Blog

Population: 485; Meeting Your Neighbors One Siren at a Time

If you want to read a literary book on firefighting or small town living then this is the book.  Population: 485 is a hilarious and moving collection of essays written about New Auburn, Wisconsin; a town of, yes, you guessed it–485 people.  Not only is Michael Perry a skilled writer, he is also a volunteer firefighter/emt, and…

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Threshold Guardians

“Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show.” –Charles Dickens, David Copperfield     Since I began Triple F, I have received many personal messages from women all over the country who are struggling in the…

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The Combat Position, Book Review, Part 1

I am only halfway through The Combat Position, Achieving Firefighter Readiness by Christopher Brennan, but I thought I would share my thoughts since there is so much to say about this fantastic book.   The Combat Position is a fluid read that addresses the mind, body, and spirit as it applies to firefighting warriorship.  The premise of the…

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Confidence

Confidence is key to high performance. For women in the fire service, confidence can be elusive, but it is essential if we are to thrive (and not simply survive) on the fire ground.  Confidence gets ladders up.  Confidence tears doors down.  We need it to be our best, but ample obstacles exist.  It is challenging…

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We Are Not Cyborgs

We are still doing it.  After all the critical incident stress debriefings, suicide prevention workshops, and unacceptably high number of firefighter suicides, (3 in one year on my dept.), we are still shutting people down who try to speak about calls and the sorrow they bring.   In the past two weeks I have heard…

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Why We Do It

My officer and I are rescue divers and awhile ago we pulled a person from a lake.  (I’m being vague for privacy’s sake.)  The call came in for a possible suicide attempt.  The lake was large and dark.  It was at night and we couldn’t see anyone.  Resources were called in.  Police and Fire were…

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Messages

The messages we receive have a great impact on our lives and performance.   They influence us on the conscious level of our mind and the subconscious level as well.  As women firefighters, it pays to ask, “What messages are we receiving”overtly or subliminally?   Men grow up receiving certain messages from the time they…

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Extrication is like Yoga

Extrication is like yoga.   I remember my first day of extrication training in the academy. It was the zenith of summer in South Florida, and I thought I was working in purgatory. The sun was drilling us, and the tools felt like blocks of steel. Just to lift the Jaws and place them where…

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Endurance

Men are built for power and women are built for endurance.     Women’s bodies have evolved over a hundred thousand years to build and sustain life. For millenia, women have been building babies in their wombs and nursing them in their arms through hostile conditions, without medication, health care, half the food we have…

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The Future of Triple F–Fabulous Female First Responders!

The Ever Evolving Journey of Triple F in Mind, Body, and Spirit   When I, Gea Haff, began Triple F–Fabulous Female Firefighters! in 2013, three months after my mother died, I never imagined in my wildest dreams how far and fast this group would grow. I’m naturally private and shy, but my mother’s passing injected…

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