We had the great opportunity to meet all the folks at La Familia Medical Center (http://www.lafamiliasf.org) in Santa Fe today. They participated in training on the PURE Model of communication. We were able to hear some great stories of successful interventions and all the hard work and help they are able to provide in their community. What a great bunch of people and organization. Keep up the great work. Check them out here:
http://www.lafamiliasf.org
Take a look at these stories on our CARE Card Program from KOB. Thank you Ryan Luby for showing interest in our initiatives as we try to change the face of law enforcement and mental health. If you want more information on CARE Cards click here or email us here.
On Tuesday (12th) UNM’s ECHO hosted a training for eight law enforcement agency in New Mexico. This exciting project will give law enforcement across the state access to ongoing training and medical professionals to staff cases with. This is an innovative approach to CIT policing that we have been part of from the inception. We are very excited that ECHO was receptive to the idea of allowing a CIT clinic in their program. We will post more as it develops.
Stress management and suicide in law enforcement is rarely talked about in many organizations. When it is spoken of most consensus is that more needs to be done about it and more dialog about it. Law enforcement is a unique career that gives many the opportunities to make a difference in their communities and have a positive impact in others lives. The job does bring the person to the forefront of poverty, violence, drugs, death, and all the negatives in communities. These horrific traumas seen can slowly eat away at someone creating more stress. When looking to start a Crisis Intervention Team (CIT) class or continue CIT education for your agency you must continue to utilize a collaborative approach. You must reach out to the advocates and providers in your community. This is not a simple or easy task, be prepared to hold lots of meetings and have face-to-face communications. We often are asked how to start collaboration or find consumers that can help with collaborations. We always suggest checking with the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) in your area first. NAMI is a great organization that can help with setting up programs and finding speakers and advocates in your area. Having people living with a mental illness, consumers, as part of your class is crucial. Having consumers as part of a class can offer a unique opportunity to develop empathy towards people living with a mental illness. This may be the first opportunity for officers to see someone living with a mental illness that is not in crisis. The interaction between students and consumer presenters is often a game changer when it comes to perceptions. Here is an article illustrating the importance for law enforcement in the efforts to reduce suicides. You can download the article in the original format or read it below.
Another great, fast paced video on psychology from the folks at Crash Course. Check out their YouTube page for more videos that can be used in training and more.
For decades, the Memphis Police Department has pioneered a model to better serve people experiencing a mental health crisis. The "Memphis Model," which aims to keep both officers and citizens safe and send fewer people to jail, has spread to almost 3,000 law enforcement agencies across the country. NewsHour's Megan Thompson reports. - PBS.org
Crash Course is a face-paced series of fun videos for educational purposes. They are a great tool for classroom training and are free to use in training. I highly recommend everyone look through all the videos and watch a few to get your mind thinking about mental illness and what we think of it. How do you find happiness? That has got to be one the hardest questions to ask yourself and someone else. Law enforcement is the focus of negative stories currently, which creates a hard climate to find happiness during work. The profession of law enforcement is currently changing in the United States; with easier access to technology and video footage of interactions the profession has come to the limelight. The changing of the profession has not been viewed as a positive thing but rather a forced doing, leaving some officers to feel that they have done wrong. Law enforcement is a unique field that attracts people who want to help others. The profession is viewed as helping others through the metaphoric battle with crime. This mindset of good vs. evil can help people in the profession handle and departmentalize the violent trauma and death they encounter while preforming their job duties. This may help us with our own mental health but it backfires when we hear negative stories about us. When you feel that you are part of the “good” side and you hear a negative story putting you on the “bad” side it can take an emotional toll on you. This can lead to you questioning yourself and your choices in career. With so much negativity directed at your profession, you have to find the fire that drove you once before. This fire will help ignite the passion you had before and can help give meaning to your job. Why did you get into the career you chose? Find that answer and then focus on that again. If it was helping people, what made you feel fulfilled in accomplishing that? Sometimes taking the time and talking about your work with a co-worker can help you find the positives and good things you have done. Find a goal for personal accomplishment and not one for someone else’s approval. This inner goal can help bring happiness and meaning to your work and personal life. If you feel like people are going after your profession take the time to read up about the history of your profession. Stigmas and media attention can bring negative emotions and thoughts towards a profession, which has shown throughout time. Stigmas can be associated with any profession and they appear to be higher in law enforcement. Taking the time to help de-stigmatize yourself and profession can give you control and meaning back which can help for happiness.
Take the time with things you enjoy even if you are drained. I love playing the guitar but after a long stress filled day when I get home I want nothing to do with it. If I take the time and force myself to play I will start to enjoy it again. It breaks the stress that I was feeling but it takes the action of doing. This is easier said than done but it can work with negative things also like chores and homework. Love playing with your kid? Know that they know when you are stressed, so take the time to engage with them, both of you will benefit. If you are in a position of supervising take the time to talk about the positives of work. This will make your employees morale rise along with yours in the process. When things are changing take a positive look at them. Explain the reason for the changes to your employees don’t do the old saying “they told us we can’t anymore”. No one wants to be told what he or she can and can’t do, we want to be educated and feel like we are part of the change. Law enforcement is a great career that gives you the opportunity to make a difference in someone’s life. It is one of the few professions that you can save someone’s life and change a community. All professions change and evolve with time and technology; law enforcement is no exception. If you feel overwhelmed and not part of the change in your department, take the time to find the answers. Talk to your peers and supervisors; find any forums and boards that you can be part of to create change. Do you have any questions that you want to ask? If so send them to Ask@goCIT.org Maybe you are checking in to see where the podcast is, well sorry to tell you we had to skip a week because I, Matt, have the flu. I cannot remember the last time that I felt this sick. I have been in bed for a week and I go from freezing to sweating nonstop. I am sure my wife loves taking care of two babies while I am home.
We packed 120 new Cruiser bags of food and resources for those in need! Over 100 bags of food and resources were handed out in the last three months in the SE area command to people in need. Officers are expressing their gratitude for the program and saying that it is helping with rapport building and de-escalating. These bags are easy to keep in cruisers and so far the program is going well. We are still trying to work out all the bugs before it is expanded. This could not be done if it wasn’t for the generous support from all of you who have donated to this great program and cause. Thank you all for your help and support! This is such a great video from the public safety folks in Rock County, WI. This video really helps build community relations and trust, not to mention break stigmas associated with public safety. It also shows all of public safety doing something together, as a team, which is needed in every community. I hope you enjoy this video as much as I did. I found a great resource from the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association on people first language. This is important to understand the powers of our words. If you are talking to someone with a disability using proper language will go a long way. Besides it being good practice it is the right thing to do. Check out some of their information below. This is copied directly from their website and please follow the link below for more information. Principle One: Person-First Language Use person-first language. Disabilities are not persons and they do not define persons, so do not replace person-nouns with disability-nouns. [ 1][ 2] Avoid: • the aphasic • the schizophrenic • stutterers • cleft palates • the hearing impaired Further, emphasize the person, not the disability, by putting the person-noun first. Use: • people with cleft palate • the lawyer who has dyslexia • persons who stutter • the speech of children with language impairment • the speech of individuals who stutter Avoid: • cleft palate children • the hearing impaired client • the dyslexic lawyer • the retarded adult Is there a difference between to be and to have? Between saying a person "with a hearing loss" and saying a person "is hearing impaired"? Some have suggested that to have may imply possession and to be may imply identity. [ 3] Thus they argue that it is less stigmatizing to use have than be. "The deaf" and "the speech of the deaf" also violate the person-first rule. However, the community of persons who are deaf prefer to use deaf with a capital D to denote the Deaf culture and the Deaf community, not the hearing loss. As a general rule, we may wish to follow the preferences of a disability group, even if it violates other principles. The problems with following the desires of different groups occur when one doesn't know what the members of a group want or when the preferences of individuals in a group differ. In my opinion, "stuttered speech" is okay. "Stuttered" describes the speech. "Cleft palate speech" is not okay, because the person (not the speech) has the cleft. However, "deaf speech" violates this rule; yet many people believe that "deaf speech" is acceptable. Person-first language makes sentences more complicated. The consensus of the Publications Board on November 19, 1992, was that deviations from person-first language should be allowed in cases when the only alternative is awkward sentence structure. When publishing research reports in ASHA journals, it is important to describe individuals with sensitivity. There are no absolute rules in regard to what language is sensitive and what language is not sensitive. Clearly, the most appropriate approaches may differ across different circumstances and different types of publications. The clarity of research papers may be affected if one is required to use person-first language every time a group of subjects from a specific population is mentioned. One approach may be to describe populations with person-nouns first in the initial description of the subjects. Then one can refer to these descriptions throughout the rest of the paper. It is more important to use person-first language when describing individuals making up a group than when referring to the group. That is, although it may be preferable to say "the group of individuals who are dysarthric" than to say "the group of dysarthrics," when stylistically necessary, it may be appropriate to use "the dysarthric group." The general rule is that person-first language is more important than group-first language. There are many examples in which we do categorize people and omit the person-noun and the person-first position; for example, the audiologist (as opposed to "the person who performs audiological services"), the speech-language pathologist, the professor, the professional, the teacher, the grandparent, the leader, the pacifist, the hypocrite, et cetera. One could make the case that we should not categorize the person by these attributes. Yet, "the person who grandmothers" is difficult to support as an alternative to "grandmother." When the categorizing is negative, person-first language might be preferable. "The person with a criminal record" may be better than "the criminal." However, we may need to do the same thing for both positive and negative attributes. If we use person-first language only for negative attributes, then person-first language could take on a negative connotation. The way out of this is to assert that it is proper for society to categorize people without person-first language in many instances, but that disabilities are not one of them. Disabilities need not be defining characteristics in the way that a profession or role in society is. There are many circumstances in which it may be appropriate to use the terms disability, disorder, or impairment. One needs to be sensitive to when it is, and when it is not, appropriate to use terms with a negative connotation. For more information and to read the full article please click the link below
We are so excited to announce that we have been awarded a Community Grant from Wal-Mart store #831 to continue our efforts with the Cruiser Bags in the southeast area of Albuquerque! This grant of $250 is for our Helping Hands Cruiser Bag Program. The funds will help continue the efforts to provide first responders with immediate resources to give to those in need. Having these bags with a meal and follow up resource information allows first responders to make positive outcomes in sometimes unfortunate encounters. The Wal-Mart grant is a community grant so the funds will be use in the neighborhood and surrounding area of store #831. These bags give law enforcement a direct crisis intervention and de-escalation tool that they have available al hours and days. Having additional resources give officers the opportunity to slow their responses by offering them the ability to provide a direct link to help. Wal-Mart #831 301 San Mateo Blvd SE, Albuquerque, NM 87108 Operation Reach Out is a free app that targets military personnel, although it is a great app for anyone. The unique thing about this app is it offers videos of people explaining suicide prevention and awareness. It makes the message much easier to receive. There is also resource information in the application, mainly for military. This is a great free app to have to get more education on suicide awareness and prevention. I would recommend keeping the information on the app to give to people you have contact with that are thinking of suicide. From the App: OPERATION REACH OUT is designed to: Encourage people to reach out for help when they are having suicidal thoughts. Help those who are concerned about family members, spouses, or fellow service members who may be suicidal. Provide a personal contact help center. Provide activities to help people who are depressed stay connected to others. Operation Reach Out is part of MCA-D’s effort to provide timely and effective support and guidance for military families. I had the opportunity to see the Rio Grande Gorge Bridge outside of Taos, NM recently and I must say that it is an amazing piece of human engineering. At first the bridge looked like a normal bridge as I drove over it, but the moment I step out of the car to look I was stunned. The bridge is a huge steel structure that provides a passage over the beautiful gorge. It has to be one of the most beautiful steel bridges in America and the landscape is breath taking. It is unfortunate that such a beautiful spot has been used for suicides. The problem has been real and one idea to help those in that crisis is to install crisis phones. These phones are on both sides of the bridge and the beginning to. They are easy to use call boxes that only require you pushing a single button. I was happy to see the State of New Mexico take this initiative to help everyone who is facing the struggle of taking their life. Enjoy some of the photos I have taken and please spread the word that hope is there. If you need help for suicide please check the following resources. If you feel like you are at your end call 911 and let them know you need help.
Click here for the National Suicide Lifeline Click here for Suicide Prevention and Help Numbers
How do you prevent a situation from spiraling out of control into a full crisis? This is a question we often ask ourselves when we think of first responders and individuals living with mental illness. We came up with a simple idea to help reduce the negative impact of a response, food and follow up information.
The idea is to create small bags, gallon size plastic storage bags, which have food and resource information. We teamed up with Roadrunner food bank to help create this new innovative program. These bags are pliable and easy to put in police cruisers and fire vehicles, where space is limited. Each bag contains food items that would account for a meal, water, and a resource guide. The resource guide has follow up information for help in food, medical, mental health, counseling, housing, and more. This is a very exciting time as we create a program that could be modeled by all first responder agencies. This gives first responders a resource to immediately help someone in need and slow their response by having options. I want to thank Wal-Mart who gave us a small community grant to help kick-start this program. This is currently being done with in the Albuquerque Police Department’s Southeast area command. I want to thank the APD’s CIU and COAST teams for helping out with packing the bags and getting them out to officers! This could not have been done with out the amazing and great people who have donated to us! LifeArmor is a comprehensive learning and self-management tool to assist members of the military community with common mental health concerns. It is very easy to use and best of all it is free through Apple’s App Store. It goes over a lot of stress and mental health concerns for military families and employees. Each section has parts for you to learn, assess yourself, tools for overcoming obstacles, and videos about the issue. This has a lot of information for substance abuse and PTSD. Please share this information with who you think would benefit from this app. |