“You don’t learn anything when it’s 80 and sunny… You grow the most through struggling times.”

Firefighter/Paramedic Heith Good’s goal was to become teacher and a football coach. After going through years of studying in college, he realized that wasn’t his calling in life anymore.

Some friends invited him to do a one-week ride-along. After going on a couple of calls, he was hooked. Within a month, he was in his first 36-hour rookie fire school. The opportunity to help someone was his “First-day Passion.”

“Never lose your first-day passion.”

“I can say, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that I still have that first day passion I felt during my ride-along.” Heith cautions you to be mindful of your first day passion, and if you lose it, it might be time to find something new.

“It is very rare to find a firefighter who hates their job. Firefighters love what they do and they are always looking for ways to help people.”

The public often sees firefighters as heroes and they don’t think about the person behind the uniform. “When we go home, we’re moms, dads, aunts, etc. Just like anyone else.“

“We see beauty and devastation and it all affects us. We can deliver a baby one day and then pull someone out of a burning building the next day.”

“We can’t always be stone cold. That stereotype isn’t always true.” Sleep deprivation and shift work make it very difficult for firefighters to handle the constant stress of being a firefighter. “We get through it, but we need help from those around us to help us.” Heith emphasized the importance of a strong support network and being able to reach out for help when you need it.

A colleague shared some words of advice early in Heith’s career that stuck with him: Make sure you surround yourself with different seasons of life (people of different ages) in the department. It’s important to have someone who’s older and can help you through your issues, and someone who’s younger and may have a different way to approach an issue. It’s not just work-related. This also pertains to issues at home and everywhere in your life.

Heith has been through some serious struggles which have helped him grow in life and help others.

Within the first year of his career as a firefighter, Heith and his wife, Pamela, had twins on the way. They lost both twins at 21 weeks of pregnancy. A year later, they had another set of twins on the way! Without family history of twins, this was a miracle.

One of their twins didn’t make it through pregnancy. The other twin, Hayley, was born at 24 weeks and spent 79 days in the NICU after birth. Fortunately, Hayley has grown up to be a strong and successful young woman as she recently graduated high school (above middle).

Within their first three years of marriage, Heith and his wife had buried 3 children. Then came their middle child. Although Pamela had to stay on bed rest afterwards, Hannah was born healthy without all of the complications they dealt with during the first two pregnancies.

Their third child, Blaze, was their first son. Pamela became deathly ill and found herself on a ventilator. Blaze spent some time in the hospital but he was able to come home long before his mom. Pamela spent a total of 4 months in the hospital and Heith had to take care of three young children while working a full time firefighter schedule.

Heith got through it with tremendous support from his church, family, and firefighters who all helped him get through those days.

“You don’t learn anything when it’s 80 and sunny… You grow the most through the struggling times.”

Heith offers his support as a peer mentor with the Ohio Association of Professional Firefighters. He encourages you to reach out if you’re a firefighter going through some struggles or a professional who would like to offer support to other firefighters.

You can contact him at his email address or on his cell phone (below).

Email: heith@total-compliance.com

Cell phone: (740) 207-0819

For Heith’s full bio, please visit: https://www.oapff.org/peer-support-good/