The Day He Got Shot Was the Day He Stopped Hiding

“I pushed myself against the pole and gave a full description of the guy who just unloaded a clip into me. Because I wasn’t done yet. Not then.”

It wasn’t a metaphor. Matt was literally bleeding out in the street, shot multiple times by a felon who should’ve never had a gun. But what stuck with us wasn’t the shooting. It was how calm he was. It was how, even then, he stayed in control.

Because what this episode made clear is that Matt’s trauma didn’t start that day—it just finally had a name.

Why We Asked That Question

The question we asked wasn’t complicated: “What went through your mind when you knew you were hit?”

But the answer cracked something open: Matt didn’t panic. He didn’t scream. He thought. He moved. He fought. And then he gave his own description to dispatch while actively bleeding from his legs and chest.

That’s not just instinct. That’s someone who’s lived too long in survival mode to know anything else.

What That Moment Taught Us

Matt didn’t just survive being shot. He survived years of bottled-up pain, failed relationships, betrayal, and the compounding pressure of pretending it didn’t affect him.

He survived the lie that "you can be a cop and still be emotionally invincible."

But that day? That day, something broke open. And once it did, he stopped hiding.

He started talking to psych services. He started facing the rage. He admitted the things he’d never said out loud—not to his ex-wife, not to his coworkers, not even to himself.

What This Means for You, the Listener

Matt’s story is intense. It’s graphic. It’s brutal. But at its core, it’s not just about being a police officer. It’s about being human—and what happens when you finally stop pretending you’re not hurting.

Because if Matt—Mr. “Grumpy”, Mr. “Guarded”, Mr. “I don’t talk to people I don’t know”—can sit across from a mic and unpack 29 years of pain…then maybe we all can.

Ask yourself:

“What’s still bleeding that I haven’t treated?”

You don’t need to get shot to start healing. But sometimes it takes a hit to realize you’ve been wounded all along. https://www.throughtherough.net/podcast/episode/269c6ea9/29-years-in-law-enforcement-and-the-bullet-that-changed-everything