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House outpatient facilities as many as five times per week if needed. Additionally, Dr. Bizzarro and Schneider have started“ Bottles and Badges,” weekly meetings at Princeton House and in other locations to provide another ongoing treatment resource.
If a patient needs time in the wing with a medical doctor, Princeton House features some of the best in the field, including Dr. Kapila Marambage, Medical Director for Addiction Recovery Program. Dr. Marambage understands the acute impact of law enforcement officers being under constant surveillance and the anxiety and depression it causes. He understands the PTSD that comes from seeing horrible incident after horrible incident throughout a career. He has learned how it has become increasingly difficult for corrections officers who never get to see the positive outcome of incidents that municipal cops experience. He suggests treatments that are both pharmacological and therapy-based.
“ What we’ re trying to do is look at their substance abuse and see if there is an underlying problem,” Dr. Marambage illuminates.“ We look at medical problems and psychiatric issues driving the addiction. It’ s very common for people who are having problems with PTSD issues to use opiates.”
It’ s not all meetings with doctors and counselors. Each patient visits the art therapy room regularly where Perlstein has noticed more than a few who will make projects for their kids as a way to be closer to their families or create artwork that conveys the feelings they would never be able to put into words. Some of the buffest cops who have come through have been known to express that the dance movement session is a place where they can finally not worry about appearance, be themselves and be … human. And another comfort of home is the
“ I’ ve seen some really beautiful letters from patients in which they have written, ' You saved my life. If your program wasn’ t there, I don’ t know where I would be.’”
Princeton House President Richard Wohl
gourmet café, which provides sometimes the best comfort for officers: good food, and plenty of it.
This tour ends with a look inside the First Responders Treatment Team office, and this might be the best therapy in the House. Officers in treatment can sit with their own in this room and realize how going back to the job is not that far away.
Dr. B notes,“ The minute they walk into this room, their guard drops.”
Burkert references signs on the wall with statements like“ too strong, too long” and how they“ send subliminal messages to make their own decisions about how they feel.”
Perlstein adds,“ It’ s a place to feel safe where they didn’ t feel safe before.”
It’ s a place to feel human. Again. Like all of Princeton
House. d
34 NEW JERSEY COPS ■ FEBRUARY 2017