If you can't stand the heat, become a cop.

What draws me to do this job? That is a good question that I doubt I could even begin to answer. My earlist experience with the fire service was when I was growing up. My dad was a Captain on the dept. that I am a member of. To this day I carry his badge with me everywhere I go. I guess you could say, "It's in the blood." I can remember before they had pagers, the fire siren going off at 3 in the morning and my dad would rush out of the house. He would never talk about what he saw to us kids. I just remember that he had a red light and siren on the car. I guess you could say I am following in my dad's footsteps. I can remember when I was in school (the school was across the street from the fire station) and hear the siren go off, and would look out the window to see my dad pulling out with one of the truck sirens wailing and light going. Watching that made me proud of my dad for what he was doing. I wanted to follow in my dad's footsteps and decided to become a firefighter myself. I had a tremendous amount of respect and pride of my father growing up and a lot of that came from his profession.
The job does take it's toll on you. You work all day and can be out on a fire call all night, to turn around and go to work when you get home. The risks we take are many. Just like the fire the other night. I found out what was in the building after we had the fire put out and it scared the @#$! out of me. But we go to training all the time and always try to look out for each other. I know my girl friend is scared when I go on a call in the middle of the night or any time of the day for that matter. I know with my training, I am going to be as careful as I can, but the risks are there. Even with all of the hazards that come with this job, the pride that comes with it will always keep me going.
yeah the job does take a toll on a person. Not only physical problems, but mental problems as well. We miss special occassions or events with our families, Miss out on having dinner with our loved ones, not able to take place in kids sporting events. All kinds of things like that. Firefighters have a very high divorce rate for a proffession. They also have a high rate of both physical and mental problems. We can leave the house in one piece and come home busted up. They say that heart and lung problems are the biggest issues that we face. I know about the physical problems. I am having shoulder surgery next month because of a injury that I incurred on afire scene. We go sometimes with little or no sleep for a day or so.
Somebody asked me why am I a firefighter. Being able to help my community doing a job that not everybody wants to do. My dad spent 20 + years as a firefighter on the dept. I am on.