Order and Chaos with Shane Norwood - A celebration of the order and chaos in all of our lives!
My name is Shane Norwood. I am a former police officer, with 20 years of experience in law enforcement. During my career, I had the distinct pleasure of working a wide array of assignments from patrol, K9, SWAT, field training officer, school resource officer and many others.
Like thousands of other officers throughout the world, I witnessed unspeakable horror and tragedy. Images of murder victims, grotesque and bloody crimes scenes, mangled and burned bodies, and more dead children and babies than I would like to recall, are seared in to the fabric of my mind. The taste of brain matter while attempting to give CPR to a small child with a crushed skull and the odors of burnt and decomposing bodies are just as active in my senses in this moment as the day they were first witnessed. I know countless colleagues who suffer in like manner.
Early in my career, I began experiencing night terrors, periods of uncontrollable and inexplicable sadness and despair, and an overall feeling of hopelessness. These feelings had grown in intensity with each passing year of my career, but were especially evident and debilitating during my time as a child sexual assault investigator. After suffering a serious injury to my gun hand during a confrontation with a violent suspect, I soon found myself home on full disability, not knowing if I would ever recover physically to be able to return to work. Now, plagued with severe physical pain, on top of the emotional and mental pain I had experienced for many years, I sank deeper and deeper in to a pit of depression and high-risk choices. I self-medicated with alcohol, in increasing amounts, in order to stop the night terrors and the depressed thoughts. But things only got worse, and soon I hit rock bottom.
Ultimately, I researched local therapists and was open to cognitive behavioral therapy and Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) treatment. As a result, I am the best version of myself. While I still struggle with the same issues we all struggle with on a daily basis, my mind is capable to process these events in a "normal," healthy manner.
In order for my experiences and loss to not be in vain, I hope to use this podcast as a means for others to come aboard, talk about mental health, or not, and provide insight in to our own unique issues, struggles and ways of coping.
This podcast is NOT just for law enforcement officers! We will cover a wide variety of topics, and enjoy conversations with guests from all walks of life! I can promise this - there will be a little bit of order, and a little bit of chaos, in every episode - no matter the topic! Thank you very much for stopping by - and enjoy the show!
-Shane