'People are burned out': Brutal fire season is taking a toll on firefighters' mental health

An increasingly stressful job

West said that for years, he suppressed feelings about two close calls escaping wildfires in his early 20s. Going home became a struggle, particularly after his kids were born. “I was really hyper-vigilant, you know,” he said. He startled easily and would grow impatient and irritable when, for instance, a line at a restaurant buffet moved slowly.

And as fires grow and more people move to forested areas, firefighters are both facing more pressure to protect communities and witnessing more human suffering. West said that after a close friend of his died on the fire line in 2013, the negative thoughts and emotions he’d been battling for years intensified. By 2017, he said, “I was having nightmares, I was having anxiety memory loss.” He had suicidal thoughts, too.A changing culture

Ming’s team sometimes sets up trailers at fire base camps that firefighters can duck into for a confidential discussion with a trained peer. Sometimes, he said, firefighters will walk into a trailer and just start crying. And some employees still slip through the cracks. State and federal jobs generally offer an employee assistance program that includes access to a handful of free counseling sessions, for instance. But temporary workers lose access to that benefit when they’re laid off at the end of fire season.

California lawmakers last year approved legislation that will make it easier for certain state and local firefighters and law enforcement officers to make such claims from 2020 to 2025. As of last March, Florida and Minnesota had similar laws on the books, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures, a Denver and Washington, D.C.-based group that advises state lawmakers.

Meyer said there’s also talk of expanding the agency’s employee assistance program to temporary workers after they’ve been laid off. But that might require an act of Congress.

If the bulk of Americans don’t believe in Climate Change then what exactly do they believe in?

Someone tell trump the federal government needs to rake the damn leaves and pine needles on federal land!

Another situation where the country, in the past, would rally together and the federal government would lead. Instead the golfer in chief plays the blame game and does nothing. He turns a tragic situation into a partisan divide. If re-elected he will sell federal lands.

Hmmm 🤔

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