Integrating Physical and Spiritual Health

[00:00:00] Feeling worn down by the relentless demands of your job? Struggling to find the balance between your physical, mental, and spiritual well being? In this episode of Surviving Your Shift, I sit down with Matt Domyancic, a former SWAT operator, police officer, and now a tactical chaplain to uncover the proactive strategies To help you thrive in high stress professions.

Matt's unique approach combines fitness, mindfulness, and spiritual care, offering practical steps to prevent burnout and find deeper meaning in your work. Tune in to discover how you can build resilience. Stay strong and live out your calling before the wheels come off. This is an episode you won't want to miss.

Welcome to Surviving Your Shift, your go to resource for building resilience in your high stress career. I'm your host, Bart Leger. Where we'll [00:01:00] not only talk about responder burnout and our experiences, the trauma, but we'll equip you with the practical steps you can take today to get your mind out of overdrive and find meaning and joy again in answering the call.

As someone who spent years working with and alongside those in high stress professions, I know firsthand how the pressures of the job can take a toll, physically, mentally, and spiritually. I've seen how easy it is to get caught up in the grind and neglect the things that really matter. That's why this conversation with Matt Domyancic, it's close to home for me.

He's got a powerful message about proactive wellness and Finding purpose in your work that I believe every first responder needs to hear. Matt is a medically retired police officer, SWAT operator, and former wellness coordinator for a police agency in the Los Angeles [00:02:00] area. He served as a collegiate strength coach at Yale and Georgetown Universities.

And also worked with NFL Combine Athletes. Matt holds an MS in Forensic Science, an MS in Sport Psychology, and an MA in Pastoral Theology with a focus on spiritual direction. Now a tactical chaplain and peer support volunteer, Matt integrates fitness, Mental health and spiritual care to help first responders build resilience and find deeper meaning in their careers before burnout occurs.

Let's hear from Matt.

Well, Matt, it's such a pleasure to have you on Surviving Your Shift. Likewise, Bart, appreciate the opportunity. You've had an incredible journey from your athletic [00:03:00] background as a collegiate strength coach, I believe at Yale and Georgetown, to your days on patrol and SWAT, I mean, and now you're guiding first responders through some of the toughest challenges of their careers.

I mean, I'm really excited to dive into your unique approach, to wellness and spiritual care. Well, thank you so much. Before we get into all that, I'd love to hear about you. No family hobbies. Tell me about Matt., a little bit about me. Well, uh, grew up in Ohio, Western Pennsylvania, football guy, grew up a lot of time in the woods, hunting, off roading, kind of a little bit of a hillbilly knuckle dragger, but also a bit of a nerd, always loved books.

You know, grew up in a family of faith. So that's always been a part of my life, but also explored things very early on, like breath work and journaling and high school, because I, I got the books from Paladin press on the secrets of the ninja mindset and I was trying to get better at football. So, uh, yeah, pushed it as hard as I could with lifting and nutrition from an early age.[00:04:00] 

Had a great relationship with my dad. That's very, uh, formative part of my life is having a healthy relationship with my father and sports military police have been, yeah, like kind of the, the core endeavors or populations that I've shared time with and appreciate it. And each one of those has their own unique subcultures.

For better or for worse. And, um, I guess my heart has always been like, how can we be the best athlete, the best cop or the best first responder person in the military, but also not wait until the wheels come off and have a crisis to start addressing our mental, emotional, and our physical health or awareness.

And those are things I don't think we're. teaching in police or fire academies, but we do know that cops like to drink, sleep with people they shouldn't be sleeping with, drive fast, tobacco, caffeine, overtime, all these, you know, self medicating things to deal with the stress and trauma, and then we wait until the [00:05:00] PTSD, addiction, divorce, or suicidal ideation.

And then we offer them help sometimes from mental health professionals and chaplains they don't know or don't trust because they've never seen them around except after a crisis and, or they only talk to the brass, not understanding that they're alienating themselves from the frontline workers. That might need them the most.

And then there's the stigma. Are they going to take my gun? Am I not going to get promoted? So all kinds of things, but, uh, I am not married. I have a girlfriend of four years and a great relationship and my hobbies are kind of related to work. It's like the working out, reading a lot, reflecting a lot, writing and journaling a lot.

And I used to love, I'm in Southern California, so shooting is hard. But I try to go home to Pittsburgh every two to three months to see my dad, and every single day, go to the range, get some 9mm in, then shoot some of our deer or bear [00:06:00] rifles. But if I lived somewhere I could hunt and shoot, I would be doing that all the time, and spending time in the woods off roading.

I'm in Southern California, so some of the options are limited. Oh, well, you ought to come to Louisiana sometimes. On our license plates, it says, Sportsman's Paradise. Beautiful. Yeah. Go back to your athletic career. How do you feel that athletic shaped you or helped you in From an early age, I loved football and all the sports so much.

And my dad did a great job of, you know, pushing me like, Hey, if you're going to do something, do it 100 percent and whatever potential that God's given you, your gift back to God is fulfilling that potential. Don't waste it. And he got me a jump rope early on, a Walkman with Jody's from Force Recon, Airborne Ranger.

Seventh grade got me, Like a squat rack bench. And so sports teaches you a variety of things. It teaches you [00:07:00] work ethic, discipline, how to take orders, how to deal with adversity, how to deal with losses, how to deal with people that you don't see eye to eye, but you have to see stand shoulder to shoulder.

Um, so I think socially work ethic wise, character wise, sports are a beautiful thing and a great analogy for life. And I would say that. Not just from my life, but even my years as a strength coach at Yale Georgetown. And then I was a strength coach and a sports psychology consultant at velocity sports in Redondo beach, which is, was a private sports performance facility for professional Olympic college and younger athletes if their parents had the money to send them to that type of training, but, uh, I think I've always been involved in sports for the love of how you can connect with other human beings and have a shared experience of learning these lessons.

And to be quite honest, like people start talking to me about college or pro sports, I know [00:08:00] nothing about it. I'm not a sports fan, never have been, even though I played college sports, coached, coached these NFL guys, first through third rounders. And the other coaches would joke, you have no idea that that guy is this or that.

I'm like, no, I don't. I, I, I really don't care. It's like, what kind of guy is he? And what's his work ethic like when we're going to train him from the next three months? So, all right. Well, I'm really not that much of a sports fan either. You know, played, played my share, but, uh, kind of the same, same here.

And I can certainly see how sports would set a person up for success later because of the, because of the conditioning, because of. All that you have to go through to better yourself. Uh, you mentioned also military. What, uh, you know, share a little bit about that. Well, I won't claim to be a quote real veteran.

I do have a DD 214. I went to the Air Force Academy for my first two years of undergrad. The, the two most real things I did was bootcamp. Um, and I would, your freshman year at those schools is like [00:09:00] bootcamp plus MIT Harvard course load. And if you're a football player in certain squads like mine, you get a lot of extra attention because some of those regular cadets probably got picked on, uh, in high school by the athletes.

So it's like payback time, broke my eardrum in boxing class. They put all of us football players in the same boxing class, broke my eardrum. I couldn't Valsalva, didn't think I'd be pilot qualified, and you have to make a decision, and Sear School, I was going to say, is the other. I was the last class to do survival, evasion, resistance, escape.

And they did a survey of Air Force Academy graduates. And that's the number one most important experience for a lot of people, including the pilots in Vietnam. But they got rid of it because people started complaining, even in the 90s, that it was too tough. Right? Wow. So, we're gonna reserve that. But that's a real rites of passage or initiation.

Just like the sports are, like, difficult circumstances in life, whether they're planned or not. are our [00:10:00] initiations to grow deeper and wiser mentally, emotionally, physically, and spiritually. So two years at the Air Force Academy and then any other involvement with the military during my first master's degree in forensic science, you had to do an internship.

And I ended up much longer story. I was going to be a Blackwater Lodge run by the seals and owned by Eric Prince, but I ended up On a mountain in West Virginia at a place called Storm Mountain Training Center, which recently closed, run by Rod Ryan, former DC SWAT Green Beret. And so for three months during grad school, the summer in between my two years of my first master's, I was sniper school, rappelling, fast rope.

Combat handguns, CQB, carbine with SWAT teams and a lot of special operators. So that was a very unique and cool experience for a grad student and somebody that grew up hunting where my dad's a reloader, I had an eye patch as a kindergartner, like teach me how to aim with one eye and breathe and slow, and then you're with these guys and it's like [00:11:00] both eyes open, moving, shooting, and just a totally different world than slow down at the range, you know, like real running and gunning.

So. Right. Now, you've also had an extensive career as a first responder, a police officer, so how did your experience as a police officer, SWAT operator, shape your approach to wellness and spiritual care for other first responders? I would say I went, here's the thing, and my, this might be part of my message that's different than a lot of the people that are speaking at police mental health conferences or writing books on police mental health.

Um, there's this, hey, I ended up self medicating, I ended up divorced, I ended up with a DUI, my kids hate me, I'm on my third marriage, I had to medically retire, but then I went on a retreat, or then I got therapy, or then I went to rehab. It's okay not to be okay and get help. And that's a message that we need, but that message usually only applies [00:12:00] to people that are in a deep, dark hole.

And it gives them permission to raise their hand in whatever way and say, okay, I can get help, but there might be 70, 80 percent of high functioning cops. That they could be slip sliding that way, unconsciously and very incrementally and not be aware of it. But they're like, I'm never going to be the guy that gets DUI and cheats on my wife and does something at work that's inappropriate.

So they push away that message. And I think, you know, we're starving for, for role models and mentors in the profession that are living life right and doing things right. And the wheels don't have to come off. And I was into fitness and nutrition since seventh grade journaling breath work since high school on and off took it, took an even deeper dive in my undergrad career due to a lot of football injuries.

I took my spiritual life more seriously and said, this has got to be more than just going to church, saying prayers and. Uh, doing what's right [00:13:00] to get to heaven on the day you physically die. So I dove into the contemplative practices, which are a lot of meditation and mindfulness that all the world's religious traditions have, and also self reflection.

Um, where's God showing up in your daily life or more peace and love, or where's the meaning and purpose and the adversity and the hardship. So part of my decision to become a cop and not a federal agent. Was what better place to learn about theology, spirituality, and psychology than go be a cop because everybody you're meeting is hurting the victim or the criminals.

Um, so I went in with a healthy tool set of how to deal with things. And I was already in something called spiritual direction, which. Not many people are aware of, but I would find pastors or priests that were also psychologists and I would keep in touch with them regularly about things on the job, meet with them frequently, talk on the phone.

And even with me being into meditation and journaling, I didn't own a TV the whole time I was a cop. I [00:14:00] was a cop, a college strength coach doing sports ministry, eating strict, working out, journaling, praying, meditating every day. I had mentors and elders in my life, good relationship with my father. But when the SHIT hits the fan, even if you're doing everything right, there's still a ton of work and it's still a struggle.

It's, it's like being an athlete. Like. Football camp is hard every year, no matter how much you train for it. Fourth quarter is going to be hard. You know, the game's on the line. It's not easy. And sometimes in our culture and society and in the police peer support world, I think there's a lot of messages out there like, hey, if you just do ketamine or if you just do EMDR, you just do this retreat.

Or you just do journaling or yoga or CrossFit or Jiu Jitsu. It'll solve all your problems and it's real easy and there's no work and it may have worked for you and that's great, but we all have individual preferences. We all [00:15:00] react to stress and trauma on a, on a individual level. And very often it's going to be an awareness of what's going on inside of us from the trauma and stress.

But then also how does that tie into earlier life experiences? And now we have a lifetime of things to unpack and to continue to learn and grow from. Um, and I think that is kind of what my message is. Why are we not training more awareness of our, our head? What's, what's going on with our thought life, our heart, what's going on with our feelings?

Oh, that's woo woo. Like we can't have feelings and what's going on in our body awareness of the body. And I'm not talking just fitness, nutrition, which, Both of those things and sleep relate to mental health, wellness, and what I would consider spirituality. But also, how is the stress, the trauma, affecting your body?

And I really wish that departments or individuals would say, Hey, As early as possible, I'm going to go get blood labs and look at my hormones, my blood sugar markers, my [00:16:00] inflammation markers, maybe invest in an oil ring or a device from heart math. And I'm going to measure my heart rate variability. I'm going to look at my daytime stress levels.

I'm going to look at my sleep. And then if you have the money and somebody near you that does neurofeedback, EEG, go get your brainwaves recorded and see what that looks like. And then if you did that, say, on an annual basis, you would have some objective data to see how the cumulative stress Or maybe what's going on in society, criticizing, condemning cops, maybe the sanctuary trauma from your chain of command, if you don't feel supported by your leadership, or maybe you've had some pretty unfortunate, like crisis calls that were heavy on the heart.

And you can see it in your blood work, your HRV, your sleep, or your EEG, and then say, hey, let's address this, rather than stuff it and drive on. Well, I believe that we do still have that culture of, you know, suck it up, or if it's not mission [00:17:00] specific, there's not a lot of attention or a lot, not a lot of money being put towards things of that nature.

You mentioned a little while ago about, you know, there are some who teach or, or write and Uh, it almost seems like those whose lives and careers rode off the rails are the ones that we, we somehow idolize. But we do wonder, are they still, are they still doing what they need to do to take care of themselves?

And are they, and you mentioned mentor, are they really a good mentor? I'm not naming names and not saying that everybody is, but you know, we really don't have to be. A hot mess in order to be experiencing some issues in, in our life, in our career, whether we're a first responder or medical professional or really anyone in a high stress, high demand career.

So I, I really believe that you're, you're on the right track when you're talking about combining the medical, uh, with the spiritual, uh, with, uh, [00:18:00] the wellness. I, I think we need to be moving more towards holistic wellness. Absolutely. And some of the things you said, like there's people out there and like, if there's still a lot of self disclosure about your wound, I see people that are attached to the wounded part of the story because it gets them the speaking engagement, it gets them the attention.

And then behind the scenes at mental health conferences, I still see cops getting hammered and hooking up and doing all the things that maybe their book or talk said they did, but they no longer do. But they're still dealing with it. And I think they're, you know, sometimes our egos can get fed in an unhealthy way by our wounds, and there's a lot, lot deeper work to do.

And, you know, just for, I don't know who your audience is, but I'll, if you would like, I'll give it my definition of spirituality from spiritual. Theology, there's a whole lot of different definitions. There's not one, but I go ahead. Matter of fact, my audience knows that I've also been a career chaplain as well.

[00:19:00] So so that's that's my background. Also. I saw that So and I listened to your other episode with chaplain jim and and you know, there's the stereotype even as a former cop and SWAT guy I'll share a couple stories real quick about the stereotype then i'll define spirituality uh at one department When they introduced me in roll call or briefing, depending on where you are in the country, everybody said, hello, sir, and peeled out of there like there was an active shooter.

Nobody wanted anything to do with me. People didn't want me to ride with them. But on the next shift, one of the sergeants was somebody that I did Krav Magan Muay Thai with. And he said, hey, the new chaplain, 10 years ago, we used to do Krav Muay Thai. Former cop from the East Coast, strength coach, SWAT, police academy instructor, people turned around dropping F bombs, where'd you work?

You know, it, the, the chaplain thing gets stigmatized, like the Boy Scout leader example you gave before we started recording, like, the worst. experience of [00:20:00] hypocritical, judgmental, somebody went sideways with their shadow, smoking meth with the male prostitute when they're the ones that are damning gays to hell.

Like, you get affiliated with all that. So even as a former cop, I had to really work hard riding along, lifting weights, going to SWAT training, shooting guns, spending time in the trenches for a year or two before people trust you. And then at another station, I rode the graveyard shift because they said those were the guys that were hunters.

They take over 500 guns a year off the streets. They're one of the top 10 police departments, but this is only a station of another of a larger agency. But within police departments, they're in the top 10 in the country for gun grabbing. And imagine taking 500 illegal guns off the street when you're five or six, two man patrol cars.

I guess not, it's not a shift of 20 cars. Well that they see so much action and there's a lot of shootings and we have district attorneys in California that [00:21:00] try to charge cops with crime and there's investigations that somebody complains on you. Even if you're totally legit, they'll pull you off the line from patrol and put you in a dispatcher behind a desk until the media and the political stuff clears.

Well, this station thought I was a federal agent for six months because they, they would ask questions like, wait, no mental health professional chaplain ever rode the graveyard shift every Friday, Saturday night. They thought you were working undercover. Yeah. You know, you don't get paid. You say you care about us.

We're not used to that. So anyways, jumping back to spirituality. How, yeah, before you, before you go back there, we were mentioning about the, the respect and the, and the trust. I remember about 30 years ago, I, I started out, I was pastoring a, a local church and I had the police chief, I was attending one of the, the law enforcement evening events and during police week, and he asked me, would you consider being, uh, department chaplain?

[00:22:00] And you know, this was many, many years ago, early nineties, I guess. And so I don't really know what a chaplain does. And so I did a little bit of research and got a little bit of training and came there and got started there. Got started with that little municipal department and then moved to Louisiana 21 years ago and started with the sheriff's office.

And I remember when the first, when I went to the academy, Graduated the academy, first in my class, was class president. First time I was tased, they were, they were taking bets on whether I would curse or not when I got tased. And, uh, matter of fact, we had our national night out this past week and I was at the, At our civic center and one of the officers who I used to work with Telling car he sells cars now, and he was talking to one of his other guys He said I remember when I want to tell you about about chaplain he said I remember when [00:23:00] we were we were shooting one evening and he Was our top shooter.

He was even shooting better than SWAT. And he said, our firearms instructor was getting onto us. He said, you're going to let Chaplin out, shoot you. And it was after I, after I graduated from the Academy, all the guys pretty much would slap me on the back and say, way to go. And then when I went through the FTO program, spent thousands of hours on patrol.

It was no longer, well, what are you here for? You're a wannabe. And so all of a sudden they began listening. That I get, I get what you're saying. And I mean, that would be a whole other episode to talk about what I would call patrol chaplaincy verse the typical chaplains in this country that are volunteer order clergy that have full time clergy jobs that do not know the police culture and do not have the time to be in the trenches, ride and go on a shooting, even if they're not going to shoot, go, go observe all the different types of training.

Get to know the people before a crisis and show them [00:24:00] that you really care because it's a menace. Yeah. There was a running joke that whenever we would, I've been, been in fights, I've been in IA before, and we would have a combative individual and I wore nothing that would say that I was anything other than.

was on, on shift and working and my partner, he would, he would tell somebody, this is the chaplain. He can either pray with you or pray over you, which one you prefer. That's awesome. I know. I know. So go on your, your, um, spirituality, your definition. Spirituality. So everybody has a spirituality, whether they identify it or not.

And I think that cops are some, some cops, the ones that continue to grow and learn through the adversity and the suffering of others that they're immersed in, are some of the most beautiful, deep, empathetic human beings there are, and spiritual. So spirituality is demonstrated by how you live [00:25:00] your life.

What are the most important values in your life that you're demonstrating by your lifestyle? So there's a difference to be saying, I believe this. And all the hypocritical stuff versus I'm walking the talk, I'm practicing what I preach. So how are you living out the most important values in your life?

And if you don't have those values defined, like that's the first step. Like define what your mission statement is in life and your values. Why are you getting up in the morning? Why are you putting that badge on? And I hope it's for more than just a paycheck. Next. What is your relationship with the closest people in your life?

And there's a ton of research on the closest three to five people in our life have the most influence. So what's the, what's the significance and the dynamics of the relationships and the authenticity of the relationships closest to you? Are they healthy? Are they dysfunctional? Next, what's your relationship with your community?

And who more than police officers is seeing the real, real, real realities of their communities. Next, stepping up the line, and this is not part of our [00:26:00] culture, at least in America, how do you relate to humanity in a non dual way? That the world's not black and white, it's not this or that, and what things can I connect with other human beings that we all share in common?

And the more we grow psychologically, emotionally, and spiritually, we should start being able to find touch points for what we have in common with other people, rather than saying, you voted for this person, you wear that uniform. You prescribe to this political party, therefore we're in different camps, we're different tribes, and we're enemies.

Next, how do you relate to your higher power? If it is God, do you believe in God, a higher power? And if not, how do you relate to your greater good? And the last thing is, what is your framework for continuing to find peace? Meaning and purpose through suffering, darkness, pain and adversity, whether you made a poor decision and it happened or not, because as a cop, very likely you're going to be exposed to painful and toxic or maybe even evil things that are not your fault.[00:27:00] 

And if you don't learn to lean into the discomfort of the feelings and thoughts and the things that surface from that, you're not going to learn the lesson to be able to integrate that into your life and move on. Okay, that is a great way of putting it because I know there's so much research out there that pretty much bears up the idea of our relationships, our social support networks, how are we connected with others.

And I love your proactive approach to spending time in the trenches with first responders rather than just reacting to crises. Can you share a story or an example of how this, I guess we could call it proactive presence, has made a difference in the lives of the officers you work with? I will say that even being a former cop SWAT guy that lifts weights at the police stations with them, goes to the range with them on or off duty, that it still could be one or two or three years before somebody says, Hey, can I chat?

And it might be on a retreat. Like I do [00:28:00] outdoor activity retreats in Missouri once a year, Peterson outdoor ministry funds, all of it, horseback riding, shooting, uh, fishing, ATVs. And over five days, there might be somebody that has known me for five years. that finally after five years and after a number of days of settling down in nature and activating the parasympathetic nervous system and what I would say is letting the inner child come out and play horseback riding, clay pigeon shooting, ATVs, they tell me something about their childhood that's now tied into the stress of the job and what they're struggling with in their family.

And they will time and time again, whether it's through, I used to be a chaplain at a rehab for cops and firefighters, different agencies or different nonprofits. People will say, like, it's, we want to be seen, heard, understood, not judged, not psychopathologized and not have somebody that's trying to fix us and give us the answer to our problems when they [00:29:00] haven't even heard our story.

Right. So spending the time that, Hey, I'm here, no strings attached, no agenda. I'm not here to psychopathologize. I'm not here to tell you about working out nutrition sleep, even though I think they're all important. I'm not here to tell you to, you know, practice tactical firearms more and do martial arts.

Although I believe in that. And I believe most cops are not trained up to the level of proficiency by their agency. So they're going to have to do some on their own. Still, even if I believe all those things, they're not coming up. I'm just holding sacred space, building relationships of trust and listening to their stories and asking a lot of good questions, or at least I try to ask good questions to allow them to start answering their own questions from their own heart or their own psyche or soul, whatever you want to call it.

And if, and when they do ask for advice, offer suggestions, maybe in these different areas that I have a background. And if I don't. have a background in something, I try to find them a resource and do networking for [00:30:00] them. And even if I do have a background, I'll say, if this is really an area you want to go deeper, this is the book and this is the person you want me to introduce you to them.

So you're practicing a ministry of presence, right? Mm hmm. Exactly. Yeah. Okay. And I guess your approach might, what we might call masculine spirituality? I would say so. Yeah. Yeah. Shooting, riding horseback. Because we have, I know we have some of our listeners that have shied away from organized religion who have seen so many things that may question the existence of a And I use air quotes, a good God, uh, in their own terminology, that they can begin to see that there is more to life than just what we see and what we touch.

And you know, there is, there is something beyond us. And I, I believe understanding and realizing that we can, we can see purpose. in, in our lives [00:31:00] as well. So, I, it's exciting that you're offering these wellness events, combining fitness, mindfulness, and what we, I guess what we might call a fellow feeling, fellowship with one another.

Yeah, I mean there were other things I used to do when I still lived in L. A. There's a 20 million dollar a year security bodyguard company covered six, and if you're a military veteran, you can use your G. I. bill to go get medical care. Certified in executive protection and the bodyguard work. And so they have range days.

And I used to go with Steve Odom, another great guy. Maybe I should connect you with former Marine, retired police officer, SWAT firearms instructor was in charge of their peer support and chaplaincy and a Southern California department. And he was the instructor for these veterans learning how to become bodyguards and executive protection.

He invited me to go shooting with them. And so they'd be one or two days of shooting. And then we do bodyguard drills on steel. And lo and behold, I'm still pretty good at running a gun. And, and even though I'm a quote old guy and Steve's an old [00:32:00] guy too. And we're with guys that did typical like four year stints in the military, early twenties, and we could out shoot a lot of them.

And we were jacked quote jacked for old guys. Yeah. So after, after a day or two of shooting me and Steve on lunch breaks and at the end of the day would bring up, Hey guys, like something, like a lot of you guys deployed and you got a lot of things. There's been people with, you know, missing limbs and other things that are obvious they've been to war.

And we, we would have discussions about mental, emotional, spiritual health. And after you shoot guns with people for two days. It gives them permission to like, okay, these are guys, guys, they seem to get it. They can walk the talk. We like them. And if I talk about me going to therapy, journaling, doing yoga or contemplative prayer or having mentors and going on retreats or whatever it is, go get a massage, go take a dancing lesson with your partner.

Like it doesn't mean you're weak, woo woo, or, you know, [00:33:00] like it's, it's good for you. And next thing you know, like the walls come down, if you collectively with other quote alpha men have established credibility that you can play the guy's game, but you can also have balance. Like Steve Odom, my gosh, he goes on all these adventures with his wife.

Like you know, he's older than me and they're biking and running and hiking. Like he's, he's a bad ass black belt in jujitsu, firearms instructor extraordinaire, and deeply in love with his wife. You know, getting after it with her. Well, I have seen that firsthand. We had the, we were fortunate that we had, our department had a gym and they, we just built a new gym and I had so many counseling opportunities.

At the gym, you know, here, here I was before my two shoulder surgeries in the same year from overdoing it here, here I was in the gym, late [00:34:00] fifties, and I was doing pull ups with 45 pound weights, uh, our, uh, we were doing fit for duty. Uh, I was doing 73 to 75 pushups in a minute, and I was out running quite a few of the 20 somethings in our, in our, in our runs.

And you know, in the gym, you mentioned, you know, some of the guys would say, man, Chapman, you were jacked. And, uh, and they would just open up. Of course, there again, lost a lot of that. Just got back in the gym eight months ago after being out for, for four years. But. It's that being willing to pay your dues, uh, and so somebody that they can, that they can respect.

You mentioned peer support a little while ago. What role do you see peer support playing in the resilience of those in high stress, high demand professions? So I started in peer support over 20 years ago. And I think, you know, what I, you know, we call it peer support. We call it mental health and wellness.[00:35:00] 

But, we're still not teaching anything about the parasympathetic, when I say that I'm brushing in broad strokes. You should be coming on the job and understand Kevin Gilmartin's Hypervigilance. You should understand Dave Grossman's Bulletproof Mind and Lethal Force Psychology. You should read Mark Bouchard's book, Setting My Sights on Stigma, Canadian SWAT, FTO, and Charger RCMP's Tactical Medical Program.

You should have an understanding of the psychology and physiology of a sudden violent encounter. And the best person for that is Tony Blower in the Spear System. The psycho behavior, the fear loop. What do you do in a holy shit moment? And you should understand that the motor skills that you're getting in the academy are not enough to make those motor skills automatic, let alone you make complex decisions under stress.

And firearms qualifications are not gunfight training. So you might have to spend some of your own money to go to tactical firearms courses, as well as take some [00:36:00] martial arts classes or anything where there's some physical contact. So you get used to the, you know, getting punched in the face and it doesn't, you know, first start on the job.

You should also understand rest and recovery, heart rate variability, and the importance of quality sleep. And I think peer support should be teaching these things in the academy, as well as giving people tools for them, whether it's the breath work, yoga, Tai Chi, you know, Learning how to do a gratitude journal.

There's so many different tools and even things like go get a massage, do acupuncture, cold plunge, sauna, red light therapy. Our mitochondria is tied into our mental health. Our gut health is tied into our mental health. We're very often as a profession neglecting to talk about all of these things tying into our mental health and then waiting until it's the train wreck story and, hey, do you want some help?

And by then, you know, Hey, if only if peer support only deals with people that are broken or get in trouble or under [00:37:00] investigation, I don't want anything to do with them. And even when people are in a dark place, they still, a lot of times don't want to be associated with that stigma. So like, do we wait until athletes tear a hamstring to do something about their strength and conditioning and make sure they're having proper.

movement mechanics and make sure they're doing good nutrition and getting sleep. Like if you look at the Division I athlete model, which the special operations units have adopted, you have strength and conditioning coaches, sports psychologists, clinical psychologists, sports nutrition, sports medicine.

Like you have all of these things that are preparation and 90 to 95 percent of your life as an athlete is training and practicing for one to 5%, which is competition. Police work is like 99 percent learn on the job, 1 percent training in the academy. And the more that we have more legislation. And politics involved in policing, the police academies are more and [00:38:00] more PowerPoint, like quote training is not psychoeducation on a PowerPoint.

And you know what? Why don't you extend police academies? If you've got to do six months of PowerPoint, then give them another three to six months where you work out every day. You do defensive tactics, martial arts every day. You're doing high speed driving every day and you're doing some breath work and some meditation and some gratitude journaling and you're normalizing those things.

So there's police departments and fire departments in Arizona that have red light, cold plunge and sauna with meditation apps and Vegas nerve stimulators to do at the end of your shift to calm down your nervous system. And they're also, if you've ever heard the retreats from Boulder Crest, they have a program called Struggle Well, where they're now teaching post traumatic growth.

To peer support teams, which is how do you digest and process the immersion in the suffering of others? the repeated and chronic exposure to stress and trauma throughout your career to help you [00:39:00] as if we're in a weight room, you're lifting more weights, you're doing more reps, you're doing more sets. Well, we got to do that psychologically, emotionally, and spiritually too, but we're not doing the post traumatic growth training.

We're often just checking in after something bad happens. And what do most cops do, especially if it's a text or a phone call? Hey, Hey, I know you saw that, you know, 16 year old commit suicide right in front of you and you've got a 16 year old at home. Are you good? I'm good. Thumbs up. I do. You are preaching to the choir.

Uh, that's one of the things that I've been trying to push lately. What I've, what I've been calling, and, and there's others out there that have the similar name, but what I'm calling comprehensive peer support, that we don't just come after you've been through a critical incident and say, how are you doing?

Okay, let's do a defusing, let's do a debriefing, but have peers who are trained To interact and to support one another [00:40:00] whether it's marriage difficulties, whether it's teenagers at home, whether it's finance, whatever it is to say, hey, let's, or, or stress inoculation, let's, let's help each other to figure out how to just be better at what we do.

And my whole goal is to help not only first responders, but anyone in a frontline profession. To be able to, to thrive, but also to be able to finish strong. I want you to retire if you want to do 30, if you want to do 30 plus drop, that's that is great, but I want you to be able to be well and to be able to enjoy your retirement, you know, not drop dead a year after retirement, because you kept all this stuff bottled in and you didn't take care of your health and you didn't take care of your mental wellness.

And then you retire with no social support system. Uh, huh. So, yes, you're definitely reaching to the choir. So, as someone who's lived through the physical and emotional demands of being a first responder, what are some key practices [00:41:00] that you recommend? Now, I know there's not one modality, there's not one thing that will resonate with everyone, or will even work with everyone.

So, as we bring this episode to a close, what are some key practices that you recommend for maintaining life balance and avoiding burnout? I'll repeat some of what I said earlier. I would really wish, especially if you have a PPO, most PPOs have one free annual preventive wellness check per year. Go get your blood work done, look at your metabolic, your cardiology factors, whatever they are, CBC.

But look at your testosterone, your ultrasensitive estrogen, your cortisol, your IGF 1. Look at your homocysteine, look at your A1C, look at your glucose, so inflammation, blood sugar. Look up, look up online and do some reading because sadly a lot of doctors don't do functional or integrative medicine that's more preventative.

They'll just make sure you're not, you're not about to die. So do blood labs once a year. If you can afford an oil [00:42:00] ring, Get an OR ring, start paying attention to your heart rate variability, read up on some of that stuff. HeartMath has a lot of great informational videos on how our HRV is related to our, our mental health and our hormones.

That's good. I've worked with HeartMath before and I had some of the devices that would help you with your heart rate variability. And if somebody is really interested in their agency, I can put you in touch with some of their instructors that are culturally competent, right? Friends was, and I've been through one of their courses and I did it for about 14 years while I was doing the EEG.

And I still do neurofeedback EEG once a week. I do an hour of meditation while they're measuring my brainwaves and my HRV. So I can see when I'm stressed and same with the blood work, I call something driving from home and armor down routine if, as long as you're not on call. So if you're in a take home and you're on call, you can't do this, but drive home and silence with your radio off.

and do some nostril only [00:43:00] breathing and make your exhale longer than your inhale. Slow down your breathing. That's tapping the brakes. Rest and relax and pay attention to what you see. Look with a panoramic view on the horizon and I guarantee you'll see things. Even if you drive the same route every day, you're normally looking at the bumper in front of you or the dashboard and you're listening to something or you're playing on your phone.

So panoramic view, which is also healthy to do if you know, first thing in the morning, When the sun's coming down, if you can stand outside, look towards the sun, panoramic view, look up at the clouds. And this is a simple form of meditation or mindfulness. What do I see? What do I hear? What do I feel? And you might feel the wind coming in on your body if the window's down.

You might feel tension in your neck. Yeah, good grounding techniques. Yeah. Progressive muscle relaxation. Squeeze your fists really hard for five seconds. Then relax and shake them out. You can do that while you're driving, doing the arm or down [00:44:00] routine, but whatever you're doing, do something to mentally.

And physically shift gears and tap the brakes. I'm heading home to my family or even if I'm heading home to myself. Take the armor off. Silence, solitude, immersion. Good, I call it a transition ritual. Beautiful. Ritual. Yeah. Having rituals and routines are super important. Anything dealing with silence, solitude, immersion in nature, and fasting.

will help calm the parasympathetic nervous system, will help lower the cortisol. And in the old days, we now, we now know it actually works scientifically. Fasting from food is beneficial, but what I talk about now is fasting from technology. While you're driving home, can you have your technology off? Is there five or ten minutes a day that you can turn off all your screens?

And take the time to go stand outside, face the sun, even on a cloudy day. What do I see? What do I hear? What do I feel? Oh, I'm worrying [00:45:00] about what I saw on the shift. Come back to nostril only breathing. Make your exhale longer than your inhale. I see the birds, I hear the car, I hear the horn, I hear the wife calling me, I go back to the breath.

What do I feel? I got tension in my shoulders. Maybe I squeeze my shoulders and my fists for five seconds, shake it out, relax. Another thing I would really love is even if it's just once a month, but try to increase it to once a week at some point in the future. But once a month, go do something to calm down your physiology if you can afford it.

Go get a deep tissue massage. Go do acupuncture. If you have a wellness center, which in California they have these wellness centers, you can do cold plunge, sauna, cryotherapy, sensory deprivation, float tank. Go experiment with those types of things. and do some of the nostril only breathing. Drive to and from those places, maybe in silence, and yeah, it might be uncomfortable, and just note your thoughts.

And don't [00:46:00] say, I can't meditate because I can't control my thoughts or blank my mind. What happens when you slow down and you spend time in silence and you do these practices, you're now aware of all the thoughts that are constantly playing in your head, but you've just distracted yourself by staying on the surface with your phone and conversations or tobacco or more caffeine or alcohol.

Or, you know, laundry list of other self-medicating, numbing techniques that cops first responders, veterans and men in general are very good at. Right. Whole, wholeheartedly agree with the physiological aspect. Few years ago I worked with under contract with Volunteers of America as a crisis counselor assigned to the first responder group.

And we had a team, we had a nutritionist, uh, we had, uh, two of us who were the crisis counselors. And we had a team of massage therapists, and we also had a physical trainer. But what we would do is, we would come to an area, and we were all in, we didn't have, we didn't have electricity for, [00:47:00] I think it was eight, six, eight weeks after.

And so we had, We had areas set up where, where police, fire, EMS were, were set up and were dealing with, with the area. And so, our team would go into those first responder communities and, uh, we would also go into the state police and, and other, other areas. And we would set up massage tables and we were just being there with them.

And it was so amazing. What we were seeing was we were seeing these macho, tough first responders who were saying, I'm good, I'm okay, I'm fine. And we were able to talk many of them into getting on the table. And after someone would get a massage, they would say, dude, you need to have a massage. Somebody touched me.

No, you need to get a massage. And on more than one occasion, we would have someone, you know, take off their, their uniform shirt, strip down to their t shirt and get on the table. [00:48:00] And within 10, 15 minutes, some of them literally started crying because all of a sudden that tension was being released and they were being able to feel and it was amazing to watch.

And we were able to, to, to get some good conversation going with them. So I am, uh, I, I agree with that physiological work. Talk to any massage therapist. And that happens. The stress and trauma is unconsciously stored in our body in a very generic sense. And then you get a deep tissue massage. Your body keeps score.

Yep. So for people out there that haven't heard of this stuff, Bessel van der Kook, the book, The Body Keeps the Score, any book by Dr. Peter Levine or any book by Dr. Gaber Mate from Canada. We'll go into this somatic relationship to stress and trauma. And for, for the PTSD stuff that we talked about earlier, we need [00:49:00] mentors and elders in the profession that are doing it right.

I believe this is a must read book recently published Mark Bouchard B O U. C H A R D. The book is called Setting My Sights on Stigma, Thoughts from an Injured Mind. Setting My Sights on Stigma, Thoughts from an Injured Mind. SWAT guy, alpha male, he recognizes he has issues and he works through them and remains on the job.

And he summarizes Kevin Gilmartin and Dave Grossman's Books plus Brene Brown and a number of Gavin DeBecker, The Gift of Fear, if you're familiar. He summarizes so many different great authors and then gives 20 years of updated research on top of the Gilmartin and Grossman stuff. And here's a role model cop that didn't have to medically retire or pick the whatever, like really let things Go to a dark place and hurt ourselves or others.

Well, we'll definitely have a link to that in our show notes. Okay. Yeah. Well, Matt, your [00:50:00] insights today have been invaluable. You know, thank you for sharing your journey and the great work that you're doing with those in our audience. Anything you're currently working on you think our listeners might be interested in?

Well, I love doing facilitating outdoor activity retreats. I stink at fundraising, but if anybody wanted to talk about retreats for their agency, like the one I talked about that I did, I do in Missouri every year, and we used to do them in Orca Island as well, where it's, you know, spending time together out in nature, doing a lot of outdoor activities, I'm also involved with.

Swell and the Jimmy Miller Foundation, which are surf therapy organizations. We either, we do retreats where Kansas city region cops and firefighters come to Orange County, California, stay in a beach house. They learn to surf. They're immersed in nature, doing a new activity, hanging out at the beach house.

Guess what? People start opening up and we teach them some breathwork and meditation with Michelle Adams, who is a yoga and breathwork instructor for Santa Ana College for Firefighters and is a heart math [00:51:00] person. So she measures their HRV, teaches them about that. Um, and they're the Steve Odom I told you about, we were trying before he retired to do Pujitsu peer support.

And what I would really love to do is integrate. Peer support training days that are tactical gun fighting, like shooting and moving on steel, something that a lot of patrol officers may not get at all or enough of, as well as, um, more practical martial arts, whatever that may be, I know everybody's like jujitsu is the thing, but I'm sure that judo, Krav Maga, Muay Thai, and other forms of MMA, whatever's available in your area, your instructors.

Doing a little bit of that and then integrating some of the breath work or meditation or God forbid yoga. I'm sure we can find Navy seals and green berets that now teach breath work and yoga. So that helps kind of like, well, I've heard of a few. Yeah. So those are, those are other things that I would like to do more of.

And I'm also reaching out to off road companies to do Uh, off road trail riding. So, like, I just [00:52:00] want to do more outdoor in nature and have a community for cops to share their stories where people listen and hold sacred space for them. So, Matt, how can our listeners follow and find out more about you? Uh, the website is tacticalchaplain.

com, tacticalchaplain. com. On Instagram, there's ThinBlueLineSpirituality, ThinBlueLineSpirituality, that's my primary. I also have the Tactical Chaplain, Facebook, Matt Domyancic, and LinkedIn, Matt Domyancic. All right. Well, you have been listening to our interview with Matt Domyancic. Uh, I'm hoping I'm pronouncing that right.

I don't think I pronounced it quite the same, uh, during our teaser from our last episode. But for those listening, remember that your career as a frontline professional can be more than just a job. It can be a path to deeper meaning and spiritual growth. And if you're struggling, don't hesitate to reach out for support.

I mean, there are people like Matt who understand what you're going through and they're [00:53:00] here to help. Well, thanks again, Matt, and blessings. It's an honor. Thank you. Thanks so much for joining me today for another episode of Surviving Your Shift. Are you wondering if you're experiencing some of the signs of post traumatic stress?

Or know someone who is? Grab a lifeline by going to SurvivingYourShift. com and on the right sidebar, click to download your copy of Understanding PTSD. Its history, causes, symptoms. If you like the show, please follow and leave an honest review. Tell us what resonated with you. Your insights help us grow and create a community that supports one another.

Next time on Surviving Your Shift, we'll be talking about something a lot of first responders deal with. How to handle the stress from work without letting it mess up your home life. Our [00:54:00] guest, Dr. Dan. Tiffany Atala is a first responder spouse and a therapist who really gets what you're going through.

She's going to share some down to earth tips and therapies for you. That can help you deal with the tough stuff and keep your family strong. If you've ever struggled to balance the job and your personal life, this episode is for you. Don't miss it. Stick around. I'll see you on that episode. Till next time, let's learn how to thrive, not just survive.