May 30, 2025 • 48 mins
Every call, every save, every loss, first responders carry more than we see. In this powerful episode, Milton Police Officer Dennis Pishock opens up about the toll PTSD takes on those in emergency service, drawing from over two decades as a firefighter and law enforcement officer.
Dennis shares his own story with raw honesty, from growing up with a veteran father who never spoke of war to confronting his own trauma after years of crisis response. He reflects on the mental burden of always moving to the next emergency without time to process, and how silence and stigma still keep many from asking for help.
But this is more than a story of pain—it's one of healing. Dennis talks about the power of peer support, the importance of community, and the unexpected moments that remind first responders why they do what they do.
Whether you're a first responder yourself, love someone who serves, or simply want to better understand the human beings behind the badges, this conversation offers rare insight into both the cost and the calling of emergency service.
Please note: This episode contains sensitive and potentially triggering content related to trauma, PTSD, and mental health in emergency service. Listener discretion is advised.
Crisis Resources: NAMI - Georgia
If you or a loved one is experiencing a mental health crisis and are NOT in immediate physical danger, call 988 to get connected with the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline. 988 provides 24/7, free, confidential support for people in distress, prevention and crisis resources for you or your loved ones, and best practices for professionals.
With the community in mind, this podcast explores the stories, people, and initiatives that make our community unique. Each episode offers insights into local government, highlights Milton's history and future developments, and showcases the vibrant arts, culture, and sustainability efforts shaping our city. Join the conversation, celebrate our community, and discover how we're building a better Milton together.
Do you have an idea for an episode or would like to request a specific topic to be covered? Email Christy Weeks, christy.weeks@miltonga.gov
Learn more about the City of Milton at www.miltonga.gov.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:07):
Welcome to Milton and Maine, the official podcast for
the city of Milton.
We want to bring you closer tothe heart of our community
through stories that inform,inspire and connect.
Each episode offers abehind-the-scenes look at the
people, projects and prioritiesshaping Milton, covering
everything from local governmentand future development to arts,
culture, sustainability andpublic safety.
(00:28):
Whether you're a resident, alocal business owner or just
curious about our city, this isyour front row seat to what
makes Milton special.
Welcome back to Milton and Made.
I'm your host, christy Weeks,the communications manager for
the city of Milton.
Today's episode is a powerfulone.
We're joined by Milton PDofficer Dennis Peshok, who has
20 plus years as a firstresponder, and he's going to
(00:50):
talk to us about a subject thatoften lives in the shadows and
that's PTSD in first responders.
Dennis has walked this roadhimself.
His personal journey, recentlycaptured in a book he wrote, is
raw and honest, and it's notjust about his own healing.
It's a message to every lawenforcement officer, firefighter
, military veteran or anyonewho's ever answered the call to
(01:13):
serve.
Through sleepless nights, missedmilestones and the weight of
duty, dennis offers not justperspective but purpose.
He believes deeply in the valueof service and the bond that it
creates purpose.
He believes deeply in the valueof service and the bond that it
creates, and today he opens upabout what it has meant for him,
what he's learned and what he'sstill learning, and how he's
working to help others do thesame.
With that, I'm going to welcomeOfficer Peshok to the podcast.
(01:37):
I'm so grateful you're here.
I know we have a lot to cover,so I'm not going to keep
chatting like I tend to do, sowelcome Dennis.
Speaker 2 (01:46):
Hey, thanks for having me, christy, I appreciate
it.
Speaker 1 (01:49):
Thank you for taking the time out of your day.
You're a busy guy and I'm goingto let you start with your
background, because you havequite a history.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
All right, I grew up originally in Norristown,
pennsylvania, up north outsidePhiladelphia, a little suburb
out there blue collar city, veryblue collar.
Everyone's hard working andmost folks stick around there
too.
Graduated college got out ofthere as fast as I could.
I say it was either that or themilitary.
So we got out, grew up in afamily of servitude for sure.
Yeah, father of Vietnam,veteran combat vet, and now that
(02:21):
I'm into peer support, we seenow how basically messed up he
was in the.
In that way he came back adifferent man, clearly from
combat yeah and uh, all thispromotions were, uh, combat
promotions.
And he, he didn't really talkabout it but he said, uh, his
friends were killed in front ofhim and they said, jim, you're
the next rank.
And he was like, I don't wantthe rank, like it's yours, it's
not a yeah, yeah.
So he got, I believe, threecombat promotions.
(02:43):
I think it was staff sergeant.
He left as my then sergeant but, um, vietnam definitely changed
him.
Uh, he didn't talk about ittill, probably after 60 years
old and it was super minutestories.
So, and we do not talk about it.
Um, yeah, you did not discuss itagain.
This is a mental health uhpodcast, so we'll go into it.
So we'll go into mental healthhere.
(03:04):
One of his stories was we usedto play Cowboys and Indians as
kids, right, and that's whateveryone did.
We didn't have phones and allthat.
And he said my first combat inthe jungle in Vietnam was great.
He said we're running around asCowboys and Indians and then he
says next thing, I know I lookover my friend's shot and dead.
And he said then all of asudden, the game wasn't fun
(03:24):
anymore and we're like, okay,that's a showstopper at a party.
You know, when you're a youngkid just bad stories.
One time his crew was bombedincorrectly by his own friendly
fire and they had to go pick upbuddies.
And again, we won't go intodetails, but again, mental
health never address.
That's your job and move on.
Definitely the suck it upbuttercup attitude.
Speaker 1 (03:45):
You know what?
So my uncle went to Vietnam andhe was given the option to
because he was a little bit of atroublemaker in high school,
right.
So he said judge said you caneither go into the military or
you're going to jail.
So he went into the Marines andhe went to Vietnam and he came
back.
(04:06):
A completely different persongrew up not really knowing a lot
about my uncle, just because hedidn't talk about a lot of
things.
And it wasn't until I wasprobably in my mid to late
twenties before he started totell and the only the only story
he told me and I remember thisso very clearly because they'd
(04:28):
get in the choppers to leave.
And he goes yeah, we used tohave to sit on our helmets and I
go, but wouldn't it do betteron your head?
And he goes well, not whenthey're shooting up the bottom
of your chopper.
You had to sit on something.
He goes because they took a lotof us out that way and he's
spent years battling thosedemons that he brought home from
(04:49):
Vietnam and he still to thisday and he's in his 70s still
has episodes, but at least nowhe can talk about a little bit
of it.
He just recently put on that hewas military, because for a
long time he wouldn't evenacknowledge it.
He wouldn't talk about it at all, right.
Speaker 2 (05:10):
And they were welcome .
Welcome back is a funny word.
They were not they were, so Imean they can tell stories
forever on how horrible theywere treated, coming back
Correct, and that's why.
That's why he hit it, I'm sure.
Speaker 1 (05:20):
I know better than to ask questions.
I'm terribly curious, but Iknow better than to ask
questions because that's on himif he ever wants to talk.
That is not for me to know ifhe's not ready for it.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
Exactly, and it's funny.
You said that because my dadwas a joker in high school and
he decided to be a joker in theMarines and they have better
jokes.
They said OK, jim, go walk theline, which means you're in the
front of the jungle by yourselfscouting, and uh, that
definitely changed him and, likeI said it, ate him up.
He died a few years ago andthere's no question the ptsd.
Yeah, and then alcohol, ofcourse, which is common in our
(05:50):
job and we'll get to that andthat's it'll eat you up and
they'll say you know cancer,whatever.
But it's the job, but yeah butit would get you um speaking of
not talking about.
Like you knew, uh, grandfather,before that battle of lady and
okinawa, that was two of hissmaller incredible battles but
um never talked about.
He was a gunner on a uh on aship and he was one of the first
ships ever hit by a kamikaze,but you knew not to discuss it
(06:14):
and you know, grandpa, back thenif you mentioned something,
grandma would come over and hityou or whatever.
We don't discuss right that everaround here and you're like,
okay, that's the end of theconversation right there, but of
course they had um major, majorthings yeah I like to tell a
story, um, about, uh, shakingthe nets.
I don't know if you ever heardthat story.
I haven't.
I haven't.
So a delta force operator Ican't remember his name right
(06:36):
now he just told a storyrecently, um, when they were
going for therapy, he had someworld war ii vets in there too,
and they call it this is greatfor us called Don't Shake the
Net Boy.
This is what they would say tothe guys in therapy.
And he was like what does thatmean?
He said you remember D-Dayclimbing down the ropes?
And he said yeah, yeah, yeah.
He said well, the guys who weredefecating themselves or
anything were starting to makeother people die.
(06:58):
So he said you shake the ropeand kill that guy.
So now you're living withkilling your buddy.
He said we, we killed one, butwe saved 10 more.
So he said we sit there intherapy and a guy would start
talking and say don't shake thatnet, Don't shake that net.
And then that was shut yourmouth.
We're not bringing this upagain.
So that's your old schoolmentality.
That is not those words, butit's still very real today,
(07:20):
Don't talk about it.
You got it, so I think it goesvery well with what we're
discussing right now too, though.
Speaker 1 (07:25):
Yeah, so I'm going to let you take the lead on this.
Sure, I want you to share someof your inspiration for writing
your book, and I will have theinformation in the show notes on
the book and any otherreferences that you have that
you think people might benefitfrom and get a better
understanding.
But I'm going to let you go.
All right, let's see let you goAll right, let's see where you
(07:45):
go.
Speaker 2 (07:46):
Yeah, we'll get into the servitude part.
I was doing basically dead-endjobs and just felt the need to
serve.
It's in the soul, it's in thespirit, like either you know or
you don't.
That's it.
And got into firefighting.
I got into Gwinnett County itwas the premier department in
the United States.
Almost it was a two-yearwaiting list.
I had about 1,000 firemenimpossible to get on and I
(08:06):
finally gave up, applied for thecity of Atlanta and they were
short, of course, and this wasback in 2001.
And Gwinnett finally called andlike start next week.
I'm like all right, great.
So I started Gwinnett Countybrutal department,
18th-thirtiest in the UnitedStates.
The United States People don'tknow that it's hard here and
again, I love my guys here.
If you don't know a departmentof that speed and level, you
(08:28):
just don't know.
You don't sleep.
Uh, you bring in bedding tosome stations and they laugh at
you.
You're like where's my locker?
They're like don't, don'tbother, don't even waste your
time.
And you're like, oh yeah,whatever they were, right, you
(08:48):
never even make it to that thing, right, that, of course is fun
for a few years and you nevernotice.
But, uh, that will get youeventually, which we'll get into
.
Yeah, so I did firefighting.
Uh, in the beginning you startout, you're both your
firefighter, medic I'm stillmedic today, 24 years now and
your first few years they calledthe box.
You're on the box, the squareambulance and you're on that box
for first couple years, mostlybefore you even start
firefighting, and that'sdefinitely where you get your
medical experience.
It's a lot of shootings there,gang related stabbings, uh,
cardiac arrests, constantly.
My first shift I had a fatalityand I'm thinking, okay, yeah,
(09:11):
first shift, but uh, this wasnormal, I had a fire, had a
house fire, and that was just myfirst shift and you keep going
and I was in norcross, which isvery, very busy area.
It's rough, it's very rough anduh, you don't sleep, you get a
lot of experience and once youleave that house, as they say,
you go to the next house.
Like you work there for howlong?
Like people are like, okay,this, this guy's got, he's got
(09:32):
moxie, he's got he's got themojo and you
don't think it because you thinkeveryone's like this but
they're not.
You know, went pretty good.
Uh, swift water technician,swift water rescue did that for
years.
Um, lieutenant over there,eventually eventually made
lieutenant, was acting captainfor a couple of years and
Swiftwater Rescue again, that'sthe elite, that's your SWAT,
that is the guys.
Right, you got to make the teamand once you're there, man, you
(09:53):
guys ain't leaving until youget hurt.
It is awesome.
And I definitely left for morereasons.
One summer we pulled 13 bodiesbodies out and that was a tough
summer and eventually, uh,that'll get to, they'll get to
anybody.
And I said, you know, I I'veseen enough.
So, um, went to, uh, just otherplaces and mandatory overtime
(10:15):
kicked in, and what that meansis 48 hours on, 24 hours off.
Speaker 1 (10:18):
And we talked about before processing, we talked
about zero processing yeah,because there's a statistic out
there and I have a few of them,and this one is from CU Anschutz
and SAMHSA.
Samhsa reported on this as well.
A study found that nearly 70%of EMS professionals reported
not having enough time torecover between traumatic events
(10:40):
contributing to increasedstress and mental health
challenges.
Speaker 2 (10:44):
Events contributing to increased stress and mental
health challenges.
Yeah, definitely on theambulance.
There's no processing, it isrunning a fatality, running a
cardiac arrest, and I don't knowif you've ever seen a picture
of an ambulance after a cardiacarrest.
Speaker 1 (10:55):
I have not.
Speaker 2 (10:56):
Yeah, look it up.
It is a bloody mess.
There's equipment scatteredeverywhere and someone's calling
you to say we need you back inservice.
Speaker 1 (11:10):
There is zero processing nothing.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
So because we won't go into details.
But cardiac arrests are ugly,yeah, most of them ain't like
hollywood.
So, um, you're cleaning up thatambulance.
They're still calling you.
We need you in service.
There's a call holding for yousomewhere.
You're driving out lights andsirens still cleaning up the
mess.
You got it and you pick up thenext one and then you pick up
that next call, and that's howit goes for 24 hours.
So in 2013, when they mandatedmandatory overtime, it was then
48 hours of that.
So zero processing, zerorecovery, hence your divorce
(11:34):
rates, which we'll get into.
Sure.
Gwyneth Fires was 78% at onetime.
Wow, yeah, and that's normal.
So that's just how it is.
Speaker 1 (11:43):
By the way, there were air quotes around that
normal, just for those of youthat can't see.
Dennis, it's important to knowthat Correct.
Speaker 2 (11:51):
And just to tell you about culture change and that,
again, is my passion Change theculture, change the stigma, get
rid of this garbage, old-schoolmentality which is killing
people and just because ithasn't hit you yet, it's going
to get you.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
It's going to get you .
It's going to get you because Ithought the same thing.
There's absolutely no way youcan be a part of that and
witness that and put that muchof yourself into what you're
doing every day and not carrysome of that home.
Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (12:17):
And they say this job won't change you, you're going
to be fine.
You go home to mama and here'sthe kids and she's shot out
because she just did a day ortwo of sure and she deserves
that break.
And uh, it's not that youdeserve it and that's what the
culture changes.
To me as a man and as a spouse,it's not my wife's job to
handle it.
It's my job as a dad to be agood parent too.
And people, they still havethat old school mentality.
(12:39):
Well, I gotta rest, I gotta goback, go back to what you're
going back to hell, like that'swhat you're doing and your
family, who's going to be theones when it's all over, are
waiting for you.
Speaker 1 (12:48):
So Right, yeah, wow, hard to hard to find those
boundaries.
But I think that's a lot of howstructuring coming through some
of these events, you have toset your boundaries, you have to
set your expectations, andexpectations is.
You have to set yourexpectations Correct, and
expectations is a weird word forme.
Speaker 2 (13:08):
Yeah, it is.
What are the expectations?
Let's go there.
So the department, at least thesuper bit, like we'll just use
them as an example Cobb Gwinnett, fulton, that just don't stop.
The expectations are your soul.
That's the bottom line.
You can sugarcoat it any wayyou want to, but they want your
(13:29):
soul.
They want you there 24 7.
Somebody calls out sick.
You're coming in.
It's mandatory.
So what we are?
We are mandated individuals atanything.
So you know, I've been throughhurricanes, tornadoes, the
snowstorms.
You're coming to work likeyou're not.
They don't care that what youjust saw.
Whatever you have to be there.
You're a professional andthat's a call.
So what are the expectations?
There are none.
You, you are unlimited.
You are uncle sam's, that's it.
Yeah, you gotta do whatever.
Speaker 1 (13:48):
And then it's very difficult on the spouse of
course too, but that's adifferent conversation for
another day yeah, when I Iforesee this conversation being
a little longer than this 45minutes that we're going to
capture today, but what I reallywant to get to is let's talk
(14:20):
about the statistics and let'stalk about how you.
Prevalence of PTSD saysapproximately 33% of first
responders develop PTS, comparedto 6.8% in the general
population.
Tell me what you think aboutthat, because that came straight
out of SAMHSA.
Speaker 2 (14:35):
It's so under-reported.
That's comical.
I mean, and again, you don'twant to use that as a crutch
where someone says, well, I sawthis.
I mean, we're talking majortrauma.
Mostly this isn't your.
You know, my pen fell off mydesk and I'm having trauma here.
This is again no time toprocess a massive call to the
next massive call to you.
Bury it that Again.
No time to process a massivecall to the next massive call to
(14:55):
you.
Bury it.
That is just beyond.
I don't know what the number is, because people aren't going to
be honest, never.
People are scared of theircommand staffs, they're afraid
to tell.
It's still the stigma which,again, my purpose is to change
that stigma.
And we can go into thatconference I was in by first
responders last week.
It's 200 people with the samementality and we are laser
focused on doing it too.
(15:16):
Because at what point is 350officers shot in line of duty
last year?
Well, that's fine.
There's guys that's 350, that'snot officers who have ptsd,
that's all the family members,that's all their partners and
that's.
But, of course, what does thepartner say to somebody else?
Speaker 1 (15:30):
I'm good, I'm fine, that's like me going home to my
wife say you good, I'm fine, andI she feels like she has to be
strong for you, because you'realready dealing.
Speaker 2 (15:39):
Correct.
Speaker 1 (15:40):
So then therefore, she doesn't process either.
Speaker 2 (15:42):
Yes, so yeah, we'll just end it there.
It is beyond under because offears and stereotypes, still
today.
Speaker 1 (15:49):
Stigma.
Stigma is a big deal.
Speaker 2 (15:50):
Stigma is a big deal.
Speaker 1 (15:59):
And we're talking PTSD and trauma, which I think a
lot of people transition intothe idea of well, that's therapy
.
There's therapy out there, yes,but what we're not talking
about is the addictions thatfollow and the behaviors that
are so detrimental to one'shealth.
Yep.
Speaker 2 (16:11):
Right.
Speaker 1 (16:11):
So I used to work in addiction treatment for 10 years
and it was one of the mosteye-opening experiences and
unfortunately the facility Iworked at was not totally
capable of handling some of thelevel of PTSD and mental health
challenges that people werehaving, so we had to send them
someplace else, and it's reallyhard to address addiction when
(16:35):
somebody is battling the thingsthat they have never talked
about.
Speaker 2 (16:40):
Correct.
Speaker 1 (16:40):
And I've been told they can't talk about it.
Speaker 2 (16:43):
You're saying you need to stop drinking.
We've missed the whole core.
You need to stop being angry.
Okay, and here's your 10 stepprocess.
We forgot why you're angry, andthat's what we're trying to
address too, and these violentoutbreaks and your isolation,
all these things, and thensuicide.
It's because you neveraddressed the core and what has
happened since 2001 for me andall that.
Speaker 1 (17:04):
So how do you change that?
Where do we go to even beginthat?
Because it's like moving theTitanic.
Speaker 2 (17:09):
It is, and that's again you find your why in life
right, and it takes and that'smy why's my purpose, and that's
other people's who do this.
Um, it starts small again.
You're starting small, you tellyour story and you start seeing
people, uh, who are like thankgod, somebody's been real,
because I've been fighting thesedemons too, and it is so.
I get to go to different placesthat have had bad things happen
(17:32):
.
I go to go to differentdepartments and you meet all
these people and you see it inthese big round tables, because
you do a round table where youdon't have to talk.
In these sessions you can'tmake somebody talk, but when
they start talking, then theirbrother talks and then her
sister starts talking and that'sall it takes is that little
nudge, and that's what I'm doingand that's what we're doing
right now.
Yeah, and someone will, Iguarantee it.
If we can touch one person here, that's all we do, it's all you
(17:54):
care about, and that touchessomebody else and touches
somebody else.
Speaker 1 (17:57):
So it starts small it does, and the first hurdle is
acknowledging yes acknowledgingthat there is an issue that you
haven't dealt with.
Yes, and then, once you're braveenough to speak about it,
because the person sitting nextto you is like nobody
understands where I'm at nobodyunderstands what I I've seen,
what have I experienced, whereI've been or how I'm feeling in
(18:19):
this moment and I feel like ifone brave person like you can
sit there and be completelyhonest as you were in your book
I mentioned it earlier that youwere brutally honest in your
book and I believe you did havesomebody reach out to you
recently.
Speaker 2 (18:36):
I have Again, I keep them all, any message I get.
I save them all, every textmessage, every email.
I put all my contacts in mybook and, uh, a Marine a couple
of days ago did and just said,hey, ma'am, read your book out
of this world, Can we talk?
And I was like, of course he's.
Like I'm a three time uhhospital, you know, induced
hospital for PTSD and trauma.
(18:56):
Try to take my own life.
And thank God you wrote thisbook and let's talk, and we're
going to talk tomorrow, and alot of messages like that.
You know you can't go intodetails because you're sure, but
that's what it's about and I'mnot a Marine vet and but we've
been through the same battles,right, mentally, health, wise.
Speaker 1 (19:20):
And he knows it and he's like yep, either you know,
you know and he's like you know,so we'll talk out tomorrow.
Live, it'll be prettyincredible.
I love that.
Yeah, to be able to putyourself in that position is
outstanding in the sense thatyou're willing.
You don't know this guy.
Speaker 2 (19:27):
Nope, and the braveness of these people
reaching out is that you can'tever, ever looked at.
It takes so much, like wetalked beforehand, these
dropping the mask, mask as I say, just dropping that ego.
Cut the bs.
Let's get real, because life'stoo short and, uh, people just
need that nudge.
Speaker 1 (19:41):
That's what we said and what we talked, what we also
mentioned and I rememberhearing this when I worked for
the treatment center, we had ahandful, of course, of first
responders and some of them weremultiple trips to treatment,
right, but I rememberspecifically one of them saying
we're just told this is part ofit.
You got it.
(20:02):
Ptsd it's part of it.
It's what you signed on to dealwith.
It's part of the job, andnobody's addressing the back end
of that, that.
You're still the human.
Speaker 2 (20:15):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (20:15):
So what are we doing?
What do we do?
Speaker 2 (20:17):
so yeah again.
Um, it doesn't matter.
Like you said, there are somany departments that are not
going to address it, becausethis will never be me.
We talked about stats.
Uh, talked about 350 officersshot.
Oh what, how many is that?
50 killed by gunfire?
Uh, it's right here in miltonwe did we've had.
We had three shootings lastyear in our area, unfortunately,
jeremy the Roswell officer tooright here.
(20:38):
That affects everybody.
Everybody If you're at thefuneral or the wake just out of
this world response.
That continues on afterwardstoo.
I mean, that just keeps goingand I lost a lot of friends and
everyone's there for two weeks,but then, after two weeks, is
what they call the disappearingtime.
Now you're on your own again.
Everyone's forgotten.
We got other things to do, butthe department here, it's great,
(21:00):
we're definitely getting there.
I'm not going to say we'rethere yet, but we are definitely
there.
We have the people in the rightplace, which is incredible.
I have a lieutenant and asergeant who help me
unbelievably.
Every time I go to anything, Italk to them and we discuss it,
us it and they're like thanksfor doing this and I'm like
thanks for sending me.
Yeah and uh, the conference Iwent last week is, uh, the first
responder yeah, tell me aboutthat oh, my god, mind-blowing.
(21:20):
Um, just, uh, you think you'redoing well.
No one ever has this figuredout, by the way.
It's a constant game andsomeone says well, I can help
you.
No man, you might be able to,but we are constantly battling
those demons because they'realways yapping yeah, you might
have saved that one in life, but, but I got five more that I
took, so you're always fightingthat.
And, peer support counselor, youcan get a reference which is,
they say, christy needs somehelp.
(21:41):
I think you'd be a good fit forher and we'll make contact and
we'll do whatever it takes.
If you're having just badproblems and we just talk and
that's it, and I just hear youout and we build a relationship.
And that's one aspect of it too, right there, and that's again
huge.
Well, you go to this conference.
That's a pretty high level ofwhat we're doing right now for
treatment and helping people.
But this conference was likeout of this dang world, like I
(22:03):
can't even explain it.
Like we, we started with umdonna from gotcha blankets.
She's the first speaker, okay,and we're like, oh, this is,
this is gonna be a conference.
Here we go, we got two days,can be happy.
She's like I just let you know.
I'm here, I make blankets andmy son was a samaritan police
officer and he killed himselfand that's how we started off
and I'm like, well, there's anattention getter.
The reality hits, oh, veryquickly beyond quick and that
(22:27):
was two days of that differentpeople's stories and you get
round tables and you help eachother out.
I'm talking people, fullbreakdowns, like getting real,
and there's nobody hiding behindthe macho ego bs, as we always
say, and every one of thesepeople is out there to help
someone at the very end, likenow.
Continue this message, continuethis message.
And this is like her a mother,yeah, who lost her kid.
(22:49):
And then you have, uh, differentpeople who have different,
who've lost different children,and they get up there and talk
and, uh, these are stories thatwe won't do on a podcast, to the
detail how they found them, how, yeah, the body looked and this
is a parent.
And you're like, okay, exactly,so, my life's pretty hard, but
it ain't like that.
And these people have turnedthis into a positive way.
(23:11):
And how do they do that?
By having these conversationsabout having this incredible
community and support group and,uh, that's what we're here for.
And then continue this and helpthat person move on, and help
each other move on, cause we'reall in this together.
Speaker 1 (23:26):
Wow, yeah, sorry, that's okay.
Um I uh, I've got three kids.
Speaker 2 (23:31):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (23:32):
Um, you have children , yep, and uh, I I briefly
mentioned earlier that I keepeverybody really really tight.
Yes, correct, like I'm.
I'm that mom.
Just a lot of it is justmotivated out of fear.
My daughter had lost aclassmate when she was a
sophomore in high school and mydaughter's response was off the
(23:55):
chain.
The way she handled herself.
She was 15 years old and shesaid, mom, I'm going to start a
prayer group.
And so her little 15-year-oldself made flyers and invited the
churches and invited thecommunity and she started.
I think the first morning shewas out there.
(24:17):
She had maybe 10 people, acouple of students, one of the
local pastors, and by the timeit finished, when school was
over and whatnot, we weregathering 50-plus people in
front of the school every day topray over the students.
Because she didn't know anyother way to deal with her loss
(24:40):
and the law, and she was.
She still reaches out to thefamily, still talks about going
fishing.
That's what she does on on theanniversary because she had no,
she didn't know any way else.
And for 15, that's a lot ofprocessing a lot of coping and
everything.
Speaker 2 (24:55):
Absolutely Yep.
Speaker 1 (24:57):
She talked to churches.
She went to three differentchurches and told her story
about Kyle and I think it hasshaped the way she approaches
Christ people.
Speaker 2 (25:09):
Absolutely it does, and a lot, of, a lot of people
in this world don't have thosemoments.
You know we call it to uh, Ican't say the on F yourself
moment or come to Jesus moment.
That's very important and uh,she had it and it's incredible.
And again, I talked, we talkedabout community Correct.
That's what it's about, and youdon't get by any of this stuff
through yourself.
Speaker 1 (25:30):
No.
Speaker 2 (25:30):
And of course I believe that the opposite of
addiction is connection my wholestory and many, many stories of
ours.
Is isolation, correct and uh,that leads to suicide.
That's the bottom line.
Human beings are made to betogether, correct?
That's it and we talk about.
The greatest gift in the worldis children.
Is that family and um?
Speaker 1 (25:48):
that's why you keep them so close I don't want to
lose that like Mom.
Why do you need to know whatI'm doing right now?
Speaker 2 (25:54):
Exactly.
Speaker 1 (25:54):
Fear.
Speaker 2 (25:56):
Anytime you bring that kind of stuff up, my mind
processes.
I just start going through allthe kid suicides.
I've been on all the kid deathsand those are the worst.
They're always the worst.
But how I define this is onegood way is it's a trash
compactor.
For us, that trash compactorand dumpster.
You keep dumping it in and itkeeps compacting everything and
it keeps compacting but it'sonly got so much, but you keep
(26:17):
throwing it in there becauseit's working.
I got this figured out and allof a sudden that trash compactor
blows up.
Speaker 1 (26:22):
Hence the word compartmentalize.
You got it right, wow.
Speaker 2 (26:26):
And it is great for us on calls.
Calls, it's very important thatwe do that because we have to
be professionals, like if I seesomething, I gotta ignore this
body, I gotta get to here, Igotta do something still the job
to do right, but it's the oldschool mentality of it.
Stayed in that compartment.
I never talk about it again.
But now we are talking about itand, um, the next day, maybe,
maybe not I, but we are going toaddress this and that's very.
(26:48):
This is all about mental healthand peer support officer,
wellness, wellness.
We're going to talk about thiscall.
It doesn't matter how bad itwas, it's not about that.
And of course, everyone isstill.
I'm good, I'm going to do this.
But it comes down to that squadlevel at first, and a good
supervisor Got a great sergeant,great sergeants, and we're
going to have this talk and Iknow they're going to support me
(27:09):
and we're going to get thegroup together and have that
great little talk.
Okay, what did you see?
And when I do peer supportcounseling for the state of
georgia, it is that what did you?
And it is tough questions.
What did you see?
How do you feel that?
That is very uncomfortable foranybody, and then now you're
taking that type a personality.
Go, go, go.
(27:30):
How do you feel?
I'm not supposed to feel thefeelings aren't a thing exactly.
I don't have time for feelings,right?
So, um, now you're going totalk about it and people start
talking man, they're, they'renot good and but then, when they
see somebody else step up, theystart flowing, tears start
flowing, there's tissues allaround and, uh, it's just a
therapy, you're getting it out,you're getting it out and
(27:50):
getting you to that next stage.
Speaker 1 (27:51):
Whatever that is to keep healing, because it's a
healing process it's continualand from what I understand
you're, you're beginning thatprocess within absolutely
milton's pd totally.
Speaker 2 (28:01):
Uh, yeah, again we got off track there.
But again, um, it starts withthe supervisors they got to be
on board starts with command setbeing on board.
Uh, we're going to do something, hopefully after the summer
yeah, you forget, because, uh,everyone's already got pto
scheduled, everyone's off, yougot family vacations planned, so
this will be something we'llput together, be a mandatory
thing.
Everyone has to be on board,like any program.
If one person from above yousays this is bs, well that that
(28:24):
person first of all needs a newjob because you just right, get
out like right you get out andthen, um, it'll destroy the
entire program, right?
that's like anything new you'retrying to do.
So I laugh at people because Iwas that guy.
I was the egotistical idiotuntil I looked in the mirror and
I said you better change, andthat's what it?
takes and that person is just Ijust laugh, You're hiding it,
(28:44):
man, but your time is coming,and law enforcement and divorce
and suicides prove thatcorrectly.
Yes, it proves it all the time.
So, yeah, we will.
The department's great, we'regoing to get there and hopefully
by the end of this year we'llhave something rock solid in
place, and I think we will, andwe have great support.
If I may, I'll talk about it.
Yes, please, we have SummitCounseling.
(29:05):
They're right there for us too,after our major incidents that
we've had.
The different priests andpastors have been phenomenal.
Speaker 1 (29:12):
If not responding to the call.
Speaker 2 (29:14):
There's so many great people and my job is to bring
it all together too, like I hada coffee with Billy a couple of
weeks ago, sitting down and just.
I've met with Jason fromsomeone individually and I'm
going to bring it all together.
That's my thing too, and causeeveryone's kind of out there,
but they all want to be in thesame spot and I think I can help
(29:34):
bring that all together here.
Speaker 1 (29:35):
I know I can, so I will so you started this
movement where you're pullingthe resources together because
that's hard, that's not an easytask that you're taking on and I
love that.
Uh, your leadership within thedepartment and I and I know
leadership here in city hall isalso behind it.
I've had a handful ofconversations with Chief and
City Manager Steve Krokoff andit is top of their mind and it
(29:59):
is important to them thewellness of their officers and
their firefighters.
So I love that you're gettingthat going.
Speaker 2 (30:07):
And I love that they support it, because it's what
does it lead to?
Of course, bad morale, sickhours.
It leads to everything, andagain, we're just talking about
that core, like what we talkedabout before.
Once you start addressing thishappy people, happy place, just
like happy mama, happy family,so it's the same thing and it
just everything keeps building,building, building and it's
awesome.
Again, we're getting there,we're going to get there.
Speaker 1 (30:36):
And I know we're going to do it together because
that's what it takes.
Yeah, yeah, well, if there'sever any way I can help, I'm I
don't know how, I mean I'm anoutsider here, but deep in my
heart I feel like I should be PD, but you know, I'm still
working on my position in there.
Too old for an officer.
Speaker 2 (30:44):
I appreciate the honesty.
Again, we talked off camera too, and it's awesome you talked
about, I think, colorado orsomething like that.
You had some dealings with that.
Speaker 1 (30:52):
Yeah, so there was the Aurora Theater shooting yes
absolutely.
And that's where we would hearyou know, hey, it's part of the
job, it's part of the job andnobody can understand that.
And then there was also anindividual who was very big in
the addiction treatment speakingworld.
(31:12):
He became a counselor.
He worked big trying to helppeople and he was a survivor of
Columbine and his buddy.
He was behind a desk in thelibrary sitting next to his
buddy and one of the shooterstook out his buddy right next to
him and spared him.
(31:33):
He was shot in the knee, had towait until he could get out the
back door and then, asadrenaline is carrying him
straight out that back door inhindsight, 2020, you look at
that and you go.
Why didn't the librarian turneverybody out the back door?
Nobody knew what was outside.
Speaker 2 (31:52):
And panic overrides everything too.
Speaker 1 (31:54):
And you can't assume that you're going to walk
outside because there's only oneshooter right.
I mean, there were so manyunknowns hindsight 2020, you can
dissect it and say this is whatyou should have done.
So he immediately went back andgot treatment um for pain and
before he knew it here he is ahigh school kid.
He's 10 years deep in addictionabsolutely um, because the
(32:17):
doctors kept giving him stuff,because that'll do the trick hey
, he told me I needed it andthat's where he ended up and it
ended up taking his life evenafter he got.
So he was sober for 10 yearsand he relapsed and it got him
the weight of the traumaticexperience he could never outrun
(32:38):
.
Speaker 2 (32:39):
Yep, it's again we talked about it's a continual
healing process.
That 10 years of soberness wasawesome, but it was also useless
when you took your life becausewe still haven't addressed this
.
And again, this we're breakingit down.
We are breaking it down fromwhether it's childhood trauma uh
, you see that a lot, a lot ofus in public safety.
You totally, you don't evenunderstand it, but the more
(32:59):
they're starting to study, it is.
You had some type of issues athome with your parents or
whatever it doesn't.
It doesn't matter, but therewas some kind of trauma in your
life that caused you to go thisroute, and that's something that
they've been going oh yeah,last couple years we're going,
it's absolutely, it's pretty uh,it's pretty amazing.
And and you start looking backlike no, no, no, and then you
start saying, well, did thishappen?
You're like I guess thathappened, but it wasn't trauma,
(33:19):
it was normal in our lives.
So, right again, we, we grew updifferent, uh, we did
everything that we do, like.
Speaker 1 (33:25):
I find myself with tendencies that my kids are like
, well, that's a little adhd,and I'm like, no, it's.
That's how you dealt withthings.
What are you talking about?
Speaker 2 (33:32):
Exactly.
Well, they just smacked us onthe side of the head and said
get over this, you're fine.
Yeah, exactly, irish Catholics.
So that was it, that was fine.
But you talk about that thegentleman who was there at the
Columbine and again, we'll justgo into it's, therefore, and I
discuss it in my book a lot.
(33:53):
I discuss it with people.
This is the spirituality side.
I like to talk to the pastorsand stuff too.
Why did God save him?
Why did God kill me?
This is real, and it'sdefinitely with your military
vets too.
If you lose a whole bunch offriends and you start saying,
you start thinking you're notgood enough, you start going to
isolation, like we talked about,and then you start drinking and
there's no reason.
It's just that survival's guiltand it's very, very real.
(34:16):
Yeah, I talk about the floodsin my book.
We did the floods in 2009 ingwinnett and rescued a lot of
people, but that's the ones youdidn't save is the crazy part.
The demons are yapping.
Yeah, you, you did, okay, butthe human mind is always trying
to go to this place and again wetalk about this, just again
changing the stigma.
That's normal and we want tokeep that positive.
(34:38):
But what about this.
Yeah, you know what You'reright, because that human mind
is still trying to go down thatroute and we're redirecting it
to the positive again too, andthere's always something
positive that you've done thatcan be looked at in that
training or whatever.
But no survival of guilt isreal, like you were just talking
about, and unfortunately thatgentleman, he didn't make it for
whatever reason.
(34:58):
Yeah, yeah but we all fight it.
Speaker 1 (35:06):
So we're going to, this is going to be another.
We've got a whole other.
We barely scratched the surfacehere on this topic, but I
wanted to introduce it, and Iwanted you to become here on
this topic.
But I wanted to introduce itand I wanted you to become your
voice to be heard, because Ithink what your purpose is is
serving others in a way otherthan the way you have in the
past.
Right.
Speaker 2 (35:25):
I couldn't agree more .
Speaker 1 (35:26):
So I love that leadership is behind you.
I love that you've connectedwith the resources.
If there is anything, as wewrap this up, that you can tell
the listeners on how to eitherbe supportive or get involved or
gain knowledge, or what wouldyou tell them?
(35:47):
How do, how do we help?
Speaker 2 (35:50):
man, we, we need another time, but that's awesome
.
It's a great question.
I'm not being derogatory.
The civilians are what keep usgoing.
We do this job to help others,right.
We do this job to save lives.
My job now is to save the lawenforcement side life too, and
the fire.
And again, nurses, whoeverdispatchers.
But anytime you get that cup ofcoffee bought for you,
(36:12):
something like something thatsmall, oh my God, it makes such
a difference, especially on abad day and um, and nobody's
going to know when you're havinga bad day.
No, and um, like people said,they all they watch videos.
I can't believe the stuff youdeal with.
Yeah, we deal with this everyday and we deal with it.
In Milton, a traffic stop flipsa switch, like that.
People go from super nice toyou, hand them a ticket to ready
(36:34):
to jump out that car and killyou, and that's it, and that is.
It's important that thecitizens around here understand
that those folks are here too.
We are real close to the dangerzone.
You talk about the Thin Bloomline.
No, that's it.
We are keeping thoseindividuals away from here as
much as we can.
But again, simple things, justnormal conversations.
(36:54):
It's always embarrassing for meto be thanked for my service,
like I don't like that.
I'm like I didn't do anything.
This is what I do, but I alwayssay thanks for acknowledging me
too.
It's just nice, and to me it'sjust a simple thing of a nice
conversation and a nice cup ofcoffee and just getting to know
the people more.
Because you look at people, youcan tell attitudes right, and
they'll go up to a certain copand they can say, oh, he's too
(37:15):
macho and they're kind ofstandoffish.
Well, no one wants to talk toyou and you're probably doing
the wrong job too.
But I love that communityoutreach part too, where you get
to if you go into a businessany of your local business, a
coffee shop and you get to knowthat owner, you know those
people have your back too.
They love having you in theretoo, and I love meeting them and
that's what it's about.
And again, we talked about itin the beginning the family,
(37:37):
that's community.
Whether it's church, whetherit's martial arts, bjj,
brazilian jiu-jitsu, it's stilla community of 10, 20, 30 people
, 200 people, and you're makinga positive impact in that world.
So keep doing what you're doing.
I would say Milton Residence.
We appreciate you and um.
Speaker 1 (37:52):
Oh, they do love their, they do love their first
responders here, they do, and weappreciate them.
Speaker 2 (38:01):
That's huge Cause.
Um, and Gwinnett, they hated me, they hated all of us.
Um, we had the kids who would.
I don't even want to go there.
They hated us.
So, uh, it's great to be in aculture where they love you and
accept you first.
Speaker 1 (38:11):
people we call when there's trouble, but when you
show up, when you're not calledbecause maybe somebody else
needed help, everybody's verystandoffish and I don't
understand it.
Now I was brought up to stayout of the police station.
Speaker 2 (38:24):
Correct Okay, if I ever found myself there.
Speaker 1 (38:26):
It was a bad decision on my part, yes, but now you
know, I've talked to DetectiveMoore, I've talked to Officer
Tidwell.
I've talked to Detective Moore,I've talked to Officer Tidwell,
I've talked to Chief Griffin,and they're always like hey, if
you need to talk, if you've gotsomething, stop by, I'm here.
Right, you can come talk to me.
Correct?
Which is a completely differentperspective than when our
generation Changing the stigmaCorrect there, it is right there
(38:47):
.
Changing the culture, becausey'all get up and put your pants
on, same way everybody else doesevery single morning.
Your job, your daily activitiesthat happen are drastically
different than mine.
My emergency is, you know, mycomputer screen turned on upside
down this morning, right, which, not going to lie, it did
(39:09):
happen yesterday.
It was the weirdest thing I'veever experienced.
Your emergencies are much moregosh.
I don't even have a word Like.
Your daily is so much moreintense and intense.
Give me words, man.
You know words I'm strugglingto find.
I don't even have it.
Speaker 2 (39:30):
It's unrelatable.
Sometimes it's very difficult,especially when you go home and
we have to shut it off.
Just early on it was like hey,we got the kids party right now
and I haven't slept in 36 hoursand guess what?
You go to that kids party andyou put on a face and that
builds, and that builds.
And that's definitely where younever know what we just went on
, whether it was a fatality orsomething.
(39:51):
Because again we have to bethat professional, correct, we?
We really really appreciatewhen folks recognize that and,
um, again, it's a greatcommunity.
I really believe they do that.
Speaker 1 (40:00):
it's just night and day from where I'm from so last
last little tidbit, because Iknow you have an amazing story
that I'm so excited for you toshare because of all the things
and we didn't get terribly deephere, but we're starting to talk
about it, but I want you totalk about what recently
happened.
Speaker 2 (40:21):
Are we doing, charlotte?
Yes, all right, we'll do it.
Speaker 1 (40:24):
Come on, all right, we'll do it Come on All right.
Speaker 2 (40:26):
So Charlotte was a, I would say the dark side, the
book side Lost a lot of kids, alot of child fatalities, moms
murdering their own kids.
So definitely a dark side of mylife.
And about the next year I was alieutenant at a different
station and ran a call about2.30 in the morning, whatever
normal.
This is Norcross.
(40:47):
It's nonstop run, run, run, run, run.
No time.
Get out there.
The mother is bleeding out inthe ground.
She's having a baby.
It's a birth like preeclampsia.
Baby's way too young, they say,and she's bleeding out.
We're thinking she's dead,baby's definitely dead and it's
just normal there.
So I can end it right there asin.
Then we got more calls.
(41:08):
We patched her up as much as wecould.
I figured she was dead and thebaby was dead and like this
isn't callous, like this is whatwe do there, you move on to the
next call and I never thoughtabout it again.
Well, I had this awesomeparamedic, vern.
Her name's Laura, but anywayshe kept in touch with this
family.
But again, when you're so busyat these stations and again, no
disrespect to anybody you don'thave time.
(41:29):
Like I might not see Christiein the morning.
So Christie didn't let me knowthat this child might have a
breath.
Now, like we haven't evencommunicated at all, because
we're doing things.
I'm on a fire, I'm doingsomething else.
I'm on another cardiac arrest.
I remember she came back andshe was like I showered for two
hours trying to get the bloodoff me.
This call will never leave me.
But she found out the kid had abreath.
(41:50):
I never knew any of this.
So she calls me and she's likehey, I want you to come to the
fire station.
This is nine years later, thisis about a month ago, and I'm
like I'm not going there.
I have bad memories, it's notwhat I want.
She's like I really want youthere.
She talks me into it and she'slike the crew will be there,
which is cool.
I haven't seen these folks inagain nine years.
So we get out there and we meetin the parking lot, get a huge
(42:11):
hug.
I'm feeling very awkward, likeI don't want to be here.
I don't even know why the hellI'm here either.
And this car pulls up and thismother, chinese mother and
Chinese little girl come runningup and they're hugging us and
Vern's like take my picture,picture.
So I take her picture.
I'm like hey, whatever, okay, Ihave no clue.
Speaker 1 (42:30):
And the kid's hugging on my leg and I'm like this is
awkward, like this is this isextremely awkward.
Speaker 2 (42:33):
And, um, so verne starts telling you remember the
call?
I'm like no idea what you'retalking about.
And then she starts discussing.
I said, well, I'm trying toplay along like well, who was on
the call?
And she said, well, you, this,did this and and you were, of
course, a lieutenant you ran.
I'm like, oh, I did.
And then the mother comes up tothank me and hands me this book
which we went over, and that'sthis is, and we'll get into it
(42:55):
maybe next time.
The trauma.
I blacked it out for nine years, blacked out behind the well,
behind the dam, and then, all ofa sudden, I saw the mother on
the ground, I saw all the blood,I saw the apartment was in
shambles, it was a poor area andit all came back to me.
The, the, the dam blew up andit was like I saw it all.
(43:18):
It was like a movie.
That's all I can explain tothis.
And I turned around and said Ineed a minute.
I walked into the bunk room andI tried to hold it together and
I'm like, holy I was.
I was at first scared Cause,like what else is up here?
And that's where we go into themental health and the peer
support.
Like what else have I blockedout of my life?
And now it's there just waitingto come out and that's kind of
crazy.
Then I'm like, who are thesepeople?
(43:38):
So we go back to whole cruisethere Very emotional, clearly
Very emotional time, a lot oftears and everything else.
And the mother is thanking us,she hands us a book, the photo
album, and says you know,because of you, and she gives us
from the birth on of her babyand this is it.
And we talk about a spider web,that spider web that spreads
out to this beautiful area ofnow.
She has three kids.
(43:59):
She might have had one.
Um, her baby on the uh, we callit the pcr patient care report
zero scores on everything.
Baby's dead.
And we talked to the medicslater.
They said so if you're blue,you have a chance, you're
cyanotic, whatever, whichbasically means you have some
color or something like that,you could live.
This kid was dead.
It was gray and it came out inthe amniotic sack in the field,
(44:21):
which means you have zero chanceof life is what that means,
because we don't have equipmentto treat a right.
Verne said the baby was thesize of her palm and she has
small hands in an amniotic sack.
So, again, the skill level tosave this life is just out of
this world.
You got to cut equipment up,you're starting to cut equipment
that in half and you're justdoing as best you can.
It's just, it's combat medicine.
You're doing what you can tosave a life and, um, so we saved
(44:44):
her life had no concept.
So the mother, two weeks beforethe visit, finally told her
daughter, charlotte, that I havea story to tell you.
Charlotte doesn't know any ofthis either, and these heroes
saved her life and she's like Iwant to meet them and just got
the chills, exactly.
So they drove from Alabama fourhours, met us at 11 am, like on
(45:06):
a Wednesday, and I just showedup like one minute before them.
And they come out of this carfrom alabama, four hours, no
traffic.
This perfect, every thisbeautiful circle comes into play
and, um, we meet and, uh, she'salive, she just had her ninth
birthday and, um, it was justunbelievable, because we don't,
we don't get these calls, wedon't get these calls, we don't
(45:26):
get these saves and we never getthe feedback of you saved
someone's life on one of thesecardiac arrests we did, and just
incredible.
And then the news channel pickedit up too.
We got the interviews and wecould go further with this, but
we don't want too much attentionto a 9-year-old girl.
So, again, we're keeping thestory going and you got to see
(45:48):
the pictures and it's a save forlife.
I think her birthday is likeApril 11th, April 13th, and I
got it marked on my calendar.
Speaker 1 (45:54):
I'll celebrate that every year now too.
Yeah, you know, you guys don'tget a lot of the wins.
Speaker 2 (46:01):
Right, correct, thank you.
That sums it up.
Speaker 1 (46:03):
You don't get a lot of the wins, you only.
You see the other side andunfortunately, because of the
nature of your business, youhave to turn around and walk
away, and you don't know howmany.
You have to remember that thereare other people out there that
you saved.
Speaker 2 (46:20):
Yes, exactly, and who are they and where are they
Correct?
Speaker 1 (46:23):
You may never know, but you have to know that the
efforts that EMS and firstresponders put out there is 100%
I want to say appreciated.
But I know some people don'tunderstand, but I know here.
Speaker 2 (46:41):
Right.
Speaker 1 (46:42):
I know you are.
Speaker 2 (46:43):
Yep and we appreciate it.
It's awesome.
Speaker 1 (46:45):
And we're going to keep this conversation going.
You will be back because I feellike we need follow-up and we
need to keep talking.
Speaker 2 (46:52):
We've only just begun .
Speaker 1 (46:54):
We have.
Oh, there's our title of thepodcast.
There it is Beautiful.
There it is, Officer Pishak.
Speaker 2 (47:01):
Yes, ma'am.
Speaker 1 (47:01):
Thank you so much for sharing today.
Listeners.
I will have a link to his bookin the show notes, so if you're
interested, you can do that.
He is probably and I say thisvery honestly one of the most
genuine, calm individuals.
I mean he's he.
We were in meet together when Ifirst started here.
(47:22):
We were cause he was new and Iremember that very specifically.
He was kind and um, just has areally good energy about him.
So if you see him out there,stop and say hi, because he
deserves it.
Appreciate it.
Thank you for having me.
Thank you so much for checkingin with us today.
I hope this was a greatconversation for you and helps
(47:42):
you understand a little bit ofwhat's going on within our
department and the changesthey're trying to make.
A little bit of what's going onwithin our department and the
changes they're trying to make.
Our leadership is on point andthe officer heart that is out
there, that wants to reach outand help others, is strong.
So stay safe, milton.
Thanks for listening to Miltonin Maine.
We hope this episode gave youfresh insights into what makes
(48:04):
our city so special.
Stay connected and don't missan episode by subscribing to
this podcast on your favoriteplatform and following us on
social media for all updates.
And, of course, if you want tolearn more about the city, visit
us online at wwwmiltongagov forresources, news and upcoming
events.
Until next time, thanks forbeing part of the conversation
(48:28):
and we'll see you on the nextMilton and Main.
Welcome to Milton and Maine, the official podcast for
the city of Milton.
We want to bring you closer tothe heart of our community
through stories that inform,inspire and connect.
Each episode offers abehind-the-scenes look at the
people, projects and prioritiesshaping Milton, covering
everything from local governmentand future development to arts,
culture, sustainability andpublic safety.
(00:28):
Whether you're a resident, alocal business owner or just
curious about our city, this isyour front row seat to what
makes Milton special.
Welcome back to Milton and Made.
I'm your host, christy Weeks,the communications manager for
the city of Milton.
Today's episode is a powerfulone.
We're joined by Milton PDofficer Dennis Peshok, who has
20 plus years as a firstresponder, and he's going to
(00:50):
talk to us about a subject thatoften lives in the shadows and
that's PTSD in first responders.
Dennis has walked this roadhimself.
His personal journey, recentlycaptured in a book he wrote, is
raw and honest, and it's notjust about his own healing.
It's a message to every lawenforcement officer, firefighter
, military veteran or anyonewho's ever answered the call to
(01:13):
serve.
Through sleepless nights, missedmilestones and the weight of
duty, dennis offers not justperspective but purpose.
He believes deeply in the valueof service and the bond that it
creates purpose.
He believes deeply in the valueof service and the bond that it
creates, and today he opens upabout what it has meant for him,
what he's learned and what he'sstill learning, and how he's
working to help others do thesame.
With that, I'm going to welcomeOfficer Peshok to the podcast.
(01:37):
I'm so grateful you're here.
I know we have a lot to cover,so I'm not going to keep
chatting like I tend to do, sowelcome Dennis.
Speaker 2 (01:46):
Hey, thanks for having me, christy, I appreciate
it.
Speaker 1 (01:49):
Thank you for taking the time out of your day.
You're a busy guy and I'm goingto let you start with your
background, because you havequite a history.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
All right, I grew up originally in Norristown,
pennsylvania, up north outsidePhiladelphia, a little suburb
out there blue collar city, veryblue collar.
Everyone's hard working andmost folks stick around there
too.
Graduated college got out ofthere as fast as I could.
I say it was either that or themilitary.
So we got out, grew up in afamily of servitude for sure.
Yeah, father of Vietnam,veteran combat vet, and now that
(02:21):
I'm into peer support, we seenow how basically messed up he
was in the.
In that way he came back adifferent man, clearly from
combat yeah and uh, all thispromotions were, uh, combat
promotions.
And he, he didn't really talkabout it but he said, uh, his
friends were killed in front ofhim and they said, jim, you're
the next rank.
And he was like, I don't wantthe rank, like it's yours, it's
not a yeah, yeah.
So he got, I believe, threecombat promotions.
(02:43):
I think it was staff sergeant.
He left as my then sergeant but, um, vietnam definitely changed
him.
Uh, he didn't talk about ittill, probably after 60 years
old and it was super minutestories.
So, and we do not talk about it.
Um, yeah, you did not discuss itagain.
This is a mental health uhpodcast, so we'll go into it.
So we'll go into mental healthhere.
(03:04):
One of his stories was we usedto play Cowboys and Indians as
kids, right, and that's whateveryone did.
We didn't have phones and allthat.
And he said my first combat inthe jungle in Vietnam was great.
He said we're running around asCowboys and Indians and then he
says next thing, I know I lookover my friend's shot and dead.
And he said then all of asudden, the game wasn't fun
(03:24):
anymore and we're like, okay,that's a showstopper at a party.
You know, when you're a youngkid just bad stories.
One time his crew was bombedincorrectly by his own friendly
fire and they had to go pick upbuddies.
And again, we won't go intodetails, but again, mental
health never address.
That's your job and move on.
Definitely the suck it upbuttercup attitude.
Speaker 1 (03:45):
You know what?
So my uncle went to Vietnam andhe was given the option to
because he was a little bit of atroublemaker in high school,
right.
So he said judge said you caneither go into the military or
you're going to jail.
So he went into the Marines andhe went to Vietnam and he came
back.
(04:06):
A completely different persongrew up not really knowing a lot
about my uncle, just because hedidn't talk about a lot of
things.
And it wasn't until I wasprobably in my mid to late
twenties before he started totell and the only the only story
he told me and I remember thisso very clearly because they'd
(04:28):
get in the choppers to leave.
And he goes yeah, we used tohave to sit on our helmets and I
go, but wouldn't it do betteron your head?
And he goes well, not whenthey're shooting up the bottom
of your chopper.
You had to sit on something.
He goes because they took a lotof us out that way and he's
spent years battling thosedemons that he brought home from
(04:49):
Vietnam and he still to thisday and he's in his 70s still
has episodes, but at least nowhe can talk about a little bit
of it.
He just recently put on that hewas military, because for a
long time he wouldn't evenacknowledge it.
He wouldn't talk about it at all, right.
Speaker 2 (05:10):
And they were welcome .
Welcome back is a funny word.
They were not they were, so Imean they can tell stories
forever on how horrible theywere treated, coming back
Correct, and that's why.
That's why he hit it, I'm sure.
Speaker 1 (05:20):
I know better than to ask questions.
I'm terribly curious, but Iknow better than to ask
questions because that's on himif he ever wants to talk.
That is not for me to know ifhe's not ready for it.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
Exactly, and it's funny.
You said that because my dadwas a joker in high school and
he decided to be a joker in theMarines and they have better
jokes.
They said OK, jim, go walk theline, which means you're in the
front of the jungle by yourselfscouting, and uh, that
definitely changed him and, likeI said it, ate him up.
He died a few years ago andthere's no question the ptsd.
Yeah, and then alcohol, ofcourse, which is common in our
(05:50):
job and we'll get to that andthat's it'll eat you up and
they'll say you know cancer,whatever.
But it's the job, but yeah butit would get you um speaking of
not talking about.
Like you knew, uh, grandfather,before that battle of lady and
okinawa, that was two of hissmaller incredible battles but
um never talked about.
He was a gunner on a uh on aship and he was one of the first
ships ever hit by a kamikaze,but you knew not to discuss it
(06:14):
and you know, grandpa, back thenif you mentioned something,
grandma would come over and hityou or whatever.
We don't discuss right that everaround here and you're like,
okay, that's the end of theconversation right there, but of
course they had um major, majorthings yeah I like to tell a
story, um, about, uh, shakingthe nets.
I don't know if you ever heardthat story.
I haven't.
I haven't.
So a delta force operator Ican't remember his name right
(06:36):
now he just told a storyrecently, um, when they were
going for therapy, he had someworld war ii vets in there too,
and they call it this is greatfor us called Don't Shake the
Net Boy.
This is what they would say tothe guys in therapy.
And he was like what does thatmean?
He said you remember D-Dayclimbing down the ropes?
And he said yeah, yeah, yeah.
He said well, the guys who weredefecating themselves or
anything were starting to makeother people die.
(06:58):
So he said you shake the ropeand kill that guy.
So now you're living withkilling your buddy.
He said we, we killed one, butwe saved 10 more.
So he said we sit there intherapy and a guy would start
talking and say don't shake thatnet, Don't shake that net.
And then that was shut yourmouth.
We're not bringing this upagain.
So that's your old schoolmentality.
That is not those words, butit's still very real today,
(07:20):
Don't talk about it.
You got it, so I think it goesvery well with what we're
discussing right now too, though.
Speaker 1 (07:25):
Yeah, so I'm going to let you take the lead on this.
Sure, I want you to share someof your inspiration for writing
your book, and I will have theinformation in the show notes on
the book and any otherreferences that you have that
you think people might benefitfrom and get a better
understanding.
But I'm going to let you go.
All right, let's see let you goAll right, let's see where you
(07:45):
go.
Speaker 2 (07:46):
Yeah, we'll get into the servitude part.
I was doing basically dead-endjobs and just felt the need to
serve.
It's in the soul, it's in thespirit, like either you know or
you don't.
That's it.
And got into firefighting.
I got into Gwinnett County itwas the premier department in
the United States.
Almost it was a two-yearwaiting list.
I had about 1,000 firemenimpossible to get on and I
(08:06):
finally gave up, applied for thecity of Atlanta and they were
short, of course, and this wasback in 2001.
And Gwinnett finally called andlike start next week.
I'm like all right, great.
So I started Gwinnett Countybrutal department,
18th-thirtiest in the UnitedStates.
The United States People don'tknow that it's hard here and
again, I love my guys here.
If you don't know a departmentof that speed and level, you
(08:28):
just don't know.
You don't sleep.
Uh, you bring in bedding tosome stations and they laugh at
you.
You're like where's my locker?
They're like don't, don'tbother, don't even waste your
time.
And you're like, oh yeah,whatever they were, right, you
(08:48):
never even make it to that thing, right, that, of course is fun
for a few years and you nevernotice.
But, uh, that will get youeventually, which we'll get into
.
Yeah, so I did firefighting.
Uh, in the beginning you startout, you're both your
firefighter, medic I'm stillmedic today, 24 years now and
your first few years they calledthe box.
You're on the box, the squareambulance and you're on that box
for first couple years, mostlybefore you even start
firefighting, and that'sdefinitely where you get your
medical experience.
It's a lot of shootings there,gang related stabbings, uh,
cardiac arrests, constantly.
My first shift I had a fatalityand I'm thinking, okay, yeah,
(09:11):
first shift, but uh, this wasnormal, I had a fire, had a
house fire, and that was just myfirst shift and you keep going
and I was in norcross, which isvery, very busy area.
It's rough, it's very rough anduh, you don't sleep, you get a
lot of experience and once youleave that house, as they say,
you go to the next house.
Like you work there for howlong?
Like people are like, okay,this, this guy's got, he's got
(09:32):
moxie, he's got he's got themojo and you
don't think it because you thinkeveryone's like this but
they're not.
You know, went pretty good.
Uh, swift water technician,swift water rescue did that for
years.
Um, lieutenant over there,eventually eventually made
lieutenant, was acting captainfor a couple of years and
Swiftwater Rescue again, that'sthe elite, that's your SWAT,
that is the guys.
Right, you got to make the teamand once you're there, man, you
(09:53):
guys ain't leaving until youget hurt.
It is awesome.
And I definitely left for morereasons.
One summer we pulled 13 bodiesbodies out and that was a tough
summer and eventually, uh,that'll get to, they'll get to
anybody.
And I said, you know, I I'veseen enough.
So, um, went to, uh, just otherplaces and mandatory overtime
(10:15):
kicked in, and what that meansis 48 hours on, 24 hours off.
Speaker 1 (10:18):
And we talked about before processing, we talked
about zero processing yeah,because there's a statistic out
there and I have a few of them,and this one is from CU Anschutz
and SAMHSA.
Samhsa reported on this as well.
A study found that nearly 70%of EMS professionals reported
not having enough time torecover between traumatic events
(10:40):
contributing to increasedstress and mental health
challenges.
Speaker 2 (10:44):
Events contributing to increased stress and mental
health challenges.
Yeah, definitely on theambulance.
There's no processing, it isrunning a fatality, running a
cardiac arrest, and I don't knowif you've ever seen a picture
of an ambulance after a cardiacarrest.
Speaker 1 (10:55):
I have not.
Speaker 2 (10:56):
Yeah, look it up.
It is a bloody mess.
There's equipment scatteredeverywhere and someone's calling
you to say we need you back inservice.
Speaker 1 (11:10):
There is zero processing nothing.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
So because we won't go into details.
But cardiac arrests are ugly,yeah, most of them ain't like
hollywood.
So, um, you're cleaning up thatambulance.
They're still calling you.
We need you in service.
There's a call holding for yousomewhere.
You're driving out lights andsirens still cleaning up the
mess.
You got it and you pick up thenext one and then you pick up
that next call, and that's howit goes for 24 hours.
So in 2013, when they mandatedmandatory overtime, it was then
48 hours of that.
So zero processing, zerorecovery, hence your divorce
(11:34):
rates, which we'll get into.
Sure.
Gwyneth Fires was 78% at onetime.
Wow, yeah, and that's normal.
So that's just how it is.
Speaker 1 (11:43):
By the way, there were air quotes around that
normal, just for those of youthat can't see.
Dennis, it's important to knowthat Correct.
Speaker 2 (11:51):
And just to tell you about culture change and that,
again, is my passion Change theculture, change the stigma, get
rid of this garbage, old-schoolmentality which is killing
people and just because ithasn't hit you yet, it's going
to get you.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
It's going to get you .
It's going to get you because Ithought the same thing.
There's absolutely no way youcan be a part of that and
witness that and put that muchof yourself into what you're
doing every day and not carrysome of that home.
Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (12:17):
And they say this job won't change you, you're going
to be fine.
You go home to mama and here'sthe kids and she's shot out
because she just did a day ortwo of sure and she deserves
that break.
And uh, it's not that youdeserve it and that's what the
culture changes.
To me as a man and as a spouse,it's not my wife's job to
handle it.
It's my job as a dad to be agood parent too.
And people, they still havethat old school mentality.
(12:39):
Well, I gotta rest, I gotta goback, go back to what you're
going back to hell, like that'swhat you're doing and your
family, who's going to be theones when it's all over, are
waiting for you.
Speaker 1 (12:48):
So Right, yeah, wow, hard to hard to find those
boundaries.
But I think that's a lot of howstructuring coming through some
of these events, you have toset your boundaries, you have to
set your expectations, andexpectations is.
You have to set yourexpectations Correct, and
expectations is a weird word forme.
Speaker 2 (13:08):
Yeah, it is.
What are the expectations?
Let's go there.
So the department, at least thesuper bit, like we'll just use
them as an example Cobb Gwinnett, fulton, that just don't stop.
The expectations are your soul.
That's the bottom line.
You can sugarcoat it any wayyou want to, but they want your
(13:29):
soul.
They want you there 24 7.
Somebody calls out sick.
You're coming in.
It's mandatory.
So what we are?
We are mandated individuals atanything.
So you know, I've been throughhurricanes, tornadoes, the
snowstorms.
You're coming to work likeyou're not.
They don't care that what youjust saw.
Whatever you have to be there.
You're a professional andthat's a call.
So what are the expectations?
There are none.
You, you are unlimited.
You are uncle sam's, that's it.
Yeah, you gotta do whatever.
Speaker 1 (13:48):
And then it's very difficult on the spouse of
course too, but that's adifferent conversation for
another day yeah, when I Iforesee this conversation being
a little longer than this 45minutes that we're going to
capture today, but what I reallywant to get to is let's talk
(14:20):
about the statistics and let'stalk about how you.
Prevalence of PTSD saysapproximately 33% of first
responders develop PTS, comparedto 6.8% in the general
population.
Tell me what you think aboutthat, because that came straight
out of SAMHSA.
Speaker 2 (14:35):
It's so under-reported.
That's comical.
I mean, and again, you don'twant to use that as a crutch
where someone says, well, I sawthis.
I mean, we're talking majortrauma.
Mostly this isn't your.
You know, my pen fell off mydesk and I'm having trauma here.
This is again no time toprocess a massive call to the
next massive call to you.
Bury it that Again.
No time to process a massivecall to the next massive call to
(14:55):
you.
Bury it.
That is just beyond.
I don't know what the number is, because people aren't going to
be honest, never.
People are scared of theircommand staffs, they're afraid
to tell.
It's still the stigma which,again, my purpose is to change
that stigma.
And we can go into thatconference I was in by first
responders last week.
It's 200 people with the samementality and we are laser
focused on doing it too.
(15:16):
Because at what point is 350officers shot in line of duty
last year?
Well, that's fine.
There's guys that's 350, that'snot officers who have ptsd,
that's all the family members,that's all their partners and
that's.
But, of course, what does thepartner say to somebody else?
Speaker 1 (15:30):
I'm good, I'm fine, that's like me going home to my
wife say you good, I'm fine, andI she feels like she has to be
strong for you, because you'realready dealing.
Speaker 2 (15:39):
Correct.
Speaker 1 (15:40):
So then therefore, she doesn't process either.
Speaker 2 (15:42):
Yes, so yeah, we'll just end it there.
It is beyond under because offears and stereotypes, still
today.
Speaker 1 (15:49):
Stigma.
Stigma is a big deal.
Speaker 2 (15:50):
Stigma is a big deal.
Speaker 1 (15:59):
And we're talking PTSD and trauma, which I think a
lot of people transition intothe idea of well, that's therapy
.
There's therapy out there, yes,but what we're not talking
about is the addictions thatfollow and the behaviors that
are so detrimental to one'shealth.
Yep.
Speaker 2 (16:11):
Right.
Speaker 1 (16:11):
So I used to work in addiction treatment for 10 years
and it was one of the mosteye-opening experiences and
unfortunately the facility Iworked at was not totally
capable of handling some of thelevel of PTSD and mental health
challenges that people werehaving, so we had to send them
someplace else, and it's reallyhard to address addiction when
(16:35):
somebody is battling the thingsthat they have never talked
about.
Speaker 2 (16:40):
Correct.
Speaker 1 (16:40):
And I've been told they can't talk about it.
Speaker 2 (16:43):
You're saying you need to stop drinking.
We've missed the whole core.
You need to stop being angry.
Okay, and here's your 10 stepprocess.
We forgot why you're angry, andthat's what we're trying to
address too, and these violentoutbreaks and your isolation,
all these things, and thensuicide.
It's because you neveraddressed the core and what has
happened since 2001 for me andall that.
Speaker 1 (17:04):
So how do you change that?
Where do we go to even beginthat?
Because it's like moving theTitanic.
Speaker 2 (17:09):
It is, and that's again you find your why in life
right, and it takes and that'smy why's my purpose, and that's
other people's who do this.
Um, it starts small again.
You're starting small, you tellyour story and you start seeing
people, uh, who are like thankgod, somebody's been real,
because I've been fighting thesedemons too, and it is so.
I get to go to different placesthat have had bad things happen
(17:32):
.
I go to go to differentdepartments and you meet all
these people and you see it inthese big round tables, because
you do a round table where youdon't have to talk.
In these sessions you can'tmake somebody talk, but when
they start talking, then theirbrother talks and then her
sister starts talking and that'sall it takes is that little
nudge, and that's what I'm doingand that's what we're doing
right now.
Yeah, and someone will, Iguarantee it.
If we can touch one person here, that's all we do, it's all you
(17:54):
care about, and that touchessomebody else and touches
somebody else.
Speaker 1 (17:57):
So it starts small it does, and the first hurdle is
acknowledging yes acknowledgingthat there is an issue that you
haven't dealt with.
Yes, and then, once you're braveenough to speak about it,
because the person sitting nextto you is like nobody
understands where I'm at nobodyunderstands what I I've seen,
what have I experienced, whereI've been or how I'm feeling in
(18:19):
this moment and I feel like ifone brave person like you can
sit there and be completelyhonest as you were in your book
I mentioned it earlier that youwere brutally honest in your
book and I believe you did havesomebody reach out to you
recently.
Speaker 2 (18:36):
I have Again, I keep them all, any message I get.
I save them all, every textmessage, every email.
I put all my contacts in mybook and, uh, a Marine a couple
of days ago did and just said,hey, ma'am, read your book out
of this world, Can we talk?
And I was like, of course he's.
Like I'm a three time uhhospital, you know, induced
hospital for PTSD and trauma.
(18:56):
Try to take my own life.
And thank God you wrote thisbook and let's talk, and we're
going to talk tomorrow, and alot of messages like that.
You know you can't go intodetails because you're sure, but
that's what it's about and I'mnot a Marine vet and but we've
been through the same battles,right, mentally, health, wise.
Speaker 1 (19:20):
And he knows it and he's like yep, either you know,
you know and he's like you know,so we'll talk out tomorrow.
Live, it'll be prettyincredible.
I love that.
Yeah, to be able to putyourself in that position is
outstanding in the sense thatyou're willing.
You don't know this guy.
Speaker 2 (19:27):
Nope, and the braveness of these people
reaching out is that you can'tever, ever looked at.
It takes so much, like wetalked beforehand, these
dropping the mask, mask as I say, just dropping that ego.
Cut the bs.
Let's get real, because life'stoo short and, uh, people just
need that nudge.
Speaker 1 (19:41):
That's what we said and what we talked, what we also
mentioned and I rememberhearing this when I worked for
the treatment center, we had ahandful, of course, of first
responders and some of them weremultiple trips to treatment,
right, but I rememberspecifically one of them saying
we're just told this is part ofit.
You got it.
(20:02):
Ptsd it's part of it.
It's what you signed on to dealwith.
It's part of the job, andnobody's addressing the back end
of that, that.
You're still the human.
Speaker 2 (20:15):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (20:15):
So what are we doing?
What do we do?
Speaker 2 (20:17):
so yeah again.
Um, it doesn't matter.
Like you said, there are somany departments that are not
going to address it, becausethis will never be me.
We talked about stats.
Uh, talked about 350 officersshot.
Oh what, how many is that?
50 killed by gunfire?
Uh, it's right here in miltonwe did we've had.
We had three shootings lastyear in our area, unfortunately,
jeremy the Roswell officer tooright here.
(20:38):
That affects everybody.
Everybody If you're at thefuneral or the wake just out of
this world response.
That continues on afterwardstoo.
I mean, that just keeps goingand I lost a lot of friends and
everyone's there for two weeks,but then, after two weeks, is
what they call the disappearingtime.
Now you're on your own again.
Everyone's forgotten.
We got other things to do, butthe department here, it's great,
(21:00):
we're definitely getting there.
I'm not going to say we'rethere yet, but we are definitely
there.
We have the people in the rightplace, which is incredible.
I have a lieutenant and asergeant who help me
unbelievably.
Every time I go to anything, Italk to them and we discuss it,
us it and they're like thanksfor doing this and I'm like
thanks for sending me.
Yeah and uh, the conference Iwent last week is, uh, the first
responder yeah, tell me aboutthat oh, my god, mind-blowing.
(21:20):
Um, just, uh, you think you'redoing well.
No one ever has this figuredout, by the way.
It's a constant game andsomeone says well, I can help
you.
No man, you might be able to,but we are constantly battling
those demons because they'realways yapping yeah, you might
have saved that one in life, but, but I got five more that I
took, so you're always fightingthat.
And, peer support counselor, youcan get a reference which is,
they say, christy needs somehelp.
(21:41):
I think you'd be a good fit forher and we'll make contact and
we'll do whatever it takes.
If you're having just badproblems and we just talk and
that's it, and I just hear youout and we build a relationship.
And that's one aspect of it too, right there, and that's again
huge.
Well, you go to this conference.
That's a pretty high level ofwhat we're doing right now for
treatment and helping people.
But this conference was likeout of this dang world, like I
(22:03):
can't even explain it.
Like we, we started with umdonna from gotcha blankets.
She's the first speaker, okay,and we're like, oh, this is,
this is gonna be a conference.
Here we go, we got two days,can be happy.
She's like I just let you know.
I'm here, I make blankets andmy son was a samaritan police
officer and he killed himselfand that's how we started off
and I'm like, well, there's anattention getter.
The reality hits, oh, veryquickly beyond quick and that
(22:27):
was two days of that differentpeople's stories and you get
round tables and you help eachother out.
I'm talking people, fullbreakdowns, like getting real,
and there's nobody hiding behindthe macho ego bs, as we always
say, and every one of thesepeople is out there to help
someone at the very end, likenow.
Continue this message, continuethis message.
And this is like her a mother,yeah, who lost her kid.
(22:49):
And then you have, uh, differentpeople who have different,
who've lost different children,and they get up there and talk
and, uh, these are stories thatwe won't do on a podcast, to the
detail how they found them, how, yeah, the body looked and this
is a parent.
And you're like, okay, exactly,so, my life's pretty hard, but
it ain't like that.
And these people have turnedthis into a positive way.
(23:11):
And how do they do that?
By having these conversationsabout having this incredible
community and support group and,uh, that's what we're here for.
And then continue this and helpthat person move on, and help
each other move on, cause we'reall in this together.
Speaker 1 (23:26):
Wow, yeah, sorry, that's okay.
Um I uh, I've got three kids.
Speaker 2 (23:31):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (23:32):
Um, you have children , yep, and uh, I I briefly
mentioned earlier that I keepeverybody really really tight.
Yes, correct, like I'm.
I'm that mom.
Just a lot of it is justmotivated out of fear.
My daughter had lost aclassmate when she was a
sophomore in high school and mydaughter's response was off the
(23:55):
chain.
The way she handled herself.
She was 15 years old and shesaid, mom, I'm going to start a
prayer group.
And so her little 15-year-oldself made flyers and invited the
churches and invited thecommunity and she started.
I think the first morning shewas out there.
(24:17):
She had maybe 10 people, acouple of students, one of the
local pastors, and by the timeit finished, when school was
over and whatnot, we weregathering 50-plus people in
front of the school every day topray over the students.
Because she didn't know anyother way to deal with her loss
(24:40):
and the law, and she was.
She still reaches out to thefamily, still talks about going
fishing.
That's what she does on on theanniversary because she had no,
she didn't know any way else.
And for 15, that's a lot ofprocessing a lot of coping and
everything.
Speaker 2 (24:55):
Absolutely Yep.
Speaker 1 (24:57):
She talked to churches.
She went to three differentchurches and told her story
about Kyle and I think it hasshaped the way she approaches
Christ people.
Speaker 2 (25:09):
Absolutely it does, and a lot, of, a lot of people
in this world don't have thosemoments.
You know we call it to uh, Ican't say the on F yourself
moment or come to Jesus moment.
That's very important and uh,she had it and it's incredible.
And again, I talked, we talkedabout community Correct.
That's what it's about, and youdon't get by any of this stuff
through yourself.
Speaker 1 (25:30):
No.
Speaker 2 (25:30):
And of course I believe that the opposite of
addiction is connection my wholestory and many, many stories of
ours.
Is isolation, correct and uh,that leads to suicide.
That's the bottom line.
Human beings are made to betogether, correct?
That's it and we talk about.
The greatest gift in the worldis children.
Is that family and um?
Speaker 1 (25:48):
that's why you keep them so close I don't want to
lose that like Mom.
Why do you need to know whatI'm doing right now?
Speaker 2 (25:54):
Exactly.
Speaker 1 (25:54):
Fear.
Speaker 2 (25:56):
Anytime you bring that kind of stuff up, my mind
processes.
I just start going through allthe kid suicides.
I've been on all the kid deathsand those are the worst.
They're always the worst.
But how I define this is onegood way is it's a trash
compactor.
For us, that trash compactorand dumpster.
You keep dumping it in and itkeeps compacting everything and
it keeps compacting but it'sonly got so much, but you keep
(26:17):
throwing it in there becauseit's working.
I got this figured out and allof a sudden that trash compactor
blows up.
Speaker 1 (26:22):
Hence the word compartmentalize.
You got it right, wow.
Speaker 2 (26:26):
And it is great for us on calls.
Calls, it's very important thatwe do that because we have to
be professionals, like if I seesomething, I gotta ignore this
body, I gotta get to here, Igotta do something still the job
to do right, but it's the oldschool mentality of it.
Stayed in that compartment.
I never talk about it again.
But now we are talking about itand, um, the next day, maybe,
maybe not I, but we are going toaddress this and that's very.
(26:48):
This is all about mental healthand peer support officer,
wellness, wellness.
We're going to talk about thiscall.
It doesn't matter how bad itwas, it's not about that.
And of course, everyone isstill.
I'm good, I'm going to do this.
But it comes down to that squadlevel at first, and a good
supervisor Got a great sergeant,great sergeants, and we're
going to have this talk and Iknow they're going to support me
(27:09):
and we're going to get thegroup together and have that
great little talk.
Okay, what did you see?
And when I do peer supportcounseling for the state of
georgia, it is that what did you?
And it is tough questions.
What did you see?
How do you feel that?
That is very uncomfortable foranybody, and then now you're
taking that type a personality.
Go, go, go.
(27:30):
How do you feel?
I'm not supposed to feel thefeelings aren't a thing exactly.
I don't have time for feelings,right?
So, um, now you're going totalk about it and people start
talking man, they're, they'renot good and but then, when they
see somebody else step up, theystart flowing, tears start
flowing, there's tissues allaround and, uh, it's just a
therapy, you're getting it out,you're getting it out and
(27:50):
getting you to that next stage.
Speaker 1 (27:51):
Whatever that is to keep healing, because it's a
healing process it's continualand from what I understand
you're, you're beginning thatprocess within absolutely
milton's pd totally.
Speaker 2 (28:01):
Uh, yeah, again we got off track there.
But again, um, it starts withthe supervisors they got to be
on board starts with command setbeing on board.
Uh, we're going to do something, hopefully after the summer
yeah, you forget, because, uh,everyone's already got pto
scheduled, everyone's off, yougot family vacations planned, so
this will be something we'llput together, be a mandatory
thing.
Everyone has to be on board,like any program.
If one person from above yousays this is bs, well that that
(28:24):
person first of all needs a newjob because you just right, get
out like right you get out andthen, um, it'll destroy the
entire program, right?
that's like anything new you'retrying to do.
So I laugh at people because Iwas that guy.
I was the egotistical idiotuntil I looked in the mirror and
I said you better change, andthat's what it?
takes and that person is just Ijust laugh, You're hiding it,
(28:44):
man, but your time is coming,and law enforcement and divorce
and suicides prove thatcorrectly.
Yes, it proves it all the time.
So, yeah, we will.
The department's great, we'regoing to get there and hopefully
by the end of this year we'llhave something rock solid in
place, and I think we will, andwe have great support.
If I may, I'll talk about it.
Yes, please, we have SummitCounseling.
(29:05):
They're right there for us too,after our major incidents that
we've had.
The different priests andpastors have been phenomenal.
Speaker 1 (29:12):
If not responding to the call.
Speaker 2 (29:14):
There's so many great people and my job is to bring
it all together too, like I hada coffee with Billy a couple of
weeks ago, sitting down and just.
I've met with Jason fromsomeone individually and I'm
going to bring it all together.
That's my thing too, and causeeveryone's kind of out there,
but they all want to be in thesame spot and I think I can help
(29:34):
bring that all together here.
Speaker 1 (29:35):
I know I can, so I will so you started this
movement where you're pullingthe resources together because
that's hard, that's not an easytask that you're taking on and I
love that.
Uh, your leadership within thedepartment and I and I know
leadership here in city hall isalso behind it.
I've had a handful ofconversations with Chief and
City Manager Steve Krokoff andit is top of their mind and it
(29:59):
is important to them thewellness of their officers and
their firefighters.
So I love that you're gettingthat going.
Speaker 2 (30:07):
And I love that they support it, because it's what
does it lead to?
Of course, bad morale, sickhours.
It leads to everything, andagain, we're just talking about
that core, like what we talkedabout before.
Once you start addressing thishappy people, happy place, just
like happy mama, happy family,so it's the same thing and it
just everything keeps building,building, building and it's
awesome.
Again, we're getting there,we're going to get there.
Speaker 1 (30:36):
And I know we're going to do it together because
that's what it takes.
Yeah, yeah, well, if there'sever any way I can help, I'm I
don't know how, I mean I'm anoutsider here, but deep in my
heart I feel like I should be PD, but you know, I'm still
working on my position in there.
Too old for an officer.
Speaker 2 (30:44):
I appreciate the honesty.
Again, we talked off camera too, and it's awesome you talked
about, I think, colorado orsomething like that.
You had some dealings with that.
Speaker 1 (30:52):
Yeah, so there was the Aurora Theater shooting yes
absolutely.
And that's where we would hearyou know, hey, it's part of the
job, it's part of the job andnobody can understand that.
And then there was also anindividual who was very big in
the addiction treatment speakingworld.
(31:12):
He became a counselor.
He worked big trying to helppeople and he was a survivor of
Columbine and his buddy.
He was behind a desk in thelibrary sitting next to his
buddy and one of the shooterstook out his buddy right next to
him and spared him.
(31:33):
He was shot in the knee, had towait until he could get out the
back door and then, asadrenaline is carrying him
straight out that back door inhindsight, 2020, you look at
that and you go.
Why didn't the librarian turneverybody out the back door?
Nobody knew what was outside.
Speaker 2 (31:52):
And panic overrides everything too.
Speaker 1 (31:54):
And you can't assume that you're going to walk
outside because there's only oneshooter right.
I mean, there were so manyunknowns hindsight 2020, you can
dissect it and say this is whatyou should have done.
So he immediately went back andgot treatment um for pain and
before he knew it here he is ahigh school kid.
He's 10 years deep in addictionabsolutely um, because the
(32:17):
doctors kept giving him stuff,because that'll do the trick hey
, he told me I needed it andthat's where he ended up and it
ended up taking his life evenafter he got.
So he was sober for 10 yearsand he relapsed and it got him
the weight of the traumaticexperience he could never outrun
(32:38):
.
Speaker 2 (32:39):
Yep, it's again we talked about it's a continual
healing process.
That 10 years of soberness wasawesome, but it was also useless
when you took your life becausewe still haven't addressed this
.
And again, this we're breakingit down.
We are breaking it down fromwhether it's childhood trauma uh
, you see that a lot, a lot ofus in public safety.
You totally, you don't evenunderstand it, but the more
(32:59):
they're starting to study, it is.
You had some type of issues athome with your parents or
whatever it doesn't.
It doesn't matter, but therewas some kind of trauma in your
life that caused you to go thisroute, and that's something that
they've been going oh yeah,last couple years we're going,
it's absolutely, it's pretty uh,it's pretty amazing.
And and you start looking backlike no, no, no, and then you
start saying, well, did thishappen?
You're like I guess thathappened, but it wasn't trauma,
(33:19):
it was normal in our lives.
So, right again, we, we grew updifferent, uh, we did
everything that we do, like.
Speaker 1 (33:25):
I find myself with tendencies that my kids are like
, well, that's a little adhd,and I'm like, no, it's.
That's how you dealt withthings.
What are you talking about?
Speaker 2 (33:32):
Exactly.
Well, they just smacked us onthe side of the head and said
get over this, you're fine.
Yeah, exactly, irish Catholics.
So that was it, that was fine.
But you talk about that thegentleman who was there at the
Columbine and again, we'll justgo into it's, therefore, and I
discuss it in my book a lot.
(33:53):
I discuss it with people.
This is the spirituality side.
I like to talk to the pastorsand stuff too.
Why did God save him?
Why did God kill me?
This is real, and it'sdefinitely with your military
vets too.
If you lose a whole bunch offriends and you start saying,
you start thinking you're notgood enough, you start going to
isolation, like we talked about,and then you start drinking and
there's no reason.
It's just that survival's guiltand it's very, very real.
(34:16):
Yeah, I talk about the floodsin my book.
We did the floods in 2009 ingwinnett and rescued a lot of
people, but that's the ones youdidn't save is the crazy part.
The demons are yapping.
Yeah, you, you did, okay, butthe human mind is always trying
to go to this place and again wetalk about this, just again
changing the stigma.
That's normal and we want tokeep that positive.
(34:38):
But what about this.
Yeah, you know what You'reright, because that human mind
is still trying to go down thatroute and we're redirecting it
to the positive again too, andthere's always something
positive that you've done thatcan be looked at in that
training or whatever.
But no survival of guilt isreal, like you were just talking
about, and unfortunately thatgentleman, he didn't make it for
whatever reason.
(34:58):
Yeah, yeah but we all fight it.
Speaker 1 (35:06):
So we're going to, this is going to be another.
We've got a whole other.
We barely scratched the surfacehere on this topic, but I
wanted to introduce it, and Iwanted you to become here on
this topic.
But I wanted to introduce itand I wanted you to become your
voice to be heard, because Ithink what your purpose is is
serving others in a way otherthan the way you have in the
past.
Right.
Speaker 2 (35:25):
I couldn't agree more .
Speaker 1 (35:26):
So I love that leadership is behind you.
I love that you've connectedwith the resources.
If there is anything, as wewrap this up, that you can tell
the listeners on how to eitherbe supportive or get involved or
gain knowledge, or what wouldyou tell them?
(35:47):
How do, how do we help?
Speaker 2 (35:50):
man, we, we need another time, but that's awesome
.
It's a great question.
I'm not being derogatory.
The civilians are what keep usgoing.
We do this job to help others,right.
We do this job to save lives.
My job now is to save the lawenforcement side life too, and
the fire.
And again, nurses, whoeverdispatchers.
But anytime you get that cup ofcoffee bought for you,
(36:12):
something like something thatsmall, oh my God, it makes such
a difference, especially on abad day and um, and nobody's
going to know when you're havinga bad day.
No, and um, like people said,they all they watch videos.
I can't believe the stuff youdeal with.
Yeah, we deal with this everyday and we deal with it.
In Milton, a traffic stop flipsa switch, like that.
People go from super nice toyou, hand them a ticket to ready
(36:34):
to jump out that car and killyou, and that's it, and that is.
It's important that thecitizens around here understand
that those folks are here too.
We are real close to the dangerzone.
You talk about the Thin Bloomline.
No, that's it.
We are keeping thoseindividuals away from here as
much as we can.
But again, simple things, justnormal conversations.
(36:54):
It's always embarrassing for meto be thanked for my service,
like I don't like that.
I'm like I didn't do anything.
This is what I do, but I alwayssay thanks for acknowledging me
too.
It's just nice, and to me it'sjust a simple thing of a nice
conversation and a nice cup ofcoffee and just getting to know
the people more.
Because you look at people, youcan tell attitudes right, and
they'll go up to a certain copand they can say, oh, he's too
(37:15):
macho and they're kind ofstandoffish.
Well, no one wants to talk toyou and you're probably doing
the wrong job too.
But I love that communityoutreach part too, where you get
to if you go into a businessany of your local business, a
coffee shop and you get to knowthat owner, you know those
people have your back too.
They love having you in theretoo, and I love meeting them and
that's what it's about.
And again, we talked about itin the beginning the family,
(37:37):
that's community.
Whether it's church, whetherit's martial arts, bjj,
brazilian jiu-jitsu, it's stilla community of 10, 20, 30 people
, 200 people, and you're makinga positive impact in that world.
So keep doing what you're doing.
I would say Milton Residence.
We appreciate you and um.
Speaker 1 (37:52):
Oh, they do love their, they do love their first
responders here, they do, and weappreciate them.
Speaker 2 (38:01):
That's huge Cause.
Um, and Gwinnett, they hated me, they hated all of us.
Um, we had the kids who would.
I don't even want to go there.
They hated us.
So, uh, it's great to be in aculture where they love you and
accept you first.
Speaker 1 (38:11):
people we call when there's trouble, but when you
show up, when you're not calledbecause maybe somebody else
needed help, everybody's verystandoffish and I don't
understand it.
Now I was brought up to stayout of the police station.
Speaker 2 (38:24):
Correct Okay, if I ever found myself there.
Speaker 1 (38:26):
It was a bad decision on my part, yes, but now you
know, I've talked to DetectiveMoore, I've talked to Officer
Tidwell.
I've talked to Detective Moore,I've talked to Officer Tidwell,
I've talked to Chief Griffin,and they're always like hey, if
you need to talk, if you've gotsomething, stop by, I'm here.
Right, you can come talk to me.
Correct?
Which is a completely differentperspective than when our
generation Changing the stigmaCorrect there, it is right there
(38:47):
.
Changing the culture, becausey'all get up and put your pants
on, same way everybody else doesevery single morning.
Your job, your daily activitiesthat happen are drastically
different than mine.
My emergency is, you know, mycomputer screen turned on upside
down this morning, right, which, not going to lie, it did
(39:09):
happen yesterday.
It was the weirdest thing I'veever experienced.
Your emergencies are much moregosh.
I don't even have a word Like.
Your daily is so much moreintense and intense.
Give me words, man.
You know words I'm strugglingto find.
I don't even have it.
Speaker 2 (39:30):
It's unrelatable.
Sometimes it's very difficult,especially when you go home and
we have to shut it off.
Just early on it was like hey,we got the kids party right now
and I haven't slept in 36 hoursand guess what?
You go to that kids party andyou put on a face and that
builds, and that builds.
And that's definitely where younever know what we just went on
, whether it was a fatality orsomething.
(39:51):
Because again we have to bethat professional, correct, we?
We really really appreciatewhen folks recognize that and,
um, again, it's a greatcommunity.
I really believe they do that.
Speaker 1 (40:00):
it's just night and day from where I'm from so last
last little tidbit, because Iknow you have an amazing story
that I'm so excited for you toshare because of all the things
and we didn't get terribly deephere, but we're starting to talk
about it, but I want you totalk about what recently
happened.
Speaker 2 (40:21):
Are we doing, charlotte?
Yes, all right, we'll do it.
Speaker 1 (40:24):
Come on, all right, we'll do it Come on All right.
Speaker 2 (40:26):
So Charlotte was a, I would say the dark side, the
book side Lost a lot of kids, alot of child fatalities, moms
murdering their own kids.
So definitely a dark side of mylife.
And about the next year I was alieutenant at a different
station and ran a call about2.30 in the morning, whatever
normal.
This is Norcross.
(40:47):
It's nonstop run, run, run, run, run.
No time.
Get out there.
The mother is bleeding out inthe ground.
She's having a baby.
It's a birth like preeclampsia.
Baby's way too young, they say,and she's bleeding out.
We're thinking she's dead,baby's definitely dead and it's
just normal there.
So I can end it right there asin.
Then we got more calls.
(41:08):
We patched her up as much as wecould.
I figured she was dead and thebaby was dead and like this
isn't callous, like this is whatwe do there, you move on to the
next call and I never thoughtabout it again.
Well, I had this awesomeparamedic, vern.
Her name's Laura, but anywayshe kept in touch with this
family.
But again, when you're so busyat these stations and again, no
disrespect to anybody you don'thave time.
(41:29):
Like I might not see Christiein the morning.
So Christie didn't let me knowthat this child might have a
breath.
Now, like we haven't evencommunicated at all, because
we're doing things.
I'm on a fire, I'm doingsomething else.
I'm on another cardiac arrest.
I remember she came back andshe was like I showered for two
hours trying to get the bloodoff me.
This call will never leave me.
But she found out the kid had abreath.
(41:50):
I never knew any of this.
So she calls me and she's likehey, I want you to come to the
fire station.
This is nine years later, thisis about a month ago, and I'm
like I'm not going there.
I have bad memories, it's notwhat I want.
She's like I really want youthere.
She talks me into it and she'slike the crew will be there,
which is cool.
I haven't seen these folks inagain nine years.
So we get out there and we meetin the parking lot, get a huge
(42:11):
hug.
I'm feeling very awkward, likeI don't want to be here.
I don't even know why the hellI'm here either.
And this car pulls up and thismother, chinese mother and
Chinese little girl come runningup and they're hugging us and
Vern's like take my picture,picture.
So I take her picture.
I'm like hey, whatever, okay, Ihave no clue.
Speaker 1 (42:30):
And the kid's hugging on my leg and I'm like this is
awkward, like this is this isextremely awkward.
Speaker 2 (42:33):
And, um, so verne starts telling you remember the
call?
I'm like no idea what you'retalking about.
And then she starts discussing.
I said, well, I'm trying toplay along like well, who was on
the call?
And she said, well, you, this,did this and and you were, of
course, a lieutenant you ran.
I'm like, oh, I did.
And then the mother comes up tothank me and hands me this book
which we went over, and that'sthis is, and we'll get into it
(42:55):
maybe next time.
The trauma.
I blacked it out for nine years, blacked out behind the well,
behind the dam, and then, all ofa sudden, I saw the mother on
the ground, I saw all the blood,I saw the apartment was in
shambles, it was a poor area andit all came back to me.
The, the, the dam blew up andit was like I saw it all.
(43:18):
It was like a movie.
That's all I can explain tothis.
And I turned around and said Ineed a minute.
I walked into the bunk room andI tried to hold it together and
I'm like, holy I was.
I was at first scared Cause,like what else is up here?
And that's where we go into themental health and the peer
support.
Like what else have I blockedout of my life?
And now it's there just waitingto come out and that's kind of
crazy.
Then I'm like, who are thesepeople?
(43:38):
So we go back to whole cruisethere Very emotional, clearly
Very emotional time, a lot oftears and everything else.
And the mother is thanking us,she hands us a book, the photo
album, and says you know,because of you, and she gives us
from the birth on of her babyand this is it.
And we talk about a spider web,that spider web that spreads
out to this beautiful area ofnow.
She has three kids.
(43:59):
She might have had one.
Um, her baby on the uh, we callit the pcr patient care report
zero scores on everything.
Baby's dead.
And we talked to the medicslater.
They said so if you're blue,you have a chance, you're
cyanotic, whatever, whichbasically means you have some
color or something like that,you could live.
This kid was dead.
It was gray and it came out inthe amniotic sack in the field,
(44:21):
which means you have zero chanceof life is what that means,
because we don't have equipmentto treat a right.
Verne said the baby was thesize of her palm and she has
small hands in an amniotic sack.
So, again, the skill level tosave this life is just out of
this world.
You got to cut equipment up,you're starting to cut equipment
that in half and you're justdoing as best you can.
It's just, it's combat medicine.
You're doing what you can tosave a life and, um, so we saved
(44:44):
her life had no concept.
So the mother, two weeks beforethe visit, finally told her
daughter, charlotte, that I havea story to tell you.
Charlotte doesn't know any ofthis either, and these heroes
saved her life and she's like Iwant to meet them and just got
the chills, exactly.
So they drove from Alabama fourhours, met us at 11 am, like on
(45:06):
a Wednesday, and I just showedup like one minute before them.
And they come out of this carfrom alabama, four hours, no
traffic.
This perfect, every thisbeautiful circle comes into play
and, um, we meet and, uh, she'salive, she just had her ninth
birthday and, um, it was justunbelievable, because we don't,
we don't get these calls, wedon't get these calls, we don't
(45:26):
get these saves and we never getthe feedback of you saved
someone's life on one of thesecardiac arrests we did, and just
incredible.
And then the news channel pickedit up too.
We got the interviews and wecould go further with this, but
we don't want too much attentionto a 9-year-old girl.
So, again, we're keeping thestory going and you got to see
(45:48):
the pictures and it's a save forlife.
I think her birthday is likeApril 11th, April 13th, and I
got it marked on my calendar.
Speaker 1 (45:54):
I'll celebrate that every year now too.
Yeah, you know, you guys don'tget a lot of the wins.
Speaker 2 (46:01):
Right, correct, thank you.
That sums it up.
Speaker 1 (46:03):
You don't get a lot of the wins, you only.
You see the other side andunfortunately, because of the
nature of your business, youhave to turn around and walk
away, and you don't know howmany.
You have to remember that thereare other people out there that
you saved.
Speaker 2 (46:20):
Yes, exactly, and who are they and where are they
Correct?
Speaker 1 (46:23):
You may never know, but you have to know that the
efforts that EMS and firstresponders put out there is 100%
I want to say appreciated.
But I know some people don'tunderstand, but I know here.
Speaker 2 (46:41):
Right.
Speaker 1 (46:42):
I know you are.
Speaker 2 (46:43):
Yep and we appreciate it.
It's awesome.
Speaker 1 (46:45):
And we're going to keep this conversation going.
You will be back because I feellike we need follow-up and we
need to keep talking.
Speaker 2 (46:52):
We've only just begun .
Speaker 1 (46:54):
We have.
Oh, there's our title of thepodcast.
There it is Beautiful.
There it is, Officer Pishak.
Speaker 2 (47:01):
Yes, ma'am.
Speaker 1 (47:01):
Thank you so much for sharing today.
Listeners.
I will have a link to his bookin the show notes, so if you're
interested, you can do that.
He is probably and I say thisvery honestly one of the most
genuine, calm individuals.
I mean he's he.
We were in meet together when Ifirst started here.
(47:22):
We were cause he was new and Iremember that very specifically.
He was kind and um, just has areally good energy about him.
So if you see him out there,stop and say hi, because he
deserves it.
Appreciate it.
Thank you for having me.
Thank you so much for checkingin with us today.
I hope this was a greatconversation for you and helps
(47:42):
you understand a little bit ofwhat's going on within our
department and the changesthey're trying to make.
A little bit of what's going onwithin our department and the
changes they're trying to make.
Our leadership is on point andthe officer heart that is out
there, that wants to reach outand help others, is strong.
So stay safe, milton.
Thanks for listening to Miltonin Maine.
We hope this episode gave youfresh insights into what makes
(48:04):
our city so special.
Stay connected and don't missan episode by subscribing to
this podcast on your favoriteplatform and following us on
social media for all updates.
And, of course, if you want tolearn more about the city, visit
us online at wwwmiltongagov forresources, news and upcoming
events.
Until next time, thanks forbeing part of the conversation
(48:28):
and we'll see you on the nextMilton and Main.
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