Those of us who have sat in the hot seat as a 911 Dispatcher can agree on our tendency to be control freaks. We often say, “My frequency.” “My caller.” “My officers.” What we do is personal. We take pride in doing our job well and keeping a handle on any and all of the chaos that surrounds us. It’s because of this personal attachment so common in our work that we often have a hard time. We want to know how things ended up and many times will never know. If things end badly, we beat ourselves up over it. God forbid, an officer is injured or hurt, we scourge ourselves endlessly, often unable to let go of grief and guilt. We feel responsible for everything that happens in our work. This increases cumulative and traumatic stress and can be emotionally, mentally and physically debilitating. What can we do to change this? We need to let go of ownership.
Shouldering burdens not ours to carry.
We pride ourselves on fixing things. We quickly assess all the information and create a solution. You’ve just been robbed? We send a squad Code 3. You’re baby isn’t breathing? We calmly talk you through CPR. Your house is on fire? We tell you to drop everything and get all your loved ones outside. In 911, we use all the questions that we ask to determine an appropriate response. On the radio, we solve a lot of problems for our first responders, answering their questions, getting them assistance, and watching out for them at all times. But we are faced with situations that are tragic; ones that do not have a positive solution. We can’t fix it. It is too broken. These are the situations in which we need to let go of ownership. I love this quote by Julie Sunne written on her blog, Embracing grace in the mess of life, “Some problems are not ours to fix. Some battles are just not ours to win, because they are out of our league.” Hurt. Death. Injury. Injustice. Anger. Hatred. Despair. The list goes on and on. These are not our burdens to shoulder. They are out of our league
Success is measured by effort not by outcome.
We are responsible for our actions, not the results. Each of us is responsible to be the best 911 Dispatcher we can be. We need to keep up on trainings and always be growing professionally. We need to be aware of current agency policies and the political climate of our areas. Knowledge is power. We also need to take care of ourselves making sure that we are getting adequate rest and exercise, eating well, managing our stress and not succumbing to negative coping mechanisms. When we take care of ourselves, we can do our job well and that is all that is asked of us. At the end of the day, we have to ask ourselves if we could have done anything differently professionally. Unfortunately, the question we often ask ourselves is what we could have done differently so that the end result was different. This is where we get stuck in grief and guilt. Again, we take ownership of tragic situations that are not ours.
One 911 Dispatcher told me she held on to a call where one of an officer’s young twin boys tragically shot himself in the face with his dad’s duty weapon. He did not survive. She held on to this call and it ate away at her. It haunted her day and night. It affected her peace of mind. Finally, she ended up in a safe place sharing her story and was faced with the question of how many years ago this incident occurred. “Seven,” she replied. The officer responded incredulously about her carrying it around with her like it was her own incident. She said it was. He said it wasn’t. It wasn’t her son. It wasn’t her brother. And, if he was that officer and she wanted to own that incident he would be pissed at her. It was only a couple minutes of her life. She was appalled at his words-until she had time to think about what he was saying her and she reframed how she was viewing the incident. She realized she couldn’t control the outcome. She couldn’t have controlled whether or not the kids grabbed the gun. She couldn’t change the challenges that occurred in the field response. The only thing she could control was how she handled the call. She asked herself, “Did I get them help? Did I do everything to the best of my ability? Did I try to calm her down? Did I do what I was trained to do?” Answering in the affirmative to all these questions, she realized that it was not her incident to own. She controlled her actions, her effort. She could not control the outcome. Recognizing this, she was able to make peace with it.
Asking a 911 Dispatcher to let go of control is a tall order. Feeling like we are in control often keeps us sane. If we stop and think about the uncontrollable chaos going on around us, it’s overwhelming. Many of us say that it is our goal that all of our field responders go home at the end of the shift. It’s a lofty goal and one that has been met with the response, “Wow, it must be nice to be God.” We can control ourselves and make sure we do our jobs to the best of our abilities, but in the end we don’t get to make the decision whether or not everyone goes home safely. This is a tough pill to swallow, but when we let go of the burden that is not ours to carry we can focus on the important thing which is being the absolute best 911 Dispatcher possible.
Michelle Perin
Michelle Perin has been a freelance writer since 2000. In December 2010, she earned her Master’s degree in Criminology and Criminal Justice from Indiana State University.
