We'd like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land on which this podcast was produced, the Gadigel people of the urination. We pay our respects to elders past and present. This episode contains Ben Besant's first hand experience of the Link Cafe siege and includes discussions of terrorism, violence, death
and PTSD. If any of these topics are triggering for you, please give this episode a miss or seek help by visiting lifelines website at lifeline dot org dot au or by calling thirteen eleven fourteen.
It's December fifteenth, twenty fourteen, and a terrorist has eighteen people held hostage inside the Link Cafe in the heart of the Sydney CBD. A police operation is underway in Martin Place in Sydney, CBD.
We just got some breaking news as a police operation are underway in the heart of the city and several police vehicles are at the scene.
What you're watching is live.
It's happening here in Martin Place, thirty forty meters from We're standing.
Tactical Operations Unit Officer Ben Besant is in position with his M four pointed directly at the target.
There are dozens and dozens of place, some very heavily armed in helmets and care blastsuits.
Through the window, Ben sees the man wearing a backpack stretched by its contents and two wires looping out from the bottom, one black and the other red. He knows the second that goes off, he and everyone around him are dead. He sends off one last text to his pregnant wife at home, asking for some photos of their young daughter. But Ben has a job to do and there's no decision to be made. He isn't leaving these hostages.
I'm at Middleton and this is Headgame today inside the mind of the man brought the Link Cafe Siege to a close. I am super stoked to have Ben Bezant on my podcast head Game. Now. This man is a man of my own heart. He was a tactical Operations unit officer in the Linked Cafe Siege. Mate, We've got loads to talk about. It's an absolute pleasure having you on here. And like I said, mate, you are a man of my own heart and I can't wait to
get into the thicker things. But before we do, how did you get it involved with becoming part of this unit? Was it always something that you you grew up with was your father in the in the police force? Did you have a military background? How did that happen?
Firstly, made a pleasure to be on this on this podcast with you and quite the introduction you just gave me, which is which is appreciated to start off with your questions. My it was more my grandfather. He was in the Royal Australian Air Force as a flight engineer. His father, so my great grandfather was in the Austrai Lighthorse involved
in the Battle of Beersheba and stuff like that. But growing up, I would say, yeah, my grandfather was a huge part of my life, told me lots of stories relating to his unit, war stories, all that type of thing. So yeah, it always it did have an impact and shaping me going forward in life.
I'd say, why did you choose to go police and not military if the military was sort of ingrained in you from a young age.
Yes, So I'd say after I left school, I decided I was just scanning to take it easy for a little while. I went and worked with my dad doing excavation and a number of other jobs. I always imagine just joining joining the army through school obviously wanted to be in the double A F which require great deal of schoolwork and aptitude in that area, which I may have fallen slightly short on. So I was processing that for a little while. But yeah, I always imagine I
joined the army. Then a good made of mine who was in the police force, having a good chats to him, telling us all the sort of things that they do and how good it was. And still in the back of my mind the whole time, I always imagined joining the military. So I did. I signed up with the police Force. I joined them. It wasn't fulfilling that side of me, the service and the wanting to be more military based, so I did join the Army reserves. I was in that for probably a year.
And a half.
I was trained in infantry, attached to one commando, which is the reserve unit over here.
And that's all wise. Being in the police.
Yeah, well yeah, they're very dommodating with that. They give you a leave for all that. So yeah, my plan was to then go on and do selection, and a lot of people once they actually get through in the reserve selection, then move into the full time commandos. But I always knew about the TU the taxic operations unit, which is realistically the closest thing to the military within the police force.
So you're like a special force within the police force. Right.
Yeah. So the way it's set up with governments in Australia and each state, so we are responsible for the counter terrorism response for New South Wales. So that's why we take a year of course, as we do above
and beyond other things. We do helicopter operations, fast ope and all that sort of thing, lots of tactical raping courses, all our water operations training and then active shooter so do all of that and we're trained to do that because ultimately, if there's a terrorist attack in New South Wales, what happens is we respond.
So so you're doing you're doing all your tactical training, you're fast roping and and your firearms training, et cetera, et cetera. We're going to jump now, we're going to jump straight into into Martin Place. And for those of you that no Martin Place, you know the Link cafe very well, and you know we know it very well
because it was global coverage. I remember watching it being live streams and but to take me through when you woke up, what you know how how the day went and how it just transpired into all of a sudden being fucking at that door, cameras in your face, the whole world's attention is zoomed in on your team.
Yeah, it was a big day and it's a day that that I'll never forget. I'd say more the aftermath of everyone with their opinions. It should have been done differently. It should have been done by the special forces, it should have been Everyone has an opinion on everything. But yeah, so that morning, I was just on shift, so I started at seven am. I was actually in our unit because we're specialized and obviously see a lot of trauma and that they make our unit go and see the
shrinks that they have within the police force. I'd say more a box sticking exercise than anything. But as I came back into the office, I knew instantly something something was wrong. I just go back slightly before that. Before that, we knew it was a matter of time. We've been doing lots of c T works, so counter terrorism work. We've been arresting. There was a large cellar I think it was up to thirty to forty guys. So we've been doing a lot of arrests in relation to that.
Leading up to it, there was the attack there the two guys down in Victoria, the counter Terrian police, it stabbed obviously after nine to eleven, and there's terrorist incidents happening around the world, so we knew something was coming. Constant briefings daily. But yeah, as I came back into the office, it was it was just a very different feel. Straight away, police negotiate a running through the office, which is something you never see.
Its ag fider sentences. Yeah.
Yeah, and then as I walked in, my sergeant there, he's walked up. Just grab your stuff, we're going, and I believe I just said to him, so the big one's happening, and he's gone, yep, let's go. So that's all. I took race downstairs. There was another operator in there, our armored vehicle, so we rushed down to Martin Place and it was just a scene of chaos as you can imagine. There's General Judy's cops everywhere trying to clear
pedestrians off the street. There was our guys trying to file into positions, and I was allocated to the Alpha team, the Entry team straight away and we're being briefed honestly, as by the seconds things were changing. But right from the beginning we were told a man in Middle East in appearance with a shotgun and a backpack, claiming to have explosives in the cafe. So yeah, I'd say, right from the beginning, I knew it was real. Wow.
So when's the first time you step on the ground and you as an individual and as team start processing and breaking this down because now you're the eyes and ears.
Yeah, of course, and then as you know, you're scrambling trying to get in tell the other you're trying to work out best positions. Yeah, we had Sierra teams, so sniper teams going up. We had three separate sniper teams in different locations. They really had very limited vision. And initially we pulled up on say, on the street down the bottom on Elizabeth Street with Martin place. Then we
were deployed up on the Phillip Street. It's like a truckloading bay, which is only really thirty meters or so from the front entry. And yeah, like you said, you need eyeball into, you need vision in to see what's going on. You can only there's only so much vision. The snipers had so that's why myself and my shieldman, PAULI, we went to our team there and said, look, this is this is not good. We don't have any real intel on what's going on. We've had no eyeball into
there for a while. So he gave us permission to push forward. So it was just my shieldman and myself was the first cover man. We pushed forward to the first of four windows on the cafe, and from there I was able to, yeah, get eyeball into the cafe. I was able to get quite a bit of vision what was happening inside. I saw a number of hostages in there who were completely traumatized, visibly shape and crying. I saw a number of them holding up the black
Islamic flags to the front windows opposite Channel seven. And then, yeah, I saw him quite quite a few times. I saw his shotgun. I saw the way he was moving. He was very serious straightaway, and the backpack, it was a big black camel mountain back and I could see clearly
two wires protruding from the bottom. In my mind, my shieldman's mind, and my supervisor who pushed forward, we wholeheartedly believe it was a bomb right from the beginning, we've done lots of specialist training with the military so and all that sort of thing, and so from everything, all their training, we believe it was a bomb right from the beginning, which changes the whole course of the job, as you can.
Absolutely it does. Absolutely, it's you know, you're on tender hooks there. You know, you've got your thinking. You know, people don't realize hostage rescue is exactly that. You know, if you can, if you can rescue all of those hostages and you don't have to fire around them. Wow, So you're up against the window, You've got good eyes on. Now do you ever lock eyes with the terrace? Do
you ever lock eyes with the with the target? And when you get there and you see the hostages, is there ever a moment where you're just like whoa, Yeah.
So we actually got vision into the cafe, probably up to thirty minutes or so. The whole time he was walking around or any anytime he went past the window, he'd always have the shotgun on a hostage, so he'd always be marching a hostage around with him or to the back of the head. So for everyone, for people out there saying it should have been a sniper shot,
rot from the beginning. That obviously avoids that. As you know, the body's natural reaction if your shot is to jerk, hence to pull the trigger, which would kill a hostage. We didn't realize at the time through the building manager that it used to be a bank to so they're glasses tough and glass to it specialized around for that. Yeah. And then and then also on top of that, common practice for that time the dead man switch on the
bomb too, isn't it. So you shoot him even if you shot him in the right spot, he didn't kill a hostage released dead man switch, everyone in the cafe is dead instantly, So that was always a consideration there.
So you're feeding back intel, I suppose you're receiving at tenfold as well. What's the process like through your head put us in your head in that time when all of this information has just been you're being overwhelmed with it.
Yeah, So our primary job is to get intel on each of the hostages, back descriptions of them, and we did manage to see them for quite a while, and as much intel and information on him, I'd say on a personal level, me seeing a lot of these hostages as you can imagine you get a bit of an emotional attachment to them, so it becomes more than just a job with just numbers, and you're overwhelming instinct with people who in our line of where you want to you want to go in and rescue, You want to
do your job. You want to be allowed to do your job and go in and that wasn't allowed to happen for quite a long time.
What's going through your head?
You know?
As the times ticking.
We were there for up to sixteen hours, so it was a It was a long day, and we obviously chatted amongst ourselves in a group, and we all believed it was a bomb, and we sort of the darking of joking about it. We all go in there, we be your medals for the missus and the families, all that sort of thing. But yeah, then it became quite real where we one hundred percent believe we run into that cafe, he's going to set the bomb off. Every
one of us is going to die. So that was a confronting realization, but it was something that everyone in my team and I believe the other team, we all had to get over and we dealt with emotionally that the moment we run in there, beyond probability, we all believe we were going to die. So that was that was difficult for us, to the point we all sent messages home on I did. I sent message to my wife at the time, tried saying my goodbys who text
messaged without Alami? I know what I thought? Yeah, I got it to send some some picks on my little girl. And yeah, that was that was a real, very real and confronting moment. She being pregnant too. I never believed I was going to be able to see my my second you know.
And how did that work for you? Psychological? Does it ramp you up? Does it gee you up? Or is it a case of listen, I just wanted to see your face before before this, before this ship show kicks off.
Yeah, I'd say with this job it was it was different than other jobs. I'm assuming I'd probably deal with things. It's the same with you just deal with the situation and worry about ramifications later. Normally it's it happens, but being there for sixteen hours and talking about it amongst your mates and yeah, it just became very real. And yeah, yeah, one hundred percent believe that I go in there that I'm going to die. So I was in a roundabout way saying goodbye, and I just wanted to see a
couple more pics of my daughter again. One of my best mates, PAULI, is a shield man. He's showing me some pics of his He's yeah, young like so, yeah, I think in a roundabout way. Yeah, he even said to me, I love you, bro, and yeah, I said, I love you man. So in sort of a rand about way, we were sort of saying goodbye to each other.
So fucking emotional rollercoaster.
Yeah wow.
And then you get the green light, tell me about that coming over the radio, right, you know, greenlit, let's go.
So as you know, you're prepared the whole day, but then you have different situations where ramps right up and yeah, you adrenaline's pumping. You've got to try and deal with that, not suppress it, but use it. But yeah, so highs and loads all day. But then the radio call coming over that they believed they were settling down for the night, and then it was within thirty seconds of that we
heard the first shotgun within the cafe go off. So yeah, from that very moment where completely high and we're completely ready. We're just desperate to go in. I remember even looking forward at Paulie and he's just rocking on his feet. We're just like just desperate, just just waiting go and then yeah, no call. We didn't go in from that point with the shotgun, we didn't have too much intel coming in. Straight away. We knew hostage had run out.
We had one one guy actually run up and then run down Phillip Street so we could see him, so we knew hostages come out. We knew he'd been fired on. And then we get that coming over the radio and it's yeah, so we're just ready, we're heightened one hundred percent, we're mentally prepared. And then there was a second shotgun blast went off a little bit later. That was when he actually took one of the hostages. Tory Johnson had him on his knees and the first round he's actually
fired above his head. We didn't know this at the time, but this is obviously what I know now. Our snipers had very limited vision. Then there was a third a third shot rang out and still remember the words coming over hostage down, white window two, hostage down, what window too? So we knew he'd now execute to hostage. Yeah, which is difficult to still even talk about. Yeah, the code word the EA co woard came over Tiger. Tiger Tiger.
So paulis shellman carrying ballistic shield. As you know, they're pretty they're pretty heavy, but set off a great rate. He sprints down to the front entry windows. It's two large paned glass windows propped on the left. I'm in position, muzzle up just over his left shoulder, got my light source on steering into the cafe, just desperate to find him.
A lot of glare coming back off the cafe. And as I'm sure you know, everything in these situation just slows down like so much's it's ridiculous how much it's slow down. And I remember looking in scanning, I've seen him. Our EA was the last two blokes on the stack to try and punch through the first window with a breaching shotgun and deployee sand and flash grenades through the first window. That's our only form of distraction we were approved to use. And as I touched on before, we
couldn't get through. It used to be a bank, so the rounds they had couldn't get through. So even that didn't work. But as I've looked in, I've sighted him my light, so I've picked him up. He's still wearing his white shirt. Still see the straps on the backpack. He's initially looking up to them. Then he's seen me and he's ye swiveled. He had his shotgun off his hip and swiveled it straight to face me, and we
had our eyes completely locked. At that point, I was just waiting for the breacher, which felt like it took too long in the moment because everything had slowed down so much. They might have been a second or two, you know.
But even a split second, even a.
Split second, and he can't really explain it to people who haven't lived it. But then yeah, he's breached out the glass window on the left, Paul. He's stepped in and I just as soon as I took my first step, just fire a movement, just bang, cracked off around at him. I ad my light, saw some laser pointer center body mouse, and I got off two rounds, i'd say, and that's when he fired on us the first time. And in a dark space like a cafe, you can imagine a
muzzle flash from a shotgun, huge flash. I knew it at that point being fired upon, but still my shield man's sort of some cover. So yeah, I just kept I just kept moving to the threat, as we were trained to do. Just push to the threat, and I just kept firing on the move. I did hear someone screaming out man down, man down, behind me, but I knew I had to block it out because my job and the only chance I believed in that time, was
to get him down. So he was incapable of detonating the bomb, so I was completely fixated on him, and getting rid of him is a threat. I had to block everything out. I continued to walk forward, just firing in the movement. Every time the muzzle of stabile ized, just crack another round off, and I hit something with my foot that there was a partition. At some point, I stopped and just kept firing, and that's when he
fired off his second round. And in that moment I became this is probably seven meters away, you know, pretty close. You doing well to miss with a shotgun at that range. And I became very aware in that moment that I
was now on my own. My shield man had been the first round that he cracked off actually hit the other glass entry door, clipped his shield as well, and that the whole weight of that glass came down on top of him and it just just pulled him the shield down momentarily, like we said before, but enough for me to keep pushing forward. But yeah, in that moment, I still remember behind my rifle, just squinting. I was sure I was going to get hit, you know, a
shotgunder that range, and I didn't. It's just good. And then yeah, I kept kept firing on him, and then I yeah, within my head the questioning why hadn't he gone down? I knew my rounds were hitting. I was sent a body mask, my laser pointers on him, so I just moved it up onto his head and kept firing. And then yeah, I knew I'd hit him. He started to crumple in that moment, I can't be sure if
he's taken a knee or not. So yeah, I followed him down and fired another couple of times still until he came to arrest, And yeah, I was just completely fixated on him with my ready to go, ready to fire him. Even if he twitched or moves, I would have would have fired. Again, He's the only threat, He's
the one can potentially detonate a bomb. So just stayed fixated on that moment until one of the studies that were deployed may well have bounced off the ground and just cracked up and just bam straight in my left ear. I've still got tindus and hearing loss to his day in that moment. That was enough to snap me out of everything being slowed down and just my fixation on him. And then I heard someone screaming out with me, with me, and that was my shield man. Then he's pushed forward.
I pushed forward on his shoulder and stood over him, and yeah, I knew very quickly he was no longer no longer a threat. He's just poor blood on the ground. He's I was only there moment earlier. But it's still a moment I think about.
It happens so slow, like you said, habits start that it's hard not for it to be imprinted in your mind, whether you like it or not. You're so hyper focused and things that you could the detail of things. You know, you can still remember his face, his face expressions. You know, it's embedded there for it us. So it's not like you can sort of unprocess it because again, until you've
been there and understand it. You're taking every single bit of detail in every single you know, subconsciously, every single and moment, in every single millisecond. Is it counts and exactly. It's hard to really explain, but I can't. I get it, mate, I get it.
Yeah, And for me, it felt like minutes rather than second. Yeah, that was a lot of the criticism I received personally later on Why did I fire on him and shoot him so many times? And all the ballistics testing, everything that came out proved that the reality was that the whole time from the point that the window was breached and I took my first round to my last was three to four seconds. Title, you know, but yeah, and
that's what we're trying to do. We're trying to keep firing until he's no longer a threat.
When you said you snap back into the room, because it is it's almost like you're in this bubble and then it's happened and you snap back out of it by something or someone. Are you straight into the to releasing the hostages at this stage that you're like, like the target's been neutralized. That's mission complete on that side.
Now the next next stage is too is to extract the the the hostages, because obviously you know you're dealing with not only live hostages, but you're dealing with with dead hostages.
Right, Yeah, of course, there's so like we were talking about before the moment that the stung grenade went off, it was like I returned back to reality, real time, pushed forward to him, stood over him, realize he's no longer a threat. I was still processing that in the moment, only a couple of seconds or whatever, but my shieldman, Paulie, push forward beyond screaming you have been saved to a hostage.
In that moment, yeah, I realized now like now our priority is to get as many hostages out as we can. Priority has changed. First priority to neutralize him, I will say too. When I was standing over him, looking down, I was looking at the backpack, I can still see it's full as wires coming out. So even in that moment, I still believed it was definitely a bomb. So now a new priority before it potentially goes off at any time is to get as many out, and that's what I did.
Well, May got an extract from your book Tiger Tiger, Tiger, and which is phenomenal book. And there's a paragraph in there that I thought explained it really well, you know, and I'm going to read that paragraph and this is when you heard tiger, Tiger, Tiger, And it says, but the brutal reality, as we saw it, was that as soon as we entered the cafe, everyone was going to die in a massive ied explosion. In that moment, this
inevitably hit us like a proverbial mat truck. Our training had incorporated strategies for deliberately putting away distracting feelings about being killed, but now death seemed almost a certainty. No one spoke. We just stood there, our rifles at the ready, shoulder to shoulder, ready to go, waiting for the whistle to blow, deep in our own thoughts. Wow, and I know that you broke that down and said exactly what you were you felt you were doing, obviously running into
a suicide mission. But when did you realize that that suicide mission sort of was no longer? When did you realize that, actually, now we've got the upper hand. I've
survived this. And the reason why I say it probably wasn't because the chaos of the situation, but to have that mindset before you breach you breach, you face the terrorists, You've got all of these hostages, and all of a sudden, was there a moment where you think I'm not going to die, you know we're safe, or you know we've lived through it or with it, or did just the situation take over.
Yeah, So on entry, as I went to engage him, I believed I'd take one or two steps in boments all over. But all I can do in the moment is try and get him down, and that was our only hope that I saw it for us, all the hostages. The moment, I was standing over the top of him, so he's now dead, no longer a threat. I was processing that, but also processing that I can see the bomb. It's still there. It hasn't gone off. So even in those few seconds I was there, that was Yeah, I
was processing weight. I'm in here, I've actually killed him. I'm standing over he's now dead body. The bomb hasn't gone off, So yeah, I'd say. In in that that moment, it changed slightly in my mind. I didn't think I was safe, but I was still shocked and surprised. I was I was still alive and he's now dead. At my feet. So now priority has now changed. Let's get as many hostages as we can because this may well go off at at any time.
What's the situation like when you're getting the hostages out, is it just get them out as quick as possible and get them to safety and then start to process what's what the hell has gone on?
Yeah, next phase is search as hard, as fast and as hard as you can. First hostage I went to was actually Luis, I hope with Paulie. He was on She was sitting on the floor in a pretty pretty bad way, you know, definitely suffering from shock and everything. Paul He's tried lifting up. I'd rush to side. I went to pick her up, and we're trying to rush her out as quick as we could. And realized she wasn't helping her. She wasn't she wasn't walking with what
was going on. And I looked down and that's when I saw her foot. I believe it was shrapnel that she copped and there was her foot was only literally been held on with a couple of attendons and just dragging behind her. So yeah, in that moment, wasn't much time to process. Oh shit, Okay, we picked up fireman's carry and then rushed her out, rushed her out the front, and yeah, the paramedics were all waiting. They rushed into her.
Quickly turned to go back into the cafe. That's when I looked down to my left and there was someone all in black receiving a lot of treatment by paramedics. That's when the man down, man down came rushing back to me. I thought it was my supervisor just quickly in the moment, because yeah, I believed initially it was him, because I knew there was a man down, didn't know the story behind it. And then yeah, it came quickly aware that it was Tory Johnson who'd been executed, which
is obviously very confronting. But then a couple of the other operators come out. One of them bumped into me with a hostage. So yeah, I just punched straight back into the cafe. And the lights were now on in the cafe. And as you notice, as soon as you turn lights on from a dark space, the whole whole field everything changes. Being dark, everything feels so much bigger and more. As soon as the lights are on it
it's changed. And it was not only a scene of chaos, it was just it was a It was a brutal scene. There was there was smash class everywhere. There were spent bullet cartridges, stun grenades, screaming distraught hostages and just just blood everywhere. The place is filled with smoke. But yeah, I just went straight pushed straight to the back and one of the other team leaders screaming out using more tactical terms I won't use here, but just search everywhere,
search the place. We've got to get out of here as fast as we can. The bomb's going to go off at any time. So I started scanning the back of the back of the cafe, like sort of behind where where he's still bleeding out on the floor. And that's when there's a lot of tables in the back corner stacked up with other tables on top and chairs and everything. And as I looked down, I could see what was the top of someone's head. I knew it
was a hostage. Screamed out to my I made them right, and he yeah, we were just rushed in, just throwing the tables as fast as we could. We just tried getting to her as fast as we could, and then each table we removed, we can see more and more of her. Yeah, so I've quickly taken a knee. Her head came to rest on my forearm, and yeah, I knew she was in a real bad way. From that point, I knew in that moment there was nothing I could really do. One of the boys screaming out be from
behind him, we need medics, So I knew. I knew the paramedics were on their way, and literally, as we're looking at each other's eyes, all I could really do was just will her to take another breath, and then finally she didn't, she stopped breathing. It's i'd say, still the toughest moment of my life, having her die in my arms like that, and then we later finding out
that she'd been killed by police shrapnel. I know, if you look at it factually and everything else that's all come out, and the rounds we're using fragged a lot. The rounds that even hit I may well have gone through him to to hit her. But it's sort of
something that I've always blamed myself for. And I'd say, through all the other things I went through, all the other jobs I went through, this is the one thing that I knew I couldn't process couldn't, couldn't lock away, And I'd say, it's the reason why I'm not still work.
And you know what, mate, we have a whole tendency as soldiers to do exactly the same thing. We take something that was completely out of our control and we take it personally, We own that, we own it personally when ultimately, you know we shouldn't. It's easier said than done. I've got good friends, and I went through a process myself of being in a patrol and someone getting blown up and thinking well, I should have been there, that should have been me. I should have gone point that day.
And then I look at the grand scheme of things and you know that that I d didn't have my power's name on. It didn't have my name on. It was just, you know, it just happened in it in
a way. And again with ricochets and collateral damage. It's one of those where the personal element, if you can try and take away that personal element and go right, well, actually, this is what I've personally done and what I personally controlled, which you know ultimately saved multiple hostages and you took out an evil individual, you took out a threat to not only humanity, but to you know, to for further chaos and destruction if they would have got their own way.
In your book, you talk about, you know, the high price that you've paid for your service. What tolld did the siege take on you?
I'd say right from that moment. I've obviously witnessed and seen and been part of a lot of other traumatic incidents, and I was after it. I did manage to stay on in the TIU for another six years after it, but all the others, everything else I've seen, I've been able to lock away, you know, and just I'll deal with that later, which is obviously not right, but it's something you do to keep to keep operational. But I knew, I knew this one instantly. It's really taken its toll.
I had to fight everything I had because all I wanted to do is be with my support network, which were which are the boys, you know the other opera and my symptoms were to be Yeah, my half of vigilance is the next level. Anytime I was at work, I'd walk around literally my hand on my gun the whole time. I'd even see just randoms, other police or anyone just just being shot and bleeding out in front of me, not that I'd done it, but just that
was what was happening. Anytime I saw a blond woman, I'd instantly believe it was Katrina and just instant panic attacking it and just have to concee little. It slowly did get better over time, and I managed to get back to a point where I believe I was effective operationally. But yeah, for the six months following it was it was bad, and and I didn't I didn't want to tell anyone. I wanted to deal with it myself. I
wanted to be with the boys. I wanted to be with the be with them, and as you know, that's your support network for people who have been through similar things and the the ones you you're with all the time. But yeah, I did manage to lock it away, I'd say for managed to last for another six years until yeah,
my cup just to stay overflowed. I could tell it was creeping in and it was starting to overwhelm me, and had a mate of mine telling me to go and see it's good, good psych that he you and bought it for a long time, and eventually I did, And yeah, that was when my whole journey in my fight with PTSD started.
From that point, I say, how are you getting on now?
So that started the whole new phase of my life is with PDSD. And initially I'd say it was getting the better of me. It was pretty much alcoholic not sleeping, nightmares, all that sort of thing that went on for longer than I'd like. Eventually, I remember a moment where I just snapped at my girls and it was unreasonable. I knew I had to sort it out. When I did, I force myself under the guidance and my psyched to go and do a stint in the psych hospital. That's
extremely confronting, which I did. But yeah, my new fight was that, and it's not I was unwilling to have that as my identity. I'm not willing to have anything beat me. PDSD wasn't going to beat me, and I'm pretty stubborn that way. And yeah, I just applied sort of what I learned in THEU just to confront the threat and then use every resource you can. And that then led into the book and my journey with it. The way I go about fighting PTSD and put it
in the book, and that's getting good traction. And it's now helping a lot of people, which is something I want.
Saving lives again, Mate, saving lives again. Honestly, there's no fluff for threat. It saves lives. Mate.
In a way, I feel like that's my news service. And yeah, getting my name out there that was important to me because not only I want to put my name to my story and tell the untold action to the tear every brave operator on the day, but then my journey with PTSD, which has already helped people I know will help people.
You want to tell your story, Mate, You want to tell your story, and I'm glad that I can be part of that, Mate with my podcast head Game. But your book, Tiger Tiger, Tiger Listen, your story's in there. It's a phenomenal book. I would recommend that anyone go and buy it and Benny listen. It's been an absolute pleasure having you on this podcast, Mate. But ultimately, what you're doing, and again I know it's hard to hear is with your books and with your story is you
are saving lives, Mate. So that's what you are, Mate, your life saver. Continue to save lives, Mate, and hopefully this podcast will help as well.
Yeah, No, I really really appreciate than you are having me on and getting the word out there, because now, yeah, I just want to get out and speak to as many people and help as many as I can. So appreciate it.
This man, my guest today, was Ben Pissant. To find out more about his experience in the link Cafe Siege, you can read the full story in his book, Tiger Tiger Tiger. I'll link the details in the show notes, or you can head to Tiger Tiger Tiger book dot com. Thanks so much for joining me for this episode of head Game. If you enjoyed it, please leave me a review. I'm at Middleton. Catch you in the next episode.