I was in the RCMP for 25 years. In my earlier days, we tended to suppress the horrific incidents that we encountered. Nowadays they have proper critical incident therapy—but back then, we didn’t want to show any weakness so we kept it inside.
There is no magical answer on how to deal with tragedies. We all deal with things differently. I found out that suppressing it doesn’t work and leaves scars. You have to learn how to deal with it and then ‘put the experience’ in a drawer—and when it emerges again, you have to know how to deal with it.
Bill T
