Paramedics Aren’t Heroes—They’re Antiheroes

(Hint: Replace “paramedic” with firefighter, police, first responders, or ER nurse. The antihero energy still fits.)

They called us heroes. We rolled our eyes.

Not because we didn’t care—hell, some of us cared too much. But if you’ve ever scraped someone’s grandmother off a linoleum floor at 3 a.m. while their son yelled at you for not wearing boot covers, “hero” starts to feel like a sick joke.

We didn’t sign up to be heroes. We signed up because something pulled us in—adrenaline, purpose, maybe the illusion that we could make a difference. And sometimes we did. But what they never tell you is how often you’ll hate the job and still do it well. That’s what makes us antiheroes.

We curse under our breath on the way to the call. We judge people who OD twice in one day—and then quietly resuscitate them anyway. We grow numb, sarcastic, burned-out… and yet somehow still show up when it counts.

Here’s the truth no glossy recruiting poster will print:

We are walking contradictions.

• Compassion fatigue dressed up as efficiency

• Moral injury buried beneath gallows humor

• Empathy rotting from the inside out, but never fully dead

We crack jokes about dead bodies because it’s the only way to keep from screaming. We laugh about trauma the same way you’d laugh after a car crash—shaken, teeth gritted, trying to prove you’re still human.

“You’re a hero,” they said.

Nah. Heroes are noble. Heroes are clean. Heroes sleep through the night.

We were the ones covered in someone else’s blood, running on cold coffee and hotter rage, showing up again tomorrow because no one else would. We didn’t wear capes—we wore resentment like armor and compassion like a threadbare patch under the left shoulder of our uniform.

You want to honor paramedics?

Stop calling us heroes. Start asking why the system breaks us and still demands more.

We’re not here to be your inspiration porn.

We’re here because we made a choice we can’t unmake.

And if we’re lucky, some of us get out before the bitterness swallows the rest.

But for those who stayed—those still in it, still hating it, still showing up?

You’re not a hero. You’re something harder to be.

You’re an antihero.