What sets this program apart is that it is a proactive approach to dealing with the emotional stresses that we experience in the fire service. Stress not only comes from our acute exposure to a major incident, but also our chronic exposure to many smaller incidents over time. This fully encompassing method helps manage stress that responders may be experiencing in their home lives as well. This approach has been proven to lessen the impact of future exposures to stress.

The training represented a rare moment in time where the team learned real coping mechanisms. Before this, we’ve had theory. NATAL’s trainers didn’t bring us theory. They made it real. NATAL’s experiential learning and simulations brought the training to an entirely different level.

I like the fact that the training focused on resilience. Many courses focus on the problem, and this course focused on the solution, which needs to be talked about more. For us as law enforcement, the more tools you have in your toolbox, the more you can help other people.

I wish I would have taken this program 20 years ago, because if I would have, my life would have been very different.

Those two weeks of intensive, experiential training, which was conducted by NATAL’s team of psycho-therapists, was so important for us. We, first responders, respond to trauma the same way others do. But the frequency with which we’re exposed to it is so much greater than the general population. Eventually it takes its toll. Either you become numb or you tell yourself you don’t care. You distance yourself, and compassion fatigue sets in.

We frequently encounter high consequence problems in stressful environments. They can take a toll on you in small bites, or in huge chunks. The NATAL training in which we took part can help any care giver, whether EMTs, paramedics, nurses, doctors, fire fighters, or police officers, use tools they already have to strengthen their abilities.

Your work is instrumental in shifting the access and ability for individuals in this field to feel again. Through both circumstance and life, your workshop is one that allowed everyone to be reminded of the fundamental and basic principles of humanity and of keeping us whole.