I am the daughter of a police officer and I am proud.

I am the sister of a police officer and I am proud.

I can remember growing up and being in elementary school when my dad was the K9 officer for the county. The school had set up a day for him to come in with the K9, Dax, and do a demonstration of what he does to train the dog. All of my friends were excited and would say, "It's so cool that you have a police dog!" I was grinning ear to ear when my dad came in. All my teachers thanked him for coming in and giving the kids an opportunity to see how wonderful police officers are.

I was proud of my dad because at that time all I really knew was he protected me from the bad guys and we had a pretty amazing dog around the house. I had no idea what the job truly entailed and how much he put at risk every single day. I would sometimes have nightmares that my dad would not come home from work and I would lay in my bed hoping I would see him the next day so I could hug him and say "I love you" one more time.

As I grew older, people in my middle school would start getting into trouble outside of school by doing things like trespassing, smoking marijuana or getting into fights. This is when kids started thinking police were not really that cool cause "they ruined their fun." Obviously this was incorrect because the police were just trying to keep kids in school and on the right track toward college rather than prison. Even though the popular opinion was "screw the police" (and that is the nice way to put it), I still was proud to say that my dad was a police officer.

High school rolled around and my older brother was in college to study criminal justice to also become a police officer. It had not really hit me quite then that I would have two bodies to worry about every day. My friends always respected that my dad was an officer and I had no interest in being friends with people with criminal records, but my dad ran background checks on all of them anyways. When I first gained the freedom of my license, I suffered through 20 questions before I could go anywhere. Basically I had to cover the five W's: who, what, where, when, and why. Now, it is something I just naturally tell him since it always gets asked.

My dad has his set ways that I just always go with like he never sits with his back to a door in a restaurant or he stands his distance from large crowds. I know he has his reasons for doing the things he does and I trust his judgment with all my being.

I am now a college student who has a father and brother in the force.

I am now a young woman who is scared more than ever for the safety of my heroes.

With everything going on in Baton Rouge, Minneapolis, and now even Dallas, I become fearful for the men and women who are the guardians of our society.

What bothers me the most is the disgraceful social media posts about police officers, some even coming from people I have known throughout the years and thought as a respectable human being. I have seen tweets saying "#BLUELIVESMURDER" and "People who say Blue Lives Matter are ignorant and racist."

Blue Lives do matter because that is my father and my brother you are talking about. That is my family. Those are my heroes.

Being a part of a family in the force is not always the easiest thing to understand. They do not always get to be home for holidays and be there when you wake up on Christmas morning to find what Santa brought you. They don't always get to be there on your birthday so you have to celebrate a different day. Planning vacations can be difficult but when they do work out, it is the most exciting thing. There will be days when they will come home and be in an awful mood because of how people treated them that day and it is hard to be constantly disrespected. My dad would always say "there go the heroes" whenever a fire truck or ambulance would go by because in society's minds, firemen and paramedics are heroes and they save people's lives and of course they do.

But so do police. People do not always see it that way.

They save our lives every day, too. They put the people who endanger society behind bars and they keep us safe. They stop drug dealers, child molesters, thieves, murderers, and even just giving a ticket to someone going a little too fast. These are all people who put lives at risk. Potentially even your life. People do not understand that they risk their lives with every call. They do not know what the situation entails and they do not know for sure that they will leave that scene unharmed or alive.

I will not apologize for backing police officers and I will not apologize for getting upset when people say they deserve to die.

When a police officer is killed, keep in mind that they could have children that will not have a daddy or mommy to tuck them in and look for monsters under the bed. They could have a spouse who will have lost their best friend and the love of their life. They have parents who will have to put their son or daughter in the ground which is something no parent should ever have to do. They could have siblings who no longer have their role models and advice givers.

My greatest dream is to have my father walk me down the aisle at my wedding and my biggest fear is having that dream cut short because he risks his life in a society with a lack of respect for the badge.

So please, next time you think about saying that a life does not matter, think twice. That life does matter.All lives matter.

Families of the blue line, hug your heroes close and always say "I love you."

Thank you to all officers who protect us every single day, and rest in peace to those who have fallen.

You will never be forgotten.