Helping another breed of foot soldier

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Journalists, like others around the world, have been affected by the tragic

attack of September 11th, whether we were at Ground Zero or not.

Many journalists that day suffered physical injuries and mental scars. It’s easy to identify the physical injuries. A first year med student could have diagnosed my shattered leg.

Unfortunately, it's much more difficult to assess the wounding of the mind and soul that journalists suffer when we routinely cover stressful and traumatic situations.

My fellow journalists are suffering in ways we cannot fathom. One tells me that they stopped their car in rush-hour traffic on a New York City bridge, unable to move, as an airliner came in on a routine final approach to La Guardia airport. Another experiences bioterrorism nightmares and is haunted by images of flesh dripping from human bodies. Still another photojournalist showers three and four times a day, scrubbing to remove a scent that is not lodged in the nose but in their mind and soul.

There are photographers that don’t ever want to go back to the Trade Center again, but they are back down there on a daily basis because it’s their assignment to deliver television or still pictures to viewers and readers.

These journalists haven’t had the time yet to take a deep breath and think about their lives. These are the casualties of war and violence we don't talk about much and rarely consider, especially among those who are hurting the most. Firefighters, Paramedics and Police Officers who survived the September 11th terrorist attacks - but witnessed unbearable carnage and human anguish – have already been given the opportunity to participate in Critical Incident Stress Debriefing or are already involved in Peer Counseling sessions.

We must assist journalists, another breed of foot soldier who served and suffered. There are tears in the press corps, too, and we have to wonder who will help us heal? Of all the men and women who charged forward into danger September 11th, I can't stop thinking about the reporters and photographers, editors, page designers, sound people and other journalists who are still being exposed to horrors covering this sad page in American history.

The public needs to know that there are people behind the pictures. That there are men and women out there working 18- or 20-hour days who are continuously going down to the WTC where they saw sites and images and things that they don’t ever want to see again.

Three years ago, the National Press Photographers Association conducted the first ever survey of visual journalists. Of the survey respondents, 99.9 percent had covered a fatal or serious car wreck at some point in their career.

We found it was not unusual for visual journalists to suffer negative effects from the cumulative exposure of repeatedly documenting the news.

Out of the charts and graphs and scientific lingo of the survey, NPPA initiated our first peer counseling training program for journalists in conjunction with the Dart Center at the University of Washington and Newscoverage Unlimited, a not-for-profit organization established in 1999.

Photographers and journalists must take a few minutes and assess their psychological well being and admit that it’s not normal to see this stuff.

The first step to assistance is for journalists to admit that we are not machines, we are people and that it's ok to get some kind of stress debriefing whether it’s talking with a friend, a member of the clergy, a psychologist, psychiatrist, a mental health worker or a peer.

Newscoverage Unlimited and the Dart Foundation recently conducted a three-day program in Manhattan, with financial assistance from the NPPA, where we trained 11 news people how to assist distressed colleagues.

The Dart Center is now setting up a New York office and a nationwide support network to deal with problems that will undoubtedly affect journalists around the world for a long time as a result of the September 11th attacks. Newscoverage Unlimited and the Dart Foundation plan on conducting similar sessions in Washington, D.C. this February, Atlantic City, N.J. in March and Minneapolis in June of 2002.

We’re looking for a location and date for West Coast sessions and are looking for additional funding to support this important endeavor.

For additional information on how to sign up for a peer training program send an e-mail to training@newscoverage.org. To make a donation, please go to http://newscoverage.us.com

We will heal as individuals, as families and friends, as a community and a nation. We will be changed in ways that we never imagined. We will be stronger and more tolerant.

A clear lesson was learned that day. Life can be gone all too quickly. We must live today as if it’s our last, enjoy every moment that we have and hug everyone that we love.

Just looking out the window at the blue sky makes me happy. I am so glad to be here. I hope that others will join me in appreciating the simple things in life and centering our thoughts on what we have, not what we’re missing.

David Handschuh is a photographer at the New York Daily News.