weasel

I have worked for the same ambulance service for 17 years and the same fire department for 10 years. It was only after a series of events at the end of 2003 and the start of 2004 that I was given the diagnosis of PTSD. The incidents that lead to this were both EMS and fire also my best friend was in the final stages of terminal cancer. After getting over that period everything was alright until the death of my mother. Sometime after that things crashed again (and I am not sure the exact extent this played other than a significant event). Which was when I confided in a person I trusted who then betrayed that trust. The incident earlier in the week was a fire incident where I was left on a hose line on my own (a 2 person job) at one point I started to lose control of the nozzle and sustained a injury but was able to regain control and continued to work on my own for a further 20 or so minutes when my SCBA became low on air. I did not withdraw earlier as I was holding my own and basically prior niggles/complications I didn't want to appear weak. From November last year I have a psychologists report saying that I am not and was not displaying any PTSD symptoms. My service has pretty much ignored this and have taken their own stand. Which for all my research appears to be wrong. I will be following this matter up after the weekend. I have had enough of this series of events leaving me feeling both worthless and powerless and will pursue this to an agreeable or non contestable conclusion.

Had further hassles on a job last night, same people involved. Am seriously considering making myself unavailable until I can talk to someone higher up next week (is weekend here now).

Ok thanks. Was hoping to catch up with someone in the service but not in my town, and in a higher position yesterday but it now looks like that will happen next week. As I said after trusting someone and being betrayed I am very cautious about who I do trust. I am so scared of doing anything in case it makes the situation even worse for me. Even before Monday nights incident was feeling like there was no light at the end of the tunnel. But yeah the situation does need addressing, and so thankyou all for the things you have said. I think my service is probably thinking they got me where I won't or cant do anything, I think now that yeah they did but because of that I now HAVE to do something. Will keep you posted. Weasel

I'm not in the US, so to sue is not an option. Um I have a previous diagnosis of PTSD. But have functioned very well for a couple of years until this latest incident last year, which seemed to have arisen after the sudden death of a close family member among other factors. Have been equivalent of emt/medic all up 17 years and have worked fire for 10 years. My plan IS to get out of the town I currently live in but that involves selling property and will not happen over night. Some of the BS I'm up against includes having a meeting with a regional manager who said 'he now realized I was quite an intelligent person' so left me thinking WHAT had he been told about me??? But he also didn't take back some of the other items that he had obviously been told about me that were BS.Which is why the whole situation has me feeling totally screwed. The unsafe situation I was put/left in resulted in a minor injury, but it did require documenting at that point I was being told that the injury was my fault and I was 'fatigued' to cause it, which is more BS.

That is not an option where I am. But as I've said I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place .... I really feel anything I do or say with end up back firing on me. I don't want any of this crap to cause 'old' problems to resurface. This whole situation has me feeling really bad and worthless.

I'm in trouble with my service. Last year I admitted to someone I was stupid enough to trust that I was having some problems with flash backs and so on, and I wasn't sure what to do about it. This person then went to our service and told them. Without talking to me I was removed from all operations. I addressed the problem and found a solution to it that worked. But it has been a battle to get back operational. I am now only partially operational. In the process my boss brought up other 'problems' he had with me, but what had never been brought to my attention before many of these I was able to defend myself on. It actually feels like the restrictions are more of a punishment rather than for any concern about my or the crews welfare. I am supposed to be fully operational for training purposes but this has not happened. This is becoming more and more frustrating. On a job a couple of days ago I was left to work in an unsafe situation. I feel that anything I say about it to my superiors would just be twisted around until the blame lay with me (and have already experienced the beginning of that when I tried talking about it so backed off). I enjoy the job and am good at it the other guys often 'hunt' me out to either work with of if they have questions. This whole situation is driving me crazy and I'm not sure what I need to do or how to go about it.