TODAY’S society is captivated by police work. We are so inundated with television series, news broadcasts and movies about policing, that it’s difficult to understand what the job actually involves.

Policing is a very hard, rewarding and stressful occupation and one that you cannot fully understand unless living it. Police officers must endure shift work, long hours, public scrutiny and unpredictable crisis-driven work.

It is very different to what we see on television.

Nathan* is currently is a senior constable who describes how the hardest part of policing is the toll it takes on an officer’s mental health.

“You never get asked to come out for a cup of coffee. You get called out into bad situations. People call the police when they need help or when they are in danger,” he says.

“It’s not surprising that ultimately we expect the worst out of people.”

When asked, he admits to becoming more cynical as his years in the police force increase and agrees that he has seen it affect his social and family life. “I try not to take my work home with me, but this isn’t always possible.”

“A few years ago, I went to a SIDS death on Christmas Eve. I was there for hours, watching a man and women cradle their lifeless newborn. It wasn’t like anything I had ever seen.” he described.

“I had been to a lot of deceased jobs but I had never seen a dead baby until that night. How can you go home to your wife and your own newborn and be the same? I think of that child I never knew every Christmas.”

Nathan explains that policing can consume an officer’s thoughts and conversations. It can become the defining aspect of the officer’s life and “without having an understanding of the changes that can happen within yourself, you can become distant from others and resent those who aren’t within the police culture”.

“People can forget that police officers are human beings too. We give out a fine for speeding and we are hated for it.” Nathan says. “You start to resent the public and the media for not appreciating what we do. People don’t understand that quite possibly we were watching someone die, compressed in a car, from a speeding accident the day before.”

“We develop ways to deal with the trauma we see, which most won’t understand. We’ll often joke about things that truthfully aren’t funny,” Nathan explains.

“It’s a blunt and harsh way to cope, but it’s a survival technique to keep an emotional distance.”

Karen* was in the police force for over 10 years and has since resigned.

“I loved being a police officer. I had to resign as I had been through a personal tragedy which needed me to take a significant amount of time off to recover physically and emotionally,” she explained.

As a mother, Karen credits her policing career to how she raises her children.

“Policing certainly opens your eyes to all the bad things that can happen. I think everyone tries their best to parent their kids to grow up to be better human beings than the generation before them, but there are certain things I’m a lot more aware of that I even now discuss with my young children,” she explained.

“Such as how bad drugs and violence are. As a police officer, you see the damage that drugs can cause and just how much addictions can affect a family.”

Karen also agreed there were many jobs police officers were called out to affect them emotionally.

“Most police officers would still remember the first deceased and the worst deceased they attended.” .

“Certain car accidents stay with you forever and jobs that involve child protection issues are always heartbreaking.”

“One that I still think about quite often involved an attempted double murder/suicide where a mother tried to gas herself in her car with her two children. As a mother of three, I think about this a lot,” she said.

“You never forget the screams of children.”

Nathan said the police force and agencies involved offered resources dedicated to mental health and emotional survival but despite this, the changes to an officer’s personality were inevitable.

“Being cynical and suspicious of human nature keeps police officers alive. The idealistic rookie is the one who gets killed. It’s as simple as that.”

*Names have been changed.