A Paramedic’s Turning Point After A Suicide Scene

One call can change the way you breathe, drive, sleep, and even trust your own judgment. I sit down with paramedic Emma Irwin to talk through a suicide scene that hit hard, the moment she cried on scene, and the quiet belief that too many first responders carry: “I should be able to handle this.” We name what that pressure does to police, fire, EMS, dispatchers, and paramedics when trauma exposure finally breaks through the professional mask. 

Emma walks me through what happened after the call, including delayed PTSD symptoms that showed up weeks later: rising anxiety at work, a medication error that signaled something was seriously off, panic attacks leaving the house, and relentless intrusive images. We get specific about the difference between suicidal intent and intrusive trauma thoughts, and why honesty is the fastest path to real help. We also talk about debriefing, why going straight from a traumatic job to the next call can make things worse, and how workplace culture can either protect people or push them into silence. 

We spend time on practical coping mechanisms that don’t cause more damage, especially peer support, self awareness, and the power of someone simply asking, “Are you OK?” Emma shares how EMDR therapy helped her process the scene, regain a sense of control, and ultimately rethink her career in a way that protects her mental health. We also address an uncomfortable but real part of EMS life: sexual harassment in the service, why “everyone knew” is not an excuse, and how reporting can change a station for the better. 

If you care about first responder mental health, paramedic PTSD, suicide prevention, and building teams where people can speak up early, this conversation is for you. Subscribe, share this with a teammate, and leave a review so more responders can find it when they need it most.

Transcript

Welcome And Mission

SPEAKER_01 0:01

Welcome to Resilience Development in Action with Steve Bisson. This is the podcast dedicated to first responder mental health, helping police, fire, EMS, dispatchers, and paramedics create better growth environments for themselves and their teams. Let's get started.

SPEAKER_03 0:29

And we're back.

SPEAKER_00 0:30

And Emmer Emmer Irving, I gotta get her name right, on Resilience Development and Action. We're talking about suicide. We're talking about we were just having a conversation about finding someone who was hanging. It was just known as a death, and suddenly you show up, it's a hanging with young kids, and you never cry on scene. And it sounds crazy, but that was difficult for you and whatever.

SPEAKER_02 0:51

But that's the issue I had, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 0:52

Okay, so let me start off. And this goes not just for you. I'm talking to the audience too, because a lot of them are first responders, but I'm gonna look you in the eye. Of course, it's not fucking crazy. You just saw someone who died and died on their own in front of their fucking kids. Sorry.

SPEAKER_02 1:06

And I would say that to someone else. Yeah, I would say that to someone else. That's my normal response.

SPEAKER_00 1:10

It's a normal response to an abnormal situation. And yes, civilians may not like would be, I get that they would be really because they're not used to that stuff. In your particular case, it's something that you deal with, but it's an abnormal situation. Yeah, one of the things that people do is like, oh, it's an abnormal situation I reacted normally to, therefore I'm crazy. It makes no sense to me whatsoever.

Anxiety Spiral And Intrusive Images

SPEAKER_02 1:32

I think it's it's because in our roles as a frontline worker, fireman, police, paramedic, whatever you are. I think you're you expect you you sort of have this what's the word I'm looking for? You don't expect to react that way. You're expected to deal with it and and to to manage it and to be calm and to be calm for everyone else on scene. And I think I didn't I wasn't embarrassed. It wasn't that I was embarrassed about crying, because I know that I'm allowed to get upset about things. I think it was the fact that I got emotional so suddenly, like I didn't have time to leave the room, I was in front of people, and I wasn't expecting the like overwhelming emotion. And I only found out that this was the cause of I'll tell you some of my symptoms I had after, but I only found out during therapy I had EDMR therapy, which is the sort of rapid eye movement therapy.

SPEAKER_00 2:21

The MDR is something I do myself, so I know exactly what it is.

SPEAKER_02 2:24

Yeah, so I had that and I only needed one or two sessions because it was that one episode, it wasn't so trauma.

SPEAKER_00 2:31

Not that I want you to have one, but so lucky it was just one.

SPEAKER_02 2:34

Yeah, I only had a couple of uh sessions and we addressed the it so after this event, for a couple of weeks I was sort of okay. I was thinking about it as you do with one of those. It wasn't there was nothing. So I think what's important is as soon as we finished that job, we were gonna head back to station for sort of a debrief, but we got a cardiac arrest to rode over, so that I then had to go and do another cardiac arrest and he passed. And that was more of an elderly person, sort of quite unwell when expected. So, but I think going straight into another job didn't help. And I think we reflected in my therapy that a debrief is very important and should have happened in this situation. I shouldn't have been allowed to go to another job, but you know, you can't say no when it's the road over, can you? You just you you can't in that moment, and that's where management should have said no for us, I think, in that situation. But yeah, in a couple of weeks after I felt okay, and then a few weeks down the line, I started getting very anxious at work, and I'm a very confident person at work, and I start getting very anxious, and with my abilities, my decision making sort of internally, and I gave a drug error because I was so anxious. No one was injured. It was a lady having she wasn't anaphylactic, but she was having a severe allergic reaction, and I gave her I am adrenaline and we're supposed to split the dose with five minutes intervals in between. I gave her the full dose, so she just felt very sick, she felt very sick, vomited. Other than that, she was fine and she thanked me for feeling better. So we were all okay, but I've never done that before, and I knew that I'd done that because I was getting very anxious, and that for me meant something was very wrong. And from then I went off work, and I think that's how I recognized it. So I went off sick, and from then it just sort of spiraled, really. I had I was having panic attacks leaving the house, I was seeing bad things wherever I went. You know, I'd walk up to the shop and I was seeing car accidents happening, you know, not necessarily relating to hangings, but someone dropping dead in front of me. It was like everything just kicked up. And I had this, I have the same window that she had at home, and I was imagining myself hanging in the window. And I did one of my assessments with occupational therapy when I was off and to go through to the therapy, and they said, you know, have you been suicidal? And I said, Well, no, like I've been seeing these visions, but I'm not suicide. Like, I don't want to die, but I just had such like intrusive thoughts, I guess it is like really intrusive thoughts. And yeah, I was off for about eight weeks and had the EDMR, and through that and replaying the scene, I was having panic attacks when I was getting out of breath, and it was all internal, it was all me losing control of the on the on scene and crying. I lost control of my emotions, and that's what it all came down to. And so all my symptoms after were me feeling out of control and losing control of you know, feeling out of breath, walking up a hill or like or you know, not controlling what's going on around me and how people are driving around me. It was just such random things, but it all came down to like a lack of control because I'd cried on scene, which I just find really interesting.

SPEAKER_00 5:46

Well I do too, because I I hear the lack of control. And I don't want to do your therapy, so I gotta be mindful here, so I gotta walk a line. But I see the lack of control, but I also see this oh my god, shouldn't I be able to handle this? Shouldn't I be able to do this?

SPEAKER_03 6:06

Shouldn't I be like this lack of my case?

SPEAKER_00 6:10

Confidence played a factor because you know, the other part too that I think in our field, and you correct me if I'm wrong, I encourage my officers, firefighters, paramedics, emts, dispatch. I say, look, there's something called passive suicidality. You don't want to die, but you're like, I wish sometimes I wasn't here, or I had these visions sometimes that I'm dead. And people are like, Oh, you're gonna take my gun away, you're gonna do this, you're gonna no, you need to be honest about these things so you can get through to the other side.

SPEAKER_02 6:40

Yeah, it doesn't mean you want it. Yeah, it was just yeah, just these visions, but things really spiraled then. And but I knew I'd luckily I'd picked up that something wasn't right because of how anxious I was feeling before that. So I was off and I'd already got the ball rolling on on therapy. And through work, I think I think my manager put in for the therapy, and um two weeks later I had my first session. So it yeah, it was super quick. And I was off eight weeks in total, and then after that, I loved being a paramedic. I really did, but I think moving to a new service, and then within two years, all of this happening, I think just sort of ruined it for me. I wasn't I I wasn't really that good friends with anyone there. I hadn't really fully settled, and I'd moved from one station to another, so I'd only have any gear at the station I was at, and I don't think there was enough people around me that I was close to in order for me to stay. I think what I was in London for six years, and I was I had a lot of good friends in London and I was really close to people in London. I think if I'd have been there, I might have stayed after all of this. But I think just being where I was, I just didn't feel comfortable enough, and it just yeah, it just put me off. I don't know, it's not I don't know, maybe I just lost confidence in myself, but I I I found other things that I want to do more in life. I love dogs, I've got my dog, I'll send you some pictures.

SPEAKER_00 7:59

There's a lot of dog lovers here.

SPEAKER_02 8:00

If I don't put up pictures, so I decided I wanted to walk dogs and get some exercise and keep bits. So I went part-time at work um as a paramedic and I opened a little dog walking business and I started walking dogs part-time, but with shift work that didn't really work out, and I thought, you know, I've got to think about what's good for me in life. And I thought, you know, doing shift work and and carrying on as a paramedic isn't what I'm gonna enjoy anymore. I don't enjoy it, so yeah, I left, but I didn't want to lose being a paramedic, you know, in case one day I want to go back to it, so the job I'm doing now means I can keep my registration and I can walk dogs and I can do things I enjoy, and I've got a nine to five life, and yeah, I'm enjoying it so far. And there's no trauma.

SPEAKER_00 8:43

Right. Well, debatable.

SPEAKER_02 8:45

But I don't have to sit in anyone's dirty house.

SPEAKER_00 8:48

I'm sorry, there's trauma everywhere in my opinion.

SPEAKER_02 8:50

That's there is okay, yeah. No, I agree, I agree.

SPEAKER_00 8:53

My my one of my best mentors said to me says to me and to a lot of people therapy exists for two reasons unresolved grief or unresolved trauma. If you take care of both of them, you probably will not need therapy. And to me, that's a great measurement of what it is. And I think that for keep your license going and all that, I I think that when you say you're not close to everyone, that's another conversation I had with other people who had trouble with their work because you know, you go to a call, maybe you struggle you you had a problem with it and all that, then the next call comes in. If you have no one on your department or, you know, on the ambulance or in the company, whatever you call them, to kind of like turn to, to talk to, then that makes the trauma worse. And sometimes it's finding that if you don't have that, maybe it is best for you to either find another place or, like you said, keep your paramedic, do something different.

SPEAKER_02 9:47

Yeah, try something different, do something you want to do. Yeah, don't get me wrong, they were very supportive, like they were very good about everything. The welfare was great for me.

unknown 9:56

Right.

SPEAKER_02 9:57

But yeah, I just didn't I just didn't feel comfortable in the position anymore. I think after like six, seven years, I feel like that's enough. Like you've seen it all. It's so exciting when you first start, isn't it? You know, blood, guts, gore, like drive fast, fast driving, blue lights like you want to do it all, you want to see everything. Oh, I wanted to hang in so badly. It sounds awful, but I just I wanted to go to these.

SPEAKER_00 10:18

If I had a dime for every time I heard that, I'd be I I have about a ten dollar bill here.

SPEAKER_02 10:22

And now, like six years later, it's like I don't I don't want to do any of it. And you know, you've either got the blood guts gore trauma stuff, which I you know I've seen it all now, and it's just every time you go, it just makes you a bit sadder. And then the rest of it just is relatively boring to me now. There's just there's no middle ground. It's either people that don't need an ambulance or it's traumatizing jobs, and I think I've had enough of that.

SPEAKER_00 10:50

Well, I think that that's so common a lot of people, like you say, you know, the blood and core and all that, and oh, I want to see my first hanging and this and that, and that's not uncommon. I hear that all the time.

SPEAKER_02 11:00

Like more than that.

SPEAKER_00 11:01

Until you do see them.

SPEAKER_02 11:03

Yeah, and then you're like, I don't know, actually. But um, I don't know what it's like in America, but in uh in England, in London, especially the like retention rate for staff is about six years before they leave.

SPEAKER_00 11:15

Oh, yeah. Well, I don't know the numbers for the private ambulances around here, that's what they call them for, you know, if you're working but the numbers can be good. I mean, I I think about the people I know. I can't think of anyone who stayed more than two years.

SPEAKER_02 11:29

I can't personally whether they go into another sort of paramedic-related job, like GP surgeries. In our GP surgeries, a lot of paramedics work in there, prescribing and seeing patients in GPs. That's quite a common one for people to go into. But most people, if you ask anyone, I think in an ambulance service, are they looking for another job? They probably are.

SPEAKER_00 11:48

And that's what I find in here too. And the you know, like in in the in the private ambulance, you either get the re the repeat people who need the same drive to whatever, but you don't get to do the stuff that maybe is more interesting sometimes, and you get repetitive and repetitive and repetitive. And then there's so much trauma someone can see before they get sick of it, too.

SPEAKER_02 12:13

Yeah, I wanted to be a critical care paramedic. That's what I wanted to do when I first became a paramedic, but I don't think I could handle seeing that all the time. It's all you do, it's just trauma. It's all the go-to. It's trauma and you know, the dead and the dying constantly. And I don't know if I could do that. I I I'd be very I think I'd be very good at it. Um I was very good at things like that, but I just don't think like mentally it's worth it. Person, I just don't think it is.

SPEAKER_00 12:39

And I think it's all about what you knowing yourself is key because you know, like I had to see one dead body in my life, I was all good. Didn't need to see any more. I was all set, and even you know, like that's what I tell people. I saw one, I'm good. I'm not talking about a funeral, I'm just talking about you know having to go to a call. I've seen a hanging, I'm all set. No need on any other hanging, I'm good. Overdose on pills, seen that. Like, name it, I probably have been either involved or seen it myself. I think that you learn coping mechanisms. And for me, what I find fascinating is some of these guys who do well in their career for a long period of time and they see all this blood and gut guts, so to speak. They're like, How do you put up with people telling you their story and their trauma all the time? To me, that's nothing. That's easy. That's the easy part. Going to a scene regularly, that's not something I want to do. That would be too traumatic for me. So I think that's something that's also the trauma that works for you. But go ahead.

SPEAKER_02 13:34

Yeah, I mean, secondhand trauma and hearing it is just as traumatic over time. It's one of those things that builds up, isn't it? Rather than an initial episode, like if you saw it. But I don't know, I I always thought I was very resilient. There's nothing wrong with you know not being able to handle certain things, but I always thought I was very resilient, and I probably still am, but I think that that incident just knocked me off completely. I don't think I can like look past the effect it had now. It makes me nervous. Like, what if something else happened and the effect was more? You know, like if I didn't get that therapy, what would have happened after eight weeks? I d I don't know. I was having such severe symptoms. Like they were really bad. Like I was, you know, I was hanging in the window in my mind while sitting in the living room. You know, I couldn't couldn't leave the house for the the bad symptoms. It's not just a bit of anxiety, you know, they were really intrusive thoughts and that actually said too. Yeah, I was having full-blown panic attacks because I went to take my bike. I I'd just got a bike and I thought, you know what, I'll go for a bike ride, you know, because I I put the bike out the front door and just had a panic attack because the thought of taking this bike out and getting out of breath, and it was just like silly stuff, like nothing, over nothing. I just couldn't go anywhere, I couldn't do anything. So if if I didn't have therapy, I don't know how I would have had a medication as well, which I just came off of. So I was on the medication, yeah, probably about six months. Um and I just came off of that, but I don't know what I would have ended up like in another five weeks waiting for therapy. So I think that made me nervous. I think it knocked me, and now I've got a bit of anxiety, I think, over how I cope with things.

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Coping Skills That Actually Help

SPEAKER_00 15:26

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SPEAKER_02 16:56

Yes, that are not gonna hurt you further.

SPEAKER_00 16:59

Exactly. So do you have any type of coping mechanisms that you suggest or that you've used on the front uh in the front line that helped you?

SPEAKER_02 17:07

And the main one is talking to other people, which is well like one of the reasons I've doing this, because I think sharing how and and the amount of times I mentioned it to someone at work and they told me a similar story they had, a similar event, a similar time during work that they'd had the same thing. And I was like, okay, so I'm not like actually going crazy, like this is quite a normal response. Whereas I if I hadn't spoken to people, I probably would have thought that I was, you know, having some really silly response and I was being ridiculous, and they made it like grounded it and made me what's the word? You know, made it normal for me, like a normal response. They made me realize that's a normal response. And I spoke to family and I spoke to my brother, and he is a fireman, and he'd gone to something and had a similar response, and I never knew about it. And I spoke, I spoke to him, I was telling him like what was happening, the symptoms I was having, I couldn't leave the house. And he said he had the same thing, and that helped so much just talking to someone else who had been through it, and talking to people that haven't been through it, it's better if they've been through it. But talking to other just talking to anyone about it really helped, and knowing when something's not right. So the fact that I was getting anxious whilst doing my job, so the point where I gave a medication error, that was not normal for me. Like that's not something I do. So I think recognizing that and taking time off work was really important to cope with it so that I could, you know, figure out what I needed to do next. And that was to speak to my managers, to ask for help and to get, you know, therapy started and to have an occupational therapy assessment. I think a lot of people sit on these signs and don't know you've got to have self-awareness, I think is like the key words. Self-awareness.

SPEAKER_00 18:49

Self-awareness is so key for coping mechanisms and knowing where you're at. I agree a hundred percent.

SPEAKER_02 18:54

Yeah. So I think having self-awareness and like good insight into who you are and how you cope with things is key.

SPEAKER_00 19:01

One of the conversations I would argue, and this is something that you you tell me how it is in England in the United States, too. This is not something that people like to do. But for me personally, I think it's also it sounds terrible the way I'm gonna say it, but calling out people. Hey, Emma, you're done looking good. What's going on?

SPEAKER_03 19:19

Yeah, yeah, no, absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 19:21

Having someone who calls you out on it, as much as it will create a defense mechanism in you, the coping mechanism is like shit, someone did actually care to ask me.

SPEAKER_02 19:30

Yeah, and we we have quite a good culture on my station at least. We had quite a good culture where you can, if you're worried about someone, you know, it's not snitching if you go and tell someone about it. You know, people actually appreciate if you maybe if you don't feel comfortable asking them, if you went to a manager and say, look, they're just not acting quite how they normally would, or you know, I'm a bit worried about them. That was actually something that I think most people would appreciate in the workplace. It's not like uh you've gone behind my back and most people would appreciate that. But I think it was also a work like a culture where you could just approach people anyway. Like I feel like even if I didn't know someone very well, I could say, like, are you okay? Like, what's going on? And my my crewmate, when I was on the when I did the drug era, he actually recognised I'd only worked with him a few times, but he recognised that this wasn't like right, and I was talking to him and he was like, you know, and then I spoke to one of like my best friends at work, and she's friends with him, and he was talking to her, and then I spoke to her, and they were like, Yeah, you need to go and so they supported me as well to make that decision, and and yeah, recognizing behavior changes in people you know is really important. I think my boyfriend actually was the one that said you need to I think you've got some sort of like PTSD or something because of the so he even recognized it and he you know he's not medical at all, he works for Google, so he's like the le the least medical person in the world.

SPEAKER_00 20:54

Yeah, well I was gonna say like uh he cares enough for you that way, hold on to it.

SPEAKER_02 20:58

Yeah, he noticed it. He noticed I was irritable and you know, things that I'm quite a happy-go-lucky person normally. I'm quite relaxed, but yeah, I was irritable in the house, you know, I was barely leaving. So he picked up on those things, and that helped as well.

SPEAKER_00 21:15

I was gonna joke around. There's easygoing people in England. Shocker.

SPEAKER_02 21:19

There's not many.

SPEAKER_00 21:20

Sorry, I maybe it's just me. Sorry, I pick on every cultures equally.

SPEAKER_02 21:24

We love a good confrontation here, don't we?

SPEAKER_00 21:27

Yes, but but but you know, like Americans are not used to that. They see the stereotype and they're like, oh my god. And I'm like, no, they're not confronting me.

SPEAKER_02 21:38

But I feel like Americans do as well, though.

SPEAKER_00 21:41

No, the difference is that if you tell me some opinion I don't agree with, you won't care and you won't try to convince me. Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. If we stop doing that, that'd be helpful.

SPEAKER_02 21:52

Just agree to disagree. That's quite a common phrase here. We say we'll just agree to disagree, and that's the end of the conversation.

SPEAKER_00 21:57

I mean, I I I grew up in Canada and I'm a French speaker first before I'm English. So believe me, I've had enough conflict with English in in my cr my lifetime. And yet we still haven't, you know, I've never shot someone. I've never hurt someone. Why? Because we agree to disagree and we move on. We don't need to move on.

SPEAKER_02 22:15

Yeah, no.

SPEAKER_00 22:16

So I don't know. I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 22:18

Work on the ambulance service in a town here and have a fight with the drunk person and maybe you'll disagree. But it's they can be very expressive and very stubborn.

SPEAKER_00 22:27

But you talked about coping mechanisms earlier. I think that's another great coping mechanism is saying, hey, listen, I don't agree with you. You're not going to agree with me. We can still talk to each other. We're just not going to agree. To me that's the other coping mechanism too is that yes you need people.

SPEAKER_02 22:42

You need to be able to right people.

SPEAKER_00 22:44

Right. But you also need to be able to be open to that conversation both sides.

SPEAKER_02 22:49

Because you got to be open to people saying things you don't want to hear.

SPEAKER_00 22:53

And I think that that's the biggest barrier here because I find that some places someone will be like you know Emma's not doing good. Oh did you tell her that no no I want you to say it. Why me? Why can't you go tell Emma? Oh I don't know if she's going to take it well. Who gives a shit if she takes it well or not? Go talk to her. Yeah. At least you know you've told her yeah if you say to her you look like shit that's probably not the best way to say it. Say hey Emma, you know what you haven't been yourself lately. You're kind of like acting differently and I don't really know you well are you okay?

SPEAKER_02 23:24

I think most people would respect and appreciate someone doing that wouldn't they? I know I would.

SPEAKER_00 23:29

And you well I would too and I think there's a lot of people here who will never say on record that that's what they want. But sometimes when they they would appreciate it.

SPEAKER_02 23:38

And even they might give a stress response you know people might not respond well to it but I think deep down that will help them in some way.

Culture Shift Around Suicide Risk

SPEAKER_00 23:47

How many times have I heard someone ask that question hey you're not you don't look good. What's going on? They leave but because they open that door three four hours later three four days later rolling doesn't it yeah yeah I think that that's another great coping mechanism tell people when they're not doing good and ask them what they're doing and if they need support. I think that the culture is not there. Around here you know we recently had a few months ago there's a woman who had just become a police officer and had some mental health issues but didn't know who to turn to and unfortunately committed suicide. And you know I if she knew who to reach out to or people would she would have been open to getting reached out I don't know and I don't want to blame them in any way shape or form. But the environment here is if you can't handle it the first year, what type of police officer, firefighter, paramedic MMT dispatcher are you going to be? I think there's a culture shift that has to occur that yeah maybe they didn't handle this one right but give them five years. If you can't handle it for five years then we'll have a conversation.

SPEAKER_02 24:47

I think the culture I mean in our ambulance service I think has improved massively I mean since I joined so yeah I've been in there I guess in the last six seven years that's pretty new and recent you know it's been it's been around a long time. There's people that have been in the ambulance service 30 years on my station I don't know how they've done it. But I think since I joined I've always found I don't know if that's just the energy I give out as well and you know the respect I give off but I've always found people to be very respectful and supportive of me and of other people and I know there's there's always going to be bullying there's always going to be racism there's always going to be hatred somewhere it's always going to happen. There's always going to be someone that does that. But I think and I'm obviously of a privileged position you know I'm a white female who you know I'm not going to come across a lot of that you know but never did I ever have anyone you know laugh at me for getting upset on a job or you know take the mick out of anyone's trauma. Everyone was very supportive and very you know the smallest thing can bring on some trauma or make you upset and people were very supportive of that which I don't think it always used to be like it used to be like you don't get upset about things and and I think we still think that I think that's why I had that traumatic response and the thoughts that why did I act like that I think we still expect ourselves to be able to handle things. But yeah I think as a service they don't have that culture definitely not as much anymore which is good.

SPEAKER_00 26:13

I mean I haven't I've I I've only been doing this for about 27 years give or take and I've seen a shift like in the culture in this time. I'm saying that there's a lot of improvements to be had but at the same time I've seen but I've seen this sexual harassment is still rough like that's something they need to that never happens women do not get harassed in their job of course not.

Sexual Harassment And Reporting It

SPEAKER_02 26:35

I actually that was another thing I had to deal with in the new ambulance service which in CCAM which didn't help I think with me not enjoying it the last two years I ended up as part of a to be fair I wasn't even a big part of it but I was I was working with a guy he sent some inappropriate comments it was the first it was my first shift on that station. He was the first person I'd met and um he didn't say anything about me personally but it was about like his sex life and stuff. And you know it's like this makes me feel uncomfortable. I sort of left it because it wasn't anything about me and I thought maybe he's just a bit you know too open. And then I spoke to a couple other females and one of them she's my friend now she had a worse experience with him and hadn't really spoken to anyone about it and I was like oh this isn't sounding good and then you know it turned out there was another person. So I was like we need to go and like speak to someone so I sort of got the ball rolling on that and said you know you need to come with me and and we reported it and so we ended up with a whole incident there which probably didn't help. But that you know that and Southeast Coast ambulance services in the news now for someone that's been fired you know sexual misconduct against students it it happens more often than you'd think.

SPEAKER_00 27:45

I mean it's not quite omerta but it's a version of Omerta if you ask me of like don't talk about it.

SPEAKER_02 27:53

Yeah it is please don't talk about it. And when we reported it it was all dealt with appropriately but my the manager of the station he he called us in and thanked us for reporting it and he said we've we've been aware of his conduct for years and no one's done anything and it wasn't until you guys actually came forward he said I think everybody's been aware of it everybody talks about it but no one reports it and he said we need to be acting on conversations we're hearing not just people that are reporting it so he you know thanked us for reporting it but he said sorry we hadn't dealt with it sooner so that you had to feel the need to report it. I think when you're hearing talks around the station as a manager you need to act on those and not just wait for someone to file a report well if you ask me if there's smoke there's fire. And if you hear smoke everyone knew what he was like you know there's nowhere which is why I reported it because it's not it's not one off thing.

SPEAKER_00 28:49

Yeah and I didn't want to do a firefighter analogy but here we are my brother will love it. But yeah no I think that that's what I I kind of tell people is that don't wait you don't need to have proof if there's smoke I'm not gonna say I'll wait till the fire that like the the flames really show up before I get upset. No bring it up and that's important and again sorry to and if it this offends anyone I frankly don't care. Women in the service of paramedics EMTs fire and police get a lot more sexual harassment than they let on and no yeah they put up just goes about it.

SPEAKER_02 29:26

And I think it depends what you'd put up with I would put up with a certain level like you know if someone's if I know someone's a good person and they're just joking around or you know there's someone a bit older and that's just how they're used to talking but I know they're completely harmless. You know things like that. There's like a certain level of banter I can have I'm very good at having sort of banter and knowing someone's character but when I don't know you and I've never met you and you're telling me these horrible things about your sex life like that's creepy. Don't do it I don't know what you're like I'm stuck in an ambulance with you for 12 hours.

SPEAKER_00 29:56

And it's not it's no longer banter.

SPEAKER_02 29:58

No it's not it's just awkward.

How To Reach Emma Closing

SPEAKER_00 30:00

I can banter with the best of them but when it gets awkward and you know I I tell people you know you banter like that with someone you know not someone you don't know. And I'll uh I'll finish on my little rant here by saying yeah if it smells like a rose and looks like a rose you don't need to be pricked to know it's a rose but if it smells like shit and looks like shit you don't need to lick it to know it's shit. So therefore if it feels uncomfortable say something. Because it's uncomfortable. It doesn't mean like it might get comfortable eventually. Yeah so I agree. I mean having done this great analogy that people always go like how can we reach you? I mean this is about we we've gone for about an hour which is really great but I would like to know how people can reach you.

SPEAKER_02 30:43

Yeah I have Instagram okay bear with me because I don't actually know what it is so just bear with me. I'm on Facebook Emma Irwin if anyone wants to send me an email like if anyone wants to talk about anything that I'm always open for a conversation if anyone's experienced anything like I have and they just want to talk to someone that's been through something similar you can email me.

SPEAKER_00 31:03

Do you want me to just say my email you can send it to me and I'll put it in the show notes. Yeah I'll send it to you and we'll put it in the show notes I'll put like my Instagram my email and I've got a my own podcast um it's a true crime podcast so I'll I'll send that it's called the last and the lost that I'm that that fascinates a lot of people here so yeah I'll send that over as well I know there's loads out there these days so we'll see if I can my girlfriend will probably just listen to it because uh you you said you had one so that's yeah that's how it is I'll send yeah I'll send it all over well I'll go listen to it too actually so what's the name of the podcast?

SPEAKER_02 31:37

The Last and the Lost.

SPEAKER_00 31:39

So we'll put that in the show notes everything if you want to reach her but you know Emma I I gotta tell you that I did not expect like I you know you meet someone online you're like how is it gonna be this hour flew by it was a great conversation and truly appreciate your candor and I hope some people are listening are going to appreciate it too so thank you for your time. Hopefully that's yeah that's why I'm here just hopefully someone hears it and it helps someone and you can go to England and know how things go there which I'll show you around show you around Ashford and and just to put a little cherry on top here don't go don't go to Oxford University it'll get spit on anyway. Have a great rest of the day and thank you for your time.

SPEAKER_01 32:24

Thanks for having me please like subscribe and follow this podcast on your favorite platform a glowing review is always helpful. And as a reminder this podcast is for informational educational and entertainment purposes only if you're struggling with a mental health or substance abuse issue please reach out to a professional counselor for consultation. If you are in a mental health crisis call 988 for assistance this number is available in the United States and Canada