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I spent last week in Sacramento, CA. The
Sacramento Fire Department asked me to train
all of their captains and battalion chiefs
in Emotional First Aid (EFA). I taught
6, 3-hour courses over a 5 day period. The
classes were not only attended by fire
officers, but by police officers,
detectives, personnel from the Coroner’s
office and staff from Risk Management.
I must admit that this was one of the
biggest challenges of my TIP career for a
number of reasons including:
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Because of the budget cuts, attendees
were feeling stretched and initially
perceived having to provide EFA as
another demand.
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Emergency responders are notorious for
their folded arms, stares and “show me”
attitude during training sessions.
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Emotional First Aid skills are not
perceived as essential skills or as
affecting emergency responders’ job
performance.
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I was an “out of town” mental health
person who didn’t know the department.
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This was mandatory training which didn’t
sit well with some.
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From a trainer’s perspective, teaching
the same material repeatedly throughout
a week is tough.
Despite the challenges,
I felt that the week was worthwhile and
“mission accomplished.” I think that my
sincere belief that emergency responders can
provide EFA in simple and quick ways, and
that this EFA is extremely important to
survivors came through and overcame the
initial resistance. At the very least, I
accomplished two (2) things in the training:
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I put the emotionally wounded on the “radar
screens” of these first responders.
- I convinced them that providing EFA,
although in most cases it’s doing simple
things, is very important to survivors (and
remembered by them “forever”).
One of the aspects of emergency response
work that I came to more fully appreciate is
the lack of follow up responders receive
from those they serve. In TIP, we have the
opportunity to receive and read “thank you’s”
from our clients. However, responders really
have no way of knowing if what they do/say
works. My major contribution may have been
reaffirming many of the EFA skills the
responders are already using, and letting
them know what a positive impact they have
on survivors of tragedy.
Of course, another part of the training
responders seemed to appreciate was the
“What to Say/What Not to Say” section. It
almost seemed like at the beginning of each
session attendees were saying to themselves
“Just tell us what to say. That’s all we
need.” Two other things happened during my trip to
Sacramento that made it worthwhile. 1.
One of the 3-hour sessions was videotaped.
They will show it to all personnel in both
police and fire departments. I think
with some editing, we will have a usable
product. 2.
I stirred up a lot of interest in starting a
TIP Affiliate in Sacramento.
All in all, it was a worthwhile trip, and I
look forward to being able to respond to
requests for EFA training from emergency
agencies with “we’ll send you the training
on DVD.”
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