Wellness Warrior: With Sean Woods

EP13- Wellness Warrior with guest, Sean Woods

Cinnamon:
Hi, all. It's Cinnamon and Erin, and we are back for episode 13. And today we're really excited to have our guest  join us and talk about his experience when it comes to the first responder world and mental health. Our guest is a Cincinnati police officer and his name is, you know what? I'm gonna wait to give a name. So some of our local listeners can maybe like figure out who he is.

Erin:
Ooh, tell us about him. How did you describe him before we started recording?

Cinnamon:
So, okay. So a little bit, a little bit less unique than a unicorn, uh, but still very unicornish. He has an education degree from a university here in town. Um...

Erin:
Which is where?

Cinnamon:
in Cincinnati. So the university that he graduated for unfortunately does not exist anymore, but we do want to give a shout out to Cincinnati Christian University, who used to be a Cincinnati Christian College and was a foundational staple here in the Cincinnati area for a very, very long time.

Erin:
Mm-hmm.

Cinnamon:
Our guest joined the Marine Corps reserves while he was in college getting that education degree. And then he joined the Hamilton County Sheriff's Office in 95 and he worked there until 2000 when he started with the Cincinnati Police Department. And since joining CPD, he has served in the capacity as a patrol officer, a field training officer, an FTO, bike patrol, plainclothes narcotics. a vice unit and then now he is a canine handler and he's also an operator for the CPD SWAT team and he has been since 2015. And today he is with us for the compilation of all those things that have made him wise and experienced and trustworthy. But the position that he holds today that is so important to us and our listeners is he is actually. the, he's spearheading the wellness program from the union side of the FOP. And he has worked with the Cincinnati Police Department's wellness program in coordination with their wellness coordinator. And he is one of the folks that if you are in need, you can reach by phone, email, text, pigeon, and he will provide resources and support. And so today we have with us, drum roll please,

Erin:
Brrrr

Cinnamon:
Officer Sean Woods, from Cincinnati Police Department.

Erin:
Yay, Welcome, Sean. Yeah, I think she called you a shiny unicorn.

Cinnamon:
I mean, a shiny unicorn.

Erin:
She definitely softened it up, but it's a thrill to have you on. And something that Cinnamon didn't say was that you are a no BS kind of man being born and raised in Long Island, New York. So even though you're not in New York anymore and you are honoring us. and blessing us with your presence in Cincinnati, Ohio. There is something to be said for where you came from and how you don't put up with any crap. So we're happy to have you.

Cinnamon:
Yeah, I feel like New Yorkers, maybe Long Islanders in particular, like there's just something in the genetic makeup that it doesn't matter where you go, for how long, how many miles away, like there is still a New Yorker in you.

Erin:
Exactly. They don't just hang up that New York hat by any means

Cinnamon:
No, they can whip out the accent and the tough guy,

Erin:
The sass.

Cinnamon:
the sass.

Erin: 
Sean, we appreciate you coming on and joining us. I know we've been talking to you for a while about getting your expertise on here, and there's a lot of resources that you have available, that you're part of, and we think that's really important for our listeners to understand what's going on out there, get some tricks of the trade, see who they can be talking to, how they can better support mental, wellness and their departments.

And, I know that you've, I had your own fair share of interesting situations and experiences and that's important too. But you've been such a advocate and so strong in this community as far as being the voice of reason, cutting through the bullshit, like getting things handled. And that's what we find very valuable.

 I think that Cinnamon and I. definitely, believe that part of the reason that she and I get things done is cuz we cut through the bullshit. But, we could be totally off and that's okay too. But I do think that works. Folks that aren't afraid to get in there and get dirty create action that's super important for any change to happen. So thank you for joining us and yes, cinnamon is raising her hand. 

Cinnamon: 
I also wanted to add, because of your unique role that we'll talk about today with your union, you have the secret information that most people don't know, and unless they're in that situation, and once you're in a situation, it makes it so much more difficult to be under duress and also navigating those resources. So the idea. That you're able to provide at least your department's understanding, which may duplicate other departments that work with the same union, what that information is that they can, file away and use at a later date if necessary. But it's not trying to grab for that information, in that moment of crisis. then even if they can't recall all of it, they'll remember, Hey, episode 13 had that guy on, that was the union liaison and he talked about this. I can listen to that episode. in lieu of making that confusing, overwhelming first phone call to figure out what steps to take.

Erin: 
Yeah. Yeah. Sean, you have military experience, you have, the experience of law enforcement. You have. The advocacy experience. You have all this experience. So can you tell us a little bit about your story? I saw you take a deep breath so you're ready. 

Sean: 
Yeah, I was listening to everything you guys say cuz that's what I try to do best is kinda listen, you guys make great points. And those are all, I was like, oh, that all sounds really good. who is this? This is fantastic. So really how this got started was probably about five or six years ago.

And so being a member of the Fraternal Order of Police, I'm in the role of chaplain now. I'm not an ordained minister or a priest. it's more of a benevolent role. I had decided that instead of just dealing with members when they pass away, that there had to be something more to supporting law enforcement.

 so in conjunction with a couple of individuals, and this is five or six years ago, we started to get into the crisis intervention stress management team. Through the state of Ohio, and that's where it started. and from there on, it's just gradually increased. I would tell anybody that there are so many parts, and I don't wanna call it a puzzle necessarily, because it's more like just coming up with a game plan or a strategy and then just like you were saying before, cutting through the bullshit and getting it done.

 Sean:
 and I've been lucky enough in Cincinnati, and this is, I think, the unique thing that I think people really need to think about when they try to develop a program. especially from perspective, if you have a strong union or a labor advantage. Now, thankfully the Fraternal Order of Police is pretty active in this role as far as officer wellness on the national level.

And on a state level. and as you guys know, actually, the State House has actually passed some bills that assist peer support. I think House Bill 5 34. so we have different things that are working in our favor, but the same time, the biggest struggle that you deal with is, and you guys know better than I do, is that when you don't have people that actually have been affected by PTs or PTs d they don't understand, it's like we've talked about so many times.

We have a police officer, he has an assistance, he is gotta wrestle somebody. He gotta fight somebody. He breaks his arm. It's so obvious that he broke his arm. He's got a cast on it. He can't work for eight weeks. He can't write, he can't shoot. But if he had that same situation and it turns out to be a mental health situation, they can't see it, they can't see the 

Erin: situation. Sean: In trying to articulate and explain to people that this is a real thing can be very difficult, especially in the beginning. not to get off too much on a tangent, but we have an individual, her name's Tiffany Galvez, and she's been 

Erin: great 

Sean: for us. 100% in her heart's in it.

Frankly, without her doing a lot of the background work and all the busy work, whatever you wanna call it, we wouldn't be able to get things done. So it's an association between the union, myself, Tiffany, being city employee, working together for the benefit of the officer to get things done.

And that's how I think it has to happen because we know those officers. It doesn't matter where you are or even what job profession you're in, you can't depend on administration. Or management to do the right thing at the right times. You just can't do it. And you have to take those steps yourself, and you can't be afraid to hurt somebody's feelings or,at least be stern in what you're saying.

You gotta believe in what talking about Erin: Yeah.

Cinnamon: 
Sean, I have a question, based on a point that you made about the visibility of a physical injury versus, maybe a mental health issue following a critical incident where it's really about the other people feeling a sense of asurity. That something's really wrong with that person.

do you think that, it would be beneficial for even the people who don't necessarily, have a history where they've had, P T S, or any kind, even if it's just the acute stress that happens in that first 30 days, but where they have the understanding of, the ways it may look, because it doesn't really always look one way.

It doesn't mean that you're gonna roll into somebody's office and they're gonna be curled up in the fetal position, or, they're constantly crying. Or sometimes when they act aggressively or angrily, people discount that and don't think that's necessarily a symptom. Like what do you think that we can do to close that gap between, the need for.

I use the word asurity, that someone is not faking. And why do you think the difference exists between a physician saying, yep, that arm is broke, versus a trained clinician saying, yep, you are symptomatic and meet the criteria. And you have confided in me that you are struggling in these ways, and therefore I'm acknowledging what's happening with you.

Sean: Wow. That's a hard one.

Cinnamon: Sorry, 

Sean: 
No, that's all right. Because we had discussed this before and that's one of our biggest concerns right now lately. Look, we know how people are in general. We know there are gonna people out there who are going to take advantage of a situation if they have to. The asurity, and dealing with this, has been very hard. for me, it's staying on point. So 

Erin: never

Sean: 
never want the police officer's situation to be public, the whole idea is to take care of this individual without it being all over the place. but there are circumstances where that becomes not possible, based on that officer's actions.

And then you give phone calls about this person better not get PTs Time bank or whatever it might be. They're lying. They've been acting like this for years and everything else. So

we try to do everything case by case as much as possible. Actually, I think you have to, you can't just say, this is it, this is what we look for.

 that being said, the one things we're trying to do with our supervisors and other officers, and this is part of the struggle too that people need to know if they're starting a program is education and training. and how to deal with that when you might see it.

Like you said, someone's not always gonna be crawled up in a fetal position on the ground. You're probably rarely gonna see that. there's a good chance you might too. You just don't know. we try to assure people that if they have a question,

they have the resources, whether it's myself or Tiffany or her assistant now, Chris Perry or a couple other people that they can call them.

And not that we're gonna have the answers because as I've told you guys too and other peoples, I am not a professional. This is not what I went to school for. I can't heal you, I can't fix you, but I can help you and I certainly can point you in the right direction to get the help that you need. Because at the end of the day, even if someone, I personally might think, this is really just a symptom of their own actions and this really isn't PTs,

Sean:
 that's not my job, frankly. So my job is to get you somewhere where like yourselves you can make that determination, not me. another part of the asurity as well, is Tiffany and myself and Tiffany more than me, is vetting individuals who we can trust to send officers to, that we know we are gonna get a good, fair diagnosis or good indication of what's going on.

And again, we don't need to know somebody's medical history or exactly why they're dealing with what they're dealing with, but we need to be able to trust those individuals. And trust is such a big part of all of this. And that's why police officers had such a big problem with this. It's one of the reasons for years and years is trust.

There's no trust. So we'll continue to do that, to the best of our ability. I think people do slip through the cracks and there's been a couple lately where I personally didn't feel I thought they were lying, let's just put it that way. I think they were just trying to figure out a way not to come to work.

and then someone pointed out to me, and it was a good point, if somebody gets away with it, that's great. if two or three people get away with it, fine. But at the end of the day, if you help that one person that truly needed it, then it's worth 

it. and I do agree with that, so

Erin: 
Yeah. And it's unfortunate that there are folks that. I guess we could say Cry Wolf can potentially ruin it for others who really need it. And also that's human beings. Being human beings. Folks tend to look for a loophole in some capacity, and I think it would be safe to say that every person in law enforcement or fire service or any first responder does deal with a level of stress that is out of the typical level of stress that any civilian would deal with.

but then it's like, okay, but where are we in this scope of the stressful experiences? And does it actually qualify for you to receive some kind of services? and why you and not them? And it gets into this whole thing. I wanna ask you, why does this matter to you? How did you even get into this?

So at one point in your life you were on patrol and Doing that work. And then next thing you know, here you are. And so how did this happen?

Sean: 
yeah, I mean like I said a little bit earlier, when I got in that role with Chaplain, 

it was like too easy. It's like, you know, I'm sure you probably both have done that. You're kind of like, it's not that you're bored. You're like, eh, let me seek something out. I'm gonna try to do something here, and next thing you know, you're down that, I'm not gonna say black hole, but maybe that wormhole that, you just don't realize what ends up happening.

And that's what happened. And the more I've learned, and as time goes on, I think it just reassures what I'm doing.  or, helping do with other people, because I continue to see how great the need is, on a more continual basis. So four years ago, I might have thought there was a need,  but I feel more strongly about that need now.

And the more officers open up about it, the more you see that, really the goal of this whole program is not to get to the point where dudes in the corner in fetal position. That's the whole point of it. We tell people that, like everybody gets stuck on the suicidal part of it, police officers committing suicide.

 Yeah, absolutely. that's a big deal. And we don't want more suicide deaths than line of duty deaths every year. we don't want any deaths. But that's a huge statistic that police officers need to understand is that we have more police officers that are taking their own lives. They're actually dying in a line of duty from gunfire, auto accidents, everything else.

 if we can stop that final feeling, that breaking point, if we can talk about it 10 years before we get to that point, we can almost solve the problem before there ever is a problem. And that's the whole idea. And we try to tell the cops that, look, we're not saying you're all suicidal.

We're not saying that. We're saying, Hey, take care of yourself. Pay attention. Hey, sergeants, guess what? You need to give a shit about your relief. Because if you're released not feeling right, guess what? That makes the job harder. I gotta worry about this. just care. you got some guys always coming in and joking every night and then for a week, he's not saying a word.

No. That's, there's a change. Something has happened, we don't know. But hey, how about you just ask them, take myself, Hey, what's going on? Everything all right? Sometimes that's all it takes. So we're trying to teach them on the front end so we don't get to that back. I've just have gradually seen the need increase as time has gone on.

And I've been honest with you guys before is there are times when I am, I'm not gonna say I'm completely stressed out, but I'm pretty damn close cause I have my own issues, just like everybody 

does. And you can't take on the issues of everybody else and have your own and be healthy. It's, quite impossible actually.

 Cinnamon: 
I wanted to ask you, because you mentioned this, indirectly, but that idea that right now we're still working through, what already is, So you've got lots of career law enforcement that have had critical incidents that came before we really started talking about mental health.

The understanding has been, it's not like I wanna kill myself, so I don't need to reach out for help. and so ideally, eventually we'll get to the place where we're actually ahead of it, right? That we're more proactive than right now, we're reactive. One of the things that you mentioned about the feedback around some of the, concerns around people using this legitimately was they've been acting like this for a long time, and I thought, of course they have, right?

This isn't like they just started suffering. We've been forcing quiet and closed mouths for a long time. So you are going to see those people who whether it's been, they've been despondent for a long time, or they've showed up like a jerk for a long time, or they've used. sarcasm, whatever it is, which we love.

Sarcasm. we don't think sarcasm is innately bad, but how would you explain to somebody, yeah, that is how they've been for a long time, and now we understand why.

Sean:
 Yeah. I would explain it the way you just did in a sense. we're, we can't look at any situation as uniquely in and of itself. Like there, there's just this one thing. one of the things I tried to do when I first started going to the academy was doing trainings,with Ms. Galvez was I would use an example for myself. I think that's one of the best things I can do if I just get up there and say all this stuff. it only means so much. But if I say, Hey, this is what happened to me. And for me it was a situation that happened. I think the third year I was on the job and it wasn't anything. It's funny cuz I've talked to this about this to a, someone who's not first responder, they would be like, oh my gosh, that's terrible. And to me it was kinda like, oh, that was just Thursday. And for me it was a shooting, it was a homicide. My partner and I were the first ones there.

So we get there and we set up the scene, now we have to wait for homicide detectives in the coroner's office. it's right about lunchtime. So I tell my partner, I said, Hey, go get my lunch bag. So he gets my lunch bag and here's this individual on the floor. lots of blood, all that kind of stuff. I'm gonna get gruesome. And I'm sitting two or three steps up from him. And I'm sitting there eating my lunch. That's not a normal reaction to a situation like that. And I can look back and say, I think that's when I realized that my personality had at least changed and then started to take into account maybe things that started to happen over the years from that point forward.

That's for me. And I try to explain that to 'em so that they can look at it. Cuz someone who has two years on could have ptsd. Ptsd, we know that. And 10 years, 15 years, and my gosh, if you've been on 25 or 30 years, the accumulated amount of trauma, for a beat officer or a police officer or a firefighter is just, it's out of this world.

cuz civilians They'll ask you a question like, how many homicides have you seen? You're like, ah, I don't know. I dunno, 65 70. And they're like, what? That's crazy. I'm like, that's how, that's work. Yeah. And I try to tell, I try to tell these cops too.

I'm like, you gotta remember you, took a job that for a long time before body cameras and everything else, you were the wall, you were the defense between the public seeing these things and not seeing them, you were, that, and cameras have changed that stuff and video has changed that stuff. Not for the betterment, I don't think, as far as that's concerned. But you took all that in so others didn't have to see it or deal with it, and they need to consider that. But it's the fatal accident on the highway where it's the child you deal with, and when you start rambling these things off to police officers in training, the wheels start turning, the hamster starts running on the wheel and they're like, oh, well, oh, okay.

 Yeah. And then unfortunately, what do we do? We try to, you could explain as much better than I could, but these traumatic incidents, what do you do? you forget 'em intentionally or not intentionally. You kind of just put 'em away, You put 'em in your mind and then when you start thinking about, yeah, you put 'em away and that's probably the best way to put it.

You put 'em away, they're not gone, you put 'em away. The thing is, you can stuff so much stuff in the closet and eventually that closet's gonna bust open. You just don't know when. So you gotta deal with those things as they go on progressively. But I love seeing cops thinking about, you can tell that they're going through their mind about, oh, there's this one, this one, this one, this one, this one, this.

 And then they start to get it. They're like, okay. and it's gotten better for us. I mean, I just had a guy this morning, safety, he goes, I thought it was a bunch of bullshit. And then after talking to him a couple times, he goes, you know, it's real. He goes, my baseline's different than everybody else's.

He goes, and I can't judge people for that. I don't know what somebody else is going through. I was like, yeah, you don't. 

Cinnamon:
 so what you're talking about, I would apply the phrase scope of experience, If I had never been into a fist fight and somebody came up and punched me, I'm gonna be shocked, right? Then I'd be like, I can't believe I got hit. But if the person that hit me was a professional boxer mma, they'd be like, you're fine.

This is nothing compared with how bad it could have been. So that scope of experience that you all have, that, as you were saying, like the shock of somebody. Responding to you saying 65 or 70 homicides. I'm like, how many memos have you sent via email during the course of your career?

 what is shocking to us as civilians is your normal day-to-day business just like responding to an email or sending a memo or faxing an item. when we're comparing, you have to look at the frequency at which you do a particular task in your job. and I like how you said that law enforcement has been a wall of protection to exposure. and that's not a brick wall, but like a foam wall that absorbs it all. And I would even clarify what you said. It's not you that forgets. It's your brain, 

 Sean: Mm-hmm. 

Cinnamon: 
And so your brain is doing something separate from your mind, our conscious thought to protect you, to be able to keep you as safe as possible with as little impact as it can until it creates a bigger impact.

 And, I think there's this divide between what civilians know and what law enforcement know. And it has gotten even bigger and there's a lack of understanding. but one of the things that I noticed is that the self-report rates.

Whether it be for mental health symptoms, depression, anxiety, PTs, adverse childhood experiences, all those numbers do not match up with the reality of our other statistics like suicide. And so with that gap, can you explain to those civilians that are listening, why do we see such low self-report numbers? What is the cost of being honest for law enforcement in particular?

Sean: 
Sure that's, I'm not gonna say that's easy, but it is. I'll say this, if you had the courage 20 years ago, even 10 years ago, to go to your supervisor and say, look, I just can't do this today. I'm checked out and usually that's the term you'll hear.

I mentally checked out I can't do this. we had that, whatever that situation was, I can't do it. That officer might be referred to the city psychiatrist for evaluation or just a checkup, and what happens then they immediately would be put on desk duty. So the immediate stigma is you can't do your job, we're gonna put you on the desk.

And so basically, why don't you just put a bright spotlight on me? because what is everybody gonna do? 

Cinnamon: What happened? 

Sean: 
Cause police officers and firefighters and people in general are horrible gossips. And they're gonna say, what happened? What happened to him? What did he do? What did she do? What's going on?

What? Oh, he's crazy. She's crazy. that's the list you go down. And that's why people would not for a long time self report. And it's not only that I almost don't fault the frontline supervisors for doing what they had to do, cuz there's a liability aspect or maybe based on their knowledge base, they thought they were doing them a favor.

But in the end, administration doesn't look at it like that. And that field officer does not trust the administration to make the right decision. They just don't. And that right now is, that  is probably the first or second biggest barrier that we have. and we've done plenty of surveys.

I've done one, Tiffany's done 'em, they've done 'em all over the country. When they ask police officers what the biggest stressor is, it's not going to the gun run, it's not going to the domestic violence, which you would think is the biggest stressor. It's administration is the biggest stressor. And it shouldn't be that way because at the end of the day, you have to count on somebody.

You gotta count the guy in the car next to you. you gotta count on your supervisors and hopefully you can trust your administration. We've gotten a lot better here. a lot better. leaps and bounds. Honestly, if have, I have to be honest, our chief has been great with our wellness program.

She has been great. but that still doesn't change the ability for police officers to trust the administration cause they don't trust 'em in other aspects. So it, translates to the wellness portion as well. so that's what would happen to a cop. You're talking about probably at a time was potentially career ending. I mean something... 

 Cinnamon: Police power pulled

 Sean: Oh, 

Cinnamon: weapons pulled.

Sean: 
oh yeah. Not to mention the fact that if you're your second, third year on the job and you go to some incident and you do all that and you're sitting on the desk for two days.

You only got two, three years on, 20 years from now, there's gonna be, cops gonna be like, he's nuts. He was on the desk 20 years ago for psychological. That stigma will stick and that cop's gonna have problems his whole career. and that's the other effect of doing it that way.

Cinnamon: 
You mentioned the referral to psych, the desk duty, the admin. I wanna hone in on what you were saying about peers, because this has gotta be a top-down, bottom-up effort. And I have frequently say you all gossip worse than hens, And so it almost sounds like y'all are each other's worst enemies when it comes to

this. And so how do we create that momentum of you know what, I'm not. Going to turn this into fodder, that's how I got into this. I was assigned, to this situation for one reason, for one topic to be discussed. But after I started, I was like, oh, there's so much more. There's the politics, the admin, the inner bickering, all of that.

So how, and is it because that's just any workplace with a higher cost? Is it because of the closeness? Is it because there are just some people that are rude and gossipy? what do you do with that, and how do you change that culture? Because it's almost like that culture has to change for people to want to come forward.

And so maybe the primary problem isn't a lack of education around what is p t s, whether that is the officers or the administration, it's getting a handle. On the 

Erin: Mean girls,

Cinnamon: juvenile behavior, the mean girl. behavior.

Erin: I think mean girl aspect because obviously there isn't time to wait till this whole generation is retired and start from scratch, so that we can teach this new generation to trust the admin or be 

Sean: yeah. 

 Erin: or whatever that is. 

Sean: or even just trust each other, like you were saying. Yeah. and the younger generation, I have to be honest, they're better about it than we are. They just are. That's the world they've grown up in. it's more accepted and everything else.

Cinnamon: You talk about your feelings and it's not,  you're not getting called up

Sean: 
Yeah. we work a job where, at any given time, the person sitting next to you, It is gonna give their life for you. I mean, what other job would the person you work with potentially give their life for you 

or for somebody else literally sacrificed themselves? Whether it's a firefighter going to burning House or us going to a domestic, it doesn't matter. Literally sacrificing your own life, your own wellbeing for somebody you don't know.

So that mentality in and of itself, and then you stack on the fact that most of us are considered what? that alpha mentality, where the top of the, so you got, so you're talking about inside the job, there's all this headbanging and this bickering and stuff. Yeah. Cuz it's everybody like dominance. I wanna be the leader of the pack. I wanna be the leader of the pack. 

I think at the end of the day, what I've tried to do, I think this is important for anybody who's trying to do a wellness program. and people can say what they want I'm not trying to stroke my own ego or anything else, like that's not what I'm doing at all.

But you have to have people who are involved in the program, who have skin in the game, who have some good ties with other officers. So that if I personally hear somebody say at this point in my career, it's very easy for me to do it, but I hear something, oh, that's a bunch of bullshit. And I'd be like, you know what?

You don't know what the hell you're talking about and this is why you don't know what the hell you're talking about. And obviously if you feel so strongly about this, maybe you need to go talk to somebody because you're so full of hate right now that you're taking on everybody else. So the people involved have to be respected.

 is pretty much what I'm saying. So if you have people who have respect, who have done the job, who've actually been in the trenches and done that, and they come out and they say things, it's gonna be more accepted, especially by younger officers, but even by the older officers that they worked with, they're gonna look at and say, okay.

I know this guy, I've been there with him. I've been in the shit with this guy or this girl. yeah, I'm gonna listen to what they have to say. I think that's very important. if you decide to just have some lieutenant that's trying to put something on their resume and start a wellness program, it's gonna go in the toilet before it starts, so don't even do it.

Cinnamon:
 I'm looking at, your resume and from patrol officer, field training officer, bike patrol plane, co narcotics, vice unit, canine swat, and now this, like if anybody's got street cred, to be able to have others respect and then also say this is serious and this is real and I'm invested in changing a, how we look on to people who are struggling.

 And how those people who are struggling feel about themselves and are willing to come forward. Because what you were saying, it made me think, about like that willingness to put your life on the line. I would pull you from a burning building, but I will just as quickly throw you under the bus or burn your house 

 Sean: Okay.

Cinnamon: 
That is so true. I mean, that's, you say that I put in context, that's what we do to each other. Yeah. I'll go take a bullet for you, but as soon as I can, yeah. I'm gonna, I'm gonna stab you in the back and get ahead of you if I can. It's a very odd dynamic. It really is. and I'm not saying that's overall the way things are anymore.

Sean: 
I think it was worse years ago. I think as time goes on, everything gets better. for me, I mean, you listed those things and when I wrote 'em down, I didn't even think about when I was writing that stuff down. And I've been very blessed. extremely blessed to work where I wanted to and work with good people and to come out alive.

Like for me it's not a critical incident. It's not, I'm knocking on wood all over the place. I haven't had the fire of my weapon while on duty. Have I come close numerous times? Yeah. Yeah. but for me it's different. And I try to tell them, whether I was in this assignment or this assignment, maybe what you deal with changes, but how you deal with it really shouldn't is that if that, I don't know if I made that sound right.

Cinnamon: 
Yeah. So no matter what happens at work, there's still a way that you need to deal with it. The same as far as taking care of yourself and so forth. One of our guests, our very first guest, talked about how had this image of what being bothered by a run would look like. And so when I had asked him, how are you doing? And he was like, oh fine. It didn't bother me at all. And I was like, what have you been doing? And he was like, talking about chasing the victim and their families down on Facebook just to kind of like read.

 And I was like, you think that's not a thing? And so having it bother him looked very different than what he thought. He thought he was able to walk away from that, scene and leave it behind. And it didn't compute for him that several days later when he is still looking up articles on this particular individual and their family, that was a problem.

And. So again, it's that there's an infinite uniqueness of how this can show up for people. But let's say that individual does recognize that something's showing up, something's off. If they're working in your department or maybe a department that's set up like yours, do they do?

Sean: So that's been one of our main goals. we made a decision to be extremely resource laden. They need to know that, and I'll get into this in just a second cuz it's it's so important. But they can call me, they can call the f o p hall. And they'll connect them to me. If we don't know. you can call Tiffany Galvez, their wellness coordinator. There's three places they can contact. Not to mention the Cortico app, that we have, which is completely anonymous. And that's a great example of, look, this is anonymous. Is it really anonymous? It's look, guys, You gotta explain it to 'em. Look, there's resources on there.

There's a, self-assessment test. you can lead a horse to water. You can't make 'em drink. It's the oldest saying in the world, it seems but it's true. It's true. At the end of the day, and this is what I've had to learn too, when I feel like there's, they're not failures, but at the end of the day, you only can do so much if the person doesn't make a decision to help themselves, you can't help that portion of it.

So we try to make sure everything's as resource laden as possible, that they know where they can call or who they can call. if you want, I'll get into the part about the wellness coordinator,

Cinnamon: I was just thinking, okay, so after I call you, what happens?

Sean: 
So after you call me, I'll talk to you. I'll say, Hey, what's going on? personally, I'll be like, you don't have to gimme specifics. How are you feeling? Is there anything you need to know? in trainings and everything else, we know that there's, I don't like to call 'em this magic words.

You, you hear magic words, things change, you know, dramatically. I personally, yes. Yeah. I'm gonna shoot myself. Okay, you know 

what? That's a different animal. Yeah. I've made it very clear. I'm not going to lie to people. I'm not gonna lie to you. I'm not gonna tell you, oh, you'll be fine. Or, this isn't gonna happen or this will happen.

 That's a worse thing you can do. It just really is, it's the worst thing you can do. So I'll talk to somebody for a little bit and I'll tell 'em like, look, I'm gonna talk to, Tiffany, or like, Hey, you sound like you fit Beckett Springs really well. Try to give them a caller, Hey, look at the Cortico app.

There's a list of people there. Choose from who you want. Letting them know that those things are about as immediately available to them as possible. It was pretty hard in the beginning, to talk to somebody and not really be able to be 100% confident in where you're gonna send them.

That's hard. at the end of the day, that's what we want. I mean, I've had people come back to me, Hey, I tried that place. I wasn't real comfortable there, but I tried this other place. That was great. I said, good, fantastic. different strokes for different folks, whatever, We all have different personalities. I tell 'em like, look, there's all these things here. Try somebody. If you don't think it's gonna work, try this one. If you don't think it's gonna work, try this one. but don't stop trying. if you get to the point where you just feel lost again, gimme a call.

Hey, we'll sit down with somebody or whatever it might be, and just continue to lay out those resources. It's when you don't have the resources that you become lost very quickly, or the wrong resources.

Cinnamon: so I've called, you've told me, here's where you can find a list of vetted therapists or vetted facilities. and I say, okay, and thank you. And we get off the phone. What happens next? I'm responsible for making those calls or pursuing the resources that you gave me, but who do you tell and what report do you write that.

Sean: 
I personally write no report. And that's one thing that's nice. There's nothing written. And we gotta tell people like, this is not for this is not for administration, this is not for anybody else. This is for you. The officer. Period. in a couple days I'll call him back, send him a message, Hey, what's up? Everything going good. It's just that continual check-in without being, there's that fine line about not being annoying. So I'm not gonna try to annoy you, but I'm still gonna make sure you're doing all right and you have what you need. And that's important with peer support. 

Erin: 
There's also that theory that you can't work harder at it than them. of course we want folks to get the help that they need, but we also can't decide what they need. Like they have to have the skin in the 

Sean: Yes, 

Erin: it to actually be effective.

Sean: yes, 

Erin: Yeah. Yes.

Sean: 
Yeah. And that's going way back to someone who's, maybe not telling the truth, or it's something el if they're not going to become vested in the process, no, it's not gonna work. and it's just gonna go off the edge anyway. Not in a bad way necessarily.

It's just gonna fade away and disappear of, that's why it's so important too, when they call, if someone calls me, I might be like, you know what? There's someone else on our peer support team that's better off talking to. So there's times like, Hey, I want to talk to you, and I'll talk to you for a few minutes.

I'm like, Hey, you know who you should really call? Or do this. I'll say, Hey, can I have so and so call you? I haven't talked to him yet. I think they'd be a great match for you. I think you guys would really get it done. And that's an important part of the process as well. cuz I've had situations where I've gotten called, Hey, can you talk to this person?

I'm like, you know what, I'm not gonna not help anybody, but I really don't care for that person for this reason. So, you know what, maybe that's not the best one for me. and so we, that's why we have to be very careful when we put lists out for people for peer support training, you'd be on the peer support team.

There might be a list of 20 people there, and couple of us go through and I'm like, yeah, there's five people on there. I'd be like, Nope. But those same five people, someone else might say, oh, I think they'd be great.  Okay. All right. Everyone's, there's different people for everyone. Some of those peer support people might never get called, but then some might get called too much and we gotta be careful of that too. 

Cinnamon:
 Again, I wanna make sure by the time we get off of this interview, our listeners are very clear, cuz I know that this is, such a point of confusion, especially if they've not had to call. So I call you, you give me resources, I am then responsible for making contact with those resources. You write no report with any demographic information about who I am. you may follow up a few days later, to check and, see how I'm doing without annoying me. 

Sean: Yeah. Right, right. 

Cinnamon: 
And so then, given that this is a newly funded position, I assume even if you aren't writing down my name, my address, what department, or what district I work in or whatnot, you're keeping some kind of record to be able to say, we help this many people, or we connected this many people to resources, or our peer support had this many phone calls.

so we know that there's going to be data that folks hear about. So how is that data collected?

Sean: 
So Ms. Galvez, what's so nice about having a wellness coordinator, very specific individual, that's her only job. That's it. yeah. she will keep some records. Of all those things you just said, how many people called who called, and I'm always very clear and we make it very clear to our peer people that Yes, you called me.

I'm gonna let Tiffany Galvis know. I don't think it's ever good if I just know, at least in the situation where we are, we have in Cincinnati, if I just know, I think there's some not good things about that. First of all, they're only getting one point of view, one voice, one person to answer their questions.

So we make sure that everybody knows that this is what I'm gonna do as far as letting, Tiffany know. 

Cinnamon: So you'll give Tiffany my name, but Tiffany won't go any further with it.

Sean:
 That's it. That's it. Yeah. and the administration doesn't expect that information. nor should they, and this is why it's so important that I think to have a union person involved with this program is because at the end of the day, labor agreements, no matter what anybody thinks of unions, labor agreements are really nice because you can put stipulations in labor agreements.

That will protect your members in lots of aspects physically and now mentally. and that's another thing that helps assure the police officer that, they're protected, so to speak. they're as anonymous as they possibly can be. our whole idea is to, hopefully you call me and nobody ever knows about this, hopefully it's a situation where you have outpatient treatment where you don't even have to miss a shift of work.

You just go somewhere. Nobody ever knows, that's the idea. but again, we just very honest with them. Tiffany keeps a very basic record of who's called or how many have called, because at the end of the day, it's important that she can go to the administration and say, Hey, we had about 150 cops call this past year. I wanna let you know this is a real thing. Cuz in essence, she still has to justify her position to an extent. So that very basic information is there. what the specifics are of any situation are not shared, with what we call upstairs. Cause we're on the second floor, so

Erin:
 Sean, I'm wondering, do you have any recommendations? Obviously our listeners, if they've heard us, they know by now that we're in Ohio, you all are in Cincinnati, I'm in Columbus. And so what you're speaking into is very much in our region, in that region. do you have any suggestions for folks, listeners that might be on the other side of the country, for how they can either A, start something like this, maybe they don't even have a wellness program or anybody that facilitates anything like this and or B, find resources if they don't feel like they have folks in their area that is there to serve.

Sean: 
Yeah, I think what I found in, there's some other cities that were ahead of us a little bit, but there was like an Indianapolis or San Diego. I would say like places like San Diego and Indianapolis, I, I think us now, frankly, if they're listening from other parts of the country, contact those departments, contact our wellness coordinator.

It's nice because it's one of those things, departments like to compete with each other. We're the best. We're the best. We're the best. You know, surprise, surprise. But wellness thankfully is one of those things like, Hey, you're in Omaha, Nebraska, awesome.

Yeah, this is what we did here. This is what we did here, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And you just let 'em know and if you need something, give me a call. I guess it's hard to say for every specific areas, but there's a lot of mental health resources out there. to the extent that I say that they're out, there probably could be more.

I'm sure there should be more. but they're out there. We just don't know about them. And sometimes it's, it sounds silly, but sometimes as simple as a Google search can reveals numerous programs, and then sometimes it takes some phone calls and say, Hey, are you specific in this? Or do you deal with first responders?

And so forth and so on. And sometimes you're surprised by what people offer. sometimes it's just a little bit of legwork. Sometimes it's probably gonna be a little more legwork. one things that I've noticed working with Tiffany in this program is that as time has gone on more.

mental health professionals are branching out into that sector of first responders, which is great. now we have more of these resources actually hiring somebody specifically to deal with first responders, which is exactly what we want. so it has an cumulative benefit force us to, actually seek those out.

 Because it's a business. mental health is a business. people, yourself being professionals, need to make a salary, make a living. if there's a need out there, it'll be addressed. it's kind of capitalism in a way, I, my biggest thing would be is if they're in a small place or in a smaller city, reach out to these other places.

And like I said, San Diego's a great one. Indianapolis, Cincinnati, Columbus does a good job from what I hear. 

Erin: 
That's interesting because, and I'm new and I'm also like so immersed in Cincinnati, even though I'm in Columbus where I'm like trying to figure out how to get in to this world in Columbus, Ohio, because it seems like everything's so closed lip, tight-lipped, and I'm like, I have been Google searching.

And it's is this all internal stuff? why is it so challenging for someone in my line of work to find the resources in Columbus, Ohio? Because I know they're here. I know there's a whole wellness center for first responders in Columbus, but it's do you have to have a badge to know anything about it?

where I feel like in Cincinnati, in that whole tri-state area, even northern Kentucky, it's like people are loud and proud and talking about it. And it isn't this but this is mine. Nobody can have it. And I'm so willing to be wrong. I hope I'm wrong. I hope somebody from Columbus calls me and says, listen here, Erin.

This is where it is. This is who you talk to please, listeners. Hint, hint. But that said, it doesn't appear that way for someone like me.

Sean: 
Each city's different, And you know better than I do. Columbus is Franklin County. It is the whole area. And that's different from Cincinnati. So maybe the demographic or the way that it's set up and each department's different. I know Columbus is pretty close knit. so it might be a situation where you have a department that, as big as it is, I'd have to look in at New York, a little bit.

I'm not sure about la, but they feel like they can solve all their problems within, without going out and hopefully don't learn the hard way. But you do need to look outside, to those resources. And maybe that's situation in Columbus. I, like you said, down here we're kind of like, it's blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. we'll, We just don't care. You just don't care. And I think that's the way it needs to be. there can't be any secrets about it.

Cinnamon: Could another department use your Cortico app?

Sean: as of right now, I think the Cortico app is just for Cincinnati Police Department 

Cinnamon: So I couldn't just download the app and get information. There's some kind of specific login that is provided to only C P D.

Sean:
 Correct. It would just be you have to be a Cincinnati police officer or, our retired guys can have access to it as well. and actually family members of police officers, which is great too. And I didn't say that before, but actually family members, have access to as well, which is really, it's so important. I think that's probably just another podcast episode, frankly, dealing with family and first responders. so right now, no. It's just that I, no. We were able to get it because of a donation from a church in Northern Kentucky. I mean, people don't realize how much apps cost, and the initial cost for this app was $40,000.

So that's a lot of money that we don't have. The f o p doesn't have it. And City of Cincinnati, the buy in for them is, they don't see it, so they're not gonna be like, yeah, we'll pay $40,000 for this app. So hopefully that's something we can branch out and

Cinnamon: We met a couple guys. They were retired sheriffs. We met them in South Bend and they had a table for, one of these app services. that was their, post-retirement job was talking about their particular brand of mental health wellness apps for law enforcement and first responders in general.

And the thing that I hear you saying in all of this is there are so many options and the one thing you don't have to do is reinvent the wheel. Aaron is digging around for a business card of the two retired sheriffs we met to find what company they were with. And mine is just out of arm reach.

Sean:
 Yes. I'm looking at my desk to see if I can see a stack of cards somewhere, cuz I know, I think it's actually like way over there. is an app? An app at the same time? Yes. It's something you can put in your phone, you can have, but you have to use it,

Cinnamon: you have to use it.

Sean: and we pimped out the app to our members for two years. And you'd still have people come in especially supervisors, you guys have the cortico app on your phone.

What are you talking about? What do you mean? What am I talking about? there's posters all over your thing. You're coming to inservice. We talk about it. You guys need to care because when your guy comes to you and has a problem, you can say, you know what? I can't handle this. Why don't you call Tiffany or call Sean? Or, Hey, download this app and then go through that. Just do me a favor and do that. it's a tool for you. that's just one of my frustrations 

Cinnamon: Yeah. 

Sean: have with our guys. It's what? Yeah.

Cinnamon: it is one of those things that I'm not paying attention until I need it, and if I have even the slightest less investment in it, then all those emails are gonna. delete. but those emails that are coming through, like cortico app, delete or I'm fine so I don't need to commit any of this detail to memory or I don't need to stop what I'm doing and download the app and then when I'm, perhaps up Shit Creek all of a sudden I'm like, what?What was that? What did you say that 

 Sean: Right, right. 

Erin: Mm-hmm. 

Cinnamon: I log in?

Erin: Yeah,

Sean: Yeah. Yeah.

Erin: Sean, I see Cinnamon over there writing diligently. She's a good note taker, question asker. and, but often I feel like we are scrambling to think of the perfect thing to ask, and we really just don't know what that is because we aren't you, we aren't you guys and gals, what did we not ask? what are we missing here that you think is important to share with our listeners?

Sean: 
Maybe a couple things is just, we are lucky enough here to have someone as our wellness coordinator that really care, that really has a heart for what they're doing and wants to do the job the right way, the correct way. It's hard to find that person. I would tell people, make sure it's, someone's just not thrown in that swat, like It shouldn't be some lieutenant or sergeant who's put in charge of the wellness unit. it needs to be someone who actually has some knowledge and experience to the extent that they have to in order to get the job done. police departments or the notorious for saying, oh, we need a new computer program. let's get a cop to do it. Or, we got this, let's just get a cop to do it. Yeah, we need a, yeah, we need a new webpage. Get a cop to make it. It's what are you doing? I'm like, professionals out there who could do this for a living the right way. Stop making a cop do it. You gave the cop a gun and a badge to go out there and take radio runs, not to create web pages.

And I guess the other thing I would say from a union perspective is that you have to find somebody willing That doesn't care about people being mad at them. So like in Tiffany's case, we wound that wellness coordinator and it was getting dragged and everything else. So at one point I was like, I'm gonna city council. So I went to a couple city council members said, Hey, this better happened. And you gotta have the courage to say, Hey, the more you drag your feet on this, and I said this, if police officers start taking their own lives, I will publicly come out and say, you have done nothing about it.

After I told you needed to do something about it and you ignored your police officers and your firefighters, you ignored us. That's on you. And you have to be willing to look at them and say that and say, whether it's a city council member, a mayor, I don't care if it's a congressman or a senator, it doesn't matter.

They're all people that got two arms and two legs. So say what you need to say. Be ready to say it and back up what you have to say. Because most of the time they don't even know. I have a clue what you're talking about. You'd be the first one telling them how real it is and what's going on but you have to have the courage to say it and then you have to have people that will back you up.

So that's the nice part of coming from a union perspective, Hey, I'm here as a chaplain, as an executive board member talking to you, city council member, and this is what's happening. guess what? I don't have to worry about that city council member or some assistant chief call and say, Hey, you're transferred outta canine unit.

Uhuh. Can't do that. Don't play that game cuz I will sue you and I will sue the city I'll win lots of money because you know you're wrong. And... 

Cinnamon: I can retire can go live in the Caribbean. So just to re, just to recap the things that you said that this wellness coordinator needs to be equipped with, and I'm pulling from before as well, knowledge, experience, where they've been through a little something. they need to have courage.

They need to have the respect of other people and the trust of other people and willingness to look like the bad guy to some folks.Yes. And that's you.

Sean: 
I'll be the bad guy. I'm fine. I'm fine with that. I'm from New York. I don't care. I'll just pull the attitude.

Cinnamon: nothing but bad guys. 

Sean: you say? 

Erin: Well, what about compassion 

Sean: Compassion Compassion?

Erin: just like it is? No, I'm not saying for the board. I'm saying for your fellow officers in that role, would it help to have a little compassion,

Sean: yeah. It does, it does. 

Erin: You're so full of it.

Cinnamon:
 I know, it's funny cuz as you can go toe to toe, we also know you as a bit of a softie. And I won't say that publicly though. if it's any setting other than the three of us, I will never confess that I think that you're a bit of a softie. And right now it's just the three of us, so it's fine. Um, I've had conversations with you, I've seen that look in your eye, that frustration, that sense of I don't know what to do. I wanna run something by you. you talk a lot about Tiffany, and her level of care and concern, and Tiffany is great. I hear great things about Tiffany.

Shout out to Galvez. But you are also not just the guy who is willing for people to be mad at and say the hard things and throw shit up against the wall. You're also the guy that people respect and are okay knowing that you have all this experience, all this credibility. If someone like Shawn Woods is not calling me a psi. And is saying that, yeah, I hear you're struggling. I've been there. I've got a list based on what you're telling me and what I know about you, if I do know you individually or personally, I think these might be the resources. And if these don't work, call me back. I'll give you more. I'm gonna check on you in a few days.

Like you are not that, behind the ears, a little damp, just here for the resume builder kind of guy. And I think you are an excellent choice for this role.

Erin: And if you weren't we wouldn't have you on the show. 

Sean: I mean, almost made me, uh, hmm. 

Cinnamon: You look at him getting tough. It's so cute.

Sean: 
It's emotional. it's, it can be, I guess insane all that I got to, if it wasn't for my wife, frankly, I mean, I can't, I can't, do any of it. I mean, so, 

Cinnamon: How does your wife support you to be able to do this?

Sean: 
Cuz you, you do you get phone calls, when you're at home or your work schedule changes cuz you're gonna go, you're gonna go to the symposium, or, it could be a number of things. And, if you don't have somebody's there saying this is a good thing, you're not gonna be effective. Because your you're gonna be too worried about what's happening here in order to be effective there. Yeah. pulled in too many different directions, and that happens look, I'd be lying if I said, that doesn't happen to me. Cuz it does. Cuz there are days where I feel like there's too many irons in the fire.

Like I, I would say, look, because I have swat and I have canine, I have the wellness stuff and the chaplain stuff. I'd be lying if I said my ability as a canine handler, and as an operator has probably suffered a little bit because I've taken time away from that I'll make it a real quick dog analogy. When you train a dog to do just narcotics, if that's the only thing you train that dog to do, they're gonna be very good at it. They'd be very good at it. When you start branching that out into four or five different things, they'll be pretty good in all of them. But you're stretching that out.

There's less time to practice each, discipline. And I think it does the same thing with the job and trying to make sure that ultimately, like family, it has to be like, you almost can't put family in the pie. if you have your pie, you have work, and you have wellness, and you have all these things, I guess technically family should be in the pie, but it should be its own pie. It's like I have to be a hundred percent part of the family and because we all have our family struggles as well, and, doesn't matter, how good anybody thinks your family is or somebody's family is. There's always something there. So I guess basically what I'm saying is you gotta be careful how thin you stretch yourself.

You gotta know your limits in doing this work. I think, you start to stretch yourself too thin, you're gonna do a disservice to everybody involved, every portion of it, whether it's the wellness, your family, in my case, canine and swat, you'll do a disservice to everybody starts stretching yourself out too thin.

Erin: Yeah, it's almost like the family is the pie pan, and if you don't have that 

Sean: yeah. 

Erin: that's solid, it's often glass, then 

Sean: blew my mind

Erin: then you're not gonna have any of the fixings and fill ins of the pie. It's all,

Cinnamon: And it can't be a Keebler pre-made graham cracker crust that you get off the aluminum that you get off the Kroger shelf, it has got to be like grandma's glass. Antique hand me down through the family kind of shit.

Sean: that just, that seriously blew, that's I didn't write anything down, but I'm gonna write that down.

Cinnamon: Your family is your pie pan

Sean: That's the pie pan. Cuz cops are idiots. So if I draw something on the board, they'll remember it. They'll be like, Ooh, pictures.

Erin: That's why cinnamon speaks in metaphor, 

Cinnamon: I do. 

Erin: remember and get it.

Cinnamon: that's what my brain sees, hell, I mix metaphors all the time. because my brain sees in pictures.

 Erin: and it works.

Sean: 
It is. it does work. So the family out there needs to hear us say very clearly. We recognize you as the pie pan. You are not a slice of the pie. You are what is holding it all together and making it all 

Cinnamon: work. And without you, we get ourselves in trouble.

Erin: Yes. Yeah. 

 Sean: Yes.

Cinnamon: breakdown, 

Sean: Absolutely. A hundred percent. 

Cinnamon: I love how we brought that full circle because you said, I think it's so important about the family and we need to do an episode on the family. And then as we're, rounding out our time, you brought it back and Erin provided such a beautiful, metaphor for that.

Sean: Okay.

Cinnamon: Oh God. Erin,

Sean: me chills. 

Cinnamon: out 

 Erin: She,she's, uh, 

 Cinnamon: that was a mic drop

Erin: 
She's yeah, she's rubbing off on me a little bit. I wanna give you one last second to dig through your brain, make sure there's nothing that we've missed that you feel like needs to be shared. I think that you've provided such great, valuable resources and, everybody that's in the first responder world has their story has that event that sticks with them.

And so it's important that we don't spend a lot of time focusing on all the horror stories and more on what the opportunities are. I just got done saying today, And I couldn't believe it came outta my mouth, but it's true is I haven't met one obstacle yet that hasn't turned into an opportunity, not one.

When I can look back and really be honest with myself, it might have sucked in the moment, but by golly it's turned into an opportunity. And that's how I experienced you. that's why it was so important that we have you on the show because you have done it all, a cinnamon listed off your many opportunities that you've had, and that could have potentially been obstacles, 

but the way that you show up, the way that you are a no shit kind of guy, the way that you will use your voice in a way that's efficient and effective, it's so important. And so it's always great and fun to hang out with you. there's never a dull moment. 

Sean: I try 

Cinnamon: You can come sit at our table any time. 

Sean: something, conversation's better, that's for sure.

Erin: Yeah, So do you feel 

Sean: Yes. 

Erin: was missed or a does Cinnamon?

Sean:
No, but there's always so much to say. It's one of those things you go on, I is what? I'm bad as a talker. Cause I, I'll just go on and on. I'll just segue into the next thing. Let's just

Cinnamon: 
You are the only one of the three of us that would do something like that. No, we don't go on tangents or rattle on or end up 47 miles away from the original topic and can't always think of more things that need to be a shared publicly. I do have a question for you because that was the one thing that was left out and I don't think I've ever, knew that you went to C C U,or CCC from when I was younger and looking at colleges. But what was your major there?

Sean: education.

Cinnamon: So there is an educator in you that makes perfect sense.

Sean: So I taught for a year and a half and I was like, oh, I don't wanna do this cuz I can get sued. And I was like, oh, 

Erin: police officer. 

Sean: officer. Cause you never 

Cinnamon: You can't 

Erin: Nope. No. No one would ever say anything bad or put you in a bad position.

Sean: so,  right, 

Cinnamon: or tell lies. 

Sean: 
My time there. I loved my time there. It was good. Yeah. I don't think there's anything else. I just  believe, what you say. Be trustworthy in what you do, and be knowledgeable. in what you're trying to accomplish. And I think it'll go far. It'll work. and people need to know if someone's starting this right from the bottom, it's not gonna happen overnight. It's a process. But it will. gain steam. Just when you think it's like starting to putter down also. It's like just ramps right back up.

Cinnamon: 
okay. So I do have one last question. Let's hope it's one last question. why is confidentiality so important to you? Why do you feel like not only is it the rule. And the expectation, but why do you choose to maintain the individual's confidentiality that make those phone calls or reach out for that help?

Sean:
 I bet you I was about to say something about that and I went boo, I went scatterbrained cuz we expressed this to the peers and anybody who's taking these calls, somebody calls you and you run your mouth, you kill the program, you kill it, anything you've done is finished. Because now not only do they no trust upstairs or administration, they don't trust you we're police officers, we already have a trust problem. 

Everybody lies to us. So it's like the cardinal sin if you're doing this,it is the cardinal sin.I mean, between House Bill 5 34 giving us the ability to not be deposed or have internal, come and ask us, Hey, I know so-and-so called you.

What did they say? Haha, nope, I don't have to tell you anything. guess what? You shouldn't be telling anybody else either. I don't even care if it's your best friend for the last 10 years that you've been partners with. If you're that peer person, don't you tell them that's not their business, It frankly isn't your business either, but someone trusted you enough to tell you and that's how you need to leave it. They told me something. in confidence and that's exactly what it means. Shut your mouth. And that's how I say it. D appears, I'm like, shut your mouth. Nobody cares. So I mean it, it's so important. I'm surprised they didn't say something earlier cuz it is if you don't have it or people don't believe it,

Cinnamon: Everything else is. 

Sean: not nothing works. 

Cinnamon: 
Yeah. And one thing that I remember hearing from, I don't know if it was pre first responders or post, but it was about clients. And when we share information in that peer setting, everybody's got someone that they trust. And so if I tell the person I trust, they've got someone they trust and then they tell the person they trust 

And it eventually will be the person that confided in you, does not trust the people who have the information about them. And so it's not about whether or not the people that you're sharing with. Are trustworthy. It's about, it's not your information to share.

Sean: 
yeah. You don't own it. It's not yours. You've been trusted with it. I mean, it, it's not, It's not your trauma. it's not yours. 

Cinnamon:  And once you say it, once you put it out in the world, you  can't reel it back in.

Sean: You can't. 

Cinnamon: You can't go to people and say, don't tell. Don't tell anybody else.

Sean: 
Right. Probably be, when I see peer lists come through about people applying for peers, that's, that is usually the one thing. it's not anything else. It's usually like, yeah, I don't trust that person to keep their mouth shut. So no, I'm a hard no on that. there's been a couple of those, I'm like, no. They just wanna put it on a resume. That's a hard No. Nobody will probably ever call em anyway, but I don't care. 

Erin: yeah. 

Sean: Don't need to take that chance.

Cinnamon: 
That idea that people are smart enough not to trust that person anyway. But that doesn't mean that somebody might, one, trust them, but also two, not know enough that 

 Sean: Yes.

 Cinnamon: provide them information that after they do know more, they wish they

Sean: Yeah, 

Erin:
Then also what does it say about on the other side when you give those kind of folks a sale of approval just to have a list of folks. It's like, well, if they're saying this about that person, then how do I know I can trust any of these people, or Sean or whomever, it muddies so much of the stuff because like that should be positions of honor.

Cinnamon: High respect. 

Sean: 
I agree. I agree. that's very true. and I think that's probably one of the reasons why we're trying to encourage people. We have a list of peers cuz we have to have a list of peers and put it out there. But my first instinct, and the first thing I tell people to do is to call Tiffany or I, And that's again, that duality. I won't get on a tangent, but that's why that wellness coordinator, so that person is, that's the hub of the wheel. That is the hub of the wheel that's keeping all the spokes in order and keeps the wheel turning. That person's so important. and putting that person in the right direction.

Even when I tell people like, you can call anybody in the peer team, but what I'd like you to do is call a wellness coordinator and we'll put you in the right direction. Someone we think you'll match up well. Cause me with 25 years on, I'll know who you'll match up with a lot better than somebody with years on.

Cinnamon: Sure. And that's only because you have vetted the people and the organizations that you are referring people to.

So you can personally say, I am confident in where I'm sending you, or giving you to reach out to

Sean: yes. And Don't take on too much.

Erin: 
well, Sean. Always lovely to see your face on a Friday afternoon. Never a dull moment. We really, really appreciate you and your service, everything that you do for Cincinnati and that whole entire area. so I'm always the stickler on time because I'm the producer and I'm, I know, but I do get to be mindful.

And of course, if you think of other stuff, like we'll have you back on, when you listen to this episode back, which please listen to your episode and pass it along. 

Cinnamon: And don't be one of people that's like, oh, I could never listen to myself.

Sean: Okay. 

Erin:
Right, we always do these things and then we're like, dang, I wish I would've said this or that, or whatever.And so it, it's all valuable. So if there's something that was missed, we will have you back on for round two. So yeah, thank you for your time today for moving areas five times so that we could see your face and hear 

Sean: All right. Thanks. thanks. for having me. Thanks for having me. I really appreciate it.

Erin: Absolutely.

Cinnamon: Thank you for taking time out. 

Sean: Absolutely. 

Cinnamon: It's always fun to talk to you.