On-the-Job Mental Wellness: Why Is It So Important?

On-the-Job Mental Wellness: Why Is It So Important?

On this episode of Mental Health Monthly, hosts Dan DeGryse and Chris Muscle sit down with Captain Rich Stack of the Chicago (IL) Fire Department to talk practical leadership and mental wellness on the job. They cover peer support, debriefing after critical incidents, sustaining programs beyond the news cycle, and the stigma that keeps people from asking for help. Stack names the protective factors that carry him: family, faith, mentors and his crew, plus small, concrete practices. The three also share advice for firefighters, leaders, and officers who want usable tools to build resilience and keep crews healthy.

ADHD in the Fire Service: Challenge or Superpower?

In this episode of Beyond the Headlines, host Chris Marella sits down with behavioral health clinician Beth Flaherty to explore how ADHD impacts members of the fire service. Flaherty, who authored "ADHD: A Fire Service Handicap or Superpower?" for Firefighter Nation, is a licensed clinical marriage and family therapist in Virginia and Maryland. She is the clinical director of the Virginia Professional Fire Fighters Peer Support Team as well as Prince George’s County (MD) Professional Fire Fighters and Paramedics, Local 1619.    Flaherty brings a highly valuable, rare dual perspective as both an expert clinician and someone who's diagnosed with ADHD. She reframes neurodivergence, mapping it out as a broad spectrum that naturally draws high-energy individuals to unpredictable emergency response work. Flaherty and Marella also tackle day-to-day challenges like time blindness and the inherent friction that occurs when independent minds meet rigid department protocols. They give insight on helping department leadership leverage these mental frameworks as superpowers rather than treating them as disciplinary hurdles.

So You Think You Have ADHD. Now What?

In this episode of Frontline Findings, Rachel Bozek welcomes guest Cassidi Dye, a licensed master level psychologist and first responder therapist, to explore ADHD in the firefighting community. They discuss ADHD symptoms, the importance of getting a professional diagnosis and the consequences of living with untreated ADHD. The discussion emphasizes the importance of creating systems and routines for people with ADHD to successfully manage daily tasks without burning out.

Confronting What Nobody Talks About

In this episode, 15-year firefighter paramedic Jason Patton joins host David Dachinger on Igniting the Shift Within to discuss the hidden struggles of first responder life. Patton, creator of the social media series Fire Department Chronicles, uses his platform to break the stigma surrounding mental health in emergency services. He shares his personal journey through childhood trauma and suicidal ideation, highlighting how therapy provided the tools he needed to heal. Patton stresses that mental wellness is the baseline for all physical and intellectual performance. He describes his presentation, How to Hug 101, which explores vulnerability in fire service culture, as well as his involvement with the nonprofit DetecTogether, which focuses on early cancer detection.

Why the "Why" Is So Important

In this episode of The CAN Report, Captain Chad Criss from Austell (GA) Fire and Emergency Services opens up to host Mike Goldstein about how faith, family, and a deeply rooted desire to serve drive his firefighting career. He details how his late grandfather's community impact and a background in competitive sports shaped his dedicated, team-oriented approach to emergency response. He stresses the critical value of comprehensive EMS training—which makes up roughly 90% of department calls—and the need for leaders to invest patiently in underperforming recruits rather than passing them off to slower stations.