"You Are Never Ever Alone": A Message for Every First Responder | Dennis Carradin

[0:00]  You're never alone. You are never ever alone. There's enough people out there that are willing to help. There's enough people that will hold what you say sacred. And this goes for firefighter, nurse, EMT, dispatcher, nur doctor, whatever it is. Your heaviest day, I will hold that. I will hold that until you're ready again to hold it. I have gone every single Monday for 11 years to buy coffee from my guys.

[0:31]  No way.

[0:32]  To him, man. I wish crisis was convenient. You know, it should only happen between, you know, 10:00 a.m. and 400 p.m. But

[0:39]  yeah,

[0:39]  you know, now, you know, there's once, you know, we have we have the little jokes is that, you know, crisis should only happen at 3:00 a.m. There's 225,000 licensed therapists in the United States. And in those licensed therapists, it includes social workers, professional counselors, psychologists, psychiatrists, uh, marriage and family therapists, 225,000. Less than 500 specialize in first responders and healthcare workers. Less than 500. If we don't partner with the right people, if we don't collaborate with the right people, then we die. We do not survive this. Welcome back to another episode here on the Heart and Hustle Podcast. And Dennis, before we get into titles and organizations, man, you've been on the ground 9/11, Katrina, Sandy Hook, Post, Coline, 30 years of just showing up in the worst moments in American history. Who are you at the core, man?

[1:52]  So, I am a retired pizza maker and I am a father of three is who I am at at the absolute core. Look, and I and I said this and you know that you know I have have my little Tik Tok obsession now where I'm doing videos and all that is that I I what I do is a trauma therapist and I've been a trauma therapist for for 30 years now. Um, I specialize within uh within first responders and I specialize in in health care folks and I do world disasters and I do mass shootings and all but at the core I am a fouryear-old that started flipping pizzas at the St. Anony's Italian festival and I am I am a father of a 28-year-old, a 24y old and a 4 and 1/2year-old because I know what I did during the pandemic. Thank you very I was going to say, "What the hell happened there, Denny?"

[2:46]  No, I you know, that's my little buddy. I, you know, there and I and I'll tell you right now, you know, it's it's wild for me when I was in my 20s, when I was a young guy in my early 20s having my two older kids who I who I absolutely adore. I raised them on my own. I was a single father and and absolutely adore them. But when this little one came around, I I can't get enough time with her. can't get enough, you know, love it. Like even this afternoon, I'm taking her to swim lesson and, you know, it's just it's this wild stuff that I I really enjoy because I think I have I have a little bit more patience now uh in my 50s than I did when I was like, you know, 24 25 years old. You know,

[3:28]  you know what's funny is when someone asks me like, "What do you learn from being a parent?" The first thing I say very quickly is patience. Um, and my best friend, she's she's in the middle right now of, you know, being pregnant and about to be a mother and she has no patience. I said, "You better get it together because your child is about to teach you this patience." I got two. So,

[3:48]  God bless. You know, no, I you know, patience is when they say patience, patience is a virtue. I think it's a needed commodity. you I patience that if I could sell that I'd be a billionaire because

[4:02]  I you know this little girl like even this morning she came in at like 2:30 in the morning and she does and it's cute and I get it you know I'm I'm out cold and I get the knock on the door swings open I got to go potty and I'm like thank you for telling you know it's 230 yeah and you don't I I don't get upset you know obviously I try to I try to teach her right from wrong you you know, and so forth. But, you know, it it's wild. And then the contrasting view is that here I am this this father, you know, and this retired pizza maker and whatever it is, but then I've been on these world disasters and I see patients every day and and we do these things that ultimately are just so almost contradictory, but yet that's that's a part of who I am and and and what I love, you know,

[4:52]  and kind of just talking a little bit about just the story. you you shared a story with me of the space that you're in and it was about the Dunk and Donuts moment at Sandy Hook. Uh random girl, right? Large large large black coffee and she starts crying and that kind of became the foundation of everything you continue to build.

[5:08]  How does something that small become something that big and and we you know from a child, right? Something that small becomes so big in our lives and this same thing small moment becomes so big in your life.

[5:18]  Well, you you think about the uh butterfly effect, right? You know, you've you've heard of that. You know, the butterfly flaps his wings off the white, you know, the white coast of Africa and we have a we have a uh hurricane here in the United States because of the butterfly effect. There's that ripple effect of little things and the the story of Sandy Sandy Hook is uh the my why or the reason for uh for the trauma survivors foundation. And you know, you I ran into a college gohead at 6:00 in the morning. Uh that as I ordered a large black coffee, she starts crying and I find out that her nephew was one of the boys that were murdered at at Sandy Hook. And talking to her and understanding that she didn't have money for therapy and and me offering 10 free sessions with a friend that was in that area, I don't know. I you know it's it's one of those things of we'll call it karma kismmit we'll call it you know natural happen stance or whatever it is but it's looking at those moments and understanding that's the moment you have to step up that's the moment that you have to put every bit of your effort into making something right and it and it's not huge things either and it's you know as a story I I had moved from Delaware to uh to Glenn Mills Pennsylvania and I was driving down on the one road to come to my office. And this is this is 11 years ago, right? And I stop in a Waw Wa to get to get a coffee. That's our convenience stores. If you if you know the Delaware Valley, people love our Waw Was. And I love

[6:55]  Wawas, man. I love them.

[6:57]  There you go. And uh I stopped in and there was a group of older gentlemen that were sitting kind of outside, you know, the gathering spot, you know, what have you. And I walked up and I found out immediately they were all Vietnam veterans. So I bought them coffee that that first day and I just sat and chatted with them. I thought, "Oh, you know, let me let me hear from the stories." When when I say that was just a happen stance, I have gone every single Monday for 11 years to buy coffee from my guys.

[7:31]  No way.

[7:32]  Talk to them. And if

[7:34]  still to this day,

[7:36]  oh god. Yeah. I just did it did it Monday and we were talking about how dreadful the Phillies may be coming up this. You know, they're they're very they're not looking they're not looking well on to the Eagles either. So, we we we got some we got some issues here. But, it's it's those moments that I think you have to step up. You have to be real about yourself and you have to be real about the people around you. And and you don't have to be a super person. You don't have to be, you know, an incredible spiritual person. You just have to be somebody that takes notice of what's around you. And those little moments I've I've tried to to capitalize on on my entire life.

[8:19]  Dennis, I will go back to a lot more of what you're doing, but something that you mentioned of, you know, that black coffee and Dunkin Donuts and being able to just call a friend and says, "Hey, can we do this?" Uh, you talked about for the last 11 years on a Monday, the communication aspect, right? I'm a big believer that communication and network I mean you have to have it in a space like today where the government um everyone's afraid of what's happening next right and it's like how do we communicate and network so that we don't sit here and you know overwhelmed and that's why we have these conversations there leaders just like you they're asking themselves what's next

[8:51]  how powerful is that communication network where you can just make a call and be that resource that asset for somebody

[8:57]  how how powerful has that been for you actually I would say

[9:00]  you know as a as an Italian Catholic We always have a guy, you know, it's it's or you need your car fixed, I got a guy. You know, you need the roof fixed on your house, I got a guy. Networking, look, man, you know, networking is is just absolute a necessity in this world. And it's not just about those those little things is that you have to know people to kind of get it together. We just had uh a graduating class from the Wilmington Police Department. Uh, we just graduated. I think it was 19 new officers and their lead sergeant was talking to another AR officer and said, "Look, I would love uh to do a warriors breakfast for him when they graduate. Would love to do a breakfast." And he goes, "Hold on. I know a guy." And he gives the officer gave me a call and said, "Hey, ma'am, would you like to provide breakfast for this?" And absolutely. And I talked to the sergeant and he couldn't get the words out and I was like, "Okay, how many people? What do you need? I got eggs. I got sandwiches." And da da d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d d it's it's the way that we have to get things done. The problem is and let let's speak to our political climate right now of how we're so divided is that we're afraid to talk to each other. We're afraid to have a conversation or what happens is is in that conversation people shut each other down. Like you can't have an opinion and not hear that opinion. Now you get shut down from that opinion. In networking and communicationwise, you're trying to establish a pattern where I'm going to help you no matter what. Like I my guys on on Monday mornings, my coffee club, my little crew, you know, I call them the wrecking crew, but we'll talk about that later. My little crew, I don't care their political affiliation. I I don't I care about them. I care about them as people. So if somebody came to me and said, "Well, you know, I'm I'm not a, you know, so and so supporter or whatever it is." Cool. Who are you? You know, who are you to the core? Are you a kind person? Are you a mother, a father? Are you somebody that served our country? Are you somebody that, you know, can can do welding, you know, or whatever it is. it. To me, we we've fallen into this bizarre pattern that no one can have an opinion and we all have to either see, you know, black or white or we have to be 0 to 60. And and that's not how things get done. Not in the real world.

[11:30]  Hey, if you're getting value from this conversation, do us a favor and hit that subscribe button. We drop episodes like this regularly and we don't want you to miss a single one. Now, let's get back to it.

[11:40]  Yeah. No, I definitely agree, man. I am one that it's sad to see especially via social you know these people that have a strong stance and if you're not here you know they aren't friending you they're saying all these things

[11:51]  and I'm with you man I love people I love humanity you know it's like I don't care who you like and and you know what team you like or what not Republican Democrat to me is as humans we've lived these lives you know on some trauma right going back to you were a blue collar Philly kid making pizza right first in your family to graduate college,

[12:14]  first to become a therapist. Do you think that background actually makes you better at this work than someone who had it easier?

[12:21]  It makes me a little prone to cussing. I think it is that I No, I think I because I didn't I you know, and I hate to say it, I I didn't grow up in a white tower. And I think I you know, it's funny. I had a conversation, not funny. Haha. We had an event. We actually had a couple events this weekend and one of the one of the events uh was our Philly Beerfest, right? You know, we were at the 23rd Street Armory. It was a great great time. I actually did a little video of it. And what I find is that these younger therapists when they meet me, they start with their resume to me. So I they'll walk up to me and I'm like, "Hey, I'm Dennis." And then they'll walk up and say, "Oh, hi. I'm trauma informed. I have alternate care and I'm LGBTQ and then I studied under so and so and such and such and I was like wow I just had seven beers I'm a little hammered right now you and and I think my background created practicality in therapy I think when you're when you're raised in an environment you're not looking at a person sitting across from you as a human you're looking at them as an agenda or you're looking at them has a narrative or you're looking at them as a diagnosis and I look at the people sitting across from me as a person like it, you know, the the patient wise obviously I you know my specialties with first responders and healthcare are a little different but you when they walk in they're a whole person. You know I'm going to revel in their successes. I'm going to help them through their failures where I'm not going to look at them and go, "Oh, well, you were traumatized as a kid, so here's the formulaic approach that I have to take to you and then ultimately I will diagnose you and this is exactly no, you're a person first." And I think maybe, you know, and I don't want to don't want to throw anything out there, you know, maybe my background was more akin to knowing a person versus kind of, you know, a diagnosis. Yeah.

[14:29]  Although I diagnose everybody, it's just name of the game, you know.

[14:33]  Hey man, that's that's that's what you signed up for, right? No, I think it's it's a a very as we kind of talked about earlier when we talk about all these different places and me and you were able to talk about post and what that actually, you know, looked like for me and and and you from your experience what it actually looked like. But I think people may not understand like trauma trauma survivors foundation and what actually looks like today, right? Can you kind of walk us through because from the outside people might think it's one thing but you have you know teams uh university training programs national conferences uh scholarship programs and a first responder app and I might be incorrect but I did my research right am I right here. How do you even

[15:09]  Well, man, you did well, you know.

[15:10]  How do you describe all of that, man? Like, a lot of things to describe.

[15:13]  Lot of lot of coffee, a lot of uh a lot of caffeine. It's

[15:18]  coffee is your thing. I see. Huh.

[15:20]  Now, you know what? It's funny. We we started with that simple, you know, it it started with our gal up in up in Sandy Hook. You know, being a trauma therapist through the years, I was being called to the all natural disasters, mass shootings, you know, you know, the the world disasters. You know, I I can honestly say I've been worldwide to some of the most horrific events that have been known to man. And when you are humbled by somebody by just ordering a black coffee and and they they break down in front of you, you know that that call to action has to be pretty quick. You have to you have to do it swiftly. So, the initial part of the foundation was just being able to do the follow-up care after an incident. like, you know, we're called in immediately. So, we're called in once something happened. It's kind of funny. Um it it was never it it's one of those things of knowing when things happen before everybody else knows that they're happening. Like I'm called to things the minute they happen and it doesn't break the news until three hours after I've been there, you know? And so that it's kind of special, but at the same token, you're doing immediate work. The work that the foundation is trying to do is the follow-up care of the days, the weeks, the months later that somebody is sitting alone thinking, "My god, I just went through the worst day of my entire life and it's affecting me." So, we started with that model, the the five session model of if somebody gave us a call based in these events, you know, we would get them to one of our therapists that you could see and it's going to be free of charge. So we went there and then we started thinking well wait a minute we're we're working with first responders as well. So we want to provide them the mental health care. Oh wait we're working with ER staff and hospital. We we want to provide them with care. So it started building and then we said okay this is enormous right you know this is huge. So, we started uh developing programs where we're teaching first responders and healthcare workers how to debrief each other, how to take care of each other, and then and then it goes, well, okay, so now we're doing that. What else do we need to do? Oh, let's try therapy dogs. That makes sense. And it everything continued to build on what it was. And then in the course of it all, you start having events to to fund raise. And then you start doing uh podcasts and then you start doing you know Tik Toks and so everything just became natural progression to it. You know the foundation right now we're working on e-learning. So we are going to have on the platform e-learning where someone can come in and get a crisis intervention certification through our our website in an e-learning platform. So, you think about, you know, the the the police officer in Montgomery, Texas that wants to help their department, then they could go to our website, do the e-learning, uh have some uh have some leadership courses and so on, and now they bring it back to their department, and they're the go-to person for for mental health. So, we're we're trying to expand it, not just, you know, not just first responders healthcare. We we want to expand it even further. Uh we have a we have a program, a a weekendl long training program very specifically for therapists who want to work with first responders in healthcare because it it is an absolute niche market that there's not many of us. We I was doing the numbers. I was talking to my intern Gary about it. The numbers are wild. There's there's 225,000 licensed therapists in the United States. And in those licensed therapists, it includes social workers, professional counselors, psychologists, psychiatrists, uh marriage and family therapists. 225,000.

[19:18]  Less than 500 specialize in first responders and healthcare workers. Less than 500.

[19:25]  Yeah. I was going to ask you why are first responders so undeserved when it comes like mental health even though they're literally the ones observing everybody else's trauma every single day.

[19:33]  I you know I there's there's two hard truths to that question. Number one, people don't understand the culture or they have pre preconceived notions of the culture. They also understand how difficult it is to get into that culture. So that that's one side. The other side to it is that therapists don't believe that they're they can make a living by doing something that niche. So if they expand their practice with more diversity of patient, they think, "Oh, well, I can make more money this way." So there there's different reasons, you know, but the reality is is that our program allows therapists that we'll say are first responder curious, if that makes sense, you know, that that would like to start working with them. We train them of what exactly to do if they have a first responder sitting in front of them.

[20:25]  I also just just sitting here just talking to you on this. I always think like because you guys are the strong ones, right? First responders are are strong ones. A lot of times those strong individuals kind of get put to the side, right? And I imagine even people like us that we seem always happy that we got it together, right?

[20:41]  Ourselves, right? We we still need a therapist. We still need that mental health check-in. Sometimes people don't check in on us because they think we're the strong ones that we got to go together. And I think it's the same thing for first responders, right? Your your police officers, your your firefighters. By the way, I think firefighters are super underrated at what they do.

[20:58]  Um I used to work at Subway and we used to give 50% off to police officers, right?

[21:03]  I used to give it to just first responders in general because I'm like

[21:06]  that guy that went and and into the fire and all this stuff, like he put his body on the line, you know? Like why are we not caring for that level the same way across the board? and we're seeing it even at at the mental health level which is kind of sad but I'm happy that you're in it making you know changes. Well, no to speak to that directly, I you know, I did 25 years as a volunteer firefighter and volunteer EMT and and there was this debate uh just recently, like within the past week, a couple of weeks, somebody had posted a video of saying, "Well, I'm I'm a nurse. I'm an ICU nurse or something. I should I should be considered a first responder and I should get that 10 uh 10% discount or 50% discount or or whatever it is and I I didn't know that it was a huge pissing contest into who was considered a first responder. You know, it like no, it it's funny when an officer and let's speak to an officer directly. An officer goes into a WAWA and WAWA employees are told, "Give them a coffee for free if they're in the uniform." And the officer will actively try to pay for the coffee. Now, if I ever got off the fire truck and I was in bunker gear and somebody offered me a free coffee, hell yeah, I'm taking that free coffee, you know? So, there's a little not an ethical difference, but I think people start they question who's a first responder, who's not a first responder. And and it literally goes into that into that weird model. If we look at numbers again, right now in the United States there's 1.1 million certified police officers. Okay, in the United States there's 850,000 volunteer and career firefighters. Now let's drop that down to 50,000 EMTs. Drop that even further down to 20,000 paramedics out of 382 million people. it. They're statistic anomalies.

[23:07]  So, okay, we're going to give them 50 50% off for somebody that's saving your life that literally is making less than somebody working at a bank making less and you're going to give them 50% off, but yet somebody's going to and complain about that. That makes no sense to me. Help them. Give them give them a free coffee. Give me a free coffee. Damn it, I want one. You know, it's it's it's a it's a people thing sometimes, man. I just think some people could be take their job a little too serious, but I also think it's just education, be quite frank, and we know that like it's just sometimes being ignorant to something or whatever it is. And good thing we have these conversations maybe to change somebody's mindset on this. The team, I mean, you're talking about all these amazing things. How long one have you been doing this? And what does that team size look like, man? Because you're naming a lot of things. And Dennis, I know you're not doing it all.

[23:57]  No, no, it's all just me. That's all. We so in our network we have about 2800 trained therapists that are in the network. Uh they are they go out on the crisis calls. They'll go and they'll sit with sit with things. When I when I say specialize, remember less than 500 specialized, but these are folks that have the training that can that can sit with our trauma survivors. So ultimately it it's not all police and and and health or not all first responders in healthcare. These are survivors of traumatic incidents. So, we have them. We we have folks in 41 different states. Uh to date, we have trained between five and 6,000 first responders in crisis care.

[24:42]  So, state of Delaware, I run the uh the state of Delaware's um clinical director for for the uh for the SISM team here. We roughly have 175 trained folks in the state of Delaware. I do uh in the Philadelphia area as well. So we have an additional like 3 to 400 there. So the numbers are there. We have the numbers to help people. Like um we had the incident in Philadelphia with the medical plane crash. Uh 493 first responders showed up to scene and we roughly had 120 uh helpers. We had 120 other first responders that were trained in crisis. We had roughly 20 therapists that came in to to help out during that time. So yeah, it's it's a it's an interesting little network manager, Jen. She she figures all that stuff out.

[25:35]  I got you. I got you. That I ask you, man. Like I I don't know how you do this job, Dar. I'm an emotional person. I don't know when I became emotional. Um I jokingly tell my wife, I think I'm on my period today or something. Um, but you know, how do you not just break down and get emotional and some of these like or do you you know, we're humans,

[25:53]  you know? It it it's funny. I had I had a I had a horrible day and this was this was last week. I had this just tremendously horrible day. It was like just nonstop. Just, you know, there was a a few crisis calls. There was patience. It was nonstop. And I I you know, as I said, my uh my 4 and 1/ halfyear-old comes running into my room at 2:00 a.m. And I had gotten her, you know, at the end of the day, got her to bed, and I just put my head down, just, you know, tons of crawls, just tons of everything going on. I put my head down. She comes into the room and she just looks at me and she goes, "Daddy, I love you." And she kissed me in the forehead and then she came back to her room. I I will tell you as God is my witness, I was balling like a 5-year-old. I was just completely involved. And it look emotionality is like we're we're trained. I mean, that's number one. You know, you're you're you're a trained individual to sit with somebody's worst day. You're you're you're trained to sit with that heaviness. And that's okay. That training kicks in. But humankind means is that sometimes I park the car in the driveway and I have to sit there for five or 10 minutes just to gather myself, you know, or I've known that I've, you know, I have a 35 minute commute home that I've ridden that 35 minutes in complete silence because I just have to get myself together, you know, and god forbid if I watch like some stupid like, you know, commercial on TV like, oh, the Budweiser commercial with the with the one with the Super Bowl with the Clyde and the Eagle. I I'm balling my eyes out. It's

[27:38]  not.

[27:38]  Yeah, man. I hate it. I hate when I'm watching something like that. I just get emotional like, what the hell's going on here?

[27:43]  That's a sign of maturity, my man. That's That's all that is. That's sign of maturity.

[27:48]  That's why the white hairs are coming in. I'm maturing here. All right. Cool. Cool. Um, listen, Dennis, this is cool, man. And you just talked about all those people, but leading a team isn't isn't easy with a team as as lean as you're doing work with at this scale. What keeps you up at night operationally? Like

[28:04]  is there something that you know is slipping through the cracks?

[28:07]  Yeah, I you know, it's funny. I I am very much somebody that I maybe it's my nature, maybe it's whatever. I worry about my team. I worry about my people. I I I I don't necessarily do. I worry about the patient. Absolutely. There there's not a day that goes by that I don't think about the individuals affected by trauma, but I worry about my team. I check on them all the time. If they've been through like a debriefing for a shooting or for a mass casualty or anything like that, I will be up at night just thinking about like, my god, should I give them a call? No, it's 3 in the morning. Don't give them a call. Wait till at least 6:00 in the morning to give them a call to check on them. is that I I do that's the one thing I worry about and I don't ever want them to ever feel alone like they that I'm a phone call away or you know one of my you know one of my other directors is just a phone call away

[29:04]  and and you know that that I think that keeps me up outside of a four and a halfyear-old that has to go to the potty that that that keeps me up. So that's why I try to do, you know, informative phone calls. I'll send out emails. I'll do newsletters. I'll make sure that I do uh articles, you know, the blog articles and all just so that we have the latest information. I'm also, you know, the the pep rally guy. I'll give somebody a text, hey, how you doing? Or send them a silly meme just because, you know, I know that they probably had a really rough time.

[29:38]  I love that, man. And I also with everything that you're doing in the space that you're in, first responders aren't calling up at 9:00 am. And this for those that are listening um on a Tuesday, right? Survivors don't just wait for business hours. How does you guys uh handle that gap right now? Like 2 a.m. moment when someone finally gets that courage to reach out. How do they reach out?

[29:57]  So, a couple of ways. Obviously, they could call our 800 number um and that'll get somebody. We do have on call people with that. uh we encourage people to go directly to our website where we have we have an activation. So you go into our website, you fill it out and and we will get right back to you to you with it. Um, you know, sadly, because crisis happens all the time, we do get the 2 a.m. phone call and, you know, I'm doing a chain. I'm doing a text chain where I'm texting out to our entire network of who's available for this crisis call or whatever it is. And you're absolutely right. I man, I wish crisis was convenient. You know, it should only happen between, you know, 10:00 a.m. and 400 pm. But

[30:43]  yeah,

[30:44]  you know, now you know it there's once, you know, we have we have the little jokes is that, you know, crisis should only happen at 3:00 a.m. So, you know, it you never really want to get a good night's sleep, but but you figure, you know, I was talking to um we had a uh school shooting in Terrace Ridge in British Columbia near Vancouver, Canada that was very similar to uh to the uh Coline shooting. And it was very very similar, very similar to Sandy Hook actually. And I got a phone call on a Friday. It was like at at 10:00 and they wanted me to speak about the about the shooting at 11:00. And it was like, okay, okay. Okay. All right. We're going to change people around. And you know, and again, you you want to accommodate as much as possible. Then that begs the question, are there things that we just don't go to or we just can't? Look, there there's no lie to it. There is a crisis every single day. You know, we we live in a world that things happen every single day. Do we miss some of those calls? Yeah. You know, let's be human about it. I would love a 100% success rating. I could say we have a 100% success rating of the events that we go on, but there are things that we can't like legitimately get to or if we don't have people in that area, we can we can offer teleaalth. We can offer some other help, but sometimes we just can't get there.

[32:17]  Yeah, it makes sense. I mean, we could only do but so much, right? And there's just so many new things and I could imagine at some point at 3 o'clock in the morning, we answer those questions within time, right? We just there's so many new things happening. But I think that um no one really wants to make some moves, right? Nonprofit funding is kind of getting cut. Programs are folding and and I'm not saying it's happening in your organization, but I've seen plenty of organizations that are living in fear right now and don't want to make moves. However, I think that if you don't make moves now and you're not really pivoting, you're probably going to be folding to my honest opinion from leading an organization.

[32:48]  Um but organizations are making impossible choices right now, man. What's your message to leaders in that space who are scared?

[32:55]  Hang tough. I mean, truthfully, uh, we've we've seen a decline in just donation wise. I think that's across the board. I think that's anywhere between 27 and 35% decline in just the past 6 months of donations across the board. Now, look, again, we can get back into political stuff and what have you. I understand we're trying to run a leaner government and so on. We also have to I leaderships that have been around for a while, they also have to understand that, you know, we're all in it for the right reasons. Now we just have to be in it on the long haul for the the the right reasons.

[33:34]  You know, there's there was a surge and I and I say this especially during the pandemic. Um, there was a surge of people trying to get 501c3s and you were finding out that they were not legitimate nonprofits. And I'm saying that in the in the nicest, most elegant way I I I could possibly say. So when you had people that were doing nefarious things with a 501c3, then ultimately everybody suffers. And so people already started pointing fingers. You know, they started pointing fingers. Oh, it's the Trump administration. Oh, it was the Biden administration. No, no. This was a very long burn that ultimately got us to where we are right now. You know, the economy didn't tank in the past year. The economy has been tanking since Obama administration. We we have to understand that. And so nonprofits typically are the ones that get hit the fir hit the hit the worst because ultimately we are running not only with grants, not only with with funding, but we are we are literally relying on donors to say, "Hey, you know, help us with this." You know, huge donors have stopped donating money because they just can't. You know, you saw I you know, we've we've seen a trend with we have our we have a 501 or 501, we have a 5K coming up. We call it the St. Patrick's Revenge 5K. And even sponsors to 5Ks, they're inundated with, you know, 400 5Ks in a month. And and a sponsor is now just trying to pick the one that makes the most sense to them to give them money. So even in that realm, we have to understand that this has been a long burn. This has been a problem. And now we pivot and understand that, okay, maybe we make our services a little leaner. Maybe we look at different sponsors to help us out. Maybe we look at different programs to help us out. But if you're in it, you're in it for the long haul and and to hang tough for a long time.

[35:42]  Yeah. And the way I look at it, man, is we're extension of the government, right? The government can't be anywhere everywhere. And as 501c3s and nonprofits, we we play those roles. And if, as you mentioned, if one person is doing wrong, yeah, we all take that hit. We got to figure out how do we get this back together cuz we're all asking for these funding and this money,

[36:00]  but are we getting um um solutions with all this money going out, right? And I think that's where they're really kind of managing it and seeing things. And listen, from one leader to another, I think that if I was running the I would have to make some of these changes as well. It's what's what's best for the country, what's best for the business in case

[36:19]  and at any organization level, you have to make those decisions. So, I appreciate that you give that advice to those that are in it. We talked about pandemic. So many people thought they were fold during the pandemic, but they came out stronger. You know, I think we learned so much during that time on how to come together, what it looks like to partner up, and we're we just need to get back to those days on what does it look like for us to collaborate.

[36:39]  Maybe we don't fold, but maybe we merge with someone that they're good at this and we're good at this. Why are we fighting the same mission? You know, and I think that's just kind of the problem. All these nonprofits fighting the same mission. Reality, man, we need more volunteers. We need more donors. We need more people to kind of show up so we can do this together versus independently.

[36:56]  You know, volunteerism, you know, that's another one. Volunteerism is way down, way down across the board. It It's wild where prior to the pandemic, you had volunteers that are just crawling out of the woodwork to help. And after the pandemic, not not so much. It was funny during the pandemic, you know, that was probably one of our we started what was called the hospital heroes food drive during the pandemic. I the outpouring that we saw we partnered with 128 restaurants that would have failed would have failed if it wasn't for that program. We had delivered close to 500,000 meals to to first responders and hospitals and and everything in between. And it the outpouring for that time was just was was amazing. However, when the pandemic when the when the walls opened up again, that program was like, "Okay, we're not giving you any more money." Because that was a necessity. Now it's not. And it was wild how quickly it had to pivot to something else. You know, we even did Christ, we didund 150 deliveries with like dog and cat food. It was like, it was just so wild. It was so wild of a time. And if we didn't partner with those, you think about it. Here's a mom and pop restaurant that me ordering 200 meals from was the difference between them closing their doors forever and being able to sustain six more months.

[38:31]  You know, it very wild time. So again, leadership has to understand that we've been in a slow burn for a long time. And you're absolutely right. If we don't partner with the right people, if we don't collaborate with the right people, then we die. We do not survive this.

[38:50]  Then uh then it's 30 years, man, doing this. What's the story that still gets you? The one you carry forever.

[38:58]  Ah, so

[39:00]  how to put you in the hot seat, you know? Man, that that's a tough one. I there's so many and it's funny, you know, and I I've been saying it's funny a lot because it's just the journey of it all. There was probably one and I I think there was a funny one and then there was one, you know, that just hits you that the funny one that ultimately I I will remember, you know, to this day. Uh, I was we were tasked my partner and I when we were down at the Hurricane Katrina relief efforts, I was down in that area for 4 months and we were tasked to find 350 people. Whether they were alive or dead, we had to find them and it was just it was it was an insane time. So, my partner and I had gone down. We were in this makeshift uh emergency response vehicle and it had just been one hell of a day. We found I think at that point we we probably only found about 50 people and out of the 50 names that we had we had 350 names. Out of those 50 that we found, 30 were dead. And that was t and you're trying to tell the families and you're trying to to move around and it just happened to be 115 degree day. We were just having more and more issues. And I I got that that Italian little whatever in me. And I'm standing at this this intersection where the signs were blown down and we're trying to find this this woman. We were trying to find this person. We couldn't find this family. The family was asking us to find them. And here I am at this intersection. There's no signs. Houses are all ripped up. And I lost my mind. Like I I went street real quick. I am I'm cussing out the heavens. I'm cussing out hell. I'm cussing out every And lit. My poor partner is looking at me now. My partner at the time was a Colorado State police officer. He's now an Episcopal priest. So I think I scared the hell out of him, you know. So Steve is trying Steve's trying to calm me.

[41:13]  It was the curse words. It was the curse words. He got to him.

[41:15]  I I literally if I don't go to hell for that one day, I I don't know how I'm not going to get there. I am losing it. I mean, I had never felt to that point that much frustration in my life. And and that's why I say I can recall it very very specifically. This little boy who probably 10 11 years old comes out of nowhere. Now I you know I he looks at me and he goes mister what's going on and I had this you know a little southern accent you know and I looked down to him and I said what where did you come from? And he said we're over there. And I was like okay. I looked at him and I said, "Okay, that where am I? What street is this?" And he goes, "Oh, it's Maple Avenue." I said, "So, this is Maple Avenue?" He goes, "Yeah." And I said, "Do you know this name?" He goes, "Oh, yeah. That's Granny." And I went, "Wait a minute. This is your grandmother?" He goes, "Yeah." And I said, "Where is Granny?" "Up over there." I look at Steve and Steve just goes, "God bless." It was like what in the hell just happened? I It was It was unreal. It was absolutely unreal. And I say when we say people are put into your life for reasons, that little boy and his grandmother were put into my life, you know, for that moment, for that reason. Now, there there's there's obviously there's there's tragic moments, there's horrible moments in 30 years of my career, but I always remember that moment of just saying that, you know, that that moment where I literally was having my brain meltdown, you know, here's this little boy that that brought me to a little bit of salvation that day,

[43:04]  you know. So,

[43:06]  I think you're not going to go to hell. And this is why, baby. That's the way this is working.

[43:13]  I think you were crying out for help and God answered your your your prayers is what it was. You know, it said a few words out there, but closed mouths don't get fed, Dennis. That's what it was. All right. Closed mouths don't get fed. I think you're good there. You're good.

[43:25]  I The other one, you know, the I I will say that that's one of those ones that got there. The first time I had always kept, especially for my older two kids, I've always kept what I did kind of away from them. And I think the first time, so my my son, God bless him, they both went went to school in Delaware. They went to uh St. Anony's and and and and St. Mark's High School, you know, good Catholic school kids and and whatever it is. And I really kept things away from them because I I I never wanted to injure them in any way. Never wanted to provide moral injury or anything like that. I didn't want them to know dad what dad actually did. I just want them to know I was a therapist. And if they knew that, we were we were good. There was a state police officer that went to St. Marks. Denny was a freshman. My oldest was a freshman at the time. And so, you know, what's that? 14 15 years old. So, here's here's him at 15 years old that he really doesn't know what I did. And this officer found out, you know, that was it was Dennis Keridan, you know, found out his name. and he walked over to my son and he goes, "Hey, I just wanted to introduce myself. I'm trooper soando and my my son's like, "Oh, hey, you know, my dad works with police." You know, like really didn't think about it. And he goes, "I want to tell you your dad saved my life." And that was it. Now, the context to that was, you know, this this trooper was going to commit suicide. And I talked him down from that and and really tried to tried to help him with that. And my son came home that night. Well, I I picked him up from school that night and as we were driving back, he was telling me the story and at his 14 15year-old wisdom, he looked at me and he goes, "Dad, you can't protect me anymore. You need to tell me." Done. Done. Like I I literally was like, "You're right. You're right. You're right."

[45:26]  Be emotional just listening to the story right now, Dennis. But like, see what I'm talking about, Dennis? Why the hell am I getting emotional? I mean, it was it it it was that moment that it it had my professional life hit my personal life.

[45:40]  And so him Danny and I have been squared away since then, you know, and whatever. And my my daughter Molina, the four and a halfyear-old, knows that daddy goes to make the boys and girls smile. That's what she says. So, we'll see. We'll see what I'll tell her as she gets older.

[45:58]  Man, Dennis, I really appreciate the conversation, man. be being so transparent and open. And I leave you with this. There's a first responder that is watching and listening right now. Um, and they've been white knuckling it, you know, not telling anybody, thinking they're supposed to be strong, cuz a lot of times they think that. We think that, right? Even just as men's, I think we think that as well. Uh, what do you say directly to them, man?

[46:21]  I I don't You're never alone. You You are never ever alone. There's enough people out there that are willing to help. There's enough people that will hold what you say sacred. And this goes for firefighter, nurse, EMT, dispatcher, ner, doctor, whatever it is, your heaviest day. I will hold that. I will hold that until you're ready again to hold it. I will take that from you. You are never ever alone. Please don't ever think of it. If you're in that worst moment of your life, understand, you know, there is a phone call you can make. Whether it's to your local peer support team, whether you go to the trauma survivors website, you go to my personal website, you are never ever alone and don't ever feel that way. Please don't ever feel that way.

[47:10]  I appreciate it, Dennis. You mentioned websites, you mentioned to connect with you. Where do they plug in if they want to uh just get that support?

[47:17]  Sure. Go to the trauma survivorsfoundation.org. Go there. We have links to everything. Go to my personal website, denniscaridan.com. So den i c a r a d i n.com. Uh you can find us on everything Instagram, Facebook, Tik Tok.

[47:37]  Tik Tok. What am I seeing on Tik Tok? What kind of stories am I seeing there?

[47:40]  You you know we we have with me it's it's all over the place. Kind of the stories we talked about today. I try to do some inspiration stuff. Apparently I'm a low-level creator now. I it's I get free stuff at the office all the time. I just have to do weird, you know, commercials for it and all that. But no, I, you know, it's funny. I didn't start I was late in the game with Tik Tok. I only started this past summer. And I've enjoyed just kind of giving education, you know, just telling people, you know, what they experience and what they're doing. And people have been so positive and so so very nice, you know, they they've been uh a lot of questions I get. I I did one we again Gary my my intern sitting here. I did a video of about Gary and said, "Look, I got a I got a 27-year veteran of the Wilmington Police Department that's getting his masters. He's a great guy and and he's willing to talk to you." And we've gotten people that I just said, "Hey, you know, ask for Gary." And we just got a uh got a uh got a request from half across the world just to talk to Gary. So I I found those avenues get directly to people. And so if you're watching those videos and you go to my Tik Tok, you go to Dennis Car, you go to my Tik Tok and something touches you and something says, "Hey, this is me. Reach out to me. Let me know. Send me a direct message. I try to answer as most of all of them I can, you know."

[49:08]  Hell yeah. Well, Dennis, we thank you so much for your time. If you guys are still watching, these are the conversations we continue to have. So, make sure wherever you're watching, if you're listening or if you're watching, make sure you guys do like, subscribe, and comment. Uh, Dennis has been a pleasure. I'm merain. This is the man, Dennis. We'll see you guys on the next one. Later.