It's always good to dispel a few of the myths surrounding police suicide, some of which have been perpetuated to keep them hush-hush or carefully closeted within departments.

We Know How Many Police Suicides Happen Each Year

No one knows how many.  No one.  

       Much of the fault lies with police departments themselves, who have done harm to their own officers by muddying the waters, concealing and misclassifying clear cases of suicides as “accidental” or “unknown cause.”

       Regardless of which side of the argument one stands, one thing is clear--no formal program has been established by law enforcement to track these figures. This is shameful when you think that  departments are spending large amounts to solve a problem for which they have no useable data or reliable information.

      Several private organizations claim to have The Numbers.  Unfortunately, they are unable to back their number with any organized documentation, give numbers for previous years, dates of suicides, departments, ages, or time on the job.  While well intentioned and perhaps of some informal use, we cannot give credibility to numbers that can’t be backed up.

     Our position is that unsubstantiated data is worse than no data at all.

     For more on this, as well as our recommendations, read the page "Sloppy Data."

"PTSD must  be traced to one big event."

      It can be.  It's nice and neat that way.  Some police agencies are loathe to recognize the important role played by cumulative stress in police work—the daily wounding of the soul over years, over decades.  Yes, cumulative stress is a real thing--ask an officer who has been crippled by it.  Sadly, it’s the nature of police work and police officers are taught not to talk about it for fear of appearing weak.  Banned from the locker room by a code of silence are phrases like:

     “I was really afraid.” 

     “I didn’t know what to do.” 

     “I was lost.”

     “I made a terrible mistake.”

     “I wish I could have done something.”

     “Sometimes I wonder if this is the job for me.”

     Under the heading of “cumulative” are the repeated exposures to screams, to rotting cadavers, assaults, spittings and verbal abuse.

Cumulative PTSD, while still rejected by a few hardliners, has finally been accepted in the medical community as real and diagnosable. To quote one expert, “In some ways, a cop's work may be even more traumatic than that of a soldier sent into a war zone.  The police officer's job, over many years, exposes and reexposes them to traumatic events that would make anybody recoil in horror.”

Law Enforcement is an Intimate “Family.”

     If it is, it’s a classic of dysfunctional families.  Law enforcement has always been a world of "dirty little secrets."  The armor must remain intact, at all costs.  Even officers love shows like "NYPD Blue" because officers smash mirrors and rip towel racks off the walls in the rest room and call the district attorney “a bitch!”--and get away with it.  “Angst” is the name of the game--and it's great entertainment.  In the real world, however, the cop knows she can't rip down the towel rack--and knows it wouldn't really help, anyway. 

"When in emotional trouble, seek out

your fellow officers."

     When you're in emotional trouble, seek out the help of a licensed professional therapist or medical mental health professional!  If you have a peer support officer program in your department, take advantage of them for guidance on how to find one.  

"Suicide is an 'angry act.”

     Suicide is a painful act.  No person wants to die. For some of us, however, the choices seem so few and the pain so great that the only way of finding escape from the pain seems to be suicide.  When I exchanged my gun for the telephone and went to the hospital, my first step was to begin crying—the pain was that deep.  No one had told me I could do that.  I didn’t realize there was an alternative. 

"When you retire, you can relax."

     The suicide rate for retired cops is frightening, and far higher than that of active duty officers.  For medically retired officers (which includes those retired on PTSD) the suicide rate is even more shameful.   The California Association of Highway Patrolmen (CAHP) reports that the suicide rate  for retired officers triples that of the general population.  For medically retired officers, they report, the suicide rate is believed to soar to phenomenal levels. 

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The California Association of Highway Patrolmen (CAHP) reports that the suicide rate  for retired officers triples that of the general population.  For medically retired officers, they report, the suicide rate is believed to soar to phenomenal levels.

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     Officers cling to the belief, in part based on truth, that they are part of a huge “family” (the ‘brotherhood’) during their careers.  When they retire, they suddenly lose that family.  They become a nuisance whenthey show up at their old office to join in coffee breaks.  They are relegated to “retiree groups” that render some camaraderie, but which can never equal the feeling of “family” they once felt wearing the badge.

    Worse, if they had the misfortune of being retired on a stress related injury, such as PTSD, they are regarded, as one officer said, “like the crazy aunt in the basement.” Some drink.  Others lose relationships or engage in reckless behaviors.  Some isolate and slide into depression.  Average life expectancies are low, for officers.  Many, as the figures show, choose to simply end it early.  What is that telling us?  That we have successfully put a band aid on their wounds, by golly, until we could sweep them away, forgotten and suicidal.