The Responsibility Of Gratitude...

I've referenced in prior posts (The Sun Will Rise) about the cycles in my life.  In my darkest times I had no choice but to lean on several friends to keep my head above water to survive.  Now that I've overcome those difficulties within my personal life and redirected myself towards a path of self sufficiency, I'm experiencing an overwhelming back flow of what you might call Karma.

I'm torn, once again.  I've been fortunate enough to have had a large enough support group of several friends who helped me without hesitation, some with significant sacrifice, and never without question.  They all did this because they believed the end result would be a positive one, and they were truly helping a friend.  This is true, and I have taken off on my own.  I am now rebuilding my foundation from the last cycle and rebuilding my self sufficiency.

Now that I'm on that path, I'm receiving a floodgate of back flow, friends that now require my help in return.  This could be repayment of debt, or a simple emotional distress they are experiencing that I am experienced in and am the most knowledgeable to help with.  Do I owe each on of these friends my loyalty and friendship?  Absolutely.  The problem I'm facing is that while I was one friend receiving support from many at one time to survive, now the tables have turned.  I am one friend that many need help from all at once. 

My resources, whether it be emotionally, physically, fiscally, or any other way are limited as I am one person.  All of those resources, however, are being stretched to overload because of the sudden reverse of friends in need.  Do I owe each of these friends my life?  Absolutely.  Am I capable of helping everybody all at once?  Impossible.

Now I play the villain, as everybody has given unconditionally to me yet I am forced to prioritize my resources to be able to return my friendship, loyalty, and resources effectively.  I must admit, I probably deserve this, as I allowed myself to accept help from so many people at once for different aspects to sustain me.  I needed it to survive, but it's my fault for needing the help in the first place.

I risk offending people, even losing friendships, as everybody wants me to be able to immediately return what was given because I am now finally in an initial position of self sufficiency again.  I have to balance rebuilding myself financially, emotionally, and socially.  Additionally, I have to devote time to those I love who NEED my help, or that I have a debt to in any other regard.

Rebuilding myself is a slow process.  My available free time is set, with extreme new responsibility in my new job.  My available financial capacity to repay debts is slow coming, as my first paycheck from new job is just barely arriving and the debts I've accrued need to be balanced with my current cost of living so I don't repeat the same god damned cycle.

I can't please everybody all at once.  The problem is, everybody who has helped in, no matter the method, deserves the same amount of friendship back.

How do you find balance in a situation like this?  It's horrible that I have to prioritize, and I wish I were more of a man than I am.  But I am also a realist, and I am working smarter these days in addition to harder.  If I don't play my cards right, I'll collapse in on myself.

There is no simple solution, no way to fix everything all at once.  There is, however, a lesson learned.  NEVER repeat my detrimental cycle again, so I will never again be faced with this responsibility.  Gratitude and loyalty are ever present, but I'm simply unable to properly show it with actions necessary to all who need it.

I am stretched so thin, and it's my own fault...

Prescribed Dependency...

An interesting thing for me to focus on tonight.  Truthfully something in the back of my mind for years now, I've just never really processed the frustration of "the issue".

At 30 years old, I am dependent on six different medications daily to survive.  The first starting when I was in ninth grade and finally diagnosed with a life-long disorder passed on genetically.  I had epilepsy, and as I grew older, it grew stronger.  Ultimately resulting in full blown tonic-clonic seizure disorder, commonly known as grand-mal seizures.  Luckily, this disorder is regulated to the point that I am safe to drive and work normal jobs.  The downside of that is that I have to religiously take thousands of milligrams of a combination of drugs daily and ON schedule.  Any deviance from this regiment causes the torturous seizures to return.  I've grown to live with this, in a healthy and functional way.

However, as I've grown, genetics have found more ways to "pepper" up my lifestyle.  Along with epilepsy, I am also hypertensive (high blood pressure), and anxiety ridden.  I am also reliant recently on anti-depression due to my inherited ability to fall into a clinical state of depression.  Along with several other life-long diagnoses, I am reliant on six pills every morning and three pills every night to survive.

When a person begins to measure their self-sufficiency, we can't help but look at this array of pills we are dependent on as a major speed-bump in the success of our daily lives.  While I am an accomplished EMT, I am unable to volunteer my services to the Army National Guard, as they will not take somebody with as many medical "deficiencies" as myself.  I am happy being a protector of public safety, but when I looked into committing more to my community I must admit that I was disheartened by my significant disqualifying factors.

Does it make you less of a man to know that you are reliant on at least six (for now) medications for the duration of your lifetime?  Is it silly to struggle with a small part of your self pride when you analyze this situation within yourself?

Luckily one of the medications, my antidepressant, is predicted to only be needed for one year.  It is found that the medication itself, along with proper counseling, will actually reshape the neural behavioral patterns to ultimately correct the problem instead of simply masking it.  That makes me happy, and gives me something to work with inside myself.

I know countless people are in the same boat as I am, dependent on pharmaceutical corporate America to keep the safe and healthy.  Most of them for worse situations medically than I am in.  I know these measures were to created to not only protect life, but also preserve the qualify of life for those living with "controllable" illnesses.  Nevertheless, I can't help but feel the fact that I'm on six pills daily, and growing, is a sign that I'm not really the man I wish I could be.  I am limited at every corner.  Even though I find new paths and ways to work around my deficiencies, I am ambivalent about my gratitude.  Part of me is thankful that I can live a normal and productive life.  The other part of me is resentful that I am not the man I want to be without these little helpers.

Am I just being ungrateful?  Are these feelings justified?  I'm afraid I won't ever really know that answer, and I'll be at odds with this situation for as long as I'm taking all the god damned pills...

In The Line Of Duty...

...six officers went down, one of which will never return. I shed tears for a man whom I've never met today. Never even worked with him on a scene or alongside his agency in a similar area. Still, I am poisoned with feelings of loss for a member who was part of a huge community.

Agent Jared Francom of Ogden City Police was killed last night in the line of duty. I watched the breaking news in awe of the tragic situation unfolding. First reports of one officer down, then three, with a final total of six officers shot. The only thing my mind and heart could focus on last night was hope. Hope that these officers would recover. Hope that these officers wouldn't be another statistic of a man lost while protecting his community. Hope that these officers would be able to go home to their families once again. Unfortunately, my hope did little to help. Agent Francom has a wife and two children that will never see him come home again. The very thought haunts my heart, and I'm trying to understand this strong sense of loss for a man and family I've never met.

Having worked as an EMT, I became very close with many of my public safety colleagues. This includes law enforcement, fire, as well as EMS. Somehow a bond is forged that isn't really easy to explain. We all work together, side by side, to protect our communities. Some of these colleagues have become close and personal friends of mine. Others I am simply proud to work alongside. We protect each other, help each other, and in a sense become a family. I was asked why the loss of an officer I never met can bring me to tears, but losing a patient I've never met on a scene or watching the news of a person in my city that lost their life doesn't cause the same effect. This isn't easy to explain, but I must attempt, not only to explain it to others, but to fully understand it myself.

In the public safety world, death is something you have to learn to deal with, or it will destroy you. The term "Professional Detachment" is one of the VERY first things taught when training to work in this field. We have to learn to separate ourselves emotionally from the people we help and sometimes cannot save. Everybody has their "buttons" however, that will always pass around that wall of professional detachment. For most that I've worked with in public safety, the most common cases you'll be told is when you have to respond to an incident involving illness, injury, or death of a child. That is true for myself as well. It's just harder to accept with children. On that same token, the words "officer down" are a powerful venom I never want to hear. My heart skips a beat, and I can't help but feel as if one of my own family has fallen. I went to bed last night, having watched the news and thinking about all the information they were able to deliver at that time. I fell asleep knowing that all were still alive at that time, hoping with everything inside me that all would be alive and stable when I woke.

While I slept, I had one of the most vivid and realistic nightmares I've ever had. That is quite a statement, as I am rarely able to remember dreams for longer than five minutes after I wake, let alone every vivid detail from beginning to end. In this nightmare, I was on the scene of the incident. An officer went down, myself and a police officer pulled him away from the scene in a safe area, and left him in the protection of colleagues. Myself and a police officer then looked at each other and knew that time was a factor. We got in a police car, left the scene and hauled ass to the injured officer's personal home. We entered the home, and explained that there wasn't much time left. She needed to come with us to talk to her husband one last time. There were children of the officer in the house, but they weren't allowed to come. We hurried to the police car to get her to her husband, but she stopped us for a moment. She ran back into the house, to get something. An object that fit in one of her hands. I couldn't see clearly what it was, but she simply explained it was the world to their relationship, and she wanted it there with her while she said goodbye. We got in the car, and rushed to the scene. That's when I woke up, almost in tears. I woke up to find out that my nightmare, in the most important sense of the story, had come true. Agent Francom passed shortly after midnight.

I shed tears for this man, and his family, whom I've never met. I thought to myself "Why?", and realized that single word was questioning so many things. Why was this violence necessary? Why should a man fall over petty drugs? Even more shocking to me, is the question I found circling my mind the most. "Why can't I fix this?", which is a question that has no business being in my mind. Logically, this situation is none of my business. I wasn't involved in that agency, I wasn't an EMT responding to that situation, I didn't know the officers injured. Why would I feel a sense of being powerless, as if I could have in the first place? Unfortunately, I cannot answer that question. I don't think there is an answer.

Some of you who read this will be my colleagues in public safety, some of you will be friends who support and respect our work, and some of you will be amongst the group of people who are quick to say "Fuck the cops!" and call them pigs. If you are one of these people, it is reasonable to assume that you have been in some sort of legal trouble at one point in your life, or simply given a speeding ticket that you really didn't want. I've been one of those people, I have a blemished past. I've been arrested before, because I made mistakes. But, before you switch to hatred of these men and women who are simply doing their jobs please remember one very important thing. All of your past put aside, whether good or bad, these people have and will lay down their lives to protect you. Unfortunately, few people recognize this form of selflessness. Even fewer show their gratitude for it.

I am thankful for the bravery Agent Francom and every other law enforcement officer show to put on that uniform and protect us every day. I am so disheartened by the loss. I hope you are too...

As explained in prior blog posts, I will often attach a song to go with a particular post that has given meaning or enabled reflection into the subject matter.  In this case, this song may surprise many of you.  However, please understand that the so called "soundtrack" selection is a reflection of how my mind and emotions are processing the subject matter, and that the lyrics, and music itself are relevant for me.