Breaking Free from Weed Addiction: Omar's Sobriety Journey and the Hidden Dangers of Marijuana and Body Dysmorphia

In this powerful episode , we sit down with Omar at the cottage to dive deep into his journey from marijuana dependency to sobriety. Originally from Toronto and now living in Denver, Omar shares how weed became a crutch during personal and professional traumas, the insidious nature of its cumulative effects, and the profound health benefits he gained from quitting. From body dysmorphia to the societal pressures fueling addiction, this candid conversation uncovers the hidden dangers of legalized marijuana and offers hope for those struggling. Learn about the neurological pathways of addiction, the impact of high-potency THC, and practical tools for recovery. If you or someone you know is battling addiction, this episode is a must-watch for inspiration and actionable insights. Don’t forget to like, subscribe, and share to support honest conversations about sobriety!

We discuss: weed addiction, marijuana dependency, sobriety journey, overcoming addiction, THC dangers, mental health, body dysmorphia, recovery tools, legalized marijuana, addiction recovery

• 00:00 - Introduction: Setting the Scene at the Cottage
• 00:27 - Meet Omar: From Toronto to Austin to Denver
• 01:19 - Omar’s Story: How Personal Traumas Led to Weed Dependency
• 02:27 - The Hidden Dangers of Legalized Marijuana
• 03:30 - Shocking Stats: Marijuana vs. Alcohol Daily Users
• 04:15 - Rising THC Potency and Its Addictive Impact
• 05:16 - Health Benefits of Sobriety: Weight Loss, Better Sleep, and More
• 07:38 - What Weed Addiction Looks Like: Omar’s Experience
• 08:23 - The Neurological Pathway of Addiction: The River Analogy
• 10:17 - Physical Toll: Hormonal Imbalance and Adrenal Fatigue
• 11:18 - How Addiction Steals Joy and Relationships
• 13:06 - Weed as a Tool vs. Abuse: The Hammer Metaphor
• 14:11 - Creativity and Weed: Myth or Reality?
• 16:11 - The Addiction Ladder: Stepping Down from Hard Drugs
• 19:13 - Withdrawal Challenges: Sleep Issues and GI Distress
• 22:08 - Addressing Underlying Trauma to Sustain Sobriety
• 24:28 - Body Dysmorphia: A Silent Struggle for Men
• 29:07 - Testosterone Replacement Therapy (TRT): Benefits and Risks
• 34:19 - Rationalizing Addiction: Confirmation Bias and Mental Gymnastics
• 37:41 - Body Dysmorphia in Men: Societal Pressures and Social Media
• 43:12 - Consequences of Overtraining Due to Body Dysmorphia
• 46:30 - Cross-Addiction: Trading Weed for Workaholism
• 50:34 - Tools for Tough Days: Community, Exercise, and Love
• 56:54 - Final Message: Hope and a Brighter Future in Sobriety
• 58:17 - Closing Thoughts and Call to Action

Episode Transcript

(00:23):
Well, this is different. We are up at the cottage, hence
the different scenery. I'm with my good friend Omar.
He's he's not from Texas, but yeah.
Do you want to explain the hat alittle bit?
Because I love it. I think it looks great.
Yeah, after So I'm originally from Toronto and Canada, but I

(00:43):
moved down to Austin, TX. Lived there for about 3 years,
hence the hat. It's the summer season.
You look great. You know, us follically
liberated men could use the right headwear.
Follically liberated? Yeah, that's awesome, man.

(01:03):
So you used to live in Toronto, you went to school in in Canada.
Why don't you tell us a little bit about your story and how you
you know, why you wanted to do this?
I think I think that's. Important.
Yeah. So I said went to undergrad in
Toronto, worked overseas for several years, moved back to

(01:26):
Toronto in 2016, had some had some personal traumas both
professionally and personally inlate 2016, early 17.
That which is right around the time that weed liberalization
was taking hold in Canada, weed liberalizing just prior to to to

(01:51):
legalization in 2018. And I kind of used weed on a
daily basis. To.
Kind of run away from my problems as a, as a
tranquilizer. And I used it for many, many
years. I'm, you know, long time sober
and obviously I, I, I love what you're doing with this podcast
and it's just, I think it's helping so many people.

(02:12):
And I wanted to add to the conversation a little bit
because I think that marijuana, THC, weed, all of this whole
group of products, given the legalization, decriminalization
movement, I live in Denver, Co right now.
So obviously that, that was one of the first places to legalize.
I think that people don't take weed very seriously as a drug.
And I didn't take it very seriously.

(02:35):
And that's why it was able to get its claws in me.
I, I used to call it death by nanometers in that one joint
isn't going to do much. 100 joints might not do much, but
you do it day in, day out, months turn into years turns
into a decade. And it has, it can have a
profound cumulative impact and it does it, it may not be like a

(02:57):
cocaine or alcoholism where it, it, it is as addictive in the
moment, but it's very easy for people to get to develop
dependencies. And I mean, we were talking
about this a little bit earlier.Wheat is an interesting
legalized weed is very interesting in that when you
look at the the cannabis industry, roughly speaking, and

(03:19):
it depends on the numbers you look at and whether you're
looking at Canada or the US, butroughly speaking, anywhere from
it's about a third of customers in the industry are daily users.
And the the numbers right aroundlegalization in 2018 in, in in
Canada were roughly 80%. So if if 80% of people who drank
alcohol were daily users, that would be a public health crisis.

(03:40):
Yeah, people would be freaking out.
Yeah. People would be freaking out.
And there are now more daily users of marijuana, at least in
the US than there are of alcohol.
And so people don't understand that this industry doesn't, it's
not an industry that has customers.
It's an industry that creates addicts.
And if you look at the the strength of the product, like

(04:02):
the DEA, so the the Drug Enforcement Administration in
the US, they used to seize back in marijuana was, well, it's
still federally illegal in America, but they used to seize
marijuana in the US And in the 90s when they would test it, it
was 5 to 7% THC. Nowadays, the average is 17
percent, 20 percent, 25%. So the product has gotten so

(04:23):
much more more powerful and it'sgotten so much more addictive.
It's having so much more of an impact on people.
And people just don't realize how insidious this product can
be, and it can have this great cumulative impact.
So I wanted to come on this podcast to raise the flag to
people. I have many people in my life
who smoke it on a daily basis. And for some people, doesn't

(04:44):
have too much of a negative impact, but they don't actually
know what their life would be like if they took it away.
Yeah. Potential that what?
What could you be doing right? So I was telling you what, when
I got clean, when I got sober, Ipermanently lost 20 lbs
permanently got leaner, permanently got healthier.
My cardiovascular fitness went up, my VO2 Max went up, my sleep

(05:07):
quality went up. My R.E.M. sleep went up from
about under 60 minutes a night to about, you know, an hour 45.
I have, I have a loop fitness monitor.
So I could tangibly look at all of these different health
markers that just exploded upwards from sobriety.
And so people, again, they don'ttake it seriously.
It's weed. It's, it's, it's fine.

(05:28):
And it's preferably called a gateway drug and it's fine for
some people to use in moderation, but it can be very,
it can be a very serious addiction that can really
undermine your long term health and really impact your life.
Like on a very personal basis here.
I mean, it cost me my last job, my very high end career because

(05:50):
I wasn't able to really bring it.
I wasn't able to be super productive.
I wasn't able to recover and sleep properly.
And over the long term, if you're smoking weed every single
day, it measurably lowers your IQ.
Now that will bounce back when you become sober.
But do you want to be less intelligent?
Like it's not worth doing? So I just wanted to like, raise
the like, have a conversation about this, 'cause I, I see that

(06:12):
you're, you're, you're going through and having conversations
with people about all these different, different substances.
And I thought it would it would be valuable to.
Absolute conversation. Yeah, absolutely.
It doesn't get talked about enough.
And when I first started this podcast, you know, my my aim was
to stay sober and help other addicts and Alcoholics or anyone
that's suffering with mental health, kind of maybe just open

(06:32):
their eyes and shift their perspective a little bit.
And, you know, maybe I do have aproblem here.
Maybe I could do this. Maybe I could try this.
Because when I first came into recovery, that was the message
conveyed unto me. Nobody was like, you got to get
sober. You know, you come over to the
side, it's way better. They kind of there was like this
attraction rather than promotionkind of thing where it was like
I was seeing all these people live a better life and be happy

(06:53):
and, you know, manage problems and deaths and disease and get
through it sober and then aspireand, and, you know, become much
more and achieve their goals. And, and that's something I
always wanted. I just wanted to like have goals
and be able to achieve them. Be a man of my word, right.
If I said I was going to show up, I want to show up and I, I
do my best to do that today. I'm really interested in this

(07:15):
idea of, you know, if you're watching this right now and
you're you're smoking weed everyday and you're like, or you
know, someone that is smoking weed everyday and you're like,
yeah, but you know, I go to workor it's not addictive from a
scientific, you know, standpointthere's right.
So can you. How did it become addictive for
you? And what did addiction to weed

(07:36):
look like? Yeah, so I'm going to use a
metaphor. I was.
I was in Utah last weekend. I love.
Utah. It's gorgeous, man.
And so like way it works is water from the Pacific kind of
evaporates and it, it dumps the snow in the Rockies and then
that snow melts and then it, it,it, it, that all that water
finds its way down to the Gulf and it, it carves out the

(07:58):
Colorado River, which basically feeds most of the western US.
And that goes through Austin. It's like all the way from
Denver. That's where the, the headwaters
are AT. And that river carved its way
over thousands of years. And I, I use the metaphor that
that's kind of what meat addiction looks like.
That river started as a trickle.And every time you take a puff
of a joint and every time you take a joint and it carves a

(08:18):
little bit of a deeper groove and a deeper groove and a deeper
groove. And it creates this neurological
pathway. Every day you just smoke that,
smoke that joint before bed. It'll help you sleep.
And that's that's how the dependence grows over time.
It's not physically addictive, but it becomes behaviorally
addictive. And for me, the pathway became,

(08:38):
you know, a stressful day at work.
I'm going to smoke a joint that's going to help me calm
down. Then I'm going to eat, I'm going
to eat a lot. I would have a couple 1000
calories and then the next day Iwouldn't eat breakfast, Maybe
I'd skip lunch. So I was in this, you know,
binge binge eating cycle. And then I would fast and not
eat for 12 to 16 hours. So I was in this crazy cycle
where I was eating a ton of food, very unhealthy food often

(09:01):
times, and then not, then not eating for 12/16 hours the next
day. And then my cortisol would be
spiking the next day. So I was putting my body through
this crazy physiological stress and I'm going to get, I'm kind
of a biohacker. I look, I like to look at the
numbers and I have all the symptoms of adrenal fatigue
that's kind of leftover from this.
Just put, I've put my body through so much stress doing

(09:23):
that. And also like at one point in
time, like at my very, very worst and my lowest point, I was
270 lbs. I'm now 222 lbs.
I've lost nearly 50 lbs and keptit off from my worst point.
That's not good for your body. It's not good for your joints,
it's not good for your heart. It's not good for your
cholesterol. It's not good for your blood
sugar. I mean, I don't know how many

(09:43):
years off my life, of my life expectancy I shaved off from
that, but that's horrendous. Not to mention the hormonal
impact. There's, there's a deep hormonal
impact. At one point I'd crashed my
testosterone levels to a very, very low number and had to get
medicated on that, on that front, which we've talked about.
So there's just a huge amount ofphysical damage you take by
doing this day in, day out, day in, day out.

(10:05):
And so that's what the dependence looked like for me.
It was a stress reliever. It was a way to turn off, turn
off my brain. It was a way to like I, I
thought to help my sleep, but inin fact, I was eroding my sleep
quality. But, and in reality, I was just
damaging every aspect of my health slowly over time, just,
you know, death by 1000 cuts. Yeah.

(10:27):
And you, you found that stuff out through blood work, the
testosterone and stuff like that.
And yeah, and. How I felt, I mean, you know,
like you, you definitely feel that when when you're out on a
date and you just your libido drops you.
Know your mood is lower. Your desire to do things is
lower apathy towards everything.You know, I mean, I, I didn't

(10:48):
want to play with my cats. Like, I just was being a bad cat
dad at one point. Like it's just stuff like that,
Yeah. Stuff that you normally like to
that that's what addiction did for, you know, to me, it all
these things that I loved and passions I had in my life, they
just didn't matter anymore, right?
Because the drug kind of, and toyour point, you know, even
though weed is not directly addictive from a scientific

(11:08):
level, for a neurological standpoint, you start to place
weed and said substance, whatever, I don't care what the
fuck it is, it's all the same. It's how we use it, right?
Above everything else, above relationships, above your job,
it's first priority no matter what, right?
So if you're spending all that time in mental bandwidth towards

(11:30):
acquiring, using, recovering from said drug, you know, weed
in your scenario, that's a lot of time, it's a lot of energy,
it's a lot of resources, right? You know, what else could you be
doing instead? You know.
I can't tell you. So I was like life hunting.
I was looking for a partner. Now, thankfully I found a a
great gal that I'm with now, butI was looking for a partner

(11:52):
during this period of time. And I can't tell you how many
dates I was on where I was just jonesing to go home and get high
and I just like had a pleasant date and I just went home at the
end of it because I didn't I didn't wanted to pursue it
further. And I don't know how many like
missed connections that may havecreated that is that is the
classic addiction cycle where it's just like you, you're.
You're. You, you change your behaviors

(12:15):
in order to accommodate the addiction and it's you, you
again, it's, it's not physiologically addictive, but
it's behaviorally addictive in this scenario.
And that's why I want to raise the flag that hey guys, that,
that joint you smoke or that bowl you, you smoke every night.
It may be fine to do now, but ina year's time or three years

(12:36):
time, that cumulative effect has, you know, carve such a
pathway in your brain that you need to be aware of a little bit
of a long term consequence. Yeah, yeah.
And that, you know, I think to your point, it's like there's
there's a lot of people out there that can kind of pick up
weed once in a while, right, Andput it down and and, you know,
be more creative or help their sleep or help alleviate some

(12:57):
pain. There's benefits, right?
But it's like any fucking drug and substance and alcohol and
it's I, I love Rogan says this. It's my one of my favorite
quotes. She's like, drugs are like a, a
hammer. You know, I can use a hammer to
build a beautiful house. I can also use a hammer to bash
my brains in until I'm dead. You know, some people can build

(13:17):
that beautiful house. I've tried many times.
I've tried to build that house with the hammer many times.
And I've gotten this like pile of rubble and where I'm just
like lying on the floor and bashing my head in over and over
again because they stopped working.
They stopped reaching that desired effect.
And I, you know, the tolerance builds and I need more and I
need more. I wanted to talk about

(13:38):
creativity a little bit because you're, you're a creative guy.
You know, we were talking, we, we talk a lot.
And I love you, man. I'm really, I'm happy that you
came on and did this. I'm happy that you were so
passionate about it. And I appreciate all the words.
And I was really looking forwardto this one for a while.
Yeah. And you're not here a lot.
So it's, it's nice to, to have you for the weekend.
Thank. You for hosting me?
Man, Yeah, of course we're gonnahave a good weekend.

(13:58):
So what do you say to people that say, like I I'm not
creative without it, My best ideas come from weed.
Like, did you ever have that experience where you thought
that that was the case? Yeah, man, so it's so funny you
say that. Like me and my girlfriend, we
ask each other all the time, like if money was no object,
what would we be doing? My answer, my answer is
literally always like I'd be writing sci-fi or I'd be

(14:21):
creating animated shorts for kids like fables, heroic Tales,
'cause we want to have kids overthe next few years.
And, and I want to tell them, I want to tell them fairy tales to
teach them good lessons. I want to create that like, but
all, all of those ideas I had, Ihad them on weed.
So yeah, I get the create creative impulse now.

(14:43):
It, it's, it's unambiguously true that if you are, are on
mind altering substances, you can think you may create all
these amazing connections like all these sci-fi books.
I want to write all of them. All these ideas came on weed.
So I I fully understand the the idea of using substance as a
muse. And if you can, it's again going
back to the conversation of use versus abuse, if you can use it

(15:05):
as a tool. Turn it off.
Yeah, that's great. In my scenario, because I abused
it, that pathway is carved. It's an addiction pathway.
Now I can't ever touch it again.It's just I'm not going to go
there again. I now I got to use coffee.
Coffee is a productivity booster.
Same. Yeah, I love that.
It's a great answer. And you know, also too, what was
your, you know, all those ideas are great.

(15:27):
What's the execution like? Right.
Like I can have a million. I can't tell you how many times
I had a million ideas to change the world on coke with.
Like, you know, when you're in the room with everybody and it's
like, yeah, we're going to do this and that, Well, man, we'll
start this fucking movie and we're going to film a movie and
do all this next day. It's like you never want to talk
to that guy again, right? Like it's the last thing on your
mind. So I think there's a there's a
gap between idea and execution. And for me, it's like that

(15:52):
abusion just isn't, isn't possible, you know, if I'm
consumed in the world of, you know, drugs and alcohol.
Now, to your point, there's a lot of people that can kind of
get the inspiration and then turn, you know, turn it into an
idea that way. But yeah, I I appreciate that.
And I definitely understand everything you're saying.
But one of the point I wanted tomake and we talked about again,
we talked about this a little bit earlier, I kind of view

(16:14):
addiction as a ladder. And there are much more severe
and dangerous things like the cocaines and heroines of the
world and weeds probably up lower on the ladder.
And so if you're moving from a heroin down to weed.
Please do that. Don't, please don't take my
message as as like, don't do that.
Like that's not what I'm trying to say.
But just think, think of the addiction ladder and try to step

(16:36):
down the ladder over time to like get get yourself to a place
of that that we're at sober, we're happy, we're healthy.
We're, you know, we're in, we'regood relationships, we're
building ourselves up. We're we're, we're be trying to
be good men. That's what we want for every
all the listeners, right? Yeah, yeah, 100%.
And but I, I'm, I'm not trying to like, if, if you're going to
use weed as a tool to step down the ladder, please do it.
But also understand there are long term consequences and don't

(16:59):
stay on it too long. That's kind of the message.
I think it's important. I love that analogy.
If you're drinking every day andyou know a joint here and there
kind of helps ease the pain of getting off, fuck more power to
you, right? But yeah, we're if, if now weed
is replacing. And this has happened to me.
Not with actually, yeah, there was a point where I was smoking

(17:19):
weed. Actually, there was a point
where I was smoking weed just not to do cocaine.
And it worked for a short periodof time.
But I'd inevitably, you know, I'm on the ladder and that
cocaine was so much more enticing because the weed
started giving me anxiety. And then I was falling asleep
and I was, you know, I want to go out with my friends.
And all those initial promises of cocaine that worked for the

(17:39):
first bit for me. Any, any amphetamine, any
stimulant for me, there was a period of life where it worked.
It made me, you know, more talkative, more fun, in my
opinion, more funny. I was able to, you know, stay up
later, do more work until it worked, until it didn't, right.
And so it, like I said, if that's helping you get down the

(18:01):
ladder, but yeah, there's a point in time where for me, it's
like that next step was like, ohman, I miss cocaine so much.
And then I would inevitably go back And the river was already,
you know, the one thing I liked,we talked about this too with
the with the river analogy. I love that analogy.
Every day you're sober and I'm sober, we're slowly throwing
shovels of dirt back on the river, right.

(18:22):
Unfortunately, if I pick up, if I and this podcast always says
turn off today, go out here and pick up a drink, somebody's
throwing a I'm throwing a bomb on that river and then the the
Canyon is opening back up again and.
It's flood. Flooding.
Yeah. Right.
Because I, I've proven that I picked up right where I left
off. And then on Monday when we.
I'm calling my dealer, like there's no doubt about it,

(18:43):
right? It starts with one drink.
And inevitably I'm like, man, remember how fun that one line
was that one time and you forgetting all the shenanigans
after and the people you were hanging out with and the places
you went to, Right. So I think I love that analogy.
It's great. Yeah.
And it's a, it's a hard process.If you've been dependent on on
any molecule for a very long period of time, it's going to be

(19:04):
hard to come off. I mean, my experience was the
1st 28 days after I quit and I went cold Turkey, which was
pretty tough. And I don't.
Don't recommend that it's. Like this, the impacts on my
sleep and my GI. The GI distress was pretty
intense, but 28 days to correct my sleep, that was really tough.
But once you get to the eye of the needle, you're pretty good.
It took me about 60 days for allphysical effects to go away.

(19:28):
There was some some GI distress and some some.
GI like intestinal? Yeah.
Yeah, digestive issues. Digestive issues, some diarrhea,
anxiety because you're as you'rewithdrawing like I was
physically dependent on those end those cannabinoids that THE
that tetrahydro cannabinoid thatwould help with anxiety and then
and then amp it up. It would make you paranoid to
the moment, but it would also help like helps you calm down.

(19:50):
So there's all there's a whole menu of things that you're going
to experience in that process. It's just a really important
exercise. Take care of yourself, eat well,
all the all, all the things thathelp with all addictions.
Let's just the the the playbook is basically the same for all
addictions, for recovery across all addictions.
But to your point, you're an example of it is possible.

(20:12):
You know, you've done it. Sure, it was hard, but sometimes
you just need to grip the steering wheel and get through.
And you know, there's lots of support out there, which is I
try to stress that home every single episode, man.
Like you're not alone. If you don't have money, you
know, there's people that have done it without resources
before, right? It's it's how willing am I to
fucking stop being a prisoner ofdrugs and alcohol today?

(20:35):
You know, am I willing to go to any lengths to get sober?
Because I'll tell you right now,and I'm sure you can relate to
this, being out on that date, being out on that thing,
thinking about drugs. I was willing to go to any
lengths to get drugs and alcohol, you know, And it's
funny the other day, you know, Ididn't really want to go to my
meeting that I had to go to. And my beautiful wife always
reminds me and I get the tough love when I need it, but she

(20:56):
goes, yeah, you know, I was complaining about the lack of
air conditioning in the the roomand it's already hot and you
know, I don't want all this stuff, right?
And she goes, that's funny. If there was a bar with no air
conditioning, you would have been there getting drunk.
And and she's like, and you know, fuck, she's right again,
right. It's true, though, man.
Like if I'm willing to walk uphill both ways in a snowstorm

(21:19):
to get cocaine. And I was, I, I remember one
time I drove from Toronto to to Guelph and back, right?
Why? Why can't I do that to to get
sober, to stay sober, to stay healthy, right?
Because it's hard. It is hard.
And the benefit takes time to realize, you know, you didn't
get the benefits after day two or three.

(21:39):
Not at all. Quite the opposite, right?
But there's like this for addicts and Alcoholics, there's
like this delayed gratification versus instant gratification.
You know, if I have a iPhone, and I've said this before, I
have an iPhone and I have the house I want to buy, the
iphone's always right here, you know, and the house is down the
road. It's like a matter of hold on a
minute, just relax on the iPhone, bring the house closer.

(22:02):
Maybe skip the iPhone for now sothat the house is in closer
proximity. And often one of the things, and
this was definitely the case with me, the addiction is
masking A deeper pain, deeper trauma.
Really, guys, like especially tomen, go see a therapist, go talk
to somebody, reach out to your best friends, talk to your, your
if you're a religious, talk to your priest, your imam, your,

(22:25):
your rabbi, whatever the case may be, get help because that
deeper trauma is that is the fuel that's probably animating
that or or energizing this addiction.
You have no idea how. Like for me, it was like I said,
through some personal traumas, I'd moved to the USI was alone.
I had no network that that was very hard.

(22:46):
I mean, I was going through likewhen I was working 70, yeah, 70
hours a week, wasn't sleeping well.
Like all of these things they like all added up to just, it
would just, it was the path of least resistance was to continue
the addiction and that wasn't the right move.
And so if you could just take a step back, take a deep breath

(23:06):
and figure out like what it, what is the thing or group of
things that is energizing this addiction?
If you could mitigate or like work on them a little bit, it
can also help you take that first step towards recovery and
have a sustainable recovery. Because I like, I've, I've been
sober three separate times for extended periods of, of my life

(23:27):
in that, in the period that I was, quote UN quote, addicted.
So three major relapses, but I'dnever addressed the root cause
until, you know, until the last couple of years.
And that when I addressed that root cause, it was a much more
sustainable sobriety. Yeah, yeah.
I couldn't agree more. And it took me, you know, a
bunch of treatment and three rehabs probably to realize the

(23:50):
underlying factor. It usually for me, it comes down
to not enough. And if I were to specify, not
enough. I'm not enough drugs, you know,
one line of cocaine's not enough.
One alcohol. It's a disease of not enough.
I've heard that before, which I love disease of perception as
well. Like I look at the world
differently, but if I were to narrow it down, yeah, like, you
know, and and I'll let you get into that.

(24:11):
I just want to finish with this quick point.
But if I could narrow down to the not enough thing, I had a
lot of body dysmorphia issues, which is what another reason why
I got on the testosterone and I'm still on it and I'm working
my way to come off of it becauseto some degree it is a clutch, a
crutch, sorry, clutch. It's a crutch.
I don't like the way I look. And I think that and from a, you

(24:32):
know, whatever fat, you know, not muscular enough, not enough
that I need to fill that hole with, you know, I walk into a
room, you're talking about me with your friends.
I'm sure of it, even though you're not.
You don't even know who the fuckI am.
You could care less. You're talking about me with
your friends. And I don't like the
conversation that I'm projectingonto you that you're having

(24:52):
about me, right. That's just like a daily kind of
every once in awhile I'll have that scenario.
And so I need to fill this hole with drugs and alcohol because
it to your point, it turns down the knob.
Yeah, on anxiety, it turns down the knob.
On you're a piece of shit. It turns down the knob and it
comes down to not enough. And I don't love myself.
Right. Yeah, Yeah, I want to double

(25:13):
click into that body dysmorphia because I could so relate to
that. And I think that that's
something that we as managed to talk.
About Yeah. And we never do.
And so I also got on TRT to. Testosterone replacement
therapy. Testosterone replacement
therapy. That's right for my, for me, my
crashed my hormones got on it partially part of the reason I
stayed on it was again, the bodydysmorphia.
I, I grew up fat and then I lostweight and then I gained a lot

(25:36):
of weight like 50 lbs. Well, depending on what time
period, 30 to £50 because of theweed addiction.
And then when I got on the TRT, it helped me lose a ton of
weight. It gave me the energy to, to, to
work out again. I got muscular, I got felt super
good. And so I was supposed to come
off the TRT within a year, but, and they told me to, but I chose

(25:58):
to stay on it because I liked the way it made me look and
feel. And that was a big mistake
because I ended up staying on itfor three years.
And I did that so that I could keep my weed addiction.
And so like one addiction created, I don't want to call it
the TRT second addiction, but itwas one dependence created a

(26:18):
second dependence. And you know, I'm still paying
the consequence. So I'm, I told you, I'm
transitioning off of that because we want to have kids in
the next couple of years. And thankfully my body is, is
responding to, to, to all the, to, to the treatment plan, to,
to, to, to turn back on, which is amazing.
Not everybody has that thing. But three years is a long time
to be on TRT for, for guys our age.
And so there are physiological consequences.

(26:40):
Like I'm still paying the price of my addiction.
So on the body dysmorphia front,I wanted to talk about like body
inflation. So and, and I wanted to give
again. I, I, I'm gonna give a example
here. If you go back to the the
superhero movies, if you go backto X-Men 1, Wolverine, Hugh
Jackman, well, he wasn't super jacked in X-Men one.
He actually that's a good point.He was a regular dude if.

(27:01):
You go back to Deadpool versus Wolverine last year, he's so
shredded in muscular whatever and veins.
Popping out. Yeah, yeah, there's this.
There's been this massive physical inflation among men in
terms of like the expectations that societies and there's
always this and there's inflation on women too, and the
expectations. Let's just kind of keep this
grounded in men because men are 12 times more likely to be
addicted than women. So I think this podcast is more

(27:22):
aimed at men, but I women too can benefit from this.
I don't want to exclude them from the conversation, but the
body dysmorphia thing is real. And the TR like I just know what
what's happening on my Instagramand I know what's happening on
my friends Instagram because a lot of them are being marketed
to super aggressively to get on TRT in their 30s.
And people talk to me because I'm pretty, I'm pretty open

(27:43):
about the fact that I was on it.And I'm telling you guys, don't
get on this until you have kids.Don't get on this.
It's not worth it. Most of the people, most of the
fitness influencers, you, you see, they're already on steroids
or TRT or something. The body dysmorphia thing again
comes back to you have to havingto heal, heal your own personal
trauma and, and, and, and, and heal that, that, that cognitive

(28:06):
distortion in the way you see the world.
I saw myself as super, super fatand like, it's so interesting to
like talk to my girlfriend who'slike very beautiful, gorgeous
woman, like unbelievable. And she's, she's like, Oh my
God, Oh my, you're, you're so fit, you're so handsome.
I'm like, I don't see that at. All.
And it's insane to me that she she thinks that.
And I'm like, there's something broken up here and I need to

(28:29):
address. And that's something I'm dealing
with my therapist right now. And that comes from yours
weightlifting in the bodybuilding community where
everyone's on steroids. So if all you do is look at
steroid users, you think your body is terrible in comparison
when you're just a regular dude.So like, try not to look at the
people who like, compare yourself to other natural
people, not not the the superhumans who are not

(28:50):
comparable. Yeah or yeah, it's a great
point. There's a few things I wanted to
clarify too. If you in like in case some
people don't know, when you takeexogenous testosterone, it shuts
down the production of your own testosterone.
Correct, and and it shuts down your fertility over time.
Yeah. So you're not.
You're infertile. You can't have kids when you're

(29:12):
some people can. I've read that they can, but
it's likely not. Yeah.
So it depends on how long you doit and what dose you're on.
But some percentage of men who get on it may never, their
system may never switch back on.It just depends on what dose
you're on and how long you're on.
We're young enough that it'll turn back on for us, balance of
probabilities. It's the people who are on it
for like 20 years and then you're like, OK, I want to have
kids at 50. You're much less likely to to to

(29:36):
turn back on. But there are still options for
if you're suppressed for even ifyou're suppressed for decades,
there are options to, to temporarily turn your fertility
on. So that all that is to say not
to scare anybody. If if you have physical issues
with testosterone like talk, speak to your.
Doctor Yeah, that's different. Yeah, no, that's different.
And some people do need that. That's why it exists, right?

(29:56):
It doesn't exist, so you can getjacked.
And let me be very clear, tests basically saved my life.
Like I was 270 lbs. I was a wreck.
I was mental health chaos, like I was in a very dark place.
And it helped me bounce back from from my my lowest point.
And then I was able to to recover from that mistake I made
was once I was out of that hole,I should have gotten off and

(30:19):
yeah, within a year. But I just kept, I just kept
that party going, you know, and that was my mistake.
It's like, it's like we turn into like our own doctors after
a while, right? We've done enough research.
You know, you're a really smart guy.
You do enough research, you start to, you know, really get
some information about it and you're like, why?
Why don't you need a doctor? Like I can say on this, you
know, even though everyone. 'S talking.

(30:40):
About Yeah, yeah, which is a dangerous thing in and of
itself. But yeah, I think that that's a
really good message. You know, there's a lot of
hidden dangers in it. And just do your research.
I always tell people, like, talkto doctors, talk to a
professional. For a long time, I was my own
doctor, as my own pharmacist, and that led me into, you know,
crack houses and fucking partiesI shouldn't have been at, right.

(31:03):
So. It's shocking how like the
overlap between like eating welland sleeping well, exercising,
like all the things that you're supposed to do during recovery,
it's also the things you're supposed to do in life.
It's just. Like it's not just for
recovering addicts. Live a good life.
Sleep, water. Yeah, Yeah.
But to your point, there's also something else that you said was
interesting, was, you know, it helped.

(31:25):
It saved your life. It helped you get to a point.
But we do this thing as as addicts and former addicts, and
we do this thing where we're like, it must be the low
testosterone. And then, you know, all this
weed and coke, whatever your thing is, It's not that it can't
be the drinking every day. No, it's got to be blank, right?

(31:48):
It's got to be low testosterone.There's always like I got to
find a shortcut. The mental acrobatics we will do
to justify and rationalize our addictions and behaviors like
the defensiveness we do, we haveover the ability to just unplug
or create that super reality that, that, that high euphoria.

(32:10):
It's insanity. I mean, like whether it's,
whether it's a stimulant, whether it's a depressant, like
whatever the pick your high, it's at the, at the mind of an
addict. And I love your the mind of an
addict post because they're so fucking relatable.
Like you. I just, every time I see one of
those, I'm just like. So good.
Yeah. Thanks, man.
Yeah, it's true, though. Like, it's, you know, you come

(32:30):
and you often hear my addiction is doing like I, I have to
separate those two people. Yeah.
Because it is. It's my sisters came on here,
you know, and said it so perfectly.
She's like, the one thing that really helped me deal with your
addiction was separating the addict.
And she got this from professional help, right?
Separating the addict from Anthony, right?
It's like I'm not the same guy when I'm in addiction.

(32:52):
I'm not. And thousands of people that
know me will tell you that, right?
I don't know 1000 people, but everybody close in my life will
tell you that I don't even know.And I look back and I'm like,
even pictures, videos, I don't know who that guy was, right?
I'm a different person when I put drugs and alcohol in my
body. I, I don't like the person that
I am. And that's why I spent so much

(33:12):
time hating myself. And it's so hard to rebound from
that. But it is possible, you know,
you can get to this place where you're like, I'm a pretty decent
human being, you know, and I found that through helping
others, but also doing that intensive one-on-one on one work
with, with therapists, right? And, you know, there's resources
out there, so it is available. I really wanna let's talk more

(33:34):
about this image of and how it'skind of changed over time of
what a man should look like. Yeah.
I think comparison is the thief of joy.
I think Roosevelt said that. Eleanor Roosevelt.
Yeah. Yeah, I think so.
Comparison is the thief of joy, right?
It's a dangerous place. Social media.

(33:54):
It takes me 35 seconds to compare myself to 1,000,000
people. Why am I not on vacation?
Why does that person get to do this every day?
Yet you don't see all the struggles.
And that's why I try to post about the attic stuff, because I
want people to see that I still struggle.
I still hear that motherfucker all the time telling me to do
stupid shit. Right?
Yeah. Why don't you talk about
actually more about like what your justifications and

(34:16):
rationalizations look like? Yeah, I mean any number, well, I
mean in the moment, the the justification, like while you're
in the throes of addiction, the justifications and
rationalizations or anything. It's like I, I told you how it
was at one point. I was like looking up scientific
studies to justify that. I was like, and this is

(34:38):
confirmation bias, just looking for information that supports
your point of view. This is cognitive distortion.
I was looking up for studies that that proved there was no
long term consequences to my behaviors.
And I was just looking for thosestudies and I was like that.
That's one example of like the, the level of, of self deceit
that I was under. And then in terms of, you know,

(34:58):
like the, the, the, the sober minds, it's kind of like the,
the urges, the, the, the impulses to to follow that
carved pathway again, where I'd be like, Oh, well, I could
probably go just get a joint andthen just go watch a movie in
the theater and put some eye drops in my eyes and no one will
know. My girlfriend will find out like

(35:19):
those, like I again, those mental gymnastics.
So how do I get away with it? That's the that's that mind of
the addict. Yeah.
And it's like, no, mother, that's not how we do this
anymore. Like that.
That's the old, that was the oldme.
We're not, I'm not going to throw dynamite and it and all
this hard work of the of dammingthat river and stopping that
pathway. So those are just two examples

(35:41):
of like in the throes of it versus like in the recovered
state. Yeah, I love that.
And for me, it was like, you know, the Adderall, the Vyvanse
was you were a big part of this.You know, when I was going
through this relapse, I rememberI was coming to you a lot.
And you, you probably realized the point when it was probably
getting bad for me, right? The way I was talking about it.

(36:01):
And I would justify it in sayingthat it was helping me do my
work all the time, right? And that was so cunning,
baffling and powerful and patient, right?
My disease was just waiting for me, this little back door of its
prescription, you know, So you're OK.
Your doctor prescribed it even though I was buying it on the
dark web. You know, again, confirmation
bias. I would forget about all this
bad information. You know, let's just leave that

(36:24):
those facts over here, right? They're not useful right now.
Or it's legal. Yeah, it is legal now.
Yeah, that's another. One, it's exactly, it's that
same principle, yeah. Yeah, and it just led me to like
this, this, you know, darker place of well, I'm already doing
Vyvanse, I'm already doing Adderall and I'm using it to
stay up late and party. So what's the point?
Might as well, you know, use something that's stronger and

(36:46):
cheaper cuz I'm spending a lot of money or my prescription's
running out, right. And I'm not looking at that.
That may be a problem, you know.Or I mean, here's an analog to
eat. It's like the 17% joint, the 22%
joint, the 25% joint, the 28% joint, the 30% joint like I was
on this escalation ladder with be to something then you then

(37:07):
you get even stronger and stronger like infused.
THC you're talking about? And you're just chasing a bigger
and bigger. And that's that's kind of why I
wanted to again, what animated me is what, what energized me to
come on this podcast was I'm raising the flag that like these
daily users, these daily marijuana users are pushing the
industry to create these bigger,the legal marijuana industry to
create stronger and stronger products.

(37:28):
And it's like, just because it'slegal does not mean it's not
creating addicts. And we're just I'm, I'm seeing
these mirrors with these different kinds of addiction.
Yeah, I don't mean to jump around, but I do want to double
click back on the body dysmorphia thing because so when
I was in Utah, I went to treatment in Utah.
Beautiful place. Like we said, you're you're

(37:49):
surrounded in mountains. Highly recommend if you want
somewhere else to go. I remember there was a counselor
there that, you know, I was talking about my body dysmorphia
and she made me do this. Really uncomfortable mirror
exercise where I had to stand infront of the mirror in front of,
you know, this kind of sounds a little bit harsh, but it was, it
was effective, right? I had to put all these sticky

(38:11):
notes on the mirror of all thesethings I said about myself,
right? All these lies I told myself,
right? And I used to do this every
morning where I would, I'd subconsciously, I'd wake up and
be like, you ate too much last night.
You're swollen, you're fat, you're this, you're that, you're
weak, you're small, you're not muscular.
I didn't even notice I was doingit.
So when she had me put them on sticky notes and put them on the
the mirror, it was like fat, right?

(38:33):
All these words, I was talking about myself and she had me do
this whole exercise where and then I wrote down all the, the
traits that I liked about my partner and you know, my wife.
And it was like confident. It was like the exact opposite
of everything, right? Beautiful, fit, friendly, funny,
you know, witty, all these. And like you know, it was.
Great taste in music, yeah? Yeah, great taste in music.

(38:54):
She'll love that one. Yeah.
But I had to do all. And then it was like, well, you
admire those things about her because you're you have them in
yourself or you want them, right.
Do you think that you're all these things?
And, you know, I was like, fuck,yeah.
Like, of course I do like. But I just.
It's so hard for me to get to that point.
Right. And so she said this, this, this

(39:14):
kind of anecdote that really shocked me.
You know, she's like, you wouldn't believe how many men
come into my falling down there.Yeah, I knew this was going to
happen. OK.
She's like, you wouldn't believeI get like twice as many men
coming to me with body dysmorphia issues, body

(39:35):
dysmorphia issues than women. Like, it's like, it's a huge
problem right now. Guys just don't talk about it,
you know? And that really shocked me.
And it made me feel not alone either, too, right?
Because to your point, I have a distorted view of, of my body of
the world. And I remember hanging out with
guys that were like, you know, bodybuilders and we'd be
standing in the mirror, you know, when we were younger, we'd

(39:56):
be standing and doing whatever guys do in the mirror, you know,
like flexing and doing weird shit, taking pictures and stuff
like that. And.
The guy that I was with would belike, man, my, my biceps are
looking really small right now. And I'd look at him and I'd look
at and he would be dead serious.I'd be like, this guy is this
guy for real right now? He's massive, You know what I
mean? Right.

(40:17):
So I'm standing, we're standing in the mirror and this guy's
absolutely like a unit, right? He's jacked and he's, he's
saying all these things about his body that he's noticing.
And I'm like, what is this guy looking at?
Are we looking at the same fucking mirror here or what?
But it's a thing, right? Like body dysphorphia to me is
like a prescued, a persecuted. I just made-up a word.

(40:38):
What the fuck? A skewed, A skewed vision like
of of basically what I look like, right?
What I look like is different toeveryone else.
Well, and it, and it gets bad when you start to hurt yourself
to address that. So I thought, so I am currently
injured. So I'm in physio twice a week
over my shoulder. I thought I'd torn A rotator

(40:59):
cuff, but in reality, I would have pretty severe tendonitis in
my shoulders. And you know, working with my, I
had to get an MRI and we figuredit out and working with my
physio, it's like, OK, what did you do to create such a high
degree of tendonitis in your shoulder?
And I'm like, well, I work my shoulders four days a week
because I want big, big, bolder shoulders because that's what
girls like. That's, that's what you need to,

(41:20):
that's what you need to have to,to, you know, be a big, big,
strong aesthetic guy to have that, that V taper.
And she's like, are you serious?And I like, I'm kind of we, we
went through how much volume I was pushing through my shoulders
and it was, it was twice what a human could really recover from,
even a human who was on TRT. And so you hurt, you can end up

(41:42):
hurting yourself because of bodydysmorphia.
And like, now I'm in a, I'm in aposition where, you know, I'm
out of the gym for 12 weeks because I literally can't push
my push any weight through any tension through through the, the
ligaments. So there are huge consequences
to, you know, thinking you just have to push harder and go
harder and harder. And it's, it's, it's a very

(42:04):
serious thing. And I, I really like it.
Like you said like comparison isthe.
Thief of Joy. The thief of joy.
I really think that that this, you know, body inflation among
men is, is a really big problem.Social media is a really, really
big problem and I'll tell peoplelike stop looking at the fitness
influencers and just start looking at the men around you in

(42:25):
your life. That is, just look at the humans
around you, the non, the non enhanced group of people.
Because the incentives in the fitness world, the incentives in
Hollywood, the incentives in professional sports are so
fucking clear to take the steroids if it's going to get
your next $1,000,000 paycheck oryour next half $1,000,000

(42:45):
contract or whatever it is. It's obvious that everybody's on
it. And some people have elite
genetics or whatever, but you'reprobably the average dude, or
maybe you're the above average. It doesn't matter.
You should not be comparing yourself to these genetic freaks
or the people who are obviously on the substances.
And the second you start to pushyourself like that, you start to
make mistakes like I made, like pushing myself to the absolute

(43:07):
limits to the point where I damaged my my soft tissue.
And, you know, like, they shouldn't be doing that in the
30s. Or spending like, you know, the
guy, and this used to be me too,spending the two hours in the
gym, right? That's there's a point, you know
where you're, it's, it's not benefiting your, your, your
health. And there's always a threat of
getting on anabolic steroids. I mean, the jump from TRT to
anabolic, that's what happened to me.

(43:28):
It's very, yeah, that's what happened to me.
And I mean that that in itself is addictive.
It's like testosterone at high doses is massively addictive.
Now, not, not the levels that wewere doing because it's TRT, but
you know, and I know, I know lots of steroid users and those,
those guys love it. They are, they feel like

(43:48):
Superman. And so again, it's, it's, it's
in my mind, it's a ladder. And you'll have to be aware of
where you are on the ladder and make sure you're not stepping up
the runs of the ladder. Yeah, I couldn't agree more.
It was definitely addictive for me, the the steroids because you
get this enhanced body that you would never get otherwise.
And it's hard to, to kind of youset, you're set a new baseline

(44:09):
for yourself, right? And you, you start to outgrow
your clothes and people start tonotice And it's like this big
shift in your body. I want to talk about cross
addiction a little bit because that's a very prevalent topic in
on in my life, but also I want to make it a part of this
podcast too, because just because I put down cocaine and
stimulants doesn't mean I'm goodfor the rest of my life.

(44:31):
Like there's I have to be vigilant about it, right?
I've picked up my phone a lot more recently and social media
has become an addiction again. There's always seems to be
something I always say this. It's like being an addict is
like having six garbage cans andfive lids.
Have you pivoted into anything else before?
I know you talk about work and like overworking.
So, I mean, I've been a workaholic my whole life.

(44:53):
Now I'm naturally a pretty conscientious person, but
specifically since I got this executive role, I have been a
workaholic, like a pure workaholic.
Now, thankfully, I, I told you some of the details like the
center of mass has moved more tomy relationship in a way from,
from work. And that's kind of been a
blessing for me just because I work on my, I want to, you know,
I want to start a family and we have a, we, we have other goals

(45:14):
and I'm in recovery right now with, with my shoulder and
having Achilles injuries. I'm just, I'm working, I'm
working on my health, I'm working on my relationship.
But yes, work is absolutely an addiction because you get
addicted to, well, one, labor leads to love.
So you love what you're doing. And so, so there's, there's a
positive aspect to it, but there's a negative aspect to it
too, in that it costs you, your,your relationships like I

(45:37):
didn't, I've lived in Denver fora year and four months.
I have made zero friends. I have my girlfriend, I have my
basketball team who are guys I like and are I'm I'm trying to
build deeper relationships with.But I have made zero friends in
a year and four months. That is not healthy.
That is absolutely an indicationof an addiction to my job.

(45:57):
And I looked it up like I workedmore hours.
Like last year I worked 33, zeroSaturdays and Sundays.
Wow, 30. So I spend a third of my
weekends working six or more hours.
That is not what you're supposedto be doing and obviously like
work is going to exploit you if they can corporate America like
capitalist machine the machine. But so it can be a positive

(46:22):
thing to work hard. But again, it's use versus abuse
and I was abusing work. I was using work as a crutch to
fill the whole of my loneliness and my sobriety and just, I'm
like, life was boring and I just, and I and I live in
Denver. Everywhere you go in Denver,
there's weed. And I just wanted to avoid weed

(46:43):
at all costs. So instead I decided I'm going
to work all the fucking time to avoid my addiction.
And I just traded one for the other.
In fact, my, my girlfriend has been so healthy for me and that
she's helped me. No, we're going to cook
together, we're going to go gardening, we're going to go
hiking. Like she's helped me so much in
finding other ways to do stuff without surrounding myself with

(47:06):
with substances and stop workingso much.
Yeah, it's a good point. Community is so important for me
especially too. I can really relate to that.
Was there a moment when you realized that work had gone into
this realm of workaholism? Yeah, when I tallied my hours

(47:26):
for the year, cuz I used to be aconsultant, so I used to do
weekly hours. I tallied my hours weekly.
So I just kept a spreadsheet going.
And when I looked at my hours and I worked 3200 hours in a
year and I'd worked 30 weekends,I was like, is this what life is
like? I was just like a sad, lonely
dude. And I was like, this is, this is

(47:47):
not what life is. And I actually kind of used to
be fun. Like that's the reason I know, I
know your wife is because we used to be really fun people and
do fun stuff. You're still fun man.
And so I, I mean, that's why I told you I started to watch
sports again and get really intothe NBA and I was just like,
find my hobbies again and find the things that I, that I used
to bring me joy and I used to enjoy in life.

(48:10):
That completely went away and through my work addiction,
through my weed addiction that preceded that.
Like all those things, yeah. So what do you, what would you,
what do you say that you know, what do you do now when life
kind of lifes you and shit goes South and what are some tools
or, you know, mechanisms or things helpful resources that

(48:34):
kind of get you through those tough days?
Well, I mean this podcast, so it's, it's, it's really funny
how how often I come to just to look at your shorts or to listen
to your podcast because for me it's like, it's like the when I
get an urge to like relapse urge, it's the first thing I
come to because it's like, I don't want to let Anthony down.
He's helped me. Like I text you sometimes going

(48:59):
for a walk in nature. I live I'm, I live in sunny
Colorado. So I'm very fortunate to have
such a beautiful place to live right near the mountains.
So being in nature, that's so that for me, it's such a healing
and restorative thing to do whenI'm healthy.
I, I don't know if you saw my home gym, but like now I, I, I,
oh dude, I got. To show it's amazing.
I'm excited. Yeah, it's amazing.

(49:19):
So I have the home gym now, so Ilike use the home gym like I
work around the injuries. So I get the squat rack and the
and the cables and and the dumbbells and stuff That's
pretty cool. So like exercise is always is
always there for me and then andmy honesty, just spending time
with the person I love most on this planet, which is my my
partner. She's genuinely the most healed

(49:40):
individual I've ever met and just spending time around her.
It's just. It's just.
Sunshine flows from her. It's beautiful, man.
I love that. I think yeah, for me, like my
partner's been such a, you know,Rebecca's been such a rock in my
life. But what I what I really like
about my relationship is and it's not perfect.

(50:02):
It's nowhere near perfect, right?
We, but I think I think she's perfect for me in that she
challenges me in a way that doesn't push me away, you know,
like she just, she'll say thingsthat make me rethink my process
and my decision and I appreciatethat so much, right?
She never tells me what to do, but I always say this and, and
this came through just like, youknow, we do a lot of therapy,

(50:24):
but also if I never opened up about my emotions and how I was
feeling and things that, you know, hey, I don't, you know,
why don't we try this instead? I don't really, you know, I
don't respond well to that or, you know, there's a lot of work
that has to happen And but there's, there's like a lot of
joy at the end of that where it's like she doesn't just say

(50:45):
she doesn't cosign my bullshit, right?
Like if I'm doing something stupid, she'll be like, should
you be doing that? Like, is that a good idea?
And not like you're a fucking idiot.
Don't do that. If I you know, if, if it's, you
know, Vyvanse again, which is what she was very vocal about
that last time, right, that's a bad idea.
You shouldn't do that, you know,but there's certain things that
you know, I think a good partnerwill challenge you in a way that

(51:08):
helps you grow and doesn't startyour growth right, totally.
It's. Beautiful man and also a partner
who like understands the kind oflove you need.
Like I respond pretty well to tough love.
Yeah, me too. Like cuz I don't, I'm at my
core, I'm a people pleaser like.Same.
I will let somebody down if I love them.
And so like, and she, she knows that about me.
She, she, she's read that about me.

(51:28):
And so she's like, she laid the hammer down.
She's like smoke another joint. We're done.
And I will never smoke a joint because I never want to lose
her, you know, And like, that's not good.
That's that strategy won't work for everybody, but for me that's
the perfect strategy because like, I love her so much and
she's wifey, you know? Yeah, yeah.
And then yeah, you know, you there's, you know, that tough

(51:49):
love thing. It's like we put she's not an
enabler, right? And and like there's, we have
enough of those, you know, there's and I'm sure she's
bounced back and forth, but she's probably learned from it,
right? Because not, not everyone's
perfect. And enabling is tough because
it's not always obvious when we're enabling somebody, right?
My parents and you know, her actually will stay more current,
but she was told to kick me out of the house.

(52:11):
It's like the hardest fucking thing in the world to do.
How do you kick your husband outof the house?
He's going to go die, right? There's a good chance he's going
to snort a fucking line of fentanyl and die right?
But she was taught to do that, and it was hard for her to do
that. But ultimately, that was the
only thing that led me back intorecovery because I needed to go
and do some more research and bang my head against the wall a
few more times to realize I don't have control over this

(52:35):
drug over this blank over. I don't have control.
I can't do it anymore. Once that pathway is carved,
sometimes it's like you cannot. It's just like you can't go
there anymore. Yeah, It's just too dangerous.
It's like a the Grand Canyon, you know, you're in the middle
of it. And then what recovery did for
me, recovery and you know, 12 step work and all these things

(52:55):
that I do, therapy, they didn't pull me out of that Canyon.
You know, it says in in the literature that I read, I'm not
making this up. I wish I did because it's
beautiful. It just simply gives me a ladder
to climb out, you know, tools toto climb out, but I have to
still climb out, you know, No one's going to pull me out of
that. Hole and then it's it's an
ongoing process like many years sober now, but it's still like

(53:16):
those urges still come to you. Like I mean, I still get them.
It's like it was a habit for so long, like nearly a decade.
So that it's going to be, I don't, I imagine that I could be
like 40-50 years old and still get an urge.
And I, I know that I know that smokers still get urges many,
many decades after they quit smoking because it's such an

(53:38):
ingrained habit. But it is what it is.
And it's just something that it's a, it's, it's an element of
our life now, but we know that we, we are so much stronger than
our addiction. And that's the tools make us so
much stronger and the journey makes us so much stronger.
Yeah, but it takes time. You know, it takes time and it
takes resources and not financial resources, but

(53:58):
friends, you know, therapists, right?
You know, I today I have a choice to to drink and use or to
fight through it and, you know, pick up something else, pick up
the phone, call somebody, right?I have a choice.
And, you know, six months ago, 10 years ago, there was no

(54:19):
choice of I I had to drink and drug to survive, right?
To get to quiet the noise, to get to the next minute of life.
I don't have to do that today. It's a beautiful thing, man.
Thanks so much for coming on. Oh, man, Thank you.
I had a great time. Yeah, I'm really happy and I'm
looking forward to many more. I'm hoping that you move back to
Toronto because I miss you man. Yeah, man, I miss you too.

(54:41):
Hopefully we we do many, many more of these and.
Yeah. But let's, let's close with
this, actually, Yeah, If there'sone thing you could say to
someone struggling right now, drug addiction, weed addiction,
let's what would you say? I'd say this, the future is as
bright as you want it to be and it's it's really up to you.

(55:04):
When I was in the worst, like myabsolute rock bottom, I just
thought it was game over for my life.
I really, really thought it can't.
It was super, super dark. But if I could, if I knew how
much brighter my life was going to be a few years down the road,
if I could just go back and tellmyself that, it would have

(55:25):
energized me so much. And I'll tell you like, it
doesn't matter how dark it is and or how much darker it's
going to get on the road, it's going to be so much brighter on
the back end of it. You just need to get through the
eye of the needle. And so don't lose hope wherever,
wherever you are on your journey, wherever you are on
that ladder, as you're stepping down that ladder, just know on
the other side of it, on the back end, it is so much sunnier

(55:47):
and so much more optimistic. And trust me, sobriety is a
wonderful state of being becauseit's the natural state of being.
It's how we ought to be. And so there's so much hope on
the back end to just find the tools, find the resources,
listen to this podcast, find read the books, go to a meeting,
you know, message people, talk to your priests, talk to your
friends, like whatever, whateverresource works for you.

(56:09):
There's a hundred different waysto to to, to get to, to get to
sobriety and to get to health, to to get back to you.
And it's it's worth it in the end.
Beautiful. I couldn't have said it better
myself. Thanks so much, brother.
Appreciate you, Omar. Thanks for listening.
Please help us grow the channel and like, share and subscribe

(56:31):
for more content. The discussions and stories
shared on this podcast are for informational and motivational
purposes only. This content is not a substitute
for professional medical advice,addiction treatment, or therapy.
If you or someone you know is struggling with addiction,
please consult A licensed physician, addiction specialist,
or mental health professional. You are no longer