Jason Nelson was seconds from death when he put his Glock 47 police service gun in his mouth and half squeezed the trigger.
The veteran cop didn’t know it yet, but he was suffering from severe PTSD that would take years and running 22 marathons to get under control.
Years later he was horrified to see the same thing happening to his daughter Holly when she tried to kill herself three times in as many months in 2015.
Jason Nelson tried to kill himself in 2008 and years later was horrified to see the same thing happening to his daughter Holly
The veteran cop didn’t know it yet, but he was suffering from severe PTSD that would take years and running 22 marathons to get under control
‘I went through the worst year of my life fighting in my own head. At school I struggled with many panic attacks and many times where I wanted to take my own life,’ she said.
‘I planned my own death and I felt like I had no way out of it.’
The then-17-year-old was suffering from anxiety and depression as well as borderline personality disorder, and deliberately overdosed on paracetamol and codeine.
Though he berated himself for not seeing her suicide attempts coming, her father knew what she was going through all too well.
The then-17-year-old Holly was suffering from anxiety and depression as well as borderline personality disorder, and deliberately overdosed on paracetamol and codeine
Though he berated himself for not seeing her suicide attempts coming, her father knew what she was going through all too well (pictured with Holly on the right and his other daughter)
Mr Nelson moved to Perth in 2007 with his wife Emma after serving in the British Navy and police force and transferred to the WA Police.
His new life in Australia did not begin well, and set his serious mental health issues into motion.
‘My supervising officers were trying to have me removed from the team by continually trying to set me up to fail,’ he said.
‘I became severely depressed and contemplated, planned and attempted suicide numerous times by placing the barrel of my loaded service Glock 27 pistol in my mouth with my finger firmly on the trigger.’
Fortunately, Mr Nelson’s family helped him get the support he needed to keep his demons at bay, along with taking up distance running.
Mr Nelson moved to Perth in 2007 with his wife Emma after serving in the British police force
Mr Nelson also served in the Royal Navy, his experiences there contributing to his PTSD
But in 2014 when recovering from a routine hernia operation he had a serious panic attack in his sleep that almost gave him a heart attack.
‘I suffered a delayed reaction to the anaesthetic and my heart went from a resting 50bpm in my sleep to over 160bpm,’ he said.
‘The crash team was called and worked frantically to reduce my heart rate as they readied the defibrillator to bring my heart back to normal rhythm.’
‘This event was the trigger point to all of the trauma short stories falling off my subconscious bookshelf and reappearing in the forefront of my mind once more.’
Mr Nelson was finally forced to reckon with repeated traumas he buried deep in his mind and never properly addressed during his childhood and police career.
Mr Nelson was finally forced to reckon with repeated traumas he buried deep in his mind and never properly addressed
‘I still suffer with many bad days in which I can’t see past the darkness but I am fighting. I am a survivor and I am a fighter,’ Holly said
They included being sexually abused when he was 13 by a person he trusted, his navy service, the death of a close friend after Mr Nelson’s stag night hours before his wedding, and the loss of his grandmother.
On top of that was the horrors of his job, including ‘seeing numerous deceased bodies, traumatic scenes, delivering death messages, attending autopsies, horrific road traffic collisions and working on covert policing teams in high risk situations’.
As all these repressed memories came flooding back Mr Nelson was such a mess he was sobbing uncontrollably on trains in the middle of peak hour.
‘I didn’t understand the symptoms and struggled to cope with what was happening to me, the flash backs, the sensitivity to noise, being hyper vigilant, and severe anxiety,’ he said.
‘I tried and failed to deal with it on my own and again became severely depressed and three months later had another major breakdown.’
Mr Nelson eventually got professional help and after a year of intensive therapy was on top of his illness, but still suffers from OCD, hyper vigilance and the occasional flashback.