Behind the Headset: 911 Dispatchers, PTSD, and Mental Health

Ashlee [00:00:00]:
Law enforcement is huge on this podcast, but we're trying to hit everyone. And here you are saying, like, this was my life as a dispatcher and I do think there is a disconnect sometimes. And I think that's something that I have learned from working in this field. I do think dispatchers don't get recognized enough for these incidences, for the stuff that they hear, that they go through. And look at this. You're saying this was personal to me too. Like this was my own call that I, that I took. Right.

Ashlee [00:00:25]:
And. And ptsd. It doesn't matter who you are. It doesn't discriminate. You can get it no matter what. And I think that's so incredibly important to share and.

Jennifer [00:00:35]:
Hi, welcome back to when the Call Hits Home.

Ashlee [00:00:37]:
This is Jennifer and I'm Ashlee. And today we have an incredible guest. I'm going to change the word. Well, I'm just going to say I say special every single time, but we're going to say incredible. And we're extremely excited to have him on because we're finally covering an area in which we've been saying we were going to grab. So before I go way too deep into this, I'm going to allow you to introduce yourself.

Larry Fraser [00:00:58]:
My name is Larry Frazier. I am the 911 director of a newly formed River County 911. We just recently combined Ballard and Carlisle county here in Kentucky into 1911-center. We took them over almost a year ago and we are in the final steps of getting everything completely finished. Their 911s now roll over to our department. So we're covering two counties now. We was able to increase our staff a little bit too for this. So it's been a very challenging year over the last year.

Larry Fraser [00:01:29]:
But I've been the 911 director here for Carlisle county before we merged for the last five years.

Jennifer [00:01:36]:
That's awesome, Larry, and I appreciate you sharing that. And it is hard making mergers happen, isn't it?

Larry Fraser [00:01:43]:
It's been very fun, though. We got a nice $400,000 grant from the state to do the merger.

Ashlee [00:01:49]:
Hey, Kentucky.

Larry Fraser [00:01:50]:
And to let us update everything we've got. So now our little bitty county of population less than 5,000 has now taken over a county with about 15,000 residents. And that 400,000 has allowed us to upgrade everything to next gen 911.

Jennifer [00:02:07]:
Wonderful to hear.

Larry Fraser [00:02:09]:
We have video to 911. We have text to 911. We have translation on 911 that's live. So if we get somebody that calls in speaking Spanish. Our system automatically translates everything for us.

Jennifer [00:02:22]:
It's really wonderful. Those real communities need those things too, Larry. So that's great. So just got to jump in here and tell me a little bit how and how being a first responder, 911, how mental health kind of plays into that.

Larry Fraser [00:02:38]:
Well, when I first got started, I was the very first 911 director here in Carlisle county in 1991. Wow. When we.

Ashlee [00:02:46]:
I wasn't born yet.

Larry Fraser [00:02:48]:
We don't need you to say when we first got. We first got the little red phone that 911 calls came in on. I have left 911 got into the state. Back then, mental health was not something that was ever a forefront of it back there. That was early times where PTSD was really coming out with just being a soldier's problem. That's something that was never on the forefront. Never even thought it would cross my mind when I went to college, that I would. Those psychology classes I took in college, I'd actually put into action sometime in my life.

Larry Fraser [00:03:21]:
But I came back into 911 in 2019 after semi retiring from my other job. Been in first responder my entire life. My father was Sheriff in the 70s, early 70s, mid 70s. My brother, myself are both 911 directors, both in EMS. I've been in law enforcement. I've worked with fire departments. It wasn't until after my second critical incident that mental health even really came to my mind that it's something that first responders needed. Once I went to PCIs for the first time in 2022, that's when my eyes were really opened and I've kind of dove off the deep end since that point.

Larry Fraser [00:04:03]:
I've taken several training classes to keep up with pcis. I just joined Kentucky's kccrt, which is Kentucky Community Crisis Response Team. Wow. I'm also a vice president of Kentucky apco. And with that, it's offered me the opportunity to be chairman of a small work group study where we are currently writing the standards, the National Standards for Peer Support Training.

Ashlee [00:04:33]:
Ooh, that's incredible.

Larry Fraser [00:04:36]:
The help that I got through PCIs utterly changed my life. That's when it really got into me that this is something that I'm passionate about, something that I wanted to make sure that I could bring it back home, put it to work here in my local dispatch center, be able to go to other dispatch centers and help those that are in times of need.

Jennifer [00:04:56]:
You know, I always like to hear that, and I always think that so part of the first responder world. Is when someone gets help how much they want to help somebody else. You know, I have to be honest, I didn't realize that you're dad was a sheriff.

Ashlee [00:05:10]:
I didn't know either.

Jennifer [00:05:12]:
Kind of grew up in a first responder home. You know, Ashlee and I talk about that in terms of our experience. Is there anything that was unique about having your dad be the sheriff?

Larry Fraser [00:05:23]:
That was probably where we, our family was first touched with. Our first traumatic incident was when I was 8 years old. My dad was working a semi wreck and a drunk driver ran through the roadblock and clipped our dad from behind. Flipped him up over the top of two or three patrol cars and he was in a leg cast for over a year because mangled his leg in so many ways. So a lot of the state troopers that worked this area after dad got to where he could be a little bit mobile even with his leg in a cast all the way up, they would come pick dad up for patrol. They would pick him up, they would drive him around, take him out on call and they just. We grew up with a house full of law enforcement officers.

Ashlee [00:06:09]:
That's incredible. I mean that's a sad story, but that's. I definitely understand what it's like to be kind of surrounded by them. Both Jennifer and I do. And it's. It's really unique. We talk about that a lot with being a child of a first responder. Is that like you just.

Ashlee [00:06:22]:
I don't know how to explain it. You don't get it unless you get it right. And. And then I think we grow these. We talk about this all the time. We're pretty resilient children and we just grow up to like a lot of us wanting to help others, which is so beautiful.

Larry Fraser [00:06:33]:
And I think that's what built the desire me and my younger brother both to get into first responding is. Was because of our father. Our older brother, he took it a different route and he joined the military and he. He retired. He retired out of the military. Wow.

Ashlee [00:06:51]:
So something I do want to kind of. Because I thought this was awesome. I hope it's okay that I share that like you reached out to us via our platform, which is exactly what we want. Like we love that. We love.

Larry Fraser [00:07:02]:
I love listening to your podcast.

Ashlee [00:07:04]:
Thank you so much. That makes my heart so happy. And we love engaging with. With you guys. So like immediately I was like, yes, he's got to come on. Right. And we want others to do that too. And I know one thing that you had said in your message is that you also.

Ashlee [00:07:17]:
And like you just shared, you've been through your own critical incidences. I don't know if you're interested in opening up about kind of what in your career now, especially 911 dispatch. What has maybe led you to this point of being like, I have to be more involved. And if, if you don't want to, that's okay too. I just know that you were, you were open about that in your message a little bit.

Larry Fraser [00:07:34]:
It, it probably started with my first critical incident as a 911 dispatcher. Yesterday marks the 33rd anniversary of that call. October 28, 1992. I was working a midnight shift, our dispatch center. I had two other dispatchers that worked for me. One of them had been involved in a car wreck, so everybody was out of place. So I was pulling double shifts. Back then, the sheriff's office did dispatch from 8 to 4 and I ran dispatch from 4 o' clock to 8 o' clock in the morning.

Larry Fraser [00:08:08]:
Oh my God. So I was dispatching one night and my fiance at the time had just called me about 7:15, told me that she was getting ready to get, get ready. She was in a college at the time and she was getting ready to go to her class and she said, hey, do you want me to bring you by breakfast? I said, sure. I said, I never turned down food. So she had a son when we met and she was going to run him by the babysitter and then she was going to come and visit me at dispatch before she had to go off to school. Just like a typical day. We talked, she said she'd be en route, everything went down. And just probably 25, 30 minutes after that point, somewhere around 7:30, 7:40, I got a call from a lady close to my residence, said that somebody had stopped at her house and said that there was a man and a little boy that had run off the road and had a wreck.

Larry Fraser [00:09:03]:
So I go into 911 dispatch mode. I dispatch out my ambulance service, I dispatch out my rescue squad, call my sheriff, wake him up, get him en route, and just business as usual. Got everybody headed that way. They said it was a man and a small child. So everybody's going that way. And things, people start getting on scene, but they're not talking back to me very much. And then the babysitter calls me and said, hey, Larry, have you seen, Is Alicia coming down to drop Adam off today? I said, yeah, I spoke to her about 30 minutes ago. There's a wreck close to our house.

Larry Fraser [00:09:37]:
Maybe she's delayed in the wreck. Then I Get another call. And the lady says, I want to report a wreck down here. She said, I hear ambulances and sirens in the distance, but I just wanted to tell you there's a girl and a small child off in the ravine. It was at that point in time that every hair on the back of my neck stood up. And I knew. I knew that that was Alicia. So I start getting everybody in route again.

Larry Fraser [00:10:02]:
People start going on scene, and I start trying to get information from them. They won't tell me anything. And I just keep getting, standby, standby, we've got something. Then somebody would call and say, hey, we need another medic. Can you see if you can find another medic to meet us here or in route? So I start making the calls. I still have the recordings of this 911 call. It's probably not a good mental health thing to admit, but I have them on my phone, and I've listened to them from time to time, and I've also used them to speak to others. Say, hey, this is what I went through.

Larry Fraser [00:10:40]:
But they've got the patients loaded up. They're getting ready to head to the emergency room. Sheriff's on scene. I holler at him. I said, can you tell me if this is my 1012? Which means friend or family? And he says, well, I'm in route to dispatch right now. I said, no, can you tell me if this is my 1012? He said, I'm en route. And about that time, his wife worked for him in the office. And she says, larry, I'm here if you need to leave.

Larry Fraser [00:11:07]:
And then I asked the sheriff again, I said, is this my 10 12? And he said, 10 4. I jump out of. I wasn't. I was also an EMT at the time. I jump out of dispatch. I get into my truck. I don't know how I caught an ambulance running code three, but I caught him. They radioed them.

Larry Fraser [00:11:25]:
I got in the back of the ambulance, and as soon as I got in the back of the ambulance, they turned me and said, here, you work on the child, Adam, and we'll take care of everything else. The rest is. The story is she didn't make it. She was pretty much DOA on scene, but they ran code on her because of who she was. Right. And I went to counseling after that. But the counseling I went to at that point in time was Christian counseling. Um, I am Christian, so that's.

Larry Fraser [00:11:53]:
I thought was appropriate, but it never really stuck with me of what transpired. Right. Let's Fast forward almost 25 years to my second incident when I found out that what had happened to me that day was that I had PTSD. My second incident was not 911 related or first responder related. I was working my job for the state of Kentucky as a pretrial officer. We done interviews on everybody that gets arrested, get their bonds set, get them a court date. And I'd been out that morning seeing a couple of people at the local jail. And I was coming back home to pick up a cargo trailer because we were moving into a new office and I was going to pick up my trailer so we can move furniture and supplies to the new office.

Larry Fraser [00:12:43]:
Was about a mile and a half from my house and my neighbor Thrivey was out mowing his yard. Early morning, June 9, 8, 10am he was mowing his yard and he really loved mowing his yard. He did not want lines in his yard. He was one of those lines back and forth. And Mr. Ivy, to keep those lines, would pull out into the middle of the road and turn around, right? I come down that road, I drove down that road. Drive. He pulled out in front of me.

Larry Fraser [00:13:14]:
I hit him. He went over the top of my Tahoe. When I wrecked into the trees and into the fence line. I look up in my rearview mirror And I see Mr. Ivey laying in the middle of the ground. And instantly I thought I'd killed Mr. Ivy. I get out of the truck, I run to him.

Larry Fraser [00:13:31]:
Several of the neighbors are there. They say, hey, we're calling 911. This man is 91 years old, just been hit by 4,000 pound Chevy Tahoe. His lawnmower and him both have been flown up into the air. He sets up in the middle of the road, starts talking to me, asking me how I'm doing. And I'm a nervous wreck. I had fractured my arm, so I'm holding my arm, trying to talk to him. My EMT skills kicked in.

Larry Fraser [00:13:59]:
I start asking him how he's doing. I run him through the questions to make sure that he hasn't had a head trauma or anything. He starts answering questions. The neighbors are calling 91 1. And he just keeps. He kept asking me if. He asked me once, he asked me at least five times, how are you? I'm like, Mr. Ivy, I am fine.

Larry Fraser [00:14:19]:
I was inside the vehicle. You're the one that flew through there. How are you doing? And he said, oh man. He said, this is nothing but a few bumps and scratches. He said, I was an airborne paratrooper in my life. He said, I've had 96 jumps he said twice my parachute didn't open quite like it was supposed to. And he said I hit the ground pretty hard. He said it was a lot harder than today.

Larry Fraser [00:14:41]:
So I said, I sat there with Mr. Ivy for five minutes listening to this man tell me his life story. Told me also, when he was 16, he fell off a grain bin. And I mean, he's like a cat with nine lives. But ambulance gets there, they load Mr. Ivy up, they proceed on to the hospital with him. They keep asking me, hey, how are you doing? I'm like, fine. I'm just a nervous wreck.

Larry Fraser [00:15:08]:
I believe I was into having a little bit of shock from the incident.

Ashlee [00:15:13]:
Yeah.

Larry Fraser [00:15:14]:
And my w. Somebody had called my wife. She'd left work and she met me there on the scene. Kind of ironic, too. The girl that they talked to that day is now my assistant 911 director. Oh my. The one that took the call that day. My wife takes me home.

Larry Fraser [00:15:31]:
I'm still kind of a basket case. Nerves are shaking and everything like that. Sheriff's department calls me and lets me know that Mr. Ivy passed away en route to the hospital. That's when I really needed help. I did seek mental health help that day. And because it was a work related incident, they sent me and had me evaluated. And that's when they gave me the medical diagnosis that I had ptsd.

Larry Fraser [00:15:58]:
Not only from that wreck, but more than likely from my first incident that. That I had hid for that many years.

Jennifer [00:16:07]:
I just appreciate you being so open and sharing that. I mean, that much courage, sharing both of those experiences and stories.

Larry Fraser [00:16:15]:
They were tough incidents.

Jennifer [00:16:16]:
Yeah.

Larry Fraser [00:16:17]:
I look back on them. Like I said, Mr. Ivy's wreck. And then that was in 2015. So seven years later is when I went to PCIS. I did do some mental health, again with the diagnosis of having ptsd. But again, it just. Like I didn't find my person.

Ashlee [00:16:38]:
Yeah. Yeah.

Larry Fraser [00:16:39]:
I mean, there's. I've been to a couple of different people in the mental health field and just didn't feel like I had a connection or I felt like I was getting the diagnosis here, do this and you'll be better, right? Yeah. But when I went to pcis, you know how we have everybody sit around in the circle and explain what one word describes you? Mine was murderer because of Mr. Ivy's wreck. Then after having my glorious EMDR session with Mike Reaser, I felt like I had £5,000 lifted off of my shoulders and I felt like a completely different person.

Ashlee [00:17:19]:
You're hitting on like so many, so many important parts right now. And, you know, one of the first things I have to say is, again, kind of quoting what Jennifer said, is that thank you. Thank you for being on here and thank you for being open and vulnerable. Because for us three, I think we are, thankfully, we come from a place where sharing our story is encouraged. Right. And it's a beautiful thing. And for so many of our listeners, they hold it right. Like, they don't.

Ashlee [00:17:45]:
They haven't maybe had that opportunity, or they don't think it's appropriate to share, or they maybe feel really isolated in what they have gone through. And I think it's so powerful for them to hear from you and to be like, hold on here, like this. He can come on this podcast and he can share, and he's gotten help for it. And he just said he's 5,000 pounds lighter. Right? Like, there's a lot of positive that comes from that. And I think that that's so incredible. And then also one of another really big thing is talking about, like, EMDR and these different types of therapeutic interventions. And I think we can go on for 20 years about that for sure, too.

Ashlee [00:18:21]:
And so everything you're saying is incredibly powerful. And something that I think I kind of want to bring to light here, too, is that we're so heavy on this podcast, and naturally, so we both come from law enforcement families, so law enforcement is huge on this podcast, but we're trying to hit everyone. And here you are saying, like, this was my life as a dispatcher, and I do think there is a disconnect sometimes, and I think that's something that I've learned from working in this field. I do think dispatchers don't get recognized enough for these incidences, for the stuff that they hear, that they go through. And look at this. You're saying this was personal to me, too. Like, this was my own call that I. That I took.

Ashlee [00:18:59]:
Right. And ptsd, it doesn't matter who you are. It doesn't discriminate. You can get it no matter what. And I think that's so incredibly important to share. And. And I guess I wonder if you can bring to light a little bit, too, maybe talking for some dispatchers in terms of, like, how. How do I want to word this best is just that I think a lot of the times people, you guys, are kind of forgotten.

Ashlee [00:19:23]:
And how would you explain it to others, especially, like, the police that are listening to let them know that, like, it impacts you guys just as much? Like, for me, I've heard a lot of, like, you Guys don't get an ending sometimes.

Larry Fraser [00:19:33]:
Yes. There's never. There's never closure. There's a lot of dispatchers never get the closure for that call they've taken. I have taken some calls that I never got closure for and were kind of left out of it. You hear the officer involved shootings, you hear the terrible wrecks involving officers or firefighters or ems, but everybody always overlooked the dispatcher that took that call and never knew the outcome of that call. My first incident with the being included was when I worked for KSP as a dispatcher. We did have a murder suicide call that came in on my shift and that was one of the first times I'd ever heard of.

Larry Fraser [00:20:14]:
They had the debriefing and they mandated that the dispatchers that was working on the day of that call come in and sit through the debriefing. And this was wonderful. This was before I went to pcis, but it was. It was amazing to see that their chaplain brought in, said, hey, he was talking to the officers. He said, guys, let's not forget the dispatchers that took these calls. He said, they heard the screams before you heard the screams. Yeah. So a lot of times.

Larry Fraser [00:20:45]:
And that's what I really like about PCIs here in the history of it here in Kentucky, how it started out strictly for law enforcement, but now they've expanded it over the last five or six years, I believe, to where they've included dispatchers along with law enforcement and PCIs. And it allows those dispatchers to sit in the room with the officers, hear the officer side of it, but also the officers get to hear the dispatcher side.

Jennifer [00:21:14]:
Yeah, I think that's a really powerful thing and I am very proud that there is so much more inclusion when previously there obviously wasn't. Some of my experience with getting to work with dispatchers is how again, kind of Ashlee said that forgotten. But also I work with a lot of dispatchers and their ability to do exactly what you said in your story. From going to one call to another call, to flying down an ambulance, hopping on the ambulance, going into that EMT training that you have. It's this ability to do 100 things at work once and. And how you're just inundated with things all the time. And you guys are kind of the organizers. And I hope this is an okay word to use some, but a little bit of the caretaker, like sending people this way, sending people that way.

Jennifer [00:22:04]:
And I think what I've also seen is how you guys operate in those police stations, fire departments, you know, your Dispatch rooms that you guys really are taking care of those people that are going out on that first line. I don't know if that's something that you would agree with. You're the expert, Larry, not me.

Larry Fraser [00:22:23]:
No, I do agree with that completely. I mean, it doesn't have to be as severe of a traumatic call like I took as it is that there is so much of it that builds up a lot of. A lot of dispatchers there. It's a cumulative trauma.

Jennifer [00:22:37]:
Yes.

Larry Fraser [00:22:38]:
It's not. It's not necessarily one call that has broke them down. It is those continuous calls, one right after another, of walking through somebody, through cpr, or sending an officer to a call where that officer maybe gets injured. And the dispatcher takes that onto themselves, saying, I'm the one that sent them on that call. But at the same time, they know it's their job to send that dispatcher. Right.

Ashlee [00:23:04]:
The amount of loyalty, that is something that I learned so quickly, and I will. I will never forget. I got to give that to all of our dispatchers. Like, you guys are so loyal. Hearing how you guys have the backs of those that are out there is so incredibly powerful. I mean, you guys do take that on. You take that on as your responsibility, and. And it's a beautiful thing.

Ashlee [00:23:24]:
Right. But then on the other hand, in those big situations, that guilt that comes along with it also eats a lot of dispatchers alive in.

Larry Fraser [00:23:32]:
The dispatchers are the first ones that are going to tell you. Everybody that they dispatch for. They're not agencies. They're family.

Ashlee [00:23:38]:
Yeah, yeah.

Larry Fraser [00:23:39]:
And the dispatcher takes that on is like, that's my family that I'm sending to this call.

Jennifer [00:23:45]:
I just got goosebumps with.

Ashlee [00:23:46]:
I did, too.

Jennifer [00:23:47]:
That's so true. And here's where I might be a little harsh, and I love your feedback, Larry, is I think that they are family, and I think like a good family, they take care of everybody, but sometimes forget to take care of themselves.

Larry Fraser [00:24:04]:
Exactly. Exactly. That is. That is 100% true. You called it while ago. When you use the word caretaker, they want to take care of everybody else, but then they forget themselves.

Jennifer [00:24:16]:
Yeah, yeah. And that is a really hard, hard one part of that. I mean, that's such a beautiful thing to see somebody's compassion that large and that ability to take care of so many. And then it's the cliche of you have to secure your oxygen mask before. Before helping those around you.

Larry Fraser [00:24:35]:
I heard that exact paraphrased not too long ago at a class that I was at that talked about Helping other people. But remember, before you help other people, you have to help yourself. So that's what I like to encourage with a lot of my dispatchers. I'm like, hey, you're doing a great job, but don't forget to take care of yourself first. Because if you don't take care of yourself, how can you take care of others?

Jennifer [00:24:57]:
I'm totally putting you on the spot here.

Ashlee [00:24:59]:
So I know don't feel like you.

Jennifer [00:25:00]:
Have an answer, but no, I was.

Ashlee [00:25:02]:
Going to do it too.

Jennifer [00:25:03]:
So do it. But so how do we do that? Like, how do we do that for our first or dispatchers? Like, I want to be there for those dispatchers and help them. Like, what do we do for them to help them learn that skill?

Larry Fraser [00:25:16]:
Checking in on them quite frequently is what I've learned. The word resiliency sticks to my head. Of all the trainings I've gone to is resiliency for them to how to them to bounce back. If I see one of my dispatchers going through something difficult, whether it's work related or personal related, I make sure I check in on them. I want to talk to them, see how they're doing. We had the serious call here later, earlier on in the year and I checked on those two dispatchers day in, day out and I kind of got annoyed with me and like, Larry, we're fine, we're fine, we're fine. I was able to talk one of them into going to pcis. She thanked me greatly for it after she got back.

Larry Fraser [00:25:56]:
But to check in on them, to just have that connection with them, to know that, hey, I'm not just the boss. I've been where you've been. I've taken those calls that I've had that build up on my back, on my shoulders. Hey, if you just want to talk about it, just talk about it.

Ashlee [00:26:12]:
Not me smiling in my heart, just like bursting with pride right now because that's an. I mean I'm sure if you have listened, that's another thing that we stress on here. And it's just that leadership role and how important it is as the leader to show that compassion and that love and to see those like those other dispatchers as humans. Right? But also just how incredibly strong you are to say, hold on here, like I've been there too. Like being vulnerable and open with them and showing your, your own human side to them I think is incredibly beautiful. I feel like I said that 6 million times already today, but there's no other way to say it right. It's Just such a powerful process. But yet we still struggle in this kind of career in this world with first responders of, of leaders understanding that.

Ashlee [00:26:57]:
And I don't need to go down that hole because everybody on here already knows me about that. Just you saying that is so refreshing. And so it just makes my heart burst with pride because that is, I think, a really big way of keeping people okay. And it's simply saying, are you okay?

Larry Fraser [00:27:13]:
Just that knowing that somebody's there to listen for you.

Jennifer [00:27:15]:
Yeah.

Larry Fraser [00:27:16]:
Somebody there to, to just let, let you vent. Some days it may have just been a bad call that somebody got smart with you on the radio that kind of set you off or something. Then sometimes that dispatcher just needs to vent. They just need to let out whatever's bothering them. And when you really get into that, why did that really bother you? Then you may really get into the root of what's really going on. It may not have been that call. It may have been a call that they dealt with two weeks ago or months ago. And this has just been the fuse that lit it off.

Ashlee [00:27:48]:
So incredibly true. And one thing that we've talked about obviously is coping and we've talked about how do you do that for your other dispatchers. But is it okay if I ask? And again, I'm putting you back on the spot here. I guess you are the guest, so I. Maybe there's a little fairness to that. But outside of work, what do you do to cope? I mean, is there anything specific that.

Larry Fraser [00:28:06]:
You have found helpful for you not working as much?

Ashlee [00:28:09]:
Yeah. Work life balance, huh?

Larry Fraser [00:28:12]:
Yes. I put a lot more into my family life. Now I didn't realize this until I was really diagnosed with PTSD of how standoffish I was for several years. Relationships, I wouldn't let anybody get real close. But when I had my second incident, I was married. And it was also from a lovely lady who is from a very big first responder family. Her father was chief deputy, her brother's a paramedic. So she understood that side of it.

Larry Fraser [00:28:42]:
I did say earlier, I am a Christian. I love helping other people. I've been a missionary for the last 15 years. I go Poland every summer.

Jennifer [00:28:50]:
I was hoping you were going to mention Poland, Larry.

Larry Fraser [00:28:52]:
We bring three orphanages into town and do a upward soccer vacation, Bible school type camp with them. In the 15 years that I've done it, I've watched kids grow up through these orphanages to become adults. Some of them are now our translators at camp. So I've poured myself into more of family and church and tried because I said, get away from work. I'll give you a small example. At one point in time in my life, dealing with all the PTSD and everything, before I really got my hands on it, I was a 911 dispatcher. I ran a food truck. I worked for an auction company.

Larry Fraser [00:29:30]:
I would also run a carpet cleaning business in there. So if I was not at work at my 9 to 5 job, we'll say I was at one of my other four jobs, pouring my life into doing nothing but work, work, work, work.

Jennifer [00:29:45]:
Talk about the grind. My goodness.

Larry Fraser [00:29:47]:
So I buried myself in work. Some people I've listened to Yalls podcast know some of the people that have spoke on here and think very highly of them. I never got into addiction. I never got into drinking or drugs or anything like that. My addiction was work. I poured myself into that instead of pouring myself into a bottle.

Jennifer [00:30:07]:
That's so true.

Ashlee [00:30:08]:
Right? We. We all have our, our stuff. I mean, in each way. Like, we can overdo anything.

Larry Fraser [00:30:12]:
Yes.

Ashlee [00:30:13]:
You know, and I think that's also important to recognize this. I feel the same about when people are, like, working out. On one hand, we encourage it. Right. We're like, this is such a good way to relieve stress and, and take care of ourselves. But on the other hand, it also can go too far. And it's figuring out for yourself where that line is. Right.

Ashlee [00:30:30]:
What that balance is. But you're absolutely correct. We can all kind of fall into things without even recognizing it being more hurtful to us. And it's easy when it's work or it's easy when it is something more positive to say, oh, it's okay, I'm working.

Larry Fraser [00:30:42]:
All versions of that I look at is like denial.

Ashlee [00:30:45]:
Yeah.

Larry Fraser [00:30:45]:
If you become an alcoholic, you're denying that you've got pain, that you need to bury me. I would work all the time so I could deny that I had pain that I needed to deal with.

Jennifer [00:30:55]:
Right.

Larry Fraser [00:30:55]:
I can say this about PCs again. After my incident with the lawnmower wreck, I had a headache for five straight years. I would go to the doctor. I had MRIs. No, there's nothing wrong with your head. No concussions, you're fine. But I have a headache and would wake up every morning at 4:00'. Clock.

Larry Fraser [00:31:13]:
Like, I mean, it was like my alarm was going off, but I was waking up at 4 o' clock with nightmares of the incident after I went through PCIS and went through EMDR. To this day, and it's almost, almost five years, I'm headache free. Nightmare free. No 4am Wake ups.

Ashlee [00:31:31]:
The biggest smile. That's incredible.

Jennifer [00:31:33]:
That's amazing. And I appreciate, you know, your acknowledgment of being honest about that work and not having that work life balance and again, that impact of our family sometimes when we're so busy with work or, you know, having that symptom of just being more withdrawn, that, that's stuff is impactful to people who care about us, who want to be close to us and want to interact and want to spend time. I think that that's really powerful to hear.

Larry Fraser [00:31:59]:
And really, it really hit home with me when I came home from PCIS on that Wednesday afternoon and walked in the door and my wife looked me square in the eyes and said, who are you? Oh.

Ashlee [00:32:11]:
My God.

Larry Fraser [00:32:12]:
She could see the difference in my eyes from the moment I walked in the door.

Jennifer [00:32:16]:
Wow, that is so powerful. Well, and I'm a wife. We'll always keep it honest with you guys. So she really.

Larry Fraser [00:32:25]:
After we got to talking and you can bleep this part out if you want, she said, you've been a real ass the last three or four years.

Ashlee [00:32:33]:
I'm leaving it, I'm leaving it.

Larry Fraser [00:32:35]:
And she could tell the difference. And we sat down and talked and I told her all about my experience. And she said, she said, I can tell the difference in you 100%.

Ashlee [00:32:45]:
You know, what is, what I have to identify with that, though, is look at how getting, like, help for yourself, right? And getting that relief. Look at how much that impacts your family. But not only that, that it's a system, people. I gosh, I could go on and on how that just impacts so many other things in life. Things get better when we work on ourselves, when we feel better, right, in our families. To feel that love, to hear her say that, I'm sure felt incredible. And I just, I just really need, I want our listeners to understand there's so much. But not even just our listeners, but the people who kind of look at us and are like, oh, gosh, mental health for first responders.

Ashlee [00:33:21]:
You know, hippie, dippy stuff. And you're like, no, I'm trying to create such change and it's for that one person, but it's so much more. It's all a system and it's for everyone else, too.

Larry Fraser [00:33:29]:
I wish all of this had been around in 1991 when I went through the first thing, because it would have made a completely different thing. And that's kind of what my passion is now, is trying to help those people. Now, the younger generation to know that there's not a problem reaching out for mental health for help of any type. I grew up with a good old rough and tough grandfather, and it stuck with me when I was a little kid. If you would get hurt out on the farm, he would look you square in eyes. He said, real men don't cry. And that stuck with me for years and years. And it wasn't until I started getting help.

Larry Fraser [00:34:03]:
I'm like, well, hate to say this about my beloved past grandfather, but he was wrong.

Ashlee [00:34:08]:
Yeah, right.

Larry Fraser [00:34:09]:
Yeah.

Ashlee [00:34:09]:
Heck, my dad. Rub some dirt on it is what I heard all the time.

Larry Fraser [00:34:13]:
You don't need a band aid. Rub a little dirt in there, you'll be fine.

Ashlee [00:34:17]:
Yeah. What do we. What do you. Sorry. Do you have more? I don't want to.

Larry Fraser [00:34:21]:
No, go ahead.

Ashlee [00:34:21]:
No. What do you feel like? Is there something I don't in. This is a bigger question too. Is there something more that we can be doing for our dispatchers, either on the clinician side of things or just in general to be helping, making sure our dispatchers are taken care of?

Larry Fraser [00:34:36]:
Kind of like what I'm working on now is training. I would like to see more mental health training. Several of the people that we work with, PCIs, have always said that we think PCIs should be mandatory like every five years. But I would like to see more training for dispatchers on the mental health side of how to deal with those. There are a few calls out there. There's a few trainings out there, but not. Not as in depth as what I would like. I think that they should be.

Larry Fraser [00:35:02]:
Yeah, but more training for the. I think we've kind of started talking about new people when we hire here, even though we're a very, very small agency. That is one of the first things I talk to him about. I'm like, okay, when I go through the interview process, everything, I'm like, you're going to handle some probably terrible calls or these calls could build up on you. I just want you to know that if they do that, we do have resources to help you, to get you through that, you will not be left alone. So kind of made it a mandatory thing here that when everybody starts picking their classes for the mandatory training for the state is. I look at what their past history is. I'm like, okay, you haven't really had a mental health top class in the last two or three years.

Larry Fraser [00:35:45]:
Let's sign you up for this one. And I think that's something that needs to be more readily available. I mean, we have 988 for our callers. Yeah, we need something like 988 for our dispatchers.

Ashlee [00:35:56]:
Well, thank you so much. Is there anything else that you want to share that you want our listeners to hear that you. Anything at all? We're just, I'm just so blown away by this interview right now.

Larry Fraser [00:36:05]:
I just want them to know that there's, there's people out there that are, have walked the walk and yeah, there's people out there that would love to help. It just takes that first step of trusting someone to say, hey, this call hit me this way or this past couple of months, these calls have hit me and got me in a certain place or my personal life is affecting my work life.

Ashlee [00:36:27]:
Right, right, right.

Larry Fraser [00:36:29]:
I just want people to know that there's people out there that would bend over backwards to help them. And there's no shame in the game is the best way I can say there's no shame in the game to reach out for mental health help.

Ashlee [00:36:42]:
Thank you so much.

Jennifer [00:36:43]:
And again, like Ashlee started us off, we have been needing representation from dispatch.

Ashlee [00:36:49]:
Yes.

Jennifer [00:36:50]:
91 1. And so I'm so appreciative of you to come on and be that voice. And we want more of those voices for sure. And I think it's amazing in terms of you just carrying that torch on for those other people.

Larry Fraser [00:37:01]:
Well, I may reach, I may reach back out to y' all too because I've also been tasked, working on this small work group to write a mental health article for Mental Health Month for apco.

Ashlee [00:37:12]:
Oh, I love that.

Larry Fraser [00:37:13]:
May or April.

Ashlee [00:37:15]:
Absolutely.

Larry Fraser [00:37:16]:
I've got to write. I've got to write a 15,000 word magazine article.

Ashlee [00:37:22]:
Larry. I wrote a whole dissertation. Okay, I got you, I got you.

Larry Fraser [00:37:27]:
All right. I may need some quotes.

Ashlee [00:37:29]:
I got perfect. Pull directly from there. Take it, my friend. Thank you so, so much, Larry, for coming on. Thank you for opening the door to our dispatchers. We still got so much more to talk about, so we're probably going to have you back and I hope that's okay. We are so appreciative. We can't wait for you guys to hear it and we just don't want anyone to forget that when the call hits home.

Ashlee [00:37:49]:
Jennifer and I are here for you.