some people are even, you know, shouting, go on, do it, jump, you know, this this real human disconnection.
So I'll go to you, Kevin Briggs, for a second.
Talk to me about that element. You know, when I talk to people from small towns, small villages, they still have that sense of community.
What impact has large city or maybe even the divisive rhetoric of today?
What impact is that having on the mental health crisis itself?
I'll tell you where I'm at for a lot of times because I'm fairly close to San Francisco.
People walk by one another and generally don't say anything.
And our mentality is growing up near a city, if somebody does say something, they want something from you.
Nobody's going to talk to you to be friendly. If they say, hey, how are you?
They want something. So that is kind of our mentality here.
Whereas you go to a small town, my family, my mother grew up in a very, very small town called McLeod,
way up by Mount Shasta in the northern part of California, very small town, where you almost expected to say hi.
If you walked by somebody with rude not to say hi, that's the kind of environment that's really, really cool.
You know, we're not looking for nothing. It's just a hi, how are you type of thing where you could sit next to someone at breakfast and,
you know, have a cordial conversation with us, but they're not going to come up and try to get money from you or eyeballing you for when you leave,
trying to get your watch or something like that.
So it's kind of built into us for a reason. And I'm not saying it's good.
I'm just saying it's there and that's a big dose of reality.
But that's how it is.
Kevin, your perspective?
It's just the reality. I mean, it's life is hard. I mean, it's everybody's dealing with so many different things.
And I think that it's hard to kind of for everybody to channel their emotions.
And we have this expectation out of people.
And I think that until we understand that everybody's struggling with their own individual thing, we can no longer have an expectation out of anybody.
I mean, everybody's we're trying to heal, trying to trying to understand ourselves, trying to love, trying to figure out how to be loved.
I mean, so many different things that we are trying to do individually as human and to facet in and try to couple that with the 8.5 billion people around us that are doing the same thing we're doing.
It just it just creates this this idea that the world is in a certain way when reality is everybody's just dealing with what they're dealing with.
And we're trying to figure out how to deal with it collectively together. I just have a different perspective.
I mean, I know the world is the way it is.
But if we if we if we just do it by individual and not just do it as the world, then we can understand that we're individually trying to figure ourselves out.
If we if we didn't have anything and if it was nobody else in the world and we were by ourselves, we still will be struggling.
Absolutely love it. All right.
Well, then so you're at the railing now.
Talk to me, Kevin Briggs.
How did you get the call?
Were you just driving by?
And then let's get to the conversation how that that entire dynamic was.
I was actually sitting in a coffee shop in Sausalito.
When I got this call and it's very easy for me to get up there on the motorcycle and because I am on a motorcycle, then I go on the sidewalks.
I'm also fairly wide on the Golden Gate Bridge.
So I was at the north end.
I proceeded south going towards San Francisco and I had his description from dispatch.
So as I near the North Power, I see the description of him and he's there.
North of the North Power.
So I see him and he's on a cell phone. I stopped, I don't know, 50, 75 feet away.
And as I'm getting off of my motorcycle, what appears to me is he looks my direction and sees me and he runs over and jumps over the rail because he's quite athletic.
I yelled something to him.
And this is all my perspective of it that he reaches out, grabs the rail, swings around on the other side and slams into the guard post there and then lands on this little bitty pipe.
But I didn't know he landed on this little bitty pipe.
I thought he was gone.
So I ran up there and then I see the his white t-shirt sticking through the slats of the pedestrian rail.
So I don't like to just walk up on folks.
I stay back and I just raised my right hand as my weapons on my right side.
And I just tell them my name.
Hi, I'm Kevin.
Is it okay if I come up and talk with you for a while?
I want to empower them.
Sometimes folks, they've been just kicked, kicked, kicked, kicked so many times by having an officer in uniform come up and say, hey, is it okay if I do this?
You know, I think that starts it off on a good note.
Didn't work this time.
He wanted nothing to do with me.
He was mad.
He was really mad and he kept screaming at me.
If you come one step closer, I'm jumping and he was very serious about it.
And I know if I would have just kept walking up, he'd be gone.
So I stayed back and it took quite some time before he trusted me enough to come up to things that I wouldn't grab him and nobody else would.
Where I could come up and be a little bit closer because that bridge, if anybody has ever been on it, is so loud.
We don't stop the traffic.
The cars are screaming by.
We have to stop the pedestrians in the area from walking on the sidewalk past us.
The wind is brutal.
It is a terrible place to do any sort of negotiation.
So Kevin, but the your perspective, you know, you're the right side of the railing.
Walk me through that, you know, sequence of events through your eyes.
I had just prepared myself for what I thought was the greatest moment of my life.
A moment without pain.
And that was kind of derailed.
And so that did anger me because I was in preparation.
Like I, you got my whole life.
I've always all I know is pain.
I don't know a moment without pain.
I don't know a moment without physical, mental or spiritual pain.
So to know that I was going to be out with this and now I'm I am now on a leg.
I'm on a pipe and I'm afraid of heights.
So now it's only two things that I hate.
I hate heights and I hate being cold.
Like so I went from in pain, hating my life, knowing I'm about to be out of pain to two of the worst things that I completely hate on Earth.
Being cold and standing 220 feet in the air.
So mentally and then this voice trying to get at me.
So all this is going on in this small time frame.
So I'm extremely upset.
Year to date, that's probably probably the maddest I've been in my life.
I can honestly say that because I'm frustrated.
I got to all these different things going on with me.
And so I'm yelling at the top of my lungs and I'm trying to get his attention and know that I was serious.
I am but I can't get the strength to get off this ledge.
I can't get the strength to just push myself back.
I think that from weeks of me not eating in months of me not sleeping the all the strength came into me grabbing that grabbing that grabbing that,
you know, grabbing the railing that that's where all my strength.
So by the time I'm on in this position, I don't have any more strength to do anything.
I don't have enough strength to go up or go down.
So I'm pretty much just kind of just stuck in this position mentally and physically.
And I'm just overwhelmed.
And so for the next 15 minutes, he could have gave up at any moment.
That's why I'm telling people how important it is for patients.
Patients is so critical when you're dealing with somebody in a mental health condition.
You got to be patient because at any given moment he could have just said, all right, enough is enough.
I don't have time for this.
And we would not be having this conversation.
He was patient.
And I gave him every reason to not be patient.
Every reason to give up every reason to say, all right, enough is enough.
And for some reason, he still hung on.
And because of that, I'm here today because something on the inside of me couldn't understand why he was so patient.
So that's what clicked on the inside of me.
Like, wait, who are you again?
Like, why are you so patient?
That's what clicked.
And that's what that him creating that safe places.
What got me talking in the first place?
But it took 10, maybe 12 minutes of me just screaming at the top of my lungs for me to even get to a place of comfort in order to start having a conversation.
It's interesting when you said finally being happy because I've heard a few people frame this.
You know, if you think about fight, flight and freeze and flow, you know, the different emotional states, the number of people I know that beat themselves up
because they didn't see it coming when their best friend, their family member took their own life.
In fact, they seemed happier.
And when you actually deconstruct it psychologically, that acceptance is almost like the deer in the lion's mouth.
There's a certain point as mammals that we just kind of give into it.
And if someone's planned their own demise, a lot of times that you hear that they seemed happier than they had for a long time.
So I can see how with you, you've got this plan, you know, planned out.
Now you're standing on if my memory serves me right.
It's not just a pipe, but a moss covered pipe that you're already going to slip off.
And you've been dragged from this acceptance flow state back into fight, flight.
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, because I had already had I had already had 10 unsuccessful like 10 attempts before that.
So when I got to the bridge, I'm like, OK, this is a must.
I looked over the railing. I said, OK, this is I cannot fail at this.
I think it's impossible for me to fail.
And that's so I had everything on the inside of me accepted the fact that finally I had reached a point of I'm looking there.
All I got to do is just jump. That's it. And I'm I'm an athletic guy.
All I do is jump like, you know, so me.
Everything is like in transition mode to finally accepting everything for it to be.
So that's a that is a huge roller coaster ride to come off of in my brain.
So, Kevin, Briggs, going back to you, you know, you talked about the patients element.
You know, what was that incremental journey that got you to finally helping Kevin back over the railing again?
So when he did finally allow me to come up and speak with him, I just approached slowly and again, told him my name.
What I'm trying to do is personalize everything.
He allowed me to use his first name, Kevin. Oh, he made it easy.
I can remember this. This is cool. So we just had a chat, really.
And but I wanted him to speak. I go by 80 20.
I want him to speak 80 percent of the time and me 20.
And if I keep that in my head, it keeps me from talking too much.
So I'm always thinking 80 20, 80 20, 80 20.
It's going to shift later on in the conversation.
I will talk more. But if I'm letting him speak, I'm gathering information.
He's being allowed to vent. So it's wonderful.
This is what we're looking for. And he wanted to talk.
And he told me this story, what we're talking about today.
So in my mind, I needed to find him a reason to come back over some hope, some purpose, combination of that three, maybe all three.
So that that's my job. I'm down with that.
And that's you know, that's what I'm looking for.
I'm very, very serious about that. So what are we looking at?
Everybody's different. You know, one guy was food.
It was french fries. They got him back over.
Another gentleman I had, it was his goldfish.
I mean, you never know. So what may be important to us, you need to put that on the wayside.
You need to find out what is important with them. What's going on?
And that's what this was about.
And when I found out about his daughter, we focused on that and talked more and more and more about it.
And then I actually gave him a break and I stepped back and let him be for a little bit and then asked his permission to come back up and focused on it again.
Because I think folks in that situation are surrounded by this huge negative bubble that I want to give them some time, you know, start talking on a positive note and then give them some time.
Take a break, let them think and then come back up and chat with them more.
I wanted him to make this decision to come back over the rail because you know how much courage it takes to go over a rail.
Hell of a lot of courage. We've talked about that.
Imagine the courage that it takes to come back over that rail and face everything again.
I want him to do that on his own. Once he makes that decision, I will help him.
We're not going to slip now, but I want him to make that decision.
And I think for later on in life, that's going to really help out.
You had the courage to face this the darkest time.
Who was it that took that?
You know, I don't know if iconic is the right word.
I don't know what the right description would be, but the well-known picture that, you know, adorned all the newspapers.
That was the guy named John Story in a helicopter way out in the bay.
He was working for, I believe, the ESF Chronicle at the time.
And that helicopter was so close a lot of this time.
I had to have my dispatch.
I don't know who she called it.
Probably was FAA to get him to back off because it was way too loud.
He was too close.
So it was a pain in the butt, to be honest with you.
So, you know, it was another day for me, though.
Of doing this type of work.
Really didn't think nothing of it.
And then this photo came out and it went all over.
And but this is what I do.
This is what other officers are doing.
But they're doing this around the world.
And you know this, whether that's on a bridge, on a building, with people with a gun to their head.
So the other big part of this is if I was not going to to break the barrier with Kevin.
If you know, if he looked up at me because he was looking down most of the time.
If he looked up at me and there was a race thing or something else.
I needed in my head to be able to back off and try to get somebody else in there to do this.
Because we have to remember it is about those folks and not us.
Absolutely.
Yeah, even I mean, a much less acute example as a firefighter and a paramedic.
There were just some patients that you, you know, I would like to say I was one of the nicest people on my crew normally.
But there were some, you know, whether it was my skin color or whatever it was, they just did not want to talk to me.
All right, let me get the Hispanic guy or you know, whoever.
And then they'd be, you know, much ruder than me.
And this person would be in love with them.
You know, sometimes like you said, to having the humility to say, okay, this isn't working as far as communication.
Let me pass it off to someone who would be the right fit.
Yes, exactly.
I agree with that 100 percent.
All right.
Well, Kevin Berthier, going back to you.
I want to walk through obviously, you know, the following years because just climbing over the barrier obviously didn't solve all your mental health problems.
But talk to me through your eyes what that switch was that took you from thinking about jumping into the water and then using all your strength to climb back over the railing.
So what was that pivotal point for you?
I was suicidal still.
I didn't get help.
I didn't seek help.
I didn't go to counseling.
You think somebody have this traumatic event happen in their life and they need to do something.
You know, they come with at some point they accept it right and get help.
And I didn't.
I did the opposite.
I ran away from it because I couldn't understand it.
When something that big and that drastic, I saw it as when I got home from from the hospital and learned that that picture was photo was out there.
And now I spent every second every minute every hour of my life building a brand of person to show the world that I was that I was the life of the party that had it together.
When that photo came out, I knew that the people closest to me knew that I was lying about everything that I've that I presented my whole life.
And so I had to I didn't know who I was going to go back to.
So for eight years, I didn't talk about that picture.
I didn't talk about that photo.
I lost a lot of family members, a lot of friends, a lot of people that was close to me because people wanted to discuss that day.
Because I wasn't in a place of accepting it.
I just completely eliminate them from my life because I didn't want to talk about it.
If it hadn't have been in being able to reunite with Briggs for the first time and rekindling that story and talking about it in in in 2013, eight years later in New York, I still I wouldn't be here today.
Twenty thirteen.
I would I wouldn't have made it out of 2013 if I wouldn't share my story in New York.
And that was the eye opening moment.
And I'm telling you, it wasn't it wasn't going to New York.
It wasn't the radio station interviewing me.
It wasn't the fancy hotel.
It wasn't the fancy tuxedo.
It wasn't getting to Columbus Circle and meet Briggs at the Jazz Center and all the fancy people.
It was the mother after I spoke after I spoke, I came down and she was waiting for me at my table.
It was the mother who opened up to me and said that she hadn't slept in five years and that she was going to sleep that night because her son died by suicide five years prior to that.
And she hadn't slept.
He lost his battle, she said.
And she was going to sleep tonight.
She told her husband she was going to sleep tonight.
And I was why she was going to sleep was because I told my story.
I told my story and she can better understand what her son Jacob was going through.
That moment right there is the reason why I changed my life and the reason why I found something fighting for that.
That moment is where I found purpose because I needed all of these moments.
Yes, I needed Briggs twice to meet him twice to be reunited with him twice.
But I needed that mother.
I needed that mother because she solidified every it's like she brought everything together for me.
And it was a in that moment.
I realized that it was way bigger than me.
And I needed that.
I needed to realize that it was bigger than me.
And so that humbling moment and being reunited with Briggs and realizing he is who we said he was in that photo.
See, I kept my eyes closed that whole time.
All I had was this man's voice and I was I was hoping I was praying to God that his voice lined up to his personality that he was who we said he was because a lot of it.
And I don't think I've ever said this my hope in humanity was in Briggs.
I lost a lot of hope in humanity and he restored it when I reunited with him and I realized that he was who we said he was.
And it changed my life.
Me, you know, being able to reunite with him a second time.
And I don't think I've ever really said that.
But that is the the God on his truth.
It's like I was restored in humanity because he was he stood on who he was that from that day.
I remember his voice.
I remember even to this day when we get around each other, I can go back and close my eyes.
I can remember him in that voice and his humility and his compassion and his empathy.
Well, that really underlines a reoccurring theme from a lot of people that come on the show that whatever their childhood looked like, you know,
there were there were struggles, especially if there was an absence of a father figure.
More often than not, it was a mentor.
It could have been a female history teacher, could have been a PE coach or, you know, a recruiter or whatever it was.
But some or maybe two or three people came in and at that moment they were the right person.
And I think especially Kevin and Kevin Briggs in our professions, plural, when you have that compassion fatigue,
we forget that that one moment of compassion as a police officer or a paramedic or a firefighter can possibly make someone turn a corner.
Maybe the addict finally feels enough love that they actually seek help or maybe the person who's living on the streets
finally finds the strength to actually go and get on that that journey that was going to get them back into housing or whatever it is.
But we're fighting against the grind of being in a first responder profession where that compassion gets beaten down and we become, you know, less nice versions of ourselves.
So understanding whether you're in uniform or not, that if you are the right person, if you stay that kind and compassionate person,
you may be completely oblivious, but that one kind, compassionate conversation you had with whoever it was, it could be a child,
it could be someone holding a sign on the side of the freeway asking for a couple of bucks.
That might be the pivotal moment in that person's life.
James, I agree with you 100% and it gets hard. It's hard because you're dealing with this every single day, not KED stuff,
but you know, whatever that may be having to do this.
But take a breath, take a breath, you know, take care of yourself.
How are you doing compared to when maybe you first started?
You came out with all this notion of I'm going to save the world.
Well, okay, how'd that turn out? But you can at least help out where you're at.
But start by helping yourself.
Well, Kevin Briggs staying with you, obviously, we talked about Kevin Batheer's, you know, struggles and journey,
you know, you had your own, you know, struggles too.
So walk me through, you know, the devolution, the lowest place that you got.
And then what were some of the tools that started helping you personally?
It was really the nightmares for me from the abuse.
And it wasn't every night, maybe four to five nights a month, but I could be tired, really tired.
And then go down and lay my head down and close my eyes.
And then here's this guy's face, just one inch from me.
And that night's sleep was just gone.
That whole everything was replayed in my mind.
And I just, I mean, it took 45 years for me to come out and then talk about this.
And when I did, you know what, I'm going to get some help with the heart issues and the high blood pressure
and cholesterol that the donut-eating cop gets.
Got to get some help.
So that's when I said that it was really the heart surgery that that really caught my attention.
I said, you know what, if I'm going to be around, I got to start changing my ways.
So that's what I did, started with meditation, getting on the different medicines and then getting some help.
So I did go through EMDR and I've had the stellate ganglion block that a lot of veterans are getting.
Had it in both sides of my neck.
You know, it really helped.
But the lady I'm with through EMDR, I walked in and the lady is introducing me to this.
And she says, Kevin, I cannot take the trauma away.
But what we're going to do is get it so it's way the hell out there and you can get some rest.
That's pretty much almost exactly what she said.
And I thought, that's all I'm asking.
Just get this SOB away from me, you know.
And it worked.
But sometimes people have to go back.
And then I was offered this stellate ganglion block, this injections in my neck.
And that helped.
So they're always, you know, they're coming up with new things all the time.
I've never heard of it and it was offered to me.
So I took it and it was great.
Staying with you for a second, being in a profession where you were, you know,
instructed to arrest and incarcerate people who were using illicit drugs.
We are now in an environment where some of those same drugs are actually making a huge
difference when it comes to mental health, psilocybin, MDMA, some of these other ones.
Have you been exposed, you know, to that world now?
Because I mean, the number of people who come on the show, of course, it's a toolbox.
It's not a magic pill.
But more often than not, especially in that kind of horrendous trauma that's buried deep.
Sometimes that was the missing key to the lock to their healing journey.
I have not tried any of that.
I'm open to it.
I have friends that have and they say they don't know, they wonder how they got along
without these things.
So I have not tried this, but I'm certainly open to it.
Right now, I seem to be stable.
If somebody tells me, you know, can always say, yeah, I'm stable.
I know exactly what I'm doing.
Well, what does everybody else say?
You know, if my girlfriend or something or one of my boys comes up and says, Dad, man,
you're losing it every day.
What's going on here?
Okay.
Sometimes we don't see what's going on with ourselves.
Or I spend a lot of time with Kev.
He says, hey, man, you're not quite the same.
All right, I'm going to take a better look then.
So I'm certainly open to it.
And as more and more science comes out, fantastic.
We need as much as we can get as far as information and products that help folks.
Absolutely.
Staying on that topic for a second.
This is something that I had a realization myself.
If you are in the same police department or the same fire station and you're using each
other as a barometer on how you're doing, you forget that you're all in the same meat
grinder.
You know, you're a horrible reporter on how each other is doing.
So asking your family or even friends that you see once in a while, that's a much better
reporter for, as you said, how you're actually doing.
If your children say you're always on edge or this kind of thing, then that's a big red
flag that your perception of you being, air quotes, fine, maybe distorted.
Absolutely.
Yes.
I agree with you 100% on that.
All right.
Back to you, Kevin, but you know, you guys have this incredible meeting in 2013.
Obviously you realize that your story is now starting to help people.
What did that toolbox look like for you?
What were some of the tools that started working on top of the fact that your story was actually
a force multiplier for other people now?
I had to change everything.
I had prior to meeting Briggs and prior to actually getting to a point of actually taking
back my life and saying, Kevin, you want to live now.
I had to realize that every decision that I made prior to that was a dead choice.
I was preparing myself to die.
So I had a job that made me want to die.
I was in a relationship that made me want to die.
I ate the food that I was eating, made me want to die.
My whole life was a reminder that I wanted to die.
So I had to literally change.
I had to completely change everything.
I didn't see what tools was going to work.
No, I got rid of everything.
I created a whole new toolbox because I realized that everything that I was doing was contributing
to me.
I didn't do one thing in my life that would contribute to me wanting to live.
So I had to create a whole new box.
And that's a time.
So I got happy with the journey of learning how to make...
Every day I'm learning something new because I'm only 11 years.
So for 30 plus years, I live wrong.
So the last 11 years, I've been creating new things every single day.
So every day I'm learning something new about myself and learning how to handle it and learning
the emotion of it.
So I'm always on this journey over destination hype.
So I was so fixated on destination growing up, destination, where I'm going, where I'm
going that I overlooked the journey and how to get there and the success and having fun
and going to where I'm getting to where I'm going.
So now I'm on journey and learning to understand 86,400 seconds in a day.
I'm appreciating every second of the day rather than waiting to the end of the day to see
what I did today to culminate to if today was a success or not.
Today is successful every single day that I am breathing.
And so it's just a different perspective for me.
And that has been my toolbox, just perspective.
Talk to me about the changes in food.
I'm curious about that.
And then also things, mindfulness, what are some of the other tools that started to reframe
the way that you were even thinking to get that presence back?
Absolutely.
Food is important.
I mean, when I say I ate food, I used to eat gas station food, liquor store food, chips,
things that microwave.
Everything was microwavable, nothing fresh.
I didn't drink water to save my life.
So just drinking water, having a diet, actually eating three times a day and preparing meals,
eating at home and eating fruits and vegetables.
It's tremendously, when you're eating food that makes you unhappy, it makes you 10 times
more unhappy.
So eating food that was healthy for me, I was able to not stress about my stomach and
my body and I can concentrate more on my mental.
So I mean, that's part of the mental journey.
Learning how to meditate, things that you think are corny that you will never do and
learning EMDR therapy, all these different things that you learn that you would never
do in a million years.
Once you start learning that, having 10 seconds breathing techniques.
I mean, so many different things that I've learned now in this 11 year journey that I
never would have did that's contributing to my success as far as wanting to live.
Beautiful.
I want to put something to the both of you.
I'll stay with you, Kevin, just for the moment.
Two things that I could set up where the Venn diagram is overlapped in all these hundreds
of conversation.
One was that feeling of burdensome and reframing the entire suicide thought process.
But the other one, I feel like especially in the first responder profession that we
got stuck on the word stigma when it comes to mental health.
We have to smash the stigma, which in itself does nothing.
All it does is you just don't talk ill about that thing.
Where I feel, because I've heard so many of these kind of Phoenix from the ashes style
stories now, where I feel that the conversation needs to go to is that post-traumatic growth,
that better version of yourself that Kevin's just completely underlined.
I mean, you just literally reinvented yourself.
That resilience that is forged from working through your struggles, your trauma, and then
coming out the other end and being a beacon of light for others now.
So talk to me about that concept.
What have you seen as far as Kevin Bathier today versus 2013 or 2005?
Just relentless.
I have a don't give up about me that I've never had in my life.
I've went through more in the last 11 years than I did in my first 30, the things that
sent me to the bridge.
I have more stress in my life now at 41 that I did at 20.
I have 10 times more the stress I did at 22.
When I took myself to the bridge, I have way more.
So it's just the relentless ability of knowing that it's not always about things getting
better.
It's about weak.
I got better.
Like mentally, I got better.
Life didn't get better.
So I think that if I'm waiting for life to get better, then I'm missing it.
I had to realize and look back that, Kevin, you got better as life got worse.
You got better.
And so I think that this relentlessness that we have to have inside of all of us that say,
you know what, that whole Phoenix to the ad analogy that no story that we have ever heard
of success has started at the top and we respect it.
Every story that we respect is about people that start at the bottom and get to the top.
And I think that we have to be okay with being at the bottom and we have to be okay if we
never get to the top.
Absolutely.
I couldn't agree more.
It's amazing.
Kevin Briggs, your perspective.
You know, Kevin nailed it.
Finding those coping mechanisms.
You may go through a bunch.
I tried yoga.
I only went to one class.
I need to do it again.
But the one class wasn't for me.
So you got to find what works for you.
Your family, your friends, I have a support group.
And when we're done here, I'm going down to have coffee with them.
Very, very important to me.
Don't let people take that away from you.
You know, if you want to go down and these folks, we talk about everything.
And these folks, they're not in law enforcement.
They have nothing to do with it.
So I also have this anxiety to where sometimes it's hard to get out of the house, but they'll
call me up.
They'll text me, hey, Kev, you're coming down for coffee.
Forces me to get out of the house.
And I know a lot of people like this.
But once we get out and we're fantastic, happy to do it.
It's just tough sometimes getting out of the house.
I have two dogs.
I grew up doing a lot of hunting and fishing.
I had limeronters and labradors.
Travel a lot now, Kevin and I.
And I still want dogs.
So I have two chihuahuas.
And when we're on stage, I say I have two chihuahuas.
I would bow my head.
I show a picture of them.
But they're a blast.
One of them's sleeping next to me snoring like all hell right now.
She's a rescue.
She's about this big, like a foot long and a foot wide.
She's kind of fat.
But when we talk about our animals, the impact that they have on us, she is absolutely wonderful.
Came to us without a name, without an age.
She was severely abused.
Her ears are all jacked up.
It took her weeks before we could even touch her.
Had to take her out in the backyard and pour her out of the cage.
But this is like people too.
When they get beat down, just keep giving them love, keep giving them love, keep giving
them love and it can turn around.
Sometimes we got to get that professional care also.
But with this dog here, she's absolutely wonderful.
She feels like a ball of cotton and she just wants to be by us now.
It's a blast.
So these guys, they help me with the stress.
I love hanging out with them.
Find what works for you.
Absolutely.
My German Shepherd's sitting outside the door right now.
The one I had prior to that as well.
They absolutely saved my life 100%.
Talk to me then about the healing that you found from being able to use your stories
and helping other people.
Because I think that's the kind of what they say, the self-licking ice cream or whatever
the term is.
I don't think people realize that when they've been through this journey, how healing it
is to be a helper, especially if you wore a uniform as a help and you transition out
of that particular career.
It's very healing, but it's very difficult.
And Kev's seen it.
Sometimes I tell these stories of what happened on the bridge or myself and I break down.
It's tough and brutal.
But I believe in this and we always have a lot of takeaways.
What can the folks take away home to use?
But when somebody comes up and says, thank you for being here.
This has happened to me.
I'm going to go seek help.
And I have these people in my head and I have a horrible, horrible memory.
For a lot of different reasons, but I remember talking to a group of nurses and an elderly
nurse.
I talked about compassion fatigue and the death by a thousand cuts and all these different
things and I showed her this what's happened to us.
Cognitive, spiritual, all these things, somatic happens to us.
She came up and said, you know what?
I'm going to go get some help.
And she had been on the job for a long time.
That was cool when you can get a professional who's been doing this for a long time to come
up and say, you know what?
You're right.
I am going to get some help.
Nothing beats that.
You know?
So if I can play a small part in that and we've Kevin, I agree, you know, we can play
a small part in that.
Then we did our job.
Kevin, but say anything to add?
Yeah, I mean, I just, that's it.
Just, just like you said, he nailed it.
I mean, just, just playing a small part in the realignment of, of, of how somebody feels
about themselves and how they look at life.
That's it.
If we can, if, if, if you got up and at some point you hated life and you wanted to die
and you heard our story and at some point you looked at your life and say, you know
what?
It's worth living.
Then we, that's all that, that is the greatest gift that our story can give.
And I think that that's, that's all we're trying to do is trying to give back, you know,
pieces of, of, of, of, of pieces of it, because it's, it's, it's impactful.
I mean, I don't, I struggle with the idea that people in the world are struggling like,
when, like, like I was struggling.
And so for me, it's hard to know that anybody in the world feels for even for a moment,
like I feel.
So it's, it's this built in understanding that this is really, we, we got something
that can really change the world.
Like this is weirdly changing the world.
Cause I'm looking at where the world is.
I'm looking at the dynamics over people that, and we got a story and people always say,
well, why these two?
Well, why not?
I mean, because as I'm a humble person, he's a humble person.
We're the only two jerks that can, that can come together and not mess this up.
Like because we're so humble enough to know that it's not, that it's bigger than us.
Like I think that if you took anybody else, it just wouldn't work.
It's just, it is because he is who he is and it is because I am who I am.
And together it just works.
And you're, you're not going to find two other people that can make this work the way it
works because we are, you know, the way we are.
And I'm really starting to see that's, that's the powerful thing about us.
Like, you know, it had to be us and I'm grateful that it's us because we can embark on this
journey and really bring some change in this dark world.
And I'm just grateful for the journey of it all.
I'm just, I really am.
We're staying with you.
You guys obviously have been going around the country talking, you've done podcasts,
you know, like I said, you've both been on here a couple of times now, but now you're
entering another medium, which I adore, which is the documentary medium.
So talk to me about that.
I know that it's still kind of early stages, but you know, what was that discussion to
initiate that?
And then what can people expect?
Me and Briggs, we just came together.
People reached out, a group of individuals based out of Dallas reached out and it's near
and dear to our hearts because we both, the greatest thing about us, we both care equally
about this, the same, like it.
And so it had to be, if we were going to tell our story, if anybody was going to tell our
story that wasn't us, it had to be cause related.
It had to be, you know, and about change, it had to be about, you know, and I think
that they got it.
It took them, it took us a while to kind of collectively come to an understanding that
we would let them present it.
And you know, cause that takes a lot of trust.
Cause I know we want the story to come across a certain way.
We don't want any ego in it at all.
And I think that, you know, I can, you know, attest for both of us that we don't believe
in ego at all.
And so to come and tell this story and it comes from an egotistical standpoint will
be the worst thing that you could possibly do for all of us and humanity.
So I think that they're, they're going to be able to articulate our story and the day
that we met in order for it to bring change in the world and not have it be about us,
that our story is just, just the foundation to allow people to see how powerful connection
really can be.
And why not have us, you know, as, as, you know, the mirroring.
Bringing an image of what connection can look like.
Kevin Briggs, anything to add?
Kevin nailed it.
It's about cause.
When I left the highway patrol in 2013, I told myself if I'm going to do it right.
And mind you, I was government service all my life, had no clue, no clue what I was stepping
into.
But I said, it's gotta be about cause and then business.
And if that changes, I'm doing this wrong.
So that's what this is about.
It's about cause.
And if we can get it, get a show made that goes out there, that makes people think and
go, wow, you know, that was powerful.
Perfect.
Let's get them thinking.
I had quite an unusual experience when Kevin Hines's documentary came out.
It was one of those dynamics where, you know, if you get enough people to buy tickets, you
can get it shown at a local theater.
And so I did that here in Ocala.
Ironically, my wife had done several of the suicide walks and I reached out to that organization
and said, Hey, would you help me share this?
We're going to have this film showing in town.
Then we're going to have, they're going to let us have, you know, 30 minutes after for
some discussion.
Never heard a thing.
Not a thing.
They were more than happy for me to walk and put beads on my neck and give them money.
But when it came to actually bringing community and not a peep.
So I'll just, that's my own personal experience.
But you know, we know some of these bigger organizations aren't always actually walking
the walk.
That being said though, we made it happen.
I forget how many people came.
It was 60 around then.
So quite a lot of people.
And I watched the power of a documentary on mental health and it was incredible.
And after people were sharing their stories and even outside the theater, people were
coming over and sharing more stories.
So I've actually seen ironically up close and personal the impact of a film that you're
going to make on the audience.
And it's hard to see on ticket sales and those kinds of metrics, but to actually host one
and see the impact on an audience, I know that you're going to really, really grab people
by the throat in a positive way.
And your message is going to resonate with a lot of people.
That's what we're hoping for.
Because if we've talked about it, we're losing over 49,000 people here in the United States,
700,000 worldwide.
I mean, we got to start talking about this more, but do so in a right manner.
Have good information and make it about the cause not to make a buck.
And we'll go ahead and we'll do this right.
Absolutely.
When can we expect the film to be out?
That's a tough one.
I would suspect within two years.
We want it done right.
So if it takes longer, that's okay.
Absolutely.
There's another one.
I had a guest on the show, Emma Benoit.
She's from Louisiana and she was, I think, 17 where she attempted suicide with a pistol.
She survived the attempt, ended up in a wheelchair.
And she is an incredible voice as well for this conversation, especially in our younger
people.
Because obviously a lot of these mental health documentaries tend to be adult beyond school.
And it's just, again, it's another testament.
Hers is called My Ascension to the power of documentaries.
And I think especially now with the streaming services, they're just, people are really
starting to lean into them and you can really kind of remove that filter and put a powerful
message directly into the home now.
I've heard of her.
I'm friends with her on some social media.
I've not met her, but yes, you know, sad story, but phenomenal person.
Absolutely.
All right.
Well, I just want to make sure that we talk about each of your own personal projects as
well.
So Kevin, let's talk about your foundation first.
Four years ago, I created the Kevin Berthea Foundation, right, right.
Pretty much around COVID when COVID happened.
And it was from the lack of realizing that it was nothing out there that cater to who
I was as an individual and cater to people like me that struggled, you know, with no
voice.
People, so many people that that look normal on the outside, but really were struggling
in these dark places on the inside.
And I just wanted to have a voice for those people and let them know that we could all
come out and talk about these things and we no longer had to be shameful and hide who
we really are.
And so I create the foundation for people like me, not to say people that just look
like me, for people that look like me internally, not externally.
And so, yeah, so I, a lot of different things, a lot of dreams, a lot of different things
that I want to want to happen.
But we're in the early stages of it, when I become 511C3 and get, you know, hopefully
end goal, work with clinicians, hopefully work with some doctors and, you know, start,
you know, get some patients.
I mean, it's just so many different things I want to do, but it started off as a dream
and kind of just, it's kind of just took off.
And in the last couple of years, I've added different things and, you know, we just keep
rolling.
I mean, you know, I knew that it was going to take probably 10 years to really get to
where I wanted to be.
So I'm four years in and looking forward to the next six.
And where can people find you and or the foundation online?
I'm at my website, www.kevinberthiafoundation.org.
I noticed the sounds kind of, you can kind of Google my name, Kevin Berthia, all my stuff
pops up.
And I don't just say that to be egotistical.
It's just all my information is here.
The power of Google.
I mean, you can literally put a name in, in a search engine and everything that has to
do with me and relates to me and what I'm doing comes up.
So it's a great tool to have.
That's why I love Google.
I mean, you know, it's just it's out there.
So and that's where my foundation is my website.
I'm on all social medias.
I made it like that because that's where people are at.
So I could be reached.
I'm easy and hard and easy.
Fine.
Brilliant.
When you used to Google James Gearing, there was a pedophile from Manchester, England and
a drug dealer from Australia.
Luckily now when you Google it as a podcaster.
So I managed to push those people further down.
That's terrible.
Well Kevin Briggs, same with you, you know, where people can find you and then the the
projects that you have out there.
Sure.
So kind of like what you have just said here, if they Google me, I think a bunch of stuff
comes up.
But it's it started this organization in 2014, Pivotal Points.
And we have many pivotal points in life.
And it's not just life based, it's career based, you know, and maybe it's education.
Do I have the money to go to school?
Do I have the time to go to school?
It's a pivotal point in our lives.
So we need to think about this.
But the presentation has been all around little little places like Borneo all the way over
to Germany, Mexico, talking about this to folks, whether it's corporations, communities,
schools, the military, mental health is everywhere.
We know that fairly obvious.
But folks are really starting to realize the importance of it.
You know, a happy employee is going to do a hell of a lot better for your company.
So things like this, I can be reached at Kevin Briggs at Pivotal Hypen Points dot com.
You can go on the website and look at some different things.
So I have one book out, I'm in the process of updating that now.
We'll probably come out with that next year.
I'm writing a pamphlet, probably about eight pages that I want to give out when we do presentations
about having that conversation.
So you have a hard copy of just something really quick to go through.
So doing things like this, social media Kevin's way better than I'm 61.
I struggle with it.
I kind of follow his lead on a lot of this.
But I am on the social media, just not very good at it.
Still a work in progress as many things.
So we hope we hope to do this for quite some time.
I hope to can do this for quite some time to get out and give folks some real world
skills and information about how we can improve our lives and those around us.
Beautiful.
I want to just ask one more question and then we'll close out.
But I think it's important because the real the anxiety when it comes to the mental health
conversation is especially if you have a fellow firefighter or whoever it is that you work
around that's truly in crisis.
So if someone's saying I'm starting to feel kind of depressed, I'm drinking too much,
obviously you know that hopefully there's some leeway.
Okay, we need to get you some help, get you a counselor.
Talk to me about the communication with someone who you think is close to or imminent as far
as a suicide attempt.
How do you communicate with these people and then where is the cutoff point for actually
you know maybe you know the Baker Act as we call it here in Florida or 5150, you know,
using law enforcement to actually ensure that person's safety.
Some information with you regarding follow-up whether that's the 988 if you need to call
that and you can that's our suicide prevention lifeline crisis hotline.
It used to be 1-800-273-TALK and does now 988 or 741-741.
Have these things with you as information for them and you could use them.
You say hey I'm going to have a conversation with an individual.
What can I do?
They can help you have that to give to that individual.
Remember have this conversation in a place where that person feels comfortable.
Keep it foremost in your mind is about them.
Probably toughest conversation you're going to have or one of them.
So you want it about them.
Hey Bob, I've noticed these different things.
I've heard these different things that's been going on in your life.
I want to let you know I'm here for you.
You do not have to go through this stuff alone.
If you'd like to talk about it, I'm here.
If they do want to talk about it, fantastic.
Let them speak.
If it comes to the point to where you know what maybe they're thinking about suicide.
Ask them.
Ask them about it and that's hard.
But you can make it like this.
You know what anybody going through all that stuff might be thinking about killing themselves.
Have you been thinking about suicide?
Sit back, relax, take a breath.
Let them answer.
And if what if they say yes.
Don't lose it.
You know we all are like oh my god what are you thinking?
Are you stupid?
How can you do this to your family?
How can you do this to your friends?
Take a breath.
All right.
How long you been thinking about this?
Do you have a plan?
Have you tried this before?
See what they say.
You know well I tried this before but couldn't do it because of my kids.
Great.
They can talk about their kids.
If it seems eminent do not be afraid to call 911.
If you are 911 get somebody outside.
Get some help.
That person if there's firearms involved let's make them safe.
Don't say you know what can I take your firearms from you for a while and just hold them.
You know what?
No.
Can I store your guns at my house for a bit till we get work through this.
Offer that EAP, that Employee Assistance Program, but make sure that those counselors are trained
in suicide or whatever it is that they're going through.
I've had some very bad experiences with some who weren't trained that thought they knew
how to do things.
So simply really by being there for them it makes a world of difference.
But don't be afraid to get some help because we don't have to go through this alone.
You know they make that decision but they made it with an unhealthy brain.
Be responsive but not responsible.
Amazing.
Thank you so much.
Kevin Bothea anything to add?
I'm good.
Brakes nailed it.
I'm good.
Absolutely he did.
All right.
Well I just want to thank you so much.
Like I said we had two individual conversations that were phenomenal but the dynamic of you
together and kind of piecing this journey bit by bit and your unique perspectives and
all these topics that we've covered has been truly invaluable.
It's been incredible.
So I want to thank you both so so much for being so generous with your time and coming
back to the Behind the Shield podcast.
It's been a pleasure.
Phenomenal.
It's been an absolute pleasure.
Thank you, James.
Thank you.