Law enforcement officers often profess that they joined the profession to “catch the bad guys,” “protect and serve” the community, get a good and steady paycheck, and experience all the “feels” from unselfishly working in a noble profession. The reality of modern police work, however, has not always aligned with such expectations.

For starters, loneliness is a significant strain. Many officers report a significant amount of loneliness and isolation (e.g., working a shift out of sync with their family). Law enforcement is often a thankless and never-ending job (e.g., not getting acknowledged, let alone receiving accolades, when a case is solved or a vehicle is recovered). Some officers acknowledge experiencing an increased concern and protectiveness for their families (e.g., some police kids have been ostracized and isolated at their respective schools). Further, officers acknowledge carrying the burden of stigmatization (e.g., receiving many negative comments around policing and their chosen careers) reflective of greater societal issues that have not been effectively addressed.

It seems to many that the anti-police rhetoric “happened overnight.” Public calls for attacks on police, including in tweets by celebrities, were unprecedented and alarming. The momentum of the anti-police avalanche appeared to gain traction in a short, but impactful, period of time. Often, the rhetoric has been influenced by the greater political climate. More recently, the death of George Floyd in Minnesota sent waves throughout the entire United States. The widespread impact remains; if riots happen in one city (e.g., Seattle), it can quickly impact other cities across the United States (e.g., Portland, Los Angeles, Dallas, Chicago, Detroit, Atlanta). The impact of social media and instantaneous communications around the world can be next to impossible to contain. Further, the generalization of all police officers as “bad apples” has led some to stereotype law enforcement officers as racist, culturally ignorant, and power hungry with morally defunct agendas—a far cry from the noble, moral protectors of the community.

The impact of the wave is palpable. Many declare: “I didn’t sign up for this.” “Once I hit 20 [years], I’m done.” “People don’t get what it’s like.” “I’m worried that with one incident, my whole life could be ruined.” What can be done to bolster the morale of those officers who have dedicated their lives to serving the very communities who have seemingly turned against them?

How Officers Are Coping

“I’m in survival mode” has now become the default stance among many law enforcement personnel. Many are trying to survive the significant job stressors that they are facing right now (e.g., mobilizations, overtime, lack of resources, pandemic, protests, civil unrest) in addition to the daily home strain of school, parenting, and relationships. Many seek quick solutions to decompress and to cope, especially when afforded inadequate sleep and recovery in between shifts.

One common short-term solution is alcohol used as a coping mechanism (e.g., to unwind after a shift, to regulate emotional arousal, to try to stay calm, to fall asleep). Alcohol is especially problematic when leaned on long-term and regularly. Tolerance develops, and then officers need more and more of the substance just to try to achieve the same effect. Overwhelmingly, the long-term consequences of alcohol use outweigh the short-term relief. No one wants to play Russian roulette when it comes to their career.

It is imperative to practice off-duty tactics that allow officers to remain whole and return home to their loved ones. Just as on-duty tactics maximize the probability of keeping officers physically safe during a critical incident or routine stop, this same logic needs to be applied to off-duty tactics to maintain safety and stability. Law enforcement officers and their families deserve it.

Recommendations

• Develop a manual section, a specific department policy, and a set of procedures for mental health and substance use. Do this under the auspices of wellness (as opposed to punishment).
• Emphasize formal training—on-duty and off-duty tactics—in the academy and various department schools (e.g., peer support, sergeant school, command development).
• Be mindful of culture (and specifically the role of alcohol within the police culture). Officers have many tragic or sad reasons to drink (e.g., death of partner, line-of-duty death, officer suicide, COVID-19 deaths in department), but officers drink for a lot of celebratory reasons as well (e.g., off-probation celebrations, retirement celebrations, summer picnics, holiday parties, hail and farewell gatherings). Remain mindful of this, and stress responsibility at the individual level, the supervisor level, and the senior command level.

Strategies for Individual Officers

Observe the dialectic. Dialectic: two opposing things that are true at the same time. Dealing with negativity is not new to police officers; they are able to weather that experience very well. The other side is that chronic strain, overt hostility, and rage are draining. Just because police can deal with something does not mean that it is not draining. They can deal with the ongoing negativity, and it is draining. Both are true.

Initially, officers often chase the “high” when they come on the job. Given today’s climate, officers may be wondering how they can just make it through their shift alive and not endanger themselves legally. Many may wonder how they can finish the job today and not wind up on someone’s social media, be on the receiving end of a political leader’s Monday Morning Quarterback statement, or otherwise have to endure some terrible critical incident.

Recommendation:

One of the most important things for supervisors, for police psychologists, and for police leaders to do is to really call out the dialectic. Officers are really well trained, and they get it, and they can handle the pressure. And it is a lot. Both things are true.

Orient to the wave. Reactions to law enforcement trend in waves, and so it is helpful to orient department personnel to the undulating waves of social support for the guardians of democracy. The ebb and flow of life extends to public support for police.

Consider post-9/11 in law enforcement. The public frequently thanked police officers, offered accolades to them for choosing the profession, and frequently offered to buy them lunch or a cup of coffee for their unselfish service. Compare that treatment to society’s reception of the Vietnam veterans who were labeled baby killers, drug addicts, and war mongers. Those veterans bore the brunt of the associated stigma at that time. Understanding, acceptance, and honor for those who served only came later. But notice the parallel between the Vietnam vets (e.g., “war mongers”) and today’s police officers (e.g., “power hungry”), and be aware that department supervisors and leaders can orient personnel to the wave. The tide will inevitably turn.

In addition to the waves of support for policing, there is also a personal wave throughout each individual officer’s career that creates its own ebb and flow. Consider the new cop straight out of the academy; he or she is full of enthusiasm, vigor, drive, and is ready to go. That enthusiasm may taper off after experiencing critical incidents or the lack of community support; cynicism might even creep in. Enthusiasm might ramp up again when the officer is promoted or authentically acknowledged for his or her efforts. Such rises and falls may continue throughout one’s career.

Recommendations:

Orient department personnel to the waves on the professional level and the individual level. Encourage them to stay the course if, in fact, policing remains aligned with their individual values. Remind them that the storms are temporary. Encourage setting up a safe shelter in the middle of a “hurricane”; offer solace with the foresight that the storm will pass.

Manage urges to avoid. Many officers have not been trained to effectively manage the current climate in policing, to wholeheartedly deal with this level of hostility. To effectively manage hostility during the work shift is one thing, but their 24/7 exposure to social media, news outlets, neighbors, classmates, family members, and spouses is a formidable force. Even silence from family members or the community underlines a perceived lack of support.

When officers perceive a lack of support, they may want to withdraw or hide during their shifts, stay low-key, avoid certain calls, or avoid seeing certain things. Officers may experience an increase in irritability, anger, and shorter fuses, which do not necessarily always reveal themselves at work. Such emotional dysregulation may manifest itself at home, in how officers are driving, or even in their wanting to take an “early out” of the profession. These challenges are understandable but also concerning.

Recommendations:

Officers should focus on what they can control (e.g., how they each show up for work, their appearance, their arrival time, their appropriate support of their partner and other officers on their shift, their handling of any given call). Leaders can encourage them to focus on what they need to do today, now, in this moment. Focus on their side of the street. This makes it far more manageable for officers to be able to engage effectively on the job and maintain their objectivity.

How to Help the Department

There are changes every day on the job—small to large—and each one tends to represent a loss of some kind, an adjustment that needs to be made. It can be a lot. It can be overwhelming.

Some officers are trying to survive through avoidance. When feeling overwhelmed, anxiety tends to spike. When emotional demands outweigh resources and skills, it is common for human beings to avoid actions or people who may increase that demand. Avoidance decreases anxiety temporarily. It works in the short term. But, like alcohol, at some point, avoidance will only harm officers, particularly if that is their predominant coping strategy. Sworn and civilian personnel may be moving away from the pain and engaging in avoidance behaviors (as opposed to pushing through the avoidance), creating a cascading mental health effect.

Avoidance can manifest on patrol; sometimes officers change their strategies in how they do police work. For example, they may be less proactive or less aggressive, not just physically in a foot pursuit, but also perhaps less aggressive in monitoring/surveillance, going after a call, or seeking something in a high-crime area.

When a person is engaging in avoidance, sleep is often disrupted. Officers may be sleeping more than usual because they are trying to escape or withdraw. Many describe sleep as the “only refuge.” Conversely, others may be sleeping less than usual because their anxiety has spiked (leaving them in a fight or flight response at bedtime). Due to such hyperarousal, bedtime tends to be when officers might resort to alcohol as a quick solution. In turn, marriages and other relationships can also easily suffer.

Strategies to Maintain Department Engagement and Wellness

Psychological Prescriptions

Change the question. First, change the question posed. Instead of asking officers who are hurting: “What’s wrong with you?” change the question to: “What happened to you?” When the question shifts, the department might begin to receive a more informed response that is more valuable to both the department and the officer. The department is likely to hear more about what is actually happening—trauma, loss, survival. When leaders have more accurate information, they can respond more effectively.

Use trauma-informed psychologists. Ideally, the department’s police psychologists are trauma-informed therapists in addition to law enforcement culture specialists. Further, the department should train its sworn and civilian populations on trauma and its effects.

Teach skills. It is not just enough to provide therapy. Departments should be teaching psychological skills to the officers. Leaders would never tell an officer, “It’s not OK to just use lethal force on a suspect with mental illness.” They would train, train, train officers until the skills are deployed without thinking, using muscle memory. Further, consider the analogy of an alcoholic who is in a high-intensity situation and may be triggered. That alcoholic probably knows what he should not do (i.e., drink), but he might not know what to do in that situation. It is the duty of the police psychologists to ask different questions, be trauma-informed, and teach coping skills—dialectic behavioral therapy skills (e.g., emotion regulation, distress tolerance, mindfulness, effective communication); performance enhancement skills (e.g., goal setting, imagery training, cognitive strategies, intensity regulation); and emotional survival skills (e.g., aggressive time management and goal setting, relationships, financial health, physical fitness, will-to-survive, multiple life roles beyond just a cop identity).

Offer refuge. The department can offer a place for officers to, quite literally, physically and psychologically rest. It is often a calm, quiet, and less-bright place where officers can take a break, get centered, get grounded, and recharge.

Provide access to common “over-the-counter” remedies. Common wellness prescriptions in departments include peer support, annual wellness checks, critical incident debriefings, and health resource platforms. Every law enforcement agency should have trained peer support regardless of department size. Annual wellness checks are important, according to the IACP Police Psychological Services Section, and they should be done on a mandatory basis; these checks should be kept confidential, and command officers should ensure that all department personnel get checked every year.¹ Critical incident debriefings afford a bridge from critical incidents to increased resilience. Also, departments can benefit from accessing law enforcement health platforms to connect to wellness resources.

Physical Prescriptions

Hold fitness challenges. Research demonstrates that the top ways to engage men in wellness pursuits are to make it a competition and to have a technological interface. And, if both are combined together in one fitness challenge, it will likely entice many of the male employees to participate for increased health and wellness outcomes. Consider what might work for personnel at your agency.

Check blood pressure. At some agencies, employee temperatures are still being taken when they enter the workplace in order to screen for possible COVID-19 symptoms. This same strategy can be applied to blood pressure checks for sworn and civilian personnel at the start of every shift to screen for health issues.

Share information about sports nutrition. Even if a given department does not have a police dietitian, any agency can produce, for example, a monthly newsletter highlighting specific sports nutrition strategies to elevate performance (e.g., building more muscle mass, losing more fat pounds). After all, most officers want to know how they can become better, stronger, faster.

Spiritual Prescriptions

Provide opportunities for meditation and prayer. Embrace technology. Many apps can help sworn and civilian employees get centered, become calm, and get grounded. Whether at a desk or behind the wheel of a black-and-white, it is easy to put one AirPod in one ear while keeping the other ear open for an approaching coworker or community member.

Research has proven that prayer and faith-based practices are effective at reducing stress. Research does not favor one faith over another when it comes to stress reduction, but research does demonstrate employees who use their religious coping strategies often find doing so reduces stress.

Encourage gratitude and forgiveness. These are two key areas where religion and psychology overlap. Turning an officers’ attention to what they have—the graces and blessings in their lives—as opposed to what they do not have helps reduce stress and increase a sense of well-being. This is just a shift in attention. What people notice and invest in is where their minds attune.

Resentments add more weight in an officer’s daily backpack that must be carried along with all of the other worries and deadlines. Conversely, forgiveness allows officers to remove one or more “bricks” from their backpacks and reduce the weight that they have to carry on any given day.

Teach (spiritual) skills. Just like cultural competence should be infused throughout the law enforcement training curriculum, arguably all police training should be virtue-enhanced, especially given the need to build trust and relationships in communities right now. Tactical yoga and relationship skills to maintain and strengthen law enforcement marriages are also valuable.

Host or provide access to retreats. Spirituality retreats are about the soul being restored. There are retreats being offered at no or little cost to police officers right now. In addition, silent retreats allow officers to unplug not just from their electronic devices but also from their daily demands and activities. This intentionally allows for increased mindfulness and the ability to recharge.

Utilize sworn police chaplains. Police chaplains are severely underutilized generally in law enforcement. Use this resource! Departments may even wish to consider hiring retired law enforcement personnel to serve in this capacity. Some officers are more comfortable with confiding their suffering to a chaplain than to peer support personnel or the police psychologist.

Address the “why.” The main focus of Viktor Frankl’s seminal book, Man’s Search for Meaning, is that if the individual knows the “why,” he or she can tolerate almost any “how.”² This can be applied to law enforcement and officer engagement right now. Departments can have discussions and trainings and talks around the “why.” “Why do we do what we do? Why are we here? Why are we in law enforcement? What is it that we are trying to achieve at the greater societal level?” If officers are thinking more about the “why,” then they can put up with almost any “how” that happens along the way.

Conclusion

Like tactical skills, crowd control, and sovereign citizen stops, all personnel should be trained in emotional survival strategies. In this climate, it is no longer a luxury to spend time and invest resources on officer engagement and wellness; it is imperative to maintain fit and ready personnel who consistently perform at optimal levels. d

Notes:

¹IACP Police Psychological Services Section, “Peer Support Guidelines,” ratified at the 123rd IACP Annual Conference and Exposition, San Diego, California, 2016.

²Viktor E. Frankl, Man’s Search for Meaning (Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 1959).

Please cite as

Stephanie Barone McKenny and Julie Snyder, “Staying Engaged and Well During Turbulent Times: The Impact of Anti-Police Rhetoric,” Police Chief Online, May 25, 2022.