Police officers and firefighters have incredibly stressful jobs that involve them putting their lives on the line every day in order to protect the rest of us. The stresses of these jobs can lead to these brave men and women suffering from depression and PTSD, which is why one yoga teacher has stepped up to help them in a big way.

Olivia Kvitne Mead is a 36 year-old yoga instructor who founded the nonprofit group Yoga For First Responders back in 2013 after she saw how much doing yoga helped military veterans that she worked with. While there are many such programs to help veterans who suffer from PTSD, Olivia noticed that first responders who suffer from this did not have as many programs to turn to for help.

“There are lots of yoga programs for veterans but they are all focused on after their tours of duty,” Olivia explained. “That doesn’t happen for first responders. They are in their jobs for 30 years until they retire. They go to work and see trauma, death, destruction, loss and the worst part of humanity, then they have to go home and be a mother or a father, a husband or a wife.”

Olivia thought that yoga could help lower their rate of mental health problems, including depression, anxiety and alcoholism. She cited an alarming study that found that more first responders committed suicide than those who were killed in the line of duty in 2017.

“There is a missing skill set in first responder training and that is what is leading to these high statistics of burnout, divorce, alcoholism and suicides,” she said. “They need to be taught the ability to handle stress and trauma and process it. Otherwise you are just going to get squished by all the trauma you witness.”

Olivia began by calling up the Los Angeles Fire Department in 2013 to pitch her idea of teaching firefighters yoga.

“The then-head psychologist of the department already practiced yoga and he knew the benefits – [but] his number one concern was: how are we going to get the alpha male population to do yoga which is marketed as a female, delicate exercise?” she recalled. “I said that I already taught veterans and I thought I could speak to this group of people.”

Olivia started volunteering at the fire department teaching yoga twice a week, and it quickly snowballed from there. These days, YFFR works with 35 police and fire departments across the United States, including in Denver, Colorado; Wichita, Kansas; and Lawrence, Massachusetts. The Chicago Police Academy has even made yoga part of their syllabus, meaning every trainee takes classes.

Olivia has said that not only does yoga help the mental state of firefighters, it also helps them do their jobs better.

“Breath work helps CO2 tolerance in the body,” said Mead. “It means that while a firefighter’s air bottle normally lasts 15 minutes in action, we can make it last longer. Yoga strengthens the body and makes it more mobile which is very important for first responders, as their body is their tool—but the true essence of yoga is neurological training. It trains the mind and the nervous system to withstand anything by teaching breathing techniques and cognitive behavioral therapy.”

Lieutenant Josh Dixon took his first yoga class in November, and he now practices yoga five days a week.

“We can’t control what goes on outside our body, especially in an emergency,” he said. “But you can control what goes on inside.”