Your Mental Health is Chernobyl: A First Responder Guide to Meltdown

Imagine you’re a nuclear reactor. You’re humming along, generating power, handling stress like a champ. You’re the dependable one, you handle emergencies like a pro and keep your calm when everyone else is losing their minds. But under that calm exterior is a reactor core that’s burning hotter with every call, every shift, every “you good?” that gets answered with a lie and a shrug. And like Chernobyl, no one is prepared for what happens when the containment fails.

A few years ago, my husband told me he would like to go to Ukraine and visit Chernobyl, and while this was prewar and recent political madness, my response was still an immediate “Absolutely not”. Who goes to the site of the world’s worst nuclear disaster? Well, apparently a lot of people, so much that it has its own category of travel called dark tourism, so after much research and planning we became one of those tourists. Within the Chernobyl exclusion zone guided tours with short term exposure were relatively safe. We visited the power plant, cooling towers, and a soviet spy radar, along with the abandoned town of Pripyat and other villages that nature has now reclaimed.  It was an amazing experience providing a lifetime of memories.

In 1986, the operators at Chernobyl believed everything was under control. Sure, the reactor may have been sketchy, and safety systems weren’t ideal, but that was part of the Soviet Union in the 80’s, they made it work. Sound familiar? You’re on your fifth call in two hours. You skipped lunch again. You haven’t slept well in a week. New policies and mandates are a nightmare. But the radio chirps and you answer.

Mental health issues rarely show up like Hollywood explosions. They creep up slowly like a rising temperature on a control panel no one is watching. You feel off, but you power thru.  Chernobyl workers ignored warning signs too. The reactor was already unstable, but they believed in the system. They thought they had control. Sound familiar once again? “I’m just tired, everyone is tired, I will be fine.”  They ran a safety test, disabled safeguards and pushed the system to its limits. When it failed, it failed spectacularly. Steam explosion. Core rupture. Radioactive graphite fire.  Your meltdown might not be as dramatic or cinematic, but it could feel just as devastating and can be just as destructive. It could be a panic attack behind the wheel. A breakdown in the locker room. An outburst of unnecessary rage. A call that sticks to your ribs and won’t let go. Or maybe it’s just numbness, the kind that doesn’t go away with a weekend off or a stiff drink.  

Radiation is invisible. So is chronic stress and trauma. You show up, you clock in, but something is different. You’re short with your partner or you zone out. You feel hollow during the good calls and unphased by the hard ones. You can’t see the damage, but it lingers in the air and contaminates decision making, concentration, sleep and joy.

Chernobyl didn’t get cleaned up in a day, it took years, science, manpower and a giant concrete sarcophagus. Your clean up might involve therapy, peer support, medication or simply a nap. There is no shame in calling in a cleanup crew, the real tragedy is pretending everything is fine when it’s not.

Being a first responder is a job that can break people who don’t ask for help, don’t be one of them. You are a human, not a robot or a reactor designed for infinite crisis handling with no maintenance. Chernobyl was a disaster, but it was preventable, yes the systems failed, but people also ignored the warnings.  Don’t let your mental health become your own personal Chernobyl, ask for help before the meltdown.

Stacy Fleegle