Stress-Less Dispatching

Oct. 15, 2014
Public safety telecommunications operators face a lot of stress.

Recently I have been doing research on telecommunications operators and stress. I have seen first-hand what taking 9-1-1 calls and dispatching public safety personnel can do after time. It seems to go like this: “Answer the line. Screaming, crying, cursing, death, destruction and/or mayhem. Handle call. Hang up. Stuff incident. Repeat.” Or, “Radio goes live. Screaming, crying, cursing, death, destruction and/or mayhem. Handle event. Stuff incident. Wait. Repeat.” Call after call, radio traffic after radio traffic, year after year this goes on. We don’t have time to debrief after each incident for the most part. Only the most critical incidents will illicit someone inviting the dispatcher to participate in processing the event in a therapeutic manner. Just like those on-scene, your body responded at the time. Flight, fight or freeze. Super hypervigilance that allowed you to work the call well. Where does all that “energy” go? Like bad Chinese food, it just sits there-heavy. Waiting to come back up. But, like so many first responders we feel we were just doing our job and that the incident was our “normal”. We don’t think much about how that event and then the next and the next just stack up. This is what’s called cumulative stress and it can create the same type of havoc on you physically and mentally as one traumatic incident and the resulting posttraumatic stress.

After intense research and reading academic papers that just told me what I already knew having been on the radio/9-1-1 line, I started delving into the stress reduction techniques that were recommended to combat this cumulative stress. I found a lot and eventually my humor took over as I was reading them and thinking about how these could be applied in the telecommunications setting.

Cultivate Gratitude

This one is easy. I can’t even remember how many times I’ve said to myself, “I am so glad that call/incident is over.” Breathing a sigh of relief when you no longer have to listen to someone is the essence of gratitude.

Carve out an hour a day for solitude

Having worked for a large metropolitan department with the communications center in the middle of the city, I, and most of my co-workers who also lived in the suburbs, got to spend an hour at least in solitude two times a day. This time was also known as rush hour. Then again, if you are surrounded by a hundred other people also stuck in their cars are you truly in solitude?

Begin and end the day with prayer, meditation, or reflection

Like cultivating gratitude, this one comes with the territory. Before I would sit down in 9-1-1 and especially before I would take over a frequency, I would pray that it wouldn’t be so busy that I can’t keep up but definitely that it wouldn’t be so slow that I would be bored. I’d also pray that the calls were interesting and appropriate. At the end of my shift, I would reflect on how the shift compared to these prayers.

Keep it simple

“Just the facts, ma’am.”

Go to bed at nine o’clock twice a week

This would be particularly effective if you work swing or graveyards. You might not keep your job long but I remember several people who adhered to this even when they were on the clock when nine o’clock came around.

Drink pure spring water. Lots of it

This is one of the most important tasks of keeping a healthy mind and body. Although there is some debate over how much water is actually recommended (I came from the 8 glasses or more of water a day generation), there isn’t any doubt that our bodies need water. When I get dehydrated, I just don’t feel good. When you have a job where you talk a lot, like telecommunications, you feel this dehydration in your mouth acutely. Your tongue sticks to the roof and your lips just don’t want to come apart. So drink up, my friends. Drink up. Of course, the downside of this is what happens after your body processes the water. You’ll spend your whole shift waving your hand trying to get a relief so you can run down the hall and get your own relief.

If it’s not delicious, don’t eat it

Some of my favorite memories of working in telecommunications involve the amazing food. Potlucks. Bake sales. Peace offerings brought in by peace officers. The problem is that boredom, craziness and a number of other emotions make the hand to mouth tactic sub-conscious. So, if food is there, it’s eaten. Try to change this to conscious eating and only eat when hungry or if the food is delicious. Also, make sure it’s available. It is NOT okay to eat someone else’s deliciousness.

Surrender expectations

Again, this one is easier said than done. I struggled with my thoughts of how citizens and officers and my co-workers should think and behave. When they didn’t match these rigid expectations, I felt my serenity fly right out the door. To be successful, you must not have any thoughts about others at all. Callers will say whatever. Officers will do whatever. Sit peacefully without preconceived notions for maximum happiness.

Now that I’m done having a little fun let me put the disclaimer. Nothing in what I’ve written is meant to take away from the seriousness of how cumulative stress can affect first responders. In fact during my research I discovered Emergency Responder Exhaustion Syndrome (ERES) and was glad to see professionals identifying the cluster of symptoms that make up the complicated way dispatchers process (or more aptly do not process) their work. A great resource that is also recognizing how dispatchers/9-1-1 operators are affected is the West Coast Post-Trauma Retreat which offers information and a six-day residential program to help first responders, including dispatchers. The truth is we do get stressed even if we don’t recognize it. We can do something about it. Utilize techniques to reduce stress. Talk it out. Journal. Seek professional help. Use self-relaxation. Utilize the tips outlined in this article (in a thoughtful, less sarcastic manner). Whatever you do, don’t stuff. The “energy” has to go somewhere and it might as well go out of you.

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