Robin Cropper
Organizations of Law Enforcement
2-21-07
# Three out of every four marriages, where at least one spouse is in law enforcement, ends in divorce and approximately two out of every five marriages nationwide. There are approximately 865,000 police officers, according to the October 2006 statistics almanac.
Taking into account the long hours, the varied schedule, and the sheer brutality of the job, it’s understandable why so many of these marriages fail. So many times the other parent is left at home to tend to the children, alone. They fix meals, help with homework, go to ballgames, and spend countless hours with out a companion. For these reasons police spouses have many times been referred to as “married singles”. Many nights that spouse sleeps alone in bed, and there is a lack of physical intimacy between the spouses due to the job.
Beyond the physical need for the spouse, there is emotional stress, for both the spouse and the police officer. It is not easy seeing the things police see. While dealing with trauma, danger and violence on a daily basis, the officer must uphold his professional demeanor and stifle feelings of anxiety, anger and frustration, a technique that often trickles into his off-duty personality. The officers begin losing themselves in a sense. They harden and become less sensitive. Also, they don’t want to discuss work while at home, due to the graphic nature of their job. The spouse may begin to feel disconnected due to the lack of communication. As anyone can imagine, after seeing the things these officers see, they are not willing to come home and say “Hey honey, guess what I did today? I scraped a 16-year-old boy off the road because of a drunk driver!” This happened to the Yukon police in March of 2005. That young man was my best friend’s brother. Obviously, they don’t discuss it. They “bottle it up”. Nothing more discussed.
June 16th, 2001, police personnel and EMS responded to a suicide. Since you aren’t familiar with that date, it was a Sunday. Father’s day to be exact. The police responded to a “911 suicide call”. When they arrived, there was a 17-year-old young man, DOA. Single self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head. He was located in his parent’s bedroom, on the floor. On the pillow of his parent’s bed, a letter had been addressed to his father. It had been opened prior to the police arriving. The note simply stated “Happy Father’s Day. Are you happy NOW?”. I can not imagine how the police officers that responded to that call felt. How could they discuss that with their loves ones? A 17-year-old high school senior was dead. He had taken his own life. He was also my best friend.
Each day horrible things happen in this world. Each day, police officers respond to those things, and they usually have lasting imprints from those events. How can anyone be happy, cheerful, romantic, loving, caring, and “themselves” with the imagine of a child’s body torn in 3 pieces, or a young man’s brains blown all over a room? How can we question “WHY” there is such a high divorce rate among the police community? We should be asking how to stop it. Many communities have mandated psychotherapy for officers. Most communities have mandated “de-briefings” in which they discuss the traumatic issue, which occurred. Although, not all officers go. Many, especially men, feel “they can handle it”. Then, alcohol becomes their coping mechanism. That leads into the discussion of alcoholism and possible domestic violence within the police community. All of these issues, although separate, are closely related. This is a high stress profession. I read a “riddle” today.
*When is the baseball coach called Mom?
*When does Mr. Popularity become the invisible Man?
*When can a "pair" turn into a lemon?
Answer:
When your spouse is a police officer!
Yes, it seems funny, however it is also all too real for families of a police officer. Through all the web pages I read today, I noticed a trend. Police have high stress jobs. Divorce rates are high, as is alcoholism, domestic abuse, suicide, and even drug use. Why aren’t there more web pages discussing coping mechanisms, counseling, and other various “helping organizations”? Many police officers are “control freaks”, so to speak. If they admit there is a problem that means they have a weakness. What can we do to correct this? Is there a way to correct it? Those are questions I cannot answer. During the research for this paper I have realized how truly tough the police officer’s job is. I now wonder where I will be in 10 years.
