Shining Light on Trauma
It’s time to bring pain out of the shadows.
The following article is about an incident I attended as a police officer, which led me to develop Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. It contains a frank discussion of suicide. I tell this story not to be gratuitous but to shed light on mental illness.
Mental illness thrives in the shadows. It lives off shame, secrets, and lies. By bringing light to the darkness, we win the fight. My hope is that this article will encourage others to talk about their own traumas, tragedies, and pain.
The beginning
It had been an uneventful weekend night shift—just the usual drunks and fighting. Elsewhere in my patrol area, a tragedy was brewing.
A teenage girl, I will call D, was finishing her first shift at a burger restaurant. She’d lived a troubled life and had been in and out of care homes for much of it. Working any job was a massive step in the right direction for her. Unfortunately, she had a panic attack, and the burger restaurant called the police due to her aggressiveness.
My colleagues attended the call, along with an ambulance. A few of the girl's friends had turned up to support her. But another girl, who I will call L, was there too. L insisted on going to the hospital with D. D’s friends were miffed…
