Latest / The Trauma Therapist / Welcome to the S.H.I.F.T. Show with Adam Blevins

Transcript

Welcome to the S.H.I.F.T. Show with Adam Blevins · The Trauma Therapist

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Trauma Papist Podcast. My name is Gom Macpherson.
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: I interview incredible people who dedicated their lives to helping
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: those who have been impacted by trauma. Here we go,
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: So five four, three, two and one, our folks, welcome
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: back to the podcast. Very excited to have us. My
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: guest today Adam Levins.
• 0:19
  Speaker 2: Adam, Welcome, Thanks guy, it's good to be here.
• 0:22
  Speaker 3: Awesome.
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: So. Adam is a former Virginia State trooper who transitioned
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: into mental health and now serves as the operations director
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: of the Virginia Law Enforcement Assistance Program. After experiencing firsthand
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: the toll of trauma, he transitioned into mental health, becoming
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: an e MDR provider, an ICIF instructor, and a PhD
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: student in Trauma informed Care. Drawn from his unique perspective
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: as both a first responder and mental health provider, Adam
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: wrote the book Welcome to the Shift Show How to
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: Love Yourself in a World that Won't. It's a raw,
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: unfiltered guide to self discovery and resilience in an unforgiving world.
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: Once again, welcome. Before we get going, share with the
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: listeners where you're from originally and where you are currently.
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: I was born and raised in a very small town
• 1:10
  Speaker 2: called Sugar Grove, Virginia, community of about seven hundred people,
• 1:16
  Speaker 2: and I've lived in a couple other places. I lived
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: in Rockbridge County, Virginia and Buni Vista for a little while,
• 1:21
  Speaker 2: and today I find myself in Mary in Virginia, right
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: between Mount Rogers and White Top Mountain.
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: So stay Trooper sounds very intense to me.
• 1:33
  Speaker 2: Can be?
• 1:35
  Speaker 3: It can be.
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: I mean, law enforcement to me in general just is
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: very intense when you're dealing with dealing with people. How
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: did let's start off here? How did you get into
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: this into that field?
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: To be honest with you, man, Growing up, it was
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: it was either law enforcement or the Marine Corps. It
• 1:57
  Speaker 2: just it came down to a last minute decision of
• 1:59
  Speaker 2: which which area I felt I wanted to serve in
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: most and which area I thought that my particular skill
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: set could be better used. And that came from the
• 2:08
  Speaker 2: nine to eleven attacks. You know. I was in fifth grade.
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: My arm was broke, so I couldn't play with the
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: other kids in pe class, and my teacher and I
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: sat there and watched the planes hit and I just
• 2:18
  Speaker 2: remember seeing human beings sprinting towards you know, chaos and
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: potential death, and I just thought, what type of person
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: is that? You know? And I wanted to I wanted
• 2:33
  Speaker 2: to be that person. I wanted to I always wanted
• 2:36
  Speaker 2: to serve. I've always had a heart to serve, and
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: the Virginia State Police is where I found my home
• 2:40
  Speaker 2: to do that.
• 2:41
  Speaker 3: Now, forgive me for my ignorance.
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: Here can you chuck theoretically just go right into the
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: State Police or do you have to go through local
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: police or how does that work?
• 2:54
  Speaker 2: You can go straight into state Police. You don't necessarily
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: have to work for a town, city, or any other
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: locality first. You can just go straight into the State Police.
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: It is a very rigorous process. It took me about
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: a year and a half from the day I put
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: in the application, through all the screening and psychological examinations
• 3:14
  Speaker 2: and all that type of stuff until you get into
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: the academy. My academy was around thirty weeks, and then
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: you had an additional eight weeks of FTO out into
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: the field. So really it's it's about a three year
• 3:25
  Speaker 2: in total process to become a Virginia State Trooper. To
• 3:28
  Speaker 2: get off of probation and do all that stuff to
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: where you're you're out there on your own doing it.
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: And what is the goal or of the state police
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: relative to local police the.
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: State police, It really depends on where you are. You know,
• 3:45
  Speaker 2: as a trooper, my goal was always to promote public safety,
• 3:49
  Speaker 2: to enforce the laws of Virginia, and to reduce traffic
• 3:52
  Speaker 2: accidents and crime in the commonwealth. Excuse me, guy, yeah,
• 3:59
  Speaker 2: but that was that was typically the goal, and it
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: depends on where you're at. In some areas, the state
• 4:04
  Speaker 2: police are generally on the highway because the localities are
• 4:06
  Speaker 2: such a large agencies. So state police really does a
• 4:10
  Speaker 2: lot of stuff on the interstate. But in places where
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: I've served, we're full service, so we handle the highway stuff,
• 4:16
  Speaker 2: but at the same time we respond to domestics and
• 4:19
  Speaker 2: all the same type of situations the localities do as well.
• 4:23
  Speaker 2: Big reason for that is, I'm sorry. Big reason for
• 4:26
  Speaker 2: that is is a lot of local agencies they don't
• 4:29
  Speaker 2: they don't have a large sworn population, so we all
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: kind of work together and make sure that the missions accomplished.
• 4:35
  Speaker 3: How long were you in that position.
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: I was a state trooper for seven and a half years,
• 4:39
  Speaker 2: served in Rottbridge County and Smith County, Virginia.
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: Talk about how the awareness of trauma and the impact
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: of it started to become aware for you, relevant for you.
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: Man, really really right out of the get go. My
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: first day on the job, I hadn't even been to
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: the academy yet. When I went through, you went to
• 5:05
  Speaker 2: what they were called probate phase, where they would send
• 5:08
  Speaker 2: you to the academy for a few weeks. You would
• 5:10
  Speaker 2: do basic driving, firearms, defensive tactics, stuff like that, and
• 5:13
  Speaker 2: then they would put you back out into the field
• 5:15
  Speaker 2: for eight more weeks with your FDO before you go
• 5:18
  Speaker 2: to the academy. And so my first day, my FTO
• 5:21
  Speaker 2: has taken me around to the courthouse, local agencies. I'm
• 5:24
  Speaker 2: meeting other law enforcement professionals and attorneys and stuff like that.
• 5:28
  Speaker 2: Thirty minutes before the end of the shift, we get
• 5:30
  Speaker 2: a call for a plane crash and I thought plane
• 5:33
  Speaker 2: crash in you know, Smith County, Virginia. Now we do
• 5:36
  Speaker 2: have a small airport here, but it came over the
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: radio that it was in Saltville, about twenty five minutes away,
• 5:43
  Speaker 2: and it was a twin engine CESSA occupied two times
• 5:46
  Speaker 2: and it was a double fatality. And that was the
• 5:48
  Speaker 2: first day on the job, and a plane crash is
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: what a plane crash is. You know, I'm not going
• 5:53
  Speaker 2: to paint the picture for everybody listening or anybody watching,
• 5:55
  Speaker 2: but it is what you expected to be. And that
• 5:58
  Speaker 2: was kind of my first taste of oh, all we're
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: we're we're in some real stuff here. You know, there's
• 6:04
  Speaker 2: there's some there's a grizzly side to this job. But
• 6:07
  Speaker 2: from there watching people, you know, seeing what people really
• 6:12
  Speaker 2: go through. And if you've never been in law enforcement
• 6:14
  Speaker 2: or in as a first responder, you don't see kind
• 6:17
  Speaker 2: of behind that curtain of humanity, right, and so you
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: don't see all of the situations and circumstances that people
• 6:25
  Speaker 2: find themselves in that that breaks them or that makes
• 6:28
  Speaker 2: them want to shrink themselves. And as a police officer,
• 6:31
  Speaker 2: you know, you respond to all types of situations, and
• 6:34
  Speaker 2: it's usually when somebody's having a really bad day. It's
• 6:37
  Speaker 2: usually when a trauma has occurred. Right. So that was
• 6:40
  Speaker 2: really when I started to learn about just how awful
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: this life can be, just how unforgiving this life can be.
• 6:47
  Speaker 2: And then I would run into some of these folks
• 6:48
  Speaker 2: later on in life and and to just see the
• 6:51
  Speaker 2: impact that it has happened now and kind of seeing
• 6:54
  Speaker 2: that process as it goes through, and then when it
• 6:58
  Speaker 2: hit me personally. You know, I can't tell you how
• 7:00
  Speaker 2: many fatal crashes and how many situations where I just
• 7:04
  Speaker 2: shoved them down, you know, just attribute it to a
• 7:06
  Speaker 2: day at work until there's that one that you can't
• 7:10
  Speaker 2: shove it down anymore. You know, you try to, but
• 7:12
  Speaker 2: all of a sudden, you know, you're trying to hold
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: a beach ball underwater. You could hold it there for
• 7:17
  Speaker 2: a while, but eventually your shoulders are going to give out.
• 7:19
  Speaker 2: And I responded to a call one day that made
• 7:22
  Speaker 2: my shoulders go out, and that's when the real impact
• 7:26
  Speaker 2: of trauma hit me personally in a way that I
• 7:29
  Speaker 2: had never experienced before. And that was a I won't
• 7:33
  Speaker 2: get into too much detail about it, but it was
• 7:36
  Speaker 2: a case that resulted in a homicide investigation involving a
• 7:39
  Speaker 2: two month old victim, and I essentially watched this poor
• 7:44
  Speaker 2: child leave this earth knowing there was nothing that I
• 7:47
  Speaker 2: or anybody else could do right. But this situation was
• 7:52
  Speaker 2: worldview challenging. It was gruesome because of the circumstances. It
• 7:58
  Speaker 2: was just all out bad, and that moment kind of
• 8:03
  Speaker 2: as it's stacked on top of all the other things.
• 8:05
  Speaker 2: But it brought all those other things back, you know.
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: It brought the ambush situation that I thought I was
• 8:10
  Speaker 2: good with back. It brought all these other fatal crashes back.
• 8:12
  Speaker 2: It brought some personal you know, personal life stuff back,
• 8:15
  Speaker 2: all the things that I thought I was good with.
• 8:18
  Speaker 2: But that particular call man, that was the one where
• 8:22
  Speaker 2: not only did I begin to notice that this has
• 8:25
  Speaker 2: had a significant impact on my life, but the people
• 8:28
  Speaker 2: around me started to notice.
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: And let me interrupt you here for a second. First
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: of all, thank you for sharing that story.
• 8:36
  Speaker 3: My god. The I think.
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: In general, many our culture in general has a particular
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: perspective on the law enforcement and even the military for
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: that matter, and how they, it's seems, have to deal
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: with trauma. Like you said, you've got to shove it
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: down to a certain degree otherwise you can't perform adequately.
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: But I'm curious, when you got into law enforcement, do
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: they talk about that at all or is it just
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: the culture You just deal with the shit and move on.
• 9:29
  Speaker 2: Yeah, So that it's interesting you bring that up because
• 9:32
  Speaker 2: there has been such a shift in this exact conversation
• 9:36
  Speaker 2: just over my short career in both law enforcement and
• 9:38
  Speaker 2: mental health. But when I came through, it was it
• 9:42
  Speaker 2: was the typical stigma, right, It was that you don't
• 9:44
  Speaker 2: talk about it, you shove it down, you ignore it,
• 9:47
  Speaker 2: you figure out where to put it right, but it
• 9:50
  Speaker 2: can't be here right, right, And so the only and
• 9:54
  Speaker 2: we got training in the Academy for Mental Health in
• 9:56
  Speaker 2: terms of dealing with other people in the midst of
• 9:59
  Speaker 2: crisis and kind of how to de escalate verbal judo
• 10:02
  Speaker 2: and how to you know, try to meet people where
• 10:04
  Speaker 2: they are to get them to what they need. But
• 10:07
  Speaker 2: there's very little conversation about what happens to you when
• 10:11
  Speaker 2: you experience all these things. And our mental health course,
• 10:13
  Speaker 2: if my memory serves me correctly, because it's been a
• 10:15
  Speaker 2: while ago now, but it was a very short hour
• 10:18
  Speaker 2: to two hour long class where one of the critical
• 10:21
  Speaker 2: Incident Stress Management team members, one of the peers, came
• 10:24
  Speaker 2: in and gave a speech about, Hey, you're going to
• 10:27
  Speaker 2: go through some tough stuff. You know, you're going to
• 10:28
  Speaker 2: see some things that the human brain may not be
• 10:31
  Speaker 2: all that well designed to experience. Right when those things happen,
• 10:36
  Speaker 2: we'll come see or you give us a call, right,
• 10:39
  Speaker 2: But there wasn't any in depth training on Hey, when
• 10:43
  Speaker 2: you start to notice those dissociative patterns, when you start
• 10:46
  Speaker 2: to notice the intrusive images and intrusive memories, when you
• 10:50
  Speaker 2: start to notice that in the places where you generally
• 10:53
  Speaker 2: felt safe before you no longer feel safe. You know
• 10:56
  Speaker 2: all the effects of trauma. Right, we don't talk about this,
• 10:59
  Speaker 2: and so as you kind of alluded to, it creates
• 11:01
  Speaker 2: this culture of I'm going to talk about it. We're
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: going to compartmentalize because it is what we do best, right,
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: and that works for a little while for some people,
• 11:10
  Speaker 2: but it doesn't work for everyone, and it certainly doesn't
• 11:13
  Speaker 2: work for everyone when you keep piling on trauma after
• 11:16
  Speaker 2: trauma after trauma after trauma, and when you talk about
• 11:20
  Speaker 2: law enforcement officers that go twenty twenty five year careers,
• 11:24
  Speaker 2: they're experiencing upwards of three hundred to four hundred critical
• 11:27
  Speaker 2: incidents just in their career, and it's insane. So we
• 11:31
  Speaker 2: didn't get a whole lot of stuff then, But as
• 11:34
  Speaker 2: especially since I've been with the Virginia Law Enforcement Assistance Program,
• 11:39
  Speaker 2: we're seeing that change kind of right in front of
• 11:41
  Speaker 2: us to where there's a lot more conversation in the academies,
• 11:44
  Speaker 2: there's a lot more conversation on the front end to
• 11:47
  Speaker 2: where people are now more prepared. Hey, here's the reality
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: of what this job is. Right, And now several agencies
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: are building their own peer teams and they have their
• 11:56
  Speaker 2: own wellness programs, and folks are hiring clinicians to come
• 12:00
  Speaker 2: in and help guide the program. So that's changing. It's
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: still a slow process, but the culture is shifting.
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: So you talked about that experience, your own personal experience
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: at seemed to be the last straw on the capital's
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: back in a sense.
• 12:21
  Speaker 3: How did that unfold such that.
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: You said, would you say, I need to get some help,
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: I need to do something about this.
• 12:28
  Speaker 3: What happened for you?
• 12:29
  Speaker 2: So to give you just a little bit more backstory,
• 12:32
  Speaker 2: I was the kind of person who, and I'll just
• 12:34
  Speaker 2: come out with it, I didn't believe in therapy. I was.
• 12:37
  Speaker 2: I was a part of that mindset and a part
• 12:40
  Speaker 2: of that stigma that said, if you go to therapy,
• 12:42
  Speaker 2: you're weak. If you talk about your feelings and your emotions,
• 12:44
  Speaker 2: you're you're vulnerable, And to me, vulnerable is weak, right,
• 12:47
  Speaker 2: And that probably led into the problems that I had
• 12:50
  Speaker 2: because that's the way I felt about it right. But
• 12:53
  Speaker 2: when that happened to me and the symptoms started kind
• 12:56
  Speaker 2: of coming on, I knew something wasn't great, but I
• 13:01
  Speaker 2: was just like every other time, just shoving it down right.
• 13:04
  Speaker 2: And it got to the point to where I've never
• 13:08
  Speaker 2: been much of a drinker. I would drink socially, you know,
• 13:10
  Speaker 2: if I went out with friends, but I was never
• 13:12
  Speaker 2: the kind of guy that would just come home and
• 13:13
  Speaker 2: kill a six pack. That was just never something I did.
• 13:16
  Speaker 2: After that happened, I became that person.
• 13:19
  Speaker 3: Now were you married and so forth to different family.
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: Not married or anything. I was living alone. As a
• 13:24
  Speaker 2: matter of fact, I was two and a half hours
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: away from friends and family because of where I was
• 13:29
  Speaker 2: sent my first duty assignment. But yeah, I would I
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: would do my eight hour shift, I would come home,
• 13:35
  Speaker 2: I would start drinking. I would isolate myself. I stopped
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: going to the gym, I stopped exercising, stopped eating right
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: at all, and just really was pulling myself away from
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: everything that could help me right. And so with that,
• 13:50
  Speaker 2: and as a law enforcement officer, you know your behaviors
• 13:53
  Speaker 2: and your productivity, it starts to reflect how you are
• 13:56
  Speaker 2: mentally right. And I started getting complaints from citizens. I
• 13:59
  Speaker 2: never got complaints. I was a squared Toway trooper. You know.
• 14:02
  Speaker 2: I did my absolute best to try to make sure
• 14:04
  Speaker 2: that everybody I encountered had a good experience, you know,
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: even if they had to leave with tickets, even if
• 14:09
  Speaker 2: it was you know, not ideal circumstances. I wanted people
• 14:12
  Speaker 2: to know my heart was in it for the right reason.
• 14:15
  Speaker 2: I care about you, I want you to be successful,
• 14:17
  Speaker 2: those types of things. But as the complaints started pouring
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: in and folks started noticing I wasn't going out to
• 14:25
  Speaker 2: eat lunch with them, I was starting to isolate myself.
• 14:28
  Speaker 2: So one day a friend of mine, who was actually
• 14:30
  Speaker 2: on the State Police peer team, approached me and said,
• 14:32
  Speaker 2: are you okay? I said, yeah, man, I'm fine, And
• 14:36
  Speaker 2: I don't know how are we with cussing on this podcast? Okay,
• 14:42
  Speaker 2: So I said I'm fine and I'll never forget this.
• 14:44
  Speaker 2: He looked at me and he said, oh, you're fucked up, insecure, neurotic,
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: and emotional. Got it. That's interesting because that's exactly what
• 14:53
  Speaker 2: I am. But that's not what I said to you.
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: So anyway, he extended kind of a helping hand and said,
• 14:59
  Speaker 2: if you need anything, and I just brushed them off.
• 15:01
  Speaker 2: I don't need nothing, I'm good, appreciate it. Typical cop response.
• 15:05
  Speaker 2: And it wasn't too long after that first sergeant gave
• 15:09
  Speaker 2: me a call and said, you're going to a post
• 15:11
  Speaker 2: critical incident seminar And I said what is that? And
• 15:14
  Speaker 2: he said that's a place where cop ghosts or cops
• 15:16
  Speaker 2: go to talk about their feelings. I said, cool, not
• 15:19
  Speaker 2: going to that, thanks, So I went to that. It
• 15:26
  Speaker 2: was the most life changing experience of my life.
• 15:29
  Speaker 3: Wow. Wow.
• 15:30
  Speaker 2: It introduced me to mental health. It introduced me to
• 15:33
  Speaker 2: peer support, It introduced me to EMDR therapy. Above all else,
• 15:38
  Speaker 2: it showed me ways out of things that at the
• 15:42
  Speaker 2: time I did not know there were ways out of.
• 15:45
  Speaker 2: You know, I just thought, this is a part of me.
• 15:46
  Speaker 2: Now I'm going to live and I'm gonna die with
• 15:48
  Speaker 2: this right going to this three day intensive seminar where
• 15:52
  Speaker 2: I'm surrounded by cops and I'm surrounded by mental health
• 15:54
  Speaker 2: professionals and chaplains and whoever else. I walked away from there.
• 15:59
  Speaker 2: I want say better, because that's a bit of a
• 16:01
  Speaker 2: stretch in three days. But I walked away from that
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: event with a new duty belt, a new tool belt,
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: you know. The one before had my firearm and my
• 16:09
  Speaker 2: pepper spray and my magazines and my keys and whatever else.
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: This one had peer support, It had mental health, it
• 16:16
  Speaker 2: had emd art, had acupunctural detoxification, it had you know,
• 16:21
  Speaker 2: put yourself in front of courses to better understand trauma,
• 16:24
  Speaker 2: to better understand coping and resiliency. I walked away just feeling.
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: I walked away feeling as though the island I thought
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: I was on I was still on it. But I
• 16:36
  Speaker 2: turned around and looked, and there was a whole lot
• 16:37
  Speaker 2: of other people standing on that same island. And that's
• 16:40
  Speaker 2: what it meant to me. And I walked away from there,
• 16:42
  Speaker 2: going I have to know what happened, how this made
• 16:47
  Speaker 2: me feel better in just three short days. What was it?
• 16:50
  Speaker 2: And that's when I decided to go back to school
• 16:52
  Speaker 2: and get a master's and pursue clinical councils.
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: That is so amazing, that's so inspiring. But you walked
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: in fresh me if I'm wrong, you walked into that seminar.
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: What thinking this is b us? I don't need this, okay?
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: So what get more specific here? What was it that
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: opened your eyes or what was life changing? Did someone
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: say something, was it just being around all those people?
• 17:21
  Speaker 2: What I would say of all the things that come
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: with the post critical incident seminar, I would say the
• 17:28
  Speaker 2: top two, the first being on the on the first day,
• 17:32
  Speaker 2: when you start to hear stories from other people, and
• 17:35
  Speaker 2: we all tend to measure our trauma, right, we all
• 17:37
  Speaker 2: tend to well, mine's bigger than yours, or yours is
• 17:40
  Speaker 2: bigger than mine, So I don't deserve to be in
• 17:41
  Speaker 2: the solisation all that nonsense. And when you see people
• 17:48
  Speaker 2: who are not supposed to open up open up, and
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: the stories that you hear at this place, again, if
• 17:55
  Speaker 2: you've never been in law enforcement, you wouldn't believe it.
• 17:57
  Speaker 2: It's stuff that the best directors in Hollywood could not
• 17:59
  Speaker 2: put on t before you. It's real life pain, it's
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: real life torment. And when all of us came together
• 18:06
  Speaker 2: and told our stories and you got that cohesiveness, you
• 18:10
  Speaker 2: got that unity, you got that feeling of man, I'm
• 18:13
  Speaker 2: not as alone as I thought I was. It was that,
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: but it was also EMDR therapy. And I know you've
• 18:18
  Speaker 2: probably talked about EMDR on this podcast a thousand times,
• 18:21
  Speaker 2: but when you talk about a police officer who's never
• 18:25
  Speaker 2: experienced anything like that before. And when you walk out
• 18:28
  Speaker 2: of this room after having spent an hour with a
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: therapist that you just met, but who's a culturally competent
• 18:33
  Speaker 2: therapist who understands cops and how to work with us.
• 18:36
  Speaker 2: I walked out of there just going.
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: What happened?
• 18:41
  Speaker 2: What happened? I don't understand And it kind of made
• 18:44
  Speaker 2: me angry because I didn't understand what happened. And when
• 18:47
  Speaker 2: you take control away from a cop, you know got issues.
• 18:50
  Speaker 2: But it was that man. It was experiencing that desensitization
• 18:55
  Speaker 2: of that trauma and helping me start to see it
• 18:58
  Speaker 2: from a perspective that I would have never considered without
• 19:01
  Speaker 2: an intervention. That's when everything switched.
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: That's amazing. I'm just let me just remind everyone I'm
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: speaking with Adam Levins. His book is called Welcome to
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: the Shift Show. So what happens? You go to the seminar,
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: you leave the seminar, How does what happens for you?
• 19:26
  Speaker 2: I had to be a part of it. I had
• 19:28
  Speaker 2: to figure it out. I immediately reached out to these
• 19:31
  Speaker 2: folks and said I want to come back. Get me trained.
• 19:33
  Speaker 2: They got me trained as a peer, and I started
• 19:37
  Speaker 2: volunteering with that very same program. Wow cheered with them
• 19:41
  Speaker 2: for about four about four years until the operations director
• 19:46
  Speaker 2: positioned for the program became available and I put in
• 19:49
  Speaker 2: for that interviewed against some phenomenal people, and luck of
• 19:52
  Speaker 2: the draw, they chose me.
• 19:54
  Speaker 3: Wow.
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: This program that I attribute to I'm gonna be honest
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: with you, guy, I attributed to saving my life, not
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: just my career, but saving my life because the path
• 20:04
  Speaker 2: I was on, No boy, no, this place gave me hope.
• 20:08
  Speaker 2: And as the operations director now I operate that very
• 20:13
  Speaker 2: the functioning of that very seminar, and I get to
• 20:15
  Speaker 2: watch three times a year anywhere from thirty to forty
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: police officers, dispatchers and their spouses and their partners come
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: through this thing. And I watched their lives change for
• 20:25
  Speaker 2: three days. And you see people that haven't smiled in
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: five years figure out they still can.
• 20:33
  Speaker 3: Oh my god.
• 20:33
  Speaker 2: You see you see spouses who are hugging and kissing
• 20:36
  Speaker 2: and loving on each other who probably haven't spoken in
• 20:38
  Speaker 2: the last six months. You're seeing people who thought their
• 20:41
  Speaker 2: lives were over realizing there's a whole lot left on
• 20:45
  Speaker 2: this whole horizon. You were just a little cloudy for
• 20:48
  Speaker 2: a little while, and that's the experience now. So I
• 20:52
  Speaker 2: got that position and I was still in school at
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: the time. I wrapped up my master's degree back in
• 20:56
  Speaker 2: twenty twenty three. I'm in residency now in Virginia on
• 20:59
  Speaker 2: the LPC track. Became emdr trained somewhere in the middle
• 21:03
  Speaker 2: of that. And when I'm not working with v Elite
• 21:06
  Speaker 2: full time, my part time position with Rivers of Holk
• 21:08
  Speaker 2: Counseling in Chantilly, Virginia's I'm just, as I put it
• 21:12
  Speaker 2: emdring the crap out of people all the time.
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: Damn so freeing, inspiring.
• 21:19
  Speaker 3: My god, So talk to us about the book. How
• 21:25
  Speaker 3: did that come about?
• 21:27
  Speaker 2: It's how it came about was when I was going
• 21:31
  Speaker 2: through that tough time all those years ago, when I
• 21:33
  Speaker 2: worked that homicide case and all the things started piling up.
• 21:36
  Speaker 2: I just started putting my thoughts on paper. I've always
• 21:38
  Speaker 2: been I've always liked poetry. I've always I've always been
• 21:42
  Speaker 2: a writer who never wrote until right now, until this
• 21:46
  Speaker 2: book finally came to fruition. But it started as just
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: a personal journal, just putting my thoughts down on paper,
• 21:51
  Speaker 2: trying to organize and trying to figure out who I
• 21:54
  Speaker 2: am with all this stuff going on and how do
• 21:56
  Speaker 2: I deal with it? And as time went on, I
• 21:58
  Speaker 2: found myself in these programs and I found healing that
• 22:02
  Speaker 2: kind of found itself on another abandoned ADHD project shelf.
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: The book did. And then sometime last year, about midway
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: through the year, summertime in the fall, with certain changes
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: going on in the world and the divisiveness and seeing
• 22:20
  Speaker 2: just not only people tear themselves down, but tearing other
• 22:24
  Speaker 2: people down, I thought, now is the time to take
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: it off the shelf and put these words on paper
• 22:29
  Speaker 2: and organize them in such a way that will resonate
• 22:32
  Speaker 2: with people. So really the gist of the book is
• 22:37
  Speaker 2: I've seen life from a very unique perspective that not
• 22:40
  Speaker 2: a lot of people do, and that is as a
• 22:43
  Speaker 2: law enforcement officer, just stuck in the middle of chaos
• 22:46
  Speaker 2: and crisis all the time. If you remember Charlottesville twenty seventeen,
• 22:51
  Speaker 2: I was right in the middle of that when Heather
• 22:53
  Speaker 2: Hier was killed and dozens of others injured when the
• 22:56
  Speaker 2: vehicle came through the crowd. My unit was the first
• 22:58
  Speaker 2: one there. We lost Jay Colin and Burt Bates that
• 23:01
  Speaker 2: day when the helicopter went down I've lost a lot
• 23:04
  Speaker 2: of friends. I've lost a lot of friends in this job.
• 23:09
  Speaker 2: And on top of all those things, watching other people
• 23:14
  Speaker 2: and kind of watching life unfold, but not just watching
• 23:18
  Speaker 2: life unfold, watching an unfold in in all walks of life,
• 23:22
  Speaker 2: at all different developmental stages of life. Right, It's not
• 23:25
  Speaker 2: just this population, this age group, it's everybody.
• 23:29
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 23:30
  Speaker 2: And then when you see the backside of that, when
• 23:32
  Speaker 2: you see the trauma, when you see the chaos, when
• 23:34
  Speaker 2: you see the real life stuff. And then when I
• 23:36
  Speaker 2: transitioned into mental health, the effects of that real life
• 23:40
  Speaker 2: stuff comes and sits right in front of me. Right.
• 23:43
  Speaker 2: So I've I've peeled back the curtain on humanity in
• 23:46
  Speaker 2: terms of what I've seen as a police officer and
• 23:50
  Speaker 2: how I've seen it impact people as a mental health provider.
• 23:53
  Speaker 2: And what I want this book to be and my
• 23:55
  Speaker 2: idea with it is to kind of be a bridge
• 23:59
  Speaker 2: to a lot of this stuff, to help people see
• 24:02
  Speaker 2: all the different factors in life, both external and internal,
• 24:05
  Speaker 2: that cause us to shrink ourselves or to be a
• 24:09
  Speaker 2: version of ourselves that's digestible and palatable to everybody else,
• 24:12
  Speaker 2: and especially in terms of trauma that oftentimes points us
• 24:15
  Speaker 2: in the opposite direction of where we need to go right.
• 24:18
  Speaker 2: Sometimes that blocks us out from getting appropriate help. So
• 24:21
  Speaker 2: I wrote the book to help people see all of
• 24:25
  Speaker 2: those things, all of these factors that are causing us
• 24:29
  Speaker 2: to be less of ourselves or at least feel like
• 24:31
  Speaker 2: we're less of ourselves. And then it transitions into the
• 24:35
  Speaker 2: struggle of all that the mental health struggles, the trauma,
• 24:38
  Speaker 2: the grief, the anxiety, the depression, all those types of things.
• 24:41
  Speaker 2: What happens when they go unchecked, what happens when you
• 24:44
  Speaker 2: keep piling these things on. And then it transitions from
• 24:47
  Speaker 2: there into the Shift show, which the Shift show is.
• 24:51
  Speaker 2: The shift is an acronym stands for stop, hype, innovate, fight,
• 24:56
  Speaker 2: and thrive, And basically it's just a simple framework to
• 24:59
  Speaker 2: help pe people. Once you recognize all those things that
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: are holding you back, stop giving power to those things right,
• 25:07
  Speaker 2: Learn what they are, learn how they impact you, and
• 25:10
  Speaker 2: learn the intervention or whatever it is that you need
• 25:12
  Speaker 2: to stop giving them power over you so that you
• 25:14
  Speaker 2: can overcome them and hype yourself up. You know, a
• 25:17
  Speaker 2: lot of people live their lives, and I saw this,
• 25:19
  Speaker 2: especially as a police officer. A lot of people live
• 25:22
  Speaker 2: their lives in the backseat, right, somebody else is steering
• 25:25
  Speaker 2: and they're kind of being They're just kind of going
• 25:27
  Speaker 2: along with the flow of their own expectations or other
• 25:30
  Speaker 2: people's expectations. Rather, So, the age is for hype yourself up. Right,
• 25:33
  Speaker 2: this is your story, this is your life. Once you
• 25:36
  Speaker 2: stop giving power to the stuff that hurts you, build,
• 25:39
  Speaker 2: build yourself up. As you start to build yourself up,
• 25:42
  Speaker 2: be innovative, right, realize that that's what the eye stands for.
• 25:46
  Speaker 2: Realize that the way I've been moving through the world,
• 25:49
  Speaker 2: the way I've been doing things, it's not working for
• 25:51
  Speaker 2: me because of whatever reason, I'm not healthy in this aspect.
• 25:54
  Speaker 2: My anxiety has gotten worse, whatever the case may be,
• 25:57
  Speaker 2: especially as a police officer, Be willing, be open to
• 26:00
  Speaker 2: new things, be willing to say this hasn't worked for me,
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: let me try something else. And then the f is
• 26:06
  Speaker 2: for once you start to learn who that person is,
• 26:09
  Speaker 2: fight for that person, fight against all the things that
• 26:12
  Speaker 2: try to bring that person down, right, because we all
• 26:15
  Speaker 2: know how hard that person is to find in this
• 26:17
  Speaker 2: life with all the noise and all the stuff. And
• 26:20
  Speaker 2: as you fight for that person, and you finally get
• 26:22
  Speaker 2: to the point to where I feel confident in who
• 26:24
  Speaker 2: I am. I've overcome these struggles and I feel like
• 26:27
  Speaker 2: I can move forward. Now. This is where we hit
• 26:30
  Speaker 2: the t this is where we thrive unapologetically who we are.
• 26:34
  Speaker 2: We're not focused on everybody else's expectations. We're not letting
• 26:37
  Speaker 2: this stuff drag us down anymore. We're taking actionable steps
• 26:41
  Speaker 2: each day to be who we want to be and
• 26:42
  Speaker 2: to be healthy.
• 26:44
  Speaker 3: I love that. Love that.
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: As we kind of wind down here, you know, I
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: was thinking about the what's the acronym of the l.
• 26:53
  Speaker 2: E AP VA LEAP, Yes, Virginia le VA.
• 26:57
  Speaker 3: LEAP, and how incredibly it's helping.
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: Individual law enforcement and first responders. Now is there anything
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: Is there another agency that's helping law enforcement agencies as
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: a whole.
• 27:16
  Speaker 2: So our program we handle the entire state. We are
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: a five O one C three nonprofit. But anytime you
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: turn on the news and you see a significant event
• 27:24
  Speaker 2: in the commonwealth, whether it's you know, won't get any
• 27:29
  Speaker 2: of details of anything because everything that we do is confidential.
• 27:31
  Speaker 2: But when you turn on the news and see something
• 27:33
  Speaker 2: bad in Virginia that involves police officers in any kind
• 27:36
  Speaker 2: of way, VA LEAP is most likely going to be
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: there behind the curtain, in the shadows. Nobody ever knows
• 27:41
  Speaker 2: we're there. But we're providing cism services. We're making referrals
• 27:45
  Speaker 2: to culturally competent trauma and formed clinicians. We're getting people
• 27:49
  Speaker 2: set up for these seminars. We're getting them whatever they
• 27:53
  Speaker 2: need to help a lower the impact of this blow
• 27:59
  Speaker 2: that they just expe' this horrific incident, but also give
• 28:02
  Speaker 2: them the tools they need to move forward afterwards and
• 28:04
  Speaker 2: prepare themselves for the next one.
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: Adam, How do people learn more about you? Learn more
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: about the book? Get the book way.
• 28:13
  Speaker 2: You can learn more about me just I'm on social media.
• 28:16
  Speaker 2: You can look up Adam Blevin's author if you want
• 28:18
  Speaker 2: to catch up with me on all the book stuff.
• 28:20
  Speaker 2: Also welcome to the Shift Show on both Instagram and Facebook.
• 28:25
  Speaker 2: Adam Levin's on LinkedIn. If you want to know anything
• 28:29
  Speaker 2: else about the book or anything, just just reach out
• 28:31
  Speaker 2: to me. It is available for pre order in the
• 28:33
  Speaker 2: Kindle Store now. It will launch on May the thirteenth
• 28:37
  Speaker 2: in print, ebook and audiobook as well. If you want
• 28:42
  Speaker 2: to learn more about the Virginia Law Enforcement Assistance Program
• 28:45
  Speaker 2: for those of you out there, mental health professionals, and officers.
• 28:49
  Speaker 2: If you want to help out, you can visit us
• 28:52
  Speaker 2: at www dot VA LEAP dot org. That's www dot
• 28:56
  Speaker 2: v A l e AP dot org. And yeah, all
• 29:00
  Speaker 2: my contact information is on there and anybody can reach
• 29:02
  Speaker 2: me that way.
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: Okay, we'll have that link up here at the show
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: notes page at the Trauma Therapists Podcast dot com. Adam, awesome,
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: Jesus man. Love to have you back, Love to have
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: you back. All right, we'll be in touch. Thank you
• 29:15
  Speaker 1: so much.
• 29:16
  Speaker 2: It's sir guy. Thank you again