A Problem of Timing
Many excellent services now exist to support first responders. Take a look at them, and you will notice a pattern: they are most often offered after pressures have already begun to build. They operate downstream.
Is this truly pre-crisis support, or is it an intervention?
To be fair, how can we get out in front of crises in a first responder organization where crisis abounds? How can we work upstream?
The CDC warns, “Loneliness and lack of social connection are widespread and pose a threat to mental and physical health.” First responders are not exempt from this.
It may seem strange to talk about social connection in environments where people are doing serious, demanding work. Yet it is a basic human need—even in this work. Social connection matters most when we are under pressure or struggling.
What Does Pre-crisis Support for First Responders Look Like?
It looks like support that is there all the time—during the quiet times and in times of emergency. It is there before first responders leave the station for their first call, and it’s there when they return at the end of their last call.
Timing is key. You can’t rush in and create a relationship after a crisis has occurred because, when trust doesn’t already exist, the member has to then accept help from someone they don’t already know well.
Relationship building must precede crisis response.
Pre-crisis Support Begins with Relationships
It is built on authentic, close, easy relationships, that are, importantly, not focused solely on work-related issues. They are personal. This is what makes those conversations possible when pressures begin to build.
It is these personal, trusting relationships that calm and regulate the nervous system.
This is how relationship-building creates a pre-crisis environment. It is what community building does: it creates the supportive relationships that become pre-crisis lifelines.