Preston O’Brien: Healing through honesty - Speaking the unspeakable of childhood abuse - The Nutters Club

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:08):
You're listening to a podcast from News Talk z EDB
follow this and our wide range of podcasts now on iHeartRadio.
This is The Nutters Club, thanks to New Zealand on
air on News talk edblad.

Speaker 2 (00:31):
Me.

Speaker 3 (00:38):
Good evening and welcome to The Nutters Club, the show
that talks about your mental health every Sunday night. And
if you haven't tuned in before, here on The Nuther's Club,
we like to dive a bit deeper into life and
we talk to people about the times and their lives
where things got a bit tough and about what helped
them get through. And it's our hope that listening to

(01:01):
the show that it might help you on your journey
a little bit as well, because no matter who you are,
life gets a little bit wob at times, and it
is my belief that talking about it always helps. My
name is mc Andrews. I'm filling in for Hamish Williams
tonight and it is always a pleasure to be back
on this show. I do love it partly because I

(01:22):
get to speak to some of you later in the show,
So do get your dialing fingers ready now. Regularisters will
know that we usually talk to psychotherapist car MacDonald on
this show. Kyle is away, but I am really excited
to be sitting in the studio with none other than
clinical psychologist doctor Ngo Lambrescht. He's a friend of another's club,

(01:42):
but I'm in his presence for the first time. Ingo,
it's great to meet you.

Speaker 4 (01:45):
Oh, it's good to meet you as such a good voice,
Oh so smooth, impressed.

Speaker 3 (01:51):
Oh hello, I can't say I've been told that before.

Speaker 5 (01:57):
Now.

Speaker 3 (01:57):
I was reading up a little bit about you online.
You've done an amazing amount of things in the last
thirty years or so. I'm curious what I expect of
your work as a therapist. To you enjoying at the moment?

Speaker 4 (02:09):
Oh, look, I love just working with people. Love my
people that I'm working with my private practice, but I
also working at the hospital at the cancer department, working
stuff on health equity stuff with Marie. And I'm just
also editing a book on culture and psychosis and I'm

(02:29):
just loving it and just trying to get the final
manuscript together to send it off to a publishers. So
it's a bit of pressure, but such good people writing stuff,
So I'm very excited.

Speaker 3 (02:39):
It doesn't sound like there's a lot of thumb twiddling
in your life. Oh no, classic overachiever. It's good to
have you here. It's great to have you here. Good
to be here. And Ingo is not the only person
I'm sitting in the Auckland studio with. Tonight's guest is
Preston O'Brien. Preston has quite a phenomenal story involving trauma, addiction, recovery, healing,

(03:02):
and now he works to help other men find places
they can share what's really going on in their lives. Preston,
welcome to the show.

Speaker 2 (03:10):
Thanks Mike. Pretty happy to be here, and I too,
was very impressed with your intro.

Speaker 3 (03:15):
Oh, thank you, thank you. Well, you've got yourself. You've
got your arm in a sling there, mate. What's been
going on?

Speaker 2 (03:22):
Motorbike crash from a couple of months ago. I've just
come out of surgery, maybe two weeks ago. So I
had a bicep tend and reattachment and a laborm reattachment.
It's not great.

Speaker 3 (03:34):
Yeah, well thank you for joining us. I know you're
in a little bit of pain, but yeah, we really
appreciate your time.

Speaker 2 (03:39):
While there's nowhere i'd rather be eleven am eleven pm
on a Sunday.

Speaker 6 (03:45):
Now.

Speaker 3 (03:45):
I don't want to tell Preston's story for him, of course,
but I do feel like I should say that this
story does involve sexual abuse and some suicidality, and listener
discretion is advised. As many of you will know regular listeners,
we like to get to know our guests a bit,
including starting from the beginning talking about what the upbringing was. Like.
I'm aware of Preston that talking about your younger years

(04:09):
things won't stay light and fluffy for long. But what
can you tell us, tell us about your childhood?

Speaker 2 (04:16):
It was pretty short. There's a start. I grew up
in Auckland. I was born in christ Church, moved up
to Auckland when I was two maybe three. Grew up
in Morningside Maris Primary Saint Peter's. But yeah, that's not
what we're here to talk about, is it really where

(04:36):
I went to school?

Speaker 3 (04:39):
My childhood was short.

Speaker 2 (04:40):
I lived in a house of sexual abuse. I was
born into a house of sexual abuse. It was my father.
We left him when I was quite young. But it's
only in therapy in the last five or six years

(05:02):
that I got sober, started going to therapy to turn
my life around. That I've realized while I went back
and found out that for twelve years that I thought
I didn't see him, I'd spent every holiday with him.
So that's where most of my abuse happened. It's really
interesting because even every time I say that, I still

(05:24):
find that really hard to believe, because if you'd ever
told me, I mean, I've heard it. I've heard the
experience explained in places before of you know, going to
therapy and recollecting things and finding out things that you
didn't know. But I never really believe that you could
bury that much information. But as a child, that's what
you do to survive. I have a disassociative disorder, so

(05:50):
that's how I survived, was just to lock it all
away and pretend it didn't happen.

Speaker 3 (05:56):
So with disassociated disorder DINGA, you must be someone who's
heard that before. What are we talking about when we
talk about that.

Speaker 4 (06:02):
We're talking about somebody who's where the brain is trying
to protect you and shuts off experiences. Now, think about it.
In war and severe pain, the body tries to survive
and avoid shock by just not feeling pain, and soldiers
have walked around for half an hour without a leg
and not feeling pain. That's what the brain does to

(06:24):
protect us. And when we have severe experiences, a part
of our brain just shuts down memories so that we
can live on. And it's actually a very kind of
it's a wise way to survive, but it's not helpful
later when we can't shut off the dissociation and we

(06:46):
start not feeling things or we get overwhelmed, the body
shuts me down too quickly. So we can sometimes steer
off into space, can kind of not know where I am,
and an extreme cases can even wander off and suddenly
be in another town and not know how it got there.

Speaker 3 (07:05):
Is it kind of like you just go somewhere else
when something really hard? Is that knowing?

Speaker 4 (07:10):
And I just my mind shifts and it splits a few.

Speaker 2 (07:15):
Wish And do you relate to that, Preston, I do
now that I know, I don't. I was quite obviously
quite young and a child. I don't know, and go
would know more about this than me, But I don't
know if it's actually a choice that you make in
the moment, it's what your brain does this. Children will
do whatever I know goes going to not there's children

(07:37):
will do whatever they need to to survive, and you create,
you know, these personalities that are created, which is not
what happened with me, but you just block it out.
I never believed when I first found out that I
had seen him for ten years. I was like, I

(07:57):
found it so unbelievable.

Speaker 3 (07:59):
So was there just missing, massive, missing blank pieces from
your childhood?

Speaker 2 (08:07):
They're still it is. I have huge, yeah, a lot
of missing information of my early from I don't know,
I want to say, up until I was about twelve
or thirteen. I have huge chunks of missing information and
just lots of just knowing that I was in places.

(08:28):
But along with that, I have memories that my therapists
have explained to me are trauma memories. Where you can
smell the wallpaper, I know exactly what the room smells like.
I can tell you how the sheets felt. And this
is as a four or five year old. I can
tell you all those things. What I can't tell you

(08:48):
is what happened in the room, because I've blocked that
out so heavily, But because I can remember all those
other things.

Speaker 3 (08:57):
And I think I've read somewhere that trauma memories are
kind of filed away quite differently to normal memories and
that the sensory aspect is important. Is that right?

Speaker 4 (09:05):
And go as correct? I said? Through so actually often heightened.
That's why Freud was really puzzled at the beginning, because
the soldiers were actually reexperiencing what they experience and he
then began to start thinking about trauma differently. And that's
what you have, these very heightened experiences that are obviously

(09:29):
kind of related to something very important that you can't remember.

Speaker 3 (09:33):
And is that where the kind of triggering that we
hear about, you know, the classic thing where I wore
veteran hears a car backfire and then and then they're
transported back to the front line. Is that that's right.

Speaker 4 (09:44):
The brain hears something that reminds it of it and
then shuts down extremely or has a very strong startle
response that looks over the top in normal life but
would make total sense in a battlefield. Or sometimes a
child will freeze because it doesn't know what to do,

(10:04):
and that's often not unusual for people with sexual abuse
or sexual worfe or rape.

Speaker 3 (10:11):
Well, if you've just tuned in, we're talking to Preston O'Brien,
and he is very vulnerably and bravely sharing his story,
starting with a childhood, in his words, where he was
essentially born into a home of sexual abuse. We do
have to take a break, but we'll be back talking
with Preston some more in a couple of minutes here
on the Nutters Club.

Speaker 1 (10:30):
This is the Nutters Club thanks to New Zealand on
air on news Talk z'd.

Speaker 3 (10:34):
Be welcome back to the Nutters Club. We are talking
with Preston O'Brien and he's been telling us about what
can only be described as a pretty tough start to life,
being born into a home of sexual abuse by his father.
You said, Preston, before that you're as a child, you

(10:54):
pretty much blanked out those experiences and there were massive
sections of time you didn't remember. You didn't you didn't
even know you had visited him every year.

Speaker 2 (11:03):
Yeah, there were things I knew and things I thought
I knew, and things I didn't know until much later
on in my life. But that's a solid that. Yeah,
I thought we'd left him when I was young three
two or three, I think, and that I didn't see
him again until I was a teenager. And yeah, so
all those years I had actually been seeing him.

Speaker 3 (11:25):
And at what point did you find out, given that
you'd blanked it out, at what point did you have
that revealed to you.

Speaker 2 (11:33):
That's a big question. Like I said, there were things
I thought I knew, but I didn't know everything until May.
I'm fifty three now, maybe five six, seven years ago.
In the last I got sober, I stopped. What am
I trying to say? Let me start again?

Speaker 6 (11:52):
Max? Sorry?

Speaker 2 (11:54):
Because of that start, your life's just a mess. I
was a kid in the seventies who grew up in
a house of sexual abuse. There was no help, People
didn't talk about it, there was nobody to talk to.
There was nobody at school to talk to. So you
just end up as one of those kids who's screaming
for help. You're always in trouble, you're always fighting at school,

(12:17):
but nobody knows what you know. Hopefully now it's very
different and people know what that means, but nobody knew
what that meant. I don't think in the seventies.

Speaker 3 (12:27):
Were you aware as a kid that something was going
on that wasn't right.

Speaker 2 (12:32):
That's a really good question, and no, because your life
is your life and how you grow up as how
you grow up.

Speaker 3 (12:42):
I think you don't know any different.

Speaker 2 (12:44):
You don't know any different. So when I hear stories
of children who I don't know didn't do, what am
I trying to say? I'm sorry, Mack. I hear stories
about normal children who didn't sexually experiment with their siblings,
and I hear that that's very abnormal. That was shocking

(13:06):
to me because I thought the way I grew up
was way I grew up. So when you're taught when
a parent and go know more about this again, I'm sure,
but when a parent teaches shows you that that's what
love is, that's what you grew up believing. So then
I ended up having those things acted out on me
by my brother as well. And it took me a

(13:26):
very long time being able to say this, obviously, and
to be able to talk about it, and to be
able to love myself and him knowing that that's just
how we were taught to show love. So nobody was
doing anything wrong in our life. It wasn't wrong. It
was what we were showing to do.

Speaker 3 (13:44):
And what looking back now, what impact do you think
it had on your ability to grow up and be
a kid.

Speaker 2 (13:56):
Devastating impact of not being able to be a kid,
of growing up I thought of something when INGA was
talking earlier about the PTSD was sold, and there's this
line that is, I think it's the MONSTERY create. The
monster I created to protect me as a child is
out of control, and that's who you become, because you

(14:19):
become somebody else completely. We talked about the associative disorder,
disassociative disorder, all that stuff gets you through that, but
then you're an adult in an adult world trying to
survive with that guy running things.

Speaker 3 (14:33):
Describe that guy the guy that protected you then.

Speaker 2 (14:38):
Who won't let you get hurt, who won't let you feel,
who won't let you love, who won't let you be happy,
who won't let you be sad? So you just shut down.
I also been late diagnosed with ADHD, so that on
top of it, there's a lot of conversations around ADHD

(14:58):
and trauma, So I don't know which came first, if
the ADHD was a result of the trauma or not,
or if I was just got the lucky Bingo card
and had both. But because of that ADHD, on top
of that, I just spent my life dopamine hunting, so
not being able to share or love anyone else, including

(15:20):
my and not being able to love myself and then
chasing dopamine. So I was just a drug ad at, alcoholic,
sex addicted adult for a long long time.

Speaker 3 (15:35):
Do you know when the abuse stopped?

Speaker 2 (15:38):
I know twelve or thirteen. Around twelve or thirteen when
I became aware that it had happened. I know that
from when I was aware that it happened from my
father it never happened again. But it happened in the
room in my house with my brother. But from my father,
I don't know. Like we talked about earlier, I have
the memories, I have, the places I have or all

(16:02):
that in my head, the trauma memories, and I have
all the work I've done and there once I got sober,
that knows that it happened in that time. But from
twelve nothing from my father.

Speaker 3 (16:15):
So if we were to go to say age twenty,
for you, what do you like as a person, then
what's going on for you emotionally? After going through all that.

Speaker 2 (16:25):
I'm the charming, happy, friendly, neighborhood drug dealing barman who
just wants to It's so funny because my superpower I
always thought was connecting people, but I used my superpower
now is connecting people. You said in my intro that
I work and trying to help men connect, and that's

(16:47):
what I do.

Speaker 7 (16:47):
Now.

Speaker 2 (16:48):
I've got a motorbike club and I've got a men's
mental health evening, and I know that as my superpower
is sharing my story and talking to men and getting
them to be able to talk to each other and
hopefully they're going home and talking to their wives and
their children as well. But at my twenties, that superpower
was getting you whatever you needed. And that's so that
people would like me.

Speaker 3 (17:07):
I think, and that what you're describing is what you
showed on the inside, but what was going on, Sorry,
what you showed on the outside, but what was going
on the inside for you.

Speaker 2 (17:18):
It's really hard to say because you are so removed
from feelings and a lot of hatred and shame. Until
you can come to a hatred of yourself, a lot
of shame. But until you can come to grips with

(17:39):
what shame is and forgiving yourself and understanding it, you
don't even know that that's what it is. So I
lived a life of passive suicide, car accidents, drug overdosas,
getting shot, getting stabbed, getting myself in all the wrong
situations throughout my whole life, waiting for somebody else to

(18:02):
end it for me, until finally we talked about the
trigger warning around suicide. Until finally I'd enough and I
tried to do it myself because it's just too hard.
It was too hard.

Speaker 3 (18:21):
And what happened after that attempt.

Speaker 2 (18:25):
I was in Sydney. I tried to kill myself. It's
the only time I'd ever tried it. My brother had
committed suicide a couple of years earlier. I was very lost.
I left New Zealand to get away from drugs and
crime and went to Sydney, which is not where you
go to get away from drugs and crime. I ended

(18:45):
up coming home. My mother came to get me from
Australia and picked me up from a hospital and brought
me home, and that got worse. I came back to
New Zealand and it was meth I think it was
around two thousand and five, and I didn't even know
what myth was and it was just rabid here, rampant,

(19:05):
and I hadn't I hadn't done any kind of healing,
so I just went downhill again. There's more drugs, more lying,
more hating, myself and trying to ruin my life at

(19:26):
this while at the same time, always there was always
two parts, because there was always the priest and that
the people hadn't There were people in my life who
had no idea any of this was happening, like none.
I'd a junk, i'dd heroin for maybe eight years and
people had no idea.

Speaker 3 (19:46):
Well, if you're anything like me, you're hanging off presents
every word, and I'm very feeling, very grateful that he's
here telling us a story in such a vulnerable way.
We do have to go to a break right now,
but we're back here with more of Preston's story after
this break here on the Nutters Club.

Speaker 1 (20:01):
This is the Nutters Club, thanks to New Zealand on
air on News Talks.

Speaker 3 (20:05):
I'd be welcome back to the Nutters Club. We are
talking with Preston O'Brien and he's telling us about his
story of growing up in a home of sexual abuse
and then later in his teens and early twenties, getting
into drugs in a pretty big way. And I'm curious, Preston,
what's the link between those two things. Do you think

(20:28):
it was Do you think getting into drugs you did
that because of the feelings from the abuse. How are
those things related.

Speaker 2 (20:37):
I don't know if it's self hatred or masking. I
think Inger might tell you it's both, but I think
it's definitely around escape.

Speaker 3 (20:54):
I mean, what were you escaping or life thoughts?

Speaker 2 (20:59):
Everything. I mean, whether you're an addict or you have
four glasses of wine on a Friday after work, alcohol
is for escaping. Whether it's a healthy escape of it's
been you know, as that Friday afternoon you've had a
tough week and you just have a couple of wines
to shake off the week, it's escaping. It's an escape drug.
So I think for me that's what it always was.

(21:25):
It's really funny because I drugs were obviously a lot
more dangerous, but I would say through my life, I
think out of everything, lying became more dangerous for me
than anything else. That's what just I think started eating
my soul.

Speaker 3 (21:42):
The lying, the.

Speaker 2 (21:43):
Lying, because if you're a you know, if you're a
drug dealer and an alcoholic and cheating on your partners,
you lie for a living. And that was worse for me,
I think than everything. Because I'm it's hard. I find
it funny saying that. But I'm a good person. I
always was. I got lost and it took me a
really long way to find myself again and be a

(22:04):
good person. But I really think it was a gaping
for me. It took a long time to figure out
why alcohol was as bad for me as it is.
I'll never touch it again, But alcohol has the added consequence?
Is that the right word or trigger I should say

(22:25):
to me because that's what my father feed us. I
know this from conversations with my brother, but that's what
our father feed us to molest us. So when I
drink now, it gives me a real a visceral or
it's probably the wrong, a biological change where I don't

(22:46):
like myself. So one of my favorite sayings from AA
is nobody has what is it? Nobody has four lines
of cocaine and then goes looking for beer. So I
have a couple of beers, and then I end up
buying some drugs and then I end up sleeping with
somebody I shouldn't, And that's just all trying to ruin,
trying to blow my whole life up realistically, So somebody

(23:08):
will step in and help me, So somebody will hold
me accountable, or somebody will make me change, or somebody
will fix me, or you know, something will change because
of how unhappy I.

Speaker 3 (23:16):
Am or was, And did anything change?

Speaker 2 (23:21):
No, because I the cycle kept repeating and repeating and repeating,
and I rock bottomed so many times. But I don't
know how to explain it. My therapist keeps asking me why,
because statistically I shouldn't be here. But there was a
part of me that just always wanted to be good
and always wanted to be okay, And so I lived

(23:44):
on that line of working with criminals and being a
whole part of that world, but also having a job
and looking like a good, solid, positive person respected. I
don't know how to explain that.

Speaker 3 (24:00):
You said a couple of times that you wanted to
be good or you wanted to like yourself. What's the
link between? I mean, I guess, but I'm asking you instead,
what's the link between being abused and not liking yourself?

Speaker 2 (24:19):
I don't know. Oh, I mean I mean that the
so much I suppose, but I don't know how to
put into words. What's the link between being abused and
not liking yourself?

Speaker 3 (24:28):
Your anger? You might have worked with clients.

Speaker 4 (24:31):
So yeah, it's a shame. I consider this is that
in a situation you haven't chosen, your body is feeling weird,
you don't like this, you get fed alcohol. What starts
happening is you really either feel pain or unpeel uncomfortable
and trauma and abuse starts creating a situation where I

(24:54):
want to move away from escaping, and my substances are
my way of medicating myself from the effects of that.
Because my body's overwhelmed, sometimes ten, sometimes depressed. I take
medication not to feel or to feel more. But whatever
it is, the bad feeling comes from often the terrible

(25:16):
experiences I've had and the triggers I have all the time.

Speaker 3 (25:20):
And that terrible experience, How does that, How would that
relate result in someone having self hatred.

Speaker 4 (25:27):
Because kids often think it's them.

Speaker 2 (25:31):
Kids blame themselves.

Speaker 4 (25:32):
Kids blame themselves, So you think two. The second reason
is and you'll even find that with adults are soldiers.
They think they're pathetic, that they have these symptoms that
no one understands, and so you feel weird, out of place,
no one gets you. Something must be wrong with me.
I can't handle this. You know, another glass of you

(25:56):
know wine and then two lines of coke and then
a shot of heroin will.

Speaker 3 (26:00):
Sort me out. Wow, would that be fairy one?

Speaker 2 (26:07):
And then you just end up in it. You're in
a cycle. You're doing horrible things that you hate yourself for.
You're waking up with shame, You're trying to get through
the next day, you're doing it again. You're trying to
get through the next day, You're doing it again. And
until you step into a room with a therapist or
a you know, I'm not trying to push AA or

(26:29):
you know, somewhere like that where you get some help,
it's not going to change. It's only going to get worse.

Speaker 3 (26:35):
Well, we are talking with Preston O'Brien about his experience
with sexual abuse and addiction. And I'm glad to report
because I know Preston a little bit that he does
did find a recovery and he has found a lot
of healing. And we'll talk about that soon. But now
we'll take a break and we'll be back in a
couple of minutes here on the Nutters Club.

Speaker 1 (26:53):
This is the Nutters Club, thanks to New Zealand on
air on News Talk ZB.

Speaker 3 (26:58):
Welcome back to the Nutters Club and we are talking
with Preston O'Brien about his childhood. It was filled with
abuse and the way that that took him to a
place of looking to drugs to kind of take away
a lot of the feelings that was left over from
that abuse. And I think actually, someone who's texting has
summed us up quite nicely. Hello, I'm sorry to hear

(27:20):
of your story. Preston a very brave man to share
your story. I hope he realizes how his sharing is
incredibly helpful for other people who, including myself, are listening.
It is an incredibly lonely place to be when you
have been sexually abused. Thank you, Preston, and I wish
you well on your recovery.

Speaker 2 (27:37):
Oh, you're welcome. That's lovely.

Speaker 3 (27:39):
The last community, the snutter's club community, isn't it.

Speaker 2 (27:41):
Yeah, I have someone to think for that. Actually, my partner, Suzanne,
who also was a victim as a child of sexual
abuse when we got together, taught me the power of
sharing my story and not hiding it because she was

(28:02):
still so angry that she wanted wants everyone to know
how common it is, in how often it happens, and
yeah that if we're not talking about it, you know
exactly that when we do, I shouldn't have we not
talked about when we are talking about it, it helps
a lot of people, helps them not feel alone. Hopefully,
it helps them not feel like it's their fault and

(28:23):
not feel that shame because you know, Angel no, that's
I'm not wrong, am I think shame's the biggest color
of men.

Speaker 3 (28:30):
It's the biggest reason for suicide, and men say more
about that.

Speaker 2 (28:37):
I know that I don't know the numbers exactly. I should.
I do a lot of work with November now and
the Distinguished Gentleman's right, so we raised a lot of
money for men's mental health research and prostate cancer research
as well. But I know that it's a is it
teens and then forty to sixty year old men?

Speaker 4 (28:53):
Yeah, So there are three major times when the numbers
of Swiss science go up right young between fifteen and
twenty two. That's usually quite impulse of stuff. Shame of
course as well, but intense feelings as you get older,
the kind of forty fives, forty forty five, So that
can be very shame based because if I was a

(29:17):
successful farmer and suddenly you lose my farm, where do
I go it's too shaming.

Speaker 2 (29:22):
Or who am I? And who am I?

Speaker 4 (29:24):
I am no longer the man who is successful and powerful,
you know, and so it is often a very shame
driven and then you get the later one than the
sixties seventies, quite ending of life and feeling very depressed,
and depression runs throughout the whole thing as well. But
you quite right for men especially as well, the shame

(29:44):
aspect of who am I? And I'm not the main dude,
I can't provide my status in society goes, I might
as well just leave.

Speaker 3 (29:54):
It's interesting with shame. It's one of those words we
use quite a lot. What would be your definition of shaming?

Speaker 4 (30:03):
You see, it's the gaze of others that is really
negative upon me that I start believing that I am
nothing and I am horrible. It's about me and my identity.
It's not my behaviors, you see. Look, if I'm guilty
of something like I break your cup, I can fix
it and then it's done. But if I feel ashamed

(30:24):
in your eyes, it's me who's bad, So there's no solution.

Speaker 3 (30:31):
So it's like I'm not it's not I've done something bad,
it's I am I am bad?

Speaker 4 (30:36):
It's different to being guilty, where I've did something bad
and can fix it, but I am the bad that
and that is profoundly wounding, and it takes a lot
of work, and it's amazing the work you're doing with
your therapist to begin to work through that and begin
to know what's mine and what isn't mine, Because that's

(30:58):
the other thing. You know, a lot of this shame
has maybe nothing to do with me, but I've been
programmed to believe it, often by the abuser.

Speaker 3 (31:06):
And do you relate to that, that sense of I
am bad? Do you relate to that person?

Speaker 2 (31:11):
Yeah, because I think for a lot I mean I think,
I don't know if I know this or I'm guessing,
but I think for a lot of men, the suicide
doesn't come from what you've done. The suicide comes from
the fear of people finding out. So I think men
who have been cheated or lied or frauded or it's

(31:33):
not generally after they've been found out, because once you've
been found out and it's all out in the open,
it's nowhere near as bad. But it's that fear of
everybody finding out you're not who you you know, who
you've pretended to be or who you want to be.
That it really struck a card with me that are
that shame is yeah, that biggest killer because I don't know.

(31:55):
I don't know how to explain.

Speaker 3 (31:55):
That and how how did you in your life disempower shame.

Speaker 2 (32:06):
I'm starting to talk without knowing what I'm saying because
it sounded like it's a bit of dead ear. But
I only know how I'm disempowered shame. I it's very
hard to tell, to tell your truths, to own the
things you've done. Like I said, I was in a
situation everything changed for me. My life turned around on

(32:30):
a I don't want to say on the spot or
on a dial on it, but my dog died. I
always had dogs because they love you and they're not
going to hurt you. I'm looking at our psychologists while
I say that he's not because they love you and
they're not going to hurt you. My dog died, and
I loved my dog, and I didn't think I was

(32:50):
going to survive. I didn't think that. I didn't I
didn't know if I was strong enough at the time.
I think I was. And there's people now who still
know me who would have had no idea of this
was happening. I was injecting meth in my garage. My wife,
my partner at the time, didn't know, and I didn't
think I was going to survive, and I didn't want
to die, and I loved her and I wanted to

(33:12):
be okay, and I started the process. I wasn't completely
honest with her, but she pushed me, and she pushed me,
and she held me accountable, and I started sharing with her.
I started telling her who I was, little by little,
which led me to on a whole on this whole
journey that I've been on for the last eight years.

Speaker 3 (33:35):
So it was exposing some of that stuff that you
were hiding on the inside. Yeah, that started to lead
to your healing.

Speaker 2 (33:43):
Yeah.

Speaker 8 (33:44):
One.

Speaker 3 (33:46):
And your partner was the person you were exposing that
to her at the time.

Speaker 6 (33:50):
Yep.

Speaker 2 (33:50):
She was the one holding me accountable. She wouldn't let
me just blow everything up and run away. She wouldn't
let me lie.

Speaker 3 (34:02):
What was your fear about how she might respond that
you leave me? And how did you respond.

Speaker 2 (34:09):
By holding me accountable and that's so hard, by staying
with me and loving me.

Speaker 3 (34:23):
What effect does that have on someone who's finding it
hard to love themselves.

Speaker 2 (34:27):
I've always said I do it. I do some talks
at the Aukland Medical School. I talk to the forty
ye med students about my story. I tell my story
and then we have back and forth. I think the
guys running the wellness days at the med school, I
think it's helpful for them to hear a story of

(34:48):
I think a fifty year old white male who talks
about feelings as well as good for people to see.
But also that became more. It's become more of a
conversation where I try to teach them who not to
judge or you know, how not to judge people when
they come into their rooms. Because I'm very charming, I'm
not unattracted of and I've got a good grasp of

(35:10):
the English language, so I could get drugs from any
doctor I needed to. I think I've digressed a little.
What was the what did you ask me?

Speaker 3 (35:18):
I forgot myself, mate. But tonight we're talking with Preston
about his if you go, then.

Speaker 2 (35:26):
I remember what I was going to say, and the
line came from that conversation, which was giving up drugs
was never as hard as believing I was giving them up.

Speaker 3 (35:37):
For worth giving them up. I was worth giving them.

Speaker 9 (35:40):
Up for.

Speaker 2 (35:43):
That was a lot harder than anything I've done. And
that's what she did for me by loving me when
I expected her to walk away, was made me realize
I was worth loving.

Speaker 3 (35:55):
Wow, Well, tonight we are. I feel very grateful to
be hearing Preston's story tonight and for him to be
sharing so openly. I don't think I have the bravery
that you have, Preston, experiences of sexual abuse, experiences of addiction,
and I'm curious to know what you think, the listener,

(36:19):
What do you have to add to this conversation? What
story would you like to share with us, because we'd
love to talk to you. Give us a call on
one hundred and eighty ten eighty. We have to go
to a break for now, but we're back talking more
with Preston on the Nutters Club.

Speaker 1 (36:33):
This is the Nutters Club, thanks to New Zealand air
on News Talk.

Speaker 3 (36:37):
Z'b Welcome back to the Nutters Club. We are listening.
We are talking with Preston O'Brien and he's generously sharing
his story of abuse, of addiction, of recovery. We've got
a couple of texts here first one. I might not
say her name. Hi. When I was a child, I
saw something. I've blocked it out till now. I've done

(36:58):
the drugs, I've done the alcohol. I've been sober for
twelve years. I've oeded on meds, and I still harm
my arms. I'm forty nine. My secret will die with me, Preston.

Speaker 2 (37:14):
I'm sorry, m that's really hard and I can relate
to everything you said there accept my secret will do
with me. So I'm really sorry that that's where you are.
I mean, you do what you need to do to survive.

Speaker 4 (37:37):
I don't know if you want to give your other
parts a chance to work through this with somebody like
a therapist like Preston has done, so that you don't
have to sit with a secret. It's like pollution in ours.
In US, it's like a toxin. And I understand why

(37:58):
you're doing it, and maybe there might be an opportunity
in your life to speak to somebody safely about this
that happens to.

Speaker 3 (38:09):
You, and one one first step can be some of
the helplines, can't they There's one seven three seven, anytime
of the day or night to talk to a train
counselor another text here from Phil. Thanks Preston for sharing
your story. It's like listening to mine, so similar. It's
so hard. I'm just at the start of trying to recover.
And thanks Nutters Club.

Speaker 2 (38:30):
Oh good on you, Phil, good luck get in there.
Don't be shy. Yeah, I'm really, I'm really yeah. I'm
sorry that that's our stories are similar. But I'm really
happy for you that you're starting and you're in there,
because it only gets easier, it really does.

Speaker 3 (38:46):
We've got time and be happy.

Speaker 2 (38:48):
Oh sorry, I'm.

Speaker 3 (38:49):
Going to happy.

Speaker 2 (38:50):
You can be happy, Phil.

Speaker 3 (38:51):
Mhm. It's a good message. Got time for one call
before we get a new sporting Weather. I'll be hello.

Speaker 6 (39:00):
Yes, Mayer Street, the Preston.

Speaker 3 (39:02):
Please absolutely, he's right here.

Speaker 6 (39:04):
Hi Preston, you are very bright. How to get us out?
Grageous man, I have had some of the circumstances. I
decided to say your strong, strong, Thank you all. You

(39:28):
know I had you, the rest of you of my
the o woods are upwards.

Speaker 2 (39:39):
Thank you, alb I really appreciate that.

Speaker 6 (39:42):
Yeah, how to get there? But I lost my wife
and I find it very hard to stalk about it.

Speaker 3 (39:51):
How long ago was that? Don't mind me asking?

Speaker 6 (39:53):
Albie I've married for forty three years?

Speaker 3 (39:59):
What was that sign?

Speaker 6 (40:01):
I've married for forty three years?

Speaker 2 (40:05):
Oh, I'll be that's horrible. I'm so sorry. It's a
long time.

Speaker 6 (40:11):
Yeah. When I dream, I look forward to dreaming because
I'm going to talk to her her.

Speaker 2 (40:21):
Oh I love that.

Speaker 6 (40:23):
Yeah, And that's the subconscious and unconscious mind. And I
look forward to having a dreamer and talking to you.

Speaker 4 (40:37):
I can imagine. And are you able to talk to
others in your life?

Speaker 6 (40:43):
Yes, I've got some very se sea of friends. They
gives me goods of thought. And I start as my
eighteen on the sunn East Side, And I'm.

Speaker 3 (41:00):
Still sorry about that. We've just had to cut you
off album, my producers saying the call is not high
quality enough, but by all means call back after the
New Sport and Weather because we'd like to talk to
you some more. Sorry about that, Alby, Yeah, we're going
to be going to New Sporting Weather in a minute.
But I was impressed that you found yourself with a

(41:24):
woman Preston, who was willing to go the hard yards
with you and go on part of your journey with you.

Speaker 2 (41:30):
I wouldn't say impressive as the word, but lucky. I
would lucky.

Speaker 3 (41:34):
Yeah, how important is it to have people around you
when you're embarking on recovery.

Speaker 2 (41:40):
I don't know if I would have done it just
for myself. I mean, that's a bosess. I don't know
how I married that up in my head. I did
it for myself because I wanted to be happy with her,
But I did it for her, so I did it
to not lose her. I can't I can see Inger nodding.

(42:02):
I don't know how many people do it for themselves
at the beginning.

Speaker 3 (42:05):
So yeah, while we are talking to Preston O'Brien, he's
very generously and vulnerably sharing his story with us. We'll
talk more about his recovery. We'll take your calls here
on Another's Club after new Sport and Weather take me.

Speaker 1 (42:28):
This is the Nutters Club thanks to New Zealand air
on News Talk ZB.

Speaker 3 (42:33):
Welcome back to the Nutts Club and those of you
who have been listening will be enjoying Preston's story, although
enjoying is probably not the right word, because Preston was,
to use his words, born into a house of sexual
abuse by his father, and as a result of that,
he has blanked out large periods of his childhood, periods

(42:57):
that he still can't really remember details of at the moment,
maybe the smell of some wallpaper, a little bit of
a sense here and there. And he's been on a
long journey of recovery from that abuse. In his twenties,
he was heavily turning to drugs to try and kind
of to kind of blot out the shame, the self
hatred that we were talking about earlier that he was feeling.

(43:20):
And then he talks about having a partner that loved him,
heard his story and still loved him, and he didn't
think he was worthy of that kind of love, and
that had a massive impact on his life. I've said
it before and I'll say it again. I feel grateful,
Preston that you're here sharing so vulnerably with us, and
that you're a man a kei wei man doing that

(43:42):
and key we men don't do a lot of that.
And I know you're working hard to get key Wei
men doing more of that kind of sharing. And I've
been to one of your triumphant man nights and it's
really it's really honorable what you're doing to get man
men talking more.

Speaker 2 (43:58):
Yeah, thanks, Matt, it's.

Speaker 3 (44:02):
Oh, it's just important, right, very just important if you're I.

Speaker 2 (44:07):
Mean, I keep saying, Oh, every generation is getting better
and it's getting easier for them. But you know, kids
growing up in the seventies, we all know that scene
and not heard. We all know boys don't cry. And
I think we're just as I don't know, as we're
getting more literate around all this kind of stuff, people
understand it a bit more in the danger of that

(44:28):
and how yeah, absolutely it's dangerous. That was seventies and
eighties for all us kids growing up there, I mean
worse in the sixties, the fifties or forties, a further
back you go, the hard it was for everyone, I'm guessing,
But just the importance of trying to change that, you know,

(44:50):
boys don't cry attitude.

Speaker 3 (44:53):
And in case you're wondering, there's a lot of people
out there right now listening who are appreciating you sharing
your story and fighting for that kind of openness and sharing.
And here's one person in a textas said, thank you
Preston for sharing your story. Sadly, I lost my daughter
to suicide. She suffered sexual abuse from a neighbor. You
have helped me understand why the pain never goes away,

(45:16):
but understanding her pain has helped me realize what it
was like for her.

Speaker 2 (45:21):
Oh, I'm so sorry. My brother committed suicide because of
how we grew up, and I know my mother was
never the same. So I'm really sorry that that happened
to you.

Speaker 6 (45:33):
And to her.

Speaker 2 (45:35):
But I'm really sorry about that. I think it's an
answer for a lot of people. It was for my brother,
it was for myself. I was very lucky that I
didn't die. I was very lucky to not die. Yeah,
I don't know what to say other than I'm so sorry,
and thanks for sharing that.

Speaker 3 (45:56):
Here's another text, and this might be a chance for
you to chiman Ingo evening. How do I help my
adult child who has PTSD and is alcoholic resulting from
having an abusive, drug fueled gambling, suicidal, narcissistic father, witnessed
extreme domestic violence towards her mother, whom we no longer
have contact with.

Speaker 4 (46:17):
Wow, that sounds incredibly painful, and it's really amazing that
you're wondering about that. Instead of blaming that person, you
are actually seeking to understand that person, And that is
just exquisite and very special, and that person's very lucky
to have you there. And what is very hard for
you is that, as I've often had to guide parents

(46:40):
or others loved ones, is just like with Preston, there
comes a point where the person chooses to go on
to their path of recovery. If they haven't chosen that,
it's really difficult and sometimes sometimes we just have to
be the mountain that waits filled with love and you

(47:02):
wait for them to be ready to actually go on
a journey. You can always check in with them whether
they're ready, but it's a very difficult place to be,
and sometimes you might get even wounded so as to
take care of yourself with that too, but that you're
so caring of them as already the first step. The
second step is how do you bring them to that

(47:23):
direct recognition that they need to start shifting, and that
is not always easy. Preston, have you got any thoughts?

Speaker 7 (47:31):
Yeah?

Speaker 2 (47:31):
I love that, and go I also think. I mean,
I know there were many times when other people tried
to make me bose recoveries right where doesn't it change
recover And I never did it. You can't make anybody
exactly what NGO said. I did it when I was
ready to. But I think what you can do is

(47:53):
let them know that when they are ready, you'll always
be there. I had a couple of people in my
life that always always treated me, spoke to me like
I was a good person who knew that my life
wasn't going so well. You know, I was in a
lot of trouble with crime, always in a lot of

(48:14):
trouble with the police. But I had a couple of
men in my life who always said to me, with
him will be okay for you. One day you'll be okay.
You're a good person, You'll be okay. And honestly, that
meant so much to me through my life. So just
from the key you've shown, like I said, I'm sure
you're one of those people in her life. You just
let her know that you are, and she'll come to
you when she's ready, if she if she can, if

(48:37):
she feels like she can, it's more likely. I guess
that's what I'm trying to say.

Speaker 3 (48:42):
I've got a quick text here before we go to
the phones. Pressed and you are a true hero. Thank
you so much, Ah, thank you. We are going to
talk to James. James, good morning, now, how.

Speaker 7 (48:58):
Are you going?

Speaker 9 (48:58):
I listened at the start, and I just thought, it's
not me talking, it's as quite president exactly the same.
I was born to a violent every day, a violent
alcoholic father, where I was bashed from standing through at school,
I was abused by the Marist brothers ere.

Speaker 6 (49:20):
Dad ten.

Speaker 9 (49:21):
I was taken out of the family home because they
thought that I was going to get the old man
when he was passed out drunk or vice versa. It
was a safe that was escalating. Went down the path
from the teenage years crime, all the hurt, all the
stuff that I had received, But I always looked at

(49:41):
the reason. That's why I was removed, and this and
that happened, and no one believed you're Back in the seventies,
that was the norm when police would attend domestics and
wouldn't arrest anyone and walk away, and no one would
believed in a man of the cloth would abuse children
because they were the closest things to God. Anyway, going
on into my twenties on self destructing and relationships. Relationships

(50:07):
would be great and then like the pressure cooker would
go up on me and I'll just destroy all the
good that I'd done. Lost rust. I had a beautiful
woman that bore me two kids, two boys, and I
vowed that I'd never do what my father did or
other males in my life did to me. But when

(50:29):
that relationship went through my self destruction and I found
myself in Australia, I was over there that I looked
at myself and thought, I wasn't violent to my two boys.
But I'm no bedding what my old man was to
me because I'm long in the life, you know. So
I came back to New ziond. I counseling for thirty years,

(50:51):
courses all of us, and I just thought, there's something
that's not wide right in my mind. I know all
the tools that have been given to me, but I
keep self destructing and too simpler to simpler, I thought
five things that I came out the other end because

(51:15):
I had to find wickedness for those that had abused me.
How hard that was because it shouldn't happen.

Speaker 6 (51:21):
And I blame that.

Speaker 9 (51:22):
You know, as a kid, you're blaming yourself, but you
think that the adults behaviors are normalized. That becomes normal
for you, you know. But I just forgive my old man.

Speaker 6 (51:35):
He was dead.

Speaker 9 (51:36):
He was never in my life again, even you know,
from the age of two type thing. I'd see him frequently.
The relationship with my mother and the other siblings. I
was out of a picture because of just how things
wherever right. But he died, and when he died, it was,

(51:56):
you know, the questions of why did you do this
and all the rest of it. And to get rid
of his daggage off me, I forgave him because maybe
when he was a kid, the same thing happened from
his grandfather and he didn't know any better, and his
alcoholism made the violent, and that's where he was, and
so I had to forgive him to get rid of

(52:18):
their baggage that I was carrying through life, still self
destructing in all of us. Roll on to the age
of fifty. I've got a good relationship with my boys.
There in my life, I became a weekend dead. I
gave up the drinking because I knew that on the
weekends when it was time to have my kids, I

(52:39):
would have letten them down. Someone would have round up
here and a party and it would have been I'm
going to party, So, you know, so I took that out,
so I wasn't leaving down. But the thing when it
came to fifty years old, I'm still self destructing them
up and down. And at this particular time, I lost
my job, and you know, I just set a gut

(53:01):
full and the pressure cocker engine. I told him what
they could do with your job. But it was a
double whamy because the house I was living and also
came with a job. So there I ended up in
my car and it was just, you know, I procrastinated,
blah blah blah. I'd had all these tools for years,

(53:22):
and I you know, I said to myself, I just
don't get it. One of the things I realized early though,
you can't be the person that's looking at you in
the mirror, right, So that was the one person I
couldn't be. S But I'm sitting in my sitting in
my car and I'm singing, here we go. You know,

(53:43):
I could reveal myself where it's just it's a lot
more trouble.

Speaker 7 (53:47):
You know.

Speaker 9 (53:48):
That was the same thing with me. But I heard
this thing and it was the smallest comment. I was
always looking thinking it's a big problem that I've got
to solve, to change my thought process to like myself
and all the rest of it, when in fact I
didn't look at the obvious. And it was so simple,

(54:09):
and it was retraining my thought process side forgive him,
my dad. I felt good about that. You know, he
wasn't in my life, but it was. That was a
big one. But what I'm going to say is each
night before I went to sleep, it was five things
to be thankful for in that day, And when I
woke up in the morning, before I did anythrink five

(54:33):
things to be thankful for. So the last thing you
do at night and the first thing in the morning,
you're starting your finishing your day, starting your day with
five positive thoughts, and when that becomes repetitive, it overtakes
the negatives thinking thinking right. So now you've seen beauty

(54:53):
and things that you never you will even notice, like
do you look at the view of the look at.

Speaker 6 (54:58):
The view of the harbor, or look at this, you know.

Speaker 9 (55:00):
Just things that never came into real because it was
always the negativity. Wow, and the song I think for
people that ask ugling with, that's all up and down
a real easy thing to do. You stand up right,
you can still standing up. Look behind you because behind
you as your past, and it doesn't matter how you

(55:22):
look at it, how you think about it. It's not
going to change, so you've got to accept it.

Speaker 3 (55:29):
Wow, thank you so much for telling us your story, James,
and I let you talk for a while there because
you were just talking so eloquently and insightfully, and you
hit odd. I just want to say, well done for
doing that level of work, because I know that you
put that work in for your kids, and I know
that you put that work in so that you can
live a better life. And he talked about the five things,

(55:51):
didn't he And it's gratitude.

Speaker 2 (55:53):
Really, isn't it grateful?

Speaker 4 (55:54):
It's it's a gratitude exercise that is very powerful and
shifting your brain. You see, when you depressed and down
and can't see anything good, going towards gratitude, you access
a different part of your brain. And as he does,
as James do beautifully in the evening before he goes
to sleep, so therefore he affects his sleep and his dreams.

(56:17):
In the morning, he starts affecting the first thing in
his day. He shifts a perspective. And that is a
really powerful counterprogramming to the terrible abuse that you have suffered, James.
And that's brilliant, It is so true. Many talk of this,
and it's a very powerful exercise.

Speaker 2 (56:38):
You are so right that on top of forgiving his father,
which is huge as leading go of the anger, because
what is it? What is it holding onto angers like
drinking a cup of poison and trying to hurt someone else?
That was huge and it was huge for me as well.

(57:01):
And I also I went to my grandmother's funeral. I
think it was my father. No, I was at I
can't remember. I did so many drugs for such a
long time after my father had passed. Oh no, this
is what it was. It was after my father passed
and his sister told me, reached out to me and

(57:22):
told me that all seven of them were molested by
their father. So this is just Irish Catholics. Sorry if
you're an Irish Catholic, but this is just that generation
and that time of that's the house he grew up in,
and he was just passing on to us when he
was talked to by his father as well, which honestly
made it a lot easier for me to forgive him
as well.

Speaker 3 (57:45):
I'm curious to know how you went forgiving your dad, Preston,
but we have to go to a break right now.
I'll ask you that question as soon as we get
back here on the Nother's Club.

Speaker 1 (57:53):
air on News Talks.

Speaker 3 (57:57):
It'd be welcome back to the Nutterers Club. But we
are talking with Preston O'Brien and I've got Eugene on
the line. But before I check to Eugene, I might
just read a couple of texts out. Here's the first one.
Every single day is a battle. Every time I change
my stoma bag, I'm reminded of that night. And to
make things worse, I've currently got no support from ACC.

(58:17):
My psychologists retired a month ago, so now I have nothing.
It's so hard, it's so terrible to hear.

Speaker 4 (58:25):
I'm so sorry. It's really difficult. And I don't know
if calling somebody might actually also help. The number that
you often bring out.

Speaker 3 (58:35):
The one seven.

Speaker 4 (58:37):
One seven three seven, I don't know if that may
at least create a connecting line, but that is difficult
to lose the person you talk to.

Speaker 3 (58:48):
It's such a balance, isn't it. Because we want to
acknowledge just how horrific that experience and situation is, and
we also want to create even some tiny piece of
hope by saying, you know, like some of those helplines,
the beauty of them is it's completely ann so you

(59:09):
get to talk to someone and see see what it's like. Yeah,
I guess there's no harmon at one seven three seven,
any time of the day or night to talk to
a train counselor a Now the text here high went
through the state war system. I had to bring myself up.
I was abused. I've not told anyone what happened to me.
It will stay with me always.

Speaker 4 (59:31):
Well that is for some maybe the answer, and for
others that might be quite hard. And I suppose there's
so much in that text, there's a story behind it,
and yeah, just wondering about you and what would maybe
help if you'd find some people who you can talk

(59:52):
to and be released from that pain that you carry
inside of you.

Speaker 3 (59:57):
And I guess that's one thing about therapist isn't an ango,
is that they are duty bound not to tell anyone. Absolutely,
so no one in your life is going to find
out if you go to it there therapy session.

Speaker 4 (01:00:08):
It's impossible. Confidentiality is absolutely key, and you can take
somebody to their board and complain that's yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:00:19):
And I'm pretty sure I'm not wrong in this. But
therapy for survival or people who have suffered sexual abuse
for New Zealander is free.

Speaker 3 (01:00:28):
Yes, ACC a.

Speaker 2 (01:00:29):
Therapist and ACC will pay for it.

Speaker 3 (01:00:31):
Yeah, it's an important point to repeat. Yeah that ACC
pay for therapy if it's sexual abuse. Yeah, I want
to set of claims they call it.

Speaker 6 (01:00:40):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:00:41):
I cannot stress enough how I don't know if I
would have when I first started going to therapy. I
don't know if I would have invested because it's very expensive.
I get that at two hundred or one hundred and
eighty dollars a week in myself for five years. I
don't know if I would have done that. I remember
saying it in my first session, and half an hour
into the session, my therapist was like, oh, I don't

(01:01:02):
think you're ever going to have to pay for therapy again.
So and Mike, can I just ask a question? What
was the last sentence of the last paragraph of that text.

Speaker 3 (01:01:12):
I've not told anyone what happened to me. It will
stay with me always.

Speaker 2 (01:01:15):
I just i'd like to know why. I know. I
don't know if that's the right question to ask, but
I don't know why you want it to stay with
you always, because it's a lot harder to carry it
than to let it go. And there are people that
want to help, and there are people that will help.
And if you're happy, that's fine. But if you're not happy,
you can be happy if you can talk to someone

(01:01:37):
and let it go.

Speaker 4 (01:01:40):
And asis is a pathway that if the sexual abuse
has happened, it happened in New Zealand. Yes, you definitely
can get three free therapy.

Speaker 3 (01:01:51):
Well, I know we're going to talk to Eugene and
I've got John as well. I know you've both been
very patient. We are going to get to you, but
we're just going to go to a quick break first
and then we'll go straight to the lines here on
the Nutters Club.

Speaker 1 (01:02:03):
air on News Dogs.

Speaker 3 (01:02:06):
It'd be welcome back to another's club. And as promised,
we are going to go straight to the phone's Eugene, Hello, Hello,
thank you being patient?

Speaker 10 (01:02:18):
Yes, nice, Yeah, I think I in my life I
actually changed that scenario about the child minister that that
that that went for generations of doing that carrying around
bags of Wolleys and in giving out little transistor radiosh
at that time. At that time, the he monistered me

(01:02:40):
once but never again. He hunted me down, and he'd
been doing this to others too. He hunted me. I
took revenge on him, and I ended what he did
for everybody. And I was only eleven years of age,
and I was proud of myself what I did to him.

(01:03:03):
I nearly took his life. Of what he did and
the anger that I put on him and he gave
to me that I actually put back onto him of
what he did.

Speaker 3 (01:03:16):
Yeah, and how have you how have you processed that
experience since Eugene?

Speaker 10 (01:03:28):
I think what I've actually heard it was actually others
that actually talked about him, and they're they're in their fifties, sixties.
They were all talking about him, and none of them
did nothing about it. They all accepted they were old.
They're a lot older than me at their time too
than when the twenties and was an he still a kid. Say,
he was doing this for quite a long time. He

(01:03:50):
even did it to my sisters and all that that
I've found out later on when I was younger, I
got him. I got him, and I nearly took his
life say uh, and brought him to a big stop
of of doing that. Did it affect my life?

Speaker 6 (01:04:08):
Know?

Speaker 10 (01:04:09):
It actually didn't?

Speaker 6 (01:04:11):
Know it actually didn't.

Speaker 10 (01:04:12):
I just wouldn't let nobody else do that to anybody else,
or let alone my family or anybody.

Speaker 6 (01:04:17):
That I knew.

Speaker 3 (01:04:20):
And did you did you find that you had to
go on a journey of healing of your own after
all that?

Speaker 10 (01:04:30):
No, I actually find that everybody else needed to I
was he actually trying to isolate me all the time
and get me away from my friends. I was actually
living in the country in rural areas, so looking after
my auntie and I lived on my own. So these
were life experiences that my parents. He brought me up.

(01:04:50):
I was adopted child, and they gave me life experiences
in the country sitting. But I looked after an auntie
she was older, and I just set the visit to
you next door. In all this where this guy would
actually come around like three o'clock in the morning, make
me look a cow earlier in the morning, like three
o'clock in the morning, where I could look it out

(01:05:12):
seven o'clock before we dischool, and then feed it to
the dogs who just isolated me from other people, but
I wouldn't accept it. I had a lot of people
around me, like school for school friends. But what I
was what I had parents that I listened to, and
they would send in your letter every week with twenty

(01:05:33):
dollars and tell me what I had to do. When
I actually did that, everybody will stood to say to
me that I was going to get a hiding for
it because of what I did to this person. Actually
I actually said no, I wouldn't because I only listened
to one person. Two people was my parents. So when
they came, my dad actually walked way around in silence

(01:05:57):
and to look at all the jobs that I was
taught to do, and I had done everything. He actually
turned around to them and said, what are you doing
to my boy? I left them here to be his
own men at eleven years of age. So that made
me really proud, and he knew there was something going on.
Did I tell them? No, I actually didn't. I didn't

(01:06:20):
actually tell them or what he was doing. Well, I
can actually say the last she brought him to a home,
he did that ever again.

Speaker 3 (01:06:29):
And that seems quite impressive to me that you as
a kid, you Jeene, you were able to do something
about it that you weren't kind of in a frozen state,
but you knew it was important enough to stop someone
from doing what they were doing so they didn't hurt
other people. How common is that, Ango, Like, to me,

(01:06:53):
that's quite impressive that a child would know that this
needs to be stopped and could have the personal strength
to do something about that.

Speaker 4 (01:07:00):
It's very unusual. And it sounds as if whatever you did,
and I'm not clear what that is, seems to have
given you a sense of empowerment where you don't feel
like a victim and so hence you don't feel affected
in the same way. Would that be a fair reading.

Speaker 3 (01:07:20):
We've actually lost him from the line he hung up,
so we've got all that we are going to get
from him. Sorry.

Speaker 4 (01:07:26):
Yeah, So that sometimes can help if but it's quite unusual.
Usually most children are the victim of these things, and
they do not have pathways or ways of feeling empowered.
Often that happens much much later through therapy, through forgiveness,

(01:07:47):
through working through the shame, etc. And accessing like what
Preston often talks about. I haven't mentioned yet, but person
talks about the good part of him, and I think
it's actually quite an important part that isn't to be
forgotten with everyone who might be going through addictions or trauma.
We have different parts, and we have some strong parts,

(01:08:09):
and we have some vulnerable parts, and it's worth not
forgetting them because we often are seen by others and
even by ourselves through shame, as totally bad and that
misses out on these other powerful parts that and wise
parts that actually are very precious. Don't lose them.

Speaker 3 (01:08:28):
And it's not always helpful, is it to just paint
yourself with one broad brushstroke. I'm bad. There's always so
many elements of who we are. Okay, we'll head back
to the phones and we're going to talk to John. John.

Speaker 6 (01:08:39):
Hello, here's the morning.

Speaker 3 (01:08:42):
Good morning.

Speaker 7 (01:08:43):
I've been listening. I've been listening this morning. I come
I come from a family of twelve on the second oldest.

Speaker 3 (01:08:51):
And sounds.

Speaker 7 (01:08:55):
I'm alone and and the for the guests you've got tonight.
I went to the Mayor's Sisters Condon and Mount Albert
until form.

Speaker 6 (01:09:07):
I don't know well.

Speaker 7 (01:09:09):
I went from here to intermediate school to Morris Brothers
in Vermont Street in Ponsonbury. But I've found that I
had a father who had a very pure mine, but
he had trouble with alcohol. My mother didn't drink at all.
But I've got six children of my own and they're

(01:09:31):
extremely successful people. And my youngest bloke, he's a big
businessman there. But he was working for Nestle. That's Nestles,
you know. And I saw this book called Chocolate Wars
and it was written by one of the Cadbury So
I thought, well, I bought this book really to give

(01:09:55):
in this book and say, well, you're working for the
opposition to Cadbury's, which is Nestleigh. However, I read that
book and that's a fine book. It's called Chocolate Wars
and it tells you all about that great Cadbury family.
This is way way back into the eighteen hundreds, and
they were actually Quakers. But there's some good morals in

(01:10:18):
that book, marvelous book. And the other thing that I'm
sorry go.

Speaker 3 (01:10:23):
On, I was just going to say, and how do
you think that relates to what we're talking about tonight.

Speaker 7 (01:10:28):
Well, it's just that they were nice people and how
they cared about other people. You know, they put the
welfare of of other people that were sick or infirmed
or something. This is the Cadbury family. They put that,
you know, carrying out their staff and their people ahead

(01:10:49):
of all that. I mean they even they even went
where they grew the beans over to that country to
make sure they weren't being grown in that country using
slave labor. You know. Anyhow, be there as I may. Now.
The other thing I find that's really helped me because
I'm eighty nine years old now and I'm a practicing

(01:11:11):
Catholic and I say the Rosary every day. I have
been only doing that for about four years. But the
other thing I would recommend people do is to go
onto YouTube and to listen to a book called Donald
Kellaway because he'd done everything. I mean, he got kicked

(01:11:32):
out in Japan with his family. He was at sixteen
years of age. He was a drug mule.

Speaker 3 (01:11:37):
We got to break in a second, John, what would
you in one sentence, what would you say that this
Callaway guy's main messages.

Speaker 7 (01:11:45):
Well, his main messages that he was almost so, he
became almost suicidal, he completely changed his wife, and he's
got he's a convert to the Catholicism. But he's really
worth listening to.

Speaker 3 (01:12:02):
Okay, Well, I guess you never know where you're going
to get good advice from. Could be mister Callaway on YouTube,
and it could be your employer. I mean, as much
as we might smile as we say that, you never
know when where kindness will come from in our lives,
do we, And it could be our place of work
that starts to offer us the kindness that we need.

Speaker 2 (01:12:21):
What is that EAP program?

Speaker 3 (01:12:24):
Well, a lot of a lot of workplaces have EAP.

Speaker 2 (01:12:29):
People tell me about it all the time.

Speaker 4 (01:12:30):
Employment assistance program where people can get due to stress
or distress about three sessions often or a bit more
therapy or a psychologist.

Speaker 2 (01:12:42):
Isn't that amazing?

Speaker 4 (01:12:43):
It is amazing if it works well, it works.

Speaker 2 (01:12:46):
Well, Yeah it does. I was just making a segway.

Speaker 3 (01:12:50):
Yeah great.

Speaker 4 (01:12:51):
But I think one thing that we might want to
respect by this that values can matter. And I've often
noticed people on their recovery certainly really holding on to
And you do this by you offering your free time
to meet the men in this club, in this place
to talk to about your journey. And I think I

(01:13:13):
think that would be an interesting thought to have because
somewhere people I've often noticed and recovery hold onto values
very very totally.

Speaker 3 (01:13:23):
And we'll be hearing more about Preston's journey after the break.
And we also have Vanessa waiting patiently on the line
and we'll have a chat to her after this break
here on the Nutters Club.

Speaker 1 (01:13:32):
This is the Nutters Club thanks to New Zealand Air
on News Talk z'd be welcome back to.

Speaker 3 (01:13:37):
The Nudders Club tonight. We have been talking with Preston
O'Brien about his abusive childhood, to put it bluntly, and
just the amazing work he's done on himself and learning
to relove himself after experiencing such a deep amount of
shame and self hatred. We have Vanessa on the lines.

Speaker 5 (01:13:59):
Hello Vanessa, Hi, this is the first time I've called
the Nutter's Club near it.

Speaker 3 (01:14:07):
Oh, well, you're very wellcome take your time.

Speaker 5 (01:14:11):
So when I was a small child, I was abused
by an older family friend of the family and then
and I used to think that I didn't understand what
was going on for a long time, and as I
got older, I was an early developer and I was

(01:14:35):
then I was abused by another family member.

Speaker 10 (01:14:40):
But then.

Speaker 5 (01:14:44):
As a teenager, I was suicidal for a while, and
then I ended up with the addition of suppose that
really ruined my life for quite a long time.

Speaker 3 (01:15:01):
You're cutting in and out a little bit, Vanessa, which
just reception.

Speaker 5 (01:15:07):
I'll shift, I know, really go better reception. If this
was any better, sorry, it's better in here, I think.

Speaker 7 (01:15:18):
So.

Speaker 5 (01:15:19):
Okay. So yeah, and I feel like I've taken a
long time to heal. But I am I am like
I'm not. I don't smoke anymore, and I don't play
the posies anymore. I don't go near those sort of places.
But every now and then it sort of haunts you.

Speaker 3 (01:15:43):
I bet it does.

Speaker 4 (01:15:44):
Yeah, that's a good good Vanessa. Haunting and in the
halls of our minds, these things can haunt us. And
it's great what you have done to work through and
stay away from cigarettes and other things.

Speaker 5 (01:16:03):
I've I've said the counseling, and you know, you get
if you can, you can get help. Sometimes it's not
always easy, and it's not always easy to tell someone
that you need help.

Speaker 3 (01:16:23):
And what more, first of all than you know, I
just want to say, I don't. I don't know what
that experience was like. I can only imagine it was horrific,
and I'm really sorry that you had to go through that.
What would you you mentioned that you have done some
work and done some healing. What would you say is
one thing that you found quite helpful in your journey

(01:16:48):
of healing?

Speaker 5 (01:16:50):
I thank God for me. I found God and I
found that because I was adopted as well. I had
a lot of rejection in your way in my life
finding finding God help they find acceptance of my of

(01:17:16):
myself and and also from people that I have met
through that.

Speaker 3 (01:17:27):
Except that's key, isn't it your community and love?

Speaker 2 (01:17:30):
God often as community and love, isn't he Yeah?

Speaker 5 (01:17:35):
Yeah, so, And I just wanted to say, as Preston,
isn't it that you your journey must have been pretty
horrific yourself and you you should feel that you've done
the right thing. You're amazing to talk about it, Evan,

(01:17:58):
because that's the other thing we we've made to feel. No, No,
we're not made to feel we feel ashamed if even
though we haven't done anything wrong.

Speaker 2 (01:18:11):
And can I just jump in the Vanessa, I think
you're right in the first time when you said we
are made to feel shamed because nobody talks about it,
Nobody wants us to talk about it, nobody asked us
to talk about it. So we are made to feel shamed,
and it's not fear because you did nothing.

Speaker 5 (01:18:25):
Wrong, No, because the thing is the only way to
heal is to talk about it.

Speaker 2 (01:18:34):
Thanks Vanessa.

Speaker 5 (01:18:35):
Sure, Okay, Well, thank you so much for letting me
talk to you.

Speaker 4 (01:18:39):
Guys.

Speaker 5 (01:18:40):
You have a wonderful.

Speaker 3 (01:18:42):
Warning and you've really brought something to this and I
feel enriched by your words.

Speaker 2 (01:18:50):
Yeah, me too, Thanks Vanssa, Thanks, thank.

Speaker 6 (01:18:52):
You so much.

Speaker 5 (01:18:53):
Bye.

Speaker 3 (01:18:56):
That's what I love about the Nuther's Club community. We're
talking about something really serious and hard and actually horrific tonight,
and yet someone who's been through that and experienced those
negative emotions has wrung up in want to give you
encouraging words. Preston, it's art woman.

Speaker 2 (01:19:12):
Well you can throw you just what did you use?
Their serious, heart and horrific let's throw in common every
day yep.

Speaker 4 (01:19:24):
But you also talked about community and connection and I
think that's something that you, Preston, actually do quite well.

Speaker 3 (01:19:34):
It seems with well I do now.

Speaker 2 (01:19:37):
And because I think I realized when I Suzanne started
holding me accountable and I needed to be a better person,
I went out and created that space. I found I
needed better role models. I've never had good role models.
Obviously didn't with my father or my brother. And yes,
I had other mean in my life. I've got a

(01:19:59):
you know, Irish Catholics. I'm not a fan of God,
but when people like Vanessa speak, I hear I just
to me, I just replace that word with love because
she's talking about it community who love and show her support.
But I have a very large Oris Catholic family, so
there were I did have a lot of men in
my life who supported me, but no real role model

(01:20:21):
in the house. So I started looking for that. As
I started getting cleaner, and because I love motorbikes, that
became around motorbikes. I ended up starting a motorbike club
that kind of grew and grew. We met every Sunday.
It's like our church became every Sunday motorcycle collective. Now
we meet every Sunday. There's maybe up to and over

(01:20:43):
one hundred bikes there every Sunday, and it's just a
space that I wanted to create for men, women, children,
anybody who wanted to. Originally it was men, but it's
grown way past that, and I just wanted to give
men somewhere to come to on Sunday. I don't know
if this is the right sentence for radio, but I'm
going to say it anyway. I wanted them to have
somewhere to come to on Sunday so they wouldn't kill

(01:21:05):
themselves between Monday and Saturday, because I know the importance
of community. I know the importance of having something to
look forward to. I know the importance of feeling of
having somewhere you belong. With the work I've been doing
and through the club there and then I've moved it
more into I have a We're called the Triumphant Man workshops, and.

Speaker 3 (01:21:27):
I've actually been to one of those workshops and I
got a lot out of that, sitting with other men
and sharing more openly than men once and I want
to hear you talk more about those workshops, but I
also need to go to a break, So we'll talk
more about the Triumphant Man in a couple of minutes
here on Another's.

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Speaker 1 (01:22:58):
Big stories, speaker respective.

Speaker 3 (01:23:00):
National's easy answer is that labour's useless. But eighteen months
international's government.

Speaker 2 (01:23:04):
So for your people are still wondering where we're going
and whether may be they're a bit useless.

Speaker 8 (01:23:07):
To Winston is popular because he speaks his mine, and
he knows what he's talking about.

Speaker 3 (01:23:11):
He commands respect when he speaks, people listening. He's the first.

Speaker 8 (01:23:14):
It's unashamedly, i think, appealing to a group of voters
that no one else is, which is working class New Zealand,
people who I think see things quite simply and often
more correctly than elites would care to imagine.

Speaker 1 (01:23:24):
Every view from every ale. This is the Nutters Club,
thanks to New Zealand on air on News.

Speaker 3 (01:23:30):
Talks edb welcome back to another's club. But we're talking
with Preston O'Brien tonight, and we have been listening to
his story of pain and trauma and abuse, but also
of recovery and of healing and of self love and
of change and of hope, which has been a real
blessing to us. Actually, I'm going to just read a

(01:23:51):
text out then we'll go back to Preston kioder Bro.
I'm Shane. Thank you for sharing me. It's a text
you can talk to him if you like that.

Speaker 2 (01:24:00):
I'm trying to use more today in my life.

Speaker 3 (01:24:04):
I'm thank you for sharing your story. I myself went
through the same upbringing I've been through counseling. It helped
me a lot. I've now become a Christian, which is
also given me the strength to overcome my past and
to keep striving to move forward and to love and
believe in who I am.

Speaker 2 (01:24:21):
Kirka Bro Kirkaha keem I.

Speaker 3 (01:24:25):
Sweet so yeah. I mentioned before the break Preston that
I went along to one of your evenings the triumphant Man.
Tell me about that. What are you trying to do
with that?

Speaker 2 (01:24:35):
H I love that because Ingo brought us into community,
and like I said, I did the bike club and
it was good and we got to I got met
along and gave them a place to be. I think
a really important thing that we're losing in the world
today is the importance of that third space. I don't
know I have somebody that does. The Bradley from Bradley Patton,

(01:25:00):
a good friend of mine up cycle. He's he's the
brains and the I'm the lived experience, and he's the
brains and the science and the number is behind what
we do. But what's it for?

Speaker 3 (01:25:15):
Why?

Speaker 2 (01:25:16):
This is what I'm trying to say. So I think
the importance of the third space that we've lost, where
the two spaces that we all know and have home
and work, But more and more people are just going
from home to work to home to work to home
to work. Now, if you can't pay your mortgage and
your wife leaves you, you've got nothing. That's two big moves,
you know, that can put anybody in a suicidal space,

(01:25:39):
or at least into a very deep depression. So the
motibike space was that third space for a lot of men.
I just tried to give them that space, and I
wanted to I wanted to become more and I wanted
to start talking to them about the importance of sharing
and how being able to share, being able to own
my shame, being able to be vulnerable, has just changed

(01:26:02):
my life immeasurably. I'm happy now. I've never been happy.
I'm happy. I don't have any money. I obviously blew
my whole life up. So I'm fifty three I don't
have a house, don't have enough money for a deposit
for a house, but I'm happy. It's fine, I'm going
to be okay. So we created this these evenings called

(01:26:23):
the Triumphant Man, where I just wanted to get men
together and just we've been doing it this year once
a month and it's kind of been a workshop where
we've been figuring out what it is and it's become
this lovely space where we're just all kind of learning
the importance of holding space and listening. Hopefully so by osmosis,
the men will learn that that's what they need. Hopefully

(01:26:47):
they'll go home and have that with their partners and
their kids, because I just know firsthand, if you can't
be vulnerable, if you can't share that shame, if you
can't say out loud what's happened, your chances of finding
joy are just so much lower.

Speaker 4 (01:27:05):
I just want to totalkle support this hugely. Guys, if
you're out there, it is incredibly lonely to go through this,
and it actually is a risk going and being in
a group like this makes all the difference, and the
researchers out there support groups really do work. It's a
safe space where people get you and because you've seen

(01:27:31):
and hold in a kind way, something changes.

Speaker 2 (01:27:36):
Yeah, And I found it really interesting because when we
start the evening, people are often afraid or they're nervous,
and that goes away so quickly because one of the
things we say in there is men have sat in
circles for thousands of years discussing how to keep the
village alive, how to keep each other alive, how to
support each other, how to live and the fact that

(01:27:56):
we don't do that is what's wrong. It's actually, it's
such a lovely space to be in once you can
get in there.

Speaker 4 (01:28:01):
And loneliness has a very serious illness, and this third
space provides another way to connect, and especially if I've
been on such a difficult journey. So guys, you've not
heard where to go.

Speaker 3 (01:28:18):
And as you're saying, ooh, there will be people listening
right now who are in the thick of it, who
have a background of trauma, maybe like you, Preston, and
could be in the tornado of addiction. You know, we've
we've got forty seconds. What would you say to someone

(01:28:40):
listening now who's in the middle of all that.

Speaker 2 (01:28:44):
Are you looking at me?

Speaker 6 (01:28:45):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (01:28:45):
I am.

Speaker 2 (01:28:49):
I don't know. That's so hard. I'm so sorry. I
know how hard it is. Everybody loves a comeback, they
really do. I was amazed I did that whole thing
where I rang people and apologized for the things I've
done and I've done. I'm about was about to swear
I've done very horrible things in my life. I know
I have, and everybody I spoke to has forgiven me.

(01:29:10):
Because people want you to be okay, and they'll love
you and they'll support you if you ask.

Speaker 3 (01:29:14):
For help, reach out, reach out. Preston, I just want
to thank you from the bottom of my heart for
coming on here, being vulnerable, sharing a story that can't
be easy to share. Thank you, mate, really appreciate it.
If you'd like to hear more of Preston's story, search
up a podcast that I made called Are You Mental

(01:29:36):
and Find Your Way to An episode on Trauma is
more of his story on there. If you want to
connect with the work he's doing, you can go to
the Underscore Triumphant Underscore Man on Instagram The Triumphant Man Ingo,
thank you so much for coming in and sharing your
knowledge and wisdom with us tonight. If listening to Preston's
story has brought anything up for you and you'd like
to talk to someone, you can call one seven three

(01:29:57):
seven anytime of the day or night to speak to
a trained counselor. A big thank you to our producers
Boris and Bevin. Thank you to News Talk said be
for letting us in the door and New Zealand on
the air for picking up the bills. Finally, a massive
thank you to you the listeners for tuning in, for
calling in with your encouraging words, for texting in. And
I'll see you back here again next Sunday here on

(01:30:18):
the nice Club my ear.

Speaker 1 (01:30:23):
Wait wait, this is the Nutters Club. Thanks to New
Zealand on air on News Talks EDB. For more from
News Talks EDB, listen live on air or online, and
keep our shows with you wherever you go with our
podcasts on iHeartRadio.

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Preston O’Brien: Healing through honesty - Speaking the unspeakable of childhood abuse

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Preston O’Brien: Healing through honesty - Speaking the unspeakable of childhood abuse