{"id":402736,"date":"2026-09-17T18:30:08","date_gmt":"2026-09-17T18:30:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/402736\/"},"modified":"2026-09-17T18:30:08","modified_gmt":"2026-09-17T18:30:08","slug":"orange-co-firefighter-says-support-hotline-saved-his-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/402736\/","title":{"rendered":"Orange Co. firefighter says support hotline saved his life"},"content":{"rendered":"

ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. \u2014 Orange County Fire Rescue<\/a> is using peer support, training and a mental health hotline to address firefighter suicide and mental health concerns. The issue has not been talked about often \u2014 or even tracked.<\/p>\n

Recently, UCF Restores<\/a> identified 307 deaths by suicide among Florida firefighters since 1999, which is believed to be one of the first studies of its kind.<\/p>\n

At Orange County Fire Rescue, the department\u2019s response includes annual training focused on mental health awareness and encouraging firefighters to check in on one another.<\/p>\n

Firefighter Jeremy Shires said the department\u2019s hotline helped save his life after he lost his mother to cancer and began isolating.<\/p>\n

\u201cI had made a plan to take my own life,\u201d Shires said.<\/p>\n

He said he received a phone call while on the way to commit suicide.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe said, \u2018I haven\u2019t heard from you in a while. How are you doing?\u2019 And I lost it,\u201d Shires said. \u201cI was hysterical, and I was in disbelief that I was receiving this phone call at this exact moment.\u201d<\/p>\n

The call came from Lt. Claudia Fernandez, Orange County Fire Rescue\u2019s behavioral health coordinator.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat was scary, right, as a human wanting to help him and caring about him,\u201d Fernandez said. \u201cI really wanted to make sure that I said the right things.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fernandez is one of 13 people trained to answer hotline calls for the department. She said Shires\u2019 crew had reached out because they were concerned about him, and so she made the call to talk to him.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe more we learn about suicide we understand that a lot of people, they don\u2019t want to die. They just want the pain to stop, and those are two totally different things,\u201d Fernandez said.<\/p>\n

Shires said the call helped him begin the process of getting help.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat overwhelming feeling of love and compassion, it really kind of steered me off course,\u201d Shires said.<\/p>\n

He went to a 72-hour treatment facility and continued working on his mental health afterward. Shires is now part of the same peer support group that helped him.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs he helps other people, he continues to heal, so it is just a beautiful thing to see,\u201d Fernandez said.<\/p>\n

Orange County Fire Rescue said its hotline received 245 calls for peer support in 2025. The department also reported 285 peer support check-ins and 159 requests for peer support. The calls and requests can involve trauma after a fire call, stress at home, relationship issues or other challenges from daily life.<\/p>\n

Shires said talking openly about mental health is an important step for firefighters.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo be able to put your pride aside and to be able to talk about it, it really is refreshing and freeing,\u201d Shires said.<\/p>\n

Orange County Fire Rescue also has therapy dogs and a chaplain available to support firefighters.<\/p>\n

The national suicide hotline<\/a> is 988 for anyone who needs help.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is help out there, and we can get you any help that you need,\u201d Shires said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. \u2014 Orange County Fire Rescue is using peer support, training and a mental health hotline…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":402737,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[767,274,770,115,1335,768,139,141,140,9429,278,835],"class_list":["post-402736","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-orlando","tag-app-community","tag-app-top-stories","tag-community-news","tag-news","tag-orange-county","tag-orange-county-fl","tag-orlando","tag-orlando-headlines","tag-orlando-news","tag-sarah-winkelmann","tag-top-stories","tag-vod"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/402736","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=402736"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/402736\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/402737"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=402736"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=402736"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=402736"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}