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Throughout the four-day class, attendees learn how they can be a support system for fellow police officers who have responded to traumatic situations. Eventually, LEAPS hopes to connect police agencies across the state into a peer support network.

The need

Instructor Tom Rutledge, a retired Mississippi law enforcement officer, said these networks have already been set up in several states across the country.

Rutledge said police officers face, on average, 188 traumatic events in their lives, while the average citizen sees only two or three. This constant trauma has deadly effects, Rutledge said, citing lower life expectancy, heart attacks and suicide.

“All these [effects occur] because we haven’t had a mechanism to deal with ourselves,� he said. “We haven’t taken care of each other, and we had nowhere to go with our trauma.�

Rutledge said the Charleston Police Department is “progressive.�

“They get it,� he said. “They want their officers to live longer and have healthier, family lives and healthier living.�

The peers

Thursday morning, Rutledge was teaching officers how to talk to someone who has been through a traumatic situation, and how to read their body language. On Friday, officers’ families are invited to the class to learn how officers react after dealing with a high-stress situation.

Lindell said he doesn’t go home and talk to his family about what he sees, but talking to someone else who has been through a similar situation can help.

“They have the understanding that I do, and they may have been through the situation that I’m currently having issues with,� he said of other officers. “And they can give me some avenues to help me get through it in a healthy way.�

Lindell said the peer support network will connect officers from all over the state who might share experiences of traumatic events, such as an officer-involved shooting.

He said the skills he’s learning in the class remind him of a program he participated in while in elementary school called Natural Helpers.

“When students would have issues with each other or things at home, you would call in another student,� he said. “I was a natural helper in school, so it kind of called to me.�

Mental health

Lindell said he doesn’t think the public realizes the toll police work takes on mental health.

“One minute, we’re eating lunch with our loved ones. The next minute, we’re at a fatality car crash. If you really think about that, that’s terrible,� he said. “You’re literally eating lunch with your wife, the next minute, you see a dead body, and then you have to go make a death notification. That really messes with your mind.�

Addressing officer mental health through a peer support program creates better police officers and gives them a better understanding of people they meet with mental health issues.

Lindell said he hadn’t heard of any of this training in his almost 18 years as a police officer. He said law enforcement officers feel pressure to be a “big, tough person� and bottle up their trauma.

“When that bottle cap explodes, it could lead to bad decisions, and it can ruin careers,� he said. “When you’re talking to an officer who’s been involved in a high-stress situation and that officer’s talking to someone who’s been there, done that and they’re doing good, I think it’s going to save a lot of careers. I think it’s going to save a lot of marriages.�