Why Do Heroes Kill Themselves?: We Can Help Stop Them!

By Stephen Anthony

Suicide is one of the leading causes of death for first responders and veterans.

They have seen too much evil in the world and not enough good. Making matters worse, they are often portrayed as villains instead of heroes.

Stephen Anthony, an Army and National Guard veteran and longtime police officer, explores why suicide is so prevalent among first responders and veterans – and what we can do to give them hope. Learn how to:

• encourage the public to view first responders and veterans favorably;
• get those considering suicide to seek help;
• Overcome problems by relying on faith in God;
• see the world through the eyes of someone considering suicide.

For sixteen years, the author talked people out of killing themselves – until one day, God had to talk him out of doing to himself what no criminal had been able to achieve.

Get answers to why so many first responders and veterans consider and commit suicide – and learn how to save a friend, a loved one, or even yourself.

• Language: English
• Publisher: LifeRich Publishing
• Release date: Jun 2, 2020
• ISBN: 9781489729224

Book preview

WHY DO HEROES

KILL THEMSELVES?

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WE CAN HELP STOP THEM!

Stephen Anthony

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Copyright © 2020 Stephen Anthony.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

LifeRich Publishing is a registered trademark of The Reader’s Digest Association, Inc.

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Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Scripture quotations marked NIV are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved. [Biblica]

Scripture quotations marked NLT are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2007. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc. Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved. Website

Scripture quotations marked NKJV are taken from the New King James Version. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Unless otherwise indicated, all scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version® (ESV®). Copyright ©2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-4897-2921-7 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4897-2920-0 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4897-2922-4 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2020909619

LifeRich Publishing rev. date: 05/26/2020

This book is

dedicated to all of our brothers and sisters

who have given their lives in this battle

between good and evil.

And to all of you who have gone to the edge,

looked down,

thought about ending your pain,

paused to think about the people who would inherit it,

and then chose to look up to God for his help instead.

It is also for those

who choose to fight for the people you love,

who choose hope over despair,

and who choose life over death.

CONTENTS

Preface

Introduction

The After-Death Dream

Lost Hope

My Eyes Have Seen Too Much

We Are All in A Sinking Ship Together!

Can You See God in Your Weakness?

How Walking Closer with God Helps Us

Does Bullying Really Happen in our Profession?

The Secret You Can’t Tell Anyone

Suicide is Like Cancer

First Responders and Our Perfect Jobs

You Don’t Know What I’ve Done

Those Who Sit in Judgment of Us Live in Glass Houses

When All Other Attacks Fail the Lawsuits Will Come

I Do Believe; Help Me Overcome My Unbelief! (Mk 9:24, NIV)

The Tale of Two Brothers

You Have Been Gypped by Life!

Racism Destroys Hope

Humanity Quiz

The Ripple Effect of Suicide

I Need to Walk Closer with God

Suicide is the Awful Tragedy That Makes Normal Kids Become Public Servants

Suicidal Ideation as a Tool

Teenagers and Suicidal Ideations

Veterans in Crisis

I Can’t Stop These Thoughts in my Head!

Help, My Friend is Suicidal!

The Valley of the Shadow of Death

Your God Isn’t Real!

When God Uses Us to Answer Prayers

Dreams–Are they Divine or just Restless Mind Syndrome?

What Help Do I Really Need?

The Fate of the Two Brothers

Putting it all in Perspective

Thoughts to Help Restore Your Hope

Thoughts to Help Restore Your Faith

PREFACE

You might ask what qualifies me to write a book on suicide prevention. And, more importantly, how is this book going to help you? I’ll start with the disclaimer that I don’t have a degree in psychology. I can’t give you endless theories on depression and suicide that I learned in a prestigious classroom somewhere.

What I do have is 20 years of experience working in law enforcement. I was a hostage negotiator for 16 years. For 12 of those years, I trained all the negotiators in my agency. I have been a part of hundreds of negotiations of all types. I personally talked countless people out of committing suicide. I have, on too many occasions, seen the end results when we didn’t get there in time. I have also seen what happens when a mental health evaluation does nothing to actually restore their hope.

I was also a member of our Police Honor Guard for 15 years. I, unfortunately, have attended more funerals than I can even begin to count. They were funerals for law enforcement officers, firefighters, paramedics, military service members, veterans, dispatchers, and dignitaries. They were services for those who were killed in the line of duty, accidentally, naturally, and by their own hands. Almost all of them were senseless deaths.

I learned to negotiate at an early age. I grew up in a dysfunctional family. Partly because of that, I experienced a lot of external and internal abuse as a child. I chose to turn that into good with God’s help. I helped stop a friend from committing suicide when we were both young teenagers. He had a plan, a weapon to do it with, and the commitment to complete it. I helped restore his reasons for living that day. I wouldn’t have been able to do that without all of my days of darkness before that. God saved me when I couldn’t see the light anymore and started me on this journey that would turn into my lifelong passion.

As an adult, I prided myself on being a man of integrity and honor. I was a husband and a father. I was a workaholic and a perfectionist. I was a supervisor with a promising career. I was at a time in my life where everything seemed to be going great. We were 10 days away from getting the keys for our new house. We had it built so that my elderly in-laws could come live with us. My future couldn’t have been brighter. God was a part of my life but only when I needed something or when I was thanking him for something. Life wasn’t perfect, but it was the best I’d ever experienced.

And then the next day my world changed forever. There were only 9 days left before we received the keys to our new extended family house. I told my wife how happy I was and how our lives had never been better. She replied by asking me for a divorce, and she wasn’t joking. I had no clue how cynical and jaded she thought I’d become because of my law enforcement career. We had to walk away from the house. She got her divorce. I lost the ability to see my young daughter half of the time. My life was a nightmare at first. I poured myself into work. I became even more of a workaholic. Things started turning around. I was awarded a medal for bravery at work. Maybe I would be alright after all.

And then something happened at work a few days before Christmas. I had no intent to do wrong, but it didn’t matter. It was something that I couldn’t fix and couldn’t fight. I was sent home on administrative leave. I was the lead Sergeant for our Honor Guard and our Negotiators. In one instant my pride, honor, and integrity were gone. After reflection, I realized that my promising career was also over. In 8 short months, I had lost everything that I thought made me who I was. I couldn’t even share my pain with my mom because she had died the summer before all of this started. On the 10-point scale of factors leading to suicide–I was an 11.

It was four days before Christmas when I was sent home on Admin Leave. I believed that I couldn’t live without my honor, so I chose to die honorably instead. I told my ex-wife what had happened at work and said goodbye to my youngest daughter. I called to tell my oldest daughter the news and to say goodbye without her knowing it. I walked into my shower stall with a gun and no intent to walk back out. My daughter wouldn’t let me hang up the phone. She could sense that I didn’t plan to exist after we hung up. While we were talking, she went online and booked a flight from her state to mine. She kept me on the phone for an hour while she packed, drove to the airport, and waited to board her plane. She then told me that she needed to hang up because the plane was getting ready to take off. I had no idea what she’d done. She made me promise to pick her up at my airport. Her incredible love for me put my plan on hold. My middle daughter was on a plane the next day. They stayed with me through Christmas. But then they had to go back home.

I went through two months of severe depression. I can’t tell you how many times I hit rock bottom again. I had to negotiate the gun out of my own hands so many times. I knew I had three reasons to live. I knew that I couldn’t give them my pain, no matter how unbearable it was for me. But at the same time, the pain of losing everything that I thought was important to me was agonizing. I kept asking God why he would let my world be taken from me. And then I started reading the Bible again. It had been so long since I’d picked one up. The words seemed to make more sense than they ever had before. Then I found this passage about Jesus that helped me truly understand: He took Peter and the two sons of Zebedee along with him, and he began to be sorrowful and troubled. Then he said to them, My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me. Going a little farther, he fell with his face to the ground and prayed, My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will. (Mat 26:37-39, NIV)

I don’t know why it made sense to me, but it did. And my hope was restored in the process. In my humility, my walk with God was closer than it had ever been. I read the Bible from cover to cover and then repeated it several times over the following months. Then one day, I learned that my nephew had committed suicide. It tore me up again. I was more sensitive than ever to the topic of suicide. It seemed like every time I went on social media, I learned of another officer suicide. I learned that officers are killing themselves more often than we are being killed in the line of duty. That is an awful fact. I realized that my whole life up to this point and what I had recently survived could help others. I had never planned on writing a book about anything. Once I started writing my thoughts down, it all made sense. I’d spent my life helping mostly complete strangers. Maybe this could be a way to help other First Responders and Veterans out of the darkness.

I kept reading the Bible and finding more passages that were relevant. I wrote them down in my notes. And then, for some unknown reason, I started waking up at 4 am every morning. My head would be full of thoughts that I needed to write down. I would type them into my phone because I didn’t want to get out of bed. I eventually combined all the notes into a document. It was hundreds of pages long. It took months to make sense of all the notes and turn them into chapters in this book. Sometimes, I would go to a section of the notes and not remember typing them at all. My head just seemed to be filled with all the topics that needed to be covered. And the topics perfectly matched my life experience. The end result is this book.

Hopefully, you now understand what this book has to offer you. I have lived through my own personal hell on Earth. I have years of experience saving lives and teaching others how to help save lives. Suicide is on the rise in all categories across the country. It seems to be affecting all of us. It is just a matter of time, before you or someone you love could face a circumstance where you need to know how to help. This book will open your eyes to what our heroes face every day. It will give you lots of ideas that could help you restore hope in someone who has lost theirs. With God’s assistance, we can work together to help the people who matter the most to us.

At the end of the book, I listed Bible verses that could help when you need them. I found it helpful to have my favorite verses available when I was really struggling and looking for God’s guidance.

INTRODUCTION

What you are about to read is not a horror story or a fairy tale. It does contain numerous tragedies and stories of desperate love. It will get gruesome and graphic at times. I am sharing some of the worst things I’ve seen as a 20-year police officer and crisis negotiator. I felt these details were necessary to show you the horrible side of suicide to help prevent future ones. I will provide you with controversial reasons for the rise in completed suicides. I wrote this book to help first responders who are going through severe depression. I will help you understand the source of the depression and the way to restore your hope. I will also provide helpful tools for the family members, friends, coworkers, and supervisors of these first responders.

If you are contemplating suicide–I ask you to please stop whatever you’re planning. Take the time to read the entire book, and ask for help instead. You will find your hope again. You will find your purpose. Give the people who love you another chance to help you. Once you’re in a better, safer place you can use the tools in this book to help others survive too.

The stories I use in this book are real, so I have purposely used fake names in almost every case. The subject of suicide is so sensitive and full of stigma that I am hoping to protect their privacy. I don’t want to add any trauma to their lives. And even though the people who completed suicide can’t feel any more pain–their family and friends still do.

I will also explain the stigma faced by first responders who ask for help under current treatment options. We will discuss ways to overcome the barriers to getting real help. There is also information on how to set up faith-based peer support groups for those agencies who are looking to do more to help. These groups would be encouraged to work with family members, others who have survived depression, mental health counselors, and faith-based leaders to provide help on different levels.

If you aren’t a believer; I’m going to ask you to indulge me, and read this book anyway. Hopefully, you will pick up some good tools to put into your toolbox for that chaotic day when you need them. My goal is not to teach you how to negotiate with people you encounter on calls. You have experts for that. My goal is to give you the tools that you need to help someone you care about when they are having the worst day of their life. It could be a day when they have lost all hope and are subtly asking for your help. After reading this book, you will understand the scream for help that isn’t making it to their lips–because their mind won’t let it out. But you will hear it because you will know how to listen.

Watching someone die because I didn’t know how to help them was the most helpless and useless, I’ve ever felt. So please, read the whole book, keep an open mind, and remember the parts that you will need some day. Our goal is to stop suicide, one person who we love at a time.

THE AFTER-DEATH DREAM

We are at your funeral. It all seems so real. Yet you don’t feel anything at all. What happened? You remember that moment with the gun. You just wanted the excruciating pain to go away. There was an idea that kept coming into your head, a terrible one. You kept pushing it out, but it would never go very far away. And then there was the feeling that you were drowning in pain again. You just wanted it to end, but you couldn’t see a way to make it stop. You tried every option you could think of, but they all just seemed to make some other part of your life worse. You couldn’t get anything right. There seemed to be no hope left. You wouldn’t be a burden to anyone else. There seemed to be only one solution.

You remember that at the last moment you changed your mind. You tried to pull the gun away from your face. But it seems like you didn’t get it far enough away. Wait! Are you dead? That can’t be. You’re right here. You still remember everything. You still feel real and alive. How is this possible? Now you sense so much pain. But it isn’t your pain. Where is it coming from? The people you see. There are so many of them.

It’s weird; you can feel their pain, but you can’t feel your own. Everyone you loved is here. People you haven’t seen in years. You wish you could go down and talk with them. You want to wipe away their tears and give them all hugs. You want to tell them that you are okay and to not cry for you anymore. You are in a better place. You want them to know that your pain is all gone. You want to make them smile again.

Then you hear their thoughts–so many of them are begging to have that day back again. They want to be there for you. They want to stop you from yourself. They want to show you how much they love you. They want to show you how much you mean to them. But they can’t get that day back, and it’s destroying them. They are all so full of guilt, shame, and despair. No, wait! This isn’t the way it was supposed to be. This wasn’t about them–it was about you. It was about ending your pain.

Your family is here too. You focus on them: they feel hopeless and helpless. You were always the one who made everything better for your family. You never stopped smiling for them. They see their lives as a living nightmare now: the one where you are dead, and you chose this ending. Their lives now have them walking in darkness. They can’t see a way out. They are desperately searching for you, as if they can will you back to life. They are begging God to take them back to the moment before you did this, so they can stop you. They are offering God everything they have and will have for that one miracle. They didn’t get an answer from God.

Now they are begging you to tell them why you did it. It’s the one answer that everyone wants from them, and they don’t have one to give. There is so much pain in the room. You can read their minds, so you know that no one is blaming you. They all know that you would never want to cause them this much pain. They don’t blame you; they blame themselves. No, wait! This isn’t what you wanted.

Now you focus on your mom. You were always there to help her when life seemed to be overwhelming her. You could make life’s troubles melt away with a hug, a laugh, and a smile. She always joked that you learned that trick from her, and that your roles had reversed as she got older. She relied on you more and more. Now she really needs you. This is the worst time in her life. She wasn’t supposed to outlive you. You were her rock. She needs you now more than ever. But you can’t help her. This time, your death is the reason she is in a living hell. You were her happiness since the day you were born. Why aren’t you here? You promised you’d always be here for her. Why did you choose to leave her? How does she answer that question for everyone who asks her? She doesn’t understand it herself.

Now your mom is crying uncontrollably. She is thinking that everyone will see her shame. The shame that is eating her alive. Why didn’t she save you? She’s your mom. A mom should know when her child is in pain. Why didn’t she know? Why didn’t she do something different the last time you were together that would’ve saved you? She thinks that everyone believes that she should’ve known. She can’t blame them because she believes it too.

Now you are crying–except you have no tears. No, Mom! Please stop crying. It wasn’t your fault! I never meant to hurt you! I just didn’t want to burden you with my pain. I saw too much. I was too broken. I couldn’t take it anymore. I wanted to save you from my darkness.

Your service has started. The people who were your brothers get up to talk. Each one of them tells everyone what a wonderful person you were. You were the one who made everything right when everything was falling apart. They all say how much they loved you and how they’d give anything to have been there for you. They each tell how their life will never be the same without you. Then your biological brother gets up. He can’t talk through his tears, but somehow, he manages. He says he will never understand why you didn’t think you could come to him with this. You shared everything, all your deepest darkest secrets. Why did you have to keep this one from him?

You are hearing your brother’s thoughts now. He wants you to know that he is now where you were. He sees only darkness. He needs you. He needs your strength, your love, and your smile. He wants you to slap him in the face to help him shake this off. But you aren’t here. You chose to leave him. You chose to end your pain, and he sees why now. Your mind is racing. Oh, God, no! Please don’t let him go down my path!

You didn’t know you’d give it all to them. How could you? You didn’t know how much you mattered to so many. You didn’t know how much they loved you. Your pain has ended, but theirs has just begun. You never wanted to give them all of your pain. You just wanted yours to stop. You thought that the world would be a better place without the burden of you. You were so wrong. You see that now.

Everyone in the church is crying now. Everyone is sad. Everyone misses you. They see their world as such a darker place now. You were their joy. You were the one who made them smile. You were their happiness. You couldn’t see that at the end. Your pain made your world so dark. You couldn’t see the light anymore. The irony is that you couldn’t see it because you were the light for those who loved you. When you were full of hope and faith you were the one lighting up the whole room. God was shining his light through you. When you chose to die, you took away their light too.

If only you could take back what you did. If only you could have seen the fall-out your decision would cause. If only someone would have warned you. If only there was some way of knowing how this would all turn out. If only there was some way you could warn your friends, coworkers, and anyone else who would listen. You beg God for his help. God, please don’t let them do what I’ve done. Don’t let them lose all hope. Don’t let them lose their faith. Let them reach out to someone who will listen and take them seriously. And make sure that person doesn’t think it’s a secret for them to keep. Give that person guidance, so that they know that the suicidal person won’t get better on their own. They need real help to get through this. Please, God, please help. I’ll give you anything I have.

The service is over. You are someplace else, but you are not sure where. Then you recognize it. You’re in your brother’s bedroom. He’s holding a bottle of pills now. He’s thinking he couldn’t be there to stop you. He plans to join you now. He wants to be there for you through whatever you’re going through. You know he can’t hear you, but you’re screaming at him anyway. Don’t do this! This isn’t the answer. The pain won’t end. You will just give it to everyone else who loves you. Please, please, please, just listen to me! Everyone loves you. They want to help you! Please let them. I’ve seen how this ends. Please don’t do that to everyone who loves you and everyone who will love you. Please don’t do what I did. Fight back! Fight back for everyone who loves you! Please listen to me. I love you! I am sorry brother. I never meant for any of this to happen. I just wanted my pain to end. Please, God, please help me! Please let him hear me. Please give me a way!

Then the quiet voice is back in your thoughts again. The one you used to ignore because it couldn’t be real. But, if it’s here now, then it must be real, right? The voice is telling you again that you’re going to be okay. It has always told you that. It couldn’t be right this time. You’re thinking you really messed this one up. It tells you that there is a way to help your brother, to give him strength. You need to help him one more time. You say that you’ll do anything to stop him from what he’s planning now. The voice tells you that you can visit your brother in his dreams if only you believe. Of course you believe now; it’s only you and the voice here, wherever here is.

The voice asks you what you’d tell your brother. Wow, you don’t know. He’s never believed in God. Everyone has always told you that only weak-minded people believe in God. They always said that you’d have to be crazy to believe in something that you can’t see. But now there is no one here to tell you that you are crazy for believing in God. It’s just you and the voice. And the fact that you are here at all, is impossible. The voice tells you that you can do this, and to remember that there are no limitations in a dream. You know that you will have to overcome his unbelief. But the good news is that there won’t be anyone else in his dream to deny that you are real.

You decide to tell your brother everything that you went through before your death. You hope he will recognize the truth in your words. You are suddenly in his dream. Wow, it seems so real. You want to just give him a big hug, but instead you say: What’s up? That is how you always greeted each other. He tells you that you can’t be there. He says it’s because you are dead. You tell him that you know you’re dead. And you don’t know how, but you are really there. You came back to slap him in the face to get him to shake it off. This takes him back. Those were his thoughts from the funeral. He asks you how you could know that. You tell him that you were there, and that you could hear everyone’s thoughts. It was the worst thing that you had ever experienced. It was awful to see everyone that you love in so much pain. You tell him that you wish you could take your death back, but you can’t. Instead, God gave you this opportunity to stop him from making the same terrible mistake. You tell him that he will be okay if he just trusts in God through what is coming next. He laughs, and reminds you that you don’t believe in God either. You tell him that death has a way of changing unbelief, and that you now know the truth.

Your brother then asks you the question that everyone wants to know: Why did you do it? You tell him that you had lost all hope, and that you couldn’t survive without hope. He doesn’t believe you. He points out that even on your last day you were helping everyone and making them feel better. No one walked away from you without a big smile on their face. You tell him that it was a struggle at the end. You didn’t want anyone to know how much pain you were in. You knew everyone else had their own problems, and that they relied on you. You wouldn’t be a burden for anyone, anymore.

You knew you had to get better to help everyone else again. You tried. God knows you tried. But everyone seemed to think it was so easy to fix. They gave you so much free advice: Just go get help. Just take more pain meds. Just talk to another shrink. Just take a different anti-depressant. Just be more positive. Just stop obsessing on it, and it will go away. You tried it all. Why couldn’t they see how badly you wanted to be back to normal too? If there was a way, you would’ve made it work. But the pain was just too great. You wanted more than anything to be there for them again, to be their strength when they needed help. You were never the one who needed help from anyone. This situation was so foreign to you. This wasn’t you, and it caused you to lose all of your hope.

In the end, you struggled to put a smile on your face when others were around. You wouldn’t let anyone see how much pain you were in. You still had to give them strength and happiness even when you had none left for yourself. It would be your last secret. You would take it to the grave with you. They couldn’t know how much pain you were in. They’d see you differently. They wouldn’t let you help them anymore. And they needed your help. They always needed your help. You only saw one way to end your pain.

Your brother is still looking at you with that perplexed look he always gave you when your words weren’t making any sense. You remember. You have to show him. No limits in his dream. You then take your brother with you to your final moments. He sees you holding the gun to your head. He begs you to stop. You remind him that he is seeing what has already happened. And that it is too late for you but not for him. He can hear your final thoughts. You were thinking that death was the only way to end the pain. He tells you that it is a lie and then begs you to just put the gun down. He hears the other voice telling you the same thing. He asks who else is there with you. You tell him that it is God’s voice. He tells you again that God isn’t real. You tell him to just listen.

The voice is pleading with you to stop and to just put the gun down. The voice is asking you to trust him. You tell the voice that you know it isn’t real. It must just be a side effect of one of your medications. The voice is reassuring you that he is real, and that he is with you. He tells you that everything will be okay if you just listen. He even promises that he will show you how it could all get better. He asks you to give him just one more day. But you tell him that you know that only weak-minded people believe in God. He tells you that everyone needs him, and that no one is strong enough to get through life alone. He says that he made us to need him. He adds that when we stray from him, we have this feeling of emptiness that nothing else can fill. You tell him to go away anyway. You tell him that you have a solution to your pain, and you don’t need his help. You’ve tried everything else, and this is the only way.

Your brother asks you why you aren’t listening. The voice seems so real to him now. You tell him to just watch. You have the gun in your face again. You are filled with despair. The pain is overwhelming you. You decide to end it. You start to pull the trigger. The voice is screaming at you to stop. He is saying how much he loves you, and that you are his child. You finally listen. You pull the gun away from your face as fast as you can. Oh, no! The bullet still goes into your head. You fall backwards, and your body starts to convulse. Your body is still trying to keep you alive. Your heart doesn’t know that your brain didn’t survive the bullet. Your brother hears the awful gasps of your lungs trying to keep you alive too. And then your body stops moving.

Your brother then sees your spirit leave your body. Your spirit seems so innocent and perplexed. It’s as if you’re a small kid again. You’re looking at your own dead body. You’re crying, but there aren’t any tears. Then you’re gone, and somehow, you’re in church at your funeral. Then you take him back to his room. You’re both sitting on his bed, just like you did when you were kids.

The silence of that moment seems to last forever. Your brother is crying. He says he knows the truth now. You tried to stop. But it was too late. You made a mistake that you can never take back. He is giving you a hug now. He wishes he was there with you, in that moment, to stop you. You tell him that you weren’t alone, that God was with you then and is with you now.

You then take your brother back to that moment earlier in the day. He can see himself holding the bottle of pills. He can hear his own thoughts of suicide. He can hear the voice telling him to stop. The voice is telling him that he is loved. The voice is telling your brother that everything will be okay if he just trusts him. Your brother asks you why he didn’t know the voice was God talking to him before. He tells you that it is so obvious to him now. You remind him that he didn’t want to believe before. The world tells us that only the weak believe in God, so he chose not to hear God’s voice before now.

Your brother then has a look of sheer panic on his face. He asks you if he’s dead too. He asks if he really did take that bottle of pills earlier today. He wonders if that is why he can see all of this now. You reassure him that he didn’t take the pills, and that he isn’t dead. You tell him that this is his dream. You show him that his body is still in his bed sound asleep. You tell him that this dream is God’s gift to you. You begged God for this opportunity to save him. God told you that your family had felt enough pain. He gave you this chance to restore your family’s hope.

You ask your brother for his help. He needs to share what he’s seen with everyone who will listen. God is real. He is the voice that is always guiding us out of the darkness and back into the light. You ask your brother to tell your family that they had nothing to do with your death. It wasn’t their fault or your fault. Make them see that it was just a mistake. You tried to stop it but you couldn’t. Help them understand that you can never unmake the mistake. You can’t change what happened no matter how much they beg and pray. Ask them to help each other get through this and to ask for God’s help too. Help them hope again. Make sure that they know how sorry you are, and that you never meant to cause them any pain. Ask them to please forgive you for your mistake and for not being there for them now. Tell them that your greatest regret is that you won’t be with them for the rest of their lives. If you could do it over again, you would ask them for help. Ask them to be there for each other and to love each other now more than ever.

You know now! Suicide is never the way to end pain. Suicide doesn’t end pain–it increases it a million times. And then it gives a part of that pain to everyone who has ever loved you. Ask for help! Accept help. If that help isn’t the help you need, then ask for more help. Accept that help too. Keep asking for help until you get the help that is right for you. Just know that the help you need might come from a connection that you’ve been ignoring for a long time. It might come from a feeling that’s always been with you: The God that you’ve chosen to pretend doesn’t exist.

LOST HOPE

We as First Responders have lost our hope. Our brothers and sisters are killing themselves faster than we are being killed by others. Think about that. Our fellow police officers, firefighters, paramedics, military service members, and veterans are killing themselves at a rate higher than those who are being killed on the job. That is unfathomable. How is this even possible? Can we stop the suicides from happening? Or is it too late? We have all seen how contagious suicide can be. Can we stop its spread before we have to go to another First Responder funeral? Do we know the causes? Can we attack them instead? Would you believe me if I told you that there are very rational causes? And what if I told you that there is a way to heal us? Would you agree to help? You might have to step outside of your comfort zone and open your mind. Would you still agree to help? Oh yeah, and then there’s the subject of God. We can’t do it without his help. But hold that thought. We will come back to it.

First, let’s talk about the causes of the increased suicides. We as a group have lost our hope and faith in humanity. You can say that’s nothing new. It’s part of the cycle of being a professional helper. You know we all go through this at some point in our careers. But now, our collective hope is at an all-time low. What is different? We aren’t bouncing back like we used to. Why? What has attacked our hope and demoralized us as a group? Is it some foreign enemy or criminal element? The long answer is yes. But that is a confusing one. So for now, we will start with no. We as a group are going through a mass depression, and it is also contagious. So have we caused this epidemic ourselves, or are we the victims? I believe we are the victims, and I’ll explain why.

I know that it is illogical to say that first responders as a group are being victimized. But what if I told you that one cause of the suicides and mass depression is the intentional undermining of our support from the American people. Let me explain. We all volunteered to do this job. We all started this profession because we wanted to help people. We know that we are all alike; no matter what color our uniform is, what type of badge we wear, the color of our skin, or where we came from. We have the same drive. We would all volunteer to sacrifice our lives to help others in need. Some would say that we are all crazy because of that. By today’s definition they’d be right. But there was a time that they called us heroes. That time has long since passed. Heroes are honored and respected. So that term clearly no longer applies to us.

I’d like to clarify that when I talk about first responders, I am talking about law enforcement officers, firefighters, and paramedics. We know that there has always been a rivalry between us, but we are all brothers and sisters. Some law enforcement officers have the notion that they are the only true first responders. They base this on: if there is a disturbance of a suspect with a gun call for service everyone else will stage. As in: the paramedics and firefighters will drive close to the area and then wait for the threat to be handled. The police officers go straight to the threat and handle it. But that’s only one type of call. What if it is a HazMat call, a fully engulfed structure fire, or a person having a medical only problem? Who is the first responder then? If you call 911, the first question they ask is: do you need police, fire, or medical? As in, who should I send first?

By definition all three professions are first responders. I’d ask that we all put aside our differences and accept that we have the same goals. We have to accept that we all need each other now. And as I think we can all agree, law enforcement needs the rest of you even more right now. Let’s tear down the walls that divide us, so that we can work together to prevent any more suicides.

So what is causing our higher suicide and depression rates? I think that as a group we believe that we have been abandoned by the American people. I don’t think we have. But the evidence to support this belief is overwhelming. All you have to do to see proof is turn the TV on to a news station. Within a few minutes, there will be someone demonizing a police officer. They will tell you what the officer did wrong, and how he should be imprisoned for his actions. They will portray their opinions on the matter as pure fact. They will make that officer out to be worse than any criminal. It will be a very one-sided broadcast. If someone does actually stand up for the officer’s actions, then they will be attacked on the air. They will be lumped in with the officer as what is wrong with this country.

How does this affect our firefighter and paramedic brothers and sisters? Regardless of any rivalry, we all work together every day. We all depend on each other for our lives every day. We all care about each other. When someone attacks one of us, they are attacking all of us. Just like when you were a kid and someone attacked your best friend. You stood up for your friends. If your friend got hurt, then you got hurt too.

Here is another simple example: as law enforcement officers we get yelled at by the firefighters when we run into burning buildings. The firefighters aren’t yelling at us because we are doing their jobs (a common myth). They are yelling at us because they know how dangerous the smoke and fire is. And we aren’t equipped to survive in either. They don’t want us to suffer the lifetime pain that could come from smoke inhalation damage. They also know that: if we go down in the smoke, they will be risking their lives to come carry us out. They will do it because that’s what brothers and sisters do for each other. We are all on the same team. We are all brothers and sisters as first responders.

Now back to the media attack. It quickly goes from one police officer did something wrong to, we all did something wrong. Whoever is the resident expert for the moment will then tell whoever is listening that all police officers are poorly trained thugs with guns and badges. They are attacking all police officers because of the actions of one police officer. It doesn’t matter that 99.99% of us will have never even met that officer. All one million law enforcement officers in this country are portrayed as evil because of the actions of one of us. It is completely illogical and unfair.

Abraham Lincoln once said, America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves.

Why would one million law enforcement officers be held accountable for the actions of one person? It’s actually quite simple, we represent law and order in this country. There are two distinct elements that want to destroy the peace we have in this country. And they have to destroy us to do that. We are the thin blue line that separates chaos from order. When we fall, so does the American way. And that is their ultimate goal. So who are these two groups?

One group, is the simple I want what you have group. They don’t think it’s fair that they have to work to earn it. They weren’t born with a silver spoon in their mouth, and they don’t think that is fair. So they want someone to give them one now. They just want to take what isn’t theirs to take, from those who own it. They want to redistribute the wealth. We have a word for that: it’s called theft. And it is a crime. It is our job to stop this crime from happening. Thus, we are in the way of their ideology. So they need us to stop being in the way. Since we all won’t just stop doing what we are called to do,