Thread: Well Ive had a crap day!

Hats off to you. You're a true champion, doing it day in day out. No prize nor glory.

I was involved in volunteer rescue for years based out of the Spit in Sydney. Its hard to get over a fatality & you need a good vent every now & again. Your not sooking by any means.

You may want to do a good deed to cheer yourself up down the track. Contact the local hospital & organise a day out for less fortunate or terminal kids or a toy drive. Ask LR owners in your area via this forum to support you & they will at there own cost. We do this quite often invariable all over Australia via clubs days out. Put the big red unit up front & plenty of LRs in tow. Kids everywhere.

The looks of excitement & joy on their little faces when you get them in a big fourby or giving them a new toy is priceless. It's also a nice feeling to know that you allowed someone to experience a truley happy day in their otherwise short lives.
This approach worked for me & helped me manage the what if ?'s that persistantly raised their head. At least I could counter them & take respite in my attempts at grief management.

You are the strength in our community & thank you for being there. We all want someone there in the end, even if it is a stranger.

Stay safe & chat with us whenever you feel the need.

Originally Posted by amshaw

Hi All,
Hope you all dont mind but I need to type this down to clear my head before going to bed. If you didnt know Im a vol firefighter with a urban brigade hear in Hamilton Vic.

.....but it is still very hard to deal with when I can still hear his crying and yelling out pleading for us to save his life............... he knew he was going to die.

amshaw, I did not been to post a reply until I really thought about it. I have PTSD from Vietnam and know exactly how you feel. Will you PLEASE seek help through your chain of command. This has been and will be one of the most traumatic experiences in your life. In my time there was no help, you just lived with it, and I hope you don't have to do that.

I'm really sorry you had to go through that.
Good luck and I hope you will see the flowers above the doom and gloom.

Cheers mate,

Andrew,

Thoughts are with you as well as Marie as she supports you through this time. I can only guess that it won't be forgotten easily especially in Hamilton and perhaps nor should it. There will be talk, discussion, opinions.

Do what works for you mate, professional counselling through the brigade, family support, sit at Christ of Christ Hamilton for a little while.

As mentioned above, if there is anything we can do to assist, just ask! Whether it be a sounding board or a more public affair!

I hope Comms supported you and the responding appliances...let me know if there is anything you need to discuss.

Keep your chin up Andrew and get help if you need it. Regards Brett

Hi All,
Thankyou very much to you all for your kind thoughtful words, it has helped us Please take this as a thankyou to all reply's even the very personol one's.......I better not reply to all post's, but then again it would push up my post numbers......

Yesterday morning after "making up" the trucks a few of us went to a local early opening cafe for a big egg & Bacon roll and a coffee etc....there were only eight of us but it was great to sit and be kind of normal again and as we have shared a terrable thing the bond between us is stronger than before as a few were the "new crew".

Its funny how there are always fights in a club or whatever but in our case when things go bad we all pull together very tight......I guess its kind of like when people go of to war together, the whole mateship and trust in having each others lives in there/your hands etc........well ok not as serious as that , but you know what I mean...... Its something I cant put my finger on and have trouble explaining it

There will be our CFA CIS debrief tonight, so for those who dont know thats when we all get to have a talk about how we are feeling and any problems we are still having ie not sleeping, still seeing flashbacks etc and the best part is most of the CIS people are firefighters so really understand and are very helpful.....(nothing worse than a person telling us all about it when they have had no life experance at all......doesnt go down to well with us at all Im affraid)

We also talk about the job to improve anything that needs improving including training, more gear needed etc, and then have tea and a few cans to make it as social as possible .....

Ive found that with a few cans some blokes tend to "drop the wall" a bit and only then really let it all hang out rather than in the CIS chair circle infront of everybody.......but as I see it doesnt matter how they let it out as long as they do...........

But Im good now, took me a while to get to sleep yesterday morning, fell asleep around 08:00 I guess, but didnt get up until 18:30 last night, and felt much better for it....so Im back to normal now.....well as normal as I was before anyway

Thanks again people, means alot

Well we had our so called debrief last night........it was a complete waste of time and most felt much worse after it

There were some members from a a small rural brigade who set up the FOV, which is just a mobile command and comms unit. As it turns out there were a few tradesmen in the crew, who thought things were not being done fast enough, and then dragged up a whole heap of crap about how the job should have been down, "why didnt you ask me for advice, Ive been a builder for 41years" blah blah............but on the advice of a enigeer at the job some things just didnt happens becasue of safty issue's with the solo, dust expolsion and a heap of other issue's.........

So instead of the night being about making sure everybody was ok and could talk about the job we had members walking out of the station in tears or members needing to be held back by others so not to beat the snot out of these guys.........not a productive night at all........

So looks like we are all going around to a members place for a few cans and Im hoping to catch up with a few blokes who really did need to talk about it....but bsfore I got a chance to talk to them last night I got a call from my wife that she needed to get to hosital asap (ambo's are always very busy here Friday nights) , so now she is in hosie for at least two nights with gastro and she is a type 1 diabetic.......... they say it all happens in three's.............

Keep a positive attitude. People like that are morons. The may have technical ability but no practical rescue ability. If they had gone ahead you may be looking at 2 or 3 dead not one. We get plenty of that in mining. Protocols are in place for a reason, to protect the rescuer, any bystanders and then the person being rescued.
Dont lose heart and stick with it. Get independent counselling and also let your local authority know you are not happy with the debrief.
Hindisght is a wonderful thing and in any rescue there are things you may do different given the chance, but you can only learn from that and do not dwell on it. Remember without you there they would not have had any chance at all.
Most days I love my job, but some days everyones a recue and medical expert.
Most importantly look after yourself and your state of mind.
CraigE

Originally Posted by amshaw

Well we had our so called debrief last night........it was a complete waste of time and most felt much worse after it

There were some members from a a small rural brigade who set up the FOV, which is just a mobile command and comms unit. As it turns out there were a few tradesmen in the crew, who thought things were not being done fast enough, and then dragged up a whole heap of crap about how the job should have been down, "why didnt you ask me for advice, Ive been a builder for 41years" blah blah............but on the advice of a enigeer at the job some things just didnt happens becasue of safty issue's with the solo, dust expolsion and a heap of other issue's.........

So instead of the night being about making sure everybody was ok and could talk about the job we had members walking out of the station in tears or members needing to be held back by others so not to beat the snot out of these guys.........not a productive night at all........

So looks like we are all going around to a members place for a few cans and Im hoping to catch up with a few blokes who really did need to talk about it....but bsfore I got a chance to talk to them last night I got a call from my wife that she needed to get to hosital asap (ambo's are always very busy here Friday nights) , so now she is in hosie for at least two nights with gastro and she is a type 1 diabetic.......... they say it all happens in three's.............

Andrew,

The unit needs to book all of you (those involved) in a group disussion with a Psychologist, those people are trained to help trauma victims.

Cheers,