Tag Archives: Firefighter Suicide

You've always given 100% to everything you do but I want to ask you to hold back on this one. Save a little for your family, the ones who love you and for yourself. You are still naive, yet full of life, humility and compassion. The job will demand these qualities from you but it will also strip you of them over time.... be careful of that.

The video and song is by Kevin Davidson . Kevin is a Volunteer Firefighter for Greenwich VFD in Kings County Nova Scotia. He is also a paid Paramedic for EHS in Nova Scotia.

This was not an accident. It wasn't a car wreck or an act of violence by someone else's hand. This wasn't a stranger I was looking at ... it was my brother laying there ... it was JACKSON and I knew what I was seeing. He was dead. What I didn't know was why.

For those of you not on the job I'll offer this brief explanation. "Making the push" is what Firefighters do once they get to (or near) the fire floor / room. It's what happens after we get to the point of no return... to the point of attack (or a difficult search).

I can't describe the feeling in your gut as you're crawling down that dark, hot hallway. So dark that you can't see the lens of your face piece and so hot that your bottle is hot enough to heat the air you try to breath. I can't tell you why it is that we keep pushing / going but we do.

If we can not help ourselves.... our own members... the Brothers and Sisters riding beside us ... how can we be expected to help those we are sworn to serve and protect? Think about that for a minute.

Live tonight at 7:30 pm EST, I will be discussing Firefighter Suicide's and Mental Health on FOOLS Radio. FOOLS Radio is a part of the Fire Engineering Radio community.

At one point, I wasn't so sure I'd even make it. Now, I have hope.

How can we be expected to save the lives of the very people we are sworn to protect and serve if we can not save our own?

I mentioned that I had returned to duty and that decision or "step" in my healing process was as huge and difficult as any of the others I've made.