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New Information on Police Suicide

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breakingthesilencecoverNew IACP Program on Police Officer Suicide

The International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP) has just released a new resource for law enforcement on police officer suicide, with information and resources on prevention and response to the problem of law enforcement officer suicide. The resources on their website are from their symposium entitled: “Breaking the Silence: A National Symposium on Law Enforcement Officer Suicide and Mental Health” and their website is loaded with lots of downloadable and reproducible materials.

According to the IACP website: “To address the mental health stigma within law enforcement as well as the critical issue of law enforcement suicide, the International Association of Chiefs of Police, in partnership with the Office of Community Oriented Policing Services, U.S. Department of Justice (COPS) hosted Breaking the Silence: A National Symposium on Law Enforcement Officer Suicide and Mental Health in July 2013. The participants at the symposium, which included the National Action Alliance for Suicide Prevention, law enforcement and mental health professionals, worked together to develop a national strategy to address officer mental health wellness and suicide prevention”.

You can find their information… Continue reading

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The Crazy Lives of Police Wives

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CrazyLivesOfPoliceWivesCoverEDITORS NOTE: The following article was submitted by Carolyn Whiting co-author of the new book: The Crazy Lives of Police Wives. This is a book written for and by police wives.  Please support them!

You can’t fix it if you don’t know it’s broken. That goes for people as well as machines. PTSD, suicide, alcoholism and domestic violence are all indicators of broken/hurt people that may go unrecognized. How can you fix the person who is hurting if he can’t be reached or he doesn’t understand that he needs help? There are too many stories about yet another police officer killing himself or another police family battling alcoholism behind the closed doors of their home, in secrecy and shame. It doesn’t have to be that way. Think of the lives that might be changed if only these hurting families knew about the myriad of resources available and the many groups with knowledge and experience waiting in the wings, eager to help. The Crazy Lives of Police Wives is a new book written for and by police wives that broaches these painful… Continue reading

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John Marx to Speak at Asian Law Enforcement Stress Conference

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LEWMcoverLaw Enforcement Survival Institute Executive Director and CopsAlive.com Editor John Marx has been invited to speak next week in Kuala Lumpur to law enforcement officials and government enforcement agencies about “Managing Stress in Times of Crisis”.

John will be reviewing our three main training programs: Armor Your Self™, Armor Your Agency™, and True Blue Valor™.

Our “Armor Your Self™: How to Survive a Career in Law Enforcement” on-site training program is an eight hour, hands-on, “How to” seminar that helps police officers and other law enforcement professionals armor themselves physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually to survive their careers in police work. To learn more CLICK HERE

The concept of “True Blue Valor™” is where one law enforcement officer has to muster the courage to confront a peer who is slipping both professionally and personally and endangering themselves, their peers and the public. It takes a system of organizational support and professional leadership to support and foster the concept of courage and intervention. We will train your trainers to deliver this program to your agency.
To learn more CLICK HERE

Our “Armor Your Agency™: How to Create a Healthy and Supportive Law Enforcement Agency” Program includes critical strategies that you will need to build a system of support and encouragement for a healthy and productive agency. To learn more CLICK HERE

The symposium, promoted by MeLearn Global, entitled Law Enforcement Psychology Masterclass is being held June 3rd & 4th 2014 at the Putrajaya Marriott Hotel just outside Kuala Lumpur Malaysia.

This symposium has just opened up extra spots for a few more attendees. This symposium is for law enforcement officials only. If you would like to learn more information… Continue reading

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How Leadership Can Reduce the Rate of Burnout Among Law Enforcement Staff

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BurnourtResearchCoverImportant new research into police burnout, leadership and stress is being published by Emerald and you can get a copy this weekend.

The report entitled: “An empirical investigation of high-risk occupations – Leader influence on employee stress and burnout among police” by Lisa M. Russell of the School of Business at Indiana University Southeast in New Albany, Indiana, USA is being published by Emerald Group Publishing Limited of the United Kingdom.

Emerald, a global publisher linking research and practice to the benefit of society, is making a free copy of this important research available for you until May 27, 2014 at this link: www.emeraldinsight.com/tk/policeburnout

A news release from Emerald stated: “US study published by Emerald analyses the relationship between stress and burnout in high-risk occupations and the role of leadership in moderating this relationship.

United Kingdom, 28 April 2014 – It is no surprise that high-risk occupations such as law enforcement have been associated with… Continue reading

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Heroes Behind the Badge: Sacrifice & Survival

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Heroes Behind the Badge Sacrifice and Survival Cover PhotoThis week is scared in the U.S. as we celebrate National Police Week in Washington D.C. During this week every year we honor those who have fallen in the line of duty, and we work to support and assist the survivors that have been left behind.

This is a time to honor the fallen while rededicating ourselves toward improving the way we serve our communities and enhance our ability to protect our citizens and ourselves.

According to the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund (NLEOMF) “This year, we’re adding 286 officers to the walls of the memorial. The names, to be added Tuesday evening in a candlelight vigil, include those of 100 officers killed in the line of duty in 2013 and 186 fallen officers from past years.”

The United By Light campaign gives everyone, everywhere around the world, especially those who can’t make it to Washington, DC, on May 13, to see the activities of the Candlelight Vigil Ceremony by Live Stream on the internet.

Register to watch the CandleLight Vigil live stream at:
http://support.nleomf.org/site/PageNavigator/CandlelightVigilRegistration

Are You a Survivor?

If you are a survivor of a law enforcement death and are not… Continue reading

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Secondary PTSD – What is it?

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secondaryPTSD(This is PART TWO in series of PTSD – What Is it? by Robert Rabe) CLICK HERE to read Part 1

EDITORS NOTE: the following is a guest post from Robert Rabe a Vietnam Veteran who also has 39 Years of Law Enforcement Experience.

Every critical incident has similarities, and everyone is different. And every law enforcement officer’s reaction is individual to them as well. Some officers go through the process of integrating the experience into their psyche without difficulty. Usually this is with the help of others (peer group counseling,debriefings). It is difficult to do it alone. But what can the family possibly do to help the officer? The family can make sure that nothing is missed,especially, if medication is needed. But sometimes medication or even intervention isn’t good enough. Needless to say, if the officer has turned to becoming sullen and melancholy, they are a different person than before the critical incident and onset of PTSD. At this point, the family becomes the secondary victim, and loyalty is tested. The spouse,the children can suffer from secondary PTSD, which is not widely discussed in the mainstream media. Secondary PTSD, while not recognized with diagnostic criteria, is based on the concept, that… Continue reading

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Blue Trauma Syndrome

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EDITORS NOTE:
The following material is from the new book “Armor Your Self™: How to Survive a Career in Law Enforcement“ to be published later this year by John Marx the founder of CopsAlive.com.

At the Law Enforcement Survival Institute we define “Blue Trauma Syndrome” as a spectrum of negative physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual health-effects manifested by a career in law enforcement. Blue trauma syndrome most certainly has it’s roots in large or cumulative doses of negative occupational stress and manifests many negative physiological, mental, emotional and spiritual symptoms.

Stress makes for an interesting enemy. You can’t see it, you can’t touch it and most times you can’t even describe it. But it is there, and it attacks us every day. We must defend ourselves and armor ourselves from it’s effects otherwise a careers worth of battle fatigue will overtake all of us. I know that I am speaking in generalities here but I think a proper amount of introspection will reveal this is true for the vast majority of us.

Now you can read all the research that’s out there (and there isn’t enough) on the effect stress has on law enforcement officers but it still doesn’t give us enough information about what stresses will get to us. Part of the problem is because the same stress will affect each officer differently and it’s… Continue reading

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Breaking the Silence of Police Suicide

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Breaking the Silence of Police Suicide
by Trish Buchanan

Please take five minutes of your time to consider, and then do something to stop police officer suicides in 5 easy steps.

1. Start with this short 4 minute video that was created by Trish Buchanan who is the widow of East Hartford Connecticut Police Officer Paul S. Buchanan, a dedicated police officer for almost 24 years and, who sadly took his own life in his police department March 12, 2013.  Please take 4 minutes to watch this video.

2. Then CLICK HERE to download our free CopsAlive.com roll-call discussion guide… Continue reading

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Basic Law Enforcement Wellness Curriculum Development

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Help us develop a basic curriculum on law enforcement wellness

The current version of the Basic LE Wellness Curriculum can always be found here: https://www.copsalive.com/wellnesscurriculum/

As part of the International Law Enforcement Educators and Trainers Association (ILEETA) annual conference being held the last week of March 2014 in Chicago Illinois, several of us are facilitating sessions at the conference in an attempt to develop a Basic Wellness Training Curriculum to be available to everyone in law enforcement.

At the conference, being held at the Chicago Westin Yorktown Center, we will host four breakout sessions and one group panel discussion to draw ideas and create a basic curriculum for future distribution.

In addition to the input from hundreds of ILEETA members we also need your input. We want your ideas, tips, best practices, research and any input that you believe would be helpful or should be included within a basic training program on wellness for law enforcement professionals.

There are several ways to help.

First, you could… Continue reading

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Quiet Your Mind

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soundwavebyjbaerSm Can You Quiet Your Mind? For law enforcement professionals the importance of being able to quiet your mind is critical as the thoughts, ideas, plans and excessive noise in our heads can become overwhelming. Even in their more mild expressions these thoughts can keep us from being focused, attentive, alert and might disturb our sleep. The profession of law enforcement can be quite toxic and contributes many direct threats to your mental and emotional well-being, not to mention your spiritual health. Things like poverty, tragedy, trauma, death and destruction can be overwhelming and thoughts about these things blend with your everyday thoughts to contribute lots of noise in your mind. Your ability to control and “quiet” that noise might become a very valuable tool in the challenge for you to be able to stay alive or to even survive a full career. Those in police work need to learn to calm and quiet their minds in order to stay focused, mentally alert, and safe. We are attaching a written procedure for quieting your mind as well as a 10 minute audio recording to guide you… Continue reading