That's what Wimberger is focusing on. She's now collaborating on a project with Magis Group, founded by Stephen Robinson and Elizabeth Hawkins Robinson; the organization offers tactical and stress-release training to members of the military, as well as workers in health-care and educational fields. But whenever possible, she wants to focus on helping cops.
While corporate clients often seek out her expertise, she still has to work to find police departments willing to work with her. And because times are tight and most departmental budgets are devoted to tactical training rather than emotional-survival techniques, she's adjusted her pay scale. Her emotional-survival course can run $1,000 for a five-hour session, but she doesn't cap the number of officers who can attend — so agencies with access to a venue that can fit a hundred or more officers reduce the per-head cost to just $10.
anthony camera
Lisa Wimberger works with many corporate clients, but she'd rather keep cops grounded.
anthony camera
John Marx, a retired Westminster police officer, founded
CopsAlive.com.
Details
Related Content
More About
And while Wimberger doesn't suggest that her program is a replacement for psychotherapy and more intense services, she thinks it's a good investment for a department, offering officers tools they can use on a regular basis so they don't wind up falling apart on the job.
It's nice to have people who care about our mental health," DPD lieutenant Addison says of Wimberger. "She's just very passionate about her work. I think she's really pushed it in the law-enforcement field. I think if more law enforcement could get into it and use it on a regular basis, it would be great for our field. I'm impressed with how passionate and dedicated she is."
Hastie thinks it would be "phenomenal" if Wimberger took her program national. "From what I did with peer support, you've got officers in shootings — these big, Type A-personality guys," she says. "Of course, they're going to say everything's fine. But I talked to them after these incidents, and a lot of these guys can't go home and talk to their spouses — because they don't want to worry their spouses. There was the class we had on emotional survival for law enforcement at the academy, which is a good class. And we talk about how when we go out to dinner, nobody wants to make the decision of where to eat. But they don't tell you how to deal with some of the ups and downs.
"It's not about what the department thinks," she concludes. "It's about what these officers individually are going to experience, and how they deal with it. Three officers out of ten might never need it — but those other seven officers will need it. And if they don't need it, it will help them and their families, or help them help another officer."
