“You don’t have to struggle alone,” and “there are people who can support you” are two of the themes a pair of local police officers highlighted during a 12-hour fitness challenge to raise awareness for mental health for first responders.
Over 12 hours, Lethbridge Police Service K9 Unit officers Constable Terry Fieguth and Constable Christian Olson completed 24 rounds of the Murph Challenge, which is named in honour of U.S. Navy SEAL Lieutenant Michael Murphy, who was killed in Afghanistan. The challenge includes a one-mile run, 300 squats, 200 push-ups, 100 pull-ups and another one-mile run.
Constable Fieguth told mylethbridgenow.com a conversation about how the pair could support not only the other members of the service along with other first responders throughout the city sparked the idea of doing the Murph Challenge. However, he said doing the challenge alone was not enough.
“We decided that we would really push ourselves to the test and see how many we could do within a 12-hour stretch, which is the average length of our patrol shifts,” Fieguth said. “It was a very gruelling task. It is struggling and difficult as it was. The good part about it was we had each other to… struggle together, which was one of the big pushes behind our mission to do it.”
He added raising awareness about mental health is not just important for first responders but for everyone in the community. He said in the past there has been a stigma when it comes to discussing mental health and are scared to reach out and ask for help.
“I’m a big believer that we got to be here for each other. It’s not something that you need to push down or be ashamed of. The help is there and people want to help. We just wanted to promote that. No single person is any different. We all have our own issues and we need to be there for each other.”
Raising funds for Legacy Place Society is one way he said they could show this through action. The pair raised $7,115 for the Legacy Place Society, which offers mental health support, suicide awareness, and transitional housing to first responders across the province including veterans and military members.
