The Kindness Matters Podcast
So. Much. Division. Let's talk about how to change that. Re-engage as neighbors, friends, co-workers and family. Let's set out to change the world. Strike that. Change A World. One person at a time, make someone's life a little better and then do it again tomorrow and the day after that, through kindness.
Kindness is a Super-Power that each of us has within us. It is so powerful it has the potential to change not only your life but those around you, too. Let's talk about kindness.
The Kindness Matters Podcast
Beyond the Flames: A Firefighter's Journey Through Trauma and Healing
Trauma doesn't have to be the end of your story—it can become the foundation for profound healing and service to others.
Former firefighter Natalie Newgent takes us through her remarkable journey from a career-ending injury to creating specialized healing spaces for first responders. After 14 years of running toward emergencies while carrying her own silent battles with stress and PTSD, a single moment changed everything when a workplace accident left her with severe physical injuries and unable to continue the career that had become her entire identity.
What saved her wasn't a sophisticated treatment program (though that came later)—it was the simple, consistent presence of one colleague who checked in regularly, sat with her in non-judgmental silence, and offered that small thread of connection that kept her tethered to hope. This profound experience became the foundation for Rekindled Retreats, Natalie's innovative healing program for first responders, veterans, caregivers, and women in male-dominated fields.
The conversation reveals surprising insights about the reality of firefighting work (80% of calls are actually medical emergencies), the unique challenges women face in these environments, and the critical gap in recovery resources for those who dedicate their lives to saving others. Natalie shares how her retreats offer multiple therapeutic modalities condensed into four transformative days, teaching participants to develop a "dimmer switch" between high-adrenaline work environments and everyday life—something first responders typically struggle with.
Whether you're a first responder yourself, know someone in the field, or simply appreciate stories of resilience and reinvention, this episode offers powerful reminders about the healing potential of genuine connection and the possibility of transforming our deepest wounds into sources of compassion for others.
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Hello everyone and welcome to the Kindness Matters podcast. I'm your host, mike Rathbun. On this podcast, we promote positivity, empathy and compassion because we believe that kindness is alive and well, and there are people and organizations that you may not have heard of in the world, making their communities a better place for everyone, and we want you to hear their stories. On this podcast, we talk about matters of kindness because kindness matters. Hey, welcome to the Kindness Matters podcast show everybody. I am your host, mike Rathbun. I was just thinking I may have misdone that Kindness Matters podcast show everybody. I am your host, mike Rathbun. I was just thinking I may have misdone that Kindness Matters Podcast, not show. Anyway, you knew what you were listening to, I didn't have to tell you. I really, really, really appreciate the fact that you are here and that you made a choice to listen to this episode and this podcast and to help me be part of a broader community just spreading kindness, so that people who are out in the world, who might be thinking there is no more kindness in the world, has a place to come, to be hopeful and to be inspired and motivated to do some kindness of their own. So thank you for that.
Speaker 1:You guys, I have the coolest guest for you today. Her name is Natalie Nugent and she is. For 14 years she served her community as a firefighter, running into emergencies while carrying her own silent battles with stress, trauma and burnout. After a career-ending neck injury and a long journey through PTSD, she found herself faced with two choices Let the weight of it all bury her or learn how to heal and thrive in an entirely new way. Welcome to the show, natalie. I am so excited to hear your story. Thank you.
Speaker 2:Thank you, mike, I'm glad to be here.
Speaker 1:Um, okay, given the two things that you had on your plate today doing a podcast or attending a retirement breakfast I'm not going to make you choose. I'm kidding, I'm kidding. Um, yeah, it's, and I think you know a lot of times, first responders, well first of all, don't get the credit they deserve. But I think and maybe I'm wrong, I probably am wrong when people think first responders, I think they immediately go to police and not necessarily firefighters or EMT. And so, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you from the bottom of my heart. You guys, what you do makes such a huge impact in the world and I appreciate that. Why a firefighter? We'll just jump into it. Why a firefighter?
Speaker 2:absolutely. You know, it was a path that I was just meant to be on. I actually went to college for a full scholarship in softball and during my first year there I had an injury and tore the ligament in my thumb which was my throwing arm. So that was my end of my softball career. And I was just out for a run when I was done with the season and there was a big line at the fire station and I had no idea what the line was for. So I just got in line, started asking questions and I filled out the application. So I found out the line was for the volunteer fire department, and so I filled out the line was for the volunteer fire department. And so I filled out the application and I showed up on day one just to see what the tryout was all about and I absolutely fell in love with the work. It was equivalent to playing my favorite sport all day during the training, the learning, the education, the academies.
Speaker 2:That came all after that volunteer experience. And then when I ran my first call and this woman was losing her husband and so we performed CPR and did everything we could where I could be this small beacon of just light and bring comfort and love to that situation and see the light on her face afterwards I knew that little impact I made was what I wanted to do for the rest of my life.
Speaker 1:Wow, yeah, you know what? I have never had that experience. I'm kind of torn as to maybe I want that kind of, maybe I don't, but that's like. Most people in the world never get to be involved in something like that. So to have that experience and to see that look on her face must have been huge and probably drove you. You were still a volunteer at that time, right.
Speaker 2:I was still a volunteer and actually after that call I made the decision to start applying to be a career firefighter.
Speaker 1:So what's the difference between training wise, for between a volunteer and a what do you call it Professional firefighter?
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, professional structure firefighter volunteer you. Often you have to pull three or four shifts a month and so usually they're 12 hour shifts and you're also on call. So if there's any big emergencies where they need you on call and you're close by, you are able to go and offer the kind of help they need. Fill in the roles that need filled. But overall a professional firefighter is someone who works full time, and so there is a more vigorous training. There's a three month academy and then 12 months in which you're a probation, and every month you get testing and training in a different facet of the job.
Speaker 1:For a whole year for an entire year.
Speaker 2:So when you finish your year of probation it's like now you have the blessing to go on and start your career. But that first year is full of, you know, rigorous training and testing and learning.
Speaker 1:every month for a, every month for a year, you're tested, wow.
Speaker 2:And, I think, a lot of people. When you imagine a firefighter, you think of this big, strong male that's going to come in and pick everybody up and carry them out of the fire. But 80% of our calls are actually medical Really 80%, yep, and we're responding to cardiac events and, as well as these fires, traffic accidents, natural emergencies, but a lot of it is medical I had no idea.
Speaker 1:I I just learned something new. Um, that's, that's crazy. Oh, it's and it it's really. There's a lot of heavy lifting involved there on so many levels, right.
Speaker 2:Absolutely yeah. Part of my test to initially become a firefighter, I had to drag 190 pound dummy and all the way down this basketball court around a big drum and then back down the other way, which of course, weighs more than me. So just the challenge in that aspect enough. There's some training that needs to take place, especially as a woman. In this career we have to make sure to really stay up on our physical shape, eat properly for the amount of energy that we're burning and we need to have those extra reserves on a fire. So it's it kind of becomes a science like what an athlete would have to compare their life to be.
Speaker 1:Yeah for sure. Yeah, I was glad. I'm glad you brought it up, because firefighting is still a pretty male dominateddominated career. How was that for you, how was your experience being? How many other women Were there, other women in the station?
Speaker 2:I was the first volunteer to be a woman through Berrien Seattle Fire Department, and that was a very interesting experience because I was young, I was 19. I was really excited to go into this career, and it was a learning curve for all of us. We didn't have women's restrooms in the fire station yet, and so there were some modifications that had to be made just to accommodate having a female volunteer, which actually translated into my career. With Vancouver, we're the fourth largest department in the state of Washington, and when I first got hired, I was the second female out of 200.
Speaker 1:Whoa. So, and what year was this now?
Speaker 2:And that was in 2014. 2014. And they still didn't have. And having to expend that extra energy just to pull up my bunker gear and wear a jacket that doesn't fit and an SCBA that's too big Just that adds challenges that we don't even talk about Absolutely.
Speaker 1:Wow, and do you? Okay? So now you did that. How many years did you do that?
Speaker 2:As a professional for 14 years and I have 16 years total in the fire service, with two of them being volunteer.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:But, then.
Speaker 1:Then something happened and you weren't able to do that anymore. Can you talk about that a little bit?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was in September of 2023. I was carrying a lot of weight in my personal life already, as so many of us do. I was a single mom and just coming off a three-year engagement, so I was doing my best to piece my life back together and I had that amount of weight going into shift that night I was pulling hose and I got stuck behind me and it caused a severe injury. I herniated my cervical column in my neck and my lumbar and I tore my right rotator cuff all from the same injury.
Speaker 1:Whoa Okay, so are you carrying the hose around your neck?
Speaker 2:I had it draped across my right shoulder and across my body. It's five inch hose, so it's large diameter hose to hook up to a hydrant.
Speaker 1:And I got stuck and yeah.
Speaker 2:So imagine a running back head down, running as fast as I can, hitting a wall. That's exactly the force that went into my body.
Speaker 2:However, I had no padding like a football player would be wearing right, just an oversized coat yeah, and what a lot of people don't talk about is when you get injured and you come out of your professional area, like for me, being a firefighter was my entire identity. Being out on the rig, that was my office I'm, that was everything I knew. So when I came off from my injury and I got put in my own little cubicle behind a computer on light duty and you took away my entire brotherhood and the community that I came from, it was really isolating and lonely.
Speaker 1:So you were still a firefighter, but you weren't going out on calls anymore. Is that right?
Speaker 2:Yeah, they put me on light duty while I was waiting to get. I had neck surgery and so I was on light duty waiting for that process and the paperwork to go through and it was just during that time, having no direction, I started to get more and more lost, and it was through this small thread of a single coworker. You know, imagine a firefighter on scene.
Speaker 2:There's 200 of us in the department and one single person continuously kept checking in on me while I was injured and he just gave me that little thread of hope that I was still seen. He really helped me going.
Speaker 1:That's so cool, but eventually you, you had to quit being a firefighter.
Speaker 2:I did I by December. So I got injured in September and by December of that same year my PTSD had completely taken over and I ended up going to a recovery center for three months.
Speaker 1:Oh, is it firefighter sponsored?
Speaker 2:Yes, okay it was first responders, police veterans, so it's a specific PTSD recovering center. And I went there and that's in Utah, and when I came home the expectation was to jump right back into shift. But I wasn't ready. I hadn't healed from my physical injuries or my PTSD. So inevitably, my city asked me to leave. Because of my injuries and PTSD it felt as if I was no longer a fit for the job and they had no use for me.
Speaker 1:So they let me go for me, so they let me go, which, since this was like the love of your life, basically that must have been so incredibly hard.
Speaker 2:Oh, it's devastating. I mean, yeah, the first thing you do when you introduce yourself is hi, my name's Natalie and I'm a firefighter, and that's your entire identity wrapped up in that. So that was a really hard thing to overcome.
Speaker 1:I can't imagine. So talk about now. I like that recovery center and it's in Utah and it's basically for all. I'm going backwards. I'm sorry we should be moving forward, but it's like from all around the country.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. Yeah, it's based out of Utah, but most of the participants were from all over the States and firefighters, police, a lot of them like my story. They got injured, came off the line into light duty or no, maybe there wasn't a light duty position, so they were just forced to resign and everybody had lost their identity. So we all were in this recovery center. It's 41 days. You stay together, you live there, you work through about 40 hours of therapy every single week and then on the weekends you do community service activities.
Speaker 1:Wow, and this is meant to.
Speaker 2:Stabilize and be able. So a lot of the patients that go to these facilities are suicidal, and this is the last intervention process to try and stabilize and bring us back to a baseline where we can show up in life, let alone back to our careers. But it all starts with the awareness that, one, you have a problem and two, the openness to want to get better and actually dive into what kind of traumas we have in our past so that we can work through them and then move forward. With whatever skill set that trauma taught us, let's repurpose that skill and use it moving forward.
Speaker 1:Oh, I love that, I love that.
Speaker 2:Because there's no bad or good traumas it's a relative scale, you can't compare it, however or good traumas. You know it's a relative scale, you can't compare it. However, one blessing that comes from any trauma and we make it through it is we learn these different qualities to get through them, which then serve us later in life. Me, I'm very independent, I'm very passion driven, and that has served me and also been a detriment in my life.
Speaker 2:So it's been a detriment in that I have a tendency to want to overwork and take too much on my plate. I didn't know how to say no, because I want to learn and do as much as I can and I forget that everybody has a limit.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we all do, every single one of us. You're absolutely right. So all of this contributed to you kind of having an epiphany about something that you could do for other people in this position. Talk about that.
Speaker 2:That small thread of hope and that individual Darren Deming is his name. He offered a type of peer support and care, and the definition I give for peer support it's not somebody who's meant to fix you or to force you to be where everybody else expects you to be.
Speaker 2:They simply meet you where you are on your journey and then they just stay to walk you through it. And so that's what Darren offered me. He would sit with me from a place of non-judgment. He never shamed me and sometimes he just sat there and we would sit with me from a place of non-judgment. He never shamed me and sometimes he just sat there and we would sit in silence, and that comfort of just knowing I wasn't alone was something I knew helped me get through my recovery, and I knew I wanted to give that to somebody else, because it was such a rare quality that he carried to be able to hold space with me, and I felt that he didn't ever try to fix me. He just simply sat with me and said you know me too. I'm going through this too, and it was such a valuable lesson that I decided to build my entire career moving forward on that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you're absolutely right though, because so many of us just don't know how to and just be for somebody who really, really, really needs it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and just sitting in silence. A simple phone call, a text message, when especially you're off duty, you haven't been going to work, maybe somebody's not showing up the way that they used to, maybe somebody's not showing up the way that they used to. If you stop and notice and make that simple little act take 30 seconds to send a text message that message could be the one thing that intervenes with that person's decision, maybe to go down a course they shouldn't have gone down.
Speaker 2:Right, I heard many stories of intervention in my recovery journey where people were at their suicidal moment and a simple text message or a phone call comes in.
Speaker 1:Pulled them back.
Speaker 2:Pulled them back. I mean, that's the universe intervening right there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I know, and you know it can be really easy. We have a friend. My wife and I have this friend and she's been going through some stuff and we hadn't seen her in a while because usually she's at work. We saw her the other day and I said how are you doing? And she said I'm good. And I said how you doing? And she said I'm good and I said how you doing really Long story, you know, and sometimes people just need that little extra push to open up, if that's what they need Um but yeah, so so you decided to to be that person.
Speaker 1:What was his name? Darren, did you say? Darren, yeah, so you decided to be that person. What was his name? Darren. Did you say Darren, yeah. So you decided I'm going to be Darren for other first responders, primarily women too, right?
Speaker 2:Yep, absolutely. And what did you start? I started Rekindled Retreats, which started as a place of community, looking for community phone calls and one-on-one coaching or if somebody is really struggling and they need resources. I created this space to be able to openly talk about what you're going through and which that point we create a resource plan or like a wellness plan that they can then start using in their own personal life to find a doctor, find a therapist they need, go down the medication route if they need, but it just gives them a one-stop shop to be able to find those resources, because just that step alone is overwhelming when you're going through it yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1:you know, trying to find a caregiver or or whatever is maddening these days, especially with insurance and what have you. I'm not going to go into that, but yeah, so if there's a one-stop shop you can go to to find everything that you need to recover or to whatever it is that they need, Now and I know that you work with first responders you also work with women, is that correct?
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's correct and I work primarily with first responders, caregivers and veterans, offering that community space and support, and as well as I work with women, especially in male-dominated fields. It's something I can relate to. I've spent 20 years in the trades so I understand what they're going through and they're often overlooked. You know, construction workers, for instance, work during the pandemic and they're out there on the front lines. They're out there and there's less women than there is males, so there wasn't tools and car hearts and things like that for women. 20 years ago, when I was in construction.
Speaker 2:So just having a space to be able to talk about those small. They seem minuscule, but when you go to work every single day and you don't have the right tools, think of that over a career. That's traumatizing in itself.
Speaker 1:Oh my gosh, yeah, no, yeah, and I don't a lot of the trades. They have tools available but you know, maybe they're not, maybe you have to buy your own, and that's hard.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and as I'm working with more and more people, I'm just discovering there's a need for a greater sense of therapy, so that this once a week, every week of therapy and then it's like hey, goodbye, go work on these things. It hasn't worked for a lot of people and that's what I'm discovering. So I'm in the process of adding to that rekindled. We're doing retreats four day, three night retreats and we're offering different practitioners to come in because, like you said, it's really hard to find a good practitioner, a clinician, and I'm going to bring a bunch of different resources all to the same place so that you can try them all out.
Speaker 2:A bunch of different resources all to the same place so that you can try them all out. You can try each different modality of therapy to see which one lands in your system, because we're not all created equal, our trauma is not equal and we all need something a little different, and it just allows the space to be able to. In four days, you can try 20 different therapy modalities. That would otherwise take you maybe possibly a year to try all of those. So just to fast track that recovery, it would be incredible that's so cool.
Speaker 1:and now, when I think of retreat, I think of one of a couple different things Camping or cucumbers on the eyes. What does a rekindled retreat look like?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so we stay in a lodge in Mount Hood area in Oregon, Rhododendron, the one in December. It's all inclusive, so all the meals we eat a range of like Ayurveda diet, which is just healthy. So veggies, fruits, lean meats and we want to well nourish our bodies. We have a training workshop on how to eat for your emotions or your hormone cycles, which is unique to women's retreats that we offer, because that's often overlooked as well.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:And then we have light yoga and somatics, which is movement that is aligned with your emotional capacity for that day. So, depending on the range of what we're training on, we'll do somatics based right towards that emotion and then we do nervous system training, which is like creating a dimmer switch. So some of us first responders, we are all or nothing. We are all in on the line saving lives, or we're doing nothing and resting and just totally shut down because we've overworked. So this is a way to create a dimmer switch to be able to turn on for work, but how to offset and actually reset our bodies so that we recover?
Speaker 1:Perfect.
Speaker 2:That's the one area that, first responders, we really fail is to be able to bring our systems down we can be the first one to respond and jump and help and serve, but when it comes to slowing down and recovering, we are the worst at that I often wondered how I mean.
Speaker 1:Because the adrenaline rush when you're doing, when you're responding to a fire, or if you're a cop, if you're responding to an incident, must be so intense. I mean, do you just walk away and shut it off? You can't, I wouldn't imagine.
Speaker 2:You can't, and sometimes it seemingly makes life a little dull because you're in these situations high adrenaline, your cortisol is flowing, everything and then you come off of that and you're taking your kids to school and you're going to the bake sale and maybe like a total offset and it seems boring and over a career it gets really hard to be able to come back to reality. We get sucked into the work mode yeah for sure.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm just picturing now going to pick up the kids. I just pulled five kids out of a building, or five people out of a burning building, but I got to go get my kids. You show up with the ash and the foot and all that good stuff. Yeah, I can't even imagine how you do that. But you, I think you found something really unique and amazing here and I. This is all well. First of all, a lot of it is because somebody showed you kindness, but then this is also showing kindness and I absolutely love it, and we're going to have links in the show notes. Do you take people from everywhere? I mean, are you just specific to the PNW or nope, we take people from everywhere. I mean, are you just specific to the pnw or?
Speaker 2:nope, we take anyone from everywhere and we offer shuttles from the airports and can help with all logistics. And it's if you're local you're able to drive. Or we also offer shuttling from portland downtown so we could shuttle you to the cabin Because it will be snowy and some people are uncomfortable driving in the snow in the northwest, so it's just a we want to get people there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, my least favorite kind of snow.
Speaker 2:I'm from Minnesota. We like our fluffy in.
Speaker 1:So what is your next retreat coming up?
Speaker 2:December of this year, december 11th through 14th Okay.
Speaker 1:All right. So yeah, If you're listening and this sounds like a program that would help you or be of benefit to you, you know what? Go to the show notes. We'll have a link to Natalie's website and maybe we'll just put it separately. Is there a sign up or a registration for it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, the registration is through the website and if you want to book a consultation call, I can fill you in all the details of the retreats as well, as I really want to focus on creating a resource. So whoever I talk to whether it's my program or maybe a program I've been through that I can refer them to I just want to make sure they get the resources they need. So they will leave with the resource book, a call and you will hopefully have at least one path to follow after.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I'm making it sound like this is all about the retreat, but you work 24-7. Besides the retreat, I mean this isn't just about one specific set of dates. You are there whenever somebody needs.
Speaker 2:Yes, except.
Speaker 1:Two o'clock in the morning.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, we're available, and that's part of the accountability piece with the program is. It's not just the retreats. You know we offer eight weeks of program that is split up four weeks before the retreat, four weeks after the retreat and then it continues with monthly calls. Before the retreat, four weeks after the retreat and then it continues with monthly calls. So it's not a, you're right, it's not an end all at the retreat.
Speaker 1:It's actually the start of a beautiful community, perfect, fantastic. Natalie, thank you so much for coming on. I really, really appreciate it. I love what you guys are doing and uh, I just I, I appreciate you thank you, mike.
Speaker 2:I appreciate your time and if anyone's struggling out there, I just really encourage you to reach out to somebody, a friend, and don't be afraid to share your story, because somebody out there needs to hear it in order to open up about their own perfectly said I I'm I'm going to shut up because I can't add to that.
Speaker 1:Take care, and we will talk soon.
Speaker 2:Bye, mike, thank you.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much for listening to this episode of the Kindness Matters podcast with my guest, natalie Nugent. I hope this episode left you feeling a little easier, a little more hopeful about the state of the world that we all share. If you enjoyed this episode, please feel free to tell your friends, family, co-workers about us. Also, don't forget to subscribe to our newsletter for more uplifting content. It's free and there's a link to sign up in the show notes. You've been listening to the Kindness Matters podcast. We will be back again next week with a brand new episode, and we would be honored if you would join us again. Until then, remember kindness matters, and so do you.
