By Raquel Tome
In Madrid, the song of the sparrows was no longer drowned out by the deafening traffic noise during the state of alarm. The city had been transformed into a spectral scene, with deserted streets where before the joyous frenzy of the coming and going of people was seething. A tense calm, broken by the shrill sound of ambulances, police sirens, and hearses announcing the building where death had visited.
Meanwhile, a swarm of specialized emergency intervention personnel such as the police, civil guard, firefighters and the military emergency unit (UME) patrolled the silent streets and attended to critical situations. They were frontline workers subjected to exceptional stress conditions. They had to cope with an enormous mental, physical and emotional burden in a highly uncertain pandemic scenario.
The images of people stuffed into their “space suits” conscientiously cleaning the streets, disinfecting the residences of our elders, conditioning spaces and transferring bodies for their delicate and respectful treatment, the arrival of the first military virus trackers still survive in my retina. , the diligent vaccination teams, the complex logistics of hospitals, etc.
Police, firefighters, military emergency unit
To learn about their situation first-hand and the resources they put in place to stay positive in the face of adversity that erupted in March 2020, we spoke to two police officers who prefer to remain anonymous; with Juan Saldaña, head of the UME Personnel Section at the Torrejón de Ardoz base (Madrid), and with Ernolando Parra, firefighter from the Community of Madrid at Parque de Las Rozas.
doHow did they deal with so many challenges immersed in a threatening panorama and subjected to the enormous wear and tear of the situation?
Think of the many obstacles they went through. Immersed in hesitant beginnings of “role ambiguity” and plunged into initial confusion, lacking well-defined protocols that would explain what to do and that they had to design and outline while acting.
They endured the heavy double shift overload while many companions fell ill, others died. The landscape was devastating. Their self-care was compromised at the same time that they suffered the stress of organizing their families without knowing very well where to leave their children or how to care for their elderly.
They faced the fear of contagion for themselves and their families in a situation where no one knew very well how the virus worked, working in contaminated environments, morgues or with infected people.
As knowledge increased, their protection was reinforced with special suits that made it difficult for them to move and breathe during exhausting days of physical work.
They sustained situations of high emotional charge because they dealt with respond to critical incidents where they had to simultaneously manage their own emotions with easily identifying with the victims.
They themselves went through similar situations in their families, but they made an effort to overcome and give support and support to others.
They also had to sort moral and ethical anguish for failing to respond to the usual standard of care under normal circumstances.
From two daily deaths in homes, to 50
Thus, one of these anonymous police officers told us about the stress he experienced constantly coordinating and receiving phone calls from people who had just lost a family member at home or from elderly people who died in nursing homes.
In the city of Madrid, it went from managing two daily deaths at home to 50 at critical moments.
He told us:
“The usual protocol could not be followed because the dead were piling up in houses and residences and there were not enough police officers to wait for long hours for the physician to arrive to certify the death; In addition, the funeral homes were so saturated that it took days to go to collect the dead. These calls were difficult, full of intense and painful emotions, taking in distressed families, dealing with confused, overwhelmed or panicked nursing home staff who had lost their grandparents and no one came and many other people, already grieving, who called anguished because they did not know where the body of their relative was.”
Our policemen did their best, he tells us excitedly:
“I felt powerless and frustrated that I couldn’t give more help as in normal circumstances.”
It is easy to think, perhaps because it is reassuring to us, that these people are invulnerable, since they are highly trained in the face of adverse circumstances and in activating the psychological resources that help them survive, but the reality is that they are not heroes and have also felt the emotional impact of being subjected to harsh experiences.
And our resilience, What is it the capacity that people have to adapt positively in the face of adverse and traumatic circumstances plagued by stressful elements, does not imply that, like them, we do not experience difficulties or anguish or that we feel vulnerable because, in essence, we are, and that is something inherent to our human condition.
Nor is it a single issue or certain personality traits that only a few people possess.
The fortress fluctuates
our strength is fluctuating and it’s a lot more likely to resent if we work in certain contexts.
Keeping her strong depends on:
- The ability of individuals and institutions to detect when our coping capacity is being exceeded.
- Count on the possibility of access to appropriate psychological resources and supports to stay strong, autonomous and functional.
Ernolando Parra, psychologist and firefighter at the Las Rozas fire station in Madrid, recounts the things that helped you stay positive In this threatening and highly uncertain context:
“helped me put attention to task. It is not a time to go to the emotions, that is what the after is for, when you return to the Park and discuss it with your colleagues. But at the time of the intervention you have to focus your full attention on the task. So it was very important for me to trust in the training physical, know well all the equipment and trust in my colleagues and in the head of the unit who was one of the team with a flexible leadership. Sometimes he gave us orders and other times he worked like no one else. Later, if someone had to speak, the companions always they listen from the proximity and we openly discuss the performances among ourselves».
«It also helped me a lot recognition of the people, when you went out into the street and you knew that your work was important and you heard how they applauded, their encouragement and energy reached me”Add.
More psychological support
They do not have direct psychological support, but he recognizes that it would be good to have that possibility.
The reality is that their actions, as Ernolando Parra or Juan Saldaña, head of the UME personnel area, explain to us, are based on values What:
- Solidarity
- Protection
- Help
- Effort
- Modesty
Because their mission could not be accomplished without them.
They value and recognize that all individual resilience lies in interdependence with belonging to healthy and resilient institutions.
Thus, Juan Saldaña points out that the UME has incorporated into its management model concepts that are in line with the healthy organization model. They seek to take care of the well-being of their members because they know that it affects the quality of the service they provide to society.
For them, psychological attention and counseling occupies a central place and they are incorporated into the design of operations with military psychologists.
Its philosophy is based on providing the exposed personnel «“de sources of support, both informal and formal, with specialized personnel who are integrated into their action protocols before and after any intervention”.
It would be reasonable to think that, due to the type of work within these organizations, some military, have effective resources of psychological help.
The truth is that not all reflect this philosophy and doing it timidly has repercussions on the mental health of the people who compose it.
Two obstacles combine to go to a psychologist: that people feel ashamed, guilty or that they experience it as “they are failing” due to their identification with the “role of savior”; and another from within the organization itself because it is stigmatized.
They are afraid of being “pointed out” as psychologically weak and vulnerable with the risk that it could compromise their professional advancement.
Some denounce the painful reality of neglecting psychological or emotional needs.
Thus, a medical doctor from the National Police Corps who works in the area of psychosocial risks also confessed to us anonymously:
“During the pandemic nothing was done. Many times there are even more basic needs that are difficult to take into account when planning operations. Rest and relief times, meal times or simply conditioning adequate spaces to go to the bathroom are not always foreseen, unfortunately there are many Piolines”.
Resilience and institutions
We must understand the mutual interdependence. Institutions are a reflection of our resilience as individuals and as a society. They put us crudely in front of the mirror.
We need to better understand why people suffer emotional crises or why we get psychologically ill.
And that, in the face of difficulties, what makes us seriously vulnerable is that people do not have access to adequate help when we need them, and organizations have their share of responsibility in this. This is The foundation of all resilience.
If we want as a society, as a community, to be well attended by our emergency services, we also have a duty to support them and offer them effective responses to their real needs.
Their resilience is ours, everyone’s. Taking care of them we take care of ourselves. We owe it to them.
