Eighteen Years and the Space Between the Calls

Written by Erin Allwardt, CMCP

I recently marked eighteen years since I first plugged in a headset and answered a 911 call. Eighteen years feels impossibly long and somehow incredibly fast all at once. Long enough for technology to change, policies to change, and centers to change. Long enough for entire careers to begin and end around me.

Long enough for me to become someone I never expected to be.

I found myself doing the kind of math dispatchers do when the room goes calm for half a second too long. I wondered how many hours I’ve spent in the center over nearly two decades. How many phone calls I’ve answered. How many more I’ve listened to while training, supervising, coaching, reviewing, and helping.

How many birthdays. Holidays. Midnights. Tornados. Pursuits. CPR instructions. Welfare checks. Domestic calls. Open lines. Silence.

How many times I’ve said:

“What’s the address of your emergency?”

And how strange it is that one sentence can become stitched into the fabric of your life.

I thought about the people, too.

The coworkers who sat beside me for years and became friends in the uniquely chaotic way only dispatch centers can create. The ones who moved on to different positions, different agencies, different dreams. The ones who finally hung up their headsets for good and walked away from the noise. Some left with celebration. Some left quietly.

Some left holes behind them.

It’s funny — I haven’t really measured my life by New Year’s resolutions in years. January first comes and goes, but my real “new year” always seems to arrive with my work anniversary in May. That’s when I take inventory of who I’ve become and what the last year carried.

Last year, fresh off the funerals of both my mom and dad, I didn’t choose a word of the year. I didn’t make ambitious plans. I didn’t create vision boards or productivity goals.

My only goal was survival.

At the time, I don’t think I realized how deeply I was operating in crisis mode. Which, honestly, is ironic for someone trained to recognize crisis in everyone else.

I just kept moving.

Show up.

Answer calls.

Handle problems.

Help trainees.

Go home.

Repeat.

There’s a certain muscle memory to grief when you work in emergency services. You learn how to compartmentalize so efficiently that sometimes you don’t realize the compartments are overflowing until much later.

And now here I am again. Another year marked by another funeral — this time my mother-in-law’s. Another season of grief. Another year of carrying personal heartbreak into a room where other people’s heartbreak arrives through a headset every single day.

And somewhere in the middle of all of that… I nearly forgot my work anniversary entirely.

I made the social media post.

I acknowledged the milestone.

But I skipped the deeper reflection.

No word of the year.

No grand declaration.

No shiny goal.

At first, I thought maybe that meant I was lost.

But maybe it just means I’m changing.

Maybe after eighteen years, I no longer need dramatic reinvention. Maybe what I need is gentleness. Intention. Breathing room. Maybe the goal doesn’t need to be about accomplishing more, proving more, surviving more.

Maybe this year’s goal is restoration.

Not fixing.

Not hustling.

Not powering through.

Restoration.

Restoring the parts of myself that grief, stress, responsibility, and years of urgency have worn thin.

Restoring joy outside of the headset.

Restoring rest without guilt.

Restoring creativity.

Restoring connection.

Restoring the ability to be fully present in my own life instead of always preparing for someone else’s emergency.

Dispatch teaches you to anticipate disaster. To think ahead constantly. To listen for what might go wrong.

But maybe this year I want to listen for what might still go right.

Eighteen years in, I know this job has changed me. Some days that feels heavy. Some days it feels like an honor. Most days, if I’m honest, it feels like both.

Thank you, Erin for sharing your experience with us. If you are interested in writing a blog, please email amanda@911derwomen.com. Sign up for our newsletter on our homepage to stay up to date with 911der Women programming, exclusive content and blog updates. Click here and scroll to the bottom.