Rich Creamer grew up in Chelsea, served in the Navy and spent decades as a police sergeant in Norfolk, Virginia. He now hosts a podcast, The Responder Reset, that tells veterans and first responders something he says he took years to accept for himself: ask for help.
WCVB Channel 5 profiled Creamer in a report by Jennifer Penate that the station published on Veterans Day, Wednesday, November 11. The station identified him as a Chelsea native and a Navy veteran who was honorably discharged after a deployment in South America.
“It is OK to seek out help,” Creamer told the station.
What he told WCVB
Creamer said he only recently began to talk about what the station called the invisible wounds of his military service and his police career. He described a culture in both lines of work that teaches people to push feelings down.
“For most, we’re kind of indoctrinated into this belief that we have to suppress those initial emotions,” he said.
According to the report, a cancer diagnosis in 2019 pushed him toward a mental health crisis. “Depression, suicidal ideation, post-traumatic stress, all the above,” he said.
He had steered others toward care before he went himself. “I walked many, many a veteran and first responders through that process, and it was just time to start taking my own advice,” Creamer said.
The program he credits
WCVB reported that a veteran advocate introduced Creamer to Home Base and its Intensive Clinical Program. “If it was not for this program, I would venture to say we wouldn’t be having this conversation right now,” he told the station.
Home Base describes the program on its website as two weeks of outpatient treatment at its center in Charlestown, run in partnership with Massachusetts General Hospital, that packs in up to two years of therapy. The organization says the program is offered at no cost to participants, with travel, meals and care provided, and that it is open to veterans of all eras, active duty service members, and National Guard and Reserve members regardless of discharge status, along with family members.
On the podcast, the station said, Creamer draws on his degree in human services counseling to reach people on the front lines who are struggling with trauma.
Where to get help
- In a crisis: call the Veterans Crisis Line at 988 and press 1, or text 838255. The 988 line is open to anyone, veteran or not.
- Home Base: the organization lists (617) 724-5202 for veterans and family members who want to be contacted by an outreach coordinator. It says its online Get Care form is checked once a day on weekdays and is not for emergencies.
The report was shared over the weekend in a Chelsea community group on Facebook, where a member called it a great story from a former Chelsea native. The WCVB report does not say when Creamer left Chelsea, which years he served, or when the podcast began.