Posted on by Julie Deziel

Hidden

Shinedown “Through The Ghost” posted at the end of the blog. Feel free to play it will reading. Very thought provoking song. I do not own the rights to the music.

Who as a child did not play the game of hide and seek. Oh the excitement as you waited as they counted to ten or twenty and heard the words; ready or not here I come.” Holding your breathe so they did not hear you as they looked behind the couch and you may have even shut your eyes believing that by doing so you became invisible and there was absolutely no way they could ever find you.

Through the years I cannot deny I have simply wanted to shut my eyes and pretend I am invisible, that I do not exist, that I am a ghost that not a single soul can see me. I have tried to hide myself away from all that I encounter just so they will not know me…as I know me.

I boast oftentimes that I am the “queen of the mask” and I have drawers full of different ones. I can pull one out at the drop of a hat, for any situation. I do this so that I can hide myself away. I can find a way to cope with all that I hear through the 911s I hear. I can cover myself with the dust of an old mask of anxiety as I wait for the next tragedy. The tragedy of it all is that I no longer see myself. It seems the color of who am is blank. The senselessness and hopelessness has overtaken the color of my soul.

I am pained that through all the aid given, all the proper authority that has been sent, all the abuse taken by the upset and angry individuals, and all the tears cried with the hurt and desperate that the world with never know me as I once knew me…for I live within a shell of a ghost. It is easier to hide myself away. I have found that shadows allow me to live and function forward. The world will not know me as I had once known me. Time has taken its toll. I will remain behind the shadows as I take my place behind the mic where the only part of me exposed is my voice. My voice is my mask and the callers becomes a part of my army of ghosts that I will live through tomorrow. Excuse me. The line is ringing once again that I cannot hide from. “911, where is your emergency?”

Posted on by Julie Deziel

The Silence is Deafening

There is no denying that a train makes a statement. With its large lumbering engines blowing their horns at every intersection to the rumbling of the ground as they pass by at 60 miles per hour as we sit on the roadway and wait for each of the train cars to make it through and we can continue on with our day. For many it is an opportunity to check their social media pages or make a phone call or another to touch up their makeup or just to simply get lost in thought. Even though it is so loud and annoying to me personally…that silence is deafening.

I have written before about my son-in-law who we lost six months ago to an undetected heart condition. We are still reeling over that tragedy. Having worked in the EMS world I know that tragedy happens and it is definitely not choosy. My youngest son and I experienced a terrible car accident years ago and I remember the look of my children and family when I was able to see them and the fear in their eyes. I do not wish that on anyone. As I have walked with an officer to deliver the news to a young mother her husband will not return home, I wish none of our officers ever had to knock on that door and see the absolute horror in a parent’s face as they know what is coming.

As I put another year as a 911 dispatcher behind me…23 years actually, a scenario that just seemed unimaginable recently occurred at the end of a long shift. I experienced a 911 call that was eerily similar to my son-in- law’s situation. There is no training for this type of situation. During the most devastating moment of the caller’s life all I could do was think of my daughter having to make that exact same call. As I walked through the information I needed I wanted to assure them they were not alone just as I prayed my daughter did not feel. As they waited for help to come and the caller and I worked together I am most certain was a lifetime for an “actual person” to get there. Even though I was “with them”, I can only think they felt a crippling silence from their most loved. When ambulance and law enforcement arrived I was able to disconnect and even though there were two other dispatchers in the room all I heard was a deafening silence.

As the words from Disturbed’s “Prayer” sing out, “Another dream that will never come true just to compliment your sorrow. Another life that I’ve taken from you, a gift to add on to your pain and suffering. Another truth you can never believe has crippled you completely. All the cries you’re beginning to hear trapped in your mind, and the sound is deafening.” This is the life of a 911 dispatcher. You carry the sounds, the sorrow, the horror and they find you in the silence and it can most deafening in those moments. I do not wish that on another soul. I think about the dispatcher that took my daughter’s call often. I am so sad she had to comfort my daughter on the worst day of her life at the moment I would have given anything to have stood in for her.

I will continue to watch the trains go by and hope for a glimpse of a baseball cap and sunglasses and a smiling Geoff riding along with his buddies and silently remember all those lives I have been a part of through a loud siren ringing telephone when it pierced the silence of the dispatch center.

Posted on by Julie Deziel

I Have Mail

I love the holiday season. I can spend all day sitting admiring my Christmas tree all decorated and soaking in the smell of Christmas wafting from the oven. One of my favorites of the season though is checking the mailbox and finding out that I have mail and it includes those special envelopes from friends and family wishing our household a “Merry Christmas”..

I work in an environment that does not bring much good news. Those that reach out on 911 do not do so to let us know they have a new grandchild or they won at bingo or they are getting company over the holiday season. They unfortunately call on their worst day no matter what time of year.

This year has seemed to be a different year in the center. Communities being in lock down brought struggles that families were not familiar with which brought out more violence, more juvenile issues and substance abuse. As the crisis has continued to drag on and continued lock downs, be it schools or businesses, it has has wreaked havoc mentally and financially on many. The tentacles reach throughout on the crisis lines, mental health providers, emergency rooms, and our 911 lines.

It seems as if death has enveloped me lately. Recently I was involved in 3 CPR in progress calls within a 24 hour period. Over this past weekend there were 2 unattended deaths in 12 hours. There are many ambulance call for services and later an obituary is viewed in the local newspapers. It may or may not be related to the medical crisis sweeping across the United States. It could be due to an internal struggle they have or an undiagnosed medical issue or simply old age took over their tired body. I turn on the National news and there is the never ending broadcast of doom and gloom and the out of sight crescendo of death due to CoVid-19 and no matter where a person goes to on social media you cannot simply will not escape it. It is suffocating. It is almost as if I can actually feel the death as a formidable item. It is exhausting and overwhelming most days.

Tomorrow though I will walk through the locked doors of the 911 doors and prepare to take the calls of another individual who is having their worst day; short of breath, high fever, or a young wife finding their husband laying lifeless on the floor. I will do my job. I will check my mailbox on my way out of the driveway in hopes that it will present me with a little joy; an envelope filled with a peaceful scene or a goofy Christmas scene but both sending love with the pictures of the family and signatures of season greetings. I will FEEL alive and hopeful…for now.

I pray you are enveloped in much love and peace this holiday season.

Posted on by Julie Deziel

#IAM911


I have no face.

All I am is a voice.

Do you remember my voice, my concern?

I remember your voice.

I remember your scream.

I remember your sobs.

I hear a small child in the background crying as they try to understand what is unfolding in front of them.

I hear a dad swear in utter despair as his son lay lifeless.

I do not see the scene although I imagine just from the sounds.

Do you hear me as I give you instructions on how to give your loved one CPR that my voice is cracking as I try not to cry with you?

I wait with you for help to arrive although I am your first responder.

Do you know I carry your broken heart with me?

I remember your voice.

Do you remember mine?

I am 911.

Posted on by Julie Deziel · 2 Comments

The Door is Open, Please Come In


I walked into your house today.  Yes, I was invited in from the moment I answered the phone but I certainly preferred not to be there.  You sat me down at the kitchen table and told me the most personal aspects of your life and your marriage,  I did not want to be caught up in so much drama.  Tonight you both have had a few too many alcoholic beverages and you have decided it was time to bring up every sin you believed your husband committed in your relationship.  These are things that should be kept between a husband and a wife.  Tonight, you as a couple could not talk it out and it became more than a talk and now you have asked me in.  I cannot unknow your story.  I see you when we are grocery shopping.  I will know you but you will have no clue it was me you let in and told all your secrets to. 

Tonight I listened to your screams and I screamed inside myself right alongside you as your loved one had just committed suicide.  I shook as I sent help to you knowing there was no hope as you had described the scene to me.  I was on your shoulder as you cried, “Why?” I walked around the house with you as you did simple things that occupied you so we could keep our minds off the horror of what had just happened in the bedroom.  Even though I was right there with you, there was nothing but my forced calm voice to attempt to bring you out of your hysteria.  We were sharing your absolute worst moment.  I was there for you but there was no one for me.  I had to go it alone.  You were going to be able to have family present to comfort you.  Surely you will not think of me but I will think of you for many years to come.

One very early morning you awoke and were forced to call me to tell me the love of your life was gone; peacefully finding eternal rest in his favorite chair in the living room.  You do not want me to hang up with you while you wait alone for those I have sent to you on your absolutely worst day.  You take me in and set me down on the couch beside you as you hold his hand and gently cry and tell me how much you love him.  I hear the story of how you met a strapping young man all those years ago at a county fair and how he has had your heart all these years and you ask how you will go on.  I ask about your children and grandchildren and hear about the immense love he had for them and the jokester that he was.  The responders are there and will soon enter your home but before they do I am witness to a very special kiss and a whispered, “I love you honey.  I love you so” as your quiet sobs are muffled against his cheeks and you leave your tears with him.  My tears are mixed with yours though you never saw them.

The ring of a phone and the simple line of “911, where is your emergency?” brings law enforcement, an ambulance or a fire department but it first brings a dispatcher, the true first responder, into your home, into your life, into incredibly personal moments.  You hang up.  You shut the door that you so willingly unknowingly had me walk through.  I was there for you; never leaving you alone in your time of need.  You more often than not will not think of me again…but from this moment though you do not leave me.

Posted on by Julie Deziel

Hold On. It’s the Phone . I Better Get It.

How many times does your cellphone ring a day in which you can simply hit the “ignore” button?  How many times does your office phone ring and you are able to look at the caller ID and say to yourself, “No, I will call them back later when I am back from my morning meeting.” At times it is a blessing to be able to just pick and choose which calls to answer.  I would be correct that most often the ones chosen would be the ones that come from your best friend, your mother or significant other and they may each leave you feeling good when you hang up; more often than not you are smiling or laughing at some point during your conversation. Imagine answering phone calls that brings at most times a high level of stress every time you answer that special ring; that ring that sounds like a siren to alert you that this is a special call.  A phone call from someone experiencing one of the worst moments in their life.  I do not have the option to ignore that call.  I do not have the option to call that number back after my lunch break.  I must answer that call as I am 911.

I go to work.  I walk through the back door after swiping my card and enter the building.  I swipe my card once again, take a deep breath and cross the threshold and listen to the room to get a feel for what my shift may entail.  I am in the 911 dispatch center.  I go to my locker and smile as I look at a picture of my granddaughter Harper Grace held there by a butterfly magnet.  I hang up my coat and put my food in my cupboard and fridge and take my mouse pad that has a picture of sweet Juliana as Little Miss Thief River Falls, my special pen, and my headset and I walk around the corner into the center and see where I will be spending the next 10 hours where I will orchestrate the activities throughout the county.

One aspect to this unique job is that it no day is the same and for the most part I thrive on that.  A dispatcher may simply take phone calls mainly dealing with property crimes and dependent upon which officers are manning the many miles of the county and city streets, take on many traffic stops.  Most days bring an ambulance page for an unfortunate family having a loved one facing a medical emergency and then there are the “regulars” that can bring a smile or an occasional eye roll.  Myself and any other dispatcher simply cannot ignore the ringing phone and have no clue what is coming with those rings.  It was recently that the phone sent a siren out signaling a 911 call and before I could even get the words “911, where is your emergency?” out I knew this was a call that would impact me.  Not necessarily in the same manner the caller was impacted but certainly would haunt me.  Her pain and agony could not be dismissed through the screams.  My own pain was difficult to hold in.  It brought forth foreign feelings that I did not know how to handle.  I have had difficult calls in my 19 year career previously that were difficult and similar in nature and did, unfortunately, awake these same types of feelings.  For the first time ever I could admit that the “struggle is real.”  The things that dispatcher “hears” are entirely guttural and agonizing.  Those calls do not go away as a property accident does.  It plays over and over.  In my mind I paint a picture of what is occurring or did occurr. I disconnect from that sad, difficult call and take a walk to get myself together as this night I am lucky enough to not be working alone as most often we do.  Those 10 quiet minutes alone are a blessing. I am 25 minutes away from the difficult call and 911 is ringing again for a plane that had to do a emergency landing which sends the center into high gear.  There has been no true time to deal with the difficult situation and now we are in hyper mode.  Andrenaline is at a high level.  All I ask for is a moment to catch my breath. But for now I cannot do that and I move through the chaos.  Hold on a second, its the phone. I better get it.

Life as a dispatcher…one phone call away from life changing; not just for the person calling but for the one picking it up, “911, where is your emergency?”