The Blue Line to Recovery: Mike Arena's Inspiring Tale

Jerry Dean Lund: 0:04

Welcome to today's episode of Enduring the Badge Podcast. I'm host Jerry Dean Lund, and if you haven't already done so, please take out your phone and hit that subscribe button. I don't want you to miss an upcoming episode. And hey, while your phone's out, please give us a rating and review. On whichever platform you listen to this podcast on, such as iTunes, apple Podcasts and Spotify, it helps this podcast grow and the reason why, when this gets positive ratings and reviews, those platforms like Apple Podcasts and Spotify show this to other people that never listened to this podcast before, and that allows our podcast to grow and make a more of an impact on other people's lives. So if you would do that, I would appreciate that from the bottom of my heart. My very special guest today is Mike Arena. Mike is a retired police officer that had a very promising career. He served in multiple specialty units. He served in different departments. He started his career at the age of 19,. But things took a turn when Mike was involved in a shooting, and that's the story. We're going to talk about the shooting, but not necessarily that, but what transpired after that, how that affected Mike's health and then why ultimately he decided to retire and Mike now has taken upon himself and some other officers to form a very cool nonprofit organization called Officer Support Initiative. Now let's jump right into this episode with my very special guest, mike. Tell the audience a little bit about yourself.

Mike Arena : 1:38

Yes, so I am 31 years old. I am a retired police officer out of my state of New Jersey. I did just over 10 years in law enforcement. I've worked at very, very different assets of law enforcement. It varies. I started my career off as a basically like a part-time officer in New Jersey. We call them specials, basically like a beach cop. You work there during the summers and the off seasons and stuff like that. I worked all the bars and all that other stuff. I did that for a few years and then I got hired by State Corrections. I worked in Trenton State Prison the maximum security facility for about two and a half years. Then I went down to Prince George County, maryland. I transferred down to Maryland, new Jersey. I worked down in PG County for a little over three years, cut my teeth down there, saw a lot of amazing stuff. Really kind of an eye-opening experience. I'm from working in State Prison, so working in PG County it's basically State Prison without the bars. It's in between DC and Baltimore. It's a very high crime urban area. After a few years doing that, all my buddies were still working up in Jersey and they were making good money. I was only making panties down in Maryland. They're like dude, come back up. I transferred back up to the Stocks University Police Department. Like I said, going from State Prison to PG County and then going to a college campus, it was not my cup of tea. I couldn't really handle the quiet and the calm. I got tasked out to our county SWAT team. I did that for a few years and then I transferred to Veteran City Police Department. That's where I finished out my career.

Jerry Dean Lund: 3:26

Man, you've got some experience bouncing around there.

Mike Arena : 3:30

Yeah, five different police departments, two different states in a little over 10 years. I've worked with a lot of different people. I've seen a lot of different ways of policing Each partner that I've always worked with, each supervisor I've always worked underneath. I've taken little things from each one of them. I basically killed my career off of that. Very versatile in policing and especially working in a lot of different assets of it, it's pretty good.

Jerry Dean Lund: 4:00

Yeah, mike, you're saying you're retired now. How'd that take place? Because you're still a young man.

Mike Arena : 4:09

Yeah, yeah. so a lot of other cops we've all been in a lot of crazy, crazy, different incidents. I've had quite a few of them over my 10 and a half year career. My last and final one was a fatal officer involved shooting in the city of Ventner. The shooting actually happened in Atlantic City. We had a suicidal male with a broken glass bottle in his hand. After trying to fuck him down for 12 and a half minutes, we were unsuccessful. He started to rush me and my partners. Unfortunately, we had to take the appropriate action and neutralize him at that time.

Jerry Dean Lund: 4:54

Yeah, that's pretty hard to take those steps. It just doesn't come easy to take those steps and take another person's life.

Mike Arena : 5:05

Yeah, definitely not. I do a lot of speaking engagements, I speak to cops all across the country and stuff like that. Tell these guys my story's not unique, but what is unique is me coming out and speaking about it. It screwed me up a lot. It wasn't for the fact that I went through it, it's just the fact that how I handled the situation, how I had ignored the signs for 10 plus years before that, I didn't deal with anything I needed to deal with before because cops and first responders we all go through traumatic shit just happened. It's the way, the job. It's an unfortunate thing and everybody said that this is what you signed up for. You are signed up for seeing traumatic shit. But the problem with first responders, especially with law enforcement, is we're caught in the academy that just pack that shit down, pack it, pack it, pack it and deal with it. I did that. I just packed everything down over my 10 plus year career, years on the SWAT team, everything like that, all the crazy stuff. I never dealt with it the way I needed to. When you have a suicide by cop situation, taking somebody's life is hard For somebody forcing you to kill them when they're going through one of the most emotional times and the stressful times in their life and they're forcing you to kill them. That's harder. It really, really takes a piece out of your soul when you know somebody's hurting, you know somebody wants help, but they don't want to give themselves that help and the only help that they want is for you to kill them. Unfortunately, I had to take the appropriate actions that day, not just for my safety, but for my safety and my partners, the safety for the civilians, for the people out there watching. It's on YouTube. You can go and watch it. Just type in Vettner City Police shooting. You'll see it. There's a guy actually on YouTube who counted. I told the individual that I shot 228 times and dropped the bottle. He refused to. That's just how the cookie crumbled that day.

Jerry Dean Lund: 7:26

Dang Mike, sorry I had to go through that. You say we signed up for the job and it's come with a lot of stuff. But I mean it still comes, like you said, as a heavy toll on you, your department, the other person's family. There's just a big toll that comes with taking someone's life.

Mike Arena : 7:52

There's a lot that comes with it, a lot more than I didn't realize. Like I said, we're cops. We pack all this stuff down when this happened. Some guys go back, Some guys go back to work. The reason they go back to work is because they still are in the mindset of I should have packed it down.

Jerry Dean Lund: 8:15

They're ready for the next call.

Mike Arena : 8:16

I know guys that have been in shootings before and they're just like I don't know what to do. I can't sit at home anymore. I have to go back to work because they want to just suppress it with the next call, with the next traumatic tragedy that they see, they're just going to push it and push it and push it. Then, after 20, 25 years of years in this job, that's the real reason why you see suicide rates being one of the highest for this profession, divorce rates, if not the highest in this profession, alcohol, drunk abuse. That's why you see all this stuff, because guys like myself thought that you're a big bad-ass cop. You're this SWAT guy. You should be able to handle this. This is what you quote unquote signed up to do. I just never sat back and really unpack the stuff that I've seen from either dead kids, horrific car accidents, murder scenes, other suicides, I mean, you name it, it's not just me. A lot of cops have gone through it and seen it. And then when you have to take someone's life, the floodgates are open. Like I said, just grab your act because you're along for the ride. At that point your mind's just taking you for a whirlpool and you're just spinning out of control.

Jerry Dean Lund: 9:30

Yeah, do you think, after that happened, do you think you basically just everything hit stuff down, just finally made it this? Way out and released.

Mike Arena : 9:40

Yeah, definitely. I went through a period of time that I was like I'm going back, I'm going back, I'm going back to my team, I'm going back, I'm doing this, this isn't gonna define me. And then I really, after speaking with my doctors, kind of took a step back and really did a deep dive into myself about can I do this again, do I wanna do this again? And can I make those exact same calls I made that day, trying to put people in different places, know where my partners are, knowing, if I take this shot, what's the backstop and beyond, where that holds, could travel, knowing all those different things without hesitation and using just muscle memory and training. Am I gonna be able to perform that way again if the time comes? And the answer was no for me, and I had to I had to take myself off a team. I looked for the betterment of my partners and the betterment of my job and the betterment of the men and women of law enforcement throughout this country, because if I can't perform at 100%, I'm not only allowed my ability to myself, to my partners, but to the public. Some guys take this job as like you're just a cop, you're out there writing speeding tickets and stuff like that. And that very moment might be true with some police departments in this country, but there's also gonna come a time in those small police departments where these men and women need to act. And if they are lackadaisical, if they are complacent you're gonna see that in their training and I'm sure you have seen it in yours. You're gonna see it in the way they conduct themselves, range. You're gonna see it the way they conduct themselves in any high stress situation. And when that high stress situation comes, it's not an if, it's a when, and you need to mentally prepare yourself for that. You need to be able to perform at the top of your game, and if you're not, that's when bad things happen. And I wasn't able to perform at the top of my game and I had to take myself out and say, listen, man, this is it. You didn't do what you needed to do for 10 plus years, and this is what the consequences are. And you can't put somebody else's life at risk because your ego wants to take over and think that you're a big bad guy. But there's a breaking point in everybody's head. Everybody has one. The toughest guy that you know, he has a breaking point, and I found mine when I had to take someone's life by a suicide, like I.

Jerry Dean Lund: 12:13

Yeah, there's a lot of things, mike, that I would kind of also like want to address in that, and I think one of the things is how hard was that to do that? To remove yourself from the police department, the police department? I just barely retired just a few days ago from the fire side of my career, so doing the law enforcement side, but and that was brutal it is it's.

Mike Arena : 12:44

I'll be honest with you, man, it was. It was tough. It was the toughest thing that I had to do facing my guys. I went down to one of our PBA meetings and I told them to their faces and listen, I don't want you to hear a direct message through online social media word of mouth. You're going to hear it from me. I am not the same guy that I was and I can't come out here with you guys and put you at risk. And a lot of them were like dude, fine, just take, take the time to eat. You know, we'll, like, help you through and that was great and that was awesome. And they really, you know, my partners really had my back. But I knew deep down inside that it just this was, this was my time, you know, and it got so low for me because this is all I've ever wanted, right, this is all I've ever wanted to do. Was, you know, kind of be a cop and everything like that? You know, and I did it and I was great at it, and I was on the SWAT team and I was doing everything like cool shit that you could think of. I'm like this is amazing as the top of the world, and when I had to give it all up, I didn't know what I was going to do with myself.

Jerry Dean Lund: 13:53

You, know I'm 31 years old.

Mike Arena : 13:54

How am I going to be a 31 year old retired cop? Like? What is, what does that even look like and what am I going to do? You know, like cops fire. You know we're basically one trip ponies at this. You know what I mean. None of us are going to get our doctorate or our master's degree and like political science, or whatever the case may be. We are in this profession and so we retire after our 25, 30 years and right off into the sunset. This is the game, this is here. It is right Pasco 200 bucks multiple times around until you get to that promise land and, like I said, I have to speak with my doctors and, seeing that it wasn't for me anymore, that moral injury really happened for me, I got really, really low and you know there's a different prong of this that we haven't really touched on. But when I went through that, when I went into my shooting, I was also the way the state of New Jersey does. This is it's a homicide investigation. It needs to be treated as such. So it has to go to the attorney general's office and they got to put it in front of a grand jury and a lot of other states are not like this. It goes to a review board of that police department of that county and other cops are looking at this and they're good to go. Unfortunately, my shooting happened August 6, 2020. It was a month in a little over a month and a half, after the George Floyd situation, where I worked as a very urban environment in Atlantic City, so it did not go over well. The suspect that I neutralized was black. I'm a white officer, my partner, who also fired me as white. It did not go over. Well, I'm sure you remember that time in policing it was in the gutter. There's nothing a cop could do to me. It doesn't, you couldn't walk across the street if you were a cop, the right way and the state of New Jersey viewed it as such. After my shooting, I got out of the hospital. I was preliminary charged with murder and manslaughter, handed me the piece of paper saying you're going to grand jury. Between 18 and 23 people are going to decide your fate, if you're going to jail for the rest of your life or not. Who've never worn this badge, who never walked these streets, who never done anything like this, but are going to Monday morning quarterback? A scene that I had a split second decision to make and exhausted all options before that decision was made. But they have two years. It took them two years to clear me, so for two years I sat in my house, not being able to work, running myself up the walls realizing that I can't do this job anymore, which had a huge effect on it.

Jerry Dean Lund: 16:48

Cause if I go back now.

Mike Arena : 16:49

I got a target in my back. You know what I mean. So all that festered in my mind and it got to a point where I was like I'm not going to jail, I'm not even going to give them this opportunity to do this. I'm going out of my own terms. I know I did the right thing. It's out of my couch, or got my service weapon, I put it to my chest and I said this is it. They're not going to make a mockery of my last name. This is not happening. I'm in the paper and I'm on the news. Enough, I'm not going to. I'm not like just wearing an orange jumpsuit for the rest of my life. I've already worked in state prison. I ain't going back to prison. I hasn't even been. And right as I was about to do that, my garage door opened or opened and my girlfriend my ex-girlfriend was coming home at the time that I got scared. I racked the slide, hit the gun in the closet and I was like all right, no one's ever going to find out about this Secrets between me and the gun. No one's really going to know. What I didn't know, because my head was so fogged up, was when I racked the slide, the brown ejected from the chamber. I went in the kitchen, started cooking dinner, doing some things around the house. She sat down on the couch, started unloading her bag. What's laying right there on the carpet? The brown that came out of the chamber Picks it up and she's like what is this? I was like it's nothing. I tried playing it all, tried playing it all. She knew, and she's like we're not playing this game anymore, we're done. You need to get your shit together and you need to help yourself because you just you can't keep living this way. And so about a month after that, she put me on a plane out to Arizona. I went to Tucson, arizona. It was an outpatient rehab there. I spent 30 days there Just kind of getting my head right, getting away from all the noise, getting away from the grand jury and all that bullshit going on with that, getting away from all the news broadcasts, getting away from deep diving into these comments that I should have never done in the first place, because I'm watching all these yo-yos Monday morning quarterback, a situation that they know nothing about, their keyboard heroes and that's it. And that did not help any situation, because I'm like, these are the people that are going to be sitting on my grand jury and this is how they feel. So that didn't help and, yeah, so I did. 30 days out there cleared my head and that really put me on the path to where I am now to get myself better.

Jerry Dean Lund: 19:17

Yeah, I can even imagine getting to that point. I mean, I was there myself not in that same manner of like with a weapon, but I was. You know, I had come to my end too and I was going to take my own life. And it's a really just a crazy dark time that people don't really understand, I think, quite often, like you're just in a swirl of everything that you can barely function in life and you're really functioning in one same function. You're just getting up and moving around through the day on good days.

Mike Arena : 19:56

You're just a zombie, yeah.

Jerry Dean Lund: 19:58

OK, so I mean, and the years of waiting to see what's going to happen, uh man, that takes its own toll on itself.

Mike Arena : 20:10

Yeah, that was. That was one of the biggest mental hurdles that I had to deal with is just waiting and waiting, and waiting, and you know, I would see, I would see my friends out or something like that, and they be like, have you heard anything yet? And I'm like no, no, it's, I haven't heard anything. And then I'm on pins and needles because I'm waiting for the next quote, unquote George Floyd incident to happen and throw a law enforcement back in the gutter.

Jerry Dean Lund: 20:34

Right.

Mike Arena : 20:35

And then you know, then my grand jury will ask you know what I mean. So I'm like sitting here praying that nothing go in. Crazy law enforcement goes on. No, none of the BS like that happens again, because then it's going to put more of a black eye on law enforcement.

Jerry Dean Lund: 20:48

Yeah.

Mike Arena : 20:50

And I'm like paint or possibly taint, an outcome that I cannot control, because these are a grand jury of your quote unquote peers. It's not peers, they're not. It's a civilian public. It's not a bunch of cops out there. And New Jersey didn't always operate this way. It used to be. It used to go to the prosecutor's office. Major crimes would take it, review it and you'd be back on the road, if you chose to, within four or five months, because they know that the gap in time really screws it someone's head, and the fact that New Jersey took two years to be able to do this really played a huge toll on my mental capabilities.

Jerry Dean Lund: 21:35

Yeah, I've had another officer he was in California went through something like this too, and that was one of the most brutal parts was just the two year wait to see what was going to happen, to see if he was going to go to prison or if he was going to be cleared.

Mike Arena : 21:54

Yeah, it's an experience and a feeling that I can't even describe. When I finally did get cleared, I slept for like 17 hours that next day Because I just, I mean two years, basically I slept. Whatever sleep I did have was, you know, piss, porcelain, so it wasn't like I was resting good, you know like, yeah, this is, you know, I feel great. So all of those things really, you know, came to a head for my suicide attempt. You know, just not dealing with everything through my career, having to take someone's life in the manner that I had to, the grand jury situation, and then really having to pull myself off a dream job that I truly love, you know, all four of those factors where they came into play and really clouded my judgment in a lot of the things that I was doing on a daily basis and sent me into a spiral of suicidal ideations.

Jerry Dean Lund: 23:00

Yeah, and I think also that people may not understand is like that you know, when you get into those situations of being having a lot of suicidal ideations, that you're thinking basically about how you can protect everyone else. Like you feel worthless, and it's not trying to take something from those other people in your life, you're just like want them to like move on and past you. When you feel that way, like you don't, like you feel like you're dragging them down, yes, yeah, you're like, like you're just one big anchor, like you're just one big 45 pound weight dragging behind somebody.

Mike Arena : 23:37

You're just dead weight. And that's exactly how you feel, like that's a great way to put it. You feel like you're just dragging everybody else down when, vice versa, everybody's just doing is trying to pull you back up, but you feel like you can't. You can't get back up because you're just you're spinning out of control. And then, now that you know you can't get back up, you're like you feel like, unless I'm just dead, we're just leaving here.

Jerry Dean Lund: 23:59

I don't you know what I mean.

Mike Arena : 24:00

It's that I don't want to call it a woe is me complex, but it kind of almost is, you know what I mean, Like you want to be able to help yourself but you really, truly can't. And you know when I went through my situation, I, you know I'm, I'm medication defined and I really jumped on the bandwagon of like I could do this on my own. I can do this on my own, I can get through this myself, no one understands me and I will make sure that I can handle it the way that I want to handle it. And that was a wrong way of thinking. I had a therapist who is absolutely amazing and I got to you know, credit her for definitely saving my life. Dr Kelly, she's amazing, she, you know, she, she. She brought me in and she tried, you know, breaking me down or anything like that to really open up to her and I'm just like you don't get it, you don't get it, you don't get it. And she allowed me to keep saying that for a couple of different sessions and then it got to a point where she was like what's in it? You're not going to listen to me. I'll bring my husband in here. He's a sergeant in in crime scenes and he sees a lot of this shit on a daily basis and he's just as fucked up. So if you don't want to talk to me, you'll talk to him. And then it clicked that she's not doing this for a job or a profession. She sees this at home. She deals with it on a personal level and that I was like he gets it and it just let. That was that that made the world of difference, because I understood she'd get it. And I tell guys all the time, especially all the cops I talk to all across the country, I say listen, finding a therapist you like is like finding a great pair of shoes that you like. You're going to have to try multiple times until you find the one you like the first one's not going to be it and if it is, might as well buy it right then and there and not screw around with it because great, but trying to find the first one it's like a needle in a haste. Yeah. So you got to try multiple guys and I'm sure you know guys. I tried therapists right at suck-dash. Yeah, it might have sucked ass the first time, but you got to go find another one, somebody you can relate to, because that is what really opens all the doors. The key is just finding somebody who you can relate to, somebody who you can trust and honestly tell the things that are going on inside of your head because they can relate to it on a personal level.

Jerry Dean Lund: 26:22

Yeah. Yeah, it's definitely a dating game when it comes to therapists. You know, it's like you have to have like the same kind of understanding and some things. Like you know, like you said, to let that guard down and like, okay, this person's trying to help me and they do understand not all of them do, because they're not all culturally competent, but that's fine, I mean, and maybe that does work for a few people, but it generally doesn't work for the most of first responders Like that. They need to find someone that's culturally competent, you know, to help them.

Mike Arena : 26:56

Yeah, yeah, that's the key right there. And, like all the guys that I talked to, and you know, they tell me their struggles and sometimes it doesn't have to do with the job, sometimes it's just personal stuff. And I told these guys all the time I said you know, reach out to me. It doesn't have to be about, you know, work. It could be about the personal shit that you're going through, because all of that shit adds up too. You know you're going home and pissing off your wife or pissing off your kid because you had a piss poor day at work, right, it's not your family and your kids fault. It's because you came home with a piss poor attitude, because you got shit on at work, right. So let's really look at what the crux of this is. Crux of it's the job and what's going on at work. You're bringing it home, so because your wife's pissing you off. No, your wife's pissing you off because you came home in a bad mood. So let's rewind this one back and let's get to where. What pissed you off that day? Oh, my sergeant was on my ass about to retort. Okay, there you go. The report pissed you off and you let that snowball down into your family, which, once you ruin your family life, that's hard to come back from Right. And then when that goes down, the shit can. That just piles up and then that'll pile back into your work, and then it'll pile back into your mental and all of that just spirals out of control and it's hard to come back from.

Jerry Dean Lund: 28:21

Yeah, yeah, I totally agree with you. I think something I've been thinking about a lot lately is like emotional intelligence I can only they teach you to like stuff or anything down. But like why don't we explore, maybe, on how to deal with some of those things when it happens, so we don't take them home to our family or we don't find ourselves in the cycle of despair and wanting to take our own lives? Like why don't we unpack that at post or in the police academy?

Mike Arena : 28:54

Yeah, and it starts like you said right there. It starts at the academy level and there are some agencies in the academies that they do teach mental health. But I mean it is a breeze over, right. Hey guys, don't kill yourself. Call a coffee cop or call an I-1. If you think you can do it, hurt yourself. Okay, push ups. You know what I mean? Yeah, like that is like the quick and skinny of it, and I really truly believe that if they implement what should be implemented in these academies, it's going to do one or two things. It's good. You're going to really see the rewards of it later on through careers. Guys are going to have better mental health, more enjoyment of the job, less suicide, alcohol, domestic all of that stuff will go down in time, or the flip side of that. You're going to see guys who are like holy, fuck, this sucks. They're right. Oh, my God, I can't handle this job because it's brutal, like all these things that are going on in my head. They said they were going to go on in my head. I'm only five, six, seven months on. I'm depending on agency that you work at. This is fucking nuts. I can't do this. So it's like a double edged sword. You teach them to pack it down, you mold them to pack it down so you can use them longer through their career, or you teach them to unpack everything, and this is the right way to do it. But you're also going to see the shit and you're really going to see the reality of this. So it's a double edged sword and I understand both of it. That's why we're battle-hardened. Same thing like the Fire Academy Run, go into the fire. Go, don't be scared, do this. We're battle-hardened in those training environments so we can last 25 years and then, once we get on the job, we continue to get battle-hardened through experience. And if you teach mental health enough in the academy, reality is gonna set into a lot of these people like shit, this is real Cause this is not a job. These are not jobs.

Jerry Dean Lund: 31:10

Yours and mine are like for the fame of heart.

Mike Arena : 31:12

Right, right, like you need to be prepared to lose your life every day. Mentally, you need to be prepared. I'm sure when you run into a burning building you're not like you know what. Yeah, that's great. I can't wait to go buy that car tomorrow, cause that's not on your mind.

Jerry Dean Lund: 31:27

No.

Mike Arena : 31:27

What's on your mind is to save your ass, save whoever's in there and your partner next to you, cause those are three things that are on your mind. Not tomorrow, I'm gonna go buy this car Now. You look at the normal Joe Schmoe was working nine to five and I'm working nine to five now in a desk office job. I can tell you I'm thinking three, four days ahead right now, but when I was working I couldn't. So it's just, it's that complex.

Jerry Dean Lund: 31:54

That's not. I think you're right. I mean, and you might even lose some people in the academy, right, they might realize sooner than later that, you know, this isn't for me, which I think is is not a bad thing. I think that's not. I think that's a good. That's a good thing. Right, get out before you, yeah, before you feel stuck. Right, start getting months on our job and you start seeing these things and you feel like now I'm stuck in this career and I'm just gonna deal with it and stuff it down. You know, there's a reason why, you know, officers have like all this PTO piled up and everything like that, you know, and sick time and everything. It's cause they don't want to take time off to deal with things. So if you're not home, you don't have to deal with it.

Mike Arena : 32:37

We. So I said this all the time cops are the best at compartmentalizing. We can compartmentalize everything when it comes to work, but when it comes to doing it at home, when it comes to dealing with the shit we have at home, we won't touch it with a 10 foot pole. We will walk in to the biggest fight crowd. Active shooter, whatever you want us to do out in the public, but if you want us to come home and be like you know what sweetheart, like, I think we should go have dinner tonight. I think we should go have a date night. How was your day, sweetie? Bullshit. It doesn't happen. And if it does, you know, it's very seldomly, but it is few and four between when a cop can come home and do that and it's so like. So one of my buddies is a cop down in Maryland where I used to work, and this dude can do it, and I don't know how he does it. He's the only person I've ever met. I idolized this guy in the fact of he can do this. He goes to work and he comes home and when I mean turns it off like a light switch, he is not a cop. When he's off duty, he doesn't carry his badge? He doesn't. He you wouldn't even know his dude's a cop at all. He doesn't portray it. Doesn't wear anything like thin blue line crack or under armor or sunglasses, head shape like none of the typical things that you think. This guy the cop, great cop working. But when he comes home he's with his wife and two kids and that's it. He doesn't want to be bothered, turns his phone off and I envy that guy.

Jerry Dean Lund: 34:12

Yeah, yeah, I mean definitely something to learn there, because I think if more people did that, they'd have better careers and better family lives, because you can't separate them. I mean one most, I mean maybe he can, but most people can't. Right, you can't just shut your.

Mike Arena : 34:30

Most can't, most cannot separate them. It's, it's a unicorn.

Jerry Dean Lund: 34:33

Yeah, yeah, he needs to go out there and do some training and let us know how he figured that out.

Mike Arena : 34:40

Dude, I've known this guy my entire life and I don't know how. And I tell him, like, even when I was working with my partner, I was like man, like how do you do this? And he's like Mike, this isn't like this, this is just a job. This isn't like. You know how. We're all like this, this is a calling and it is, and I truly believe, the soft sort of fire. And this is a calling. You need to be 100% in all the time. This dude is 100% in all the time, from eight to eight, whatever his 12 hour shift is. My man is 100% in all the time, but how he can turn it off is amazing to me because, first responders, we make this our lives, right? We, what do we do? We hang out with each other after, right, we're all on cops. We're all on fire, hanging out with each other. On the weekends. We're shooting the shit and talking about the shooting stories back and forth, the things we did, the things we want to do, the things we wish we saw, things we did see. We're always talking about it, we're always hanging around it, and then we work, so it's always just consumes us. Yeah, and that's what I think is another, you know, prom to this is when I went through my shooting, I had another buddy of mine who told me he's like you know, maybe talking to cops isn't the best thing Like that's what I was doing, talking to all my buddies, telling them kind of what I'm going through, and every single one of them man, you did your job, dude, you did your job, you did a great job, you did your job. None of them understood it because if they weren't there, they didn't do what I did, they didn't go through what I went through. And I kept thinking like all right, yeah, I guess you know I did do my job, but what am I doing here? Like why am I? Why am I throwing a pity party for myself? Like shut, like, suck it the fuck up. Like this is all in your head. You're, you know, you're this SWAT guy, this is this, this is that. And that was the wrong way of thinking was going to ask cops like for help Because they're they're spraying. The same way, I was there.

Jerry Dean Lund: 36:39

Yeah.

Mike Arena : 36:40

Bet you can part metalize this shit and push it down and uh, and that was a mistake. So I tell the guys I talked to, all across country, like listen, don't talk to other cops, go talk to somebody else, go talk to a pastor, go talk to your lady at the grocery store, whoever you want to talk to, because when you tell these civilians the shit that you see or have seen, their jaws are going to drop Right. I'm sure when you go and you talk to somebody about the things that you've done in your career, they're going to be like, oh my God really, and you're like, yeah, yeah, that was like a Tuesday. And to them it's crazy because, like, the human brain is not meant to see what we see as first responders.

Jerry Dean Lund: 37:23

Right.

Mike Arena : 37:24

The average. I think the average goes through like five to eight traumatic events in their lifetime. What is that Like? A week tour for you?

Jerry Dean Lund: 37:35

Yeah Right, I have seen some statistic like that. It's like to the like 7,500 traumatic calls compared to like over like the same amount of time, or something. It's phenomenal, like it's it is it's?

Mike Arena : 37:50

it is. You can go through. You can go to a fatal car accident. Uh uh, someone burned alive in a building or a dismembered body, all in the same tour.

Jerry Dean Lund: 38:04

Yeah.

Mike Arena : 38:04

You know, and there's people who go their entire lives and the only fatal that they see God has been hopefully not is a loved one in a casket out of funeral.

Jerry Dean Lund: 38:17

Yeah.

Mike Arena : 38:18

You know. So it's, it's, it's talking to those people and you're not looking for the sympathy, you're not looking for the oh you know, the atta boys or anything like that, but you're looking for someone to have a fresh perspective of what first responders see right. Yeah, I think like that, really have to start fashion. It's not always the best answer and it's hard to do, because if you do, do it Right, let's say for me or for you. If you went to your administration You're like, hey, that last call has me fucked up, I get to get a day off tomorrow. I gotta clear my head with this. They're gonna be like what is that guy? Is he right? Is he right in the head? Is he got to go see somebody? This, is he a liability now? Then you get blackball right. Then you get blackballed. You get think that like, hey, listen, like he can't do this anymore. Then you become the liability. And then some guys like now that you know, now I can't get promoted if I talk, if I say something. I talked to one guy. His department literally told him if he goes out on leave after his shooting, he's not gonna get promoted. And these are some of the things that go on and it's it's a travesty.

Jerry Dean Lund: 39:33

It's hard to believe honestly in In the state age. This still is that way.

Mike Arena : 39:40

And, like I'm sure, how many years have you done before you retire? But congratulations.

Jerry Dean Lund: 39:46

Oh, thank you.

Mike Arena : 39:48

33 years altogether and we'll see a few more in the law enforcement side of things, yeah 33 years right, and after 33 years, I am sure there has been times where you're like this call has fucked me up and you're like I need a day tomorrow.

Jerry Dean Lund: 40:09

They're like no one's calling out tomorrow.

Mike Arena : 40:10

If you do, you're getting you know You're shitting your fire to piss off the captain or the chief or whoever your supervisor was tomorrow, even though you just got your ass kicked in a call, right, spare. And if you do go up to you, right, whoever's supervisor you are in your life, listen, it's, it's something's not, something's not right. That person then looks at you or might possibly look at you, or you might feel that they might look at you in a different way, in a different way, right, like me being the tap guy and all this other stuff, right? me being that guy if I go to my sergeant and I'm like, hey, listen, like that, that calls got me jacked up. That kid's head is literally rolling down the road after a fatal car accident. I Need some time. I got a comprehensive, I got an unback. This. They might look at you in a different aspect. When something goes down, something gory, something horrific, something very, very traumatic, they might be like, oh, should we send Mike first. Remember that call he had a couple years ago and he said he couldn't handle anymore. People don't forget about that.

Jerry Dean Lund: 41:10

No no.

Mike Arena : 41:13

Right, so then it hinders us, as first responders, to seek help because of that. Yeah and when you add multiple times of those things happening, that is where in lies the issue. Yeah, yeah, I.

Jerry Dean Lund: 41:29

Pains me to say this a little bit, but I Did go in one day and just was trying to like explain you know how I was feeling. I was filmed, like, burned out like from a lot of different things and Didn't really get anything back that I wanted, like you know what I mean. Like I was looking for a job hey, take some time off or whatever. At plenty of time off I could take, you know, or just some understanding, a level of understanding which didn't happen. And that's the day I decided I was gonna retire. I call the retirement board and how my date didn't Right and like and how, how, how empty, did you feel?

Mike Arena : 42:12

Right, you go to you, you go to the people that you should be talking to for help and you're going through Things in your mind and in your head and you're like, and it takes a lot, a lot To go and speak, like, seek help, and just, or even just say like, hey, I'm being burned out here. I got a lot of things going on in my head, in my mind and a lot of my plate, and you can you can chalk it up and frame it However you want to, but just to be able to go through Another person and say that you are going through a lot of shit in your life and you just need to take a step back Takes a lot to do, yeah, and when you do make yourself vulnerable in a situation like that, to not have it reciprocated in Even a fraction of the way that you believe that it should be is very Disheartening. It's a blow to your yourself, esteem, to your work ethic, to the level of commitment that you now have to this profession that you love so much.

Jerry Dean Lund: 43:19

Yeah, yeah, summed it up pretty, pretty well, there, right, like so, when you, when you went, like you just said, Like, yeah, I didn't feel like I got the response that I wanted.

Mike Arena : 43:29

I was like you know what's free, as I'm going to retire before, right, and who knows, maybe if they're like, you know what, you earn this, you deserve this, you do whatever you need to do, I will have your back. Don't call me on my work cell, call me on my personal cell. Let's go out tomorrow. Let's talk tomorrow, let's do this. Let's go golfing. You know what's good, I'm gonna take a sick day tomorrow too. We're gonna go golfing on the golf course, hit a bunch of golf balls or whatever you want to do. Yeah, whatever you guys enjoy doing, we are gonna do that. And Then let's go back to the golf course or whatever you want to do. Yeah whatever you guys enjoy doing, we are gonna do that and then let's Reconvene and get out of this environment that we are in in our work establishment. Let's just go out, free our minds. I don't want to talk about work. I don't want to hear about work. I don't want to hear about it. I want to hear about what you are doing in your life.

Jerry Dean Lund: 44:18

Yeah.

Mike Arena : 44:19

How refreshing would that would have been. And you probably wouldn't know walking been like hey, listen, I'm gonna the pension boy today. Here's my papers.

Jerry Dean Lund: 44:26

Yeah, yeah, it would have been a lot different, would have definitely been a lot different. And as and as, are.

Mike Arena : 44:32

Those are the things that are going on in policing and the fire department and a lot of first responders. Those are the things that are like are going on. I actually started a nonprofit with a buddy of mine. It's called the officer support initiative. We started that. He was one of the first responding officers to the pulse nightclub shooting in Orlando, florida, and you know the lack of support. He got through his situation Even when I went through mine. You know I'm not one to throw anybody on the boss or bash anybody or anything like that, but you know, in the time that I went through my situation my guys were great, they were amazing, but my administration, because of the temperature of the environment of policing, didn't want to touch it. Yeah, you know they wouldn't even put out a statement saying we support the actions or we believe he did the right thing or whatever the case may be. It was questions or just. You know the AG's office will answer any of the questions and then after two years past the chief of police has to say is glad it's over. No, like we. You know we knew he'd like did the right thing. We're so proud of the actions that he took that day. You know he saved civilians, lives. He does. Whatever all of this stuff, you know the PBA puts me up. The PBA gives me a Materia Service Valor reward Right for my actions that day. But my own police department, my own administration, can't even come to my aid, even after two years after and say we appreciate, you know the actions that like he did. Yeah, it was just a cold shoulder and I I try to Reframe it in the way of an understanding of their portrayal of it, but I can't, because I couldn't care less. If I was chief police or whatever, or if I what my political status was, I could give shit. Who the hell's gonna? Who I'm gonna piss off If I think my guy was in the right. I'm gonna make a short shit known that I think my guy was in the right, that goes a long ways, but you know it does it like definitely does, but what happens is that you have people in these positions that care about their political status. they care about what they're moving forward in the future in, and that is really what kind of consumes them. I actually brought it up on another podcast that, like a lot of these police departments around this country, you know they got to get off their ass and really stop worrying about the stupid shit that doesn't matter and start worrying about the things that are going on with the troops that they're on the ground you know, like, who cares about your political status? if you want to become mayor next, or you're the next town council member, or whatever the case may be, who gives a crap about that? Right now, you guys are going through some shit. You need to be there for them and you also need to give them the tools to be able to do it. We didn't carry tasers at my police department. I thought it was a mistake, but they were too expensive. The city wouldn't buy them for us. They were too expensive. Some police departments won't let their guys wear outer carriers. They think it's too tactical. Forget about the side effects of your back, being able to breathe easier, or some more enjoyable 12 hour, 10 or eight hour shift. Forget about that fact. There we only give a crap that you look like identical to somebody from 1925. And the whole avenue of policing is still back in 1925. And the times don't change. And that is what you're seeing now is that these guys only care about their political status and it really jams everybody off.

Jerry Dean Lund: 48:21

Yeah, I mean it's not hard to think that take care of your guys and your guys will take care of all the things. Even if you do want that political status and stuff, you will probably still achieve that if you're taking care of your guys. Mike, tell us a little, go ahead.

Mike Arena : 48:40

No, no, go, go, go, go, you're good.

Jerry Dean Lund: 48:42

I was going to say tell us more about your nonprofit.

Mike Arena : 48:45

Yeah, so it's like I said. It's called the Officer Support Initiative. We have an Instagram. We have a TikTok. We're kind of just getting off the ground with this, but go give us a follow. We got some t-shirts and hats and everything coming out. Now we're just a bunch of cops that are just. We're just an avenue for guys to come and like, speak to Things that are going on in your life. Not professionally, not only professionally, but personally. You've got things going on. You want to just speak to somebody who's been through that type of situation. We have five guys on the board. Each one of them are different. Each one of their stories are incredible and each one of their stories is relatable to somebody else. We have a guy that's been through some hairy shit in the military. We have my other partner who went through the Pulse nightclub shooting incident. You have me that's been involved in an officer involved shooting. We even have a guy who just became a cop, realized that he was getting burnt out after a few years and he's like this job is not for me anymore. So we have all these different avenues for you to be able to speak to and we'll get you in touch with a therapist or even if you don't want to speak to a therapist, even if you just want to text me or call me and vent and be like my sergeant, pissing me off man, go for it. Dude, I'm here, and it's the same thing for firefighters and perfect responders too. I was a volunteer fireman for a couple of years and I know the shit that you guys go through and it's hairy. It is some crazy, crazy shit that the firefighters go through and some people firefighters and police they have a love hate relationship. And they were always busting each other's nuts and everything like that. If you get paid to sleep, it's always fantastic. But with all those jokings aside, this is one team, one fight, and we will always be there to help each other and we'll never leave them behind.

Jerry Dean Lund: 50:50

Yeah, I agree, mike. I appreciate you having it on today. I love the different perspectives that you brought to the episode today and please get on there and reach out to Mike and follow them on TikTok and Instagram and there are other places. If you go to EnduringtheBadgecom podcast, we will have all of Mike's information there. You can also link to their social media as well. So thank you so much, I appreciate it, man.

Mike Arena : 51:21

Thank you very much for having me on. This is fantastic. If you ever want to throw another episode at me, just let me know and I'll jump on here. Man, I appreciate it.

Jerry Dean Lund: 51:32

Thanks, Mike.