Green Beret’s Reality of S.A, War, Addiction and Healing with Trevor Beaman Part 1

Trevor Beaman is an active duty U.S. Army Green Beret, a husband, father, and a dedicated advocate for mental health and trauma awareness. He shares his journey from a difficult childhood marked by sexual abuse and dysfunction to the rigorous path of becoming a Special Forces soldier.

He opens up about the harsh realities of war—witnessing extreme violence in Afghanistan, losing fellow soldiers, and grappling with the psychological toll of combat. Trevor discusses how these experiences compounded his struggles with mental health and substance abuse, forcing him to confront the lasting impact of both his military career and his past.

 

Trevor’s Links/Socials:

Trevor’s book, No One Else Can See Your Fire: https://a.co/d/5sgQN5R

https://trevorbeaman.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/trevor_a_beaman

 

 

Veteran PTSD Resources:

https://www.mentalhealth.va.gov/ptsd/next-step.asp

 

Combat Call Center: (877)WAR-VETS

 

PTSD Foundation of America -Veteran Line: (877)717-PTSD

https://ptsdusa.org

 

 

Mental Health/S.A Resources:

Suicide and Crisis Lifeline

988

 

National Sexual Assault Hotline

RAINN 800-656-4673

 

Sexual Assault Crisis Text Line

741741

https://www.crisistextline.org

 

SAMHSA’s National Helpline (mental health and/or substance use)

1-800-662-HELP (4357)

 

 

Beyond the Monsters Socials

https://www.instagram.com/beyondthemonsters/

https://linktr.ee/BeyondtheMonsters

 

*Disclaimer: The content shared on this podcast is for informational and entertainment purposes only. The discussions and experiences shared are based on our personal stories and opinions. This is not medical advice, and it should not be used as a substitute for professional medical guidance. Always consult with a qualified healthcare provider for any concerns or questions regarding your health.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Welcome back to Beyond the Monsters and today I have Trevor Beaman.
trigger warning, sexual assault, abuse, suicidal ideation, drug use, violence, and otherexplicit content.

(00:28):
And you know what?
He, there's so much about this guy that you have to introduce yourself because, and justtell us, tell us all about Trevor.
Thanks for having me here in Nashville gets me out of town for a little bit.
All right.
I'm Trevor Beaman I was born raised in South Bend, Indiana grew up love in Notre Damefootball and then I moved to northern Chicago when my mom got remarried and Stayed up

(00:59):
there until I went to college and joined the army when I was in school and
in December of 2000 and went to Afghanistan a few times, became a Green Beret and
you know, became a father and husband and, you know, have two kids and living a prettycool life now in Western Florida.

(01:28):
And I'm about to retire from the army about 24 and a half years of doing this thing andnot much.
But it's, but what brings me here today is, is this
this idea of beyond the monster and what that can kind of look like and feel like as a kidthat grows up being sexually abused by your stepfather and having a monster there, then

(02:06):
having a monster from addiction and alcohol and substance abuse, having that monsterthere, then
having a monster from suicide ideations and also the loss of friends from war, the loss offriends from their own hands and then like those monsters that are there then seeing my

(02:30):
children be born, having them in my life and then feeling those monsters every day andasking questions about like how does this even begin?
Huh.
And so it's a, there's a lot that builds up in your brain over time about what theseconstructed things that start to build up walls or compartmentalize things that make life

(03:02):
either harder or easier and it kind of sways back and forth throughout time.
But
the beginning of it is where we'll start and we'll build on it and how all those separatethings kind of were added to either relieve pain or forget about life or try to just

(03:24):
manage my day to day.
and the different things that I did and encountered and therapies and rehabs and thesethings and what they did individually to get me onto this like healing journey and this
path of like happiness, love and I, you know, this idea that humanity is worth fightingfor and to try to become this like beacon of hope for others.

(03:53):
And I just want to make sure that I thank you and I thank you a hundred times, you knowfor coming on and talking about this because I know for and for some reason I know for
guys in general what I've seen is it's harder for men to tell real stories like this and Ican just imagine How many people are gonna relate to your story?

(04:18):
So I don't think it's necessarily difficult.
They just don't practice it.
That's it.
And after you say it a few times and get it out, it doesn't seem so painful or sojudgmental or I'm not a real man or like that.
I think those are real feelings.

(04:40):
Right.
But I think as you practice it and show it and you don't feel like you're going to bejudged or something's wrong with you or like how could you ever live with that and have
all those different feelings inside after you let it out enough and breathe through itopen up and you just be like, you know, like what I'm doing matters because I'm actually

(05:03):
saying something that matters to them.
But it all really matters to me because it feels like
Every time I discuss these things that happened to me and the way it made me feel Itdoesn't hurt as much Right that knife that that person has in my heart Isn't as sharp and
it just gets dollar and dollar and then one day It's gone and you're like I did it BecauseI was able just to tell someone how I feel And what happened to me and that's there's

(05:34):
nothing more than just a story and feelings together and that's
I mean, for me, that's why we write books.
Because everything.
Yeah, I wrote a book.
We'll talk about that too.
Take us down the road.
Let us know.

(05:55):
So before I'm even born, there's some stuff that happens that's really important.
So my mom's growing up.
My my grant, her dad was in the World War Two and got two Purple Hearts to get injuredtwice in Germany.
He came back home and he was a truck driver and was gone a lot.

(06:18):
And my mom was stuck home.
And my mom was more.
as like a treated like a pet, then a child.
And my grandmother who passed away before I was born, just didn't give the love that mymom needed.

(06:40):
And while my mom was growing up, one of her cousins raped her.
So this hat.
And so then
She doesn't get love and acceptance from her mom.
And she's abused by a man at early age.

(07:00):
And now my father, who his father, my grandfather was at Omaha beach.
And to think about that, like going into Normandy and to come home from that.
My dad was treated poorly and he wasn't seen a lot.

(07:26):
He would be like locked in closets.
He'd be on sports teams and he wouldn't get any recognition.
So my dad had a lot of anger inside and I think my mom has from what she went through.
I was just going to say your mom too, she just had to have a lot of...
she just has a lot of sadness inside of her because of those things.

(07:49):
And so my parents meet and my mom at the post office in South Bend and my mom's like thefirst mail handler and they just connect and all this stuff and I think my grandfather
ends up buying them a plot of land on the south outside the city.
And so I have an older brother who's 15 months older than me.

(08:11):
So my brother's born and then I am.
And it seems, that's what I know, like everything is okay.
But as I'm growing up, my mom tells me that my father's really angry and abusive to herand that he has thrown her downstairs and she has all these...

(08:36):
like back problems, hip problems because of my father.
So I'm only one years old at this, right?
And so we're just beginning here.
She...
After years later, I'm talking like 30, 40 years later, I'm 44 now.

(09:01):
So this is like, I was 39.
I find out my father actually caught my mom in bed with his best friend.
Alright, so that event happens which I didn't know, right?
And so I'm I there's many many many decades of my mom telling me and my brother that mydad's a monster.

(09:25):
horror, right?
Right?
And so my parents get divorced and I was under the assumption majority of my life that mymom took us from our father.
Okay.
Because he used to.
Right.

(09:47):
Later on I find out that my dad actually is the one who took us and my mom did not want usat all.
And so this is 1982 and my dad's still working at the post office and he doesn't, he's nota mail hander, he works inside like with all the electronics.

(10:09):
all the different type of sorting machines and stuff like that.
he does that.
So he has to go to a lot of training in Oklahoma.
So he's gone.
And so he's traveling and he's he reached out to his family saying, can you help me withmy two boys?
And they said no.

(10:30):
And his mom, because my dad, my dad's
Dad dies of a heart attack.
And so he's not in the picture.
And so it would be my grandmother on my dad's side that was trying to help my dad raiseus.

(10:50):
And she said, it's too much.
These kids, can't do it.
So my dad ends up giving us back to my mom.
Hmm.
So my mom is super prideful woman of all the things.
She goes on to welfare.

(11:12):
We move into the projects.
My brother and I are essentially the only two white kids that are there.
But even though we were in this small apartment that had cockroaches, have beds that areon the ground, she still figures out a way.

(11:34):
to go to nursing school and to graduate from that.
And it's just the three of you at this point.
There's nobody helping or...
So that's great lead into what is another person that is introduced into my life.

(11:55):
And this man is in South Bend and he comes there to become a priest.
St.
Mary's across the street from Notre Dame University.
And I haven't got an answer on how my parents are like how my mom meets this man.
Nothing.
I don't know.
And you're not seeing dad at all at this point?

(12:16):
Little like, I don't know.
This is like still I'm like three, four years old.
And all I can, all I can think about or that I have knowledge about is that my mom meetsthis really Catholic man that wants to help razor boys.

(12:38):
And it's on and off.
He comes and helps our family when she has to do stuff.
I don't know.
This is before I can remember anything.
have no idea about what this guy is doing in her house or anything like that.
But she she graduates and then we move out of the projects because she has she's makingmoney.

(13:03):
She's able to afford more.
So we moved to another home.
And that's like preschool ish.
I remember like I got held back School is severely difficult for me.
I don't know.
I'm like one of the things that you could be looked at ADHD It's probably some type ofdisorder something learning Cognitive something, you know, there's something there.

(13:27):
That's I'm not picking up what's going on in school.
It's really really hard for me.
So I'm held back and at that
My mom is working in the ER in the hospital and we have babysitters that are like kind ofnot like what I what I think of babysitters now this is like like evil witches of that my

(13:50):
mom would hire to come watch us that would like us and like treat us like shit and likechase around us the house with you know like sticks and shit like kind of thing right like
not like not actually like that but like just like
people that are really happy at all.

(14:14):
But we moved on through that.
And so then we moved to another house in town and it's like a picturesque neighborhood.
You know, all the kids are out playing, everyone's riding their bikes everywhere.
And this is 1985, 86.
And kids are just out all day.

(14:34):
Like what we want in America is like nothing will happen to them.
It's great.
And we all have friends that we spend, you know, weekends with and sleepovers and it'sawesome.
Like we're, we're just have this, it feels very beautiful life.
Like we've made it feel inside.
Like did you have that feeling of like okay, this is home.

(14:57):
Yeah
I was like this this I'm pride.
have pride where I live And it was cool and then my dad it was just like every otherweekend we would spend you know time with our dad, but my house With my mom was vastly
different than the house of my dad's I See I actually got to see the anger in my fathercome out But it wasn't ever

(15:27):
Okay.
never put a hand on either of us.
He would throw shit around the house and fucking destroy it.
That's how he...
Kind of like a temper tantrum.
Now as a father, I feel it.
And I understand how that could be so overwhelming.
didn't have any coping skills or stress.

(15:48):
That's it.
And it felt like he just married his work.
And so there was trash in his house and beer cans everywhere and all that.
But even with all the filth and everything, our bedrooms were immaculate.
where me and my brother stayed, he cared about us.

(16:09):
He just didn't care about himself.
I think he maybe got a little broken from all of the losing his kids and not being able tobe there for him.
So my mom continues to date other men during this whole time.
Okay.

(16:30):
And she meets a firefighter who one night decides that he's going to kill her.
And he tries to shoot her with like a buckshot shotgun on our second floor of our house.
And it goes through our she doesn't she doesn't die.
She doesn't get injured or anything, but it goes through our house into the next house.

(16:53):
And nothing but nothing happened.
Nobody gets hurt.
But I'm away with my dad.
How long were these two dating?
because you're still really young.
Were they fighting and stuff like that?
But it wasn't ever around me and my brother.
We were never home when she would be with other people.
She didn't bring people into the house.
so you guys weren't home?

(17:14):
No.
But I come home to this and my mom's like Mario tried to kill me.
I'm like what?
I'm in second grade?
So.
The man my mom had met years before that asked her for the seventh time if he can marryher.

(17:39):
And now I believe my mom is so broken and so tired of being abused, fearful for her kids,I think she just gives in.
I don't think it was for love.
security.
I think that was stability.

(18:01):
Mm-hmm.
And so she married this man.
She moved me and my brother away from our Piscarot night beautiful home because she wasrunning.
She was running from all the things that scared her that was in that house.

(18:22):
I get now, I understand how you want to take your kids away from all of that.
I totally get that.
That was me too.
I did that.
So I understand that now, but when I was a kid, like you just took me from my dad for thisguy who's on the surface is everything you would want.

(18:46):
You're not.
As we moved to Glenview in the northern suburb of Chicago, we moved into like, back intothe projects.
because they couldn't because it's so wealthy there they cannot they couldn't afford a newyou know back then it's probably like six eight hundred thousand dollar home like there

(19:10):
there was no they didn't my mom wasn't making enough money and he definitely didn't haveany type of skills or anything like that like the guy wanted to be a priest and it's
totally confusing
because we move into this two-bedroom apartment from this, you know, four-bedroom home.

(19:35):
kids are playing and you're actually having a normal life.
The normal life turns back into like, there's this like, transitory people living inapartments, there's lots of gang banging, there's drug use, there's domestic violence,
there's all of those are happening around us.

(19:57):
But, so then I'm like third grade.
And it's, so that's eight years old, that's 1988.
And it's gonna be like,
around...
I don't know, October, November timeframe.
That's where my life starts to completely change.

(20:21):
And I'm in this bedroom.
My mom's working.
She's 11 to 7 in the ER.
And my mom doesn't know what this man's about to do to her.
Something.
All right.
And it's the thing about trauma that's really fucked up is that this moment feels like itdid when I was eight years old.

(20:50):
So I get that how it's you don't want to talk about it or you don't want to relive itbecause it's hard and it's a lot of different therapies and stuff kind of get into this
and Reiki kind of relive some stuff and
it helps you out.
it's...

(21:12):
I'm in this bed and why I know it's the wintertime is because can like, I can like see thecrystals on the window forming.
At night?
I feel, we're on a waterbed, and I feel the water moving around me, almost like I can feelthat plasticness of the waterbed on my skin as I'm laying in this bed.

(21:45):
The hardest part about this moment that I've ever had to deal with is that I could havegot up and ran away.
I could have fought.
But I didn't do any of those.
I just did nothing.
I just laid there with my eyes closed.
as this man slowly touched my body.

(22:11):
And can hear the aquarium bubbler going off.
I can feel his breath on my body.
I can feel his stubble of his goatee and beard on my body moving around.
But this moment isn't a...

(22:33):
doesn't hurt.
I'm not like, I'm not like grossed out or I'm not.
just feeling all the touches throughout my whole entire body.
And when this man finally touches my penis, it's such an exhilarating feeling that I'venever had in my life.

(23:07):
And to be pleasured by another person is one of the basic wonderful things that we canshare with another person.
And it was confused.
I was confused.
didn't understand what was happening, but I knew I liked it.

(23:29):
I knew it felt really good.
And that was low touch onto my body and really nothing more than this moment on this bedas an eight-year-old kid.

(23:53):
And after he had pleasured himself, he lifted me up and carried me back into my bed and Iwent to sleep.
As if nothing happened.
Like not a word was said or anything.
some eight.

(24:15):
Year by year, it gets significantly worse.
It's no longer just like touching and this, it's penetration.
How often was this happening?
So...
when I...

(24:35):
The frequency reduced as I got older.
I end up saying that happened about a hundred times in about eight years.
He confessed to doing at least 50 times.

(24:57):
So here's, so this happens.
It's not painful.
It doesn't, I don't get any rashes, pain, nothing on my body.
There's no evidence of anything ever happened.
It's
It's almost like it's consensual.
it, to me, even to today, it feels like that.
feels, if in a loving way, who you would call it, which is kind of gross and everything,it was like caressing a young child because you were in love with them.

(25:27):
I understand that.
mean, starting at eight years old, that's what else would you think?
So, after fifth grade, I, in the summer, I decide I'm gonna join the Latin Kings andbecome a gang member.
Right, so I get beaten to the gang and just to liven this up a bit.

(25:53):
And I'm like, I'm gonna be a shorty in the Latin Kings because that's what's going aroundhere and like all this shit's happening at home.
I'm like, I wanna be a part of something bigger than me.
I want to serve something else because I don't feel included in my house other than kindof, I don't, I'm not going to go get to the rape part yet, but I feel like I'm being like

(26:17):
taken advantage of.
And so I get beat into this gang and I come home and I'm like taking a shower.
And I'm like, I walk out of the shower, put a towel on me and my mom sees my back and it'sa completely bruised.
Like I got the shit bad.
I mean, I had a 10 year old kid.

(26:40):
and
10 years old.
Right?
So yeah, that's 10.
No, no, it's eight years old still, right?
Eight, nine years old, nine.
I'm almost turning 10.
I'm going into sixth grade.
Right?
Yes.
So I got my ass kicked.

(27:00):
And my mom calls the police on this kids.
And she's like, we're going to prosecute him for assault.
I'm like, fuck me, man.
I'm going to like.
To grow up in a bad neighborhood and prosecuting people, I'm like, my mom doesn't get thestreets.

(27:21):
She doesn't get that now I'm gonna have to live with these kids till I leave.
Right.
And like, that's a, we got some years here, mom, before I graduate high school.
And I don't have to be running all of this anymore.
So my mom decides we're going to move across town to get away from this.

(27:42):
So we went from living in this rundown apartment into a trailer park on the other side oftown.
And like I said, we were living in a very wealthy town.
And so now I'm like, I've moved, I've lived in both of the worst places in this town.
And I hate it.
I hate that I'm from that fucking place.

(28:03):
So much.
Because I go to school and there's all these kids, Range Rovers, Mercedes, all this, andI'm like, I got nothing.
Was depression starting then a little bit, do you think?
Okay.
Wow.
So, this whole time we're like having this family that goes to church.

(28:26):
We have family outings, we're traveling.
We're doing like, I end up going to cruises to Hawaii and spend time in Sweden.
And my mom's very bad with money.
Like put things like it almost in a very much.
a manic way, almost like bipolar, as like I believe I need to go do these things right nowand does them without seeing the consequences of a year later of what these choices are.

(29:00):
So my mom is constantly in debt and doesn't do well with finances.
I don't even think till today, but so we moved to the trailer park.
and the sexual abuse becomes significantly.

(29:24):
more physical than what I was describing in the bed and in the water bed that I was in,where it kind of all began.
and that's, I'm in sixth grade and it starts to be the penetration of his anus, my penisinto his mouth.

(29:51):
that he made me perform oral sex on him into him attempting to rape me.
But I was a teeny-county kid, just not happening.
And still this whole time, I'm very like...

(30:18):
As if like I am just a puppet for him to use for his own desires.
Throughout the time that he was using my body for his pleasure, it just slowly and slowlygot more and more aggressive and

(30:45):
their duration started to increase longer and longer.
So now I'm getting less and less sleep at night.
And I think this from like age 10 to 12 is probably the highest frequency of thishappening.
So my brother to this day has said that he, my stepfather never touched him.

(31:14):
I don't know.
That's his story to tell.
I'm not.
I'm not gonna get into his life, because that's his to tell me.
So, I make it to seventh grade, and I start to feel like there's this heartman mentalizedperson in my life has now came into my mind.

(31:40):
And it feels very much like when I go to school, I put this kid that's being abused intomy locker.
I take that mask off and I take my school mask on.
I'm just a happy kid.
Nothing's happening to me.

(32:03):
But like in the beginning, around October, time frame, I was really done with life.
I was home all alone and I decided that I was gonna end my life.
At 10.

(32:23):
I was 12 years old.
Since 1992, I see myself in the mirror of my parents bathroom.
Just crying.
I can still feel like the moist skin on my face about how I didn't have anything left inme to live for.

(32:45):
Just all of my soul was dark.
Fucking just...
angry, sad, everything that I had in me wasn't worth fucking living.
And so I took two weeks of heart control pills of his, some pain medication.

(33:07):
would get completely naked.
I get into, I run a tub of water.
It's nice, it's comfortable.
like, fuck it.
I slit my wrists.
Mm.
Thank whoever's watching over me or whatever, whatever energies in the world that saw me,then I didn't do it right.

(33:35):
But I had a lot of drugs in my system and I was really not in good spot.
And my...
Yeah.
And my wrist stopped bleeding and I'm like, fuck this.
I'm not gonna stay in here.
It's not gonna, it's not working.
Whatever, it's not happening.

(33:57):
So I get dried off and I'm like sitting in our living room and my mom walks in on mycouch.
I'm this.
And she fucking looks at me goes, what the fuck did you do?
Because I'm like pale.
And she knows what's up.
And I was like, I did all this.

(34:17):
And she goes, great.
And so she gives me milk of magnesium.
And I just start vomiting everywhere.
And she's like, we gotta go to the hospital.
Because there's probably, there's a lot of things in you that we gotta get out from you.
So we go to the ER.
I get my stomach pumped.
I have to drink like this two liter of charcoal.

(34:41):
Gross, right?
Awful.
And because of the milk and magnesium, I'm just vomiting it all up.
I can't swallow anything.
So I get two tubes put in me and they're just like pumping it in.
Right?
It's a shitty experience.
Time, okay.

(35:03):
Were you mad at this point that it didn't work?
Or what are you feeling?
If you remember.
have to figure out what I'm going to say why I did this.
Alright.
And I conjure up this idea of like, I miss my father.

(35:25):
I want my father to be around.
heartbreaking, you'll see.
It sucks.
So I go to the psych ward, I'm there for a week.
My stepfather stays the whole entire time in the room with me while I'm in the hospital.

(35:47):
Percy did.
course it didn't.
Later on I've like, I see it more now than I saw it then.
And so that's one part of the problem.
Next part of the problem didn't show up.

(36:09):
Hmm.
I don't know why, though, at this moment in my life.
I don't understand what happened.
What I was told is that your dad couldn't find the hospital.
Did they even tell them?
Okay.
But she didn't tell him at hospital.

(36:30):
So he's driving all the way from South Bend to Chicago to find his son that he can't find.
And just gives up and goes home.
And that's when I started to lose all hope in my father.

(36:51):
Because he wasn't there when I needed him.
And of course you don't know the reality.
Right.
yeah.
There's Leading.
There is there's there's.
One behold, there's there's actually really cool outcome to this.
Like this story is great.

(37:12):
It's really.
I'll breathe now.
Yeah.
Okay.
Um, and so I, I go back to school, I meet this awesome counselor, Dana, who I would go seeand this is a huge advocate for school counselors reaching out for kids that at least give
them a space to say something to feel safe.
like, like there was a woman there for two years after I tried to commit suicide that sawme every single week that was there for me.

(37:42):
And like, I just, she just contacted me.
recently that she gives a presentation about my life to kids, about being sexually abused,where to touch and not be touched by adults, bullying, all this.
they talk all about all this stuff.
And it's kind of cool to have that, to know that I'm still at that same school, 30 yearslater, I'm making an impact.

(38:11):
I'm changing someone's life without even knowing it.
And it's
But at the same time, I'm like, what was that woman thinking about when she got home?
About what is a 12 year old kid trying to kill themselves?
And then for her to later on know that this was a, for her to think about all thequestions I could have asked this little kid to get him out of this.

(38:41):
And she just didn't know.
Well, back then, mean, you're a few years younger than me, but I know back then, we didn'tknow what we know now, you know, and it wasn't as public and people just didn't talk about
it as much.
So I could see why she probably didn't really didn't fully know what to say or do.

(39:03):
but.
experience in writing books and telling stories.
Maybe you'll ask the kid the right question, even if it makes you feel uncomfortable.
Right.
It's important that they do now.
mean, yeah.

(39:23):
okay if you upset somebody because you're wrong.
Imagine if you're right.
Like, I knew it.
And I saved a kid's life.
Pretty f- Pretty fuckin' cool.
Yeah, it is.
And so I make it through seventh and eighth grade and into high school and then.

(39:49):
And so as I make it into freshman and high school.
life changes.
Me starts to, you know, pre-birthday and other things are more enjoyable to my eyes thanthis man abusing me at night.
And so I, you know, start dating and having sex with women.

(40:19):
And now I this is probably a weird question, you're so was at this point.
I mean, you've been abused for so long by a man.
Were you only attracted to women?
Girls.
So whatever.
Or that might be coming later too.
I wouldn't, it's not, there's, it's not about being attracted to a man or a woman.

(40:46):
It's can you be pleasured by either?
is, it's just, I mean, it's difficult, right?
It's like, I had questions about my own sexuality because both are awesome.

(41:11):
And until it like really wasn't, but in the beginning, feels like it's just like love andtouch and like all that is really powerful.
on my brain and my body.
And you weren't being educated on anything.
at that point you're just going by feeling and.

(41:32):
Right, like, to my eye to look at a man, I don't see anything that's like, yeah, this isdesire, isn't there?
But I can see how, I could see how you could, or even me, could fall in love with a man inthe right circumstances.

(41:57):
Like, if I was a prisoner,
If I was on an island somewhere and there was just another man, if it was me and a man,could I fall in love with a man because that's all I had?
I say yes, I can't.
I think that is the basic need of a human.
And if that's there, then you need that connection with another human.

(42:22):
It's just to me,
It goes back to connection and love and...
And so, but that's not like my number one thing at all.
But if I'm trying to survive and live the next day, then like I'm going to enjoy life howI can and what I got.
It seems plausible and it's, I would want to have a partner.

(42:49):
I totally get that.
But there's, yes, there's these things like in my
Supposed to be with a man or am I supposed to be with a woman?
There was years of inner like thinking about this and it's, it's hard and difficult toprocess those constant thoughts of like, should, why do I continue to be with a woman?

(43:15):
Maybe I like, I've been happy.
I felt happy from a man.
And then so, but I think that's like college life and like that moment.
I think there's a lot in that timeframe when you're trying to maybe 18 to 21, 22, you'retrying to figure out that.

(43:38):
And I think, but I didn't like explore that with the man ever.
I've never had a sexual alteration.
outside of that abuse.
So there's it's nothing I've ever was like I must feel it inside me to act upon has neverhappened.

(43:58):
And so I meet a gal in high school and you know, we're together and.
I pretty much spend my whole high school years with her.
And kind of like break off like when I go to college, but.

(44:19):
After my 16th birthday
I start to see what my stepfather is kind of doing with his life.
That makes me super unsettled inside.
He starts to take on hospice care for children with autism and Down syndrome.

(44:47):
These kids can't speak.
They can't raise their hand and say this is happening to me.
But everything in my heart and soul is like this motherfucker is fucking these kids.
And I can't stand for it.
Like I can take what has happened to me and I can live with that forever.
But I will not allow this man to hurt another fucking child.

(45:10):
And it's just, it enrages me.
My mom finally sees it, like sees the anger in me.
And she's, don't think she'd ever seen me.
the anger towards him or was it just angry?
Yeah.
I'm not just some 16 year old kid that's like given hell to their parents kind of like andI'm back in front of the same mirror that I was when I was 12 years old now I'm 16.

(45:48):
My mom walks into the bathroom and she goes, is your stepdad fucking you?
Wait, she just...
And I look at her and I say, finally, all these years, asked me the right question.
So.
Like, yeah.

(46:09):
It's like in the car now.
And we drive around for three or four hours and I explain and talk to her about all thethings that had happened to me through all the years, all the places, churches, vacations,
crossed state lines.
No.
And so, so because you say that I'll deep dive into that church problem.

(46:36):
So he worked at a convention center that was also a...
well, just a church, right?
And he was like the night custodian and he would ask me to stay there with him.

(46:56):
And so he raped me at the church.
And as you can imagine, my...
My hope for God and faith is nonexistent.
based off of.

(47:17):
what all loving God allows a child to be abused in this manner, in his house.
Right.
and that led me on a path of being a non-believer because it just doesn't make sense.
own.

(47:37):
I think there's other things out in this world that I can see and is more truthful.
The energies of the world seem to be more impactful to me than God will ever be.
Because at a time I needed that there for me, it never showed up.
I give you a long fucking time to be there.

(48:00):
It never came.
Still.
And so we drive around.
I tell her everything and she believes 100%.
I feel at that moment on top of the world.

(48:20):
sure.
these demons, monsters, this...
nasty things that are all out of me and I fucking feel phenomenal.
My mom though on another plate, probably how you feel right now is like my god what hasbeen happening to my son how and what do I need to do

(48:56):
So I go to the police station.
I sit down with the police officer and I just start writing.
Telling them what happened.
All the different...
methods of insertion, the everything I explained that like this person has ejaculated onmy body and my face that he's tried to penetrate my anus that he used my body in the

(49:24):
manner that he, my penis would penetrate him, all of the things, every single thing.
And
They're like, okay, we're gonna go arrest him.
They go to my house, they arrest him, signs a full confession to everything that he did tome.

(49:47):
The only thing that's description, there's a difference that there is.
As I said, it happened at least 100 times and he's admitted to doing it 50 times.
Okay, and then...
I finished high school.
graduate, actually I graduate early from high school.

(50:15):
He gets on a like $300,000 bail.
His folks came up with $30,000 to get him out of jail.
I spend the next two and a half years going to court.
And he's out this whole time.

(50:35):
Yeah
Yep.
So I'm in college and I'm living in a fraternity, bunch of guys.
And as I'm rushing the house is the last proceeding.
And it's during our like initiation portion of the...

(50:57):
I think this is probably...
So I'm like 18, 19, 1999.
I just turned 19.
and I'd tell this group of guys that I gotta go put the guy who abused me for almost adecade in jail.

(51:22):
And I got big hugs and...
You know, and...
They cared about me and I didn't like, I didn't feel alone.
That was probably like the first time that you felt like that.

(51:44):
but at that same time I discovered drinking.
and alcohol made all of those memories disappear.
I would just drink to forget it all.
Because I didn't understand it.
It just...

(52:06):
It felt...
When drinking, there's this special moment that you have for just a little bit of time.
As you're like coming up on drinking, it's nice, it feels good.
And then there's this real fucking awesome sweet spot where the world is bliss.

(52:31):
But then you have one more drink and it turns for me sadness.
and self-hate.
almost self-destructive.
So every time I drink, I want to get to the part where life is really awesome and I don'tremember anything.

(53:01):
problem with alcohol is it wants to kill you.
If you give it enough time.
you
So I discover alcohol in college, a little bit of cannabis here and there, not really.
A whole lot.
It's a little bit of drug use, know, but not this.
That's just alcohol and weed and stuff.

(53:26):
College.
Great time.
And so I go to it's the day to go stand on the stand and I have to go through all thisover again in front of a judge.
And as I'm telling my story,

(53:47):
Knowing that this man had confessed to doing this to me, his mother stands up and goes,you're a fucking liar.
Fuck.
How?
I'd like...
Maybe now as being a father?

(54:12):
But I don't think so.
I would never stand and defend my child.
Ever.
For committing that horrendous act on a little fucking person.
No, I will not be there for you.
The judge...
Raids out all the counts.
know, all the aggravated sexual assault.

(54:34):
First degree, second degree, all of it.
I think it ended up being like 36 counts of all different types of...
methods and of things as you do with body parts where they shouldn't be on other people.
They gave him eight years in prison.
So yeah, eight years.

(54:56):
And at the moment in time, I said, that's as many years as he tried to fuck me.
Now you can go get fucked for eight years.
And I was okay with that.
Especially as I go to war and that changes my life.

(55:16):
have a unique perspective on the death penalty and murder and things like that.
I think laws should be stricter.
Killing people for sexual assault and abuse.
That's another cover.
I think you should be in a single room.

(55:40):
because we can afford it here in America and never see light or another human again.
And you just die miserably.
You get to think about all the shit you did to a fucking little person for eternity.
Mm-hmm.
That's what I would want for people.

(56:02):
We're not gonna give you the gracious gratitude of death.
Fuck no.
that one bit.
Live it every day just like that person relives it every day because it doesn't go away.
How much it hurts goes away in time.

(56:25):
And so, I'm in college.
I went on stand and defended myself and what happened to me.
I was really, really proud of that.
Mm-hmm.
Your mom's with you during all this?
Yeah, yeah, but so, but I'm a senior in high school.

(56:49):
Just to go back a little bit.
When.
All this came out.
The school was like, we're going to get Trevor out of school as fast as possible.
And so I got out of school at semester early, but at that same semester, my senior year,my mom moves to West Lafayette where my, because my brother's already going to school at

(57:13):
Purdue where I am going to follow him.
But I have one semester at home in a trailer park all by myself.
after I just came out with all this stuff, like 12 months earlier, I'm just like sittingin this empty trailer, like drinking a six pack of beer every night, doing my homework and

(57:37):
going to school on my own.
Like one, I was like, what fucking kid keeps going to school?
There's nobody making him like there's no one at the school that's gonna be like He didn'tcome to school today.
I wonder why right like he's going through the fucking worst time of his life But no, Iwent to school every single day I went to I had a job and I just kept going and Showing up

(58:05):
every day.
I just I don't know.
It just No one made me do anything.
I just like
I don't know why, it's just, it's who I am.
guess it's just essence of my soul is I show up.
I don't know.

(58:27):
And that comes like, I, I didn't get good grades in high school.
I didn't get accepted into university when I applied.
yeah.
that point, you know?
So I, I never get an acceptance letter into Purdue.
And my friend, Stu Lancy, I was living at the house before the semester started.

(58:55):
He's like, let's go down to the bursar's office and let's see if we can get you intoschool.
So I walked in in the middle of the summer and I said, I want to go to school here.
I got the money.
I can afford it.
Like, all right, you got to take this class.
You gotta go to the community college across the river, take a few classes there.
If you get a 2.0 or better, we'll let you in.

(59:16):
So someone showed up for me and it got me into school.
Awesome.
So my life at school began and then, you know, rushing to fraternity and friends and itseems everything seems great.
Well, I meet this gal and she gets pregnant and I'm 20.

(59:39):
And I'm like, I've got to, to show up.
So I kind of drop out of school and I start working at the car factory in Lafayette andI'm just going to work 60 hours a week to support this woman and this baby.

(01:00:00):
And she goes home and tells her parents and mom and dad, absolutely not.
We will cut everything off from you if you have this child.
So I am like, I want this baby.
I want a son or a daughter.

(01:00:21):
No, she has an abortion.
Is that 20 years old?
after you already left school and everything.
So.
I shouldn't have a 24-year-old kid in my life.
I don't.
It's hard and sad.

(01:00:42):
And because of that, I joined the army.
December of 2000.
Right before 01.
Yeah.
And I meet this another girl during this time her name is Kayla Hearst.
She's beautiful.
woman.
And I go off to basic training and like, it's slowly, it's like this, you know, collegelove that kind of like falls apart.

(01:01:11):
But she had a huge, huge soul and heart in her.
It's kind of a hippie chick.
Who, you know, means a lot to me.
And so I get all done with all this basic training.
I become a cook and stuff, which is like wild.
Now I was like, that's what you decided to do.

(01:01:33):
They definitely, the talent management portion of the army at this point did not see.
And the potential that I had, they didn't get, put me on the right path.
So I come home and then nine 11 happens and like, there's this pounding on my door whenit's going on.

(01:01:56):
And I just like, look at all my friends and like,
I was like, it's finally happened to us, Everywhere else in the world there's terroristattacks every day.
It's unfortunate it happened to us, but we've got to get ready if we're going to go towar.
to To have that feeling like you know it's coming.

(01:02:20):
And some people are cheering like I was excited.
I was like yeah I can, I'm gonna get one of the reasons why I joined the army.
It's gonna happen.
Right and that's to achieve this honorable death.
Because inside me even though I'm doing well in school, I'm a soldier now, I still didn'twant to be alive.

(01:02:44):
there.
is still there.
I felt suicide was an easy way.
because I knew that if I committed suicide, that would be the first thing that anyone eversaid about me.
I didn't want to be remembered as that.

(01:03:09):
It's hard.
Because...
I get called to go to Iraq in 2003 and I spend a few months down in Georgia and they'relike, you don't need to go.
We don't need your job.
I come back home.
After I come home, I'm living in a house with three of my friends and my friend Sean Keelyis a kid from Michigan that is an Irish alcoholic.

(01:03:43):
It's bipolar.
It's in trouble with the law that he's the type of guy that would, you know, get drunk atthe bar, walk home and not realize he's at the wrong house.
and can't understand why his key doesn't work to open the door and like try to kick thedoor down and please

(01:04:04):
called on him.
he's a mess.
He's a mess and he just has these continuous problems with alcohol and drugs.
He's on probation and he's living with us and one night his parole officer shows up.
He's been drinking.

(01:04:24):
And they give him a breathalyzer and they're like, you're drunk.
You violated your probation.
Not knowing what I know now, I know that his world just collapsed inside of him.
And he got in his car and drove to Michigan and hung himself.

(01:04:49):
So this is my best friend, the world dies.
There's something different that happens at this moment that I carry on.
The grief process here wasn't alone.

(01:05:12):
All the boys from the house came to see us every day.
People spent time with us telling stories, listening to music, talking about what Seanmeant to us.
And it wasn't...

(01:05:32):
It wasn't a lonely grieving that I went through.
where I think some people think that that's the best is to get through really hard timesalone.
Yeah.
That's not the case.

(01:05:52):
It makes it so much darker, I think.
Yeah, you gotta...
It's okay to ask for help.
people want to.
They'll be there for you and they'll get you in the right spot.
And so we dealt with all that together.

(01:06:15):
and then Kayla Hearst gets murdered.
god.
So she switched schools.
She's in the University of Ohio.
She is in a bad drug deal in a house where she shouldn't have been in.
Her and her two friends were tied up and executed in their home.

(01:06:41):
What the fuck, Trevor?
I'm like, I don't know how much more I can fucking take in my life.
Right?
And this is where my friend Dave in the TED Talk says, you're the Michael Jordan offucking trauma.
for some levity to this conversation.

(01:07:02):
Right?
And it's, and at that point, I'm 23.
So I have a fucking shit childhood.
College is introduced drugs and alcohol.
My best friend hangs himself.
The girl that like had taken my heart is killed.

(01:07:24):
And then I'm volunteer to go to Afghanistan.
Volunteered.
and
I have to go to the infantry school and it's out in Arkansas and I'm there and it's abeautiful training area and it's hot as hell during the summer because it's like June and

(01:07:45):
I'm there and we're just doing like three weeks of training and it's like learn aboutwalking through the woods and using guns and how to shoot, right?
Cause I'm just a cook.
didn't really go like I do basic training, right?
Like, but there's like,
But my commander, Eakins, like, hey, yeah, you got, I want you to, to come with us to thistrip.

(01:08:10):
All right.
I really want to go.
Cause the last time I didn't get to go and I told myself I'll never get called up againand not go.
So I'm there and in while I'm there, there's a guy next to me.
name is specialist Snyder who's been a bunk mate, the kind of thing.
You

(01:08:31):
And I look at this kid dead in his eyes.
I say, you don't need to be going to Afghanistan.
You're gonna die.
Or you're gonna get someone else killed.
foreshadow for you.
What did say to that?
Nothing, just like 20 years old, like whatever Trevor, fuck you.

(01:08:56):
So we get to Afghanistan in July of 2004.
We're downtown Kabul, it's the center of Afghanistan.
There's not a lot that happens on this trip.
There's a few firefights, gunfights, bangs, whatever you want to call it at the front gatewith just some, you know, locals that just want to die.

(01:09:18):
I think, I don't know, there wasn't there.
We're going to cause anything.
It's like suicide by police is like what happened.
Like I'm just tired of life and they just shot at us.
It's nothing that I engaged in.
But.
This time in Afghanistan is, changes me because I go from Kabul, which up in the center,to down south in Kandahar.

(01:09:45):
And we get tasked on a mission set to do, for the Afghan national army to give them moneyfor serving.
And one of the places I go to is called Firebase Price, which is after Warrant OfficerPrice and whatever, who was killed in the beginning of Afghanistan war.

(01:10:07):
What's there that changes my life is the Green Berets, the Special Forces guys.
I didn't know anything about these guys and didn't even really know that.
I knew that some Rangers existed, but they're different.
It's different than that.
And I was like, these are the guys.
that free the oppressed.

(01:10:30):
I love that.
I loved that so much since I was 16 years old.
Because I fought for people who couldn't stand up for themselves.
I was like, these guys, there's 12 dudes in the middle of the desert that are convincingother people to fight for their country so that other Americans don't have to come here.

(01:10:59):
I was like, what am I have to do to be one of these dudes?
I was like, I think I can change the world if I'm one of those guys.
and then a few months later, right before we come home,

(01:11:19):
We get a call on the radio saying that one of our, one of the trucks from our task forcehit an anti-tank mine right outside of Kabul looking for like some area to do training at.
And specialist Snyder was driving that car, that pickup truck.

(01:11:41):
And all four guys were killed instantly.
And they brought their bodies back and we had to carry their bodies on.
to the Chinook helicopter to send it.
It was really hard because I feel like I manifested that moment.

(01:12:02):
and it just sits in me.
And there's nothing I can do about it.
So there's finding the thing I want to do most, but also there's a loss in humanity at thesame time.
Because not only did Americans die, I also had to see Afghan children that were molested.

(01:12:28):
set on fire and put acid on their fucking bodies because they ate during Ramadan.
my God.
And I'm like, what the fuck people do this to little kids?
And so, there's the three things, right?
There's cruelty to children.

(01:12:50):
There's death of our brothers.
And there's this ultimate, like, what I should become comes out of this trip.
On the way home, just like, I'm going to come back here and I'm going to help people.

(01:13:11):
So I go back to school and I finished my degree in history and I study about the MiddleEast because I wanted to know like, why are people this way?
And why is it they have all these problems and what's with Islam and being Muslim and likeall that and Mecca, Medina and these places and Saudi Arabia and like, what's all that
about?
So I study a lot of that.

(01:13:32):
And I graduate.
but right before I graduate, I take one last class at school and it's called death anddying because I thought this class was going to offer like grieving methods and stuff.
But the class did offer me was this sweetheart of a lady and she, her name's Sean, whichis kind of funny because my brother's name is Sean.

(01:14:02):
really?
Right, so it's this funny thing and...
So I end up meeting my like.
college sweetheart in this last class.
This last class, death and dying.
I'm like, and it ends up being like an English class about grammar and spelling and I getlike answers wrong on tests because I can't spell deceased right.

(01:14:34):
It's just like, whatever.
so my now wife is there and.
This is the fall of 2006.
And at that same time, I signed up to go on active duty because I was in the NationalGuard on that first deployment.

(01:14:59):
So she still had like two years left to school at that time.
And I go directly in to becoming a Green Beret as I signed up to go to Fort Benning.
You know, I had already been a paratrooper and a big deal and go straight into thepipeline to go to selection.

(01:15:21):
And it was, it was pretty cool.
And awesome.
So you were like determined, you're like, am going to be one.
Yeah.
And, so, but I have a, I got a lot of fire that I can use when it's really, really dim.

(01:15:41):
When else can see your fire.
It's a nice lead into.
Book title, right?
Yes, yes.
And that's all, there's a lot that you can discuss about that.
But to think about the Q course, the qualification course to be a Green Beret is like twoyears long and just nonstop training.

(01:16:04):
Do you have to be selected?
So you got to go through a 21 day selection process and the majority of that is alone.
Right.
You're walking land navigation is by yourself.
There's a team week portion, but that's really not.

(01:16:25):
It's an individual event with other friends, essentially, that they construct theseapparatuses to create pain and the desire to quit is it.
And then with time to see how you treat other people.

(01:16:46):
It's easiest way I can say what it is.
You're fucking gonna suffer.
They just want to probably weed people out.
It's can we break you in 21 days?
Right.
And and it's all of mental, physical, all of it's there.
And for guys with this, in my opinion, that this is why a lot of special operators havechildhood trauma.

(01:17:10):
Is because we don't care.
It's like there's nothing you will be able to do to me out here in this woods.
Ever fucking break me.
Right ever I can see that
And it's like, so I can think about the possibilities of life all day long while I'mwalking through the woods or carrying hard things and like, are you gonna still feed me

(01:17:35):
and I'm still gonna sleep tonight?
That's not that bad of a day.
So I just, I'm made to feel uncomfortable.
Whatever, like you just have to just like.
Be comfortable with being uncomfortable, right?
like, it's just part of it.
And keep telling yourself that thousands of other people have done this before me, I cando it too.

(01:17:59):
And that's about the amount of mental fortitude that you need.
How did you feel during it where you just, like you said, you can't break me kind ofthing?
Were there times during those days where you're like, I can't do this?
It...
The time there changes you.

(01:18:24):
As like, as you start to get tired and has you get like exhausted from not eating enoughfood, it changes your perspective of the world.
Like we feel very like aperture way open right now.
But as that pressure is put on you, all you really see is like what's here in front ofyou.

(01:18:46):
And that's it.
And it just, takes a little bit of time.
But I think all the guys that are green berets, get to this point where they're like, thisis what I have to accomplish and this is all that matters.
Nothing else in my life matters.
And it's really, it's fun to be there because

(01:19:08):
Life doesn't really exist.
It's a way of disassociating from the reality of the world.
And that's kind of like deployments are easier than being here.
Because you're just so hyper fixated on something.
I've heard a lot of.
Mission, the objectives that I'm trying to achieve.
That's it.
That's That's I don't know how guys have kids and go to war.

(01:19:32):
Because I don't know how you do it.
There's a lot, there's a lot of heart there that I want to be there.
I can't be in two spots.
In way that you're, feel like you're torn apart.
So selection's not hard.

(01:19:53):
It's just days that you got to put in to get to the end.
And hopefully that you've shown enough to the evaluators and the cadre that are there thatyou did.
You've done all the things, to get selected and to move on into the actual likequalification course.
The, the, the whole entire entirety of the, the Q course.

(01:20:19):
is like phases and sections.
And so you go out to this place, Campbell Call, it's on the outside of Fort Bragg in NorthCarolina.
And you're there from six weeks, four weeks at times.
And then you come home and you spend like the weekend drinking and partying and then goingback out and you do this thing over and over.
For me, the hardest part was language school.

(01:20:40):
I learned French.
Tried to, really bad at school.
But I tried every day.
I showed up.
I kept on just going to class.
I tried.
I gave it everything I could.
I just couldn't pass these tests.
They're really difficult.
But the leadership that was in charge of all of this just gave me another shot.

(01:21:03):
Keep going at it, Trevor.
once again, another person showed up for me.
Which is like, this is a big deal, right?
There's people in my life keep...
being inserted into it to like get me, keep on keeping me going on and I feel like I'mfailing or falling apart.

(01:21:28):
There's someone there.
So we get to the whole Q course and everything.
I become a special forces communicator.
work with radios and computers and things like that.
Then one of my friends, Jay Sevier, is in this portion of this 18 Echo communicatorcourse.

(01:21:51):
And we go through one of the hardest parts of it.
It's called Max Gain, and we have to carry this 100 pound rucksack, and we've got to FMcommunications from here to Arizona, I don't know, somewhere in the United States.
It's really like a five day exercise that puts a lot of stress on us.

(01:22:16):
We all make it through it, all of our friends and everything, we make it.
And then we're going to Robin Sage, which is like the colex of everything to get yourgreen beret and move on to being an army guy.
And our friend Jay is running on a treadmill and his heart explodes, dies instantly.

(01:22:36):
Fuck.
It's all the boys.
Yeah.
So this is 2009.
So we have to go to Austin, Texas to bury him.
Already, right?
Haven't even graduated, we're already putting soldiers in the ground.

(01:23:00):
Hard.
It's just like an accident that happens and it's just, there's no answer to it.
So we take, like, we go to Austin and we have a great time.
Come home and like that loss, that person was there to like, you can make it.

(01:23:21):
And so Robin Sage is a real gut check of all of it, right?
So from the beginning of the Q Chorus to the end, it's like it stacks.
on each other.
in the beginning, it's just physical stuff and it slowly interjects mental things into it.
So now it's like this whole exercise of mental, physical, who you are morally andethically is all being challenged throughout this four week exercise of Robin Sage.

(01:23:56):
And it was phenomenal.
It was awesome because like building rapport with people isn't hard for me to toconversate to anyone doesn't seem and be relatable.
is what you needed to be able to do there to be successful.

(01:24:17):
So, oh, that's great.
know, it was awesome.
And I had done my green beret and.
I get married in December 2009 on the 19th.
I'm in Afghanistan 20 days later.
In a place I didn't want to be, so I work at the headquarters at Bagram.

(01:24:43):
And so I get to see a different perspective of the war though.
Because I was working for the Colonel and I was traveling around with the Generals.
So I get to see how the firebases are expanding and how many my friends are out fighting.

(01:25:04):
And I, in this, it's like a joint operation center.
It's like huge screens and like hundreds of computers, right?
And you can just see everything that's happening within the country.
And so every mission that's on it, like I'm looking through the names.
Like all my friends are there and like.

(01:25:26):
I get to meet all the guys that are coming in the country because the commander wants togo out and see all the ODA guys and all the Grim Berets that are coming in.
Then my friends start dying.
I'm there and I'm going to funerals.
Again
And all I want to do is like be on an ODA and be there.

(01:25:47):
I wanted, like, I didn't do all this work just to be in the headquarters element.
Right.
It's like an eight month deployment on there.
I come home and I'm back in Afghanistan like the next February.
Right.
So I come home in September and I'm back in Afghanistan in February and I'm there toDecember.

(01:26:10):
Right.
And this is my third rotation, probably my most significant hardship of deployments that Igo on.
And within the first month we're there, we're getting in gunfights.
But nothing like severe, just pop shots and weird things.

(01:26:31):
But one of the very first villages that we walked through, we had met up with some A &Aguys and they walked through the center of the village and we were on the outskirts of it.
And me and my friend Jake are on top of this building on like the, the Western side of thevillage.
And we're like watching like.

(01:26:53):
The guys like walk through the village just to kind of pull security for him.
And I just hear this loud explosion and dust like goes into the air.
Like Jake, what the fuck was that?
I've never seen anything like this before.
He's like, I'm pretty sure that...

(01:27:16):
the guy just was evaporated in front of us.
Then the same moment I hear a single gunshot and then the city erupts in gunfire.
Taliban member shoots a young girl in the head.

(01:27:36):
.
firefight takes and just mean Jake are just like at all that this human being just wasevaporated my other friends are fighting some of them are trying to save this little girl
we have a helicopter coming in at the same time pick her up

(01:27:57):
Right, we.
Yeah, we save her.
And it's really awesome that, months later, like, her dad came and thanked us.
For saving her life.
Yes.
We saved her.
my god.
And then it's just a summer full of gunfights and killing.

(01:28:20):
just, there's a lot of there's, and this is how complex PTSD is created.
PTSI, PTS, however you want to define it.
I love all of it.
is that there's not a lot of alcohol to drink.
So how do I.

(01:28:41):
get relief from what's going on.
There's opium that we smoke every little bit every once in a while.
I start taking diazepam a lot.
There's a lot of volume on the open market and I just start chewing value like nothing.
It's candy just, and it just numbed every numbed it all.

(01:29:04):
And I got used to doing that a lot of using substances like that to.
drain out all the pain of the and where I was currently at.
Right.
I've.
home.
On my...

(01:29:24):
what is this now?
20...
I come home on my second wedding anniversary and I end up looking at my wife
And I had.
drinking a whole bottle of Jameson and I chased it with Ambien.

(01:29:48):
Not good.
And we have an argument and it goes like this.
You can't tell me what the fuck to do until you pay the mortgage.
Mmm.
And then I pass out in front of her and split my head open.
And I come through in the bathroom and my wife's like 105 pounds.

(01:30:12):
And I'm bleeding everywhere.
what the fuck is going on, right?
And that's when problems inside of me started to come back up again.
Cause I'm drinking too much and I'm using different types of narcotics like trimadol,Ambien and

(01:30:40):
and you're not hyper-focused anymore.
Right, so now I'm home.
But we're back in Afghanistan six months later again.
Yeah.
So after, so this is my fourth deployment.
And right before I came home from that last deployment, I tried a drug cut, whatever.

(01:31:04):
It's a synthetic opiate that makes everything feel phenomenal.
I went back and I stuck everything into my veins, I possibly could.
I never got in trouble with it.
I hid everything, I think, fairly well.
Obviously I'm still in the army.

(01:31:27):
Yeah
And I was managing all of that pain that was in me from a little kid to my friends dyingto the loss of loved ones and my friends committing suicide.

(01:31:47):
I just couldn't take it.
It was so fucking hard.
and the first time I ever stuck a needle in my veins.
was as much as exhilarating as the first time he touched me.

(01:32:07):
It's the same feeling.
The rush, the warmth.
And that's really hard.
And then shooting up becomes...
very methodical.
All of it feels phenomenal of drawing medicine or filling up or seeing a flash of blood inthe needle is something that once you do, you always want to have in your life.

(01:32:44):
Which I can see why it's like so hard to get off of.
heroin.
I don't think that you know and with me doing you know over 20 years with addiction andpsych and everything what you just said almost every single heroin addict I've ever come

(01:33:06):
across says the same exact thing.
They say the same exact thing.
Yeah.
That it's so for me that's why I always think to myself
but God, you guys all know this.
You know, it's like Russian roulette.
You're doing that and you just never know.

(01:33:28):
But you know if you do it one time, you're always gonna want it.
That's where I struggle with addiction and addicts.
thing is is that I can my my mind tells me it won't happen to me I'm stronger than thedrug

(01:33:54):
There's a lie in there, right?
was just a little.
But that voice that lies to you is the same voice throughout all of the things ofaddiction, of depression, of suicidal ideation.
Sometimes it's just louder or quieter at different times.

(01:34:16):
And life tends to put pressure on one or the other.
It's great.
You don't hear it.
Little things happen here and there, it's not so bad.
You lose your house, it's screaming at you that you're an awful person.

(01:34:36):
Might as well just go back.
Mm-hmm.
So you're doing this while you're there now.
Yeah.
Then what?
mean, like, do you just stop?
Or you don't?
So this synthetic opiate, I wasn't using heroin.
Okay.

(01:34:57):
There's a cap in it that you can only use so much in like a 24 hour period where yourbody, like there's a plateau and you can't overdose.
I essentially stopped using that drug because there is no more.

(01:35:20):
It's not accessible to get here in the States as easy.
It's within the medical, but it's not like you can just.
So with what you just said, how did you go from there?
You have this high, you have this feeling.
Why didn't you, when you came back home, why didn't you do heroin?

(01:35:41):
Or seek it?
So I got more into like Oxycontin and Trimadol and different opiates than...
because I knew heroin would kill me.
Probably.
I think.
Yeah.

(01:36:03):
And so I come home from that fourth deployment.
My wife gets pregnant with our daughter.
How is she doing during all this?
So she is working, so my wife's a behavioralist and she's working at an autism clinicaround Raleigh Durham and she's also getting her masters at this point.

(01:36:29):
The first 36 months that we were married, I was in Afghanistan for 25 months.
I was never home.
Thankfully, she was really busy with school and yeah.
And so she was going to school and every deployment she would design another room in herhouse and that would get done and then I leave and I come back and there's another room

(01:36:54):
done.
She made a beautiful home for us.
She just had a sick husband that...
You can't see it.
She knows it's there, but it's not obvious.
Right?
That there's this sadness inside me that she knows exists, but it doesn't always, it's notalways around.

(01:37:22):
It was really good at keeping it, compartmentalizing a lot of it.
Then I go back.
I go back again for like a one month thing to reenlist in the army and I'm shooting upagain there like crazy.
And I come back home and I start to realize that something's not right.

(01:37:46):
And I just like, I think my testosterone isn't okay.
I'm like, what's going on?
I need to go get sleep studies.
I need to try and figure out what's really wrong.
What's, what is not right in me?
That's not what's really wrong.
Right.
And then we go, let me go search for all the things that could potentially be making mefeel depressed and lethargic and not wanting to live.

(01:38:14):
It has nothing to do with my past or how much I'm drinking.
Not at all.
So I get all these tests done and all this stuff and I start going to therapy and Istarted talking about all this stuff that happened as a kid and
how it makes me feel and...

(01:38:36):
I
decide that like the ODA life isn't really for me at that moment because my team sergeantwas like your daughter's on the way.
and you need to be home for her because I wasn't home for my two girls and I'm gonna makethat decision for you.

(01:39:01):
His name's Benjamin Tabber.
He, I think, saved me as a dad and I truly honor it.
But I apply to go get my master's degree at the same moment in time.
And I didn't fully understand like what it meant to write a thesis or what it meant tolearn about strategic studies.

(01:39:31):
Well, you had difficulty.
Right.
a stupid, it was Marshall McGurk, who is my commander.
He's like, I think you do well.
You you went to Purdue, like you have a history degree, you'll do fine.
It's, you know, it's a 10 month program.
You'll be able to go there.
You won't have to do any army stuff at all.
Just go there and focus on that.

(01:39:51):
Okay.
All right.
You convinced me.
But as I get into the school, I start to see the complexities of Washington, DC.
politics is eyes wide open to the whole diplomacy, intelligence, military stuff, economicstuff's all being shown and gathered into my brain about this.

(01:40:18):
I, I'm not really happy with what I'm learning.
And it really starts to spiral me down into those people in Washington don't care about usservice members at all.
They just were leveraged for them to inflict pain onto other countries.
And it just spirals me down into like, at this moment, I started drinking like bottles ofwine.

(01:40:43):
And from college, I knew I couldn't drink liquor because I drink it like beer.
And it really, really puts me over.
Extremely drunk.
And I didn't want to get overboard, right?
I'm trying to stay in that middle portion and beer allows you to do that a lot easier thanshots of liquor.

(01:41:08):
Is wine in the middle?
Wine's in the middle?
Wine, wine's there because wine helps you write a lot.
And there's a lot in this program, there's a lot of writing that's needed to be done andit lets this language flow, right?
And then I would edit drinking coffee the next day at coffee shop.

(01:41:31):
So I'm getting, I'm get, all right, I have my childhood shit, I got war shit that I'vekilled people.
I'm learning about politics and what's happening in America and way that we fight wars andwhat it all means and who we are.
And I go on like a bender for like three days.

(01:41:53):
And I'm in my car at Fort Bragg and I stop in front of the hospital, I'm drunk.
name.
Like if I did, I have two options here.
Either I'm going to go onto the drop zone and kill myself.
Wow.
So you're deep.

(01:42:14):
Yeah, not good.
Okay.
Right.
Because I've like, I've been drinking too much.
And as, as I hit like the third day of being the world starts to become black inside me,and I don't see any value for me to live.
And there's some, there you can, there's a discussion about risk management that we havewithin the army that sees threats.

(01:42:41):
And
As I drink a lot, I start to see myself as a threat to my kids and my wife.
Okay, Trevor, you have a hell of a story, so this is gonna be part one.
We're gonna cut it off here and then start part two.
Okay?