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Welcome to the Breaking the Stigma Podcast with McNeal and Company. The mission of this podcast is to offer education and resources for first responders, wellness, mental health, and resiliency. The host of this podcast are not mental health professionals, but all information shared will be in conjunction with either a certified training or mental health expert. We are here to break the stigma around mental health discussion. That being said, some of our topics may be triggering or upsetting to our listeners. If at any time you are overwhelmed, we encourage you to pause the podcast or forward to the end where we will list the hotline. You can call for immediate help and conversation with a professional. Please be safe and gentle with yourself. We need you here, and we want to help. So, welcome everyone to Breaking the Stigma podcast. This is episode number one. We're gonna talk about why there is stigma, and we're gonna talk a little bit about what that means for first responders. Um, I am joined here with my colleague, Jason. Jason, you wanna tell them a little bit about yourself?

Absolutely. I'm Jason Salazar. I'm a risk management safety specialist for McNeil. Uh, prior to this, I worked for the sheriff's office as a deputy sheriff.

Awesome. Thank you. Uh, so I think we're just gonna jump right in. You know, I'm excited to be here. I'm excited to be starting this podcast. So I'll tell them, I'll tell our audience a little bit about why we're starting this podcast . So we work very closely as an insurance company with first responders, and we were looking at our training, and we really felt like there was a need for more resources for first responders and their mental health. So Jason and I put our heads together, we brainstormed, and we said, you know, how do we get this information out to people ? And how do we do it in a way that's relatable and that people will really , uh, gravitate toward? And I mean, I don't know anyone who isn't listening to podcasts at this point. Exactly. I think every single person I know is listening to a podcast. So we said, you know, what is better? What's a better way than a podcast , uh, to allow you to listen to us whenever you need to. Hopefully you'll get some good resources or some good thoughts you can share with your friends, with your teammates , um, you know, with former first responders. So that is breaking the stigma. We are hoping to break down this thought process that mental health is, you know , a bad thing. <laugh> , we're gonna talk about how it's a good thing and how wellness is important. So, Jason, am I missing anything on that?

No, I, I think you, you hit the nail on the head right there. There is that the, when, when me and you looked at this months ago, back in what, probably December, we started thinking that there, there, there need , there can be more resources out there. Um, like you said, with podcasts, everyone li so many people listen to podcasts. It's easy. You can be at the gym, you can be at the firehouse, you can be the ambulance station. And we understand that not everyone can be there. When something is live, you may run to a call. So we understand it . It's a , it's a great tool to have that you can just go onto your phone, listen to, listen to a podcast real quick, you know, collect the information. And that's like you said, Kayla, that's what we're looking for. We're looking for even just as much as we possibly can give someone, even if it reaches out to someone that's better than we could ever ask for. Yeah . And I think with , uh, a podcast , uh, just being able to reach out to the people, you know, because it's such a sensitive topic.

Yeah, and I'll give a little background myself. You know, I'm not a first responder, but I have lived with veterans. Um, I grew up with a lot of military men in my family, and I know a lot of first responders. So this hits very close, close to home for me, because I never maybe even realized that there's such a small amount of resources. And I think that's come to light in all aspects. I mean, I, I feel like mental health isn't talked about enough in society, period. Um, or we kind of put this idea of like, the woe is me, or like, you're complaining or, you know, stop being so sad all the time, right? Like, we kind of say this to, to our friends and our family. And it's very easy for us to be like, Hey, cheer up <laugh> . Well, it's not always like that, right? Like, it's not always, it's not that simple. Uh, typically our mental health is not that simple. So we're here to debunk some of that, hopefully break some of that down for you all. And we are going to be having guests on almost every single episode to chat with us and tell us about their experiences or give us their expertise. So today you have just Jason and I <laugh> kind of going back and forth and, you know , we're two peas in a pod over here. <laugh> messing everything up left and right today. Bear ,

Bear with, bear with us, <laugh>,

But we're here. Uh , so Jason, why don't you, you know, tell us a little bit about your experience working in law enforcement. Tell us, you know, what was the stigma? What was the thought process for you and your team on mental health issues or even just, you know, bad calls or things that really stuck with you? What was, what was the process like? What did it feel like?

It was, it was definitely something like you said with , uh, the stigma behind it. We were , you're told, especially when you go first going to the academy, it's a , it's a very rigorous job. Uh, any first responder job is , uh, physically, mentally , um, all those are so challenging. It takes a toll on your physical health, mental health , uh, family life. So when you, when you get into the job, you want to, you know, being a first responder, you're strong in general. You're not only physically strong, you're mentally strong. You're someone that you go into the danger, you will rather risk your own life for others. So I think a lot of people look at it as that may view it. I know I used to view it as, well, if I go get help, am I even cut out for this job? Because how am I, if I'm gonna go seek , uh, counseling or if I'm gonna go see a psychiatrist or try to go through a peer support program, I don't want people to view me as weak. I don't want people to view me as , uh, you know, Jason can't do his job or he just, he just can't handle it. You know, sometimes you'll hear that is that maybe it's just not the right fit for you. Well, it , that doesn't have to be the case. It doesn't have to be the case where just because you get mental health treatment or you go want to go talk to someone, or even if just talking to a coworker , um, does not mean you're weak. It means that you want to better yourself. You want to better your home life. I, I went through that when I, when I going through my time in law enforcement , um, you know, I would shut down. I would shut down at home. I would shut down at work, and it just, it bottles up. And it wasn't until that I finally said, I have to, you know, I really need to start talking about this and talk about whatever the things that I've seen or the stuff that I've heard , um, stuff that got got to me naturally.

Yeah. And it's really interesting that you say that because, you know, I think of myself too. I've said this out loud, I know I have that I could never do the job. I could never be a police officer. I could never be a firefighter. I couldn't, I couldn't be an E M T, I can't do blood, I can't do this, I can't do that. I don't feel like I'm mentally strong enough. And I think you bring up a good point that like, that's not what it , that's, that's not the case. The case is that we're human <laugh> . Right? Exactly. So seeing these things that you all see day to day , you know, being in right and out there, seeing someone bleeding, seeing someone hurting, seeing, even just responding to family members at a crash or at a , at a fire, right? I mean, these are things that are not normal everyday things. And it's okay to be human. Like I think that's, that's part of the stigma, right? Is that you almost feel like you have this like hero syndrome if you wear will, where it's, you can't be human. You have to be this like super human that like doesn't have emotions or doesn't have, you know, is just, oh, I'm just tough. I can, I can deal with it, no problem. Yeah.

Well, and you also think too, that I can just put, put everything on the, on my back and carry it through where in , in fact, I mean, you , you raised a really good point. When you look at any first responder job, the majority of of Americans don't see what any, a lot of first responders have seen. And not only that, but they see it time , day in and day out. So not only do you see something traumatic, you see it multiple times. So you may have a really bad call, you may , uh, a really bad fire and you, you may see that your first time, but when in doubt you may see that 20 other times throughout your career. Yeah . So all those start to pile up that, that's where you start getting that backed up in your head of all those calls. If you think about all the calls first responders go to whatever capacity you work, even, you know, dispatch, you, you know, you hear the people on the other line and you know, you can just feel , uh, the trauma right there. And I think that's where people don't understand is that it , it eventually does get to you. And that's okay. It's okay to say, you know what? This call did not sit right with me. This call made me, whether it reminded you of your wife, your mom, your dad, yeah , your brother, your sister, your kids. It's okay because we're like you said, we're human. We are naturally, you have that empathy, you have that compassion for people. It would be, it's different if you don't feel that, you know? Yeah,

Absolutely. Do you think that it's a stigma? Because in general it's just hard to talk about. Yes. Part of it is this like hero syndrome, and part of it is this idea that like, we're scared of, you know, repercussions because it's not talked about. But do you think that maybe there's the stigma because it is hard to talk about? Like I don't , I don't, I don't know that there's many people who really feel comfortable sitting down and having a true conversation about like, like when you ask, for example, when you ask like, how are you today? How often are we expecting an honest answer back from those people ? How often you don't , are we expecting you to say like, actually I'm not

Good. I've had a terrible morning . Yeah , I've had a terrible

Morning .

I'm not , I was in traffic for an hour. I got into an argument with my spouse. Uh, I , I ran this call and I think you , you know, you , you raised a great point. Is that one , it is tough to talk about. Oh, me personally, I remember having to sit down with my wife and tell her, I am not okay. I am not okay. Like I am, I'm struggling right now. It is , it was not easy to do that because I, I did feel defeated, but once I got that out there, it felt like a literally a ton of bricks off of my chest because I was like, I can't keep, keep this in anymore. Um , right. Like you said, you know, we used to do that all the time, and it doesn't matter what job you're in. And I remember working in law enforcement , uh, I worked in the jail and we would have a major incident , uh, you know, whether it was the day before or we do shift change, and they're like, yeah, how was , you know, how was , how was shift today? Ah , it was fine. But they don't really , you know, you don't tell, you don't go into depth of, well , I had to do this, I had to do that. I got, I got punched in the face. You know, all those things play into it. And like you said, it's mental health. It is a tough thing to talk about. And it's, understandably, it's a , you're vulnerable, you're in a very vulnerable spot. And it , as first responders, it's hard to be vulnerable because to , to do that job, try to shield as much emotion as you can to be able to do your job, because you're trying not to think with emotions. You're trying to think of the best possible way, whether it's for a patient, a victim, whatever it is.

Absolutely. There are different types of stigmas. Right. So you, you touched on this a little bit earlier. You said yourself, the internalized kind of shame, the discomfort thinking like, well, what if I'm not strong enough for this job? And then of course, you also said, you know, public stigma, you know, scared of what others are gonna think about you. But the other, the other piece of it that I think we haven't really touched on yet is the institutional, you know, as, as a police officer, as law enforcement did, were you ever worried that if you talked about your mental illness, that it would be frowned upon by, by whether it was a supervisor or the institution in general? Did you ever feel like it was kind of an unwritten rule that you just didn't discuss that kind of stuff?

Yeah, it, it definitely you do, especially when you first start. Um, if you don't know a whole lot of people there, you know, you know, you may know people in your academy, but you're , you're , you're fresh off of field training and, and you do, you sometimes feel that, you know, I don't want to be blacklisted if I talk about that, you know, Hey, I'm not doing okay. Or I came into work today and I'm like, struggling just to get out of bed because I've been working overtime, I've been doing this, I've been doing that. Um, you do start to, you know, some people may feel that way. I know sometimes I used to feel that way. I'm like, well, if I, if I tell them I'm, I'm not doing well. Yeah. I would get a little worried of like, okay, well how am I gonna be viewed now? Am I gonna be viewed as you shouldn't be in this job, or I don't, I don't think you're gonna be able to hack it. Um , right . Absolutely. Yeah. There was times that I , I would definitely feel that way.

Yeah. Not to mention the idea, like institutionally, there may be different generations too. Right. And I think, you know, my <laugh> I'll never forget my, my dad, I had a moment where I just, I had a full like, anxiety attack, like just full blown , I don't even remember what it was over, you know, I was having like a rough day. I was having just a rough time. I was, I , I believe it was like a transitional period for me. And I just had a moment because I was, I was safe in my parents' home, and I just let, let go. And my dad looked at me and he said, you need to calm down. He's like, you have this made up disease in your head that you have anxiety. He's like, that's not a disease. Right? Yeah . And I stopped and I looked at him and I got, I got mad <laugh> . Yeah . I was like, what do you mean mean that's not a disease? It absolutely is a disease. Yeah. Now , I'm not saying, I'm not saying we should go around self diagnosing ourselves, not by any, not by any stretch. I do not believe that that's the case, but it's very easy, right. For that older generation, they were taught, my dad's 76, he was taught, you just get through it. Yeah . You just deal with it and you don't, and you don't talk about it and you cry if you need to cry in your own time, but you don't talk about it, and you don't go out in public and Yeah . And speak of it. So I think that's the struggle right now too, is that there's still kind of an older generation. It's nothing against them , it's just that they weren't raised necessarily the same way and with the same amount of, with the same amount of exposure to it as we were, you know. Exactly . We , we've been kind of taught this through our experiences and in our lives, in our generation that no mental health is just as important as physical health.

Oh, abso , absolutely. I mean, I think, you know, you raised a great point because yeah, there are generations that were raised. You pull up your bootstraps, put on your work clothes , and you push through it, you know, especially like you said, with anxiety, I've, I've struggled with anxiety for a long time and it absolutely , uh, <laugh> is something that it's valid <laugh> . It's, it's debilitating. It is. It , there's, there's times that, you know, it almost, it almost feels surreal that you are like, is this even really happening right now? Because you almost sometimes feel outer out of body with it. You know, you start , you're like, gosh, I don't even really, you can't even pay attention to everything because your , your anxiety's so bad. Um, and I think, like you said, with with the exposures we have, and also circling back to resources, the amount of resources that are starting to come out more. Um, and that's why, just like with this podcast we want to do for first responders, because it's getting there, but there could definitely be a lot more resources out there for first responders. You hear about it all the time. Covid was a prime example when they started showing that, Hey, we want to have more resources for mental health. Um, it took a toll on everybody. So when Covid hit and then you started seeing more people saying, you know, I'm gonna go seek help, my question was, why? If we can do that for that, why can't we do more? We need to do more for first responders. Yeah . We need to get more stuff going. And we, we should absolutely get more resources for that .

You bring up a great point, you know, how are we gonna do this? How do we make it happen? Because the reality of the situation is that a lot of these departments, a lot of the fire departments, a lot of them can be volunteer. A lot of them are fully volunteers. Some are obviously a mix, some are fully career. But no matter what, they're running on limited budgets. None of these, none of these departments, and we're not just talking fire , we're talking e m s. We're , you know, people don't realize that these are public servant jobs, therefore they're really not making a ton of money into these organizations. But a lot of it is community funded . Yeah . So if the communities aren't aware, you know, or people are not aware of what's happening with first responders and their mental health, how is it gonna get better? You know? And I think it's, it's important that, you know, we are, we are connecting to some incredible people that we will be bringing on who really, this is their life's work and this is what they want to do. Because more first responders are dying by suicide than they are in the line of duty. Isn't that a crazy statistic? If that doesn't, if that doesn't, it blows jar you Yeah, exactly. If that doesn't jar you, I truly don't know what will, you know, so for me, I mean, that was huge to hear that, to think about that is like, what are we doing and why aren't we fixing it? Jason, I guess I ask you like, how, how do you think this is going to get better? What are the supports that you think companies or organizations need to be having?

I'm a huge proponent in peer support. Uh, some of my closest friends I met through law enforcement, the ones that I, that could actually see me vulnerable. The ones that could see me at my worst, that I could go to once I finally accepted. And that's, that's the, in my opinion, one of the biggest things is you have to accept it. You gotta accept it's okay to say, look, I'm not doing okay. It's okay to say, look, we've all heard of burnout. We've all had, you know, we've, we've all heard of P T S D, we've heard of all those. It's okay to say, you know what, maybe I need to talk to someone. If you're not comfortable talking to a , a psychiatrist, a counselor, right away, talk to a close friend of yours. Talk to a close friend. Because that's what I think the other resources need to be , uh, that organizations can use that. It's such in the broad scheme of it, it's not a super complicated process to have a peer support team to say, look, we, if you're a firefighter, you have another firefighter who can, that you can call 24 hours a day to say, look, I'm not doing okay. That is a huge first step. If organizations even looked into doing a peer support program, critical stress debriefs, and I know a lot of agencies do that, but not all of them still utilize that, is maybe looking and looking at your policy and saying, Hey, what are the, what are the different stipulations that we use when we do want to use a critical stress debriefing program? Maybe taking a look at them . The best thing is talking to your crew members. Talk to your employees, talk to them. If you're a leader, talk to your, talk to your shift and say, Hey guys, what, what is a good resource that we can maybe start looking at implementing? Yeah . It doesn't have to be right then and there, but just already having that conversation already shows it . And it goes a long way.

I agree. So, I mean, we can talk all day about resources. You know, we can, off the top of our heads right now, you and I can name off at least 10 resources for people. But if they don't believe that mental health is important, or if they don't believe that this is a problem in the first responder world, how are we going to fix that? How do we break the stigma?

The, the number one thing is accepting that this is an issue. That it is an issue and it is okay to talk about it. Yeah . And it's okay to seek help. 'cause I think that's the stigma about it. It's okay to seek help and still do this line of work. It's okay to say, look, I need , uh, I need to talk to someone. And , uh, is to accept that, because I think the stigma around it is, well, if you say something, well, how am I gonna , you know, how am I gonna trust you if you can't even handle this? When in doubt, I wouldn't doubt that the guy who says that is probably struggling with the same thing you're struggling with. Right . Is having an open line of communication. That's the best way I could put it, is that it's not only at work, but it's at home. Mm-hmm . <affirmative> , it's with your family, your spouse, your kids, whatever you have to do. It is having that open line of communication with them .

I agree. And I think we say open line of communication. I think sometimes we forgot , you know, it's, it's easy for us to talk. I mean, me and you are sitting here talking, right. And we're, we're jabbing back and forth, but it's very hard sometimes to listen. And I think a huge part of that open line of communication is reminding our leaders, reminding our communities to listen. Absolutely . And absolutely to hear when people walk up to you and say, Hey, I'm not having a good day today. Or, Hey, that call, just, I know it seemed routine, right? It wasn't abnormal, maybe, but it just hit me in a weird way. And I don't know, I don't even necessarily know what I'm feeling. I just know I'm not feeling good. And I think the ability to listen is also going to be so important.

Oh, absolutely. I mean, I, I think that's the , one of the biggest things is being able to, like you said also is listening. I know when I, when I was a first responder , uh, my wife works , uh, used to work at a hospital , um, she'd come home and I would be so burned out from my day that I'd be like, you know, she was trying to tell me something and my mind would be so wrapped up in my own , uh, issues that Yeah , I had a problem with that. And I think it can go, it can go both ways. Um, the other thing too is like if you see something, say something. Yeah . If you see someone struggling

Advocate for others, yeah.

You see your battle buddy out there who's struggling, talk to them, you know, that's unfortunately, yeah. Maybe it's not gonna be the most comfortable situation. Maybe it's not gonna be the most comfortable conversation to have with them. But I would rather go to one of my closest friends and say, Hey man, are you okay? 'cause you don't look okay. Or, Hey, why don't we go talk? I would rather have that than my friend. Whether it becomes another statistic, be another , uh, problem with drinking any kind of bad outlet. Because any first responder could understand what that is, is having a bad outlet. You'll learn how to communicate better too, and is being more open about it. And I think that's the thing is that it's still, it's starting to get there with mental health, but it's still not there where we can just openly talk about it.

I agree. We're talking very specifically about stigma in the workplace, but this all comes home with you, and it all is like a circle. And even think of if you're having a hard time at home and then you go to work, it can make work even worse. And then it's just this like vicious cycle of like, we're constantly, it's , we're constantly hurting and we're constantly dealing with stuff, and we aren't getting any of it unloaded. And I think that's why it's so important to remember your resources, because that's a nice place to, they're an outside source. There's someone you can talk to who doesn't have all these biases or who doesn't have your personal life, you know, at stake, or that you can openly talk to them freely about anything you want. And they're not going to judge you. They're just going to help you. Um, and they're gonna help you cope. And they're gonna give you mechanisms on potential therapy if it's necessary. And we'll, we'll talk more about that with Nikki on our next episode. It's really important, I think that we are utilizing our resources, but that we are, we're absolutely talking about it because it is a full circle thing, and it's happening throughout all of your life. If you're dealing with stuff at work, and then you're also dealing with stuff at home, where do you go? Where do you have to go? Exactly .

Yeah. And I think that's where we've talked about before is having that physical health too, is that it creates, it's such a great outlet. It's such a great stress relief. It's like, okay, well let's say you maybe don't, aren't ready to talk to someone yet. Okay, go work out , go work out whatever you like to do. Whether you like to go golf, whether you want to go shoot hoops with your kids or by yourself. You want to go run on a treadmill or you want to bench press 2000 pounds. If that means that it gets you in a little bit better head space to start thinking about it. And that way all those things that are jumbled up in your head start to dissipate a little bit more. I'm a huge proponent of that, that , I mean, I think it's, that's why you see weight rooms in fire departments. That's why you see 'em in e m s. It's like, you there , the resources are there, take some time. Absolutely pop on. Whether , what do you , whether you do wanna listen to this podcast and pop it on, or you wanna listen to your favorite , uh, music artist , if it gets you to clear your head space . That's the way I view it, is that if it helps you clear your head space , if that's what you gotta do, you gotta do what's best for you. And that's like, for me, my biggest support was my family. My parents were such a huge support. My wife was my absolute rock. She always saw, she saw me at my lowest . She saw me through so many different phases. And it was because I finally just said, I'm, I'm gonna be open about it. And it , yeah , it's, it was such a great reception to it, you know,

And I think it's also being honest with yourself. You're saying all the right things, right? I mean, but you, if you're ignoring it or you're avoiding it, you're probably gonna turn first to the other things, the alcohol, the drugs. You're gonna turn there first because you aren't accepting your reality. And your reality is you need to heal and you need to get better for your family, for your friends, for your team. We can say, no, this doesn't exist. And we can continue to say that, continue to say that, and we can continue to watch our relationships and our careers and everything just crumble around us because we refuse to accept that maybe I do need to talk to someone, or maybe I do need to change my lifestyle to help build some more resiliency for myself. Dealing, you know, with this career and what I see in it, it's, it's great, Jason, that you were so honest, you know, you were able to see it within yourself and you said, you know, I wanna be honest with myself here, and I'm going to be, and because of that, you were able to come out on the other side of this and you were able to have, you know, a career in law enforcement that I, I'm thinking was probably fulfilling to you. Absolutely . And a career and , and a career that taught you a lot and people that you have from that career that are still friends, I'm sure. And you were able to have all those things because you were honest with yourself and you were honest with the fact that, Hey, I've seen some stuff and I need to make sure I'm good. I need to check in with me. Yeah . And we, we so often just in society, we forget to check in with ourselves, <laugh> . Absolutely . And to say, Hey, how am I feeling? How am I doing? And being honest about, hey, maybe , um, there is something more going on. I'm drinking more than I usually am, or I'm not interested in the stuff I used to be, or I don't really wanna be around my family anymore. Those should be triggers to be like, okay, that's not normal and there's something going on and I, I need to have some help. Yeah.

When you start isolating yourself from people that you know, whether it's your family, your friends, yeah. That, that, that is an issue because I get, we all have days where, yeah, absolutely you want to just go as far away from human civilization as possible, but when it becomes a more frequent thing that you are isolating the people that are closest to you. You know, we, we talk about physically fit, but also is ha being mentally fit. If whether you go to the gym and you say, these are the goals that I want to hit. I want to , I wanna be able to run three miles in X amount of time. Okay, well, what if you take those goals and you say, I wanna be mentally fit and in X amount of months, I want to be able to have this conversation with this person, or I want to be able to have less sleepless nights. I can't even tell you how many times I would sleep sometimes like two to three hours, and I'd wake up in the middle of those two to three hours, and then it just eventually would build up that sometimes I'm like , I, you know, when I used to work at graveyards, I'm like , I don't even know where I am right now. Driving home. Yeah . And because that anxiety would build up because of those stress factors becoming mentally fit. My goal used to be, I used to say, okay, on this night I wanna get at least four hours, four hours turned into five, five turned into six. That's great . And then that's , I'm like, I wanna be able to sleep like a normal person out there. That's awesome. I don't , you know, I don't want to be up till midnight in having to get up for work at 4:00 AM or three in the morning. You know, whether you even set those mental, mental goals, utilize it like a gym, say, by this time I want to be able to do this for myself. Yeah. You know, it just kind of gives you a goal. And that's, that's kind of how I used to view it. I used to , I want to be able to do this. I want to be able to go to my wife and say, Hey, look, I'm having issues.

I think that's great. And I think developing those, those habits will absolutely make you stronger in your career, your relationships, and just within yourself as well. And I think we're all struggling with that coming out of this covid life. We've been living for two years. Yeah. The first responders are, have been probably struggling with it their entire careers. So those are some really, really great points. And we'll definitely be diving into some more, you know, resiliency and how are we going to prepare ourselves for the things that we're going to see. So Jason, I think as we're wrapping up this, this first episode, I think we've, we've touched on a lot and hopefully we've changed some thought processes for the, for the listeners. Yeah . But I just wanna share a few facts with everyone that I found absolutely . That were really, really hard hitting for me, 6.6% of first responders will attempt suicide that is 10 times more than civilians or non-first responders, 10 times more. Suicide is the third leading cause of death in the entire world. And as I said earlier, in 20 20, 97 firefighters died by suicide. 26 e m s paramedics died by suicide as opposed to 62 on duty firefighter deaths.

That's,

That's 97 to 62 . And let's also, let's also just be really blunt and say that's probably not even all reported, right? I mean, I'm sure there were some that weren't even reported. So that's, that's what we're dealing with. That is the , that is the problem. That is the problem. And that is why we need to break this stigma. So Jason, any, any final thoughts? Anything else for our audience for today?

My thing would be is think about it. Go home and truly think about it. Think about what are some of those goals. And also doing, like you talked about Kayla doing a self-check saying, how am I doing? And having a very strong, honest conversation with yourself. Maybe it's easier to do it with yourself, rather than saying, I'm gonna go straight to my family, my spouse, my, you know, whoever my friend, having an honest conversation with yourself and saying , how am I truly doing? Take a look at your life, take a tally and say, what are the things that I do want to get better at? Yeah . Whether it's mentally, whatever it is, but , um, know there are people that do care about you and that truly do wanna help you. And that they, there's resources out there. And that's what the goal of this podcast is, is to reach out to as many people as we can to say we understand and we do wanna help. And we do want to get those resources out to you and talk about it.

Yeah. And to add to that, if any of you watched our webinar, we did add some resources in the webinar, and it's a flyer that will actually have a website for self-assessments. And we will make sure that that is also on our website. Um, but you can also contact us , um, at McNeil if you need those resources. We would love to get them to you. Like Jason said, we want you to be healthy and happy and safe. And that is our ultimate goal here, is to help you continue to be the heroes that you are. Absolutely. But healthy heroes, right ? Absolutely . We're gonna be healthy heroes and we're not going to allow ourselves to be a statistic. Thank you all for joining us today. Looking forward to Nikki Johnson on our next episode. So please tune in and also feel free to write into us if there's anything that you would like us to talk about. Absolutely. We're really happy to be here. Thank you all for bearing with us on our first episode.

Thank you for what you do. And everyone stay safe.

This concludes this episode of Breaking the Stigma with McNeal and Company. If you or someone you love needs to speak to someone immediately, please reach out to the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-662-FOUR 3 5 7. We look forward to you joining us for future episodes of breaking the Stigma, be well and go safely.