Central Oregon Community Response
Off Duty
Silver Rail · After October 15
Prefer one to one? Lezlie and Jennifer both offer individual therapy.
Who it's for
Law enforcement, fire, EMS, dispatch, educators and school staff, hospital staff, and counselors. Not for parents or the general public.
On October 15, the shooting at Silver Rail Elementary changed our community. Some of you ran toward it; others sheltered children, answered calls, or treated the wounded. Since then, you've been the steady ones everyone looks to. That role leaves little room for your own grief, fear, or anger. This confidential group makes that room, among peers who don't need it explained.
Out there, you're the steady one.In here, you don't have to be.
Why it can't wait.
Sleeplessness, irritability, replaying it, feeling "fine" one minute and wrecked the next are normal reactions to an abnormal event. Addressed now, they tend to ease. Left alone, they can settle in as anxiety, depression, PTSD, heavier drinking, or other ways of numbing out.
What you'll take with you.
Practical tools you can use right away: settling your body after stress, getting sleep back on track, handling triggers on the job, and catching the slide toward numbing out. Along the way, you'll make sense of grief and guilt, find ways to talk with your family, and build support with peers who get it.
What this is not.
You won't be asked to relive the day or describe what you saw. This isn't part of any investigation or performance review, and nothing you say is reported to your employer.
Prefer one to one?
Both group leaders also see people individually. Lezlie Kellison brings two decades in hospitals, jails, courts and community programs. Jennifer Masotja-Wright offers individual therapy by secure video, with a particular focus on first responders and people in high-stress professions, and more than 16 years in mental health, emergency management, and disaster response and recovery.
To enroll
Aspen Counseling
In crisis now? Call or text 988, or the Deschutes County crisis line, 541-322-7500 ext. 9.
Photos: Mount Jefferson at sunrise over the Metolius River, by Bonnie Moreland; the Three Sisters and Broken Top, by Willie Scott, U.S. Geological Survey. Both public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.