A Farewell Letter to My Brotherhood

On Sunday, 17 November 2019, I sent this email message out to the individuals I had worked with for the past 16 years...

This past Friday was my last day as a police officer.  Last night, I watched a documentary movie titled No Greater Love.  I don't know if any of you have seen it, but I recommend it as its message is about brotherhood.  Many, including me, have likened law enforcement work to military service.  As a matter of concept, police departments are paramilitary organizations.  Whether they are operated as such, well, that's a different issue.

The movie shares the story of a group of soldiers of the "No Slack" Battalion from the 101st Airborne Division while they are on deployment in Afghanistan.  I have never deployed overseas or into a combat zone and I am always indebted to those who have served and been there.  But to the few who I know, have talked to and are reservists or national guardsmen who are also police officers, they agree that being a police officer is consistently more arduous due to the day in and day out of dealing with other people's crises, stress, anxiety, and trauma.  The members of No Slack are brothers.  That is obvious.  They commit to risking their lives over and over while in combat.  But they are also clearly committed to each other when they are at home and struggling with their own individual challenges.  Combat, I can imagine using my cognitive reasoning skills, creates unique bonds.  You are surrounded by life and death and you rely on the man next to you.  You have to.  So, when those men return home, they again rely on their brothers to help them.  They care for each other.  They have to.

Law enforcement, for all intents and purposes, is akin to those issues faced by those servicemembers.  There can and, almost assuredly, will be countless times that you, as a police officer, will rely on the man (or woman) next to you.  You have to.  It only takes one moment for someone's life to change, forever, and that includes dying in the line of duty.  A police officer, however mundane the call for service is or the area that they patrol, exposes himself to potential danger.  As I'm sure you have all heard at one time or another during your tenure, there's at least one gun on every call for service, every traffic stop, every contact.  And those moments add up.  Some stay with you.  A few haunt.  It's during those "some" and those "few" when your brother or sister-in-arms needs your help.  They might need a simple pick me up or a more committed commitment.  But at some point, someone will need you.  And for the ones that do need your extended hand, do not expect them to call out and let it be blatantly known.  You will have to "see" them.  And to see them, you'll have to know them.  Individuals in a depressed state, whether acute or chronic, are sometimes too consumed by their helplessness to pick up the phone and say "hey man, can we get together?"  That's your job.  He's your brother, right?  Certainly, there were times, however slight or subtle, when you needed him and he was there for you...to back you up on a violent domestic or a high-risk traffic stop.  Those sounds of distant sirens getting rapidly closer never sounded so sweeter.  So, what's stopping you from doing the same for him when it's a little less dramatic of a situation?  The answer is nothing.

I spent over 25 years in law enforcement working with other officers from all walks of life with varying degrees of skill level and professional commitment.  I am proud of the things that I have accomplished and the dedication I conveyed during my career.  But there was always one thing that I struggled with while I was there...the absence of a dependable brotherhood.  Yes, there were some moments and instances where people stepped up.  But all too often, it was fleeting.  To be certain, there is accountability on my part.  I am sure I failed along the way at times.  And for that and for those for whom I did, I am remorseful.

So, I will leave you all with one last piece of humble advice.  Take it for what it's worth.  You must care for each other.  You have to.  And that means, more than not, that the caring happens beyond the call for service, the traffic stop, the contact.  It happens when someone is out due to an injury, illness at home, struggles with a spouse, or even the unexpected legal and administrative challenges at work...when that individual, who was your "brother" up until that moment, is fighting to "breath" and keep their head above water emotionally, mentally, and probably financially.  When the fear of loss is enveloping them, they could use that extended hand of yours.  And they might have to use it (that hand of yours) over and over and over.  Because the sense of abandonment is a shitting thing to someone who thought those unique bonds of brotherhood extended beyond that call for service, that traffic stop, that contact...and that it also went to when they're home alone looking for a purpose.

"Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends"  John 15:13

Always, be well and be safe.

John

Rules Are Meant To Be Broken. Right? No...Not This One

October has passed and along with it another Mental Health Awareness Month.  In 1990, Congress established the first full week as Mental Health Awareness Week in recognition of NAMI's (National Alliance on Mental Illness) work to raise awareness.  October 10 was dedicated by the World Health Organization as World Mental Health Day.  Who knew that?  Did anyone do anything special for those dates or time frames?  Volunteer?  Talk to a friend?  Reach out to a co-worker?  Stick a ribbon magnet on your car (sure, hope not).

Me?  What did I do, you ask?  Well, I had the distinct "pleasure" of attending a police suicide funeral on October 19.  Police Officer Thomas J. Bomba was a 13-year veteran of the Montgomery County Police.  More importantly, he was a husband and a father of two boys.  Six years on the county peer support team...one line of duty death and four police-related suicides.

I never met Officer Bomba, but I heard about him from mutual friends and as well as childhood mates.  He was one helluva a jokester, both on and off the job.  But as with most of us who cleverly use humor as a shield, there was suffering underneath.  TJ, as he was affectionately known by his co-workers, or, better yet, T-Bomb, by his childhood friends, was emotionally wrestling with personal issues at home.  Now, look...some will say that putting that out there is out of bounds.  I can respect that and my intent is not to highlight his intimate issues specifically, but to bring focus on the fact that police officers - those that respond to other individual's crises over and over - have their own.  I've said it before and I'll say it again...we are human, so we need to stay linked to one another.

So, what's the lesson?  There has to be one, right?  We simply cannot let TJ die without using his sacrifice as a call to arms.

OK.  Here's another instance where we need to be connected to our brethren.  If someone leaves the job, for whatever reason, particularly one that is not of their own determining, do you think that maybe there might be a need to remain united to that person, at the very least in a casual manner to ensure that they don't unexpectedly fall off the cliff?  I know an officer that had dedicated the better part of his entire human existence to the public safety profession who got forced out due to medical concerns.  Now, I'm not here to say whether those health concerns were legit or not.  I have no clue.  That's not the point of this diatribe as to how he was subsequently "taken care of".  The dude just devoted 30 plus years - yeah, that's right, thirty years - of his life to the profession, to the community, to that department, and...to the safety and welfare of those "brothers" and "sisters".  I was beside myself and simply disgusted at how the agency just discarded him like a bag of shit.  Unfuckingreal.  And a disgrace to the "think blue line", the law enforcement "family", or, quite frankly, whatever the fuck you wanna call it.  Just sickening the way that administration's "leadership" treated him.  At his core, regardless of what or how you thought of him as a police officer, he is a human being.  As any of us would demand and deserve, his departure warranted a respectful exit.

So, he is out.  Unceremoniously no longer a police officer and now, presumably, without an identity - which is a critical issue for many who leave the job and arguably a prominent factor in the rising tide of suicides within the law enforcement profession - and what do his brothers and sisters do?  Dick.  Nobody reaches out and, if they do, it's cursory; a simple interaction with the now stranded kin for a few weeks or a month or so.  And then "poof".  It's like he didn't exist.  Years and years of "bonds" broken in a virtual instant.

Now, many will argue that if he wanted to maintain those relationships, that severed officer had every opportunity to reach out and preserve those friendships.  But if you're saying that then you don't get what it feels like to be deserted.  It's like, when you're a kid, you go over to your buddy's house for years and then one day their parents no longer want you around and tell you to "get the hell out".  Are you going to walk back over and ask to be welcomed back into your friend's house?  Or, are you going to stand by, patiently...eagerly...and await his invite because you don't feel wanted in that revered place your friend calls "home"?

Discouraged individuals, whether chronically or acutely depressed, almost unconditionally, will NOT initiate contact, especially when they feel like they have been abandoned by someone - a friend - or by something - a profession, a "brotherhood".  It is absolutely up to those that remain within the "house" to preserve contact, to keep that unique bond alive and well so that the dispirited can still keep some semblance of that once family.

So, listen up "brothers" and "sisters"...Stand. The. Fuck. Up.  Get out of your own self-absorbed lives, if even for a half-hour breakfast gettogether, a quick phone call, or, hell, how about a goddamn text just to check-in and see how they're doing during their challenge to steady themselves.  And do it more than once, twice.

They deserve it.  For years and probably hundreds, if not thousands, of times during various routine and balls-to-the-wall calls for service you depended upon them to watch your six, protect your ass, or just flat-the-fuck-out save your life.  And now, the best you can "spare" them is a blow-off?  Abandonment...of trust.  Of friendship.  Of honor.

But I get it.  We all have our own shit to deal with, right?  Of course, we do.  But tell me, please, how it makes any sense whatsoever to expend blood, sweat, and tears for people you don't even know and then not even the time of day for ones you called your brother for years?  Do the right thing.  Helping one another doesn't always have to mean talking about inner feelings, holding hands, giving hugs, or shedding tears with one another.  Helping out a brother or a sister can be - and will almost assuredly be - as simple as hooking up for lunch every once in a while, heading out to a game, or even that 21st century preferred method of "connecting"...the dreaded text.  Speaking from some very personal experience, it does not matter what you do, JUST DO SOMETHING...for the love of God and for the simple fact of treating another human being with a sense of decency.  And do it several times, not just the token once or even twice.  Golden rule, right?  You could help someone from starting down the path of despair, which sometimes can lead to the road TJ was on.

And for those of you that need a refresher...Matthew 7:12 "Therefore, whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets."

He Has a Name. It's Chris.

Chris.  Or Jose, depending upon your relationship with him.  His God given name is Jose Christopher Trujillo-Daza.

They all have a name.  It's Mark.  And Martin.

These are the three men who I will be riding for beginning this Friday in the 2019 Police Unity Tour with Chapter IV.  This is my ninth Tour and, since 2015, I have been participating in it to honor police-related suicides.  This is contrary to the original intent of the Tour.  The Police Unity Tour was started in 1997 by two New Jersey police officers to bring awareness and honor to those public servants that had been killed in the line of duty.  The problem?  Each year, more law enforcement officers take their own lives than are killed in the line of duty.  According to the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund (the Tour is the Memorial's primary supporter), there was 150 line of duty deaths (LODDs) in 2018.  In that same year, Blue H.E.L.P. recorded165 suicides.  To date, NLEOMF lists 40 LODDs and Blue H.E.L.P. reports 76 suicides.

Seventy-fucking-six.

No way.  This is not happening.  It can't.  That is simply unacceptable.  Period.  And that's why I have been riding for these individuals...to raise awareness - to provoke ACTION - as to what is happening to those that help others.  The stigma of seeking help that engulfs our first responder professions (and military) is killing us.  Literally.

I have had the tremendous honor to talk to Chris' family and friends.  What an amazing young man he was.  He was loved.  Chris was a First Class Petty Officer assigned to Port Security Unit 313 out of Coast Guard District 13.  PSUs are deployable units that provide force protection and security to forward operating naval bases and are almost exclusively staffed by reservists.  Chris was a boat driver, a boatswain mate, for the unit.  When fellow Coasties talk about him they use words like honorable, respectful, dependable, intelligent, and likable.  How I wouldn't beg for a member like Chris to be on my team.

And his family adored him.  His older brother, Paul, told me that their hero, their leader, was Chris.  Paul looked up to his little brother.  They both went to aircraft mechanic school and then worked together for six years.  Chris dreamt of one day becoming a police officer and, presumably, used his duties and responsibilities with the Coast Guard to hone his leadership skills and officer safety tactics.  He loved serving.  His community.  His country.

Chris loved his mom.  Tragically, six months prior to his suicide, his mother lost her battle to cancer.  Paul knows that her loss took a heavy hit to Chris.  But, with this stigma strangling public safety professions, he was reluctant to seek out help.  So, we lost him.  (Many times, a traumatic catalyst like the loss of a family member sets a loved one into an abyss.  Keep that in mind if you know someone who has experienced such a loss.  It could be a trigger.)

And we lost Mark.  A beloved 43-year old police officer in Lancaster, Pennsylvania.  A father, a brother, a friend, a son.

And Martin.  A dedicated sergeant with the New Jersey State Police.  A husband, a father, a son.

This shit has got to stop.  It simply has to.

So, I ride for these three...and all the others.  My journey to honor them starts on Friday.  All participants in the Tour wear an "honor band", which is an engraved metal band with the officer's name, agency, and end of watch date.  We wear this band as a way to remember the loss during tough times on our ride.  It reminds us that our "tough time" is nothing - nothing - compared to the challenges and struggles that the families, loved ones, friends and other survivors go through each and every day since their loss.

But police-related suicides do not get the same honor.  They must, however.  I mean, it's on The Wall (the Memorial)...

 "It is not how these officers died that made them heroes, it is how they lived."

- Vivian Eney Cross, Survivor
(husband, SGT Christopher Eney, EOW: 24 August 1984)

So, I ride...again...for heroes like Mark.  Martin.

And Chris.

I Thought About Suicide Today

I thought about suicide today.

It was a pretty shitty "sleep" last night.  After I woke up, I grabbed a bowl of Special K - with berries - and sat down at the kitchen table.  As I ate, it just started rolling in.  And once it starts, it kinda keeps going.  Remember that whole seed thing?  I rolled through each person within my circle of trust, wondering, briefly, about how they would react to the news.  And I came to the love of my life.  I pondered as to how I would want that to go...remember me always or forget I even existed.  I dunno.  Still don't.

The last few days have been rather shitty.  She and I got into a "disagreement".  It's been brewing for a bit, so there was no surprise when it finally erupted.  For a few weeks, I have been bitter about work.  A lot of anger and anxiety being compartmentalized inside me.  There have been a few attempts to address this pileup, but nothing of sustaining substance that would do the trick.  So, that's on me.  But once you get caught up in a vicious loop - her then me then me then her and on and on - it's hard to break out of it.  Dr. Sue Johnson, relationship expert and bestselling author of Hold Me Tight (a must read for cops), calls it the demon dialogues.  And Jesus, are they nasty.  And pointless.  Here are two people who love each other getting caught up in some quagmire of shit that keeps going round and round with no end in sight and only an escalation in anger, disdain, and resentment to show for it.  So, when I came to thinking about her while these thoughts slithered around in the depths of my mind, I didn't know if I wanted the whole drama engulfed in "never forget the good times" yadda yadda b.s. or simply the final page in a chapter that doesn't get read again.  It simply sucks not being on point, or connected, with her and getting it wrong.  Most of this shit is simply a result of mis- or even noncommunication.  Frustrating.

But here I was, I just polished off my cereal and consumed in my thoughts of despair and sorrow.  Near the end of my rope.  Like a lot of us, I just want pain to end.  Ok, some pain is good.  The kind that lets you know you're alive and even the emotional kind eventually leads to gratefulness of appreciating what you have and all that.  But goddamn, I'm tired of the unnecessariness of feeling like shit.  The work backstory has some significance to this path, but I'll spare you the details...for now.  The point is that this flashpoint is a culmination and, as I've said in the past because it's true, we turn to those closest to us to unleash and release the torrent of bullshit that is stacked behind that proverbial dam in our mind.  I know better.  She deserves better.  But that demon dialogue thing is a powerful force.  Instinctual.  We rally to our own defense first and foremost.  But in times like this, we need to stop and evaluate the words that our reaction driven minds are pushing out.  Words can sting.  And be heartbreaking when they're from your loved one.  No, I'm not a pussy, but, as I told her this morning, I've spent over a quarter of a century seeing people be shitty to other people and I. Am. Done.

I took a shower.  (Always a go-to for the psychological cleansing as well as an actual one.)  And then I went to church.  The church I attend is one that we discovered together, she and I, which is pretty cool.  It's something I like to hang my hat on when I tell people about where we go to seek forgiveness and feel inspired about humanity.  It is powerful to have that as a connecting point with her.  But I went by myself today.

Today's sermon title was "Fixing Church".  I was not necessarily fired up about the sound of that talk and thought, "OK, God, I need a little help here and this doesn't seem like it's going to give me what I need."  (Que the big buzzer sound.)  Wrong.  And this is what I absolutely love about this place of worship and, specifically, Pastor Kevin.  He is literally a Godsend.  Once he got rolling, the message started to materialize.

Hope.  Helping one another.

What started out as a talk about how the church has moved away from being a venue of celebration, migrated into a discussion about hope, about the church being that place, in the middle of this swirling world of hopelessness, that steadfast point in the center of chaos.  Hope is essential.  It is the difference between health and despair.  And maybe God, as Kevin suggested, brought some parishioners to the church that day, not for themselves, but to be there for someone else.  To be a strength of hope for another, someone they're sitting next to, perhaps.  As Kevin began to segway into the sermon's conclusion, he mentioned Rick Warren.  Rick Warren is a well-known pastor in California.  Five days after Easter Sunday in 2013, Pastor Warren's son, 27 at the time, committed suicide.  He left his parents house earlier in the evening, shared a few texts with his mom, and then used a handgun to end his life.

Kevin shared how Pastor Warren and his wife navigated through the months that followed.  With Easter so close to his son's death, he reflected on the three days of Easter and how he survived the "darkest day of (his) life".  There's a cycle that everyone goes through and repeats in life.  Good Friday, the day when Jesus was crucified and died, is a day of loss, of suffering.  Saturday follows as a time of doubt and confusion.  But Sunday.  Sunday is the day of victory.  Of hope.  BOOM!  That's what I'm talking about, right?  The cycle begins with suffering enters into doubt before ending with hope and victory.  Yet, that wasn't what connected with me.

Kevin went into something more powerful for me.  He said, "If you are in the 'Friday' situation of suffering and pain..."  Oh boy, I thought, here it comes.  I can feel it.  "...would you mind just raising your hand.  Go ahead.  Hold them up.  Now, the people around you need to put their hand on you because we're in this together...and don't not put your hand up.  'I don't wanna admit that I'm in Friday'.  Everybody goes through 'Friday'."  About four or five raised their hands.

Then I raised my hand.

I closed my eyes and listened to Kevin's words.  Within moments, I felt a hand on my left shoulder.  Then another.  And another.  Perhaps six or seven different people had softly, gently laid their hands on me.  I was overwhelmed.  I quietly wept.  It was one of the most powerful experiences of my entire, battered and bruised, life.  Even as I write this now, many hours later, I tear up.  I put aside my pride, my shame, and silently called out for some help.  God, what a moment.  I felt strength and energy.

You may be, right now, neck deep into a "Friday" with no end in sight.  It is black as shit for as far as you can see.  Been there.  Done that.  But it doesn't have to be.  Despair is fleeting.  Hope is alive.  There is strength in numbers.  And we can take care of each other.  I know.  Been there.  Done that.  What I experienced today was glorious and the absolute perfect timing for me, as it always seems to be the case when I walk through the doors of the sanctuary and take a seat for worship, forgiveness, help, or healing.  Reach out and lay a hand one another.

Here is Kevin's Sunday sermon.  The story about Pastor Rick Warren begins at 53:00.  I encourage you to watch it.

And those early morning thoughts?  Gone.  Nowhere to go, but hope.