Sunday 15 November 2009

Everything's Going To Be OK

The winter period has never exactly had me sparking into action, what with the depressing doom and dankness. I often wonder if I've got that SAD syndrome, but then I've always preferred Springtime to the Summer. This year I'm just going with it and not wishing the months away.

This week I was taken aback by the general response to the suicide of German goalkeeper Robert Enke. The general perception being that he must have led a great life and there was no room in it for depression. Since when did a state of mind restrict itself to certain occupations? The things that I picked up on were his fear of failure and drive to succeed thus setting himself the highest goals. It just struck a chord that he was somebody who had a perfectionist personality and it just took a stressor to put him over the edge and into a bad place. The numero uno stressor is bereavement and the loss of a child multiplies that one several times over. He did a good job of keeping his troubles from his team mates which is a shame. It was a very tragic story that played on my mind for days.

I even had a pang of sympathy for our unelected leader Gordon Brown. It's been reported that he too has been down in the dumps, and maybe that's why he has taken to pounding the streets. That's very therapeutic but he should learn to enjoy it more and control his own destiny as that too looked like a staged photo opportunity. If your minds not right I can understand the difficulty in stringing together a coherent sentence on paper, I do it all the time at work but still they spin about his disability. If he's a stress monkey then better out then in says I, and he should pop in here for a few tips.

Maybe I shouldn't have been surprised that I was going to have a week of death and mortality thrust upon me with all these thoughts in my head. A close friend received an unfavourable diagnosis and as much as you try and remain positive the realities of life hit home and have you reflecting on how much time they may have left. What do you say to them?

A dead body found in the street is always going to involve us and if there are no witnesses to what happened we treat is as suspicious. Never assume anything, but after a couple of hours investigation stringing everything together it looks like a suicide. Possibly a victim of this recession but definitely a victim of their own thoughts. I speak to the next of kin on the phone after a death message had been carried out personally by officers. It was an unexpected shock, but the deceased kept everything in and wouldn't speak about things troubling them. There was a BIG stressor involved in that death too. I explain our procedures and try to be as helpful as possible but what can you say to somebody who's just had the worst news?

Maybe sometimes people just need to hear the words "Everything's going to be OK".

7 comments:

Old BE said...

Great post.

Dandelion said...

It would be nice if more police officers had your attitude.

Stressed Out Cop said...

Dandelion

Maybe they need to hit the depths to reach that understanding. I wish that on nobody.

Don't forget I used to be everything that you hate, and now think I've got this stress thing sussed. Wish I'd got there year's ago.

MTG said...

We are on a journey together and some will fall. Others hold on to dignity and press ahead but the least anyone can do is encourage the weaker.

Tom102 said...

Brilliant post. I wish I had the same understanding when I was younger, that you, and my co-commentators suggests.

Metcountymounty said...

"As you stare long into the abyss, the abyss stares long into you"

Took me a couple of years of doing this stuff before I knew what that really meant.

Is it wrong that I don't trust people until I know they have or have seen them experience things that are going to deeply affect them? There is another quote I like "there is a difference between knowing the path, and walking the path" which suits Policing perfectly.

We should all know on day one what we're getting into, but until you actually experience it you can't know how you'll react or what it will do to you afterwards.

Old BE said...

"Is it wrong that I don't trust people until I know they have or have seen them experience things that are going to deeply affect them?"

How deep must you see them go? I imagine that in your job you need to know that your colleagues are to be relied upon, but how hard is the test? Surely you must have to work with people you don't know that well all the time?