Zebulon Police Department creates peer support program

ZEBULON, NC — Some North Carolina agencies are setting up peer support programs and expanding mental health resources for first responders to help them cope with the traumatic experiences they face every day.

According to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, 30% of first responders develop mental illnesses such as depression or PTSD, compared to 20% of the general population.

Charlotte-Mecklenberg, Raleigh and Greensboro are some of the larger agencies that already have peer support programs, and now smaller agencies like the Zebulon Police Department are joining in.

Zebulon police will first seek out representatives from the program and then attend formal training. The goal is to have employees from several smaller agencies in East Wake County as point of contact when a first responder needs to discuss a call or situation they’ve been called to. A volunteer leading the effort and the Zebulon police chief say it can save lives.

“When I first started in the police force in the mid-’90s, there was a ‘get it together, buttercup’ attitude,” said Zebulon Police Chief Jacqui Boykin. “You deal with something, you just put it aside and you move on. You never talk about it. You never shed a tear and you certainly don’t have to talk to anyone about it. That was a sign of weakness.”

Mental health is no longer a taboo subject, but is increasingly becoming a necessary topic of conversation, especially among first responders.

“The average person experiences two critical incidents in their lifetime. And research shows that police officers deal with 188 of them. So that’s almost 200 critical incidents,” Boykin said.

Boykin says people need a variety of tools to help them cope with the stress that comes with these jobs.

“Everyone deals with stress differently, everyone deals with pain and grief differently. The more resources we can offer them, the better,” Boykin said.

Boykin says she was immediately on board when Tammy Richards, a volunteer with the Zebulon Police Department, approached her about setting up a peer support program.

“Here at the Zebulon Police Department, we have a gym where they can take care of their physical health. And that’s why we also need to talk about how we can take care of their mental health,” Richards said.

Richards has friends and family who work as first responders, so she knows how stressful this daily routine can be for them.

“The badge really weighs heavy. And if they can put the uniform back on and do it, then we certainly need to have things in place to help them deal with the things they see,” Richards said.

The goal is to train employees at several agencies in East Wake County on how to provide mental health support to their colleagues.

“An officer can call another officer, a sergeant can call another sergeant and talk about problems or issues or things that are on their minds,” Richards said.

“The idea of ​​being able to go to a colleague in a neighboring agency and have someone to talk to who isn’t involved in everything we do here is ideal,” Boykin said.

Connect with other people who understand what you’re going through while creating a culture that encourages you to talk about the difficult things you face every day.

“My main goal with this whole program is to create an environment where it’s OK to not be OK,” Richards said. “There just hasn’t been a holistic view of employee well-being. We’ve realized now over decades and through research that the cumulative impact of the day-to-day things in this job can be overwhelming. We’re not doing our employees any favors by encouraging them to suppress it.”

Zebulon Police are in the early stages of setting up this East Wake Peer Support program. Richards has already completed the training and an officer is currently going through it and will serve as the first internal peer support representative. They hope to have the program officially up and running in about a year.

Zebulon police are also trying to get involved in this program by contacting agencies in Knightdale, Wendell and Rolesville, but the initiative is open to any agency that wants to participate, including fire and EMS departments, regardless of location.