The Border Patrol is like a dysfunctional family that lives next door and everybody thinks they are just a regular family. That is until the house goes up for sale because of foreclosure, the dad get arrested, the 12-year old daughter is pregnant and the wife takes off with Orville the computer tech who had been at the house twice a month to service the computers (amongst other things) that kept getting mysteriously broken.
The thing about dysfunction is the fact that everybody wants to blame someone else, instead of recognizing the fact that everyone needs to eat a piece of this sandwich.
The Border Patrol has had multiple suicides amongst its Agents. No one knows why but no one wants to take any responsibility. So here goes, I am going to take responsibility for my actions and no longer will I sit silently and read the cut and paste death notifications. No longer will I worry about offending someone. No longer will I sit back and allow those that can and should be doing something to do nothing. I owe that to every Agent who puts on the green.
I believe The Border Patrol has some unique qualities and some institutional issues that make us more susceptible to the issues that can lead to suicidal ideation and suicide attempts. The issues that have been proven to lead to suicidal ideation are: Depression, PTSD and Relational problems.
The unique qualities that contribute to these disorders are the fact that many Agents are removed from their local communities and assigned to remote locations. Another quality is the fact that psychologically it is a negative environment. Contrary to popular belief and the front most agents put up we do care about the people we encounter. We do our job because we have sworn to do it and believe in it but that does not make us immune to the plight of the people we arrest. To add to this we are portrayed in the media as racists and thugs.
Some of the institutional issues that contribute are job dissatisfaction, poor labor management relations and a rapid influx of new recruits.
I am an Agent and a therapist. I spoke recently at the national convention (National Border Patrol Council) on Suicide Prevention and Awareness. I have previously posted on this topic.
Many of the questions that come up after an incident are similar but the main one is “why?”. The best answer to this is that you will not understand the decision someone makes to take their own life because it is not a rational decision. It is a decision made based on negative emotions and lack of hope. The people who make this decision are not thinking with the clarity of a rational mind. They are seeing only the dark side of a situation and in that darkness reality ceases to exist.
The other statement I hear is there was nothing that we could do. In my presentation I highlighted the point that there is always something that can be done, it just may not be something that you can do. It may be something the person has to do for himself. That could be asking for help or taking the steps necessary to get another opinion of their situation. Perception is the key. If you want a reality check go to a pediatric burn ward of a hospital.
I hope this posting is taken in the tone in which it was meant. I do not want to see any more of my brothers and sisters die by their own hands. As law enforcement officers we are more likely to die by our own hands than by homicide. Yet what is the proportion of training we are given to prepare for assailant attempting to kill us versus training on suicide awareness and prevention. More training is an easy and obvious method to combat this crisis.
Suicide in the Patrol has been the dirty little secret kept by a dysfunctional family trying to pretend nothing is wrong. It is time to shed some light on this subject so that every thing to prevent this from happening again is done now!
Terence L. Shigg M.A.
Sgt-At-Arms Local 1613
