WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.740 This episode is sponsored by TeamBuildr, yet 00:00:02.740 --> 00:00:04.860 another company that's doing great things for 00:00:04.860 --> 00:00:07.679 the first responder community. As a strength 00:00:07.679 --> 00:00:09.960 and conditioning coach myself who also trains 00:00:09.960 --> 00:00:13.140 tactical athletes, dissemination of wellness 00:00:13.140 --> 00:00:15.320 information is one of the biggest challenges. 00:00:15.980 --> 00:00:18.519 Now TeamBuildr is the premier strength and conditioning 00:00:18.519 --> 00:00:21.539 software for tactical athletes and there are 00:00:21.539 --> 00:00:24.839 several features that really impress me. Firstly, 00:00:24.920 --> 00:00:27.780 there is a full exercise library. So you, the 00:00:27.780 --> 00:00:29.940 personal trainer, does not have to create that 00:00:29.940 --> 00:00:33.060 within your own department. Secondly, you can 00:00:33.060 --> 00:00:36.020 send out programming, but also individualize, 00:00:36.060 --> 00:00:38.840 which I love. So you blanket program for everyone. 00:00:39.060 --> 00:00:41.780 Now you can tweak based on someone's injury, 00:00:41.979 --> 00:00:44.479 someone's need to maybe drop some body composition, 00:00:44.520 --> 00:00:47.420 rather than having to write a program for every 00:00:47.420 --> 00:00:50.200 single person on their own. TeamBuildr also 00:00:50.200 --> 00:00:52.679 allows you to build custom questionnaires to 00:00:52.679 --> 00:00:55.719 collate health and wellness data. It integrates 00:00:55.719 --> 00:00:58.280 with wearables. And I think one of the most important 00:00:58.280 --> 00:01:02.079 things is obviously it tracks. To me, it's imperative 00:01:02.079 --> 00:01:05.560 that we as a profession start tracking our people 00:01:05.560 --> 00:01:09.439 from day one and then over the full span of their 00:01:09.439 --> 00:01:12.659 career, therefore catching potential wellness 00:01:12.659 --> 00:01:16.200 issues and injuries before they happen. Now, 00:01:16.219 --> 00:01:18.420 if you want to try Team Builder, they are offering 00:01:18.420 --> 00:01:20.760 you, the audience of the Behind the Shield podcast, 00:01:21.180 --> 00:01:25.359 a free 14 -day trial to experience all of the 00:01:25.359 --> 00:01:27.900 features. And if you want to take a deeper dive 00:01:27.900 --> 00:01:32.439 into Team Builder, listen to episode 1032 with 00:01:32.439 --> 00:01:36.459 Melissa Mercado or go to teambuildr .com. And 00:01:36.459 --> 00:01:37.980 I'll spell that to you because it's not as you 00:01:37.980 --> 00:01:44.489 think, T -E -A -M -B -U -I -L -D -R .com. Welcome 00:01:44.489 --> 00:01:46.230 to the Behind the Shield podcast. As always, 00:01:46.269 --> 00:01:48.069 my name is James Gearing, and this week it is 00:01:48.069 --> 00:01:50.950 my absolute honor to welcome on the show veteran 00:01:50.950 --> 00:01:54.909 firefighter Di Alexander. Now, one area that's 00:01:54.909 --> 00:01:57.489 rarely discussed when it comes to the EMT and 00:01:57.489 --> 00:02:00.670 paramedic side of our profession is how we deal 00:02:00.670 --> 00:02:03.250 with death, whether it's working a code, whether 00:02:03.250 --> 00:02:05.209 it's going to someone who passed away during 00:02:05.209 --> 00:02:07.750 the night. We have very, very little training, 00:02:07.810 --> 00:02:10.590 and that in itself can turn into moral injury 00:02:10.590 --> 00:02:13.509 and even mental health challenges. So in this 00:02:13.509 --> 00:02:16.310 conversation, we discuss a host of topics, not 00:02:16.310 --> 00:02:19.169 only DAI's own journey into the fire service, 00:02:19.349 --> 00:02:23.069 the 343 Hero Challenge that we both do, and other 00:02:23.069 --> 00:02:25.789 areas of firefighting, but we take a deep dive 00:02:25.789 --> 00:02:28.909 into the world of codes and death notifications. 00:02:29.409 --> 00:02:31.590 Now, before we get to this incredible conversation, 00:02:31.849 --> 00:02:34.370 as I say every week, please just take a moment, 00:02:34.509 --> 00:02:37.430 go to whichever app you listen to this on, subscribe 00:02:37.430 --> 00:02:40.969 to the show. Leave feedback and leave a rating. 00:02:41.330 --> 00:02:44.710 Every single five -star rating truly does elevate 00:02:44.710 --> 00:02:47.330 this podcast, therefore making it easier for 00:02:47.330 --> 00:02:50.889 others to find. And this is a free library of 00:02:50.889 --> 00:02:55.550 well over 1 ,000 episodes now. So all I ask in 00:02:55.550 --> 00:02:58.650 return is that you help share these incredible 00:02:58.650 --> 00:03:01.469 men and women's stories so I can get them to 00:03:01.469 --> 00:03:04.490 every single person on planet Earth who needs 00:03:04.490 --> 00:03:08.000 to hear them. So with that being said... I introduce 00:03:08.000 --> 00:03:31.699 to you, Dai Alexander. Enjoy. Well, Diana, I 00:03:31.699 --> 00:03:34.159 want to start by saying thank you so much for 00:03:34.159 --> 00:03:35.939 taking the time and coming on the Behind the 00:03:35.939 --> 00:03:38.330 Shield podcast today. Thank you so much. Thank 00:03:38.330 --> 00:03:40.909 you for having me, James. It's an honor. So where 00:03:40.909 --> 00:03:42.710 on planet Earth are we finding you this afternoon? 00:03:43.590 --> 00:03:47.610 Well, today is my first day off shift. So yesterday 00:03:47.610 --> 00:03:49.969 was a pretty good day, but it was busy at work. 00:03:50.090 --> 00:03:54.610 And I have a small business that I also operate 00:03:54.610 --> 00:03:59.530 on my off days. So today I'm doing that and I'm 00:03:59.530 --> 00:04:02.259 hanging out with my dogs. hopefully having a 00:04:02.259 --> 00:04:04.159 pretty low key day. I play a lot of pickleball. 00:04:04.219 --> 00:04:07.639 So that's on the agenda today. That's part of 00:04:07.639 --> 00:04:09.860 my mental health plan and my physical fitness 00:04:09.860 --> 00:04:13.020 plan these days. And so that's what I'm up to 00:04:13.020 --> 00:04:16.019 today. I saw the pictures and I wanted to ask 00:04:16.019 --> 00:04:18.740 you about this. For me, having played tennis 00:04:18.740 --> 00:04:21.439 in the past, but never at a good level, kind 00:04:21.439 --> 00:04:25.129 of a. kind of advanced beginner at most. It is 00:04:25.129 --> 00:04:27.490 a very frustrating game because it's hard to 00:04:27.490 --> 00:04:29.310 really get a good rally in the game of tennis 00:04:29.310 --> 00:04:31.889 unless you're both great, great players. And 00:04:31.889 --> 00:04:33.889 what I've seen with pickleball is it seems to 00:04:33.889 --> 00:04:36.829 get people that maybe aren't, you know, skilled 00:04:36.829 --> 00:04:38.930 at the beginning to still be able to move around 00:04:38.930 --> 00:04:41.569 and have good rallies and enjoy the game rather 00:04:41.569 --> 00:04:43.290 than go get your tennis ball from the other side 00:04:43.290 --> 00:04:45.009 of the field because it went over the fence. 00:04:45.430 --> 00:04:48.050 Talk to me about your journey into pickleball 00:04:48.050 --> 00:04:50.290 and then what have you seen as far as the benefits? 00:04:50.920 --> 00:04:52.980 Yeah, so I think it has a lot of really amazing 00:04:52.980 --> 00:04:56.800 benefits. First of all, it really boomed a lot 00:04:56.800 --> 00:04:59.259 right after COVID. So you had a lot of people 00:04:59.259 --> 00:05:03.480 who had been, you know, hunkered down and scared 00:05:03.480 --> 00:05:06.540 and isolated for a really long time. And then 00:05:06.540 --> 00:05:09.980 out came this super social sport that almost 00:05:09.980 --> 00:05:12.199 anybody could play. You know, I think when I 00:05:12.199 --> 00:05:13.720 first started playing, a lot of people thought, 00:05:13.740 --> 00:05:15.399 you know, and I would say pickleball, first of 00:05:15.399 --> 00:05:17.699 all, it's kind of a funny word, you know, in 00:05:17.699 --> 00:05:21.220 terms of sports, it doesn't sound. Super exciting. 00:05:22.379 --> 00:05:24.120 And then lots of people would say, oh, that's 00:05:24.120 --> 00:05:25.779 an old person's sport, you know, or whatever. 00:05:25.980 --> 00:05:28.060 But I always caution people, those old people 00:05:28.060 --> 00:05:30.000 will beat you up when you get out there. But 00:05:30.000 --> 00:05:31.740 it's really wonderful because it's a very social 00:05:31.740 --> 00:05:34.519 sport in the sense of no matter what level you 00:05:34.519 --> 00:05:36.620 are, whether you're a beginner or not, people 00:05:36.620 --> 00:05:40.459 welcome you in to play on the court. And then 00:05:40.459 --> 00:05:43.360 also because there's all different levels of 00:05:43.360 --> 00:05:47.810 athleticism. Whether you have beat up knees and 00:05:47.810 --> 00:05:51.129 shoulders from tennis or any other sport is really 00:05:51.129 --> 00:05:53.810 super encouraging for people because no matter 00:05:53.810 --> 00:05:58.569 your level of athleticism, your physical ability 00:05:58.569 --> 00:06:01.689 or level of fitness, or even knowledge of the 00:06:01.689 --> 00:06:04.810 sport, people welcome you in. And so it's super 00:06:04.810 --> 00:06:07.310 encouraging for people because it gets them physically 00:06:07.310 --> 00:06:11.959 moving. Obviously, most courts are outside. which 00:06:11.959 --> 00:06:14.019 is super helpful too. So you get people outside 00:06:14.019 --> 00:06:17.899 in the sunshine, you know, in the fresh air and 00:06:17.899 --> 00:06:19.879 they get out there and get their bodies moving. 00:06:19.939 --> 00:06:21.920 They're having fun and now they're socializing 00:06:21.920 --> 00:06:24.259 and all of which I think are super, very healthy 00:06:24.259 --> 00:06:27.040 things and very healthy, not just for us physically 00:06:27.040 --> 00:06:30.199 and cardiovascular speaking, but for our minds. 00:06:30.300 --> 00:06:33.060 And so it's created a lot of really great relationships 00:06:33.060 --> 00:06:36.000 and friendships with people. And I think you 00:06:36.000 --> 00:06:37.860 can talk to a lot of people who will actually 00:06:37.860 --> 00:06:40.279 tell you that pickleball saved their life. Right. 00:06:40.360 --> 00:06:41.800 And then whether that was because they were coming 00:06:41.800 --> 00:06:44.420 out of, you know, COVID and being isolated for 00:06:44.420 --> 00:06:46.540 so long. Lots of people experience a lot of depression 00:06:46.540 --> 00:06:49.139 and darkness in their life. And this really brought 00:06:49.139 --> 00:06:52.000 a lot of light to them. And so it's been pretty 00:06:52.000 --> 00:06:54.660 cool. You know, my journey with pickleball started 00:06:54.660 --> 00:06:59.319 when I was same thing. I had worked in our emergency 00:06:59.319 --> 00:07:03.850 operations center for most of COVID. And so I 00:07:03.850 --> 00:07:06.129 wasn't isolated and away from people, but I was 00:07:06.129 --> 00:07:10.930 working all of the time. And so my normal regimen, 00:07:10.930 --> 00:07:13.470 I was doing CrossFit then. My normal regimen 00:07:13.470 --> 00:07:16.470 for CrossFit was null and void because none of 00:07:16.470 --> 00:07:18.810 the gyms were really open. And those machines 00:07:18.810 --> 00:07:22.029 and routines and wads were not really readily 00:07:22.029 --> 00:07:24.670 available, nor was my ability to do so schedule 00:07:24.670 --> 00:07:28.740 -wise with so much work. And so I had gone out 00:07:28.740 --> 00:07:30.779 to Arizona, which is where I'm going to retire 00:07:30.779 --> 00:07:34.040 to. I had gone out to Arizona and my aunt plays 00:07:34.040 --> 00:07:36.000 pickleball out there and she invited me to play. 00:07:36.060 --> 00:07:37.180 And I said, oh, you know, I don't know what this 00:07:37.180 --> 00:07:39.139 is, but OK, I'll go do it because, you know, 00:07:39.180 --> 00:07:43.180 I'm pretty competitive. I'll play anything. And 00:07:43.180 --> 00:07:45.500 went out there and I liked it a lot. Revisited 00:07:45.500 --> 00:07:47.360 it months later when I went back out there again. 00:07:47.740 --> 00:07:50.540 And then the next time I went out there and we 00:07:50.540 --> 00:07:52.480 went and played, I said, you know, I really love 00:07:52.480 --> 00:07:55.279 this sport. And I think if I got. little bit 00:07:55.279 --> 00:07:57.660 better I think I would love it even more so now 00:07:57.660 --> 00:08:00.939 here I am part of the pickleball cult if you 00:08:00.939 --> 00:08:04.579 will we're a pretty crazy group of people so 00:08:04.579 --> 00:08:07.399 so now I do tournaments and all kinds of stuff 00:08:07.399 --> 00:08:09.879 and it's a lot of fun and pickleball is a wonderful 00:08:09.879 --> 00:08:14.500 sport to get people moving and socializing who 00:08:14.500 --> 00:08:18.189 even if you don't have you know, that hand -eye 00:08:18.189 --> 00:08:22.029 coordination yet or a racket or paddle sport 00:08:22.029 --> 00:08:24.750 in your past that you can usually pick up on 00:08:24.750 --> 00:08:26.670 pretty quick. And people will be very accepting 00:08:26.670 --> 00:08:28.930 of that. So there's people on every levels playing 00:08:28.930 --> 00:08:33.129 all the time. I had the same observation. It's 00:08:33.129 --> 00:08:36.090 so sad that, you know, when we went through COVID, 00:08:36.210 --> 00:08:38.809 there wasn't an analysis at the end like, okay, 00:08:38.850 --> 00:08:41.659 what did we do well? What did we do poorly? how 00:08:41.659 --> 00:08:43.720 do we learn from the mistakes and make some changes? 00:08:43.860 --> 00:08:45.860 And I think, you know, arguably a lot of things 00:08:45.860 --> 00:08:47.899 that people were told, stay inside, don't be 00:08:47.899 --> 00:08:50.519 around people, you know, don't exercise, watch 00:08:50.519 --> 00:08:53.279 TV, get fast food and alcohol delivered to your 00:08:53.279 --> 00:08:56.580 house, binge watch Tiger King. We saw, you know, 00:08:56.600 --> 00:08:59.080 what happened. It wasn't a good outcome. And 00:08:59.080 --> 00:09:01.639 so it's taken a while, I think, really people 00:09:01.639 --> 00:09:03.899 to kind of start to really trust coming outside 00:09:03.899 --> 00:09:06.620 again. That's, I think, at least a year after 00:09:06.620 --> 00:09:09.399 COVID had passed was when people really started 00:09:09.399 --> 00:09:12.519 to go. And then what I love about the pickleball, 00:09:12.600 --> 00:09:14.960 it kind of reminds me of CrossFit. So we've both 00:09:14.960 --> 00:09:17.059 done it for a long time. You know, when you're 00:09:17.059 --> 00:09:20.139 talking about snatches and, you know, bar muscle 00:09:20.139 --> 00:09:22.139 -ups and some of these things, they're very, 00:09:22.139 --> 00:09:24.460 you know, complicated movements. This is why 00:09:24.460 --> 00:09:26.440 athletes that are very good at that spend their 00:09:26.440 --> 00:09:28.379 whole career just working on those few movements. 00:09:28.679 --> 00:09:32.000 And so it's very intimidating. But if you get 00:09:32.000 --> 00:09:33.820 a firefighter and you just give him a sandbag 00:09:33.820 --> 00:09:35.620 and say, okay, walk to that cone and back, or 00:09:35.620 --> 00:09:38.490 push that sled to the end and back. it removes 00:09:38.490 --> 00:09:41.029 that intimidation. I think it's the same, you 00:09:41.029 --> 00:09:42.889 know, with the general public, what pickleball 00:09:42.889 --> 00:09:44.370 is doing is saying, look, you don't have to be 00:09:44.370 --> 00:09:46.590 the best in the world. You know, we're not trying 00:09:46.590 --> 00:09:48.389 to win the world championship. You just want 00:09:48.389 --> 00:09:50.409 to get out there and play again. I think we've, 00:09:50.409 --> 00:09:53.549 we've lost that as a culture. You know, if you're 00:09:53.549 --> 00:09:55.750 first, you're last and all this bullshit, like 00:09:55.750 --> 00:09:57.830 it's okay just to go out and play. This is why 00:09:57.830 --> 00:09:59.970 games were invented in the first place for fun. 00:10:00.590 --> 00:10:02.730 Yeah. And what I love about it is, you know, 00:10:02.750 --> 00:10:04.590 I think what a lot of people just need to do 00:10:04.590 --> 00:10:07.490 is, you know, at least every other day, go out 00:10:07.490 --> 00:10:10.389 and intentionally move your body. And, and this 00:10:10.389 --> 00:10:13.009 just allow, this is just a platform to do that, 00:10:13.049 --> 00:10:15.870 you know, and I relate pickleball to CrossFit 00:10:15.870 --> 00:10:17.649 in the sense of, it's kind of a funny sense, 00:10:17.750 --> 00:10:21.980 but when I first started playing. You know, I 00:10:21.980 --> 00:10:24.740 would judge a book by its cover. You know, that's 00:10:24.740 --> 00:10:26.700 my competitive nature to look at that person, 00:10:26.759 --> 00:10:29.340 size them up real good and determine if I thought 00:10:29.340 --> 00:10:31.120 I could already whip their ass before the game 00:10:31.120 --> 00:10:33.600 even started, you know, or before the WOD started 00:10:33.600 --> 00:10:38.539 in the sense of CrossFit. And I was very often 00:10:38.539 --> 00:10:43.159 humbled when somebody who was. you know, larger 00:10:43.159 --> 00:10:46.700 than me. You know, maybe they had many more pounds 00:10:46.700 --> 00:10:52.779 than I did body fat wise or size wise. And I 00:10:52.779 --> 00:10:55.340 was humbled very quickly when I learned that 00:10:55.340 --> 00:10:58.659 they were, regardless of the outside of the book, 00:10:58.840 --> 00:11:02.019 that they still beat me or they were stronger 00:11:02.019 --> 00:11:04.340 than me. And so the same thing kind of happens 00:11:04.340 --> 00:11:05.940 in pickleball where you look at somebody, you 00:11:05.940 --> 00:11:08.659 think, ah, they're older, you know, we're going 00:11:08.659 --> 00:11:12.289 to dominate this game. And they humble you real 00:11:12.289 --> 00:11:16.809 quick. So it's a fun sport for that. And I think 00:11:16.809 --> 00:11:19.409 being humbled in all aspects of life is really 00:11:19.409 --> 00:11:23.350 important. 100%. That's why I do jujitsu. Yeah. 00:11:24.009 --> 00:11:25.789 All right. Well, let's start at the very beginning 00:11:25.789 --> 00:11:28.490 of your timeline then. So tell me where you were 00:11:28.490 --> 00:11:30.370 born and tell me a little bit about your family 00:11:30.370 --> 00:11:32.769 dynamic, what your parents did, how many siblings. 00:11:33.190 --> 00:11:38.970 Okay. Yeah. So I am an actual. original Floridian, 00:11:39.110 --> 00:11:43.169 not just Florida, but I was born here in Orlando. 00:11:43.549 --> 00:11:50.289 So back then it was, it's Florida Hospital, excuse 00:11:50.289 --> 00:11:55.169 me, AdventHealth East now, but back then it was 00:11:55.169 --> 00:11:57.730 Orlando General Hospital. So I'm an original 00:11:57.730 --> 00:12:03.429 Orlando O -Town girl. Mom and dad, my dad left 00:12:03.429 --> 00:12:08.169 when I was 15 months old and my mom raised myself 00:12:08.169 --> 00:12:12.090 and my two older brothers. I grew up on the east 00:12:12.090 --> 00:12:15.049 side of town. So if anybody's familiar with Orlando, 00:12:15.190 --> 00:12:17.769 I grew up in Bonneville, went to Bonneville Elementary 00:12:17.769 --> 00:12:21.210 School. I went to Union Park Junior High, then 00:12:21.210 --> 00:12:23.409 it became middle school. And then my mom moved 00:12:23.409 --> 00:12:26.009 us out to Titusville and I went to Astronaut 00:12:26.009 --> 00:12:28.120 High. And I really didn't love Titusville that 00:12:28.120 --> 00:12:30.100 much. So as soon as I had the opportunity to 00:12:30.100 --> 00:12:33.059 move back to Orlando, that is what I did. So 00:12:33.059 --> 00:12:36.059 I've pretty much lived in Orange County for the 00:12:36.059 --> 00:12:39.120 most part in Orlando and Orange County for all 00:12:39.120 --> 00:12:43.620 but about three years of my life. When you were 00:12:43.620 --> 00:12:45.539 in the school age, what were you playing and 00:12:45.539 --> 00:12:48.940 doing as far as sports and exercise? You know, 00:12:48.980 --> 00:12:51.860 I was on the swim team for a little while in 00:12:51.860 --> 00:12:59.559 high school. My middle school also had a pool. 00:12:59.720 --> 00:13:02.460 So there was a lot of swimming that was going 00:13:02.460 --> 00:13:04.700 on. My grandfather was very close with my grandfather. 00:13:05.200 --> 00:13:07.360 He had a pool. So every summer I did a lot of 00:13:07.360 --> 00:13:09.139 swimming. He taught us how to dive and all kinds 00:13:09.139 --> 00:13:14.000 of stuff. And so I was on the swim team in high 00:13:14.000 --> 00:13:17.460 school for a small amount of time. And I started 00:13:17.460 --> 00:13:22.980 realizing they were boys. And when I discovered 00:13:22.980 --> 00:13:25.419 boys, I discovered that the boys on the dive 00:13:25.419 --> 00:13:28.980 team, looked a little bit better than the boys 00:13:28.980 --> 00:13:31.820 on the swim team. So I went over to the dive 00:13:31.820 --> 00:13:34.519 team and that's what I did mostly through high 00:13:34.519 --> 00:13:37.600 school was the dive team. And I played a lot 00:13:37.600 --> 00:13:39.659 of other sports just on the side and for fun. 00:13:39.740 --> 00:13:43.620 And then I played a full contact football as 00:13:43.620 --> 00:13:46.440 an adult, which was a lot of fun. And then otherwise 00:13:46.440 --> 00:13:50.740 I've just been into, you know, for about. around 00:13:50.740 --> 00:13:53.000 eight to 10 years, I did competitive bodybuilding, 00:13:53.240 --> 00:13:55.960 then got into CrossFit and then COVID and then 00:13:55.960 --> 00:14:00.139 pickleball. When you talked about changing to 00:14:00.139 --> 00:14:03.980 the diving team, when I was young, we had a CDT, 00:14:04.039 --> 00:14:05.940 which is craft design technology. And it was 00:14:05.940 --> 00:14:08.529 like the woodworking stuff. I grew up on a farm. 00:14:08.629 --> 00:14:10.889 I was good at mucking out stables and, you know, 00:14:10.889 --> 00:14:13.250 stacking bales of hay, but I wasn't actually 00:14:13.250 --> 00:14:15.610 a craftsman by any means. So I ended up doing 00:14:15.610 --> 00:14:17.450 home economics because all the girls were in 00:14:17.450 --> 00:14:19.330 that class. So I totally understand what you're 00:14:19.330 --> 00:14:22.429 saying. I love that. I wish they still had, I 00:14:22.429 --> 00:14:25.070 think they do in some, in some schools, but you 00:14:25.070 --> 00:14:27.159 know, they took a lot of that. out of schools, 00:14:27.299 --> 00:14:30.740 the home mech, the shop, workshop mechanics. 00:14:30.960 --> 00:14:32.559 There's a few schools that still have them, but 00:14:32.559 --> 00:14:35.240 I think probably when we were in school about 00:14:35.240 --> 00:14:38.879 the same time, it was a requirement. You couldn't 00:14:38.879 --> 00:14:41.000 finish high school without going to home mech 00:14:41.000 --> 00:14:44.620 and making a pillow. There's a shift. I just 00:14:44.620 --> 00:14:47.440 posted a New York Times article a few weeks ago, 00:14:47.539 --> 00:14:50.299 and it's saying that the Gen Zs are going into 00:14:50.299 --> 00:14:52.679 the trades, and it makes perfect sense. The same 00:14:52.679 --> 00:14:55.139 reason why we have a recruitment crisis. They're 00:14:55.139 --> 00:14:57.710 looking... at all these jobs and they have all 00:14:57.710 --> 00:15:00.690 the information now this is 2025 and so they're 00:15:00.690 --> 00:15:02.710 looking at college like so wait a second this 00:15:02.710 --> 00:15:04.990 is fifty thousand dollars worth of debt four 00:15:04.990 --> 00:15:06.769 years of my life and i get a piece of paper that 00:15:06.769 --> 00:15:09.210 doesn't guarantee me a job that sounds terrible 00:15:09.210 --> 00:15:12.090 one year and i can be a welder you know one year 00:15:12.090 --> 00:15:14.750 i can be a firefighter and so this is what's 00:15:14.750 --> 00:15:17.809 exciting about This kind of period is that people 00:15:17.809 --> 00:15:20.549 are looking to go in the trades The problem is 00:15:20.549 --> 00:15:22.389 they're looking at the fire service and they're 00:15:22.389 --> 00:15:24.870 seeing 56 hour work weeks mandatory overtime 00:15:24.870 --> 00:15:29.279 cancers divorces and so Until we fix that, they're 00:15:29.279 --> 00:15:31.100 looking at this going, that doesn't seem good. 00:15:31.200 --> 00:15:33.320 And we're seeing the complete evidence of that. 00:15:33.460 --> 00:15:35.580 Young people are not flocking to the fire service 00:15:35.580 --> 00:15:38.340 anymore. So we have a beautiful opportunity to 00:15:38.340 --> 00:15:40.960 turn the ship around, but we've got to address 00:15:40.960 --> 00:15:43.600 the things that are broken. We talk before I 00:15:43.600 --> 00:15:46.000 hit record. I won't get on my soapbox, but the 00:15:46.000 --> 00:15:49.559 24 -72 is a huge part of that to show them, hey, 00:15:49.620 --> 00:15:51.679 we actually care about you. We want to invest 00:15:51.679 --> 00:15:53.840 in you. We want your marriage to stay intact 00:15:53.840 --> 00:15:56.360 and your kids still talk to you. So we're going 00:15:56.360 --> 00:16:00.539 to take care of you. Yeah, very important. All 00:16:00.539 --> 00:16:03.139 right. I think, you know, one of the things that 00:16:03.139 --> 00:16:07.460 I'll mention this again later also is that, you 00:16:07.460 --> 00:16:10.860 know, and I know you know this probably have 00:16:10.860 --> 00:16:13.120 better, more up -to -date statistics than I do. 00:16:13.279 --> 00:16:17.100 But when we start getting into firefighter and 00:16:17.100 --> 00:16:22.340 first responder fatalities or suicides. It's 00:16:22.340 --> 00:16:25.899 quite astounding. And that even more so makes 00:16:25.899 --> 00:16:29.820 me wonder why, honestly, anybody would want to 00:16:29.820 --> 00:16:33.500 come into this job if they knew that. It's terribly 00:16:33.500 --> 00:16:36.220 sad because I think this is a very personally 00:16:36.220 --> 00:16:41.730 fulfilling career. Can be. Yeah, 100%. I mean, 00:16:41.750 --> 00:16:43.990 we work together. I mean, just working in, for 00:16:43.990 --> 00:16:46.730 example, Battalion 4 in Orange County, you are 00:16:46.730 --> 00:16:50.110 going to get fires and all kinds of crazy, crazy 00:16:50.110 --> 00:16:51.830 calls. And you're truly going to make a difference, 00:16:52.029 --> 00:16:54.269 arguably, to some of the most desperate people 00:16:54.269 --> 00:16:57.769 in society. So this is what's so sad is the calling 00:16:57.769 --> 00:17:00.190 is amazing. But people say, oh, it's what you 00:17:00.190 --> 00:17:02.500 signed up for. It's like, no. When we went to 00:17:02.500 --> 00:17:04.440 fire Academy, we went to EMT school, we went 00:17:04.440 --> 00:17:06.920 to medic school. They weren't talking about mandatory 00:17:06.920 --> 00:17:10.000 overtime. You know, they were talking about the 00:17:10.000 --> 00:17:12.920 job itself. So we have an amazing opportunity 00:17:12.920 --> 00:17:16.720 to go back to that. We really do, but we have 00:17:16.720 --> 00:17:18.880 to fix the things that are broken. We just haven't 00:17:18.880 --> 00:17:21.400 evolved. And yet the calls have just gone through 00:17:21.400 --> 00:17:23.579 the roof and the staffing has stayed the same, 00:17:23.640 --> 00:17:28.880 arguably come down even. Yeah. The classic response 00:17:28.880 --> 00:17:33.069 you would get is the best job in the world. What's 00:17:33.069 --> 00:17:36.470 sad as well about the suicide statistics, people 00:17:36.470 --> 00:17:39.349 will quote what's actually studied. And it's 00:17:39.349 --> 00:17:41.930 like, OK, I understand that. How many people 00:17:41.930 --> 00:17:44.269 do you know personally that we've lost to suicide 00:17:44.269 --> 00:17:47.390 or overdose? And they said died suddenly in the 00:17:47.390 --> 00:17:49.829 announcement. They weren't counted. How many 00:17:49.829 --> 00:17:53.390 people get to retirement and then they take their 00:17:53.390 --> 00:17:55.690 own life? None of us are counted in statistics 00:17:55.690 --> 00:17:58.730 once you leave the fire service. So I would argue 00:17:58.730 --> 00:18:00.970 that the numbers that we see are the absolute 00:18:00.970 --> 00:18:03.789 tip of a massive, massive iceberg, which makes 00:18:03.789 --> 00:18:07.630 it even more startling. Yeah, I agree. 100%. 00:18:07.630 --> 00:18:11.329 All right. Well, then when you were in the high 00:18:11.329 --> 00:18:13.769 school age. what were you thinking as far as 00:18:13.769 --> 00:18:15.970 career aspiration was it already the fire service 00:18:15.970 --> 00:18:18.650 was it something else no definitely not um in 00:18:18.650 --> 00:18:21.029 fact my mom was a nurse my grandma was a nurse 00:18:21.029 --> 00:18:24.349 so i and in fact every halloween when i was a 00:18:24.349 --> 00:18:26.309 kid i dressed up as a nurse because that's what 00:18:26.309 --> 00:18:30.049 i thought i was going to be and so um once i 00:18:30.049 --> 00:18:33.349 got through high school i really didn't i really 00:18:33.349 --> 00:18:36.730 wasn't uh that young adult that thought i knew 00:18:36.730 --> 00:18:40.630 what i was going to do i really um i wasn't until 00:18:40.630 --> 00:18:45.220 about 25 when I had my son that I started thinking, 00:18:45.319 --> 00:18:47.640 I think I was supposed to be doing something 00:18:47.640 --> 00:18:52.750 with my life and I hadn't done it yet. Obviously, 00:18:52.750 --> 00:18:55.069 when you're looking at a child that depends on 00:18:55.069 --> 00:18:58.490 you, it was the ultimate reality check for me 00:18:58.490 --> 00:19:00.609 that I needed to do something more with my life. 00:19:00.690 --> 00:19:03.750 And I knew I had a calling. I just had not stepped 00:19:03.750 --> 00:19:06.170 into it yet. And I don't know that I would have 00:19:06.170 --> 00:19:10.549 been, for me anyways, any younger than that, 00:19:10.549 --> 00:19:13.750 that I would have been emotionally and mentally 00:19:13.750 --> 00:19:19.130 prepared. to be the patient care provider and 00:19:19.130 --> 00:19:26.029 the steward to the people that I was when I became 00:19:26.029 --> 00:19:29.869 a firefighter paramedic. So I don't know that 00:19:29.869 --> 00:19:32.309 I would have been able to provide that same love 00:19:32.309 --> 00:19:35.109 and care and compassion that I share with people 00:19:35.109 --> 00:19:39.009 now. I don't think I would have been ready for 00:19:39.009 --> 00:19:46.180 that at 22 or 23. But I decided that I was going 00:19:46.180 --> 00:19:49.460 to go to EMT school first. And so I went to EMT 00:19:49.460 --> 00:19:50.900 school and I said, you know what, let me go to 00:19:50.900 --> 00:19:54.440 EMT school and see if I can handle all these 00:19:54.440 --> 00:19:56.980 cool things that I see on TV that look like, 00:19:56.980 --> 00:19:59.460 you know, what I'm going to do for the job. And 00:19:59.460 --> 00:20:04.440 so I went to EMT school and I loved it. But I 00:20:04.440 --> 00:20:07.619 learned right then when I did my clinicals and 00:20:07.619 --> 00:20:10.579 my ride alongs, I learned instantly that I was 00:20:10.579 --> 00:20:13.099 not going to be a nurse. I at least knew that 00:20:13.099 --> 00:20:15.619 my place wasn't in the hospital, and I learned 00:20:15.619 --> 00:20:18.380 that I loved pre -hospital care. I loved being 00:20:18.380 --> 00:20:22.099 that first person with patient contact. I had 00:20:22.099 --> 00:20:30.119 done my turns in the ER for my clinicals, and 00:20:30.119 --> 00:20:38.230 there were a lot of really angry nurses. i just 00:20:38.230 --> 00:20:40.430 remember thinking like i i don't think that these 00:20:40.430 --> 00:20:42.250 i don't remember i think i remember thinking 00:20:42.250 --> 00:20:44.710 that it didn't seem like any of the nurses are 00:20:44.710 --> 00:20:47.130 very happy doing their job which sent a very 00:20:47.130 --> 00:20:49.009 clear message to me that maybe this is not what 00:20:49.009 --> 00:20:51.450 i want to do because i what i was coming in for 00:20:51.450 --> 00:20:55.430 is happiness you know and and then i went and 00:20:55.430 --> 00:20:57.190 did my ride -alongs i did some with the city 00:20:57.190 --> 00:21:00.859 of orlando i did some with orange county And 00:21:00.859 --> 00:21:04.460 I loved it. I instantly fell in love with the 00:21:04.460 --> 00:21:06.259 camaraderie at the station. I think a lot of 00:21:06.259 --> 00:21:08.059 that's because I have two older brothers. So 00:21:08.059 --> 00:21:10.940 I was really used to that environment of a lot 00:21:10.940 --> 00:21:15.079 of guys and that camaraderie and the jokes and 00:21:15.079 --> 00:21:19.079 stuff. I absolutely loved that. And then when 00:21:19.079 --> 00:21:23.000 we ran calls, I loved being that initial patient 00:21:23.000 --> 00:21:27.900 contact care person. That kind of makes you feel 00:21:27.900 --> 00:21:30.359 like you come in, swoop in and save the day and, 00:21:30.359 --> 00:21:32.980 you know, bring the calm to the storm. I really, 00:21:33.039 --> 00:21:36.279 really love that. And I knew in that moment after 00:21:36.279 --> 00:21:39.000 the clinical and the ride along, I knew exactly 00:21:39.000 --> 00:21:42.539 what I was supposed to do with my life. I had 00:21:42.539 --> 00:21:44.859 not chosen my exact pathway at that point, but 00:21:44.859 --> 00:21:47.140 I had a lot of friends in the fire service and 00:21:47.140 --> 00:21:50.440 for another adjoining county that I was good 00:21:50.440 --> 00:21:52.180 friends with who said, you know what, you should. 00:21:52.859 --> 00:21:54.880 you know go to standards and then go to medic 00:21:54.880 --> 00:21:57.079 school and i was i knew i was already going to 00:21:57.079 --> 00:21:58.980 go to mexico i had already taken my prereqs for 00:21:58.980 --> 00:22:01.900 it as well and i said you know what let me um 00:22:01.900 --> 00:22:04.359 let me look more into the fire service and then 00:22:04.359 --> 00:22:07.579 i i discovered that i also loved the physical 00:22:07.579 --> 00:22:10.099 aspects of the job the challenges of the job 00:22:10.099 --> 00:22:14.980 i also loved what seemed to be what i would call 00:22:14.980 --> 00:22:18.319 as a greater sense of equality Right. So the 00:22:18.319 --> 00:22:20.640 way I compare it is the game of golf. I'm not 00:22:20.640 --> 00:22:22.460 a very good golfer, but I'll golf with my brother 00:22:22.460 --> 00:22:26.720 every now and then for fun. And, you know, I 00:22:26.720 --> 00:22:29.900 tee up a little bit closer than he does right 00:22:29.900 --> 00:22:32.279 in the game of golf. And I never liked that. 00:22:32.299 --> 00:22:34.759 I always wanted to know that I had to shoot the 00:22:34.759 --> 00:22:37.680 shot just as good as the guy did, you know, to 00:22:37.680 --> 00:22:39.740 get hired or to get the job or for the position. 00:22:40.420 --> 00:22:43.980 So. I felt like the fire service, you know, like 00:22:43.980 --> 00:22:45.960 I had to take the same test the next guy did. 00:22:46.059 --> 00:22:48.160 I had to do all the same things. I had to carry 00:22:48.160 --> 00:22:51.539 the same weight, you know, as the other male 00:22:51.539 --> 00:22:54.460 or female that was competing for the same job. 00:22:54.559 --> 00:22:56.420 So I really liked that about the fire service, 00:22:56.480 --> 00:22:59.019 and I loved the physical challenges that I thought 00:22:59.019 --> 00:23:02.559 I was going to face doing the job. And so I said, 00:23:02.579 --> 00:23:05.180 let me go put in some applications and see if 00:23:05.180 --> 00:23:08.200 I can get a job. And I had a couple in. I went 00:23:08.200 --> 00:23:11.460 to standards, got hired, and went right to medical 00:23:11.460 --> 00:23:15.279 school. Going back to one thing you said about 00:23:15.279 --> 00:23:18.380 the nurses first, when I kind of look firstly 00:23:18.380 --> 00:23:20.319 at the shifts that they work, again, people talk 00:23:20.319 --> 00:23:22.460 about, oh, maybe 12 should be better. Nurses 00:23:22.460 --> 00:23:24.440 are a perfect example. Do they look happy? Do 00:23:24.440 --> 00:23:26.859 they look healthy? No. So that's not the answer. 00:23:27.220 --> 00:23:29.980 But I can also imagine, I hated the hospitals 00:23:29.980 --> 00:23:32.500 too. I actually had my prereqs ready for do the 00:23:32.500 --> 00:23:35.359 PA program at UF. And then I was like, nah, that's 00:23:35.359 --> 00:23:38.099 just not the right fit for me. But you think 00:23:38.099 --> 00:23:41.480 about the futility. In most things in life, whether 00:23:41.480 --> 00:23:44.119 it's a business, whether it's a military mission, 00:23:44.440 --> 00:23:48.119 you are moving towards a goal. But I can't imagine 00:23:48.119 --> 00:23:52.319 spending 20, 30 years in nursing. And despite 00:23:52.319 --> 00:23:54.839 all of your efforts, the people that walk through 00:23:54.839 --> 00:23:56.920 the doors get sicker and sicker. And there's 00:23:56.920 --> 00:23:59.059 more and more of them. You know, the obesity 00:23:59.059 --> 00:24:00.900 crisis is getting worse and worse and worse. 00:24:01.079 --> 00:24:04.180 You know, the overdoses. So it's no wonder that 00:24:04.180 --> 00:24:06.799 our medical professionals get burned out because 00:24:06.799 --> 00:24:10.339 despite all their hard work. it doesn't get better. 00:24:10.700 --> 00:24:16.619 Right. Yeah. Yeah, I knew pretty quickly it wasn't 00:24:16.619 --> 00:24:21.099 for me. From all the clinicals that I did, and 00:24:21.099 --> 00:24:23.019 even when I went to medic school and did clinicals, 00:24:23.019 --> 00:24:25.400 and then I went to UF and took my critical care 00:24:25.400 --> 00:24:28.079 and did clinicals, there were not very many happy 00:24:28.079 --> 00:24:33.099 nurses. So every time I had to do them, it was 00:24:33.099 --> 00:24:34.759 just a confirmation that I was choosing the right 00:24:34.759 --> 00:24:38.339 path. Well, you talked about the kind of equality 00:24:38.339 --> 00:24:41.660 element as well. With you having been bodybuilding 00:24:41.660 --> 00:24:45.259 and CrossFit, what is your perspective of fitness 00:24:45.259 --> 00:24:49.279 standards in the fire service? For me, we went 00:24:49.279 --> 00:24:50.519 through school. I don't know if you went to Mid 00:24:50.519 --> 00:24:53.440 -Florida Tech. That's where I went. It was called 00:24:53.440 --> 00:24:55.519 minimum standards. That's literally what they 00:24:55.519 --> 00:24:58.700 label our certification. And at that point, you're 00:24:58.700 --> 00:25:01.180 asked to do the firefighter challenge and all 00:25:01.180 --> 00:25:04.460 these things that are extremely taxing. And then 00:25:04.460 --> 00:25:06.299 you go into the profession and then you're told, 00:25:06.400 --> 00:25:08.220 oh, there's no standards. And then when people 00:25:08.220 --> 00:25:09.740 try and talk about it, oh, you're trying to take 00:25:09.740 --> 00:25:12.880 our jobs. I, James Gearing, have a massive problem 00:25:12.880 --> 00:25:15.599 with that, that we are asked to do incredible 00:25:15.599 --> 00:25:18.740 things, sometimes physically, and that we have 00:25:18.740 --> 00:25:21.359 no standard. But an ocean lifeguard or a special 00:25:21.359 --> 00:25:23.839 forces soldier is held to a very high standard. 00:25:24.099 --> 00:25:26.480 So what is your perspective on that whole concept, 00:25:26.680 --> 00:25:29.380 meeting the bar at the front door, regardless 00:25:29.380 --> 00:25:33.140 of gender? Yeah. So the reason why I think that 00:25:33.140 --> 00:25:35.680 happens first and foremost is because the industry 00:25:35.680 --> 00:25:39.140 is at such a demand for people that if we maintain 00:25:39.140 --> 00:25:42.019 a standard, we won't be able to hire anybody. 00:25:42.460 --> 00:25:48.400 I mean, it's sad, but I think that there's not 00:25:48.400 --> 00:25:51.480 enough emphasis. on physical fitness and the 00:25:51.480 --> 00:25:54.880 fire service and holding true people truly accountable 00:25:54.880 --> 00:25:58.519 for that. And having those requirements, you 00:25:58.519 --> 00:26:02.079 know, I mean, for us, we, if you were hired by 00:26:02.079 --> 00:26:03.960 a certain date, you don't even have to finish 00:26:03.960 --> 00:26:08.819 a particular basic baseline test within a certain 00:26:08.819 --> 00:26:10.420 amount of time that everybody else does. And 00:26:10.420 --> 00:26:14.829 so there's just no standard. you know, we can't 00:26:14.829 --> 00:26:16.490 hold people accountable for that. I've talked 00:26:16.490 --> 00:26:18.009 to other people in other departments outside 00:26:18.009 --> 00:26:21.690 of Florida that they have like body fat tests 00:26:21.690 --> 00:26:24.349 and everything, and they'll terminate you if 00:26:24.349 --> 00:26:26.269 you don't meet this criteria. So I know that 00:26:26.269 --> 00:26:28.170 it exists. I don't know how they do it. And we 00:26:28.170 --> 00:26:30.329 can't, I don't know if it's the size of the department 00:26:30.329 --> 00:26:34.390 that makes it such a big deal, but there is definitely 00:26:34.390 --> 00:26:40.869 not enough emphasis and standards being held 00:26:40.869 --> 00:26:44.940 accountability. to being of any sort of physical 00:26:44.940 --> 00:26:46.500 fitness, right? That doesn't mean you have to 00:26:46.500 --> 00:26:49.400 be into CrossFit. I mean, I love CrossFit because 00:26:49.400 --> 00:26:51.900 I like the fast pace. I'm not really a yoga person, 00:26:52.000 --> 00:26:54.140 you know? Like, I really like the fast pace, 00:26:54.339 --> 00:26:56.599 you know, pick up heavy shit and throw heavy 00:26:56.599 --> 00:27:01.000 shit around. I like that kind of stuff. And I 00:27:01.000 --> 00:27:03.279 have a very competitive nature. That doesn't 00:27:03.279 --> 00:27:06.900 mean that that has to be what a firefighter looks 00:27:06.900 --> 00:27:10.480 like. You know, it can be all kinds of, you know, 00:27:10.500 --> 00:27:13.640 we have lots of people who do, you know, who 00:27:13.640 --> 00:27:18.220 are cyclists and runners and people who do yoga. 00:27:18.319 --> 00:27:23.160 So there, but we are. We have brought in so many 00:27:23.160 --> 00:27:25.980 young adults who have never worked out a day 00:27:25.980 --> 00:27:28.859 in their life and and and have no interest in 00:27:28.859 --> 00:27:31.759 it. You know, now some of that, I think, can 00:27:31.759 --> 00:27:33.480 be because they're young and they didn't have 00:27:33.480 --> 00:27:36.240 that foundation already. And sometimes we bring 00:27:36.240 --> 00:27:38.160 them in and then you get to watch this person 00:27:38.160 --> 00:27:43.579 blossom into this amazing human. Right. Who has 00:27:43.579 --> 00:27:45.859 now adopted these great healthy lifestyles. So 00:27:45.859 --> 00:27:48.180 we have a heavy influence on some of these people 00:27:48.180 --> 00:27:52.039 also. You know, but there is just not enough 00:27:52.039 --> 00:27:58.579 emphasis on that. There's not a standard, actually. 00:27:59.259 --> 00:28:01.440 You know, we say, okay, this is what you have 00:28:01.440 --> 00:28:04.980 to do, you know, every year. But the reality 00:28:04.980 --> 00:28:07.059 is, let me turn this down. I'm sorry, it keeps 00:28:07.059 --> 00:28:11.329 going off. But the reality is. There actually 00:28:11.329 --> 00:28:15.349 is not a standard. And we may say you have to 00:28:15.349 --> 00:28:20.009 reach this. And so the goal, if you will, that 00:28:20.009 --> 00:28:21.970 we tell people for our department that you have 00:28:21.970 --> 00:28:25.630 to get to is not even a minimum standard. It's 00:28:25.630 --> 00:28:29.549 not a standard, right? It's just like this is 00:28:29.549 --> 00:28:31.670 what you have to do. But if you don't pass it, 00:28:31.730 --> 00:28:35.930 there is no repercussion. You know, there's there, 00:28:36.089 --> 00:28:38.210 you know, we'll we'll set you up on a plan. We'll 00:28:38.210 --> 00:28:40.910 offer you a trainer. We so there are things that 00:28:40.910 --> 00:28:46.329 we have in place that to help people. But there 00:28:46.329 --> 00:28:50.250 isn't any repercussions for not maintaining some 00:28:50.250 --> 00:28:54.130 level of fitness or reaching the goal. I think 00:28:54.130 --> 00:28:57.210 that's very common. How competitive was it when 00:28:57.210 --> 00:29:02.460 you tested? I would say that it was pretty competitive. 00:29:03.400 --> 00:29:07.720 It was, you know, and actually I recall I was 00:29:07.720 --> 00:29:10.799 testing for two different departments and I called 00:29:10.799 --> 00:29:12.700 the department I work for now and was trying 00:29:12.700 --> 00:29:17.420 to get one of my assessments rescheduled because 00:29:17.420 --> 00:29:19.839 I had an assessment at another department at 00:29:19.839 --> 00:29:22.160 the same time. And I was very transparent about 00:29:22.160 --> 00:29:24.480 that. I just believe in being honest at all costs. 00:29:25.240 --> 00:29:27.660 And so I said, well, I have this other thing. 00:29:27.759 --> 00:29:30.319 And actually their response was, then you need 00:29:30.319 --> 00:29:32.779 to decide who you want to work for. And I thought, 00:29:32.839 --> 00:29:35.039 oh, I better get my shit together, you know? 00:29:35.740 --> 00:29:42.579 And then I made, that is exactly what I did is 00:29:42.579 --> 00:29:46.259 I focused in on that department and focused in 00:29:46.259 --> 00:29:49.180 on my training for that task. I had my dog who's 00:29:49.180 --> 00:29:55.099 trying to join me here. And so I think it was 00:29:55.099 --> 00:29:58.500 very competitive for me. And there weren't, you 00:29:58.500 --> 00:30:00.140 know, I've been in the fire service for almost 00:30:00.140 --> 00:30:03.880 18 years. There weren't as many women then as 00:30:03.880 --> 00:30:08.720 there are now. And there was definitely a lot 00:30:08.720 --> 00:30:11.019 of focus, I think, on departments bringing women 00:30:11.019 --> 00:30:13.319 on board. You know, I think the average last 00:30:13.319 --> 00:30:16.160 I knew was about one to two percent in a department. 00:30:16.400 --> 00:30:20.200 And we we are somewhere around eight or nine 00:30:20.200 --> 00:30:22.400 percent, maybe even a little bit higher women. 00:30:26.070 --> 00:30:31.670 So my class had six or seven girls out of like 00:30:31.670 --> 00:30:35.410 25 or 30 people that got hired together. And 00:30:35.410 --> 00:30:38.769 that was a tremendous amount of women to come 00:30:38.769 --> 00:30:42.170 in at one time. So there was a lot of competition. 00:30:42.549 --> 00:30:47.430 My hiring process in general was about nine months 00:30:47.430 --> 00:30:51.259 long. You know, and I knew or at least I felt 00:30:51.259 --> 00:30:53.279 in my mind at the time. I don't know if this 00:30:53.279 --> 00:30:56.180 is real or not in hindsight, but I felt like 00:30:56.180 --> 00:30:58.720 there was a lot of competition and I felt like 00:30:58.720 --> 00:31:00.980 I had to do my best at everything. And whatever 00:31:00.980 --> 00:31:03.480 I was doing to be my best, somebody else was 00:31:03.480 --> 00:31:05.559 working harder. And that was my drive to work 00:31:05.559 --> 00:31:08.519 harder to get the job. So this is what I love 00:31:08.519 --> 00:31:10.619 to hear, because I think I think you came on. 00:31:11.000 --> 00:31:14.079 to orange county a year after i did i came from 00:31:14.079 --> 00:31:16.079 the west coast and then and then joined when 00:31:16.079 --> 00:31:19.380 i moved back here um and you know compared to 00:31:19.380 --> 00:31:21.160 what i'd seen in the west coast you know orange 00:31:21.160 --> 00:31:23.640 county was was not as competitive and this is 00:31:23.640 --> 00:31:25.660 what was crazy is the one that was the most competitive 00:31:25.660 --> 00:31:28.779 had the highest standards they set the bar high 00:31:28.779 --> 00:31:31.279 and that attracted all the good firefighters 00:31:31.279 --> 00:31:34.380 so this mentality that you lower the bar i mean 00:31:34.380 --> 00:31:36.880 it's a it makes no sense and b it's so dangerous 00:31:36.880 --> 00:31:39.180 just to illustrate i've talked about this a few 00:31:39.180 --> 00:31:43.500 times on here We had a little boy, Trucker Duke's, 00:31:43.500 --> 00:31:45.799 pass away. He's the son of a Hawaiian firefighter. 00:31:45.880 --> 00:31:48.640 And when he did, I put together a little kind 00:31:48.640 --> 00:31:52.200 of workout to dedicate to him. And I called the 00:31:52.200 --> 00:31:54.319 tower Trucker's Tower. And the tower next to 00:31:54.319 --> 00:31:56.460 us where in my last apartment was 28 stories. 00:31:57.059 --> 00:31:59.700 So I just put on, when I got a few of my fellow 00:31:59.700 --> 00:32:02.420 firefighters, we just put on a high -rise strip, 00:32:02.579 --> 00:32:04.259 what you would actually need to fight fire at 00:32:04.259 --> 00:32:07.839 that level. So two extra tanks, hose, a tool, 00:32:08.000 --> 00:32:09.660 and obviously a pack and your bunker gear. That's 00:32:09.660 --> 00:32:12.990 it. At 168 pounds, that was another 100 pounds 00:32:12.990 --> 00:32:16.750 of gear. Then you climb 28 floors, and then you 00:32:16.750 --> 00:32:19.549 go to work. That's right. You are the parent 00:32:19.549 --> 00:32:21.910 of the child that's stuck on that 28th floor, 00:32:22.049 --> 00:32:25.130 and you find out that the person that was supposed 00:32:25.130 --> 00:32:27.549 to be going up to get them only made it to the 00:32:27.549 --> 00:32:30.609 fifth floor. This is what we're talking about. 00:32:30.970 --> 00:32:33.890 These standards, it's so fucking dangerous to 00:32:33.890 --> 00:32:37.250 have no standards in a job where sometimes we're 00:32:37.250 --> 00:32:39.329 just bandaging a sprained ankle. I get it. There's 00:32:39.329 --> 00:32:41.970 no real athleticism in that. But sometimes you're 00:32:41.970 --> 00:32:44.809 dragging people out of a school shooting or climbing 00:32:44.809 --> 00:32:47.529 a skyscraper because all the elevators are out. 00:32:47.750 --> 00:32:50.789 So this is what blows my mind is that you're 00:32:50.789 --> 00:32:52.730 going to have an Evaldi moment. One day we're 00:32:52.730 --> 00:32:55.549 going to have the Grenfell or whatever horrendous 00:32:55.549 --> 00:32:58.710 fire in our first year. And they're going to 00:32:58.710 --> 00:33:00.569 do an analysis and they're going to say, wait 00:33:00.569 --> 00:33:03.269 a second, how come half these firefighters didn't 00:33:03.269 --> 00:33:06.390 even get up to the fire floor? Now, the money 00:33:06.390 --> 00:33:08.309 you could have spent on actually hiring good 00:33:08.309 --> 00:33:10.930 firefighters and putting that bar in and putting 00:33:10.930 --> 00:33:13.509 in a D -shift, for example, the four platoon 00:33:13.509 --> 00:33:16.349 system, that you would have saved money hand 00:33:16.349 --> 00:33:18.670 over fist from the lawsuits of all the dead people. 00:33:19.109 --> 00:33:24.809 Yeah. It's pretty wild. Yeah. You know, and I 00:33:24.809 --> 00:33:30.660 think, I think. You know, for us and for some 00:33:30.660 --> 00:33:34.299 other adjoining departments that I've seen, just 00:33:34.299 --> 00:33:38.519 also promoting people into positions of strong 00:33:38.519 --> 00:33:42.339 leadership who also don't have that physical 00:33:42.339 --> 00:33:46.700 presentation, if you will. And I hate to make 00:33:46.700 --> 00:33:48.660 it sound like, oh, it's the physical thing, right? 00:33:48.740 --> 00:33:53.819 But, you know, you're in a lot of cases. your 00:33:53.819 --> 00:33:56.500 physical presentation. And I may not, and I'm 00:33:56.500 --> 00:33:58.559 not necessarily just talking about body fat here, 00:33:58.640 --> 00:34:01.420 right? I'm talking about how you prepare yourself, 00:34:01.579 --> 00:34:06.059 your hair, your, your hygiene, right? How you 00:34:06.059 --> 00:34:08.280 dress is your shirt tucked in, like how you are 00:34:08.280 --> 00:34:11.670 presenting yourself to the world. on how you 00:34:11.670 --> 00:34:14.190 are presenting yourself to the organization shows 00:34:14.190 --> 00:34:16.829 everybody what kind of control and discipline 00:34:16.829 --> 00:34:19.190 you have in your life and how that and that's 00:34:19.190 --> 00:34:21.909 going to come into your professional life as 00:34:21.909 --> 00:34:26.150 well and so when i see departments that put people 00:34:26.150 --> 00:34:31.690 in positions of strong leadership let me rephrase 00:34:31.690 --> 00:34:34.969 that of strong influence right and that leadership 00:34:34.969 --> 00:34:41.389 role that don't Check any of those boxes that 00:34:41.389 --> 00:34:43.550 they appear to be a person who has got their 00:34:43.550 --> 00:34:47.309 life together. Right. Who has who has discipline 00:34:47.309 --> 00:34:50.710 and self -control and leadership. Yeah, I have 00:34:50.710 --> 00:34:53.750 to scratch my head at that because I think that's 00:34:53.750 --> 00:34:56.670 shameful. And I think it's shameful because not 00:34:56.670 --> 00:34:58.510 everybody has to be, you know, a bodybuilder 00:34:58.510 --> 00:35:00.969 or CrossFit or, you know, I'm only in pickleball 00:35:00.969 --> 00:35:03.369 shape right now, you know, but not everybody 00:35:03.369 --> 00:35:06.949 has to be a certain image. I don't want to make 00:35:06.949 --> 00:35:09.329 it sound superficial like that, but there is 00:35:09.329 --> 00:35:11.449 something to be said, you know, when you can 00:35:11.449 --> 00:35:13.829 look at somebody and say, there's a different 00:35:13.829 --> 00:35:16.349 level of reverence, right? When you look at somebody 00:35:16.349 --> 00:35:19.150 who's in charge of something and you can see 00:35:19.150 --> 00:35:21.820 that they also have. charge of their own personal 00:35:21.820 --> 00:35:24.079 life and their own personal health. It really 00:35:24.079 --> 00:35:29.440 says something. So I think we continue to breed 00:35:29.440 --> 00:35:34.719 this culture that that's okay. There have got 00:35:34.719 --> 00:35:37.739 to be better options. I'm suspicious as to why 00:35:37.739 --> 00:35:43.000 that happens. But sadly, when we put that on 00:35:43.000 --> 00:35:46.659 the forefront, I think we're showing what we're 00:35:46.659 --> 00:35:49.889 looking for for people. Yeah, I was very sad 00:35:49.889 --> 00:35:53.309 to hear when Chief Droz was ousted because to 00:35:53.309 --> 00:35:55.250 me, I worked with him in Hialeah as well. We 00:35:55.250 --> 00:35:57.170 always joke that every time he was my chief, 00:35:57.230 --> 00:36:01.010 I left. But, you know, he walked the walk. I 00:36:01.010 --> 00:36:03.210 think he was a great spokesperson. I think he 00:36:03.210 --> 00:36:05.610 was a great leader. I mean, I watched, for example, 00:36:05.809 --> 00:36:08.070 the dive program and some of those other ones 00:36:08.070 --> 00:36:11.639 have some life. breathed back into him and he 00:36:11.639 --> 00:36:13.659 allowed the people that originally created them 00:36:13.659 --> 00:36:16.159 to go ahead and continue and i watched him in 00:36:16.159 --> 00:36:18.239 the fit pit all the time working out constantly 00:36:18.239 --> 00:36:21.739 you know so that to me is a good fire service 00:36:21.739 --> 00:36:26.420 leader yeah uh chief droads was um he is an amazing 00:36:26.420 --> 00:36:30.800 leader um and he i felt like was an amazing leader 00:36:30.800 --> 00:36:35.400 an example for us um i was very sad to see him 00:36:35.400 --> 00:36:40.880 go um But I can tell you that I still have a 00:36:40.880 --> 00:36:42.719 really great relationship with him. I have an 00:36:42.719 --> 00:36:46.420 immense amount of respect for him. And when I 00:36:46.420 --> 00:36:49.539 think of Chief Drodes, what I think about is 00:36:49.539 --> 00:36:53.739 the leadership that he showed us, right? Not 00:36:53.739 --> 00:36:57.119 every organization is going to be so blessed 00:36:57.119 --> 00:37:01.519 to have experienced somebody like him. And so 00:37:01.519 --> 00:37:04.400 what he brings to the table, I think, is so cool 00:37:04.400 --> 00:37:06.019 and so very important. And I talk about this 00:37:06.019 --> 00:37:07.780 a lot when I talk about I'll talk about leadership 00:37:07.780 --> 00:37:10.000 for a second. When I talk about leadership is 00:37:10.000 --> 00:37:12.780 everybody understands these kind of analogies 00:37:12.780 --> 00:37:16.920 because you're either an adult child or you are 00:37:16.920 --> 00:37:19.400 a parent. Right. And so everybody knows that 00:37:19.400 --> 00:37:22.559 when you have kids, especially if you have more 00:37:22.559 --> 00:37:26.000 than one kid. Now, I'm talking about children, 00:37:26.159 --> 00:37:30.000 but relate this. to firefighters, right? Sometimes 00:37:30.000 --> 00:37:32.980 I say firemen, sorry. Relate this to firefighters. 00:37:34.840 --> 00:37:37.440 When you're a lieutenant and you have five or 00:37:37.440 --> 00:37:40.400 six firefighters in your house, those are your 00:37:40.400 --> 00:37:43.099 kids, right? I'm a captain. I got a whole bunch 00:37:43.099 --> 00:37:46.699 of them. These are my kids, right? And so when 00:37:46.699 --> 00:37:49.539 I'm using these analogies, I'm really applying 00:37:49.539 --> 00:37:55.400 this to my leadership in the fire service. Not 00:37:55.400 --> 00:37:59.699 every child is going to respond the same right 00:37:59.699 --> 00:38:02.619 you have brother you have siblings yes yeah one 00:38:02.619 --> 00:38:07.300 of five oh my that's a lot of kids that's like 00:38:07.300 --> 00:38:09.300 your mom and dad had their own firehouse is what 00:38:09.300 --> 00:38:11.719 they had yeah well we were kind of feral because 00:38:11.719 --> 00:38:13.679 they were my dad was a veterinary surgeon so 00:38:13.679 --> 00:38:15.980 he was off running calls and mom was in the office 00:38:15.980 --> 00:38:18.420 so we were like it was a lord of the flies on 00:38:18.420 --> 00:38:21.179 the farm basically yeah well a lot of most kids 00:38:21.179 --> 00:38:24.420 are feral anyways but you know there was there 00:38:24.420 --> 00:38:26.900 was a And, you know, you'll be able to identify 00:38:26.900 --> 00:38:29.480 what kind of child you were, which just really 00:38:29.480 --> 00:38:31.460 transitions a lot into how you are as an adult. 00:38:31.980 --> 00:38:35.599 But, you know, there's some some firefighters 00:38:35.599 --> 00:38:37.460 you can look at, some kids you can look at and 00:38:37.460 --> 00:38:38.639 you can just give them that look and they'll 00:38:38.639 --> 00:38:41.539 start crying. They'll do when you go, James, 00:38:41.760 --> 00:38:44.340 OK, I won't do it anymore. Right. And then you 00:38:44.340 --> 00:38:47.280 have the other kid, you know, you maybe this 00:38:47.280 --> 00:38:50.360 is you or you're one of your other siblings that 00:38:50.360 --> 00:38:52.719 you can beat the hell out of them and they'll 00:38:52.719 --> 00:38:56.230 come back for more. You know, and so organizations 00:38:56.230 --> 00:38:59.530 want us to treat everybody the same, you know, 00:38:59.530 --> 00:39:02.489 to have this equality of how we treat people. 00:39:02.590 --> 00:39:04.750 But that's not real and that's not good leadership. 00:39:05.030 --> 00:39:09.469 And what I loved about Drodes is that he expressed 00:39:09.469 --> 00:39:12.210 some of that leadership, not necessarily in those 00:39:12.210 --> 00:39:14.949 terms, but we always knew where we were going. 00:39:15.070 --> 00:39:19.389 And so I always say like when you're in a relationship 00:39:19.389 --> 00:39:22.059 with somebody. there's going to come a point 00:39:22.059 --> 00:39:23.860 in time, whether it's the male or the female 00:39:23.860 --> 00:39:25.860 or whoever it is in the relationship is going 00:39:25.860 --> 00:39:29.420 to come forward and say, so what are we doing 00:39:29.420 --> 00:39:32.139 with this? Right? Where are we going? Where's 00:39:32.139 --> 00:39:33.860 our relationship going? Are we getting married? 00:39:34.000 --> 00:39:36.380 Are we having kids? Do you love me? Like, are 00:39:36.380 --> 00:39:37.960 we going to move in together? What's the next 00:39:37.960 --> 00:39:40.530 step? You know what I mean? And that's really 00:39:40.530 --> 00:39:43.710 important for humans because we need to know 00:39:43.710 --> 00:39:45.469 where we're going in our life because forward 00:39:45.469 --> 00:39:48.949 progression is how we move. It's how we grow 00:39:48.949 --> 00:39:51.710 and it's how we maintain happiness and fulfillment 00:39:51.710 --> 00:39:53.789 in our life. So if you don't have that and you 00:39:53.789 --> 00:39:55.730 don't have it in a relationship, what do people 00:39:55.730 --> 00:39:57.550 start doing? They start scratching their head 00:39:57.550 --> 00:39:59.269 and they're saying, well, I wonder what it would 00:39:59.269 --> 00:40:02.710 be like with this person. You know, I wonder 00:40:02.710 --> 00:40:06.050 what my relationship would be like. All it takes 00:40:06.050 --> 00:40:09.409 is some other male or female to come along and 00:40:09.409 --> 00:40:12.090 tell you you look pretty that day, and then all 00:40:12.090 --> 00:40:13.769 of a sudden someone else has sparked your interest, 00:40:13.989 --> 00:40:17.449 and you can start figuring out real fast that 00:40:17.449 --> 00:40:21.929 maybe you're better served somewhere else. And 00:40:21.929 --> 00:40:23.989 so to bring it back around, what Drodes did is 00:40:23.989 --> 00:40:26.730 he always gave us direction. We always knew where 00:40:26.730 --> 00:40:28.969 we were going in our relationship, right? He 00:40:28.969 --> 00:40:33.329 came along and he said, We are going to be an 00:40:33.329 --> 00:40:38.210 ISO class one department. Okay. And this is the 00:40:38.210 --> 00:40:40.690 pathway to get there. You guys are going to do 00:40:40.690 --> 00:40:42.590 all the work. You guys are going to go flow, 00:40:42.750 --> 00:40:44.869 you know, hundreds of thousands of hydrants. 00:40:44.909 --> 00:40:46.889 You're going to do hundreds of thousands of PIPs. 00:40:46.929 --> 00:40:50.969 You're going to do all of this hard work, but 00:40:50.969 --> 00:40:52.269 I'm going to support you. I'm going to give you 00:40:52.269 --> 00:40:54.309 all the tools that you need. And that's going 00:40:54.309 --> 00:40:56.590 to be the pathway to success. Right. And then 00:40:56.590 --> 00:40:58.010 he came along and said, we're going to create 00:40:58.010 --> 00:41:00.690 a world -class dive team. I'm going to support 00:41:00.690 --> 00:41:02.690 you. I'm going to get you the funding. And so 00:41:02.690 --> 00:41:05.510 there was always direction on where we were going. 00:41:05.570 --> 00:41:08.650 We knew where we were all going in our relationship, 00:41:08.909 --> 00:41:13.570 you know, and a lot of departments don't have 00:41:13.570 --> 00:41:15.409 that. And so when you don't have that direction, 00:41:15.510 --> 00:41:16.949 you don't know where you're going. You start 00:41:16.949 --> 00:41:18.750 getting curious and you start looking for somewhere 00:41:18.750 --> 00:41:21.539 else to go. Whether that be another department 00:41:21.539 --> 00:41:25.119 or, you know, another somebody else in a relationship, 00:41:25.400 --> 00:41:27.179 you know, kind of thing. And so I think it's 00:41:27.179 --> 00:41:29.260 very important that people have that direction 00:41:29.260 --> 00:41:31.019 and they know this is what we're doing in life. 00:41:31.099 --> 00:41:33.480 This is what we're doing today for our job. This 00:41:33.480 --> 00:41:35.619 is what we're doing today for our physical health, 00:41:35.699 --> 00:41:38.179 our mental health, our spiritual health. Right. 00:41:38.199 --> 00:41:40.179 There's all different aspects. And you have to 00:41:40.179 --> 00:41:41.480 know where you're going and what you're doing, 00:41:41.539 --> 00:41:43.280 what the plan is. You know, otherwise you get 00:41:43.280 --> 00:41:45.469 bored and you. Probably sit on your phone and 00:41:45.469 --> 00:41:48.050 veg out on social media all day long, you know, 00:41:48.050 --> 00:41:50.889 which isn't exactly healthy either. You know, 00:41:50.889 --> 00:41:54.829 so Chief Drodes gave us a lot of excellent leadership 00:41:54.829 --> 00:41:57.949 and direction. And then he always had the support 00:41:57.949 --> 00:42:00.610 and he always knew who you were. And he always 00:42:00.610 --> 00:42:02.789 showed his face. And people need to see that, 00:42:02.829 --> 00:42:06.030 right? And even though he was very busy, he still 00:42:06.030 --> 00:42:10.329 made it known that he was present. And there's 00:42:10.329 --> 00:42:11.949 just something to be said for that. You know, 00:42:11.989 --> 00:42:16.230 when you don't know who your fire chief is, when 00:42:16.230 --> 00:42:19.269 you don't see your battalion chief, you don't 00:42:19.269 --> 00:42:21.690 see your leadership and they're not present, 00:42:21.809 --> 00:42:23.789 it's kind of like they're not there and you just 00:42:23.789 --> 00:42:27.429 want to go play with somebody else. Yeah. I mean, 00:42:27.429 --> 00:42:30.690 I saw it firsthand. I remember sitting in station 00:42:30.690 --> 00:42:34.530 50 when he came to visit and I was assigned at 00:42:34.530 --> 00:42:37.469 70. So we had the rescue boat and it was amazing. 00:42:37.530 --> 00:42:40.300 They'd float people through. that some of them 00:42:40.300 --> 00:42:42.659 couldn't even swim and you've been sent to a 00:42:42.659 --> 00:42:44.559 station where you might have to drive a boat 00:42:44.559 --> 00:42:48.179 to a lake back it down a dock then drive around 00:42:48.179 --> 00:42:49.860 and hopefully not kill the person that you need 00:42:49.860 --> 00:42:53.119 to save then jump in and understand how to backboard 00:42:53.119 --> 00:42:54.440 them and get them you know what i mean it's a 00:42:54.440 --> 00:42:56.500 very very i was a lifeguard for years it's a 00:42:56.500 --> 00:42:59.179 complex task that you're asking to do and so 00:42:59.179 --> 00:43:01.219 i was underlining that and wayne dormany had 00:43:01.219 --> 00:43:03.440 already been well involved in the the rescue 00:43:03.440 --> 00:43:06.070 diver side and i know And loads of people had 00:43:06.070 --> 00:43:07.650 tried to get it off ground the first time. So 00:43:07.650 --> 00:43:10.349 it's not that I had any big influence, but it 00:43:10.349 --> 00:43:13.469 was yet another voice. But I saw that actually 00:43:13.469 --> 00:43:16.449 make a difference. I saw him listen and go collectively 00:43:16.449 --> 00:43:18.670 all these voices I've heard about this dive program 00:43:18.670 --> 00:43:21.809 and the boats. They're right. We do need to fix 00:43:21.809 --> 00:43:24.070 this. And, you know, before I left, they were 00:43:24.070 --> 00:43:26.110 doing the surface diver and then ultimately went 00:43:26.110 --> 00:43:28.590 to the full on diver driver. And when he when 00:43:28.590 --> 00:43:30.550 he was my chief in Hialeah, we actually did rescue 00:43:30.550 --> 00:43:32.690 diver training because Hialeah is full of canals 00:43:32.690 --> 00:43:35.760 and lakes. So we did that in the academy. We 00:43:35.760 --> 00:43:37.840 got through all that dive training. So I know 00:43:37.840 --> 00:43:40.300 he had a background of that too. But what I saw, 00:43:40.340 --> 00:43:42.260 like you said, he was present in the stations. 00:43:43.019 --> 00:43:46.280 And if you were coming up with a problem and 00:43:46.280 --> 00:43:49.400 a solution, he empowered those people to actually 00:43:49.400 --> 00:43:51.940 do it. I mean, what the PIOs did, what the promos 00:43:51.940 --> 00:43:55.119 did as far as storytelling, all the amazing things 00:43:55.119 --> 00:43:57.139 that Orange County did, the lip sync battles 00:43:57.139 --> 00:44:00.059 with other departments. I mean, it was so good. 00:44:00.670 --> 00:44:03.670 And I just it blows my mind that whatever fragile 00:44:03.670 --> 00:44:06.610 egos behind the scenes were threatened by that, 00:44:06.650 --> 00:44:08.869 that they literally got rid of the best leader 00:44:08.869 --> 00:44:14.130 they've had in decades, arguably. Yeah, I definitely 00:44:14.130 --> 00:44:17.090 wouldn't argue that. That's, you know, I've seen, 00:44:17.170 --> 00:44:19.929 you know, 18 years worth of different leadership 00:44:19.929 --> 00:44:23.849 come through. And and I have a good working relationship 00:44:23.849 --> 00:44:27.489 with a lot of people, you know, so I don't want 00:44:27.489 --> 00:44:34.519 to make it sound like, you know. Drozd was wonderful. 00:44:35.900 --> 00:44:39.559 And I think that I don't know that there could 00:44:39.559 --> 00:44:45.340 be a better fire chief for me. When I see him, 00:44:45.340 --> 00:44:48.500 I still tell him he's my chief. I interviewed 00:44:48.500 --> 00:44:51.739 him just a few weeks ago. I'm hoping that he's 00:44:51.739 --> 00:44:53.920 going to get a very prominent national position. 00:44:54.179 --> 00:44:57.059 I'm still waiting to see, but I know he's in 00:44:57.059 --> 00:45:01.440 the running. Yeah. And, you know, I saw him at 00:45:01.440 --> 00:45:04.159 a union conference, and there was about 10 of 00:45:04.159 --> 00:45:11.199 us sitting at the table. And, you know, I feel 00:45:11.199 --> 00:45:15.239 that, I believe that if it was any other fire 00:45:15.239 --> 00:45:19.960 chief that we've had past or present, a lot of 00:45:19.960 --> 00:45:22.320 people might get up and shake a hand or, you 00:45:22.320 --> 00:45:24.539 know, do the hi thing. Because it was, you know, 00:45:24.539 --> 00:45:26.579 a dinner time kind of thing when he came by the 00:45:26.579 --> 00:45:30.860 table. But that's not what we did. Every single 00:45:30.860 --> 00:45:34.960 person at that table got up and walked over to 00:45:34.960 --> 00:45:38.960 him and shook his hand or hugged his neck. And 00:45:38.960 --> 00:45:41.920 that's just that is just the energy that he puts 00:45:41.920 --> 00:45:45.900 off and the leadership that he gives. And it's 00:45:45.900 --> 00:45:50.239 impressive. Absolutely. He does it right. He 00:45:50.239 --> 00:45:53.219 does. And the thing is, I I'm on this kind of 00:45:53.219 --> 00:45:55.829 chair at the moment to kind of call out. the 00:45:55.829 --> 00:45:58.550 poor leadership just because i mean i'm eight 00:45:58.550 --> 00:46:00.929 years plus deep into this podcast now with the 00:46:00.929 --> 00:46:03.750 same kind of messages and thousands of episodes 00:46:03.750 --> 00:46:08.050 with you know true smes you know layering this 00:46:08.050 --> 00:46:09.989 argument of you know how you fix this i mean 00:46:09.989 --> 00:46:12.230 the solutions are out there but it's really good 00:46:12.230 --> 00:46:14.710 to talk about some examples of good leadership 00:46:14.710 --> 00:46:16.829 because it does exist out there and we need to 00:46:16.829 --> 00:46:22.980 model those people it does i i i think that I 00:46:22.980 --> 00:46:25.659 don't know if that's really harder on that higher 00:46:25.659 --> 00:46:29.719 level of leadership. I find it hard to believe 00:46:29.719 --> 00:46:34.159 that it is other than staying true to yourself. 00:46:34.380 --> 00:46:37.260 And I do believe that with the right upper leadership 00:46:37.260 --> 00:46:39.460 that you can continue to promote through the 00:46:39.460 --> 00:46:42.960 ranks and stay true to who you are. And I mean, 00:46:42.960 --> 00:46:45.880 stay true to who you are, meaning you don't sell 00:46:45.880 --> 00:46:50.590 out to what some corrupt leadership wants. You 00:46:50.590 --> 00:46:57.809 know, and it's really disheartening when you 00:46:57.809 --> 00:47:01.869 want to give people what you think you have to 00:47:01.869 --> 00:47:08.469 offer, but you won't because of those what are 00:47:08.469 --> 00:47:11.610 seen as roadblocks above you. You know, that 00:47:11.610 --> 00:47:14.480 they want you to be a puppet. You know, they 00:47:14.480 --> 00:47:17.519 they want to they want you to say yes and do 00:47:17.519 --> 00:47:20.519 what they tell you to do without explaining anything. 00:47:21.179 --> 00:47:23.400 And I don't and I don't think that's good leadership. 00:47:23.559 --> 00:47:27.360 You know, I think I think people should be able 00:47:27.360 --> 00:47:29.159 to come to you and ask you questions. And I do 00:47:29.159 --> 00:47:30.699 believe in the chain of command. So don't misunderstand 00:47:30.699 --> 00:47:32.739 when I say that. But I think that people should 00:47:32.739 --> 00:47:36.000 be able to come to you, ask you questions and 00:47:36.000 --> 00:47:39.400 they your leadership should be able to give you 00:47:39.400 --> 00:47:44.980 a. answer that is based off of a policy a procedure 00:47:44.980 --> 00:47:51.079 a protocol right um logic common sense you know 00:47:51.079 --> 00:47:53.099 and safety things they they should be able to 00:47:53.099 --> 00:47:55.699 give you a proper answer for those things and 00:47:55.699 --> 00:47:58.659 not just because i said so That's not an answer. 00:47:58.719 --> 00:48:01.340 That doesn't create judgment. It doesn't create 00:48:01.340 --> 00:48:04.760 character. It doesn't create understanding. That's 00:48:04.760 --> 00:48:07.940 not succession planning. We're not bringing people 00:48:07.940 --> 00:48:10.099 up through the fire service to be leaders. We're 00:48:10.099 --> 00:48:13.059 bringing them up to be puppets. And that is going 00:48:13.059 --> 00:48:18.480 to cause major issues for people, their safety, 00:48:18.579 --> 00:48:21.260 first and foremost, but also their mental health. 00:48:21.579 --> 00:48:25.519 And I say that because people who don't feel 00:48:25.519 --> 00:48:32.360 like they have value will be of no value. I know 00:48:32.360 --> 00:48:35.860 it sounds super cliche, but that's just real. 00:48:35.960 --> 00:48:38.380 If you don't feel like you're contributing something 00:48:38.380 --> 00:48:41.980 to your career and to a department and to your 00:48:41.980 --> 00:48:44.820 crew and to your call, to your firehouse or whatever 00:48:44.820 --> 00:48:48.219 it is, then people will just stop feeling like 00:48:48.219 --> 00:48:50.809 they have a place. And we lose camaraderie. We 00:48:50.809 --> 00:48:52.889 lose brothership. It causes mental health problems. 00:48:52.969 --> 00:48:57.210 Like it's, it is a huge disconnect. You know, 00:48:57.230 --> 00:48:59.289 it's funny when you think about, you know, the 00:48:59.289 --> 00:49:01.429 fire service, let's take it another step further. 00:49:01.469 --> 00:49:05.369 Say you're Marines. We know that they break these 00:49:05.369 --> 00:49:08.409 young men and women down and then build them 00:49:08.409 --> 00:49:11.190 up to become Marines. I think in the fire service, 00:49:11.250 --> 00:49:14.530 we stopped at break these people down. So I agree 00:49:14.530 --> 00:49:16.550 with you completely. If you just leave them broken, 00:49:16.630 --> 00:49:18.900 you run them into the ground. you know, running 00:49:18.900 --> 00:49:21.639 five, six calls after midnight. And then they 00:49:21.639 --> 00:49:23.539 get that phone call at 7am that you're not going 00:49:23.539 --> 00:49:26.400 home, say for another 24, you know, we just, 00:49:26.420 --> 00:49:29.340 we just beaten them down. And I did a post not 00:49:29.340 --> 00:49:31.679 too long ago. And this is, this is how I feel. 00:49:32.179 --> 00:49:35.480 There is no greater cowardice than a leader who 00:49:35.480 --> 00:49:37.880 refuses to advocate for the health of their people. 00:49:39.099 --> 00:49:41.699 So if you have a retention problem, if you have 00:49:41.699 --> 00:49:45.059 suicides and cancers in your department, that's 00:49:45.059 --> 00:49:48.780 on you. That's the buck stops there. You're at 00:49:48.780 --> 00:49:51.679 the top of the pyramid. So if your department 00:49:51.679 --> 00:49:54.980 is crumbling, you're the person with the giant 00:49:54.980 --> 00:49:57.780 paycheck. You're the person with the jacket that 00:49:57.780 --> 00:49:59.579 looks like you're going to the freaking parade 00:49:59.579 --> 00:50:02.199 in New Orleans. So now it's time to earn those 00:50:02.199 --> 00:50:04.619 stripes and bugles, you know, and turn it around. 00:50:04.719 --> 00:50:07.460 I feel that's what Drozd did is he came in and, 00:50:07.500 --> 00:50:08.780 you know, no, you're not going to blame that 00:50:08.780 --> 00:50:11.159 person two weeks in, but he came in and was like, 00:50:11.199 --> 00:50:12.619 all right, like you said, what's the mission? 00:50:12.719 --> 00:50:15.860 How can we turn this around? But if like locally 00:50:15.860 --> 00:50:20.099 here, you've lost five of your firefighters in 00:50:20.099 --> 00:50:22.019 four years and almost lost another one. They 00:50:22.019 --> 00:50:24.739 just survived their attempt and you refuse to 00:50:24.739 --> 00:50:27.780 do anything. Like to me, there is no greater 00:50:27.780 --> 00:50:31.260 cowardice. You're literally a tiny, tiny man 00:50:31.260 --> 00:50:33.960 in this case wearing a uniform, but you haven't 00:50:33.960 --> 00:50:35.920 got the sack to actually do the job that you're 00:50:35.920 --> 00:50:38.559 supposed to be doing. And people are dying and 00:50:38.559 --> 00:50:42.059 you. are unmoved by it it just blows my mind 00:50:42.059 --> 00:50:44.519 i don't understand and then i don't understand 00:50:44.519 --> 00:50:47.179 if that person isn't doing it why the rest of 00:50:47.179 --> 00:50:50.199 the department isn't getting out you know forks 00:50:50.199 --> 00:50:53.679 and flicking you know torches and storming the 00:50:53.679 --> 00:50:55.139 castle and saying all right well then get the 00:50:55.139 --> 00:50:57.880 fuck out our people are dying you know if you're 00:50:57.880 --> 00:50:59.539 not going to do it fine then move out the way 00:50:59.539 --> 00:51:01.880 and let someone else do it this is what we need 00:51:01.880 --> 00:51:04.360 to do as a profession we need to stand up and 00:51:04.360 --> 00:51:07.239 demand change Yeah, I totally agree with you. 00:51:07.699 --> 00:51:11.079 You know, I think the issue, the reason why, 00:51:11.099 --> 00:51:13.219 in my opinion, you won't see that in some departments 00:51:13.219 --> 00:51:16.059 is because they've promoted a culture of people 00:51:16.059 --> 00:51:23.420 who won't stand up, right? There's a lot of leadership 00:51:23.420 --> 00:51:25.739 out there. They don't want people to ask them 00:51:25.739 --> 00:51:28.139 questions. They feel challenged and threatened 00:51:28.139 --> 00:51:32.300 by it, right? But when I ask you... Why, why 00:51:32.300 --> 00:51:35.099 are we doing it this way? Or it's a, it's a, 00:51:35.099 --> 00:51:38.019 it's a threat to them, but to me, it's a clarification, 00:51:38.260 --> 00:51:40.860 right? I need to understand because understanding 00:51:40.860 --> 00:51:42.980 what we're doing and how we're doing it is very 00:51:42.980 --> 00:51:44.460 important. And it's very important to relay that 00:51:44.460 --> 00:51:46.960 to other people, but they're creating this, these 00:51:46.960 --> 00:51:49.980 leaders, that's not what they want. Right. And 00:51:49.980 --> 00:51:52.860 so what happens is they, they put their head 00:51:52.860 --> 00:51:55.300 down and they say, whatever you want me to do. 00:51:55.900 --> 00:51:57.980 And that includes standing up for other people. 00:51:58.000 --> 00:52:01.750 They won't do it. Their their paycheck, their 00:52:01.750 --> 00:52:05.250 power, their whatever they're getting out of 00:52:05.250 --> 00:52:09.110 that position isn't worth it to them. Sadly. 00:52:10.650 --> 00:52:13.730 That's very sad. And, you know, one of the things 00:52:13.730 --> 00:52:17.449 I talk about in my presentation, too, is how 00:52:17.449 --> 00:52:20.409 how do you show people that you care? Right. 00:52:20.469 --> 00:52:22.849 It's easy to say I care about you. But what are 00:52:22.849 --> 00:52:26.130 you doing to show people that you care about 00:52:26.130 --> 00:52:29.619 them? On every level, right? Because even fireman 00:52:29.619 --> 00:52:31.219 to fireman, we just keep shitting on each other. 00:52:32.440 --> 00:52:35.599 You know, so whether it's, you know, call outs 00:52:35.599 --> 00:52:37.940 or the way that we treat each other or support 00:52:37.940 --> 00:52:40.260 each other or the lack thereof, there's lots 00:52:40.260 --> 00:52:42.840 of ways that we just, we just shit on each other. 00:52:44.199 --> 00:52:49.880 You know, and I think that when people can stop 00:52:49.880 --> 00:52:52.820 for a minute in the hustle and bustle to say. 00:52:54.279 --> 00:52:56.440 Okay, yeah, I mean, these are my brothers, these 00:52:56.440 --> 00:52:58.059 are my sisters, and I care about them, but what 00:52:58.059 --> 00:53:00.760 am I doing to show them that? You know, just 00:53:00.760 --> 00:53:02.559 showing up at work every day is not showing people 00:53:02.559 --> 00:53:05.320 that you care about them. You know, hell, even 00:53:05.320 --> 00:53:08.000 half the people that I know in the industry, 00:53:08.219 --> 00:53:13.400 I think a lot of us just say, I don't fucking 00:53:13.400 --> 00:53:17.139 care. Right? I mean, I say I don't care a lot, 00:53:17.199 --> 00:53:19.280 but anybody that knows me knows I just care too 00:53:19.280 --> 00:53:22.289 much is my actual problem. And then I think that's 00:53:22.289 --> 00:53:27.769 also a curse, you know, but I think that's a 00:53:27.769 --> 00:53:30.889 huge component that comes into our mental health, 00:53:30.969 --> 00:53:35.389 you know, is people come to the fire service. 00:53:35.409 --> 00:53:37.110 Right. One of the great things about the military 00:53:37.110 --> 00:53:39.570 is this brotherhood connection that you get, 00:53:39.750 --> 00:53:42.929 you know, and we're losing that brotherhood connection 00:53:42.929 --> 00:53:46.090 within the fire service. I think we are. It's 00:53:46.090 --> 00:53:49.400 not it's not the same. Five or even, you know, 00:53:49.440 --> 00:53:52.039 10 years ago, it's drastically different from 00:53:52.039 --> 00:53:54.860 even five years ago, those bonds that you feel 00:53:54.860 --> 00:53:57.719 or that you see, you know, how crews used to 00:53:57.719 --> 00:54:01.079 go out and they do do outings. And, you know, 00:54:01.119 --> 00:54:03.340 I send out an email every day to my guys and 00:54:03.340 --> 00:54:06.139 expect for the lieutenants to communicate that 00:54:06.139 --> 00:54:09.059 information to the crews. I'll go by a station 00:54:09.059 --> 00:54:11.980 and sit down with the whole crew and say, hey, 00:54:12.000 --> 00:54:14.340 did LT talk to you guys about the email I sent 00:54:14.340 --> 00:54:15.619 out? You know, we've been having these things 00:54:15.619 --> 00:54:18.550 go on or whatever it's about. And they'll all 00:54:18.550 --> 00:54:20.469 look at me dumbfounded. And then I'll look at 00:54:20.469 --> 00:54:21.809 the lieutenant. He goes, oh, I was going to do 00:54:21.809 --> 00:54:23.309 it in a little bit. And I go, what do you mean 00:54:23.309 --> 00:54:24.650 a little bit? It's four o 'clock in the afternoon. 00:54:26.210 --> 00:54:32.170 So we're losing this brotherhood and that connection. 00:54:32.309 --> 00:54:37.590 And that connection is so imperative for our 00:54:37.590 --> 00:54:40.900 mental well -being. To know that that person 00:54:40.900 --> 00:54:43.840 you're going to work with has your back not only 00:54:43.840 --> 00:54:45.920 in a fire, you know what I mean? But when your 00:54:45.920 --> 00:54:48.280 whole world falls apart at home, that you've 00:54:48.280 --> 00:54:49.960 got something else that can rely on. And there's 00:54:49.960 --> 00:54:52.119 lots of people that come into the fire service 00:54:52.119 --> 00:54:54.139 who don't have any of that already. They don't 00:54:54.139 --> 00:54:56.320 have parents, right? Or maybe they didn't have 00:54:56.320 --> 00:54:58.300 a good upbringing. They don't have siblings. 00:54:58.440 --> 00:55:00.860 They don't have a support system. Some people 00:55:00.860 --> 00:55:05.039 that have moved into larger counties like this. 00:55:05.480 --> 00:55:08.579 and left their family behind just to get a job. 00:55:09.539 --> 00:55:12.219 And then we're not even, I'm not even building 00:55:12.219 --> 00:55:15.280 them in to be part of their support system, you 00:55:15.280 --> 00:55:18.280 know? So I always encourage people to take a 00:55:18.280 --> 00:55:20.699 few minutes to try to just ask themselves like, 00:55:20.780 --> 00:55:22.960 okay, I care about people, but what are you doing 00:55:22.960 --> 00:55:26.820 to show people that you really care? Absolutely. 00:55:27.679 --> 00:55:30.500 Well, I want to kind of go back into your career 00:55:30.500 --> 00:55:33.599 before we dive into the world of codes and death 00:55:33.599 --> 00:55:37.440 notifications. As you progress through, what 00:55:37.440 --> 00:55:40.619 was some of the kind of career calls that you 00:55:40.619 --> 00:55:43.679 ran? And are there any that started your thought 00:55:43.679 --> 00:55:46.679 process on changing the way that we look at some 00:55:46.679 --> 00:55:56.300 of these things? So for me, I think the ones 00:55:56.300 --> 00:55:59.579 that hit me the hardest were some pretty bad 00:55:59.579 --> 00:56:05.119 pediatric calls. You know, and really, I'm pretty 00:56:05.119 --> 00:56:09.460 sensitive to seeing people suffer, you know, 00:56:09.460 --> 00:56:14.079 pain and suffering. And I think as you. I talk 00:56:14.079 --> 00:56:16.340 about being a mature medic, right, or a mature 00:56:16.340 --> 00:56:19.219 patient care provider isn't about your actual 00:56:19.219 --> 00:56:22.039 level of maturity and how old you are, but the 00:56:22.039 --> 00:56:23.800 things that you've experienced in life that make 00:56:23.800 --> 00:56:27.000 you sensitive to other people. You know, when 00:56:27.000 --> 00:56:29.239 you have kids, you treat kids differently. You 00:56:29.239 --> 00:56:31.780 know, when you've suffered a back injury, you'll 00:56:31.780 --> 00:56:33.880 probably stop telling people to slide over onto 00:56:33.880 --> 00:56:37.699 the stretcher themselves, you know? So I think 00:56:37.699 --> 00:56:41.360 there was... can't say anything like any one 00:56:41.360 --> 00:56:45.739 thing profoundly. It was just this sense of knowing 00:56:45.739 --> 00:56:52.260 that this is what I was made for. You know, I 00:56:52.260 --> 00:56:54.519 think there was a point in time in my career, 00:56:54.639 --> 00:56:56.739 or like I said, before I got into it, I was like, 00:56:56.800 --> 00:56:58.820 I know that, I know that I like this, right. 00:56:58.920 --> 00:57:02.340 But I think that there was a profound time for 00:57:02.340 --> 00:57:07.179 me that I realized that this is what I believe 00:57:07.179 --> 00:57:11.090 God made me to do. to help people on this level, 00:57:11.170 --> 00:57:14.329 to be a servant to others, you know? And, and 00:57:14.329 --> 00:57:15.949 then of course, as you get older, I think that 00:57:15.949 --> 00:57:18.949 you can really, if you're paying attention to 00:57:18.949 --> 00:57:20.989 yourself and to life, I think you can really 00:57:20.989 --> 00:57:24.309 understand that we're truly here to serve others 00:57:24.309 --> 00:57:26.889 and that this life isn't really just about us. 00:57:27.869 --> 00:57:32.030 And it really is about what you have to give 00:57:32.030 --> 00:57:36.559 other people. And I think that when you, Can 00:57:36.559 --> 00:57:39.119 really sit in that and really understand it. 00:57:39.179 --> 00:57:41.820 I think that's a very special place to be. And 00:57:41.820 --> 00:57:43.480 the unfortunate part is that you can know all 00:57:43.480 --> 00:57:45.340 of that and then have a department who doesn't 00:57:45.340 --> 00:57:47.219 give a shit about you and you don't feel like 00:57:47.219 --> 00:57:51.440 you have a lot of value. And after 18 years, 00:57:51.480 --> 00:57:55.920 sadly, you know, I've reached a point where I've 00:57:55.920 --> 00:58:01.099 never felt less valued in all of my career. And 00:58:01.099 --> 00:58:05.940 any less and so underutilized. You know, and 00:58:05.940 --> 00:58:08.019 when you have things to offer and you want to 00:58:08.019 --> 00:58:10.800 give things to people that you know are going 00:58:10.800 --> 00:58:14.820 to help them with the rest of their life, that's 00:58:14.820 --> 00:58:25.420 a moral insult. So I think for me, really, it 00:58:25.420 --> 00:58:28.380 was just a maturity thing for me that made me 00:58:28.380 --> 00:58:32.800 realize that this was what I was supposed to 00:58:32.800 --> 00:58:36.539 be doing. and made me push harder in that passion 00:58:36.539 --> 00:58:41.760 it's interesting coming from california where 00:58:41.760 --> 00:58:44.159 this bar like i said was set so high they would 00:58:44.159 --> 00:58:46.980 cut 25 of the recruit class by the end of the 00:58:46.980 --> 00:58:49.739 probationary year just through attrition it wasn't 00:58:49.739 --> 00:58:51.360 like they were trying to get rid of good people 00:58:51.360 --> 00:58:54.900 but the bar was so high that 25 never made it 00:58:54.900 --> 00:58:57.659 every year that was the ones that out of a thousand 00:58:57.659 --> 00:59:00.019 people did a written test in my class was about 00:59:00.019 --> 00:59:03.800 15 so out of a thousand people you know Three 00:59:03.800 --> 00:59:08.579 didn't make it to the end of the year. So, yeah, 00:59:08.659 --> 00:59:13.000 and then I come to Orange County. And in that 00:59:13.000 --> 00:59:15.380 previous California department, you know, whether 00:59:15.380 --> 00:59:17.719 it was roof operations, whether it was interior 00:59:17.719 --> 00:59:20.199 attack, you know, we had all these preset hose 00:59:20.199 --> 00:59:22.500 lays. We constantly worked on building construction 00:59:22.500 --> 00:59:24.719 and cutting, you know, conventional roofs and 00:59:24.719 --> 00:59:26.760 panelized roofs and all these different things. 00:59:26.800 --> 00:59:29.159 And it was just drilling over and over and over 00:59:29.159 --> 00:59:31.340 again. And what that meant was when you were 00:59:31.340 --> 00:59:35.059 at a fire. your captain over there would turn 00:59:35.059 --> 00:59:37.400 around and say, all right, lay the bundles. All 00:59:37.400 --> 00:59:39.500 right, we're going to do a pullback. That's all 00:59:39.500 --> 00:59:41.800 I need to say. And in your mind are all these 00:59:41.800 --> 00:59:43.619 orchestrated events. You're taking off the right 00:59:43.619 --> 00:59:45.940 tools. You're throwing ladders, getting on the 00:59:45.940 --> 00:59:48.380 roof, cutting opposite your partner, all the 00:59:48.380 --> 00:59:52.539 things. And that requires a lot of trust. And 00:59:52.539 --> 00:59:55.079 so at the chief level, they're telling my captain, 00:59:55.260 --> 00:59:58.059 all right, we roof ops, interior attack, primary. 00:59:58.219 --> 00:59:59.739 That's all they're saying. And then off we go. 01:00:00.159 --> 01:00:02.679 There's an immense level of trust. Then I go 01:00:02.679 --> 01:00:06.059 to orange and it's the other side of the spectrum, 01:00:06.219 --> 01:00:08.980 micromanaging. And now no one even knows really 01:00:08.980 --> 01:00:10.380 what they're supposed to be doing because there's 01:00:10.380 --> 01:00:12.960 no clear direction. And that's where you get 01:00:12.960 --> 01:00:15.840 that almost that moral injury element, that kind 01:00:15.840 --> 01:00:17.599 of organizational betrayal, because you've gone 01:00:17.599 --> 01:00:20.800 through fire academy. And, you know, the most 01:00:20.800 --> 01:00:23.239 firefighters wearing that uniform want to be 01:00:23.239 --> 01:00:25.199 a good firefighter. They want to be a good medic. 01:00:25.840 --> 01:00:28.900 But it requires strong leadership at the company 01:00:28.900 --> 01:00:30.880 level, at the station level, and then at the 01:00:30.880 --> 01:00:34.539 battalion level and then beyond. And I was just 01:00:34.539 --> 01:00:37.059 so weird because I saw both ends of the spectrum 01:00:37.059 --> 01:00:39.679 and it was such a large chasm between the two. 01:00:39.960 --> 01:00:43.679 But yeah, that lack of direction creates such 01:00:43.679 --> 01:00:46.619 toxicity. And then you throw in the extra sleep 01:00:46.619 --> 01:00:49.800 deprivation from the chronic understaffing. Like 01:00:49.800 --> 01:00:51.340 I was getting mandatory all the time at Orange 01:00:51.340 --> 01:00:54.820 County and I left there in 2013. You know what 01:00:54.820 --> 01:00:56.400 I mean? So it wasn't like when the hurricanes 01:00:56.400 --> 01:00:59.699 came, it was constant. And I was a single dad 01:00:59.699 --> 01:01:01.599 and a medic. And I was like, yeah, this isn't 01:01:01.599 --> 01:01:02.900 going to work. And I went to the creek because 01:01:02.900 --> 01:01:05.239 you can't tell me I can't go home. I'm a single 01:01:05.239 --> 01:01:08.619 father. So, yeah. So going back to what you're 01:01:08.619 --> 01:01:11.599 saying. We're taking these great firefighters 01:01:11.599 --> 01:01:14.340 and in the wrong environment, you're destroying 01:01:14.340 --> 01:01:17.719 them. And I don't think people realize how much 01:01:17.719 --> 01:01:21.260 impact that organizational betrayal has. Yes, 01:01:21.300 --> 01:01:23.480 we see some horrible shit. Yes, sleep deprivation 01:01:23.480 --> 01:01:26.340 is a massive part of the conversation. But the 01:01:26.340 --> 01:01:28.760 fact that your tribe that you said that you potentially 01:01:28.760 --> 01:01:31.840 could even die for turns their back on you when 01:01:31.840 --> 01:01:35.980 you need them is extremely detrimental. And what 01:01:35.980 --> 01:01:39.820 do you think in your research and all the people 01:01:39.820 --> 01:01:42.719 that you've talked to over the last eight years, 01:01:42.820 --> 01:01:45.920 what do you think drives that micromanagement 01:01:45.920 --> 01:01:50.940 for these leaders? I have my own suspicions, 01:01:50.940 --> 01:01:53.000 but I'm always interested in what other people 01:01:53.000 --> 01:01:56.519 think about it. Who is it that always tells you, 01:01:56.619 --> 01:01:59.340 sit down, you're making us look bad? Is it the 01:01:59.340 --> 01:02:01.500 stud in the station or is it the fat one in the 01:02:01.500 --> 01:02:05.059 Lazy Boy? Yeah, that one. It's the same thing. 01:02:05.519 --> 01:02:09.099 It's fragile egos. It's people who really know 01:02:09.099 --> 01:02:10.599 that they don't know what they're doing. It's 01:02:10.599 --> 01:02:12.699 what it boils down to because a strong leader 01:02:12.699 --> 01:02:16.699 grooms other strong leaders. Our span of control 01:02:16.699 --> 01:02:18.559 is supposed to be, what, five to seven, if my 01:02:18.559 --> 01:02:20.679 memory serves me right? So you're not supposed 01:02:20.679 --> 01:02:23.440 to be telling the firefighter what to do. That's 01:02:23.440 --> 01:02:27.679 several rungs of the ladder down. So having the 01:02:27.679 --> 01:02:29.719 trust in your people, but it's a high level of 01:02:29.719 --> 01:02:32.199 training. And this is what I saw in Anaheim and 01:02:32.199 --> 01:02:34.800 Hialeah. You know, when you train your people 01:02:34.800 --> 01:02:37.539 well, then you can say, all right, go do it. 01:02:37.559 --> 01:02:40.659 If you have a culture of fitness, you know, they're 01:02:40.659 --> 01:02:42.940 going to be OK climbing all those floors and 01:02:42.940 --> 01:02:46.039 getting the job done. But if you know, if that 01:02:46.039 --> 01:02:50.280 that entire cascade has all these faults, you 01:02:50.280 --> 01:02:52.260 know, and then people do make mistakes because 01:02:52.260 --> 01:02:54.840 there is a lack of direction is almost like that. 01:02:54.900 --> 01:02:57.340 Well, I told you so again now from the top. So 01:02:57.340 --> 01:02:59.920 if you have high standards and you have a high 01:02:59.920 --> 01:03:03.260 training bar. you can then trust each rung of 01:03:03.260 --> 01:03:05.039 the ladder to do the job they're supposed to 01:03:05.039 --> 01:03:07.679 be doing. But if you've lowered the standards 01:03:07.679 --> 01:03:09.880 and you've got people, as you said, that can't 01:03:09.880 --> 01:03:12.579 even make it up five flights of stairs, you end 01:03:12.579 --> 01:03:14.519 up with this kind of, you know, dude with a whistle 01:03:14.519 --> 01:03:16.199 in the middle of the crowd pointing their fingers 01:03:16.199 --> 01:03:18.880 everywhere rather than the calm, collected leader. 01:03:19.239 --> 01:03:21.039 You know, like, I mean, Band of Brothers is a 01:03:21.039 --> 01:03:23.519 perfect example. Dick Winters. That's who you 01:03:23.519 --> 01:03:25.480 need to have in battle. That's who you need to 01:03:25.480 --> 01:03:28.519 have on the fire ground. He's not telling the 01:03:28.519 --> 01:03:30.360 guy holding the grenade which way to throw it. 01:03:30.599 --> 01:03:36.179 Yeah, no, I agree with you. I always, I've always 01:03:36.179 --> 01:03:41.480 believed that micromanagement is led by incompetency. 01:03:42.440 --> 01:03:45.039 You know, whether it's that person doesn't know, 01:03:45.179 --> 01:03:50.139 it's kind of like the classic, you're never going 01:03:50.139 --> 01:03:52.739 to rise under a stressful situation, a person's 01:03:52.739 --> 01:03:54.599 never going to rise to their highest level of 01:03:54.599 --> 01:03:57.159 training. Right. They're going to they're in 01:03:57.159 --> 01:04:00.420 a stressful situation. And we see this when people 01:04:00.420 --> 01:04:03.659 when they're running critical calls. Right. And 01:04:03.659 --> 01:04:05.800 everybody in the fire service, especially as 01:04:05.800 --> 01:04:07.960 experiences in health care in general, where 01:04:07.960 --> 01:04:10.800 you're you have a specific type of patient that 01:04:10.800 --> 01:04:13.900 needs a specific type of treatment. And the probie 01:04:13.900 --> 01:04:16.980 or somebody else comes running in with a thermometer, 01:04:17.320 --> 01:04:19.960 you know, and you look at them like, what in 01:04:19.960 --> 01:04:22.909 the hell are you doing? Right. And what does 01:04:22.909 --> 01:04:25.110 that have anything to do with this patient? And 01:04:25.110 --> 01:04:27.349 that's because it's not really that they're stupid. 01:04:27.530 --> 01:04:29.929 I mean, sometimes we have those two. It's not 01:04:29.929 --> 01:04:33.010 really that they're stupid. It's that they are 01:04:33.010 --> 01:04:35.429 defaulting to their lowest level of training 01:04:35.429 --> 01:04:37.949 in a stressful situation. And people are never 01:04:37.949 --> 01:04:39.869 going to rise to their highest level of training. 01:04:39.929 --> 01:04:42.050 And that is why the training is so important. 01:04:42.150 --> 01:04:47.389 Right. The reps repetition is master. But I do 01:04:47.389 --> 01:04:53.710 think that micromanagement is led by and fueled 01:04:53.710 --> 01:04:56.989 by incompetency, whether that's the inability 01:04:56.989 --> 01:04:59.630 to do their own job or not knowing your job, 01:04:59.710 --> 01:05:03.309 but they cannot, a leader cannot do their job 01:05:03.309 --> 01:05:06.829 when they're micromanaging you to do yours. And 01:05:06.829 --> 01:05:09.829 I'll go back. This is one of the things I loved 01:05:09.829 --> 01:05:13.030 about Drodes is that he allowed people to do 01:05:13.030 --> 01:05:16.539 their job. You know, I don't I don't know, in 01:05:16.539 --> 01:05:21.559 hindsight. You know, I wish we still had him. 01:05:21.599 --> 01:05:23.659 So I just have to say, I don't know, in hindsight, 01:05:23.760 --> 01:05:31.159 if that's what hurt him the most was trusting 01:05:31.159 --> 01:05:34.800 the people that weren't really trustworthy. You 01:05:34.800 --> 01:05:39.619 know, but led, I believe, like what. a leader 01:05:39.619 --> 01:05:43.800 should lead and saying, okay, you are in charge 01:05:43.800 --> 01:05:46.019 of this, or these are all my division chiefs 01:05:46.019 --> 01:05:48.159 or my positions, right? These are all my people. 01:05:48.199 --> 01:05:51.440 And I trust them because I wouldn't have them 01:05:51.440 --> 01:05:55.710 in that position if I couldn't trust them. And 01:05:55.710 --> 01:05:58.110 maybe there wasn't time to fix some of those 01:05:58.110 --> 01:06:00.230 things. I don't know. I mean, I can speculate 01:06:00.230 --> 01:06:02.309 on all kinds of, I've got all kinds of crazy 01:06:02.309 --> 01:06:04.469 ideas in my head about, you know, how things 01:06:04.469 --> 01:06:06.409 could have been different, you know, in order 01:06:06.409 --> 01:06:09.550 to keep him and stuff. But, you know, sometimes 01:06:09.550 --> 01:06:12.650 I wonder if that's the very thing that hurt him 01:06:12.650 --> 01:06:17.929 the most was trusting maybe people that were 01:06:17.929 --> 01:06:19.690 or weren't trustworthy. I don't know, you know, 01:06:19.710 --> 01:06:23.570 but. That was a great leadership skill also that 01:06:23.570 --> 01:06:27.190 he exhibited was not micromanaging people. And 01:06:27.190 --> 01:06:31.769 it's a disease across the fire service. I'll 01:06:31.769 --> 01:06:34.750 give you a quick Orange County story. The last, 01:06:34.769 --> 01:06:38.070 very last shift there. So first thing in the 01:06:38.070 --> 01:06:40.630 morning, I finally got to ride up as an engineer 01:06:40.630 --> 01:06:42.730 for the day, being on the rescue the whole time. 01:06:45.050 --> 01:06:48.010 we went to a call with the medic unit and it 01:06:48.010 --> 01:06:49.929 was a gi bleed like i've said this on here i've 01:06:49.929 --> 01:06:52.289 never had a code save in my whole career i'm 01:06:52.289 --> 01:06:54.389 just that freaking grim reaper when i show up 01:06:54.389 --> 01:06:56.090 if you're already if you're already in cardiac 01:06:56.090 --> 01:06:57.989 arrest then you're screwed i just get the brain 01:06:57.989 --> 01:06:59.869 bleeds and the triple a's and you know all the 01:06:59.869 --> 01:07:03.110 things so anyway by the time we end up you know 01:07:03.110 --> 01:07:05.710 working that caught it on scene ultimately clean 01:07:05.710 --> 01:07:08.369 up go back in service they're like our gearing 01:07:08.369 --> 01:07:10.750 we need you back on the end on the rescue oh 01:07:10.750 --> 01:07:12.349 and by the way you're probably going to get mandatory 01:07:12.349 --> 01:07:16.079 again next shift And at that point, it was like 01:07:16.079 --> 01:07:19.039 I said, I'm a single dad. You can't tell me I 01:07:19.039 --> 01:07:21.519 cannot go home. I have a child that needs me 01:07:21.519 --> 01:07:25.000 for those 24 hours. So I went into the office 01:07:25.000 --> 01:07:27.820 and I was in everything but the actual medical 01:07:27.820 --> 01:07:30.619 left for Reedy Creek. So I was like, you know 01:07:30.619 --> 01:07:34.599 what? Fuck it. I'm done. And so I told my LT, 01:07:34.800 --> 01:07:36.500 John Brown, I'm like, hey, how do you how do 01:07:36.500 --> 01:07:38.840 you quit? He's like, well, how do you tell him 01:07:38.840 --> 01:07:40.579 that you don't want to work here anymore? Oh, 01:07:40.639 --> 01:07:42.679 you write an email. OK, so I wrote him an email. 01:07:42.760 --> 01:07:45.630 Hey. I won't be here as of next shift. He's like, 01:07:45.690 --> 01:07:47.010 I think you got to do two weeks. I'm like, they're 01:07:47.010 --> 01:07:48.429 not going to replace me in two weeks. That's 01:07:48.429 --> 01:07:51.230 stupid. I need to be home. And so I said, this 01:07:51.230 --> 01:07:53.010 is my last shift. And that was it. Boom, send 01:07:53.010 --> 01:07:56.250 it off. Well, the gods weren't very happy because 01:07:56.250 --> 01:07:59.210 the next call in the afternoon we had was a homeless 01:07:59.210 --> 01:08:01.710 lady that was missing for about three days. And 01:08:01.710 --> 01:08:05.230 this was the summer in Florida. So we go through 01:08:05.230 --> 01:08:07.690 the woods in Orange Ave, tell the crew, hey, 01:08:07.750 --> 01:08:09.570 just wait there because I'm the medic on that 01:08:09.570 --> 01:08:12.480 day. We can smell her. So I'm like, we don't 01:08:12.480 --> 01:08:14.039 all need to see this. You just stay here and 01:08:14.039 --> 01:08:16.979 I'll go check it out. Sure enough, it was just 01:08:16.979 --> 01:08:20.260 flesh dripping off bone by that point. So that's 01:08:20.260 --> 01:08:23.319 dead person number two. Day goes on a little 01:08:23.319 --> 01:08:26.000 bit more. We try and lay down. We get banged 01:08:26.000 --> 01:08:28.159 out. Structure fire. And I don't know if you 01:08:28.159 --> 01:08:29.979 remember, this one seemed to be kind of known 01:08:29.979 --> 01:08:32.779 in the county, but it was the one where it was 01:08:32.779 --> 01:08:37.949 either arson or suicide attempt. young man had 01:08:37.949 --> 01:08:40.329 set fire to a house and then came out the house 01:08:40.329 --> 01:08:43.989 completely on fire and so we're we're responding 01:08:43.989 --> 01:08:47.630 to the the call um chris booth was the medic 01:08:47.630 --> 01:08:50.149 um he's calling for help so we're initially going 01:08:50.149 --> 01:08:52.109 to the address and we we hear it and luckily 01:08:52.109 --> 01:08:53.909 we're at the right place and we divert and go 01:08:53.909 --> 01:08:57.090 help chris and the guy it was such a weird call 01:08:57.090 --> 01:09:01.550 because he's leaning against the fence um completely 01:09:01.550 --> 01:09:04.069 just burned head to toe like third degree burns 01:09:04.069 --> 01:09:08.039 um And we end up doing a standing takedown, get 01:09:08.039 --> 01:09:11.239 him in the back. And I'm literally about to intubate 01:09:11.239 --> 01:09:13.539 him. And Chris almost instinctively is like, 01:09:13.720 --> 01:09:17.220 what's your name? You know, this guy's, I won't 01:09:17.220 --> 01:09:20.140 go into detail, but the guy's injuries, you could 01:09:20.140 --> 01:09:23.140 not have an airway. And clear as I'm talking 01:09:23.140 --> 01:09:26.239 to you now, he says his name. And we're both 01:09:26.239 --> 01:09:30.939 like, what the actual? And so I end up, you know, 01:09:30.960 --> 01:09:33.680 he's answering the question. So now. We don't 01:09:33.680 --> 01:09:36.380 have, you know, RSI in Orange County. So it's 01:09:36.380 --> 01:09:37.960 like, all right, I guess non -rebreather then. 01:09:38.079 --> 01:09:40.439 Burn sheets and let's try and get a line. And, 01:09:40.479 --> 01:09:42.300 you know, it was only around the corner from 01:09:42.300 --> 01:09:45.800 RMC. So that was call number three. So that was 01:09:45.800 --> 01:09:48.899 my shift that day. Three dead people, you know, 01:09:48.979 --> 01:09:51.479 two, I mean, all three protests, to be honest. 01:09:52.239 --> 01:09:55.880 And the culture that we had there, it wasn't 01:09:55.880 --> 01:09:57.500 this particular day, but there have been days 01:09:57.500 --> 01:09:59.460 where we've been backing up the ambulance, the 01:09:59.460 --> 01:10:03.300 rescue out the bay in the ER or RMC. And we've 01:10:03.300 --> 01:10:05.260 been threatened to be written up because we weren't 01:10:05.260 --> 01:10:07.340 wearing our traffic vests to back up the rescue. 01:10:08.359 --> 01:10:10.720 That is the problem with the culture. No one 01:10:10.720 --> 01:10:13.560 asked, hey, you lost three people today. Are 01:10:13.560 --> 01:10:16.979 you OK? But God forbid that you clip the curb 01:10:16.979 --> 01:10:18.920 and the drive cam goes off or you're not wearing 01:10:18.920 --> 01:10:21.699 a traffic vest in an ambulance bay. And now all 01:10:21.699 --> 01:10:23.319 of a sudden they've got all the fucking time 01:10:23.319 --> 01:10:26.180 in the world for you. That, I think, is a massive 01:10:26.180 --> 01:10:28.600 example of what's wrong with the culture in a 01:10:28.600 --> 01:10:33.699 poorly run department. Agreed. No arguments there. 01:10:35.140 --> 01:10:38.619 Normal behavior. Yeah. And it should be the other 01:10:38.619 --> 01:10:40.020 way around. We're going to get into it now. The 01:10:40.020 --> 01:10:43.720 whole mental health thing. I was OK after that. 01:10:43.899 --> 01:10:46.319 I mean, I was not in a great place in my whole 01:10:46.319 --> 01:10:48.140 life. I was a single dad going through a divorce 01:10:48.140 --> 01:10:51.899 and all that stuff. But what if what if that 01:10:51.899 --> 01:10:54.640 had been crushing for me? And then someone comes 01:10:54.640 --> 01:10:57.220 and says, where's your vest? You know, what's 01:10:57.220 --> 01:10:58.920 that going to do to that person? You know, so 01:10:58.920 --> 01:11:01.319 this is why these conversations are so important. 01:11:01.420 --> 01:11:02.920 It's not about talking shit and criticizing. 01:11:03.060 --> 01:11:05.899 It's highlighting where things are wrong, highlighting 01:11:05.899 --> 01:11:08.340 where that could even lead, God forbid, lead 01:11:08.340 --> 01:11:11.640 to a suicide. And how can we turn it around to 01:11:11.640 --> 01:11:15.619 avoid that happening? Yeah. And I think I think 01:11:15.619 --> 01:11:18.920 really, you know, for people in roles of leadership 01:11:18.920 --> 01:11:21.600 and and to me, I say roles of leadership that 01:11:21.600 --> 01:11:23.710 can be literally anybody. You know, it doesn't 01:11:23.710 --> 01:11:25.789 have to be a lieutenant or it doesn't have to 01:11:25.789 --> 01:11:29.909 be a higher rank anything. Every single person 01:11:29.909 --> 01:11:33.789 is in some role of leadership or can be. And 01:11:33.789 --> 01:11:37.510 I think really just having a dialogue with people 01:11:37.510 --> 01:11:41.229 first. And trust me, I have had plenty of my 01:11:41.229 --> 01:11:45.210 own disciplines that a dialogue would have been 01:11:45.210 --> 01:11:49.000 appropriate first. For you, it's just exactly 01:11:49.000 --> 01:11:51.859 like what you're saying. Why, how, why, right? 01:11:51.979 --> 01:11:55.100 There's lots of questions, but, you know, starting 01:11:55.100 --> 01:11:58.640 out with a dialogue first, you know, instead 01:11:58.640 --> 01:12:01.060 of coming at somebody and accusing them or just 01:12:01.060 --> 01:12:04.140 slapping them with paperwork, I think a conversation 01:12:04.140 --> 01:12:08.359 is warranted first, you know? And I think even 01:12:08.359 --> 01:12:11.460 for, you know, some of the most egregious things, 01:12:11.539 --> 01:12:14.180 I think you really just have to look at somebody 01:12:14.180 --> 01:12:16.840 and say, What were you thinking? What's going 01:12:16.840 --> 01:12:20.520 on? You know, because I don't feel like the fire 01:12:20.520 --> 01:12:22.439 service is full of a bunch of crappy people. 01:12:22.520 --> 01:12:24.720 You know what I mean? I mean, I think I think 01:12:24.720 --> 01:12:27.859 almost every single person comes into this industry 01:12:27.859 --> 01:12:31.500 with the intent of helping other people. So why 01:12:31.500 --> 01:12:34.979 do we have so many people who go through times 01:12:34.979 --> 01:12:37.000 where they don't want to or they say, I don't 01:12:37.000 --> 01:12:39.340 care, you know, or, you know, fuck these people 01:12:39.340 --> 01:12:42.199 or whatever, you know, I just. There's something 01:12:42.199 --> 01:12:45.159 very wrong within the system and within a department 01:12:45.159 --> 01:12:48.579 that has that many people who feel that way. 01:12:49.079 --> 01:12:52.840 And that's how they respond. Well, I mean, and 01:12:52.840 --> 01:12:54.920 this is not the case in some departments, but 01:12:54.920 --> 01:12:57.920 in some that I've seen, again, if there's that 01:12:57.920 --> 01:13:01.039 low bar and someone barely squeaks through as 01:13:01.039 --> 01:13:04.260 it is, they don't want to be in the field. They 01:13:04.260 --> 01:13:06.359 want to get in that admin role as soon as they 01:13:06.359 --> 01:13:08.819 can, and then they climb that ladder. So they 01:13:08.819 --> 01:13:11.529 don't have any idea. what it's like some of them 01:13:11.529 --> 01:13:14.069 maybe were even threatened with termination or 01:13:14.069 --> 01:13:16.050 bullied by their classmates because they really 01:13:16.050 --> 01:13:18.869 weren't the right fit for the fire service they 01:13:18.869 --> 01:13:21.250 made it through and now they're climbing up and 01:13:21.250 --> 01:13:24.569 we all know some that even became very um vindictive 01:13:24.569 --> 01:13:27.010 once they got into these higher positions yeah 01:13:27.010 --> 01:13:30.649 and i think you have some um elder leadership 01:13:30.649 --> 01:13:34.909 um you maybe you call them elders um that likes 01:13:34.909 --> 01:13:38.800 to say things like I was on the rescue before, 01:13:38.960 --> 01:13:40.800 right? I've done this and I've done that, right? 01:13:40.859 --> 01:13:44.079 But you and I both know, not only are we running 01:13:44.079 --> 01:13:49.500 way more calls than what we used to, right? Industry 01:13:49.500 --> 01:13:52.579 -wide, right? Not just a particular, but we are 01:13:52.579 --> 01:13:54.659 running way more calls than what we used to. 01:13:55.079 --> 01:13:59.920 And the job they did then is different than the 01:13:59.920 --> 01:14:02.939 job that we do now. You know, the rescues didn't 01:14:02.939 --> 01:14:04.979 transport back then. You were on the rescue, 01:14:05.079 --> 01:14:09.840 but you didn't transport. 100%. So that is a 01:14:09.840 --> 01:14:15.619 big deal. Now, I do laugh at these young folk 01:14:15.619 --> 01:14:20.319 now where they talk about having to sit at the 01:14:20.319 --> 01:14:22.340 hospital. I do kind of laugh and poke fun with 01:14:22.340 --> 01:14:24.319 them. And they know I'm poking fun with them 01:14:24.319 --> 01:14:26.340 when I do it. But I tell them that they're very 01:14:26.340 --> 01:14:28.920 spoiled now. Because back when we were on the 01:14:28.920 --> 01:14:31.720 rescue, it was normal to sit at a hospital for 01:14:31.720 --> 01:14:34.750 three, four, five, six hours. i sat at one hospital 01:14:34.750 --> 01:14:38.649 in winter park one time for six hours nobody 01:14:38.649 --> 01:14:42.050 came to rescue me there wasn't sushi parfaits 01:14:42.050 --> 01:14:45.329 coffee energy drinks there was none of that salads 01:14:45.329 --> 01:14:47.529 sandwiches they didn't have any of that stuff 01:14:47.529 --> 01:14:50.810 you know so uh i joke around them now that they're 01:14:50.810 --> 01:14:52.909 pretty pretty spoiled that they get all those 01:14:52.909 --> 01:14:57.069 amenities when we didn't you know you're lucky 01:14:57.069 --> 01:14:59.569 if you could find one of those little one tablespoon 01:14:59.569 --> 01:15:02.170 size packets of peanut butter and a cracker and 01:15:02.170 --> 01:15:03.729 then the nurse was still going to yell at you 01:15:03.729 --> 01:15:06.789 for taking them that's what made me laugh about 01:15:06.789 --> 01:15:09.090 covid when all the reporters are like oh there's 01:15:09.090 --> 01:15:11.189 people in the hallway i'm like where were you 01:15:11.189 --> 01:15:13.529 the other years there's always people in the 01:15:13.529 --> 01:15:15.609 hallway what are you talking about yeah it's 01:15:15.609 --> 01:15:19.890 wild yeah so it's pretty crazy you know and i 01:15:19.890 --> 01:15:23.300 think the industry just continues to change um 01:15:23.300 --> 01:15:26.220 in a way that doesn't feel doesn't feel very 01:15:26.220 --> 01:15:30.420 good yeah i mean i i it feels like we're expected 01:15:30.420 --> 01:15:33.859 to care for everybody else but nobody cares about 01:15:33.859 --> 01:15:37.920 us that's a crappy feeling well i underline this 01:15:37.920 --> 01:15:40.899 too because i am an incurable optimist although 01:15:40.899 --> 01:15:43.600 i sound very angry a lot of times This is the 01:15:43.600 --> 01:15:46.819 perfect time to change. We are truly at crisis 01:15:46.819 --> 01:15:49.000 level now nationally in the fire service. There 01:15:49.000 --> 01:15:50.399 are some departments that are doing it well, 01:15:50.500 --> 01:15:53.140 and they're fine. But the other, I would argue, 01:15:53.180 --> 01:15:56.539 90 plus percent are struggling. And if you draw 01:15:56.539 --> 01:15:59.039 a line of recruitment, retention, et cetera, 01:15:59.220 --> 01:16:02.359 it's not headed in a good place at all. So we're 01:16:02.359 --> 01:16:05.279 in a perfect opportunity to change this. You 01:16:05.279 --> 01:16:07.460 know, you should be able to go in and become 01:16:07.460 --> 01:16:10.119 a police officer or a firefighter, have a healthy 01:16:10.119 --> 01:16:12.560 career, have plenty of rest and recovery, be 01:16:12.560 --> 01:16:14.800 held to a fitness standard that promotes performance 01:16:14.800 --> 01:16:18.000 and longevity, have immediate access to mental 01:16:18.000 --> 01:16:20.539 health, you know, within your department and, 01:16:20.619 --> 01:16:23.399 you know, retire. And look back and be proud 01:16:23.399 --> 01:16:25.739 of what you did and then spend, you know, decades 01:16:25.739 --> 01:16:28.880 with your grandchildren. So we absolutely can 01:16:28.880 --> 01:16:31.079 fix this. This isn't a doom and gloom conversation, 01:16:31.199 --> 01:16:34.119 but it is one of those, you know, look, lying 01:16:34.119 --> 01:16:37.039 in the sand. We're tired of pussyfooting around 01:16:37.039 --> 01:16:40.039 now. If we don't do something soon, aside from 01:16:40.039 --> 01:16:42.840 the freaking litany of deaths that we have, you 01:16:42.840 --> 01:16:45.000 know, everywhere in our first responder professions. 01:16:46.189 --> 01:16:48.409 Our delivery of service is going to go to the 01:16:48.409 --> 01:16:50.189 point where some areas are literally going to 01:16:50.189 --> 01:16:52.310 call 911 and they're going to get a dial tone. 01:16:52.710 --> 01:16:55.630 Nothing even there anymore. So what a beautiful 01:16:55.630 --> 01:16:58.510 opportunity to finally say, look, the data is 01:16:58.510 --> 01:17:02.189 undeniable now. Now is the time to make change. 01:17:02.329 --> 01:17:04.590 And I think the future of the fire service is 01:17:04.590 --> 01:17:08.569 extremely exciting. But sadly, it's off the backs 01:17:08.569 --> 01:17:11.250 of the men and women that we've buried that will 01:17:11.250 --> 01:17:16.859 finally be able to force change. For sure. All 01:17:16.859 --> 01:17:20.600 right. Well, with that segue, death, let's talk 01:17:20.600 --> 01:17:25.000 about your journey into doing presentations now 01:17:25.000 --> 01:17:30.060 on death notifications, on the perspectives from 01:17:30.060 --> 01:17:33.420 the responder and the family on a code. What 01:17:33.420 --> 01:17:36.560 kind of made you start questioning things about 01:17:36.560 --> 01:17:39.079 how we do it? And let's talk about the solutions 01:17:39.079 --> 01:17:43.600 that we need to be moving towards. So for me, 01:17:43.659 --> 01:17:48.640 I. Years ago, I had a pediatric code. It was 01:17:48.640 --> 01:17:52.479 a father who was at home with their four -year 01:17:52.479 --> 01:17:56.140 -old, and he was using drugs, and the baby drowned 01:17:56.140 --> 01:18:00.899 in the tub. And we took this child to the hospital, 01:18:00.920 --> 01:18:05.340 and I realized when we got to the hospital that 01:18:05.340 --> 01:18:10.819 there wasn't a lot of engagement with the mom 01:18:10.819 --> 01:18:15.350 when she arrived on scene. And I remember feeling 01:18:15.350 --> 01:18:19.689 heartbroken and at a loss for her, thinking that 01:18:19.689 --> 01:18:22.189 I should. I mean, I think that a lot of people 01:18:22.189 --> 01:18:25.029 think that somebody else on scene is going to 01:18:25.029 --> 01:18:27.310 talk to family members when they have a loved 01:18:27.310 --> 01:18:29.470 one that's having a crisis, whether it's death 01:18:29.470 --> 01:18:33.750 or a critical injury or illness. And so I began 01:18:33.750 --> 01:18:36.770 to realize that that is not what was happening, 01:18:36.829 --> 01:18:40.300 that a lot of us. believe that somebody else 01:18:40.300 --> 01:18:43.880 is going to have that conversation or we're just 01:18:43.880 --> 01:18:45.600 not supposed to have it because we haven't, it 01:18:45.600 --> 01:18:47.619 really hasn't been taught to many of us, you 01:18:47.619 --> 01:18:52.199 know? And so then just over time, you know, I've, 01:18:52.199 --> 01:18:56.920 I've been an EMS educator for over 15 years and, 01:18:56.920 --> 01:18:59.399 you know, teaching EMT school and medic school 01:18:59.399 --> 01:19:01.520 and anything EMS, I would teach it, you know, 01:19:01.520 --> 01:19:05.859 and I just loved it. And I really, I think over 01:19:05.859 --> 01:19:09.000 the years, as I've become more sensitive to that, 01:19:09.079 --> 01:19:13.720 I just realized that we're, there's a huge opportunity 01:19:13.720 --> 01:19:17.779 that we're missing to make a difference in people's 01:19:17.779 --> 01:19:23.420 lives, you know? And I kind of started honing 01:19:23.420 --> 01:19:27.119 in on that a little bit. And through that, I 01:19:27.119 --> 01:19:29.659 discovered that it wasn't just that we were missing 01:19:29.659 --> 01:19:32.739 an opportunity to change the lives of the family 01:19:32.739 --> 01:19:35.880 members who were suffering, but it was an opportunity 01:19:35.880 --> 01:19:39.600 for us to heal that we were missing. And so I 01:19:39.600 --> 01:19:44.819 kind of had this epiphany that this is a huge 01:19:44.819 --> 01:19:50.979 mental health component of how we survive this 01:19:50.979 --> 01:19:56.369 industry. So I for a while have said, I got to 01:19:56.369 --> 01:19:58.409 figure out how to get out of this job mentally 01:19:58.409 --> 01:20:01.609 and physically intact. And so as I started delving 01:20:01.609 --> 01:20:06.329 into that more, I really came to understand that 01:20:06.329 --> 01:20:11.590 we needed to get to closure on calls. And how 01:20:11.590 --> 01:20:13.289 and then how do we get there? You know, like 01:20:13.289 --> 01:20:15.149 everybody knows like what closure is if you have 01:20:15.149 --> 01:20:18.829 a loved one that's dead. Right. You know, but 01:20:18.829 --> 01:20:21.850 we. But how do we get to closure as first responders 01:20:21.850 --> 01:20:24.470 and why would we and what does it matter? What 01:20:24.470 --> 01:20:26.229 does it look like and why would we do it and 01:20:26.229 --> 01:20:29.050 things like that? And so there was a big discovery 01:20:29.050 --> 01:20:34.489 for me that we have so much to offer family members 01:20:34.489 --> 01:20:36.069 that we're not doing that a lot of people are 01:20:36.069 --> 01:20:39.289 not doing. And it's because. We haven't talked 01:20:39.289 --> 01:20:42.250 about it. We haven't trained for it. We're very 01:20:42.250 --> 01:20:45.890 robotic on the job to protect ourselves, right? 01:20:45.989 --> 01:20:52.390 We think that by not doing something and ignoring 01:20:52.390 --> 01:20:56.930 the distraught family members, we think that 01:20:56.930 --> 01:20:59.729 we're actually protecting ourselves. But there 01:20:59.729 --> 01:21:03.069 is a part of that that we're missing that can 01:21:03.069 --> 01:21:05.630 help them through the grieving process, but also 01:21:05.630 --> 01:21:09.399 help us get to closure. And so when I realized 01:21:09.399 --> 01:21:16.699 all that, every year, historically, in the last 01:21:16.699 --> 01:21:18.939 five years or whatever, maybe longer, five or 01:21:18.939 --> 01:21:21.939 eight years, I've been giving a pediatric class 01:21:21.939 --> 01:21:26.579 at our preceptors academy that we have every 01:21:26.579 --> 01:21:29.319 year. In fact, we have one coming up next week 01:21:29.319 --> 01:21:33.420 or the week after. And it's a multi -jurisdictional 01:21:33.420 --> 01:21:37.260 academy. People in from other jurisdictions and 01:21:37.260 --> 01:21:39.520 they participate. And it's really a quite wonderful 01:21:39.520 --> 01:21:42.359 educational two weeks that's available for people 01:21:42.359 --> 01:21:46.739 to go to. And I asked last year, I said, hey, 01:21:46.779 --> 01:21:50.000 I've got this presentation that I want to give. 01:21:50.840 --> 01:21:53.539 I kind of gave them a summary about what it was. 01:21:54.020 --> 01:21:56.539 And I was for sure that they were going to tell 01:21:56.539 --> 01:21:59.640 me no, because people like to tell me no. And 01:21:59.640 --> 01:22:05.220 they said yes. And so then I said, well, I better 01:22:05.220 --> 01:22:07.100 put the presentation together because I don't 01:22:07.100 --> 01:22:09.979 have one. But I knew, but it was all in my soul. 01:22:10.020 --> 01:22:11.760 It was all in my heart and soul. I knew what 01:22:11.760 --> 01:22:14.479 I wanted to share. I just needed to put it together 01:22:14.479 --> 01:22:17.359 and, you know, something that was going to make 01:22:17.359 --> 01:22:20.720 sense. And so I put together this presentation. 01:22:20.899 --> 01:22:23.680 I talked it over with all of our medical directors 01:22:23.680 --> 01:22:26.260 because I wanted to make sure that we were on 01:22:26.260 --> 01:22:28.319 the same page. And I wanted to make sure that 01:22:28.319 --> 01:22:31.859 what I wanted to share with people, that there 01:22:31.859 --> 01:22:37.079 was the same. vibe you know that that uh you 01:22:37.079 --> 01:22:40.720 know sometimes you can geek out on something 01:22:41.310 --> 01:22:42.869 And then when you go to give it to other people, 01:22:42.930 --> 01:22:45.569 they didn't quite geek out on it as well, you 01:22:45.569 --> 01:22:48.050 know? So I wanted to make sure that I was geeking 01:22:48.050 --> 01:22:51.670 out in some other people's lanes. And they loved 01:22:51.670 --> 01:22:53.949 it. And there was not really hardly any of it 01:22:53.949 --> 01:22:55.689 that they wanted to change. They had some really 01:22:55.689 --> 01:22:58.470 good suggestions of some things that I threw 01:22:58.470 --> 01:23:01.329 in there to talk about. And then every single 01:23:01.329 --> 01:23:04.869 one of the medical directors made it a point 01:23:04.869 --> 01:23:07.090 to come and see me give the presentation at the 01:23:07.090 --> 01:23:13.090 academy. And it was quite, well -received and 01:23:13.090 --> 01:23:18.029 the message is just so emotionally evoking because 01:23:18.029 --> 01:23:21.409 we're talking about something that we probably 01:23:21.409 --> 01:23:24.149 know deep in our hearts that we should be talking 01:23:24.149 --> 01:23:28.489 about and addressing with people. But it takes 01:23:28.489 --> 01:23:32.550 real raw courage to have those difficult conversations 01:23:32.550 --> 01:23:36.550 with people. It takes every, every single time 01:23:36.550 --> 01:23:40.520 I've done this. It takes the most courage I could 01:23:40.520 --> 01:23:43.520 ever have in my life to look at mom and dad and 01:23:43.520 --> 01:23:46.319 tell them that their child's dead. That never 01:23:46.319 --> 01:23:50.000 feels OK. And it doesn't even have to be a five 01:23:50.000 --> 01:23:52.180 year old. It could be, you know, a grown adult 01:23:52.180 --> 01:23:55.619 child. Right. But to look at, you know, even 01:23:55.619 --> 01:23:59.359 a wife or husband and tell them that their spouse. 01:24:00.199 --> 01:24:02.140 is dead takes a lot of courage and of course 01:24:02.140 --> 01:24:05.180 it's it's it is harder it is more difficult when 01:24:05.180 --> 01:24:07.840 um they're younger but to look at mom and dad 01:24:07.840 --> 01:24:09.260 and tell them that their five -year -old child 01:24:09.260 --> 01:24:12.920 is dead is it has got to be the hardest thing 01:24:12.920 --> 01:24:16.279 and hardest conversation to have with a family 01:24:16.279 --> 01:24:22.640 member so um when i when i realized that we weren't 01:24:22.640 --> 01:24:25.199 doing that a lot of people weren't doing that 01:24:25.199 --> 01:24:30.039 um i had to ask why And really the why is because 01:24:30.039 --> 01:24:33.399 we want to protect ourselves. It's difficult 01:24:33.399 --> 01:24:37.140 and we don't know what to say. And so I wanted 01:24:37.140 --> 01:24:41.500 to make it my mission and part of my journey 01:24:41.500 --> 01:24:45.039 for the rest of my career or until people are 01:24:45.039 --> 01:24:49.180 done listening to me say it, that we can do better. 01:24:49.560 --> 01:24:51.859 And we owe it to people to do better. We owe 01:24:51.859 --> 01:24:54.680 it to their families to do better. And we owe 01:24:54.680 --> 01:24:59.079 it to ourselves. for us to do better. And what 01:24:59.079 --> 01:25:02.100 I mean by that is I think there's a lot of times 01:25:02.100 --> 01:25:04.760 in the fire service, especially in the last several 01:25:04.760 --> 01:25:08.279 years, and I'm at fault for saying this myself, 01:25:08.479 --> 01:25:10.300 I'm not a hypocrite, so I will absolutely admit 01:25:10.300 --> 01:25:13.520 this, where we say, oh, you know, these generation 01:25:13.520 --> 01:25:15.840 of firemen that come in, they're softer now. 01:25:16.340 --> 01:25:20.579 You know, they're different. And I think we're 01:25:20.579 --> 01:25:23.260 softer as a species. You know what I mean? When 01:25:23.260 --> 01:25:26.180 you think about, like, how Greece was built. 01:25:26.560 --> 01:25:29.979 You've got structures made of marble that are 01:25:29.979 --> 01:25:32.859 still standing thousands and thousands of years 01:25:32.859 --> 01:25:37.159 later. And so I think that we are a softer species 01:25:37.159 --> 01:25:39.720 in general. But my point is that even if that 01:25:39.720 --> 01:25:44.279 is true, are we, the people that are doing the 01:25:44.279 --> 01:25:46.359 job now and have been doing the job for all these 01:25:46.359 --> 01:25:49.619 years, our leadership, are we still not responsible 01:25:49.619 --> 01:25:52.159 to change the culture for those that are coming 01:25:52.159 --> 01:25:57.079 through? And we are. And so my mission now is 01:25:57.079 --> 01:25:59.439 really to get this message to as many people 01:25:59.439 --> 01:26:02.159 as we can and as many people as I can, because 01:26:02.159 --> 01:26:04.699 if it changes one life and it saves one life 01:26:04.699 --> 01:26:06.520 or makes a difference in anybody else's life, 01:26:06.600 --> 01:26:09.079 then it is worth it to me. It's worth my time 01:26:09.079 --> 01:26:11.659 to go and give that presentation and to talk 01:26:11.659 --> 01:26:14.680 to people and share what I what I have to share 01:26:14.680 --> 01:26:18.329 with them on it. I'm not the only person out 01:26:18.329 --> 01:26:20.489 there that's talking about this. You know, in 01:26:20.489 --> 01:26:23.409 fact, I would argue to say that there's not enough 01:26:23.409 --> 01:26:25.270 of us spending enough time to talk about it. 01:26:25.670 --> 01:26:29.989 And so what I hit in this presentation isn't 01:26:29.989 --> 01:26:32.750 just about how we talk to families, because again, 01:26:32.930 --> 01:26:36.449 I am sensitive and I understand that all we keep 01:26:36.449 --> 01:26:41.069 doing in the fire service is asking for our boots 01:26:41.069 --> 01:26:44.279 on the ground workers to do more. right do more 01:26:44.279 --> 01:26:46.619 do more do more but then we don't have anything 01:26:46.619 --> 01:26:48.520 else to give we don't take anything off the plate 01:26:48.520 --> 01:26:50.680 right we just keep piling more stuff on so when 01:26:50.680 --> 01:26:52.899 i talk about this i know that it sounds so much 01:26:52.899 --> 01:26:54.779 like i'm talking about oh what else can we do 01:26:54.779 --> 01:26:58.359 we could do more for other people but but part 01:26:58.359 --> 01:27:02.159 of this pathway is how we get to closure as first 01:27:02.159 --> 01:27:04.800 responders and how we get out of this career 01:27:04.800 --> 01:27:08.039 mentally and physically intact you know and i 01:27:08.039 --> 01:27:09.899 and i just think that's so important so this 01:27:09.899 --> 01:27:13.220 has really become my mission Um, until I just 01:27:13.220 --> 01:27:17.180 can't say it anymore. Um, about how important 01:27:17.180 --> 01:27:19.739 this is of, of how we facilitate the grieving 01:27:19.739 --> 01:27:22.319 process for families and how we get to closure 01:27:22.319 --> 01:27:26.720 as first responders. In some of the recent conversations, 01:27:27.060 --> 01:27:29.760 uh, even Alex Javer that I think we talked about 01:27:29.760 --> 01:27:32.659 on the phone a while ago. Um, she's, she's, you 01:27:32.659 --> 01:27:35.020 know, excellent resource as well. Talking about 01:27:35.020 --> 01:27:39.380 just the clear, clear communication on someone, 01:27:39.460 --> 01:27:42.680 you know, not saying passed on or whatever, you 01:27:42.680 --> 01:27:44.600 know, and how that is actually healing for both. 01:27:45.300 --> 01:27:48.359 But when you think about the front door, and 01:27:48.359 --> 01:27:50.199 you talked about your journey, EMT school and 01:27:50.199 --> 01:27:54.020 then medic school, I reflect back now. And, you 01:27:54.020 --> 01:27:56.060 know, if we're doing a mega code, you get, you 01:27:56.060 --> 01:27:57.760 know, all these funky rhythms thrown at you and 01:27:57.760 --> 01:27:59.640 you push your drugs and you defibrillate or pace 01:27:59.640 --> 01:28:02.000 or whatever you need to do. And then, oh, congratulations, 01:28:02.300 --> 01:28:05.239 sign this rhythm, you got ROSC. I think that 01:28:05.239 --> 01:28:08.359 we do a disservice in the educational side. Because 01:28:08.359 --> 01:28:12.220 if we do A, B and C, the person lives. And as 01:28:12.220 --> 01:28:14.460 you and I both know, in James Gearing's career, 01:28:14.760 --> 01:28:17.859 I'm still batting zero at the moment. So, you 01:28:17.859 --> 01:28:20.159 know, it sets you up for failure. And then you 01:28:20.159 --> 01:28:22.880 have, again, that kind of moral injury of what's 01:28:22.880 --> 01:28:25.199 wrong with me? You know, and the thing is, what's 01:28:25.199 --> 01:28:27.220 wrong with you is it was a GI bleed or a heart 01:28:27.220 --> 01:28:29.399 that was so diseased, it's not going to come 01:28:29.399 --> 01:28:31.939 back, you know, or it was a, you know, a stroke, 01:28:32.020 --> 01:28:35.619 whatever it was. And so even at the front door. 01:28:36.199 --> 01:28:38.260 I'm thinking, isn't that a great opportunity 01:28:38.260 --> 01:28:40.260 to start applying what you're talking about? 01:28:40.479 --> 01:28:44.079 Do your mega code and get them to still push 01:28:44.079 --> 01:28:46.359 all the right drugs and still give the right 01:28:46.359 --> 01:28:50.199 electric therapeutics. But say, hey, you did 01:28:50.199 --> 01:28:52.659 everything you could. It's asystole. We're going 01:28:52.659 --> 01:28:55.439 to call it. Now I need you to tell the family 01:28:55.439 --> 01:28:58.779 what happened. Yeah, I love that. And I think 01:28:58.779 --> 01:29:03.420 that's a great opportunity to implement, if nothing 01:29:03.420 --> 01:29:06.149 else. the thought process and the new patient 01:29:06.149 --> 01:29:08.770 care provider, right? That's going to be having 01:29:08.770 --> 01:29:12.390 that interaction or that opportunity. And so 01:29:12.390 --> 01:29:17.750 what I used to, I found out when I used to, I 01:29:17.750 --> 01:29:20.510 developed the paramedic sign -off process for 01:29:20.510 --> 01:29:22.510 the county. When I developed that and I would 01:29:22.510 --> 01:29:24.310 have people come in and do a scenario and they 01:29:24.310 --> 01:29:27.750 would need to use like electric cardioversion, 01:29:27.930 --> 01:29:31.329 electrical therapy on a patient, I would ask 01:29:31.329 --> 01:29:35.750 the new medic, I would say, OK, tell the patient 01:29:35.750 --> 01:29:38.630 how what you're going to do before you deliver 01:29:38.630 --> 01:29:40.090 the energy. What are you going to say to them? 01:29:40.670 --> 01:29:43.510 And and and a lot of these people have never 01:29:43.510 --> 01:29:45.890 thought about what they're going to say. So they 01:29:45.890 --> 01:29:48.250 would say something like, OK, now hold still. 01:29:48.350 --> 01:29:50.569 I'm going to shock you. You know, I'm like, oh, 01:29:50.649 --> 01:29:52.310 God, is that what you would say to somebody? 01:29:52.689 --> 01:29:56.310 So we are. That's a great opportunity to build 01:29:56.310 --> 01:29:58.210 in at least some of that thought process. You 01:29:58.210 --> 01:30:00.069 know, most of the time we're going to be more 01:30:00.069 --> 01:30:03.489 successful. About saying something difficult 01:30:03.489 --> 01:30:06.090 to somebody, if we've at least thought about 01:30:06.090 --> 01:30:09.689 how we might say it before we have to say it. 01:30:10.810 --> 01:30:13.510 You know, so that's a lot about what this is 01:30:13.510 --> 01:30:17.329 about is, you know, is this a new concept? No, 01:30:17.430 --> 01:30:19.210 this has been around for a while. A lot of the 01:30:19.210 --> 01:30:22.329 things that I talk about we've done in hospitals 01:30:22.329 --> 01:30:24.510 before, you know, bringing family members in 01:30:24.510 --> 01:30:27.569 to be a part of the code. We've seen this has 01:30:27.569 --> 01:30:29.949 been happening for years, but not in the field. 01:30:31.119 --> 01:30:34.039 You know, and and there's power in doing that. 01:30:34.100 --> 01:30:37.819 And so and understanding why we do that and what 01:30:37.819 --> 01:30:40.119 kind of power that holds is so important. And 01:30:40.119 --> 01:30:42.340 I think that's a great opportunity. I was talking 01:30:42.340 --> 01:30:44.880 to one of my chiefs the other day and he was 01:30:44.880 --> 01:30:47.560 asking about the presentation and he was asking 01:30:47.560 --> 01:30:49.699 me if I thought it would be beneficial for the 01:30:49.699 --> 01:30:52.579 recruits. And I was like, oh, you know, let me 01:30:52.579 --> 01:30:53.899 think about this. I mean, I could change some 01:30:53.899 --> 01:30:56.439 of the content. And honestly, I just really didn't 01:30:56.439 --> 01:30:59.460 think of it. On the level that you just presented 01:30:59.460 --> 01:31:02.239 it. And so I think that I will go back and have 01:31:02.239 --> 01:31:04.460 another conversation because even though they 01:31:04.460 --> 01:31:08.439 are brand new, there is still so much power because 01:31:08.439 --> 01:31:11.039 this is really about planting the seed. I can't 01:31:11.039 --> 01:31:12.680 make people go out and have these conversations, 01:31:12.939 --> 01:31:14.899 right? I can't, I can't, I'm not going to be 01:31:14.899 --> 01:31:16.500 there to hold their hand and give them moral 01:31:16.500 --> 01:31:19.159 support or tell them what to say, but planting 01:31:19.159 --> 01:31:23.899 that seed for them to know that. You can do this. 01:31:23.899 --> 01:31:26.340 And this is why you do it. And this is why it's 01:31:26.340 --> 01:31:29.359 important for them and for you. It's really powerful. 01:31:29.500 --> 01:31:31.859 So I think I'll go back and have some conversations. 01:31:31.880 --> 01:31:34.180 So I'm really thankful that you mentioned that. 01:31:34.220 --> 01:31:36.880 That's a powerful, dynamic time in their career 01:31:36.880 --> 01:31:40.840 to implement and plant that seed for them. Yeah, 01:31:40.859 --> 01:31:42.520 this is coming from a lot of people that told 01:31:42.520 --> 01:31:44.579 people that their loved one was dead because 01:31:44.579 --> 01:31:46.680 I was their medic. So I had a lot of practice. 01:31:47.380 --> 01:31:51.939 Yeah. But joking aside. What were some of the 01:31:51.939 --> 01:31:54.439 things that you would say? Well, I mean, I have, 01:31:54.539 --> 01:31:56.760 I hear lots of things that people say, but what 01:31:56.760 --> 01:31:59.340 would you, because you probably didn't have any 01:31:59.340 --> 01:32:03.340 formal death notification training, right? No. 01:32:03.619 --> 01:32:05.840 Yeah. I'll give you the worst case scenario. 01:32:07.500 --> 01:32:09.460 Yeah. The worst case scenario. I'll never forget 01:32:09.460 --> 01:32:11.979 this. I was at the Creek and it was a cardiac 01:32:11.979 --> 01:32:15.720 arrest in a hotel room. The code went well, but 01:32:15.720 --> 01:32:19.939 the precursor to this. Before I got there, they 01:32:19.939 --> 01:32:22.039 were just show coding everyone. And they were 01:32:22.039 --> 01:32:25.239 filling ER beds with dead people and giving these 01:32:25.239 --> 01:32:27.380 families tens of thousands of dollars worth, 01:32:27.439 --> 01:32:28.920 if not tens of thousands of dollars worth of 01:32:28.920 --> 01:32:31.939 medical debt for someone who was asystole the 01:32:31.939 --> 01:32:35.439 whole time. So when I went in there, I was adhering 01:32:35.439 --> 01:32:37.800 to the asystole protocol that I'd been taught 01:32:37.800 --> 01:32:40.579 as an Orange County medic. And there was a time 01:32:40.579 --> 01:32:42.539 where a battalion chief grabbed me by my radio 01:32:42.539 --> 01:32:44.539 strap and said, you will take this patient. And 01:32:44.539 --> 01:32:46.279 I was a brand new probie then. You will take 01:32:46.279 --> 01:32:49.060 this patient to the hospital. The next code after 01:32:49.060 --> 01:32:53.100 that was this one. So I said to my crew, we're 01:32:53.100 --> 01:32:55.899 going to follow a sisterly protocol. If we get 01:32:55.899 --> 01:32:58.420 20 minutes, we're going to call it just to preset. 01:32:59.119 --> 01:33:02.199 But what I didn't realize is that the family 01:33:02.199 --> 01:33:07.289 next door were within earshot. And that came 01:33:07.289 --> 01:33:09.609 across as kind of callous. So even though I was 01:33:09.609 --> 01:33:11.609 doing it because I didn't want this guy to be 01:33:11.609 --> 01:33:14.229 dragged down a hallway in a resort and end up 01:33:14.229 --> 01:33:15.949 in an ER bed that might be needed by someone 01:33:15.949 --> 01:33:18.710 who has a chance of living, you know, so that's 01:33:18.710 --> 01:33:20.729 when I look back and go, when did I do it wrong? 01:33:20.890 --> 01:33:22.649 You know, I should have absolutely said that, 01:33:22.729 --> 01:33:25.449 but be aware of, you know, lowering my voice 01:33:25.449 --> 01:33:27.289 and all those things. So that's a poor example. 01:33:28.449 --> 01:33:30.510 But the other one was, it's just, it's by that 01:33:30.510 --> 01:33:33.329 point to me, again, making it up and listening 01:33:33.329 --> 01:33:36.350 to. other medics that i was you know respected 01:33:36.350 --> 01:33:40.109 and and listened to was just being kind and empathetic 01:33:40.109 --> 01:33:43.250 and switching from robocop medic which we have 01:33:43.250 --> 01:33:46.489 to be to you know sitting down holding their 01:33:46.489 --> 01:33:48.310 hand and saying look you know this is what we 01:33:48.310 --> 01:33:50.789 did this is you know how he responded or she 01:33:50.789 --> 01:33:53.449 responded you know we we try and try and try 01:33:53.449 --> 01:33:55.489 but we don't want to give you false hope and 01:33:55.489 --> 01:33:57.890 take him off in an ambulance when we've already 01:33:57.890 --> 01:34:00.149 passed the point of, you know, of them actually 01:34:00.149 --> 01:34:02.949 having a chance of living. So we want to be respectful 01:34:02.949 --> 01:34:05.890 and leave them here with you and just kind of 01:34:05.890 --> 01:34:09.569 be a very, very to the point, but also compassionate 01:34:09.569 --> 01:34:12.409 and sit with them as a human being now, not the 01:34:12.409 --> 01:34:14.489 medical professional that burst in a few minutes 01:34:14.489 --> 01:34:19.649 before. Right. Yeah. And I think, I think probably 01:34:19.649 --> 01:34:25.739 most people. I haven't had that good example 01:34:25.739 --> 01:34:29.020 of what to say. I mean, when I talk to people 01:34:29.020 --> 01:34:32.020 everywhere, you know, different states and everything, 01:34:32.239 --> 01:34:36.380 most people don't have training on what to say 01:34:36.380 --> 01:34:38.239 and how to say it and understanding that, you 01:34:38.239 --> 01:34:40.420 know, you too could feel something when you say 01:34:40.420 --> 01:34:42.920 it and that's okay, you know, because we're always 01:34:42.920 --> 01:34:44.439 protecting ourselves because we don't want to 01:34:44.439 --> 01:34:46.520 be emotionally involved and we don't want to 01:34:46.520 --> 01:34:49.300 feel this pain and suffering because we do this 01:34:49.300 --> 01:34:51.659 way too much. And so when I talk about this with 01:34:51.659 --> 01:34:55.710 people, I also... I have to kind of give that 01:34:55.710 --> 01:35:00.369 understanding, too, that doing this, the purpose 01:35:00.369 --> 01:35:03.630 is not to become over emotionally involved in 01:35:03.630 --> 01:35:06.029 calls either. Right. Because that can also be 01:35:06.029 --> 01:35:10.310 very dangerous. OK, I've I've given this presentation 01:35:10.310 --> 01:35:14.069 to I just gave it to a local department here 01:35:14.069 --> 01:35:19.520 to the entire department. And. they have a specific 01:35:19.520 --> 01:35:22.760 person that responds to all cardiac arrest and 01:35:22.760 --> 01:35:25.500 that is their role is to talk to the family which 01:35:25.500 --> 01:35:27.500 i think is wonderful that they have someone that 01:35:27.500 --> 01:35:29.380 does that now they have their own feedback on 01:35:29.380 --> 01:35:32.079 whether that person actually does it or not you 01:35:32.079 --> 01:35:34.439 know but um it's also important to know that 01:35:34.439 --> 01:35:39.340 um that particular person may not be the right 01:35:39.340 --> 01:35:41.920 person to have this conversation with the family 01:35:41.920 --> 01:35:44.619 you know because just like you're saying it has 01:35:44.619 --> 01:35:50.670 to be somebody who can be compassionate and kind 01:35:50.670 --> 01:35:55.170 and can control themselves. Right. Because you, 01:35:55.270 --> 01:35:57.310 you don't want to fall apart when you're telling 01:35:57.310 --> 01:36:00.289 anytime I've talked to mom and dad about their 01:36:00.289 --> 01:36:07.350 dead baby. It's very, it's very heavy. But I 01:36:07.350 --> 01:36:10.029 can manage to get the words out without falling 01:36:10.029 --> 01:36:13.350 apart. You know? So it's got to be the right 01:36:13.350 --> 01:36:15.510 person, too. And those words have to be direct 01:36:15.510 --> 01:36:18.430 and they have to be delivered directly and clearly 01:36:18.430 --> 01:36:21.329 and with kindness and a nice, steady cadence 01:36:21.329 --> 01:36:23.630 when you're talking to people that are under 01:36:23.630 --> 01:36:26.050 this much distress. And so I always encourage 01:36:26.050 --> 01:36:28.789 people to think about the person you love most 01:36:28.789 --> 01:36:34.689 in your life. Right. And if you were to die and 01:36:34.689 --> 01:36:37.829 assuming that, you know, you're the person that 01:36:37.829 --> 01:36:39.909 they love most in their life, if you were to 01:36:39.909 --> 01:36:43.439 die, what would you want? them to say to your 01:36:43.439 --> 01:36:48.199 loved one you know regardless of whether we have 01:36:48.199 --> 01:36:51.119 experience in the fire service or not or if they're 01:36:51.119 --> 01:36:53.659 are in the health care industry what would you 01:36:53.659 --> 01:36:56.760 want them to say to you and so I like to give 01:36:56.760 --> 01:36:58.939 examples of what that kind of dialogue sounds 01:36:58.939 --> 01:37:00.600 like for people because it's one thing to say 01:37:00.600 --> 01:37:03.380 oh we should be talking to people but what does 01:37:03.380 --> 01:37:07.180 it sound like right And so a lot of times what 01:37:07.180 --> 01:37:09.920 we do is we we say things like we're doing everything 01:37:09.920 --> 01:37:12.600 we can and we're sorry for your loss. Right. 01:37:12.680 --> 01:37:14.699 Those are probably the two most common things 01:37:14.699 --> 01:37:17.300 that we say to people that are their family members 01:37:17.300 --> 01:37:22.000 when they're critically injured or traumatized. 01:37:22.159 --> 01:37:28.020 And those things aren't wrong to say. Right. 01:37:28.699 --> 01:37:31.159 And it's just that I believe that we can do better. 01:37:31.199 --> 01:37:32.880 And I believe that we owe it to people to do 01:37:32.880 --> 01:37:35.180 better. And the problem is that people just don't 01:37:35.180 --> 01:37:38.399 have the training of what to say. And so I like 01:37:38.399 --> 01:37:40.619 to give examples of those dialogues. And so what 01:37:40.619 --> 01:37:44.000 I like to do for people is I like to show up 01:37:44.000 --> 01:37:46.319 on these calls. And the first thing I do is interface 01:37:46.319 --> 01:37:51.149 with the crew to find out. what we have right 01:37:51.149 --> 01:37:54.550 so an example would be you know i get there and 01:37:54.550 --> 01:37:56.670 i say hey what you got to the crew running the 01:37:56.670 --> 01:38:00.329 code and then they would say 80 year old female 01:38:00.329 --> 01:38:03.890 stage four cancer recent diagnosis initial rhythm 01:38:03.890 --> 01:38:07.689 is asystole and so that tells me that this patient's 01:38:07.689 --> 01:38:10.210 probably not going to survive their injuries 01:38:10.210 --> 01:38:12.449 right i mean that's the reality we're going to 01:38:12.449 --> 01:38:13.670 try right we're going to do everything we can 01:38:13.670 --> 01:38:15.090 but they're probably not going to have a good 01:38:15.090 --> 01:38:17.380 outcome And so at that point next, I want to 01:38:17.380 --> 01:38:19.319 interface with the family immediately, if there's 01:38:19.319 --> 01:38:23.560 family there. And that's going to sound like 01:38:23.560 --> 01:38:26.720 this, where we would say, the first thing I want 01:38:26.720 --> 01:38:29.079 to know is my audience, 100 % of the time, right? 01:38:29.140 --> 01:38:32.579 Who am I talking to? I gave up on trying to figure 01:38:32.579 --> 01:38:35.680 out if it's a guy, a girl, a husband, a wife, 01:38:35.720 --> 01:38:39.180 and how they're related. So I just ask, how are 01:38:39.180 --> 01:38:42.760 you related to the patient? you know this is 01:38:42.760 --> 01:38:44.760 my mother and then i like to go through and i'd 01:38:44.760 --> 01:38:48.100 like to tell them what we found what we're doing 01:38:48.100 --> 01:38:49.880 and what we're trying to get the outcome to be 01:38:49.880 --> 01:38:52.760 because it's very important that patient care 01:38:52.760 --> 01:38:57.539 providers understand that we see this all the 01:38:57.539 --> 01:39:00.960 time the families don't and they don't understand 01:39:00.960 --> 01:39:04.359 why we are still doing something there and we're 01:39:04.359 --> 01:39:06.380 not already on the way on the way to the hospital 01:39:06.380 --> 01:39:10.119 right they don't understand that doing, working 01:39:10.119 --> 01:39:13.739 the code on scene gives them the greatest chance 01:39:13.739 --> 01:39:16.300 of surviving if they're going to. And so you 01:39:16.300 --> 01:39:18.060 have to explain that to people and you don't 01:39:18.060 --> 01:39:20.159 have to explain to them like that, but you do 01:39:20.159 --> 01:39:22.279 need to tell them, we owe it to them to tell 01:39:22.279 --> 01:39:25.560 them what we're doing with their loved one. And 01:39:25.560 --> 01:39:28.380 so I love to ask people like, you know, when 01:39:28.380 --> 01:39:31.220 you worked for different departments, where did 01:39:31.220 --> 01:39:33.180 we put family members when we were working a 01:39:33.180 --> 01:39:38.699 code? Where do we normally? I mean, a lot of 01:39:38.699 --> 01:39:39.960 times we just take them to a different room. 01:39:40.119 --> 01:39:43.699 Yeah, we put them in another room with who? The 01:39:43.699 --> 01:39:47.279 cops. We usually put them in law enforcement 01:39:47.279 --> 01:39:50.039 there and they're screaming, crying. And the 01:39:50.039 --> 01:39:55.180 reality is that in almost every instance, I know 01:39:55.180 --> 01:39:57.859 there's a rare occasion that this happens, but 01:39:57.859 --> 01:40:00.880 in almost every instance, they just want to know 01:40:00.880 --> 01:40:03.829 what's happening. Right. And we put them in another 01:40:03.829 --> 01:40:06.609 room and we block them off from seeing the person 01:40:06.609 --> 01:40:08.890 that they love the most in their life who they 01:40:08.890 --> 01:40:11.210 have no idea what's going on. So we owe it to 01:40:11.210 --> 01:40:13.369 these people to talk to them. So I usually come 01:40:13.369 --> 01:40:16.430 in and say, how are you related to the patient? 01:40:16.550 --> 01:40:19.729 They tell me. And then I'll say, when we got 01:40:19.729 --> 01:40:21.710 here, your mom's heart wasn't working on our 01:40:21.710 --> 01:40:23.970 own on its own. We started doing compressions. 01:40:23.989 --> 01:40:25.750 We're trying to get our heart to work again. 01:40:26.189 --> 01:40:29.569 Right. Or CPR use very basic words. And so, again, 01:40:29.649 --> 01:40:32.369 what we found. what we're doing and what we're 01:40:32.369 --> 01:40:35.430 trying to get the outcome to be, right? She also 01:40:35.430 --> 01:40:37.390 wasn't breathing on her own. We put a tube down 01:40:37.390 --> 01:40:39.250 her throat. We're breathing for her, giving her 01:40:39.250 --> 01:40:43.170 the most amount of oxygen that we can. We've 01:40:43.170 --> 01:40:45.149 started an IV. We're giving medications. The 01:40:45.149 --> 01:40:46.850 medication's going to try to get her heart to 01:40:46.850 --> 01:40:49.029 work again. And then we have to tell people how 01:40:49.029 --> 01:40:50.850 long we're going to do this for. In standard 01:40:50.850 --> 01:40:53.229 practice, we know it's 20 minutes, right? We're 01:40:53.229 --> 01:40:56.369 going to do this. I usually say 15 to 20 minutes 01:40:56.369 --> 01:40:58.449 because by the time I get there, it's already 01:40:58.449 --> 01:41:00.430 been a few minutes, right? And so I usually tell 01:41:00.430 --> 01:41:04.109 people, we're going to do this for 15 to 20 minutes. 01:41:04.149 --> 01:41:08.289 If there's no change, we're going to stop. Now, 01:41:08.329 --> 01:41:10.810 just like we were talking earlier, we're not 01:41:10.810 --> 01:41:13.729 going to use the words dead, death, and dying 01:41:13.729 --> 01:41:15.960 yet. Right. We don't want to use the words like 01:41:15.960 --> 01:41:18.899 past, passed away, moved on their spirit left, 01:41:19.100 --> 01:41:20.939 like whatever kind of crazy things people say. 01:41:21.619 --> 01:41:23.479 We don't want to say that. We don't want to say 01:41:23.479 --> 01:41:25.659 those those words. We want it to be a very clear, 01:41:25.720 --> 01:41:28.680 direct communication. But we don't want to use 01:41:28.680 --> 01:41:31.159 dead, death and dying yet, because do you know 01:41:31.159 --> 01:41:33.279 that a lot of people believe that we're keeping 01:41:33.279 --> 01:41:36.319 their family member alive and that when we stop 01:41:36.319 --> 01:41:42.930 is when they die? So they think we are the ventilator 01:41:42.930 --> 01:41:44.590 that we're just going to go whenever they say 01:41:44.590 --> 01:41:46.390 it's OK, we're going to go over and unplug it. 01:41:46.409 --> 01:41:48.550 That's literally what a lot of people think is 01:41:48.550 --> 01:41:51.050 happening. And that's just in the world that 01:41:51.050 --> 01:41:52.529 we live in here that has nothing to do with the 01:41:52.529 --> 01:41:55.909 different cultures that come into the area, you 01:41:55.909 --> 01:41:58.710 know. And so a lot of people don't understand 01:41:58.710 --> 01:42:00.729 that. And so I tell them we're going to do this 01:42:00.729 --> 01:42:02.770 for about 15 or 20 minutes. And if there's no 01:42:02.770 --> 01:42:05.390 change, we're going to stop. And usually at that 01:42:05.390 --> 01:42:07.409 point, people get emotional and that's fine. 01:42:07.470 --> 01:42:10.250 They need space. Give them space. Allow them 01:42:10.250 --> 01:42:15.189 space or invite them to come in. Now, the problem 01:42:15.189 --> 01:42:17.569 is that a lot of times we don't want it. When 01:42:17.569 --> 01:42:19.590 I say this to other fire departments, people 01:42:19.590 --> 01:42:21.350 are like, oh, God, we're going to bring them 01:42:21.350 --> 01:42:23.350 in. These people are going to go crazy when you 01:42:23.350 --> 01:42:26.140 bring them in. The real reason why we don't want 01:42:26.140 --> 01:42:27.579 to do this, and I've asked people everywhere, 01:42:27.699 --> 01:42:29.640 like, why do you not want to bring people? Why 01:42:29.640 --> 01:42:30.939 do you not want to bring the family member in 01:42:30.939 --> 01:42:32.680 to see their loved one? And they're like, oh, 01:42:32.739 --> 01:42:34.539 they're in our way. They're going to see what 01:42:34.539 --> 01:42:38.859 we're doing. Okay. I mean, I've had one group 01:42:38.859 --> 01:42:42.739 tell me that, you know, sometimes. sometimes 01:42:42.739 --> 01:42:45.319 the bag isn't checked out properly. And so they're 01:42:45.319 --> 01:42:47.439 like, where, where the F is this? And where's 01:42:47.439 --> 01:42:49.020 that? And they're throwing stuff out of the bag. 01:42:49.100 --> 01:42:50.500 And I just looked at him and said, you know, 01:42:50.520 --> 01:42:52.300 you just have to be a better professional than 01:42:52.300 --> 01:42:54.899 that. That's not even acceptable. That's, that's 01:42:54.899 --> 01:43:00.819 crazy, you know? But we, the real, the real reason 01:43:00.819 --> 01:43:03.359 why we don't want to bring that family member 01:43:03.359 --> 01:43:06.060 in is because now we have to talk to them. Right. 01:43:06.119 --> 01:43:08.319 And historically, as much as we have to talk 01:43:08.319 --> 01:43:11.960 to people, we don't want to talk to them. And 01:43:11.960 --> 01:43:14.619 so, you know, if they, a lot of people are going 01:43:14.619 --> 01:43:16.399 to opt to not come in, but if they do, you just 01:43:16.399 --> 01:43:17.960 have to explain to them what we're doing and 01:43:17.960 --> 01:43:19.220 you have to be right there next to them. A lot 01:43:19.220 --> 01:43:21.199 of times I might have their arm, my arm around 01:43:21.199 --> 01:43:23.239 them or something. I am right there next. I'm 01:43:23.239 --> 01:43:27.869 married with them and now they are my job. And 01:43:27.869 --> 01:43:30.789 then also I identify that we don't always have 01:43:30.789 --> 01:43:32.710 that many resources to do that. So it's very 01:43:32.710 --> 01:43:35.149 dependent on what your outfit looks like, right? 01:43:35.189 --> 01:43:37.930 We're running four man engines, two man rescues, 01:43:37.930 --> 01:43:39.930 sometimes a third person on a rescue if we're 01:43:39.930 --> 01:43:41.470 precepting and things like that. So there is 01:43:41.470 --> 01:43:44.210 quite a bit of manpower and I'm showing up as 01:43:44.210 --> 01:43:48.199 an additional person. But in most cases, we can 01:43:48.199 --> 01:43:51.699 involve people. So if they opt to not come in, 01:43:51.859 --> 01:43:54.380 then that's a great time to give them space and 01:43:54.380 --> 01:43:55.800 tell them that you're going to come back and 01:43:55.800 --> 01:43:58.500 find them in about 15 or 20 minutes and let them 01:43:58.500 --> 01:44:02.439 know where we are. So in this specific example 01:44:02.439 --> 01:44:05.739 with the 80 -year -old female, we did reach a 01:44:05.739 --> 01:44:08.460 point to where we were ready to terminate the 01:44:08.460 --> 01:44:11.359 code. And so I told the crew, continue working 01:44:11.359 --> 01:44:13.279 the code. I'm going to go talk to the family, 01:44:13.340 --> 01:44:16.479 and I'll be right back. And so once I gather, 01:44:16.600 --> 01:44:18.340 now there's more family members there, right? 01:44:18.439 --> 01:44:21.220 So now I'm asking, who are you and who are you 01:44:21.220 --> 01:44:23.199 and how are you related? Because I need to know 01:44:23.199 --> 01:44:26.680 my entire audience. Maybe there's people there 01:44:26.680 --> 01:44:28.779 that aren't in the family and I'm getting ready 01:44:28.779 --> 01:44:30.920 to have a very intimate conversation with them 01:44:30.920 --> 01:44:32.819 that maybe they don't want the other people to 01:44:32.819 --> 01:44:35.020 hear. If there's children there, we have to be 01:44:35.020 --> 01:44:37.300 sensitive to that. Maybe they don't need to hear 01:44:37.300 --> 01:44:39.479 that. And you leave that up to the adults to 01:44:39.479 --> 01:44:41.420 make that decision. But knowing your audience 01:44:41.420 --> 01:44:46.430 is paramount. And so from there, I'm going to 01:44:46.430 --> 01:44:49.470 reiterate what we did. And so what we're doing 01:44:49.470 --> 01:44:53.189 for people is we're preparing them for bad news. 01:44:53.989 --> 01:44:56.130 Right. We are building them up to give them bad 01:44:56.130 --> 01:44:58.329 news. And so there's two main things that we 01:44:58.329 --> 01:45:01.109 say in all of the United States and probably 01:45:01.109 --> 01:45:03.250 outside of that, that we would say to somebody 01:45:03.250 --> 01:45:06.130 before we give them bad news. Right. One of the 01:45:06.130 --> 01:45:08.869 things that we say is you want the good news 01:45:08.869 --> 01:45:11.810 or the bad news first. Right. One of those common 01:45:11.810 --> 01:45:15.590 things we say, or we might say, I've got some 01:45:15.590 --> 01:45:17.729 bad news. You might want to sit down for this. 01:45:17.989 --> 01:45:20.250 And so what we're doing for people, we don't 01:45:20.250 --> 01:45:22.170 realize it because we haven't been trained that 01:45:22.170 --> 01:45:25.670 way. But what we're doing subconsciously is we 01:45:25.670 --> 01:45:29.689 are preparing them for bad news. And so now what 01:45:29.689 --> 01:45:33.409 I'm asking is that we do this intently. Right. 01:45:33.489 --> 01:45:38.510 We are intently building up bad for that to deliver 01:45:38.510 --> 01:45:42.670 bad news. And so by telling them we're going 01:45:42.670 --> 01:45:44.250 to do this for 15 or 20 minutes, I'm going to 01:45:44.250 --> 01:45:46.029 come back and find you. And then we're going 01:45:46.029 --> 01:45:47.750 to have a conversation and see where we are. 01:45:47.869 --> 01:45:50.130 We're building them up for bad news. So now we're 01:45:50.130 --> 01:45:51.989 at the point where we know we have to deliver 01:45:51.989 --> 01:45:56.569 bad news. And so we're going to go back through 01:45:56.569 --> 01:45:59.550 and basically repeat everything we said when 01:45:59.550 --> 01:46:01.729 we got there. As promised, we've done this for 01:46:01.729 --> 01:46:05.329 15 to 20 minutes. And basically you're kind of 01:46:05.329 --> 01:46:07.409 checking protocol boxes in your head. So it's 01:46:07.409 --> 01:46:10.170 nothing that's difficult. to think about because 01:46:10.170 --> 01:46:11.869 you already know it right we've done this for 01:46:11.869 --> 01:46:14.890 20 minutes we've given them you know four rounds 01:46:14.890 --> 01:46:17.310 of this medication and so you're kind of checking 01:46:17.310 --> 01:46:21.750 boxes but in layman terms with them and um and 01:46:21.750 --> 01:46:24.810 then i like to tell them um we are getting ready 01:46:24.810 --> 01:46:28.609 to stop is there anything that you can think 01:46:28.609 --> 01:46:32.829 of that we can do differently before we stop 01:46:32.829 --> 01:46:35.220 that might help And so that kind of gives the 01:46:35.220 --> 01:46:38.380 family an opportunity to chime in and be a part 01:46:38.380 --> 01:46:42.060 of the termination. And so as kind of crazy as 01:46:42.060 --> 01:46:46.180 it sounds, what's happening in our minds is we 01:46:46.180 --> 01:46:52.060 as healthcare professionals came to this job 01:46:52.060 --> 01:46:55.300 to help people and to save lives, right? And 01:46:55.300 --> 01:46:57.220 I know you're batting zero, but we all aren't, 01:46:57.220 --> 01:47:04.050 right? And so what happens is when we, Can't 01:47:04.050 --> 01:47:07.430 save somebody, even if we believe that everybody 01:47:07.430 --> 01:47:09.489 dies at their own time, like no matter what your 01:47:09.489 --> 01:47:15.390 belief system is. When we don't get pulses back, 01:47:15.550 --> 01:47:17.670 when we don't save somebody, when we have to 01:47:17.670 --> 01:47:20.949 pronounce somebody dead, there is a part of us 01:47:20.949 --> 01:47:24.149 that feels like we failed at our job. There is 01:47:24.149 --> 01:47:26.069 part of that that you're never going to forget. 01:47:26.229 --> 01:47:29.390 Right. You have every single person that's in 01:47:29.390 --> 01:47:33.880 this industry and you have calls. You are never 01:47:33.880 --> 01:47:38.640 going to forget for the rest of your life, not 01:47:38.640 --> 01:47:40.819 the rest of your career, right? We don't get 01:47:40.819 --> 01:47:43.579 to retire and retire these memories. This is 01:47:43.579 --> 01:47:47.420 for the rest of your life. So being able to have 01:47:47.420 --> 01:47:49.840 an opportunity when we talk about how we get 01:47:49.840 --> 01:47:53.260 to closure as responders is super important because 01:47:53.260 --> 01:47:56.079 again, this is about getting out mentally and 01:47:56.079 --> 01:47:58.760 physically intact. And if I can sit here and 01:47:58.760 --> 01:48:02.500 tell you that this is one of the keys. And the 01:48:02.500 --> 01:48:05.659 pathway to success of getting out of this industry 01:48:05.659 --> 01:48:07.819 mentally and physically intact, that's pretty 01:48:07.819 --> 01:48:15.600 important. And in most instances, the family 01:48:15.600 --> 01:48:17.060 members are going to say, you've done everything 01:48:17.060 --> 01:48:19.520 you can. Sometimes they may say, can you do it 01:48:19.520 --> 01:48:21.079 for five more minutes? Can you give one more 01:48:21.079 --> 01:48:24.180 round of that medication? And we can. We can 01:48:24.180 --> 01:48:27.130 do that to honor the family. Right. We know that's 01:48:27.130 --> 01:48:28.270 not going to make a difference in the patient. 01:48:28.350 --> 01:48:31.789 And even if it did, you know, sometimes if you 01:48:31.789 --> 01:48:36.310 got an iota of anything back, like rhythm wise 01:48:36.310 --> 01:48:39.250 for the patient, it's usually not going to change 01:48:39.250 --> 01:48:45.810 the outcome. But nonetheless. And then you want 01:48:45.810 --> 01:48:48.250 to extend the opportunity for them to come in 01:48:48.250 --> 01:48:51.899 and say goodbye to their loved one. And so in 01:48:51.899 --> 01:48:54.439 this particular instance, I said they said, no, 01:48:54.500 --> 01:48:56.819 you've done everything that you can. And I said, 01:48:56.859 --> 01:49:00.680 would you like to come in and be a part of the 01:49:00.680 --> 01:49:03.180 termination? And when we pronounce your mother 01:49:03.180 --> 01:49:06.899 dead, now we're using dead, death and dying very 01:49:06.899 --> 01:49:12.140 clearly, very calmly, steady cadence with kindness 01:49:12.140 --> 01:49:15.560 and compassion. And that's usually when you're 01:49:15.560 --> 01:49:17.659 going to see the next level of an emotional response. 01:49:18.329 --> 01:49:21.529 Right. But now they're getting to where they 01:49:21.529 --> 01:49:24.250 are understanding that this is real and this 01:49:24.250 --> 01:49:27.109 is really going to happen. And the really unique 01:49:27.109 --> 01:49:30.130 opportunity that we have to give this to people 01:49:30.130 --> 01:49:33.350 is something only that we get to offer. Right. 01:49:33.449 --> 01:49:36.989 If they're just if if if we don't do any of that, 01:49:37.109 --> 01:49:41.130 the next time they get to say goodbye to their 01:49:41.130 --> 01:49:42.750 loved one is going to be when they're cold, dead 01:49:42.750 --> 01:49:46.550 and stiff. You know, and so, again, remember 01:49:46.550 --> 01:49:48.210 that a lot of these family members think that 01:49:48.210 --> 01:49:51.229 we're kind of keeping their family alive. And 01:49:51.229 --> 01:49:54.470 so sometimes I'll even tell people, you know, 01:49:54.489 --> 01:49:57.529 the last senses that go before we die are our 01:49:57.529 --> 01:50:00.649 sense of hearing and our sense of touch. That's 01:50:00.649 --> 01:50:03.449 why when you have a patient that is fighting 01:50:03.449 --> 01:50:05.909 for their life and you're fighting for them, 01:50:05.989 --> 01:50:09.229 you talk to them. Right. Fight with me. Stay 01:50:09.229 --> 01:50:12.090 with me. Open your eyes. Squeeze my hands because 01:50:12.090 --> 01:50:15.390 they can hear you even when they're dying, even 01:50:15.390 --> 01:50:17.829 when they're actively dying. To what point? Maybe 01:50:17.829 --> 01:50:19.289 we don't really know. Right. I'm not in that 01:50:19.289 --> 01:50:21.489 spiritual realm. And maybe it's based off of 01:50:21.489 --> 01:50:27.069 your beliefs, you know, but. So I don't have 01:50:27.069 --> 01:50:29.590 any problem telling people, you know, come in 01:50:29.590 --> 01:50:35.289 and kiss her, tell your lover and say whatever 01:50:35.289 --> 01:50:38.689 last things you want to say. And so we bring 01:50:38.689 --> 01:50:40.810 the family in. In this particular instance, as 01:50:40.810 --> 01:50:43.210 soon as we walked in the door with the family, 01:50:43.329 --> 01:50:46.850 I told the crew, I said, hey, LT, you guys can 01:50:46.850 --> 01:50:48.890 go ahead and stop resuscitation and pronounce 01:50:48.890 --> 01:50:51.670 the time of death. And now I'm saying it again. 01:50:51.930 --> 01:50:54.510 So now this is probably at this point the second 01:50:54.510 --> 01:50:57.430 time I've said dead, death, or dying to them, 01:50:57.489 --> 01:51:00.590 and they know this is it. Now, again, remember, 01:51:00.670 --> 01:51:05.090 to them, a lot of family members believe that. 01:51:05.920 --> 01:51:08.600 there's a potential that their loved one might 01:51:08.600 --> 01:51:12.939 still be able to hear them. So what we're offering 01:51:12.939 --> 01:51:16.300 something to them is something very unique. It's 01:51:16.300 --> 01:51:19.720 a very unique opportunity that's going to facilitate 01:51:19.720 --> 01:51:23.180 the grieving process. And so it's really important 01:51:23.180 --> 01:51:25.560 for people to understand that grieving is the 01:51:25.560 --> 01:51:30.210 healing, not the hurting. So what we're doing 01:51:30.210 --> 01:51:32.590 is we're helping with the healing. And that's 01:51:32.590 --> 01:51:34.310 really the most important thing to think about 01:51:34.310 --> 01:51:36.630 when we're having these conversations with family 01:51:36.630 --> 01:51:38.909 members. So the family came in, they all sat 01:51:38.909 --> 01:51:42.090 down and they said, can we say the Lord's prayer? 01:51:42.250 --> 01:51:43.770 And I said, of course you can. And then they 01:51:43.770 --> 01:51:47.170 said, will you join us? Right. And I think this 01:51:47.170 --> 01:51:52.140 is an area where some people get a little. unsure 01:51:52.140 --> 01:51:55.500 of how to proceed when you have a patient that's 01:51:55.500 --> 01:51:56.859 saying, will you pray with me, which I've had 01:51:56.859 --> 01:51:59.239 people do many times over the course of my career, 01:51:59.319 --> 01:52:02.840 you know? And, and so what I like to tell people 01:52:02.840 --> 01:52:06.699 is, and I was raised in the church aligned with 01:52:06.699 --> 01:52:08.760 my beliefs. I felt fine with it. I got down on 01:52:08.760 --> 01:52:11.119 my knees. I prayed with them. And so did a couple 01:52:11.119 --> 01:52:13.239 of the other crew members. And I'm going to tell 01:52:13.239 --> 01:52:15.680 you, not only did we profoundly change the lives 01:52:15.680 --> 01:52:18.140 of the family that was there and help facilitate 01:52:18.140 --> 01:52:21.300 that grieving process, but in that moment, it 01:52:21.300 --> 01:52:24.140 profoundly changed the lives of the first responders 01:52:24.140 --> 01:52:27.680 on that call. Hands down. And so we debriefed 01:52:27.680 --> 01:52:32.739 after that call. And the crews kind of had a 01:52:32.739 --> 01:52:34.460 little bit of a hodgepodge crew. So about 50 01:52:34.460 --> 01:52:36.260 percent of them were assigned there and had never 01:52:36.260 --> 01:52:38.460 seen that before. I do that with all the codes 01:52:38.460 --> 01:52:40.359 that I go on. That's my goal of what it's supposed 01:52:40.359 --> 01:52:43.800 to look like. And they said, you know, we've 01:52:43.800 --> 01:52:46.979 never, ever seen that before. And so what I encourage 01:52:46.979 --> 01:52:49.239 people to do on the religious side of it when 01:52:49.239 --> 01:52:52.140 that happens is I've prayed with people. And 01:52:52.140 --> 01:52:54.880 what I tell people is I hold their hand. I'm 01:52:54.880 --> 01:52:57.220 literally delivering psychological first aid. 01:52:57.939 --> 01:53:01.420 And I hold their hand and I tell them, you lead 01:53:01.420 --> 01:53:03.760 the prayer. Now, I might be spooked out if they 01:53:03.760 --> 01:53:05.779 start praying to Satan, you know, or something. 01:53:06.159 --> 01:53:09.020 But at the end of the day, it wakes up. Yeah. 01:53:09.500 --> 01:53:11.760 Yeah, exactly. But at the end of the day, we're 01:53:11.760 --> 01:53:14.140 there for them. So whatever they believe in, 01:53:14.180 --> 01:53:16.420 they can pray to. I'll hold their hand. And at 01:53:16.420 --> 01:53:18.619 the end of it, I'll say amen or something, you 01:53:18.619 --> 01:53:21.340 know. So our beliefs don't always have to align. 01:53:21.500 --> 01:53:23.380 We don't have to be that sensitive about stuff 01:53:23.380 --> 01:53:26.100 like that. We're really just there for them, 01:53:26.199 --> 01:53:31.819 you know. And so it's real important to understand 01:53:31.819 --> 01:53:35.180 that. We're facilitating the grieving process 01:53:35.180 --> 01:53:37.859 for the family, but this is how we get to closure 01:53:37.859 --> 01:53:40.760 as first responders, right? And all the research 01:53:40.760 --> 01:53:46.420 and all the data is showing that getting to closure 01:53:46.420 --> 01:53:49.300 for us, being competent in the job, right? Being 01:53:49.300 --> 01:53:51.640 competent, right? Which comes from training and 01:53:51.640 --> 01:53:54.319 education, right? Getting all those reps in and 01:53:54.319 --> 01:53:57.199 having experience, having these conversations. 01:53:58.960 --> 01:54:01.380 Being competent and being confident are two of 01:54:01.380 --> 01:54:05.699 the biggest pillars of how we are going to respond 01:54:05.699 --> 01:54:08.399 and handle calls and the stress of the call. 01:54:08.560 --> 01:54:11.979 And then interacting with the patient and their 01:54:11.979 --> 01:54:14.800 families is how we get to closure. And that's 01:54:14.800 --> 01:54:17.239 how we're going to have, that's literally the 01:54:17.239 --> 01:54:20.920 pathway and the key to success. of our mental 01:54:20.920 --> 01:54:23.260 well -being after these calls because we don't 01:54:23.260 --> 01:54:26.739 have to have a 911 or a pulse event for us to 01:54:26.739 --> 01:54:30.380 need cism and debriefing right it is these are 01:54:30.380 --> 01:54:33.420 the everyday calls that we have we don't have 01:54:33.420 --> 01:54:35.960 to have some catastrophic event it doesn't have 01:54:35.960 --> 01:54:39.000 to be a pediatric code for us to need closure 01:54:39.000 --> 01:54:42.699 it's the everyday call where we're seeing people 01:54:42.699 --> 01:54:45.000 suffer whether they're dead or not right leaving 01:54:45.000 --> 01:54:48.939 people in a suffering state is a moral insult 01:54:49.529 --> 01:54:53.810 to our soul you know and feeling like even if 01:54:53.810 --> 01:54:56.489 it was even if even if grandma was 90 and she 01:54:56.489 --> 01:54:58.489 died and she was and in your mind you're like 01:54:58.489 --> 01:55:00.229 man well she had a great life 90 years old that's 01:55:00.229 --> 01:55:03.289 that's pretty good and old you know like we can't 01:55:03.289 --> 01:55:05.470 save everybody i believe that we can't save everybody 01:55:05.470 --> 01:55:09.710 um but even when we have to pronounce somebody 01:55:09.710 --> 01:55:14.229 dead there is part of that burden that we still 01:55:14.229 --> 01:55:20.109 carry and when you involve family members, and 01:55:20.109 --> 01:55:22.449 you allow them to be part of that decision -making 01:55:22.449 --> 01:55:25.149 process, you are sharing that burden with them. 01:55:25.229 --> 01:55:28.270 So you are not carrying the burden alone. And 01:55:28.270 --> 01:55:31.989 I think that's really important. And getting 01:55:31.989 --> 01:55:35.550 people to understand that really doesn't take 01:55:35.550 --> 01:55:39.189 much because the first time they have the courage 01:55:39.189 --> 01:55:43.409 to try it, they feel it. And it's pretty profound. 01:55:43.569 --> 01:55:46.750 And so usually after These presentations, I usually 01:55:46.750 --> 01:55:48.850 have someone that calls me or contacts me some 01:55:48.850 --> 01:55:50.930 way and says, I tried it and oh my God, that 01:55:50.930 --> 01:55:54.090 was so powerful. And it's just a unique opportunity 01:55:54.090 --> 01:55:56.970 that we have that we're not taking advantage 01:55:56.970 --> 01:55:59.250 of because we don't talk about it enough. And 01:55:59.250 --> 01:56:02.949 frankly, we have to talk to other people and 01:56:02.949 --> 01:56:06.989 that's difficult for us to do sometimes. It makes 01:56:06.989 --> 01:56:09.890 a lot of sense because when I think about all 01:56:09.890 --> 01:56:14.060 the deaths. And I hear this from other first 01:56:14.060 --> 01:56:16.119 responders. It wasn't to say it's more the traumatic 01:56:16.119 --> 01:56:19.439 deaths. It wasn't so much the grotesque nature 01:56:19.439 --> 01:56:22.979 of the car accident or wherever it was. It was 01:56:22.979 --> 01:56:25.260 the wails of the loved ones that really kind 01:56:25.260 --> 01:56:29.079 of reverberate. I had a code. A young man was 01:56:29.079 --> 01:56:31.680 dropping off a dog at a resort before going, 01:56:31.779 --> 01:56:34.420 spending a vacation there and literally just 01:56:34.420 --> 01:56:38.739 keeled over. Another, you know, another event 01:56:38.739 --> 01:56:40.600 that you're not going to return from. But the 01:56:40.600 --> 01:56:44.800 code. went perfectly and i think this is the 01:56:44.800 --> 01:56:47.300 thing when you talked about training if you're 01:56:47.300 --> 01:56:49.560 not training your department properly if you're 01:56:49.560 --> 01:56:51.479 not holding them to the right standard if you're 01:56:51.479 --> 01:56:53.779 not giving them those reps you're setting them 01:56:53.779 --> 01:56:56.560 up for mental health challenges because there's 01:56:56.560 --> 01:56:59.039 going to be that doubt would that person have 01:56:59.039 --> 01:57:01.520 made it had i got that io had i done my compressions 01:57:01.520 --> 01:57:04.000 properly whatever it was but that particular 01:57:04.000 --> 01:57:07.380 one we still had a somewhat of a rhythm so we 01:57:07.380 --> 01:57:11.000 worked in 20 minutes we we transported And ultimately, 01:57:11.020 --> 01:57:15.159 he didn't make it. It was a bleed. And I was 01:57:15.159 --> 01:57:17.239 doing, if you remember, RMC, the report writing 01:57:17.239 --> 01:57:21.420 area was right next to the grief room where they 01:57:21.420 --> 01:57:23.180 would do the notifications in the hospital. Oh, 01:57:23.380 --> 01:57:26.619 my goodness. And so I'm 10 feet, if that, from 01:57:26.619 --> 01:57:29.399 this room typing, and I just hear these screams. 01:57:30.119 --> 01:57:32.779 And I think this is where there's a lot of value 01:57:32.779 --> 01:57:35.300 in what you've been talking about is you're now 01:57:35.300 --> 01:57:38.720 making a connection with that traumatized family. 01:57:39.310 --> 01:57:41.529 before it's just this wails and you're from it 01:57:41.529 --> 01:57:44.449 i remember years ago in california we had a gangbang 01:57:44.449 --> 01:57:48.010 shooting and the kid i think was like 15 and 01:57:48.010 --> 01:57:50.289 i remember pulling the yellow sheet over him 01:57:50.289 --> 01:57:52.670 and then the whole fucking park just erupted 01:57:52.670 --> 01:57:55.649 in screams and the dark gallows humor in me thought 01:57:55.649 --> 01:57:57.529 well if i pull the sheet back will they stop 01:57:57.529 --> 01:58:00.109 and then i go forward again and then stop that's 01:58:00.109 --> 01:58:01.890 because that's the way we think up because we're 01:58:01.890 --> 01:58:05.319 fucked up But, you know, again, it was that I 01:58:05.319 --> 01:58:07.859 can remember vaguely the kid, but I remember 01:58:07.859 --> 01:58:10.479 the screams and the heartbroken families far 01:58:10.479 --> 01:58:13.600 more than that. So by actually creating a bridge 01:58:13.600 --> 01:58:16.560 to those very people that are traumatized, it 01:58:16.560 --> 01:58:20.079 makes perfect sense to me. Yeah. And a lot of 01:58:20.079 --> 01:58:22.140 times what you find is people, families that 01:58:22.140 --> 01:58:27.939 are very appreciative and loving towards you. 01:58:28.319 --> 01:58:32.420 And we're in a moment where we probably need. 01:58:32.880 --> 01:58:37.399 some level of validation and appreciation you 01:58:37.399 --> 01:58:41.899 know because in order for us to you know we love 01:58:41.899 --> 01:58:44.199 to say we're doing everything we can but it turns 01:58:44.199 --> 01:58:47.420 out that we have to not just say it but we have 01:58:47.420 --> 01:58:50.949 to believe it And so when families tell you, 01:58:50.970 --> 01:58:53.750 you did everything you can, thank you for trying, 01:58:53.869 --> 01:58:57.449 like, you know what I mean? It kind of reinforces 01:58:57.449 --> 01:59:01.810 that you also know, right? So the way that we 01:59:01.810 --> 01:59:03.630 believe that we've done everything we can is 01:59:03.630 --> 01:59:05.989 through confidence and competence, right? But 01:59:05.989 --> 01:59:07.789 then when you get that validation from the family, 01:59:07.989 --> 01:59:12.170 nobody else can give that to you, you know, and 01:59:12.170 --> 01:59:15.409 as a responder. And so it's interesting because 01:59:15.409 --> 01:59:20.279 the... Journal of American Medical Associates 01:59:20.279 --> 01:59:23.760 back in 2016 had an article on this, and it's 01:59:23.760 --> 01:59:26.579 called The Resuscitation That Never Ends. And 01:59:26.579 --> 01:59:29.079 it literally talks about, have you read it? I 01:59:29.079 --> 01:59:31.500 haven't, no. It's a great title. Yeah, yeah. 01:59:31.560 --> 01:59:34.979 Well, and it's because it's a great, great title. 01:59:35.100 --> 01:59:37.720 And it's because it's really true. And that's 01:59:37.720 --> 01:59:41.729 basically what it's talking about is that. having 01:59:41.729 --> 01:59:45.850 the competency and being confident in what you 01:59:45.850 --> 01:59:50.550 do in route and on scene are the building blocks 01:59:50.550 --> 01:59:54.229 of closure for you as a provider, not for the 01:59:54.229 --> 01:59:57.609 family, right? But for you as a provider, this 01:59:57.609 --> 02:00:00.890 was back in 2016, almost 10 years ago, you know, 02:00:00.930 --> 02:00:07.850 and a really profound article and just really 02:00:07.850 --> 02:00:15.659 underscoring. How that impact over a 25 or 30, 02:00:15.720 --> 02:00:19.020 30 year career is a deadly combination when we 02:00:19.020 --> 02:00:23.239 don't have it. You know, and and I and I just 02:00:23.239 --> 02:00:25.180 can't say it enough. You know, like I said earlier, 02:00:25.579 --> 02:00:28.539 those calls that you that you'll never forget 02:00:28.539 --> 02:00:30.920 the sounds, things you did, things you didn't 02:00:30.920 --> 02:00:33.979 do. You know, I worked at one particular station 02:00:33.979 --> 02:00:38.039 for 13 years of my career and I can drive down 02:00:38.039 --> 02:00:43.070 that road in that area and tell you. everything. 02:00:43.070 --> 02:00:46.489 I'll never forget any of it. Not because I haven't 02:00:46.489 --> 02:00:49.130 tried, you know, but you just never going to 02:00:49.130 --> 02:00:50.670 forget these things. So I'll say you have like 02:00:50.670 --> 02:00:53.329 this hypothetical cup in your head of all these 02:00:53.329 --> 02:00:55.649 memories of these things that you've seen and 02:00:55.649 --> 02:00:58.350 done, things you've heard, things you've seen, 02:00:58.489 --> 02:01:00.170 things you've done, things you haven't done, 02:01:00.210 --> 02:01:03.350 that you never want to look back and wonder if 02:01:03.350 --> 02:01:06.350 that had a negative impact on your patient's 02:01:06.350 --> 02:01:12.149 outcome. And you you don't get to ever empty 02:01:12.149 --> 02:01:16.210 that cup the cup runneth over you know so what 02:01:16.210 --> 02:01:20.869 you do in that moment for your own mental health 02:01:20.869 --> 02:01:24.029 your own future is so important because we have 02:01:24.029 --> 02:01:26.310 to get to closure as first responders not just 02:01:26.310 --> 02:01:31.069 on high acuity calls you know but if you think 02:01:31.069 --> 02:01:34.069 about the opportunities that we have to interface 02:01:34.069 --> 02:01:37.699 with families Even when we have, let's say, it's 02:01:37.699 --> 02:01:39.640 still a critical call, right? But even if you 02:01:39.640 --> 02:01:43.659 say like a STEMI, right? So what I encourage 02:01:43.659 --> 02:01:45.899 my guys to do and what I do when I'm on scene 02:01:45.899 --> 02:01:48.560 is I have the crew stop. We package the patient 02:01:48.560 --> 02:01:51.159 for transport. They're getting ready to go to 02:01:51.159 --> 02:01:53.720 the hospital. You know they're going to take 02:01:53.720 --> 02:01:56.199 this patient right to the cath lab. You know 02:01:56.199 --> 02:02:00.460 people die in the cath lab. So if you stopped 02:02:00.460 --> 02:02:04.319 for 30 seconds. So what I do is I tell the crew, 02:02:04.380 --> 02:02:06.300 hold on just a minute, guys. And I go get the 02:02:06.300 --> 02:02:08.220 loved one, the husband, the wife, or whoever 02:02:08.220 --> 02:02:10.199 it is, and I tell them, I say, would you like 02:02:10.199 --> 02:02:11.920 to come over and say I love you before we leave? 02:02:12.979 --> 02:02:14.659 Sometimes they're driving in separate vehicles. 02:02:14.739 --> 02:02:16.220 Sometimes they have to do something with the 02:02:16.220 --> 02:02:18.460 kids first before they come. What if by the time 02:02:18.460 --> 02:02:20.880 they get to the hospital, their loved one is 02:02:20.880 --> 02:02:24.979 dead? That's happened to me. We were pacing him, 02:02:25.020 --> 02:02:27.680 and she said, I love you. We closed the doors, 02:02:27.819 --> 02:02:30.180 and in about two minutes en route, we lost capture 02:02:30.180 --> 02:02:32.460 and never got him back. Yeah, and I'm going to 02:02:32.460 --> 02:02:39.159 tell you, as terrible as that is, At least the 02:02:39.159 --> 02:02:41.920 last thing, one of the last things that you remember 02:02:41.920 --> 02:02:44.399 and that she'll never forget is that she at least 02:02:44.399 --> 02:02:46.800 got to say, I love you. And those were her last 02:02:46.800 --> 02:02:49.560 words to him and the last words that he got to 02:02:49.560 --> 02:02:52.560 hear. And that's still profound. And that is 02:02:52.560 --> 02:02:54.340 still a part of the process of how we get to 02:02:54.340 --> 02:02:57.060 closure. So being able to afford that opportunity 02:02:57.060 --> 02:03:00.300 to somebody is very unique and we just don't 02:03:00.300 --> 02:03:02.760 think about it, but it's very powerful, you know, 02:03:02.760 --> 02:03:06.939 because. even if somebody is still, if someone's 02:03:06.939 --> 02:03:08.659 dead, but they're still warm, right? Like we're 02:03:08.659 --> 02:03:11.079 still actively working the code and we allow 02:03:11.079 --> 02:03:12.800 the family member to come over and say, I love 02:03:12.800 --> 02:03:14.380 you. I don't tell, I don't use the words like 02:03:14.380 --> 02:03:15.779 come over and say goodbye. Cause then they're 02:03:15.779 --> 02:03:18.560 like, Oh, they're going to die. I don't do that. 02:03:19.460 --> 02:03:22.500 My go -to phrase is, would you like to come over 02:03:22.500 --> 02:03:25.720 and say, I love you before we go? You know, sometimes 02:03:25.720 --> 02:03:27.460 people are like, no, it's okay. I'm like, okay. 02:03:27.659 --> 02:03:29.640 You know, but I afforded them that opportunity 02:03:29.640 --> 02:03:34.239 that nobody else was going to. Okay. And So even 02:03:34.239 --> 02:03:37.739 if they choose not to take it, you're still offering 02:03:37.739 --> 02:03:41.380 them something that's very unique. And it's part 02:03:41.380 --> 02:03:44.220 of the closure process for us, you know? And 02:03:44.220 --> 02:03:46.979 it doesn't have to be these high acuity, crazy 02:03:46.979 --> 02:03:48.899 calls that we do this on. When you have strokes, 02:03:49.180 --> 02:03:52.380 when you have STEMIs, right? It's going, it feels 02:03:52.380 --> 02:03:54.659 different. If you've ever lost somebody that 02:03:54.659 --> 02:03:58.479 you love and you got to say goodbye to them when 02:03:58.479 --> 02:04:01.720 they were warm and they still feel like they're 02:04:01.720 --> 02:04:05.159 kind of there. It's different than when you say 02:04:05.159 --> 02:04:07.979 goodbye to them in a casket or when they're cold, 02:04:08.020 --> 02:04:12.119 stiff and dead. And so we don't know that these 02:04:12.119 --> 02:04:14.399 critically injured patients that we take to the 02:04:14.399 --> 02:04:16.380 hospital are going to survive their injuries. 02:04:16.840 --> 02:04:19.579 They might die in the cath lab. Right. They might 02:04:19.579 --> 02:04:22.579 stroke out and that and they'll have no other 02:04:22.579 --> 02:04:25.859 memory of anything other than what you gave them, 02:04:25.960 --> 02:04:29.819 what you gave them before you left the scene. 02:04:30.539 --> 02:04:33.800 And so I think we have to slow down and take 02:04:33.800 --> 02:04:37.619 better care of our patients in that regard. But 02:04:37.619 --> 02:04:39.960 understanding that doing that, taking better 02:04:39.960 --> 02:04:42.399 care of them in turn is taking better care of 02:04:42.399 --> 02:04:45.859 us because we are taking an opportunity to be 02:04:45.859 --> 02:04:49.319 impacted in our mental health. We you know, we 02:04:49.319 --> 02:04:50.640 don't want to think of it in those terms, but 02:04:50.640 --> 02:04:52.539 that's what we're doing. We're allowing ourselves 02:04:52.539 --> 02:04:54.880 to get to closure. And we know that doing that 02:04:54.880 --> 02:04:57.800 over not doing it over a 25 or 30 year career, 02:04:57.859 --> 02:05:01.539 we see what's happening to people. You know, 02:05:01.560 --> 02:05:05.220 James, I just talked the other day to one of 02:05:05.220 --> 02:05:10.720 our guys who's pretty close to retirement and 02:05:10.720 --> 02:05:14.420 struggling tremendously. And when we talk about 02:05:14.420 --> 02:05:18.260 this, this is exactly why I talk about it. Because 02:05:18.260 --> 02:05:23.960 it's so hard to believe that this guy is so close 02:05:23.960 --> 02:05:27.220 to the end of his career and mentally struggling 02:05:27.220 --> 02:05:30.880 more than he is. ever has right and probably 02:05:30.880 --> 02:05:33.340 that person that came into the industry thinking 02:05:33.340 --> 02:05:36.199 that doesn't bother me i'm not going to be affected 02:05:36.199 --> 02:05:38.619 by this stuff right we all want to believe or 02:05:38.619 --> 02:05:40.359 maybe we never even thought about it before right 02:05:40.359 --> 02:05:42.079 like i never came into the fire service thinking 02:05:42.079 --> 02:05:45.199 all these calls were going to me up and i and 02:05:45.199 --> 02:05:47.239 i'm not even i'm not even like a sensitive kind 02:05:47.239 --> 02:05:49.899 of girl you know like i believe that when it's 02:05:49.899 --> 02:05:51.939 your time it's your time it's preordained when 02:05:51.939 --> 02:05:53.680 you know like i'm one of those people that believes 02:05:53.680 --> 02:05:56.029 that everything happens for a reason and And 02:05:56.029 --> 02:05:59.649 we can't we can't change that. Right. But it 02:05:59.649 --> 02:06:02.310 doesn't mean that when we when people die and 02:06:02.310 --> 02:06:06.750 we're there, that we don't hold on to and harvest 02:06:06.750 --> 02:06:10.210 some sort of pain from that in our heart and 02:06:10.210 --> 02:06:12.250 our soul and your mind, like whatever. Right. 02:06:12.350 --> 02:06:18.689 And so. When you see this over 25 or 30 year 02:06:18.689 --> 02:06:23.270 career and you leave the fire service, you you've 02:06:23.270 --> 02:06:29.170 been a. A servant to the people for 25 years 02:06:29.170 --> 02:06:33.050 and you're haunted by your own memories that 02:06:33.050 --> 02:06:37.930 the only answer to your pain and suffering is 02:06:37.930 --> 02:06:42.789 to take your own life. And so for me to talk 02:06:42.789 --> 02:06:45.729 about this all the time, but then just recently 02:06:45.729 --> 02:06:48.550 interact with one of our one of our guys who 02:06:48.550 --> 02:06:51.210 has less than a year left in his career and is 02:06:51.210 --> 02:06:55.579 mentally suffering. And it's not always it's 02:06:55.579 --> 02:06:57.840 not always completely job related. Right. There's 02:06:57.840 --> 02:07:00.119 a lot of things that you start to reflect on 02:07:00.119 --> 02:07:02.859 in your personal life. Right. About marriages 02:07:02.859 --> 02:07:05.060 and relationships and kids and your relationships 02:07:05.060 --> 02:07:07.439 with your kids about whether you mess those up 02:07:07.439 --> 02:07:09.960 or not. And how much was that impacted by our 02:07:09.960 --> 02:07:13.380 cold, callous job that we do? Our early life, 02:07:13.380 --> 02:07:15.239 too, is something we don't talk about a lot from 02:07:15.239 --> 02:07:17.579 in vitro through to when you put the badge on. 02:07:17.640 --> 02:07:21.640 That has an impact as well. Yes. Yeah. And so, 02:07:21.640 --> 02:07:24.520 you know, the reality is what we what these actually 02:07:24.520 --> 02:07:28.239 are, are trauma markers that we're creating in 02:07:28.239 --> 02:07:31.140 our body. You know, that's what that's what these 02:07:31.140 --> 02:07:33.520 are. I mean, right. And I don't mean like a traumatic 02:07:33.520 --> 02:07:36.340 call. I mean, like it's trauma. There's mental 02:07:36.340 --> 02:07:38.880 trauma, spiritual trauma, physical, sexual, all 02:07:38.880 --> 02:07:42.220 kinds of all kinds of traumas. And so that's 02:07:42.220 --> 02:07:44.520 what's happening is we're actually creating. 02:07:45.159 --> 02:07:47.239 We're not creating, but what's happening to our 02:07:47.239 --> 02:07:50.279 body are traumas that we just never get to get 02:07:50.279 --> 02:07:55.500 rid of. And there's so much research and so many 02:07:55.500 --> 02:07:58.720 people's stories out there about it. And unfortunately, 02:07:58.979 --> 02:08:02.699 just like you mentioned earlier, when we have 02:08:02.699 --> 02:08:06.699 organizations that are only tracking firefighter 02:08:06.699 --> 02:08:12.619 suicides that are active duty is not the whole 02:08:12.619 --> 02:08:16.829 picture. Of what's happening out there. And so 02:08:16.829 --> 02:08:19.149 sadly, we're seeing many people come to the end 02:08:19.149 --> 02:08:22.350 of their career and the end of their own lives. 02:08:23.050 --> 02:08:27.529 You know, and and so this is a this is a gateway 02:08:27.529 --> 02:08:31.710 to closure. And so I don't just talk about this, 02:08:31.750 --> 02:08:38.229 you know. For myself, I I try to show up. We 02:08:38.229 --> 02:08:42.529 run about 60 to 80 codes a month. In our organization. 02:08:43.650 --> 02:08:50.029 And in my area, I oversee six stations, second 02:08:50.029 --> 02:08:54.010 in command of six stations. And in my area, I 02:08:54.010 --> 02:08:57.909 ask my guys to add me to every code. I can only 02:08:57.909 --> 02:08:59.609 go to the ones I hear on the radio, the ones 02:08:59.609 --> 02:09:01.630 they add me to, but I go to every code that I'm 02:09:01.630 --> 02:09:04.789 added to. And my goal when I show up is to do 02:09:04.789 --> 02:09:07.630 this because I want them to see what this looks 02:09:07.630 --> 02:09:11.890 like. And I specifically tell them. So this is 02:09:11.890 --> 02:09:13.529 my mission. This is what I'm doing. I'm not showing 02:09:13.529 --> 02:09:15.289 up to be the protocol police. That's not what 02:09:15.289 --> 02:09:16.529 I'm trying to do. I'm not trying to show up and 02:09:16.529 --> 02:09:18.529 bust your balls, take over your call, call you 02:09:18.529 --> 02:09:20.090 out. Obviously, I'm going to make sure we're 02:09:20.090 --> 02:09:21.750 all doing our job because that is an important 02:09:21.750 --> 02:09:24.970 factor in us getting to closure also. Because 02:09:24.970 --> 02:09:27.090 again, you have to be competent and competent. 02:09:27.949 --> 02:09:30.710 Those are the two big pillars to get to closure. 02:09:31.250 --> 02:09:33.750 So if you're screwing up on a call, that's not 02:09:33.750 --> 02:09:38.630 going to help you get to closure. But my goal 02:09:38.630 --> 02:09:41.449 is to show up and show them. what this looks 02:09:41.449 --> 02:09:45.729 like in hopes that they get some closure and 02:09:45.729 --> 02:09:49.470 that they learn this process and they have good, 02:09:49.529 --> 02:09:54.890 happy, healthy careers and retirements. And so 02:09:54.890 --> 02:09:59.329 I'm just doing everything that I can to get that 02:09:59.329 --> 02:10:01.350 message out to people and really help them understand 02:10:01.350 --> 02:10:04.010 what is the point in doing this. And the point 02:10:04.010 --> 02:10:06.939 in doing it is not. It is for other people, right? 02:10:07.020 --> 02:10:08.800 So when I say this, yes, we're doing more for, 02:10:08.819 --> 02:10:10.619 just do more for other people. Have these hard 02:10:10.619 --> 02:10:12.600 conversations. I know they're difficult, but 02:10:12.600 --> 02:10:16.380 the reason why is the most profound, and that 02:10:16.380 --> 02:10:21.340 is to save your own life. Absolutely. And the 02:10:21.340 --> 02:10:23.579 gentleman or the firefighter that you're referring 02:10:23.579 --> 02:10:29.319 to, this is what's so scary, is when you go to 02:10:29.319 --> 02:10:32.180 the fire station, if you do have a cohesive firehouse, 02:10:32.840 --> 02:10:35.140 that's still nurturing. You're still able to 02:10:35.140 --> 02:10:37.380 have the firehouse banter and you're enjoying 02:10:37.380 --> 02:10:39.859 it. And if you're like we used to as 70, if you're 02:10:39.859 --> 02:10:42.039 playing Bay hockey and breaking windows and fixing 02:10:42.039 --> 02:10:46.140 them before anyone sees, it's a healing element. 02:10:46.520 --> 02:10:51.979 But for our retirees that transition now, sadly 02:10:51.979 --> 02:10:56.659 because of the landscape, they may well be divorced. 02:10:57.000 --> 02:10:59.079 They may be living in a one bedroom apartment. 02:10:59.850 --> 02:11:01.670 And now they don't have the firehouse. They've 02:11:01.670 --> 02:11:04.050 lost their identity as a firefighter because 02:11:04.050 --> 02:11:05.750 they go to the store. No one gives a shit what 02:11:05.750 --> 02:11:08.869 you used to do. And then that purpose. I used 02:11:08.869 --> 02:11:11.529 to love, I had a 70 mile drive to and from the 02:11:11.529 --> 02:11:14.989 station. I used to love driving home. And again, 02:11:15.050 --> 02:11:17.449 yes, I was a full on reaper if you went to cardiac 02:11:17.449 --> 02:11:20.470 arrest, but numerous pre -code saves, of course. 02:11:20.529 --> 02:11:23.810 And that's an amazing thing. Traumatic pre -codes 02:11:23.810 --> 02:11:26.210 and all those things. And it was just a back 02:11:26.210 --> 02:11:28.350 to bed call. And you change someone's life by 02:11:28.350 --> 02:11:30.409 cleaning them up and putting them in a fresh 02:11:30.409 --> 02:11:32.029 set of clothes and putting them back to bed. 02:11:32.170 --> 02:11:34.350 You know you made a difference and you've lost 02:11:34.350 --> 02:11:37.109 that too. So someone who's already struggling 02:11:37.109 --> 02:11:40.350 at the end of their career, that's a very dangerous 02:11:40.350 --> 02:11:42.829 place when we go transitioning out. So we need 02:11:42.829 --> 02:11:46.550 to really envelop him and give him the tools 02:11:46.550 --> 02:11:48.689 that he needs to start working on himself now 02:11:48.689 --> 02:11:51.989 and finding that tribe to transition into. find 02:11:51.989 --> 02:11:54.289 a pickleball group to start playing with. You 02:11:54.289 --> 02:11:56.350 know what I mean? Because if you leave that man 02:11:56.350 --> 02:11:59.850 or that woman isolated when they're already struggling 02:11:59.850 --> 02:12:02.430 with a, again, we all know Orange County, depending 02:12:02.430 --> 02:12:05.029 on where you're stationed, your career could 02:12:05.029 --> 02:12:08.229 be almost a flat line like 86 used to be, or 02:12:08.229 --> 02:12:11.470 you could be 50, 42. And it's almost a vertical 02:12:11.470 --> 02:12:13.550 line with your learning curve and the amount 02:12:13.550 --> 02:12:16.130 of trauma that you've accumulated. So, you know, 02:12:16.130 --> 02:12:21.449 we really need to identify that, that, um, enveloping 02:12:21.449 --> 02:12:23.569 of our people that are almost at the end of their 02:12:23.569 --> 02:12:27.050 career and really start helping them transition 02:12:27.050 --> 02:12:29.050 and preparing them for some of these jarring 02:12:29.050 --> 02:12:30.770 things that they're going to get. Because I would 02:12:30.770 --> 02:12:34.210 argue that the silent majority of suicides and 02:12:34.210 --> 02:12:37.729 overdoses and death by alcoholism are our retirees. 02:12:37.789 --> 02:12:39.649 That's when the heart disease manifests. That's 02:12:39.649 --> 02:12:42.189 when the cancer manifests. But we're not counted. 02:12:42.470 --> 02:12:45.189 There's no VA for firefighters. So you're not 02:12:45.189 --> 02:12:47.770 on the statistics. So those are the ones we have 02:12:47.770 --> 02:12:50.199 to watch more than anyone, in my opinion. Mm 02:12:50.199 --> 02:12:53.399 hmm. Yeah. And I think that's another thing to 02:12:53.399 --> 02:12:55.659 really touch on, you know, is the alcohol and 02:12:55.659 --> 02:13:01.260 substance abuse. And, you know, again, I'm not 02:13:01.260 --> 02:13:03.239 a hypocrite, so I can't sit here and say that 02:13:03.239 --> 02:13:04.640 I haven't been that person that's like, oh, man, 02:13:04.680 --> 02:13:06.479 that was a bad call. Let's go have a drink or 02:13:06.479 --> 02:13:08.180 man, that was a terrible shift or, you know, 02:13:08.180 --> 02:13:10.399 sometimes we celebrate fires. Right. You know, 02:13:10.399 --> 02:13:14.479 but the reality is that it is so important to 02:13:14.479 --> 02:13:18.520 understand your intent or your friend's intent. 02:13:19.710 --> 02:13:22.329 you know, pulling on your shoulder to say, let's 02:13:22.329 --> 02:13:25.949 go have this drink, you know, or whatever. And 02:13:25.949 --> 02:13:28.229 I think that it's just so important to understand 02:13:28.229 --> 02:13:33.750 that whatever substance or alcohol or action, 02:13:33.890 --> 02:13:37.750 right, because there's other things also that 02:13:37.750 --> 02:13:43.510 you're consuming to numb out pain also numbs 02:13:43.510 --> 02:13:48.260 out love and joy in your life. And I just I just 02:13:48.260 --> 02:13:51.000 think it's important to make mention of that 02:13:51.000 --> 02:13:56.060 and and be aware, because, you know, if someone 02:13:56.060 --> 02:13:57.640 called me tonight and was like, hey, let's go 02:13:57.640 --> 02:13:59.600 have a bottle of wine and talk about this. I'm 02:13:59.600 --> 02:14:02.640 going to say, hell, yeah. Right. But, you know, 02:14:02.640 --> 02:14:05.720 there's just so many instances where when we're 02:14:05.720 --> 02:14:08.279 talking about that brotherhood earlier, where. 02:14:10.220 --> 02:14:12.840 We it's it's a lot different in the last five 02:14:12.840 --> 02:14:15.439 years, the last 10 years, but definitely the 02:14:15.439 --> 02:14:17.600 last five years. There's a profound difference 02:14:17.600 --> 02:14:19.800 in the connections happening in the stations. 02:14:20.020 --> 02:14:22.739 So what happens is when we used to come back 02:14:22.739 --> 02:14:25.119 and stay up and talk about these calls and things 02:14:25.119 --> 02:14:28.300 like that. And maybe they weren't even in the 02:14:28.300 --> 02:14:29.760 middle of the night. Right. But we would come 02:14:29.760 --> 02:14:31.939 back and we everyone sit around the kitchen table 02:14:31.939 --> 02:14:37.109 and we almost had our own debriefing. You didn't 02:14:37.109 --> 02:14:39.130 even ask if you were doing it. You didn't have 02:14:39.130 --> 02:14:41.430 to go rally people to come and do it. We just 02:14:41.430 --> 02:14:44.250 did it. And that's not really happening much 02:14:44.250 --> 02:14:45.850 anymore because people are going back to their 02:14:45.850 --> 02:14:48.829 rooms or back to their bunks, back to whatever 02:14:48.829 --> 02:14:50.569 they were doing, back on their social media. 02:14:51.350 --> 02:14:56.149 They're looking for their own fix to forget about 02:14:56.149 --> 02:15:00.619 or mend that pain. that they're suffering from. 02:15:00.739 --> 02:15:03.300 And so we don't get those connections the same 02:15:03.300 --> 02:15:05.359 way in the stations after these calls either. 02:15:05.479 --> 02:15:07.300 And it's hard to keep track, even in leadership, 02:15:07.479 --> 02:15:09.800 it's hard to keep track of, like, who's okay 02:15:09.800 --> 02:15:14.340 and who's not, right? You know, and I think that's 02:15:14.340 --> 02:15:17.859 just a higher level of awareness that people 02:15:17.859 --> 02:15:21.579 need to have for each other. You know, we should 02:15:21.579 --> 02:15:25.029 know. We should get to know one another that 02:15:25.029 --> 02:15:26.390 we're working with. And if, you know, if you 02:15:26.390 --> 02:15:28.449 have someone floating in for the day, you don't 02:15:28.449 --> 02:15:30.829 know if maybe they, I mean, I actually had a 02:15:30.829 --> 02:15:33.789 guy that came to me a few months ago and I had 02:15:33.789 --> 02:15:36.449 showed up on a call. I don't, he doesn't usually 02:15:36.449 --> 02:15:38.189 work in our area, so he wasn't used to seeing 02:15:38.189 --> 02:15:43.890 this, but we had ran a call and he saw my presentation 02:15:43.890 --> 02:15:46.750 and then he came up to me and he says, you know, 02:15:46.789 --> 02:15:51.189 nobody in this department knows this. He goes, 02:15:51.229 --> 02:15:54.880 but. I had to work a code on my own child. And 02:15:54.880 --> 02:15:58.739 so he's telling me this whole story. And he obviously 02:15:58.739 --> 02:16:01.699 just felt the need to really share it with me. 02:16:02.560 --> 02:16:05.399 And it was invaluable. But this is an exact example 02:16:05.399 --> 02:16:07.859 about how many hundreds of people has he worked 02:16:07.859 --> 02:16:10.479 with that he's probably worked pediatric codes 02:16:10.479 --> 02:16:13.029 with. They don't even know this about him. And 02:16:13.029 --> 02:16:14.850 we just don't we're not taking the time to get 02:16:14.850 --> 02:16:16.689 to know one another because we're so engrossed 02:16:16.689 --> 02:16:19.130 in doing other things and all the training things 02:16:19.130 --> 02:16:21.390 that we have to do and all the mandatory this 02:16:21.390 --> 02:16:25.310 and, you know, all the other computer training 02:16:25.310 --> 02:16:27.710 we have to do and stuff that's taking time away 02:16:27.710 --> 02:16:30.109 from the building of that brotherhood where we're 02:16:30.109 --> 02:16:32.729 able to check on each other, you know. And so 02:16:32.729 --> 02:16:36.770 and then, of course, there's. There's never any 02:16:36.770 --> 02:16:39.670 substance abuse in the fire service, so we don't 02:16:39.670 --> 02:16:43.229 have to worry about that. But it's just so important 02:16:43.229 --> 02:16:46.290 to check on each other and get to know one another 02:16:46.290 --> 02:16:49.209 so that when we're coming back from these everyday 02:16:49.209 --> 02:16:51.809 calls, again, it doesn't have to be a child that 02:16:51.809 --> 02:16:57.850 died. It's the everyday call that we're working 02:16:57.850 --> 02:17:02.270 on how we get to closure and how we survive. 02:17:03.180 --> 02:17:05.719 this industry and how we get out mentally and 02:17:05.719 --> 02:17:09.620 physically intact hitting on the alcohol for 02:17:09.620 --> 02:17:11.700 a second what people don't realize is it's a 02:17:11.700 --> 02:17:14.600 sleep disruptor as well so you've got you know 02:17:14.600 --> 02:17:17.280 56 hour week you might have had a probably had 02:17:17.280 --> 02:17:19.860 a mandatory and now you go home and i get it 02:17:19.860 --> 02:17:22.620 i did it i didn't realize how much i drank through 02:17:22.620 --> 02:17:25.639 my career not binge drinking but frequent air 02:17:25.639 --> 02:17:30.100 quotes relaxing drinking wind down um And it 02:17:30.100 --> 02:17:32.180 disrupts your sleep. So you're compounding that 02:17:32.180 --> 02:17:34.520 sleep deprivation. And I think the other terrifying 02:17:34.520 --> 02:17:37.899 thing, if you look at most suicides, alcohol 02:17:37.899 --> 02:17:41.200 is involved. And I always kind of give this analogy. 02:17:43.239 --> 02:17:45.739 If you think about when we were young, there 02:17:45.739 --> 02:17:48.920 were times, I know with me at least, where you 02:17:48.920 --> 02:17:52.379 meet someone and you end up having a one -night 02:17:52.379 --> 02:17:54.159 stand or whatever. And then the next morning, 02:17:54.200 --> 02:17:57.459 you're like, oh, shit. You know, I didn't actually 02:17:57.459 --> 02:18:00.840 find that person that attractive. And here we 02:18:00.840 --> 02:18:03.860 are. It's the same with alcohol. You get people 02:18:03.860 --> 02:18:06.579 who are close to crisis. That invisible hand 02:18:06.579 --> 02:18:09.139 is still stopping them from, you know, making 02:18:09.139 --> 02:18:12.000 a permanent decision for a temporary problem. 02:18:13.200 --> 02:18:17.260 But when you add alcohol in. Again, it distorts 02:18:17.260 --> 02:18:19.299 your reality. All of a sudden, that guy or girl 02:18:19.299 --> 02:18:21.420 is way more attractive than they were. All of 02:18:21.420 --> 02:18:23.440 a sudden, that resistance that you take in your 02:18:23.440 --> 02:18:26.000 own life starts to melt away and you get that 02:18:26.000 --> 02:18:29.120 air of Dutch courage. So that's another important 02:18:29.120 --> 02:18:31.299 thing about alcohol is if you're in a crisis, 02:18:31.579 --> 02:18:33.760 think that you're compounding your own sleep 02:18:33.760 --> 02:18:36.959 and you're actually taking away some of the kind 02:18:36.959 --> 02:18:39.459 of training wheels, the safety mechanisms around 02:18:39.459 --> 02:18:43.819 you taking your own life. That's for sure. All 02:18:43.819 --> 02:18:46.090 right. Well. I want to be mindful of your time 02:18:46.090 --> 02:18:48.610 for people listening. If they want to reach out 02:18:48.610 --> 02:18:51.010 to you, they want to learn more about the presentation 02:18:51.010 --> 02:18:53.030 that you're giving to Orange County. Where are 02:18:53.030 --> 02:18:56.729 the best places to do that? So my best contact 02:18:56.729 --> 02:19:00.450 information is I'm going to give you my email 02:19:00.450 --> 02:19:01.989 address and I'm going to give you my cell phone 02:19:01.989 --> 02:19:06.709 number. And I am happy to come out and talk more 02:19:06.709 --> 02:19:09.610 about this. Talk to people one on one. I talk 02:19:09.610 --> 02:19:14.930 to. um people in mass quantities and i'll be 02:19:14.930 --> 02:19:17.030 giving this presentation the full presentation 02:19:17.030 --> 02:19:21.250 at the first their first care conference which 02:19:21.250 --> 02:19:23.090 is down south that's one of florida's largest 02:19:23.090 --> 02:19:26.590 ems conferences i'll be back down there in um 02:19:26.590 --> 02:19:32.829 uh in july july is it june or july and that's 02:19:32.829 --> 02:19:35.729 down south and of course i'm giving the presentation 02:19:35.729 --> 02:19:39.809 at our preceptors academy that's coming up um 02:19:40.600 --> 02:19:42.959 And those are open for other people to attend. 02:19:43.079 --> 02:19:45.819 So my contact information for that is my cell 02:19:45.819 --> 02:19:53.579 phone number is 407 -616 -2270. And then my email 02:19:53.579 --> 02:20:04.100 address is diana .alexander .ocfl .net. And I 02:20:04.100 --> 02:20:06.340 think the beautiful thing about giving this presentation 02:20:06.340 --> 02:20:11.959 is I go anywhere and I give it at no charge. 02:20:12.260 --> 02:20:15.799 And the reason why I do that is because I hold 02:20:15.799 --> 02:20:20.079 hardly believe that this message will change 02:20:20.079 --> 02:20:23.620 people's lives. And I wouldn't want anybody to 02:20:23.620 --> 02:20:26.159 not get the information on account of money. 02:20:26.899 --> 02:20:31.299 And so I will take my own personal time and come 02:20:31.299 --> 02:20:33.420 out of, like I said, I just gave it to an entire 02:20:33.420 --> 02:20:37.510 department. I'm here locally across three shifts 02:20:37.510 --> 02:20:41.290 and I'm going down south to give it at that conference. 02:20:41.350 --> 02:20:43.889 I have another department down south that has 02:20:43.889 --> 02:20:47.829 me coming. And then I'll also be at the Polk 02:20:47.829 --> 02:20:50.549 County EMS conference that Dr. Banerjee puts 02:20:50.549 --> 02:20:52.149 on. He asked me to come out and give it there 02:20:52.149 --> 02:20:57.200 in. I think that's in May. I got a lot of dates. 02:20:57.260 --> 02:20:59.899 I can't remember them all, but most of where 02:20:59.899 --> 02:21:01.979 I give the presentations are open for other people 02:21:01.979 --> 02:21:04.959 to attend and it's worth seeing. And I'm happy 02:21:04.959 --> 02:21:07.319 to answer questions, talk more about it, or just 02:21:07.319 --> 02:21:09.200 listen to people talk. I think it's, it really 02:21:09.200 --> 02:21:12.120 has its place. And I really appreciate the opportunity 02:21:12.120 --> 02:21:14.979 to come on here and talk to you about it. And 02:21:14.979 --> 02:21:17.559 obviously talking with you anyways is wonderful, 02:21:17.719 --> 02:21:22.600 but it's an honor to be able to give that to 02:21:22.600 --> 02:21:24.750 other people. So thank you for your time.