Leaders ask for Help.

A new era is upon us. Remember when it was cool to have your helmet all charred and maybe even a little warped and melted? We’re smarter now and know that not only is that caked-on soot flammable, it’s also carcinogenic. Keeping your helmet clean means improved safety and keeps the cancer cooties away.

It’s time for a similar approach to mental health. Gone are the days of stuffing those bad calls all the way to the deepest corners of your brain. Gone are the days of being worried that if you ask for help, department admin will immediately pull you out of the game. Gone are the days of confusing numbness for resilience.

Newsflash: that probie is not going to be impressed when you brag about all the tragedies you’ve seen in your 1 year and 1 day career while scarfing down lasagna.

Want to REALLY impress them? After that cardiac arrest when you’re back in the solitude of the station, ask them how they’re doing with what they just experienced. Are they processing the call in a healthy way?

By showing early that it’s ok to talk about it, they’ll save the deep corners of their brain for useless Jeopardy trivia like a normal person. Not only that, but you just let them know you care. Guess what? NOW you’re cool in the probies eyes, and you just planted a seed of resilience.

What happens when your cholesterol is a little high? You can make some lifestyle changes, maybe take some medication, and get regular checkups for monitoring. You have options and will likely live a long healthy life. If you don’t do those things, it’s just a matter of time until that heart attack shows up, and then your options are limited.

Mental health is no different. If you catch the issues early and address them…you will have many choices on how to bounce back. If you wait until you’re in crisis, that’s when you’re taken out of the game.

Obviously, our job is dangerous.

We take risks daily and our baseline is skewed by what a normal shift becomes. Just because you’re doing ok it doesn’t mean your partner is, so never be afraid to ask how they’re doing and give them time to answer.

It comes back to caring. I hear from a lot of people that the fire department “brotherhood” isn’t what it used to be. You can train on tactics all shift, but something special happens when a crew truly cares about each other.

That’s how you build brotherhood back up.

Your effectiveness on the fire ground or chaotic medical call greatly increases when you have a bond with those you’re working with. One of the biggest predictors of how you will respond to those bad calls is the condition of your mental health at the time of the incident. That’s an easy concept to grasp.

Go into a call with your mental health already trashed, and you’re setting yourself up for failure.

The same call for someone with a safe support system, good night of sleep, and a therapist already in their arsenal will have a much better chance of processing things in a healthy way. If they still have problems recovering, they can be a modern-day leader and seek help.

Help is available from a wide array of readily accessible resources. The most important thing is to have the confidence to ask for help when you need it. Squashing things down may seem so much easier but trust me...long-term mental health relies upon dealing with issues as they arrive.

It’s never too late to ask for help, but doing it early gives you the best chance for recovery, and that’s what a true leader does.