From 2011 to 2017, I was a law enforcement dispatcher at the Broward Sheriff’s Office. That’s six years behind the mic, fielding calls no one ever wants to make.

We were the lifeline. The voice in the dark. The calm during chaos. But no one ever trains you for what happens when the headset comes off.

The Shift That Never Ends

There were weeks I was mandated to work 16-hour shifts back to back. We’re talking about a schedule that didn’t ask you—it told you.

I’d clock out sometime after 3:00 a.m., drive home in silence, pour a glass of Jameson just to come down enough to sleep, and wake up in a house already emptied by morning routines I wasn’t part of.

My kids were already gone. My wife was moving through her day. And if she was still up when I got home, I often couldn’t talk to her. It wasn’t about love—it was about emotional bandwidth. She didn’t have the mental fortitude to hear about what I had just lived through. And I didn’t have the strength to explain it.

We talk a lot about trauma in public safety. But for dispatchers, it doesn’t just come from the calls. It’s from the schedule, the lack of sleep, the isolation, and the disconnect from your own life.

The Call I Still Carry

There are certain calls that never leave you. One in particular still replays in my mind, even now.

A father fell asleep. His two-year-old and four-year-old got out of the house, wandered into the backyard, and slipped into the lake behind the home.

By the time he realized they were gone, it was too late.

I sat in the comm center, helpless, watching the media helicopter footage as divers pulled the children out of the water—one after the other.

That one broke me in a way others hadn’t. Maybe because my own kids were the same age at the time. Maybe because it was so avoidable. Or maybe because I could do nothing but watch.

This is what dispatchers carry home. And we do it without fanfare, without medals, and often without anyone to talk to about it.

Proud to have worn the headset with this crew.

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What You Don’t See Be

What You Don’t See Behind the Console

Here’s what people forget: dispatchers are people, too.

We’re not just empty vessels waiting to take the next 911 call. We’re parents. Spouses. Business owners. Caregivers. Some of us are already dealing with family drama, financial struggles, depression, or grief before we even put the headset on.

Compound that with what the job throws at you—the screams, the silence after gunshots, the toddler who can’t wake mommy up—and you start to understand the scale of the emotional load we carry.

During my years in dispatch, I was also trying to build a side business doing auto detailing. I’d get off at 3:00 a.m. and be back at a detailing job by 7:00 a.m.—working under the Florida sun, exhausted, dehydrated, and mentally fried—only to have to be back at my shift again by 3:00 p.m.

That kind of grind? It chips away at your soul.

It wasn’t just that I was tired. It was that I was absent from my own life. And the moments I was there with my kids, I was too drained to be fully present.

They deserved better. I deserved better. But the system didn’t care.

Why I Walked Away

So when Motorola Solutions offered me a role, I took it without hesitation.

Even though it was a traveling job—fly out Monday, fly back Friday—I knew the time I spent at home would be higher quality.

Some people couldn’t understand the decision. “How could you leave your kids all week?”

What they didn’t understand is that I had already been gone. Just… quietly. Present in body, but not in mind, not in heart.

The Motorola job gave me something dispatch never could: boundaries.

And with those boundaries came the ability to show up for my family in a meaningful way when I was off the clock.

This Is the Part Leaders Need to Hear

We can’t keep losing good people because we refuse to acknowledge the emotional and logistical realities of the job.

Dispatcher wellness isn’t a nice-to-have. It’s foundational to the performance and longevity of our communications centers.

Retention issues? Recruiting problems? Start by asking what we’re doing to protect the humans behind the headset.

That means:

✅ Reducing mandated overtime—or eliminating it altogether ✅ Building true mental health support into agency culture ✅ Recognizing that dispatchers, like officers and firefighters, experience operational trauma ✅ Understanding that resilience isn’t infinite—and “just deal with it” is not a policy

Where I Am Now

Today, I run Castleberry Public Safety Group.

I help agencies implement the same technology I used to depend on—but with a twist: I build strategy around adoption and wellness, not just deployment.

Because tech alone won’t fix burnout. But thoughtful strategy—designed with real dispatcher experiences in mind—can change the game.

To My Brothers and Sisters in the Headset

If you’re in the chair right now and you’re struggling: You are not weak. You are not broken. And you are not alone.

You are performing one of the most important, under-recognized jobs in public safety.

You deserve rest. You deserve support. And you deserve to be seen.

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