Includes a foreword by Dr. Kevin M. Gilmartin, author of the bestselling Emotional Survival for Law Enforcement: A Guide for Officers and Their Families. Th s book offers practical strategies for police officers to use on- and off-duty to improve wellness, strengthen ethical commitments, and boost resilience. This book demonstrates a research-based approach to dealing with the challenges you face daily in your law enforcement job. It provides personal and professional steps you can take on-duty and off-duty to optimize your health and maintain your performance. When you practice the skills outlined in this book, you will be better prepared to handle crisis situations before they happen, and more capable of coping with them afterwards. Your power as a police officer does not come from your badge, gear, or tactical skills. It comes from your POWER: police officer wellness, ethics, and resilience.
Being a police officer involves daily risks and stressors that can compromise your health, shorten your career, and make life harder on your loved ones. Even if you have a gym or access to counseling at work, you need a personal plan to maintain your overall wellness--physical, cognitive, emotional, social, and spiritual. The tips, stories, and exercises offered in this book can help you develop a plan and stick with it. This book provides not only an outline for the basis of positive psychology, it also applies to the reality of police work. It is understandable from a practical point of view. I would strongly encourage police officers, psychologists, and counselors to read this book. Although there is a common belief that exposure to trauma and stress will always result a pathological response such as PTSD, this not necessarily true. Police officers can also experience a positive reaction from trauma, learn from these experiences, and grow stronger during their next encounters. Resilience is a matter of getting better, gaining ground from where they were, and sustaining growth over time. Resilient officers can learn to control the environment, better understand the traumatic event, and from this develop an ethos of encouragement and inner strength. This is essential to better serve the public and care for the well-being of officers themselves in this challenging occupation.
John M Violanti, PhD
Research Professor
Department of Epidemiology & Environmental Health
School of Public Health & Health Professions
University at Buffalo
State University of New York
Buffalo, NY
New York State Police, Retired As a law enforcement officer and clinical psychologist highly involved in mental health wellness and resilience initiatives for police officers, The POWER Manual will be a "go-to" resource for me, and something I intend on sharing with as many law enforcement and mental health professionals possible. This book has filled a much-needed gap by providing easily understandable tools for improving health and wellness and building resilience in a manner and language that is delivered from a cop's perspective and literally from one cop to another. As the law enforcement profession looks to advance the culture in a direction that prioritizes the physical and mental health of its officers, the POWER Manual is an amazing resource to support such a vision.
Dr. Michael T. Wiltsey
Law Enforcement Officer & NJ Licensed Psychologist
Associate Professor
Professional Security Studies, New Jersey City University (NJCU) The POWER Manual is the most realistic training book for police officers that is currently available. As a serving police officer for 19 years and subject matter expert in the area of peer support and officer wellness, I have never seen a manual that combines an understanding of the relationship between stress, wellness and ethics. The manual also explains the unique stressors faced by first responders and provides exercises for officers on and off duty. Dr. Blumberg, Dr. Papazoglou, & Dr. Schlosser should be commended for their collaboration that is based on evidence and their own personal knowledge and experiences as a former police officer and police educators.
Patrol Sergeant Beth Milliard, PhD
York Regional Police, Aurora, Ontario, Canada I am excited to see this Manual. The value of providing empirically-based strategies and tools to enhance wellness, but in a manner that is relatable and usable by officers, cannot be overstated. The police culture is unique, and a manual written by professionals with intimate understanding of this culture is of vital importance. Many research articles and books dealing with the topic of police stress and wellness can be found in the professional literature, but those providing practical techniques that officers can implement into their lives to promote wellbeing are scant. This Manual successfully fills the void.
Brian A. Chopko, Ph.D., P.C.
Professor
Criminology & Justice Studies/Department of Sociology
Kent State University at Stark Policing is one of the toughest and most dangerous career choices you could embark upon. After all, what other profession requires you to continually deal with the worst of humanity? What other job causes you to be in a constant state of hypervigilance, yet at the same time remain calm enough to be a counsellor, a social worker, a psychologist, a medic, a lawyer, a teacher or a prison warden? What other profession authorizes you to take a person's liberty, or at worst, execute deadly force on another human being, but then mandates that you render assistance to the person who has just tried to harm or kill you? What job causes you to wonder whether you will come home to your loved ones at the end of your shift each day?
The darkest day of my life occurred back in 2014 when I finally succumbed to my demons and attempted to take my life by suicide. I had for some time re