Murders to Music: Crime Scene to Music Scene (Streamline Events and Entertainment)
Come on a ride along with a Veteran Homicide Detective as the twists and turns of the job suddenly end his career and nearly his life; discover how something wonderful is born out of the Darkness. Embark on the journey from helping people on their worst days, to bringing life, excitement and smiles on their best days.
Murders to Music: Crime Scene to Music Scene (Streamline Events and Entertainment)
Lies, Shitty Days and IME'S....Lessons Learned
Ever wondered why mental health injuries like PTSD face more skepticism than physical wounds? Join me, Aaron, as I peel back the layers of my personal battle with the workers' compensation system and the emotional labyrinth of the Independent Medical Examination (IME) process. Picture recounting your darkest memories not once, but repeatedly, to a system that questions your pain. It's a journey riddled with frustration and the stark realization that promises of solidarity from city and union often ring hollow.
Throughout this episode, I share the raw and unfiltered reality of healing from trauma. Imagine navigating a two-and-a-half year storm of medication and therapy, only to find your past traumas resurfacing at every turn. Listen in as I chat with a friend who shares my struggle with PTSD, discussing the power of vocalizing our experiences and the challenge of separating memory from its emotional heft. Even as progress is made, the struggle to accurately convey the depth of mental health challenges in official records remains a daunting battle.
In a candid exploration of identity and career upheaval, I reflect on my life as a former police officer and musician. The loss of these aspects of my identity, akin to losing a part of oneself, is compounded by a system that should be supportive but often isn't. By sharing my story, I hope to offer a beacon of perseverance and understanding to those caught in similar maelstroms, encouraging you not to let the bureaucracy or your personal battles define you. Let’s shine a light on these challenges and strive for the empathy and support we all deserve.
Hi, I'm Aaron your host and I would love to invite you to leave a review, send some fan mail or email me at Murder2Music@gmail.com. Does something I'm saying resonate with you...Tell me about it! Is there something you want to hear more about...Tell me about it! This show is to provide value, education and entertainment and hopefully find its way to the WORLD! Share, Like and Love the Murders to Music Podcast!
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Welcome back to the Murders to Music podcast. My name is Aaron, I'm your host and thank you so much for coming back for another week. So this week I'll be honest with you. I'm kind of having a shitty week and I want to talk about why it's that way. I want to talk about I don't educate anybody out there in the world who is in the middle of a workers' comp claim and a mental health claim, anything like that. So here's what we got guys. So in the I'm going to jump right into it.
Speaker 1:So in the workers' comp world there is a thing called an IME or an independent medical exam. And let's use the analogy of breaking a leg. If you were to break your leg at work, you would go to an independent doctor who would say, yep, the leg is broken. Then, after the healing period, you would go back to either that doctor or another one who would look at the leg and say the leg is healed and they close your claim. That is an IME. In the case of a mental injury, mental health injury, ptsd, post-traumatic stress injury, they are trying to analyze your first of all, your first IME, when you would go to the doctor and they say, yeah, your leg's broken. They are trying to analyze and evaluate whether or not you have post-traumatic stress injuries and they do that through this independent medical exam and that is an interview that can last two to three hours and in that interview you have to go through and talk about your medical, your financial, and talk about your medical, your financial, your sexual, your trauma history, the things that you've experienced, how they affect you, how they affect you as a human being, how they affect you as a parent, how they affect you in the real world. All of those things have to be explored in great detail. The reason they do that is they want to be able to analyze and see if you fit the criteria for post-traumatic stress injuries and, if you do, is it an injury related to the job or is it an injury related to something outside of the work world?
Speaker 1:Well, when I started down this path, I was analyzed six different times for post-traumatic stress exams and six different times I had to go before doctors and tell them the story and remember this is way back when, when I wasn't really interested in talking about it. I wasn't interested in having a, you know, a post-traumatic stress injury. I thought PTSD was a joke and I was pissed off, they were stealing my career from me and uh. But I had to go to six of these. All six reports got sent to the city's council team and during that time the council team says we're not satisfied with these six, you need to go to a seventh one. The seventh one they sent me to was a doctor named Dr Paul, and Dr Paul, who's got a long last name, saw me and we had a two to three hour interview whereI had to go through all of this stuff again for the seventh time.
Speaker 1:I'm pretty upset and frustrated at this time because I've had to tell my story and, like I've said before, if my legs were blown off, I wouldn't have to prove to people that there's an injury. But when you have a mental health injury or a post-traumatic stress injury, it's literally death by a thousand cuts and they can't see it. So everybody questions whether you're trying to scapegoat, whether you're trying to get out of work, whether you truly have an injury, whether you didn't get hugged enough as a child and you got spanked too much and that is what caused the problems. Maybe uncle bad touch touched you when you were five and all of a sudden that's the reason you're having these issues, you know, and they're trying to skirt the responsibility of it being an on-the-job injury. Remember their job is to not pay. Just like they told me during the process, I was nothing more than a number on a profits and loss statement and their job was to keep the profits column bigger than the loss column. Or when the lawyers kept delaying things because their tactic was, if I killed myself with post traumatic stress injuries, then they wouldn't have to pay out, and that is just a tactic they use. Have to pay out, and that is just a tactic they use.
Speaker 1:But you got to remember. This is the same people. The city that I worked for for 21 years in law enforcement. The same city that I sacrificed for every single day. The same city that I risked my life for. The same city that I held people while they died in my arms because that was my job and that's what I needed to do. The same city that lied.
Speaker 1:You know, we get lied to as a child. We get told that we can. Little Johnny, you can do anything you want. You want to be an astronaut, you can be an astronaut. Well, that's a lie. Little Johnny is never going to be an astronaut. You know, little Johnny might not have what it takes and no matter how much little Johnny tries, little Johnny will probably and much like the lie they tell us in law enforcement and any officer out there who has been around the block and who has had to go up against the city or the government or the red tape bureaucracy can probably agree with me that they tell us we're family. They tell us that they're there for us. Our union says we're going to defend you. If anything ever happens to you, we're going to wrap our arms around you and we're going to love on you and carry you through this. That is all bullshit. It is true until the minute it's you for you versus the city. And when that happens let's fall back to the comment that I'm nothing more than a number on a profits and loss statement. I have just as much value as the guy cutting the grass for the city that is horseshit. I don't know if value as the guy cutting the grass for the city. That is horse shit. I don't know if you can tell, but I'm spun up. It's been a hell of a weekend which we're about to get into. But let's get back to the IME.
Speaker 1:So my seventh IME, I go to Dr Paul. Dr Paul does this interview and ultimately writes a 37 page report. That was very objective and that essentially said Turnage is screwed up because of things that he experienced or suffered on the job. The injuries are work related. There is no other contributing factors. He needs intensive therapy and you guys need to take care of him. That is essentially what the report says in 37 pages. So they have to take that, because that report is bought and purchased by the opposing counsel because they didn't like the six that we went through.
Speaker 1:So then I go through the two and a half years of hell leading up to today, which is healing, getting better, being medicated, coming off medication, healing, getting better, being medicated, coming off medication, feeling good on top of life. Go back to the trial in February of 2024, where it's literally like having a surgery with no anesthesia. At the end of that I come out all of those scars and wounds, try to heal. But every time they try to heal the scab gets ripped off, it gets infected and I got to deal with the whole process again of trying to heal again those scabs getting ripped off, it gets infected and I got to deal with the whole process again of trying to heal again, those scabs getting ripped off, our subpoenas coming in the mail, conversations with old co-workers, seeing old people driving through the city and passing intersections where I got into a fight or there was a dead person or whatever it might be all those intrusive memories, it could be the fact that I'm struggling and I'm short-tempered, so it's causing problems in the house, causing problems with the family, causing problems in my work environment. All of those things are those scabs getting ripped off.
Speaker 1:And I want to interject one thing I want to say this week I was talking to a very good friend of mine about this exact situation and I was kind of explaining. He's got his own PTS injuries from something else and we were talking about it and kind of comparing and contrasting where we're at. And he said you know, I don't know if the podcast is good for you or not, because are you ripping off these scabs? Are you reopening old wounds? And I just want to ensure the listeners that anything I talk about on the podcast are things that I have worked through in therapy, that I have cleared and when I say cleared, you know, prior to therapy I have a memory of the incident and I have the emotional baggage that goes with it and those two are packaged together Through therapy, through EMDR and through a lot of work I am able to keep the memory but separate the emotional baggage and the emotional response and the hurt and pain that goes with it. That memory will never go away, but the pain doesn't have to be there because I reprogram, repurpose my relationship with that trauma and I'm able to talk about it. So just know that as I talk about these things in the podcast, these are not things that are negatively affecting me and that I'm not hurting from, because these are things that I have worked through and I'm not carrying that emotional baggage with me every day. But then I got a feel because, remember, before I went into the trial, I was feeling good. I was off medication, life was good, I was coasting along and I was finding my healing place. I still had the issues and I still had the trauma there, but I was able to cope and manage.
Speaker 1:But what happens next is just a reminder that, no matter how copacetic in life you feel, those injuries are still under the surface and it's still just a trigger away from being back to where you started, or sometimes even worse. And you know, oftentimes these people think that if we're medicated or if we're having a good day, then the injuries don't affect us anymore. But that is absolutely not the case, and I've said it before that guy that got his legs blown off, if you judge him when he's got his prosthetic legs on and he's running a marathon and he's smiling coming across the finish line, if you rate him on that day, then you're like you know what? He's totally fine, he's back in life, he's 100%, full swing. But now take those limbs off, take those legs off and have him run that marathon. Look at the pain, the suffering, the hobbling, everything else that goes with it. Is he 100%? Absolutely not. When you're on the medication and you're having a good day, now you might feel like you know what? I got this, I'm winning life right now. And it's not until you absolutely take away the medication, or you have a trigger or something reminds you, or you take the fake limbs off, that you really get exposed to what life is like. And that is what's about to happen.
Speaker 1:And then my worst day came going to the trial and then coming out of that trial through that two and a half year period, it was more hell than when I came out of law enforcement, because now I have feelings, I can feel and process things, and all those things that used to not affect me are now seeping into my internal sponge and I'm saturated with negative feelings and infection. So then we have to have that final closing IME. So I get notified that I have to go to another IME and I'm notified that I need to go to my primary care physician. So I go to my primary care physician and he talks to me for 10 minutes and he writes a closure statement and in the closure statement he has to assign me a disability rating number and that is basically telling how disabled am I, based on my condition that I have and if anybody out there listening has ever been through this process, you'll understand what I'm talking about. So he writes this and he writes a statement, but the statement doesn't include anything of great detail that I told him just the day before. All the details the gastrointestinal, the sexual, the relationship issues, the withdrawing, the isolating, the pulling away from church, not doing things I used to do that I enjoyed, like motorcycling, which we'll talk about in a second but it didn't include any of those things. So, therefore, it looks like none of those were factors when he did his disability rating, which is an important number, because that's a rating that sticks with you. So I called him and I'm like, hey, you didn't take this into consideration. So he writes another one and now he gives me a different number.
Speaker 1:Well, those are handed to the defense opposing counsel, and opposing counsel says is it A or B? Is it apples or oranges? We don't know what it is. You need to go to a panel interview. So now I need to go in front. This is number eight. If you're counting, my doctor was number eight. So now I need to go in front of a panel interview to be analyzed and again, quote unquote prove that I have some injuries as a result of post-traumatic stress.
Speaker 1:I don't want to continue proving I don't. I would rather have my legs blown off than have to continue to go through the bullshit that I'm having to go through. So then I go to my therapist and I'm like hey, I have another IME coming up on Monday and you know we need to talk about I'm feeling some stress around it. So we have a conversation. Well, in that conversation, all of the stuff that I'm talking, some stress around it. So we have a conversation. Well, in that conversation, all of the stuff that I'm talking about comes up, all of these infected wounds come up and I realize just again how messed up I am from the job and how short I am and how I'm pulling away from my bestest of friends. I don't want anything to do with them and I'm like, basically, you know, let's go screw yourself. I don't have time for you, I don't have time to chase this relationship and my emotions and my attitudes and feelings and behaviors are way out of line from what they should be.
Speaker 1:This is all affecting me, and it's affecting me because of my past experiences and it's just a reminder of how injured and how my injuries are still present. And it sucks to be there. It sucks to continue thinking that you are messed up. It sucks to continue thinking that you're injured and that you don't know how you're going to go on. Or you know why don't I have any friends? Well, it's because I'm an asshole. That's why it's because my friends tell me hey, hey, you want to go for dinner and I can't, so I got something going on. Want to go for drinks? No, I got something going on. Well, go, screw yourself. I'm tired of asking you. I can't want it to be.
Speaker 1:I'm losing friends because I'm isolating, insulating, withdrawing from people. I am losing the things that are closest to me and I'm not going to allow these people to pull away. I'm going to pull away first and I'm going to shut the door. Well, when I do that, it does nothing but leave me alone and isolated, and that's where I've been living and it's really, really rough. So now I go to this therapy session and I leave having discussed the things that we need to discuss, but I literally feel worse than when I got there.
Speaker 1:And Monday comes and I get the IME and it's not a panel interview, it's with Dr Paul again and it's the same guy that did my seventh one and now I'm one-on-one with him and I'm one-on-one with him and he understands my history, he understands my traumas and it's a total God-send-in blessing that I don't have to go back through all of that stuff and describe all of that pain again. He totally gets it and I have to talk about the differences between when he saw me last and when he saw me now. I have to talk about the delta. I have to talk about the things that, what has got better, what's got worse, what stayed the same. So we spent an hour and 35, hour and 40 minutes talking about that and I felt, like you know, at the end of that conversation at the end of it it was good, it was a comfortable, familiar conversation with this gentleman and I felt, like, you know, I couldn't have said anything else, I couldn't have told him anything else. There's nothing that I didn't get out and he's going to write a fair and objective statement and I think it's going to show that I'm still under the effects of PTS injuries and that they still are currently active and affecting my world and my life. And you know, some things got better because of therapy, but some things didn't. So this is the IME process. So at the end of this, now these numbers will go to the court and to the lawyers and they'll determine how injured I am and based on a criteria and all this other stuff.
Speaker 1:This whole process sucks, guys and girls. I know there's people listening who have post-traumatic stress and I don't want to scare you away from doing the right thing or from reporting it or going through the process, because I guarantee you life is going to be better once you're out of your environment. Once you're out of your stuck world, your stuck relationship, your stuck job and the pressures of law enforcement, and the weight of the badge is no longer on your shoulders, life is going to be better. You are starting a new place, and that is awesome. Um, and this is just part of the journey. Right, this is a season of life, not life as it is, and I'm smart enough to understand that and recognize that.
Speaker 1:But I totally understand why people get depressed, why people kill themselves, why people just give up on life because it's a shitty place to be and it seems like a tornado. Everything is spiraling and I was just talking to a friend of mine and she was saying that you know, I've seen you decline in this area, decline in that area, decline in this area over the last year since the trial, and she described it as a tornado that was spinning and it started off in the center, but before you know it, it starts sucking in everything around it and everything gets pulled into the center of this tornado and destroyed. And that's totally the way I feel, whether it's my relationships or my job or my, you know, whatever it may be music, motorcycles, law enforcement, friends, whatever it may be, everything gets sucked into this vortex and before you know it it's just all part of the storm and when you're in the middle of the storm it's really hard to see out. You know you can't read the label of a pill bottle from inside the pill bottle. You have to be on the outside looking in and I feel like I'm in that pill bottle. I feel like I'm in the middle of that storm right now and it really, really sucks. Men and women, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, family and friends, it's a shitty, shitty place to be. And then I think about the effects and I think about how law enforcement was taken from me and I think about how, um, how, I really didn't have a choice there and it and that sucks. And then I think about how I've declined. My relationships have declined with everybody around me, including some of my family. The relationships have declined or at least suffered. I've withdrawn and pulled away from some of my best friends. I have, you know, this vortex over this last year of since the trial has really screwed things up in my world.
Speaker 1:And the last thing you know, I used to ride a motorcycle. The things that made Aaron was a cop motorcycle music thing. You know I used to ride a motorcycle. The things that made Aaron was a cop. Motorcycle music cop got taken. Music has diminished.
Speaker 1:Last year I think I did three shows all year long. I was doing 20, 30 shows a year and I did three shows last year. No interest in no capacity to tolerate people or be up on stage and like I don't, I don't know, it's rough. Then my motorcycle. I haven't ridden a motorcycle in two years and it sits in the garage and I've got, you know, a 15, 20, $15,000 motorcycle sitting there that I haven't ridden in two years. But if I give that up, that's the only identity tied to the old Aaron that I have.
Speaker 1:I was talking to a friend today and his is a snowboard, his snowboard. He used to ride a bunch. Life happened, happened For whatever reason. He doesn't. Yet he looks at it every day and he's like man that used to be me. But if I get rid of it then you know who am I without it and that's the way I feel. That's the way I feel about my bike.
Speaker 1:If I get rid of my bike, I'm giving up, I'm selling out on the last thing that is a tie to my old errand and that old errand that um was numb but but, you know, was at least me, and it's really really tough to have that, to have that identity shift. Um, you know, having a career shift, not just a career change but an entire career shift of learning something new, all that stuff is tough. And this isn't like a whiny session, this is just. I just want to tell you guys I'm about to wrap it up. It's going to be a short one today, but the whole process of this workers' comp thing super sucks. If you guys are thinking about going through it, I just want you to know that there is life on the other side. I'm smart enough to know that. Don't kill yourself. A lot of people do. Don't give up, don't give in, don't acquiesce. Keep up the good fight. I will survive, no matter what and keep going. That is our mantra, that is our motto.
Speaker 1:No-transcript being alone and isolated. When you're off work for a year and a half and you don't get a single phone call from your coworkers asking you how you're doing or where have you been or how's life going, then after that you come out of it and you've got to fight your city for another year or two years and the people who are supposed to take care of you remember that lie. They lied to you and told you they were going to be there. Well, they're full of shit and the next thing you know you're having to fight them up an uphill battle. And you sit in the middle of this and you look backwards behind you and you see the amount of trauma you've experienced and what you've sacrificed for your family working long hours, holding people while they die, the shit that you've seen and witnessed and the mental scars that put you where you are today.
Speaker 1:So now you're where you are today, feeling all this pressure of yesterday, looking ahead, thinking I should be on my way out, but instead it's an uphill battle because you're fighting your city, you're fighting your government. You're fighting your city, you're fighting your government, you're fighting bureaucracy and you got to continue to prove and prove and prove. If you're doing the math, dr Paul was number nine for my IME's PTSD diagnosis. So nine times I have had to look and fight uphill. Nine times I've had to prove that I'm still injured from all the shit that I saw yesterday. If anybody in the civilian world were to take a look at one week of my life before or any cop's life, and the stuff. We have to see the risk we put ourselves in, being scared to death. When you got somebody pointing a gun at you and you're fighting them all that stuff you would totally soil yourself. So go ahead and defund the police. Go ahead, defund the police and your world would be a better place. It's all horse shit. So as you sit in the middle looking uphill at the fight, you've got to go.
Speaker 1:Sometimes it's super easy to think I just want to give up, don't give up. I really contemplated not even doing an episode tonight because I didn't know what I wanted to talk about, but this conversation has come up a couple times in the last 48 hours, so I thought I would share it with you, because somebody else out there has either experienced it, is going through it or will go through it, and I just want to educate people on what happens. And you know, if you're not in law enforcement thank you for sticking around. If you've listened to this, then the takeaway should be that if you see somebody suffering, if you see somebody going through this process, if you know your buddy is going through the process, whether they're a cop or a pharmacist or whatever it may be, and they're dealing with some of these issues. These are some of the things they're feeling.
Speaker 1:These are some of the things they may not be vulnerable enough to talk about or transparent enough to share with you, but this is going on in their world. So when they're pulling away, when they're stressed out, when they don't have time for you or a temper, maybe give them a little bit more love and a little bit of support. Wrap your arms around them and just let them know. You know what, I get it. I don't get it because I haven't been there, but I can imagine. You're going through a shitty time and I just want you to know that I'm there for you. If I'm distant, I'm not pulling away. I'm not. You're not losing me. I just don't know how to be in this time. I don't know what you need. Let me know and I will help you out. Thank you for sticking around and listening to it. I really appreciate the support. You know, if you guys could pray for me, if you're a prayer, pray for me. My world is shit right now and I'm just having a little rough patch and I get it. But you know, hang in there, guys and girls. Thank you so much.
Speaker 1:If you guys want to follow me, follow me on Instagram at murders2music. On Instagram. That's all spelled out. Or you could email me at murders2music at gmailcom Murders2music at gmailcom. Give me a five-star review, if you have one, if you feel like it, send me a comment. Let's keep the algorithms. Let's keep this thing going. Welcome to 2025. I know the year will be better and, like I said, sorry for the bitch fest, it's not what it's meant to be, but, man, sometimes we're just dealt a shitty hand and I want to educate folks on what this is all about. Thank you guys so much. I appreciate you. I appreciate your time. That is the Murders to Music podcast.
