Dean Stott's Journey from Special Forces to Mental Health Advocate

Episode Transcript
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(00:07):
Dean Stott, welcome to the Amy Izz show. I am so excited to dive into
your background. You're the first army person I've had on my show
and you're the first british guy I've had on my show. Oh, wow. And I'm
so excited because we have so much in common, even just from our journeys.
You were 17, I think, when you joined the service, I see. Yeah, 17. And
I was 17 as well. We're both from England. Even though my accent is totally

(00:28):
throwing everybody off, it's an identity crisis for me. But I actually wanted to
join the war alarmy myself. Oh, really? So
I didn't. I ended up joining the american army, which is a whole story in
itself. But you're probably one of the coolest people I've ever talked
to, to be honest with you. No, no, seriously, I'm so
excited. Your whole background is so fascinating. You've obviously, at

(00:50):
this point, you're a published author. You are on an amazing new
show, toughest forces on earth. And did I say that? The name of
that toughest voice. Yeah, people get mixed up. People sometimes say will's toughest
forces, but no, you got it right. Toughest forces on earth. Awesome. And that
show, for those of you that don't know that, haven't seen it yet, it's on
Netflix. He goes around the world with a couple of other guys and he

(01:12):
tests out the toughest trainings in all of the military services around the
world, so. Just such a cool thing. And on top of that,
you were SBS through the royal army though,
right? Through the british army, yeah. Yeah. So I didn't go to normal traditional route.
Primarily used to be 100% Royal Marines. So I went
to non judicial. So coming from the army, I should have gone to the special

(01:35):
air Service, the SAS, which is the more famous of the two
units. But because I'd spent eight years with
free commander brigade with the Royal Marines in the reconnaissance force, and I was also
now the senior diving instructor for the army. I just had a fondness for the
water. And actually, when I decided to do
tier one selection, ESPs had just opened up their

(01:57):
recruitment to the army as well. So
much to discuss to my friends in the SAS. I did that. I
went for the SBS. But unlike for the listeners here, unlike the
us military setup, where you have Delta Force and SEAL
team six, which is your tier one equivalent, their selection
is individual. They have their own selections. As SAS and SP's is

(02:19):
joint, we only have one, so there's no easier one than the other. So
wow. Yeah. Well, I want to talk a little bit about your journey getting in
just for a moment, because I feel like there's such connection for me, and I
know a lot of my audience joined the military young. I was actually a recruiter
for a while for the army here in the US. And so I distinctly remember
a lot of the people we would focus on recruiting were young kids that were
literally in high school. We would get them while they were in high school still

(02:42):
and put them in like a recruit sustainment program until they graduated. And
then we would also focus specifically on, like, you know, wrestling
schools or football teams or whatever. We would develop a relationship to recruit him young.
So I want to talk about that a little bit, if you're okay, just kind
of starting there. So in your book, which, if you guys have
not read it yet, relentless Dean Stott, go grab it. It is such a

(03:04):
crazy read. You talk about your journey just
like kind of leaving school. You weren't exactly sure what you wanted to do. You
were on vacation and you kind of did what I did, too. You pissed your
dad off and went rogue, but you joined the
military, so join the military. Yeah, my father was in the military. My
grandfather and his brothers were all in the military. So I was born into

(03:26):
a military family. And actually, because my father was in the military, every
three years we would move to a new town,
new city or new country, whether it's Germany, UK,
but also within that military environment. So in the UK, they call
us pads brats, which means your father's in the military.
So you're a military child. And my

(03:48):
father's last post was Aldershot, which was the home of the british army.
So you had the parachute regiment, you had the army
catering Corps, the Royal Logistic Corps. It was almost like
Fort Bragg, but on a smaller scale.
And so I was immersed in that environment. But I never
really had any aspirations of being in the military myself. I always

(04:10):
wanted to be a firemande. Growing up as a young boy, if you asked me
what to be, it was a fireman. And my father,
his career wasn't the career that I ended up doing. My father
was what we call a tracksuit soldier. So some of you touched on there were
recruiting, you targeted schools where there's sport, where there's
wrestling. The military was an alternative option for

(04:30):
those who may not have actually made it professional,
because I know when I know we have famous boxers who went professional,
we have famous soccer players who went professional from their time in the
military is a platform for
them. And my father was the army. I say he's like the Ted lasso
of the army. But now I've watched Ted Lasso, he's nothing like my father. I

(04:52):
was gonna say, that's awesome. I would love to have your dad if he was
Ted Lasso. Nothing like Ted Lasso. But he was the army soccer manager,
player and coach. So he never really had
a uniform. His uniform was tracksuit and
trainers and soccer boots. And as you touched on,
I went to when I finished school at the age of 16,

(05:16):
you know, you can't join the fire brigade until you're at least 18.
And I went to college and then in
1993, I think there was a recession in the UK.
And just for one fireman's job, there was 2000 applications.
So I was like, you know, I'm gonna have to go away and get some
sort of some

(05:36):
career advice or I'm just gonna have to, you know, do something else. I can't
just go straight into that. So I went to college and I didn't really like
college. I went on holiday with a few of my friends, surfing down in
Cornwall. That's where my fondness from the water comes from. My father used to
always take us away on surfing holidays.
And, yeah, I was supposed to come back after two weeks. My

(05:57):
father dropped me and my friends off long before the
mobile phone and ended up picking us up two weeks later. But I wasn't
there. I ended up staying. I ended up actually starting off as a silver service
waiter in a local hotel and then ended up working in a surf
shop. So my father came looking for me six months later and found me in
a surf shop, took me back home and sort of

(06:19):
all the way back, a four hour journey was highlighting how I'd
ruined my education and what was I going to do with my life now? And
so for me to silence him, I said, well, I'll join the military.
I weighed about 130 pounds. I was about five foot seven. I
wasn't the sort of size that I am today. And, you know,
he told me I'd last two minutes, which for me was my driving force.

(06:43):
But Monday morning I went to his office and literally the careers
office was only 400 meters from where my dad's office was in
oldershaw. And I walked across and yeah, I
started my application process. One of the things about your journey
that kind of really sparked my attention throughout reading the book
and just learning more about you in general was just this pursuit

(07:05):
of excellence. You had to do the next greatest thing. You
had to achieve it. You had to accomplish it, whereas that's
not a common trait in people. That's actually really rare. And,
I mean, I don't know too much about your story growing up to the point
where you joined the military, but for people who have
any kind of trauma in their life or any kind of need

(07:28):
to prove a point or need to prove their parents
right, it seems like those are the. That's like an underlying skill
set or trait, not a skill set, a trait in their character that kind of
makes them do it, where they're overachievers almost. Do you feel like you
resonate with that at all? I didn't as a child. I sort of look back.
I get asked that quite a lot. There is that unrelenting pursuit

(07:51):
of excellence. And I always wanted to be the best, but that didn't really
start until the military. I think there was a
competitive angle. Anyway, my father, as we touched on with the soccer manager,
and I played sports in school, and I was good.
I wasn't the best. I got sports personality year. It wasn't because I was the
best. It was because I took part in everything. I think

(08:14):
my confidence came when I then joined the military, because in a short
period of time, I joined at the age of 17 and a half. And within
18 months, you know, I'd gone from five foot seven to five
foot eleven and 130 to 200 pounds.
So physically I was growing, but mentally I was getting
stronger as well. I had no aspirations of being in the special forces. I

(08:36):
actually joined the Royal Engineers. My father was in the royal engineers because he thought,
well, if he's going to join the military, you know, get what you can from
the military, get a trade, you know, because I think he probably thought I would
probably do the minimum three to five years. And
so when I joined the military, did my ten week basic training, then we did
the twelve week combat engineer training, and then we just went on my

(08:58):
commando course. You know, each time I was doing these courses,
mentally I was becoming more confident. I actually then realized, actually,
I am just as good as everyone around me,
if not better. And I was becoming top student. Top students.
And then for me, that was it. I think because I was achieving them
quite early on in my career, I then aspired to do

(09:21):
that in every course that I went forward on. By
the age of 21, I was now a para
commando, a diver, a PTI. I'd done every arduous course you
could in the royal engineers in such a short period of time.
It was that period then that then led
me forward on that unrelenting pursuit of excellence. If I was going to do anything,

(09:43):
I had to do it to the best of my ability. Yeah, I mean, you
just really resonated so much with me because during my
own journey in the military, you know, I joined young, but, I mean, I had
not a great childhood. And so for me, thank God for the military, honestly, because
I would have been really, really lost had I not had it. And
because, you know, my situation was, if I don't succeed,

(10:04):
it was a survival thing for me. Like, if I don't win, if I don't
achieve this course, if I don't pass this thing, I'm out on
the street, I'm on my own. Right. And so in this pursuit,
for me, I was just constantly trying to survive. So I passed
all the courses I possibly could. I mean, I became the number 12th female in
the history of the US army to go through rappel master school.

(10:26):
So, like, you know, those things are cool. Awesome. But at the same time, it
wasn't because I was, like, you know, on my own, unmotivated to do it. It
was. Sorry. Motivated to do it. It was just because it was a survival mechanism,
I think, for me, like, I wanted to prove myself. I wanted to. It was
like a defense mechanism also. Yeah. Around, like, all these tough
people and tough guys, and I wanted to kind of, like, prove

(10:46):
myself. So I always thought that was interesting, you know, as I was going through
your story, just like, you're such a rare breed
to just, like, constantly achieve and, like, excel at everything
you do. So, yeah, I think for me, you know, it's interesting to
hear about the survival. Yeah. Because most people in the military,
especially the special forces, come from humble beginnings. You know, they don't have great

(11:08):
upbringings, and so it's almost like when they. When they find themselves in
the military, they find friends for life. They find a community that they're actually comfortable
with who probably didn't, probably were misunderstood in the civilian sector
as kids. Yeah. So, yeah, so it's great to hear
that about the survival. You know, for me, I didn't really. It wasn't about survival
for me. I was just, you know, I, like I said, I didn't

(11:31):
have a plan in the military. A lot of the guys in the special
forces, when we eventually go tier
one special forces, all they've wanted, or even tier two, you know, I
did that when I was 18. The commando forces, all they ever wanted to
do since a young child is being in a Royal Marine or a
commander or parachute regiment, be like the GI Joe yeah, the GI Joe. Whereas for

(11:54):
me, I was out. No, I never had any aspirations of doing that
myself, but that sort of helped me, I think, along the way because I never
put myself under any self induced
pressure. You know, when I actually ended up doing tier one special
forces, there was guys there from the age of six. That's all they wanted to
do. And their career, their lives and paths had taken to

(12:15):
this point where they're now just about to start selection. Whereas for me,
you know, I did it because I'd done every other arduous course and I'd seen
guys go and I just thought, well, I. I want to be the best of
the best. And so for me, I didn't go
in, put myself under that pressure that the others did.
And I sort of went in. Well, if I pass, I pass. If I don't,

(12:36):
I don't. And I think that helped me along the way as well.
I don't know about in the UK, but here in the US,
military services, almost without exception, the
personality traits that make it through some of those tougher courses are a lot more
humble. And I wonder if that really worked out in your favor, because you definitely
get those guys, like, where they would go through the process, the workup,

(12:58):
the training, the day zeroes to kind of be assessed. And even though
they might have it in the bank for the physical stuff, it's almost always the
purpose that they get not chosen. To move forward is like an ego thing
where they're not considering their brothers around them, where they're
kind of more self centered and they just have this attitude
that they're better, they're more macho, they need to be there. And it's like those

(13:20):
guys almost always don't make it through. So I wonder if that helped you. Yeah,
it did help me. Yes. Maybe for the listeners to understand. So the special
forces is tiered. So, like the tier two special
forces, that's where you really focus on being a team
player. You know, that, like your buds, your rangers, your
green brays, that's where they do all that. And for us in the UK is

(13:41):
like the commando course and the parachute regiment. And
as you touched on the tier one special forces, one of the e forces, there
is humility, you know? And so some guys, they are.
They are, on paper, they are rock stars, they are great operators. But
when it comes to tier one special forces, they're looking for something a bit different.
You can't. You have to be self driven or self motivated. And

(14:04):
some people like to have praise or being told by an instructor,
you're doing well. And they really struggle when they're not getting praise because they
don't know how they are fitting alongside all these other guys. And so
there's a great. There's a great book by a guy called Rich Devini, a good
friend of mine who, SEAL team six officer. It's called attributes and
basically touches on that. He said they had these rock stars coming in from the

(14:26):
SEAL teams who, on paper, these guys are fit. They've done
great tours and were failing because they'd never understood how to deal with
resilience. They'd always needed that appraise as
well. And so for me, I didn't need
that. I'd been an instructor on
the commando course, so I'd seen what, and I also knew what

(14:48):
instructors were looking for. So you do have an idea of what they're looking for
in selection, but when they're telling you're not doing well, you just have to ignore
it. You know, they're playing mind games. But I remember
my chief instructor on day one of selection, he had us in
this room. There was 200 of us in there. He said, look
around the room and see who you think will be here in six months time.

(15:10):
And then six months later, there's only eight of us stood in there, and the
other seven weren't the seven I fought. When you are
there, you're quite stereotypical. Straight away. You're like, well, that guy looks
fit. He looks like he can perform well. And as you touched on, you
know, you can be the fittest person in the room. But if you can, then
if you run that radio 30 miles across the mountain, you don't know how to

(15:32):
turn the radio on, then you're useless to the team. So, yeah, selection
is the process of selection
is the physical. There's been able to retain information, and then
there's the personality traits that they're looking for as well. You know, they
do. There's days where they just push on you saying
that, you know, just hand. Just hand your notice in

(15:53):
now. You know, you're not going to make it just to see how you react.
And they put you under. They put under
pressures that you probably wouldn't have expected in the tier two s. And so they're
the big differences I find. How many of
those guys, like, I don't know, maybe just from your course or if you're aware
of other courses that went through when they were. When they were asked, like, hey,

(16:15):
just hand in your notice. How many of them do you think actually did it.
A lot of the guys do. A lot of. Really? Yeah, a lot of it.
So our process, our six month selection, I mean, the SP's is
nine months because we have the diving and the boat and afterwards. So the first
month really is all physical. They don't even know your name. The instructors,
they don't need to know your name. Do they give you numbers? Yeah, you have
numbers? Yeah, you have numbers. And then you're basically running up and down the

(16:38):
mountains with 70 pound 80 on your back for a month.
So naturally, you're going to get those who physically weren't
prepared. You're going to get those that have been injured along the way and then
some who then probably self assess and thinking crisis is just
the start, you know, so you lose a percentage there.
And then our big one is the jungle. Within six months in the jungle. And

(17:00):
the amount of guys that just voluntarily withdraw
because the instructors are telling them, you're not good enough, you're not good
enough. And they're seeing themselves, they're comparing themselves to other people.
But I always remember the chief instructor saying,
let us fail. You don't fail yourself. Oh, wow. Wow.

(17:21):
Which was really powerful for me. It was like, you know, until they've told you
you failed, you're still on the course. Yeah. And
so six weeks in the jungle. We do 28 days solid in
Brunei. Jungle. And. And where is that for us lame people?
That's in Borneo in Indonesia. Wow.
It's a. It's a beautiful jungle there. And we have a great relationship. Obviously, the

(17:43):
UK has a great history, but I, the king of
Brunei, we have a squadron of
Gurkhas. Gurkhas who work with the british army from Nepal and
they protect him. And so we obviously get access to his jungles and
stuff. So there's those relationships that's been going on for years. You'll have to
forgive some of my ignorance, because while I'm from the UK and I spend a

(18:06):
bunch of time there and I go there still now, and I have all my
family there, there's still some things that I'm still learning about because
I've spent so much time in the United States. But Gurkhas,
from at least what I recall, are like, pretty elite, right?
Yeah. They come from Nepal, Nepalese, and they
really helped during the jungle warfare back in the likes of Malaya

(18:27):
and Borneo and things like that. And I know, like, the Japanese used to be
scared of the Gurkhas. They have, like, they're famous for these kukri knives,
these knives that are arched and
we have a lot of traditions, and one of their traditions is every time they
draw their kukri knife, they have to draw blood. But, yeah, these guys
are like, so. How do they do that? Well, what they do now is they

(18:48):
actually have a little pin prick on the bottom of their handle. The days of
old, they used to just have to cut their hands, but these guys, their
selection process for them is they come down from the
villages, from the mountains. They have a selection process over in
Nepal, and it's literally, they are there in their flip. Their sandals and flip
flops. They have a netted bag which is

(19:11):
attached to their head and just full of stones behind them, and they are running
up and down the mountains. But, yeah, there's a huge
old tradition there between the Gurkhas and the british
forces. Yeah, these guys
are elite in themselves. Yeah. Wow. So dean's had, like, the
most crazy, incredible career, and

(19:33):
I don't want to dive too much into the career, because I think it speaks
for itself. Like, I mean, just read the book for sure. And you're going to
see some amazing stuff in the Netflix show as well, just
to show you how cool he is, jumping out of helicopters and diving and all
of that. But I want to fast forward a little bit to
a time in your career where you got hurt. You had an injury, and

(19:55):
I think it was career ending for you, right? Yeah, it was career ending.
So for me, just so you. I joined at the height of
the war on terror, so it was the busiest time in special forces history. So
for me, I now found myself working alongside like minded
individuals, guys that, you know, I could compare myself with. And I still
was competing with them always, because coming from the army to the SBS,

(20:18):
I felt like I was always flying a flag, you know,
always representing a unit. So I was representing the army within the special boat
service. But, yeah, we were literally doing first
ever operational jumps, operational jumps, doing hostage rescues.
We were ticking all the boxes. And you're going all over the world, like, war
zones everywhere. Just for context for the audience here. Yeah, war zones. We were diving

(20:40):
on cartel boats in Colombia or rescuing hostages off the east coast of
Africa. And so for
me, I finally landed where I wanted
to be. Life for me was great. And
as you touched on, there was a curveball. I'd
not long met my wife, Alana. I probably met her

(21:02):
about nine months before, and so, happily
dating, doing a job that I love. I was about to go back out to
Afghanistan in another two weeks, and we're out in Omanda doing pre
deployment training. So Oman
is very deserty as well and has mountains, so very similar to the environments of
Iraq and Afghanistan. And again, the relationship between the

(21:25):
british and the sultan of Oman, we get to use those
training facilities. And I was doing a hey ho jump, which is a high altitude,
high opening jump. So unlike skydiving halo, where you're
free of the lines, this one, you're actually still attached to the aircraft. It's called
a static line and you exit the aircraft at
15,000ft. The parachute opens straight away and you can travel up

(21:47):
to 50 km or 30 minutes in the air to the target area.
So it's a method of insertion that we have. And we did this on the
previous tour, but we had new guys coming through selection, so we
had to get them through this process. So the sergeant major was like, will you
guys go jump with them? Which we did. And it was the third jump of
the day. I exit the aircraft and normally you do

(22:07):
compulsory count and then check that you have a canopy. So I did my
compulsory count and then as I looked, I didn't realize I was looking the
wrong way. I was looking up with my leg was actually caught in the line
above my head and so I was trying to clear my leg in time because
I know that the parachute's just about to open and I couldn't clear it
and it ripped my leg over my head and to my right. And so

(22:29):
thankfully, my heel cleared from the line, otherwise it could have taken your
leg off. But straight away I knew, you
know, I knew definitely I wasn't going on tour in two weeks time, just purely
because of the pain. And the pain was that bad? I was vomiting
because of the pain. Like, while you're still in the air? While I'm still in
the air. And at 15,000ft. The reason we jump at 15,000ft

(22:50):
on that shoot is we don't need to use oxygen. That's the limits. Anything higher,
you have to go on oxygen. So I'm still, you
know, hovering between 14 and 15,000ft here. The air
is so thin. I was drifting in and out of consciousness, I was vomiting, so.
And when I was waking up, I could see that the. I could see
the guys in front of me, but for me at least, I had a

(23:12):
canopy and I could start flying it. But my
first concern was I needed to land this because, you know, if I
land it badly, I could damage the good leg as well. How long were you
in the air? So after your shooting comes up, your
legs done, how long is the time between you hurt
your leg to the time you're on the ground? About 30 minutes. Oh, so I

(23:34):
still had 30 minutes. Yeah. So. And there's nothing that can be done. I mean,
like, does anyone see you at this point and see that you're in? Well, I
had comms, and I know I could come up on the radio and tell the
guys I've hurt my leg, but I know what the answer is gonna be. Well,
let's have a look at. Yeah, hang in. Yeah. Just wait to see what you
do when you get on the ground. So, actually, when I got to the DZ,
I made an assessment of where the other parachute was coming in, which was the

(23:57):
best angle, and I landed at one legged. It was a great. It was a
perfect landing, but, yeah, the damage sustained. I know. The
medic took me straight to the MRI. They reviewed a
tore my ACL, my MCl, my lateral meniscus in my knee,
my hamstring, my calf and my quadricep. And so literally the next
day, from my buttock to my achilles was just black.

(24:19):
Wow. Yeah. And so they. Yeah, that was it.
I was basically told that, you know, you need to go back to UK and
you need to start your whole physical therapy with this. But then
it then became a whole spiral of issues as well. Losing MRI
scans. We had the icelandic volcano had gone
off in 2010, which was

(24:41):
ground in all air flights. And so, actually, I spent the first four weeks in
Oman, just on painkillers, in a. In a five star hotel,
which sounds great, but when you're in pain and the rest of the guys have
gone to Afghan. So by the time I got back to UK a
few weeks later, Alana could see that I'd already lost weight. She could tell
that even in my eyes, I'd sort of lost that spark.

(25:03):
And then. Yeah, a spiral of errors. They were losing medical documentation. It took
me 44 weeks before I even got an operation. One of the things that blew
my mind in the books, this is actually from Alana's book, she who dares.
Alana Stott is Dean's wife. She's coming on the show
later in her book. I
was so frustrated on your behalf because when she was

(25:26):
sharing some of the timelines that it would take for you to get basic
treatments, surgeries, whatever, it was way longer than I would
even imagine the american VA to be. And the american VA has such a
bad rap. I mean, it's truly atrocious how long it takes
for people to get basic care. You had to wait
forever, it seems like, to get your care, so I'm not

(25:48):
surprised. But at the same time, I'm just. It's like almost worse than the Americans.
Yeah. You know, I hear the Americans complain about the
VA, actually, you guys got sometimes a lot better
than us. Yeah, I think there was an element of.
It wasn't really the process. It was just individual areas as well within the
medical system. And also, the guys had already gone on tour as

(26:10):
well, so their focus was on that.
A knee operation a few years before when I was an instructor on the commando
course, and actually, from tearing my lateral
meniscus, I got operated on within a week. And
then six weeks later, I was back running 30 miles with his students.
So I had that to compare to. I was like, well, why is this different

(26:31):
now? I'm now in tier one special forces,
but, yeah, it was just an element of more medical issues and errors
within the system. And in the end, I almost threatened legal
action before I could because they can't let you lead the military
until they've operated on you, so they're almost already. I was looking at. My
career's ended. I'm looking at the next phase of my life, and I couldn't even

(26:54):
start that until I had this operation. So it literally operated on me. And
then weeks later, I was out. Wow. So,
you know, again, reading, I'm actually pulling from Alana's book because I love her
perspective of just what she went through. And I think it's the reason
why it's so important for me to talk about this on this show. It's, you
know, we have a military undertone on this particular show, and we talk about

(27:16):
mental health a lot. We talk about life after the military transition, et cetera.
And what was so profound for me was her perspective being
the wife. She's at home, I think. You guys have a kid at this point,
right? Yeah. We had Molly at this time, and, you know,
she was holding down the fort like the most incredible, badass
wife ever. But when she got you home and she was very excited to have

(27:38):
you back, she realized your spark was gone. You were having a really hard time
mentally. She talks so much about, you know, that
you kind of went down this spiral, and you were definitely having, like, some.
Some issues with anger. And one thing that,
like, I honestly, like, I went through such a similar thing, and it
made me cry reading this. And so I just want to read this for the

(27:59):
audience because it just, like, really paints. So
I'm going to cut from a couple pieces here. I'm not going to read it
all in one. But just like so, the injury had taken Dean's spirit. He had
lost physical abilities, but it was the change in his mental state that was the
toughest challenge. The anger started to show more and more. The
smallest things would set him off, and it was reaching a boiling point. Dean's

(28:19):
squadron had gone off to Afghanistan without him. During the tour, one of
Dean's team was lost. He blamed himself, and somehow he believed
if he had been on the tour, that his friend would still be around. And
then she goes on to say, here, you know, you're in the kitchen one
morning, and Alana says, every
morning I would wake up and for the first few minutes I would be on

(28:40):
eggshells until I worked out what mood he was in that day.
One morning, he got up and was excited to make breakfast. He was in a
great mood, which was great to see. He was smiling and headed into the
kitchen. After a few minutes, I heard a loud bang, followed by the
awful sound of Dean shouting and hitting things. I went to the kitchen,
nervous as to what I would find. What had happened? I walked

(29:02):
through the door and looked around. I saw Dean. He was shaking with anger.
His face was red and sweaty. The red mist had firmly
descended. I tried to speak to him, to calm down and
to find out what had happened. Had someone called him? Had someone else been
hurt? But no one else was here. What had happened? Just a
million thoughts raced through my head. I looked at the floor and there was a

(29:23):
broken egg lying there. I looked back at him and his eyes started to
well up. I broke the egg, he said, and his
lip trembled. I'm not a man. I can't even make
eggs. What am I worth? I looked him in the eyes,
wrapped my arms around him. I held him tight as if I was never letting
go. And I promised him I would sort everything out. Everything was going to

(29:45):
be okay. So for me, that was, like,
so profound, because it's such a
big deal to transition. It's so hard, and
it's hard for families, it's hard for soldiers, for service
members. And it's like a whole
kind of like, frozen point in your life where you're like, what's going on

(30:08):
next? What do I do now?
The part that really got to me was just like the fact that you
had just broken an egg, and it's so simple, it
doesn't mean anything, but to you, it's everything. And I've been in those moments myself
so many times. And I hope this show helps service
members to realize that you get beyond that? Oh, yeah. Yeah.

(30:30):
You get past that. So I just want you to touch on like that for
a moment and what that was like for you from your perspective in that moment.
And then, like, if you have any advice that you
could share to move beyond that. Yeah. So for me, I
never wanted to leave the military. You know, I understand that some people
will get what they want from the military and feel like, no, it's

(30:52):
time for me to go and then voluntarily leave. For me, I felt
it was stolen from me. You know, I literally was
now in a unit, as I touched on before, where
I belonged, you know, I was doing what I love day in, day out. You
know, the front cover of the book pretty much summarizes the picture, summarizes
my career. You know, I was enjoying life, and I felt it was snatched

(31:15):
away from me. I didn't want to leave. I was going to be a lifer.
What they said I would still be now until I'm 55. And
so for me, I never had any. I never looked beyond
that. I never had any aspirations of being
a civilian. My life, my career was planned out until
I retired. And so I felt that I'd been robbed of

(31:35):
that. And then to add to that, as you touched on, my guys were already
out in Afghanistan when we lost one of the guys as well.
And so for me, I'd lost. Where I got to in my
military was because of my physical robustness. You know, I
now couldn't even run 100 meters without my knee giving way. And so
I was going through what's known as an identity crisis. You know, what, I had

(31:57):
a role and a purpose in the special forces. I knew what I was doing.
You know, what is my role and purpose? How do I now fit in
society? How can I slot in? Because you've gone from being,
without sounding arrogant, you've gone from being like a rock star in the special forces
to now no one even known, you know, months before, we were briefing the prime
minister up on hostage rescues. Now it's like, yeah, doesn't

(32:18):
really care. And it does feel like that. It does. I know a lot of
people, and I've learned now that actually, you know, when you're in the
military, and it does, it's that culture, they make you feel like you are
special. You know, I mean, there's no. There's nothing like this out there in
the civilian sector, when, in fact, there's plenty.
There's plenty like that for me to then not even

(32:40):
feel recognized. But then, yeah, to do just a simple
task. I thought I'll make breakfast. And even then, I just, you know, it wasn't
the eggs fault. Wasn't my fault, really, but it just then just culminated
to that point. So at the time Alana saw it, I didn't see it.
Well, it was, it was the identity crisis. And, yeah, Alanna
literally, as she says in her book, says, you know, she has

(33:03):
aspirations of doing stuff, which she's done now, which is good, but she literally had
to put her career and plans on pause. Just really sort
of fix me. Yeah. But for your listeners, as you said,
yes, you know, there's the dark places, but there is a light
at the end of the end of the tunnel. So for me, I just needed
to sort of find, you know, I can't run

(33:25):
anymore. Okay, I can't run, but what can I do, you know? I mean, and
what are the skill sets I've taken from this, from the military? And
how can I use them in the civilian sector? Because, again, on the
transition, everyone, I have a lot of friends. I don't have a degree
or a university degree, and a lot of my friends who
are in, are like, oh, I'm going to struggle when I get out. It's like,

(33:45):
no, there's so many other skill sets you get from the, from the military
that are transferable to the civilian sector. It's just knowing
how to use them. Do you, in the UK,
when you guys get out of the military, do they have, like, educational benefits?
Not like yours. No, no, we don't get anything like yours at all. No,
we, when you leave, you have a career

(34:08):
transition workshop and I'll put you on certain courses, but they're
not. It's really up to you still. All they do is teach you how to
write a resume or cv and do interview techniques, which is
ironic because I had a friend who left a few years after me, and he
came to me and I was now very well established in the
security sector. And I sort of put him onto

(34:30):
a couple of clients. And then I said, well, you need to know, get an
NDA. You need to. I started talking through some of the processes with me.
He's like, well, what's an NDA? You
know, he wanted to then start invoicing. I said, well, you know, you don't invoice
until the end, you know, but, yeah, always have a mobilization
fee, you know, put that in your proposal. He's. I don't know what you're talking
about. Oh, my God. I said, so what do you guys do still? And he

(34:52):
said, still? All we do is CV's resumes and interviews.
I said, well, I've never had an interview since I've left the military, and I've
never given anyone my resume. So for me, I think
there's other skill sets that they should be teaching these guys and girls when
they're leaving so that, you know, when they are out there, understand the corporate world.
Understand the terminology is actually the same as the

(35:15):
military. Sorry, the language is the same. It's just different terminology.
It's just understanding what it is. So one of my things that
I done my whole career, I mean, I joined the military as human
resources. I was a recruiter. I've interviewed my entire life.
I do it now. I always laugh because you just hit the nail on the
head for me of something I work with soldiers to this day

(35:37):
on is when they leave the military. Yes, you need to work on your
resume because most of these guys and girls, but a lot of the guys are
putting on there, infantry. I'm really good with a m 16,
an m four, a saw, two, four nine. Like, they list out all their weapons,
and I'm like, hey, that's really cool. But unless you're going law
enforcement or some kind of, you know, outdoor, you

(35:58):
know, sportsman, range instructor or something like that, like, you need to overhaul all
of this. Focus more on, like, leadership skillset, team management. I mean, like, you know,
just completely skills. Yeah, exactly. Completely overhaul the resume. Because it does
make me laugh, though, when I see, I'm like, send me what you have. And
I read through what they have so far before we work together. And it's just
like, okay, this is. We need. We need to judge this a little bit, make

(36:18):
it a little bit civilian friendly. Well, I was quite lucky because I had
Alana, you see? So the military is great in the fact that they're like
your mother and the father. They clothe you, they feed you, they pay you on
time, they take all the way, those distractions. You can just focus on
your job. I joke that I didn't know who provided electric or
the gas to the camera. I didn't really care. But thankfully for me,

(36:40):
Alana is very entrepreneurial. And
my transition ended up, although we touched about a couple of turbulent
bits, was actually quite smooth because she picked up
all those roles that the military did for me. I still don't know who we
bank with. I just still don't know who provides the gas or the electric. Alana
does that for me. But you go, I joined the army at 17. I left

(37:03):
at 33. I've never had to deal with the local city or
the local council for things like that. So they're the things that I
think that the UK military could be working on better. There's obviously, there's
the career transition that can help, but also getting you
set up for the civilian world who you need to be able to speak to
and get advice for because, you know, again, Alana

(37:25):
set up my first after her security company on her phone
in 30 minutes, you know, on company's house. She just had it
submitted and it was done within a week. Whereas for me is like, you know,
have I ticked the right box? Have I done it correctly? You know?
So for me, we understood where our skill
sets lay. You know, she took that side of the house

(37:48):
and I just then focused on my skill sets, which was obviously, at the time,
was the security sector. But even talking
about, you know, the white collar industry, you know,
these corporates, you know, I generally come for that.
Everyone wants to help each other out. And Alana's that, no,
no, this, the world out here is not the same as the military. These people,

(38:09):
not everyone has your back. Not that everyone's bad, but said, no. They'Re all
self serving. Yeah. Yeah, for the most part. And so I was like, oh, so
Lana felt that she also had to protect me on that. No, because the amount
of times I've given stuff away for free, even just some ips or
just, you know, I go to meetings with people and they explain the
situations. They've got security issues and I'd give them the answers over a

(38:30):
cup of coffee. And Alana's that. No, no, no.
What you need to do is this, is this and this. But. So Alana
deals with all the contracts for us. I don't even talk about money. And the
way I best explain that, and again, this is where
veterans could get a bit of advice as well, is that, you know, we come
from an environment where if you're planning an operation in

(38:52):
Afghanistan and you need a Spectre gunship, a UAV,
we need three Black Hawks, we need a squadron of guys. No one tells
you the cost of that is automatically done for you in the military. So you
don't really understand negotiating proposals. You just brought up, like,
multimillions of dollars and just that little configuration. Multimillions of
dollars. You can have that no one's telling me the bottom line

(39:14):
or you need to put in a proposal, there's a bid for it. And
so you go from that environment to the corporate world. And
so I find it very difficult to talk about money
because I don't see the value, especially with some of the stuff I do, especially
with the evacuations and rescuing people. I don't see a value
on someone's life. I just need to rescue them. Whereas Alana. Well,

(39:36):
then she will come in and take over because. Yeah, a lot of people do
take advantage of veterans because they generally want to help
people and don't realize their value or their
worth. Because when I first came out, Alana's like, this is, I was
like, no way you can charge that. She goes, why not? There's people
charging more than that with less skill sets than you. I was like, oh, wow.

(39:58):
Yeah. So no concept of, like, no concept. Yeah. Money and, like, just business
operations in general, et cetera. Yeah. And that's such a
crazy, awesome thing for you that you had, Alana, because so many people
come out and they're just completely on their own where they don't have families. Right.
They join young. They never got married, obviously, like, relationships in the military next to
impossible. And, you know, they come out and they're literally isolated

(40:20):
by themselves, and that's where the failure rate happens. So do you have any advice
for service members that are leaving just on, like, you know, setting up
community or any. Any tips to help them kind land on their feet? Yeah, I
think. I think for me is, you
know, try and find. Try and get
as much advice from people who have done it before you, if that makes

(40:41):
sense. I remember we went to this career transition
workshop, which the SES and the SBS did, and basically
it was okay, but they got four ex veterans in
who are very successful. You know, these guys now have very successful
businesses. And I was like, okay, that's great. But that's now put
me under extreme pressure because I'm like, you've just given me

(41:05):
these success stories. I want to understand. And I knew one of my friends up
there, and he, yes, he had now a multi million pound security company,
but I knew that he'd failed for other companies before. I'm like, I want to
know about that. You know, what were the lessons you took away from those?
Because that's what me, I think some veterans get overwhelmed because they
seed I other veterans, especially in, like, now world of media,

(41:27):
they see all these other veterans doing well, or they see other guys doing well
in the corporate industry, and that puts them under pressure as well. And so for
me, it's like, you know, get as much advice from those
around you, you know, what's worked, what hasn't worked. You know, if you were to
do it again, what would you do differently? Very much. A hot debrief is what
we did in the special forces. Just take that into the, into the corporate world.

(41:47):
And for me that my biggest thing I would say to them is be
confident in your abilities because everyone, again, we
don't. I came out with no
degree, but my skill sets were way above my peers
in the corporate world just because of the other skill sets we had. I remember,
and the pin drop for me once I took a UK trade investment, oil and

(42:10):
gas to Libya to make Libya oil and gas. And
basically we had four huge oil companies pitching
to Libby. Oil and gas. Just as it was about, they open their oil terminals
again and these guys run six, seven figure wages and they're
representing these oil and gas companies. Of the four, three of them
just, you know, their presentation wasn't in

(42:31):
order. You know, they were stumbling, stuttering with their
words. And I'm like, my God, you know, whereas in
the military you're taught to present in front of guys, you do presentations
all the time. You know, you get critiques on it. Yeah. And for me I
was like, wow. Yeah, you don't need an education, you know, it's just doing the
basics. So find out, you know, as you said with your cv. Yeah,

(42:53):
it's good that you can fire an m 60, but, you know, what other transferable
skills have you got? And, yeah, because you'll be very surprised. We're
now in a society where people don't like to talk in big
groups. You know, they don't feel comfortable and I'm very comfortable. I'll speak in front
of 10,000 at the o two arena or I can
speak to a group of 30 people don't understand how

(43:15):
to deal with failure or when they have plans, these corporate worlds, they
have plans and they don't know what to do when it doesn't go to plan.
You know, that's pretty much the military inside out. Things never go to plan,
but we're always reactive to situation changes and we always want to achieve
that aim. So, yeah, sort of take on board the skill sets
you have. Believe in yourself. Don't compare

(43:36):
yourselves to other veterans or to other people. You're unique yourself
and yeah, the world is your oyster. You know, the military is a
great, such a great. Although I had a
bad year last year, I very much
still believe that there's so much you can get from the
military that help you. You know, they're all, at the moment

(44:00):
they're talking about Rishi Sunak, who's the prime minister, if he
gets elected on 4 July, he's on about bringing in national service again,
which is like the draft here. And so for me, I think it's a
good thing because at 17, I didn't know what I was going to be doing.
And even if I left three years later, there was so much I got in
that short period of time. So, yeah, so take on board,

(44:21):
you've got the skill sets, and just believe in yourself, really,
and then find a community. Don't find yourself
on your own. Unfortunately, these people that we heard
with veteran suicides, they tend to have just drifted off on their own and
had no one to communicate with. So stay in touch. It's very easy
nowadays to stay in touch. You know, when my dad left, there was no mobile

(44:45):
phones and so it was probably difficult for that sort of,
that sort of generation. But now there
are tools out there. You know, there are nonprofits, there
are groups that help guys get jobs, guys and
girls get jobs. So, yeah, just utilize those resources.
There's a couple things I want to make sure we touch on. So one is

(45:07):
you have. You did some amazing work with. I think it
was Prince Harry and a few other people. I think the initiative was
called heads together. Is that right? Yeah, heads together. It was
a mental health campaign that him, his brother and Kate were doing. Yeah.
And so is that still in operation? That's still in operation, yeah. So
the royal. Royal foundation. The Royal foundation was set up

(45:30):
for ideas that William, Harry and Kate and them had
back in the day. And there's free arms to it, there's the
veteran arm. And so Invictus games, which everyone knows of, that
was born out of the royal foundation. So they take an idea,
they develop it, and then it moves on. So there's the
veteran side, there's the conservation

(45:52):
side, and then there's the mental health side. And
so, yeah, Harry and I met each other on a JTAC course back in
2007, and we've been friends ever since. And when
I left the military, we were doing a lot of
non profit stuff behind the scenes. But
there was an incident in my book. It wasn't an incident.

(46:14):
I single handedly evacuated the canadian embassy out of Libya on my own. 18 military
and four diplomats. No big deal came home from that.
Alana told me I'd only been home 21 days in a whole
365 day calendar, which is where the second pin dropped. I was
actually still trying to match the adrenaline rush of the special forces without
coming to terms with the fact that I'd left. And so I

(46:37):
decided I was gonna. I always wanted to do a world record, and so I
did a world record attempt. Never cycled before. Well, cycled 20
miles and apply for the world record for the world's longest road, which runs from
southern Argentina to northern Alaska, which is 14,000
miles. All of this after the military, by the way. So for those of you
at home, like, listen, life does not stop when you leave the military.

(46:59):
Two Guinness World Records. Two Guinness World Records. Yes. The world's longest road.
And at the age of 40, I said, I'll do that. And so
Harry, Ilana, and I had done a lot in the philanthropy area before, especially
around veterans. And so I rang him up. I told him I was doing
this challenge, and him and his brother Kate were just about to launch heads
together, as you touched on, but heads together. I'd seen

(47:22):
mental health firsthand in the military with some of my friends, but I wasn't aware
how big it was throughout the whole of society. Postnatal
depression, young children, teenagers, veterans, the
whole spectrum. And so, yeah, that was the challenge. That was
the campaign that we did this bike ride for. I set a target of a
million pounds. The world record was 117 days.

(47:44):
A year later, I set off. I finished it in 99 days,
became the first man in history to do under 100 days. But more impressively,
and Alan will touch on, she raised, you know, over $1.4
million for the charity as well. Huge. Huge. I mean,
it's so amazing. It just gives me goosebumps to think about all of this incredible
stuff that you did after you left the military. I mean, your life just kind

(48:07):
of bringing it full circle from that moment in the kitchen where you broke this
egg, and it just was like the tipping point with a snapping point of, like,
releasing all of this just mess
inside you and feeling like a failure, too. Going on to raising
over a million pounds and breaking two world
records and clearing embassies and starting security

(48:28):
firms and hanging out with Prince Harry. Going to the royal wedding. Are
you kidding me? Just all of these incredible things. That's amazing.
Congratulations. No, no. Yeah, I think I wouldn't be.
You know, I always say, take a positive from a negative. My
negative was me leaving the military. Yeah. But I wouldn't
be here chatting to you. I wouldn't have world records. I wouldn't have Netflix shows,

(48:50):
and, you know, I wouldn't have a very successful security company.
I wouldn't have probably have the family that I have now, either. So
it is. That's why I say you sometimes
end up in a dark place, but it's not dark for too long, you know?
I mean, if you just surround yourself with the right people, you know, they'll show
you the light. This too shall pass. This too shall pass.

(49:11):
It's kind of my mantra myself, because, I mean, I go through it, you know,
we all go through it, just. This too shall pass. Yeah. So amazing. One
of the last things I wanted to touch on is Alana
in the book describes this moment where, you guys have to be honest, I
was kind of. I'm like, I'm single, so I was like, I want to have
a moment with some guy where we're drinking bottles of wine in the kitchen and

(49:32):
talking all night long. But she has this moment with you in the book where
she. I think the exact sentence was, it's gonna be death or it's gonna be
divorce. And that is so
heavy. And, you know, the military. I don't know about the UK, but in the
US, the military divorce rate is, like, 80%. Yeah, it's so high.
And obviously, you know, for obvious reasons, that

(49:54):
relationships in general are just so challenging, especially when you're in roles like you were
in, where you're just constantly deployed, you're on constant training
exercises, and you're always gone. And with Alana, I mean, she
guys. She is, like, the coolest wife ever. I'm telling you. But, you know,
she had, I think, two kids at the point where you were still. Were you
about to leave the military? Is that why you guys had two children? No. So

(50:16):
I left the military in May 2011. That's when I left.
And Molly was born in June 2011. Okay. Yes, it
was after. Yeah, got it. So they have three today, but at the time. So
just one. So she was, like, holding down the fort, running all of
the things at home. I mean, just. She's
incredible, and she's kind of feeling, like, isolated on her own. And while she'd figured

(50:38):
out life by herself, I think that was the catalyst, at least from her perspective,
of, at this point, why do I need you? And
so talk to me about that, because my hope is that from this
conversation. Cause you guys have obviously figured it out, and you've come so far,
and you guys have accomplished incredible things together, like, the ultimate power couple here.
Tell me about that. Because I want to help people save their marriages. Yeah. I

(51:01):
think for Alana, it was probably her identity crisis.
She'd gone from very successful. She was a bank manager, the world of finance, and
then put everyone on pause to help me and pick me up.
And so straight away, we were doing security, and it
was actually a lack of communication. It got to the point.
So I just finished the canadian embassy evacuation.

(51:24):
I came home, and my normal standard operational procedure would be
charge my phone, launder my clothes, and get ready for
the next task. And Alana was my business partner as well. With this, you know,
tasks would come in, and she'd send me away. There had been occasions where I'd
literally landed in the morning from a task. Alana's giving me my second passport
and another bag at the airport, and I'm flying off again.

(51:45):
And so when we sat down that evening, my father had died
that year as well, and I literally buried him and flew out the next day,
and I literally disconnected from society.
And I came back from the canadian embassy, and we realized
I'd only been home 21 days in a 365 day
calendar, so she hadn't even seen me. And so

(52:08):
we sat down, we drank two bottles of wine, and
tears started flowing, talked about my father.
Soon realized that actually, she thought I wanted to be
away, and I thought that she wanted me to be away, to be
building money for the family, when, in fact, she also had another business in property
developing, when really, I didn't actually have to leave if I didn't

(52:30):
want to. So, yes, I was trying to match that adrenaline rush
that I had when the special forces about coming to terms with the fact that
I'd left. But more importantly, we just
miscommunicated. We hadn't really sat down and spoke. I didn't actually want to be going
away. And so, yeah, I took a sabbatical
from the security industry, and then. Yeah, but chapter 16 in my book

(52:52):
is called dead or divorced. That was the conversation we were having. So we then
realized now that if I now go out the door,
it's fine, because I know Alana's green lit
everything we do together. So we now, as a family, we have
five, with the three children, obviously, the youngest is about 20 months,
so she doesn't really get a say. The other two children, we sit down on

(53:15):
everything. More recently, the Israel evacuations, we sat down with the
kids. Dad's gonna have to go. This is. Yeah, it's fine. We get
the nod from them. Whereas before, it was almost quite selfish. And the
special forces, when you're in the special forces is a selfish
role. You deploy for six months, your pager
goes off. You could be away. You can't tell your wife, and they're expected to

(53:37):
stay at home and sort run everything. Yeah. And so for
me, that's fine, when you're in this military, because that is
your job. But when you're in the private security sector, you're almost volunteering
to do that. And so, yeah, that's where we'd got the yin and yang balance
wrong, myself and Alana, and where we do now,
I see a lot of couples, especially when they see

(53:59):
maybe one of the couple, especially the women,
unfortunately, because a lot of women have successful careers and
they put their careers on hold to start a family or whatever, but then their
husbands are carrying on with their careers. And if you're not really working
together or community again, there can be a lot of resentment when he's becoming successful
and you feel like you've lost your own identity. So that's what Alana and I

(54:21):
do as well. We literally do everything together because I
think both of you, as you touched on a power couple, you can both be
successful with your own careers. It's just knowing when to. To
pause and when to support the other one, you know, rather than just one just
going off. I love that in your book, you also, as
you're talking about the debt or divorce in chapter

(54:43):
16, the thing in that, for me, was the communication element,
that you guys were living like two
entirely separate existences. And then when you sat down and
had this deep conversation, which two bottles of wine one night of just
talking till the sun comes up, literally, was this catalyst for you guys
to kind of start this new chapter and realize just how much you did

(55:05):
love each other and want to be together and supported each other. You just thought
you were doing what the other person wanted, but never had that conversation. So I
think that's a key takeaway, at least for me, is just having a conversation and
talking. Having a conversation. Another thing, not in my book,
maybe in Alana's book, one thing we do annually is from the moment
we met, every New Year's Eve, we have a dreams book, we have a

(55:27):
goals book, something we always wanted to do. And so we still always
bring that out each year as well to make sure that we are still
on track and you don't lose sight of what you've always wanted to do as
well. Well, Alana said in her book as well, there was a moment that stood
out to her when you guys had first started dating, I think, and it was
around her career, like, what do you want to do? And she was,

(55:48):
like, coming up with all these different ideas, but it wasn't necessarily what she
wanted to do. I think you corrected her. I forget exactly what you said, but
the way you phrased it when I. Met her, you know, she was. Where we
used to live in Aberdeen is like the oil and gas capital of Europe. So
it's like the Houston of Europe. So very, very male
centric, very oil driven. And so for a

(56:08):
young female growing up there, it's quite hard. But she then, you know, she was
a bank manager at 21. You know, she's very, very driven, as
you know. But when I met her, I said, well, is this what you've always
wanted to do? Have you always wanted to be a bank manager? And it's when
we first started dating. And she said, no, I always wanted to
be a spy, you know. So I think her favorite series at the time
was 24, but she doesn't let me watch that with her. Could always start correcting

(56:32):
Jack Bauer on his pistol hand. And I said, well, what have you
done about being a spy? She goes, oh, nothing but a lot. You know,
especially in that environment. A lot of people just tell her to
take her head out the clouds. And so the next day, I turn up at
the bank where she was working and at a Ydez an envelope, and it had
the joining instructions for Mi Six, which is like your CIA,

(56:54):
with the phone number of the chief instructor who was a friend of mine. I
said, well, let's start your process. And she's like, wow. So
she did. And actually, she got all the way through. She failed
on the family section. So God knows who I've married into with her family
history. But I think for her, she then realized, well, this guy is
actually going to push me rather than hold me back. And so, yeah, that's

(57:16):
the way we sort of boast, really. Then fell in love with each other because,
you know, some of the stuff I do, these bike rides and, you know,
the evacuations, you know, a lot of these are Lana's, you
know, decisions, not mine. And that's one of the things I love about her so
much is because she's a total badass. And, I mean, like, even on the show,
toughest forces on earth, that's currently on Netflix. For those of you still

(57:36):
listening, she was a nutritionist on that show. And
so she was incredibly invested in the performance of all of the guys on
the show. And, you know, she's running the security company. I mean, she's. She's been
through a lot of these courses. She's. She's like really neck and neck with you.
You might have your beat.
Yeah, you need to find a partner who's going to challenge you. Yeah. Who's going

(57:57):
to push you. I think with Alana, she's no reason she's got into nutrition. Was
actually, when I was doing the bite ride, I was going to be burning between
nine and 12,000 calories a day, and we were. She was
checking out these nutritionists, and they just weren't really understanding me. Yeah. A
lot of it now is about. Or military training. Or military training.
Yeah, yeah. It's all about these sport gels and things, which is a short burst

(58:20):
when she's like, no, no, I just. I generally eat normal food. And
so she trained as an advanced sports nutritionist to.
To help me during my training process and for the bike ride. And,
yeah, we filmed the first episode on toughest forces on earth, which was
the first episode, the production team was still trying to find their feet, and
there were days where literally we would just have a half

(58:43):
a burrito and we've done like 2 hours of PT or been diving
for 4 hours, and I'm like, no, I came back from there skinny. And ilana's
that, right. You know, she tends to, like, take a visual
view of me and then, like, right, yeah, he needs help. Yeah. And so, yeah,
she bought a bag of Doritos. Yeah, yeah. Doesn't work for me. Yeah.
Wow. You know, every show that I film, I always talk about charity, so I

(59:05):
know we talked about the one earlier, but are there
any charity organizations that you'd like to shout out that you encourage? I. Service members
should check out. Yeah. So the ones for me at the moment
is heroic hearts. Coming from the UK, we're about
15 years behind the US when it comes to even marijuana is a legal
heir. So when I did my bike ride,

(59:28):
I was trying to promote the message that physical activity
helps your mental state. It did for me. That's why I
say to veterans as well, sometimes you come from an environment where you've got
gym access all the time and things that you then just become
busy as a civilian and you sort of neglect that. But there is
a linkage between being physically active and helping your mental

(59:50):
state. So I was promoting that massively on the bike
ride, and then I got introduced to the plant
medicine here in the US. So I've actually. Your
first podcast to know this. Actually, I actually went out last
November to Mexico and did the ibogaine and DMT,
but I've never smoked before my life, never done any recreational

(01:00:12):
drugs. And for me, I've seen the impact that's had
on veterans and their spouses as well, which heroic hearts do. So I now sit
on the board of heroic Hearts, and Alana helps now fundraise for them.
But for me, it's just what it
highlighted to me. I've been telling people that physical activity
helps your mental state. It does. It's a short term

(01:00:34):
relief, but actually the plant medicine takes you. The
way I explain it is you're like a pan on a flame. You do
physical activity, you take the lid off and the steam escapes, but you're putting it
back on. So it's then going to start building up again. What the plant medicine
does, it takes you completely off the flame and off.
So for me, it's something I've only just started to

(01:00:57):
know more about, but I'm seeing the effects it's having on
veterans and veteran suicide. There's been people going there
with their suicide notes and then just coming back and the wives and
families automatically seeing the changes. So for
me, I want to help start promoting that message. I was very fortunate I didn't
have any addictions or PTSD, but as you touched on the book,

(01:01:20):
there were still anger issues for me. I'm very
comfortable in environments that are hostile.
What upset me is when I come back to the western world and I see.
You're the hostel. Yeah, no, but I see. No, I see people arguing about the
most stupidest of things, you know, and compared to what's going on
outside the world, and it tends to be when someone beeps their horn, you know,

(01:01:42):
some beeps their horn. I used to get out of Redmi. Yeah. I get out
of the car. I did it in Scotland. I dropped my daughter off a nursery
and I was coming out. Yeah, I was coming out and the guy was beeping
his horn, and next thing, Alana sees me, I've got this guy just ripped through
his ring screen. I'm just like. And then I apologize. The red mist just
goes. So there was always underlying issues, but which the
ibogaine and the medicine's been amazing for

(01:02:05):
me. Yeah. So I brought my shout out to heroic hearts. You
couldn't, like, I haven't done that yet, but I really want
to. I've had so many people tell me that that will change my
life. And so that's, I think next for me is I really
want to go. Try that as a veteran. I would love
to. Sign me up. Honestly. Sign me up. She's the

(01:02:27):
one I know. Well, actually, I did talk to her about it and she told
me, the medicine calls you, and
I have such a crazy story about how even Alana and I got connected in
the first place, because the statement the medicine calls you, it could not
be more true. It's just been telling me it's
time, and I feel like it's time. So I'm going to go check it out,
and I'll let you guys know how it goes. I think for me, with the

(01:02:50):
plant medicine, what puts off the special forces community or the veteran
community is almost. It looks quite hippy ish, and.
And that's really what preserve so people like myself. And, you
know, I went to an event where there were some SeAL team, six guys have
done it, and they answered all my questions for me. I did no research. I
literally said yes. And I went the following Friday. Wow. Yeah. I

(01:03:12):
don't listen to podcasts. I didn't do any research. And typical
meetings, I listen to this one, but I just jumped straight in.
I was just like, well, let's see what it do. And Alana's very spiritual
anyway, and so. So if she'd gone away and did it before me,
then I probably wouldn't listen. I had to go myself
and then come back. And so, you know, for me, I was worried about

(01:03:35):
will I lose my physical ability, which I use
for doing will records. And actually, they said, no, it cleans you up. It
just makes everything a lot clearer. So,
like I said, I didn't know much about it, but now, very much,
we'll fly the flag for plant medicine. Well, you sold me at taking.
Taking the pan off the flame, because I feel like that's what I need. I

(01:03:56):
need to be taken right off the flame. Yeah, because you do, you know, you
can't. There are ways of relieving that
anger short term, but you need to start then looking at it long term.
And that's what it was with Alana. Like I said, I didn't have
PTSD or any addictions, and life was quite good, you know,
family. But there were those moments, and it probably about two or three times a

(01:04:19):
year that red mist would come down, and Alana said there's nothing no one could
do or say when that happened. And so that was always her fear. And then
we actually had. We have a podcast called behind the scene, and
we had. I'd heard about Ayahuasca, but we had
Amber and Marcus Capone from the vets on, and they.
He talked about how he tried ayahuasca,

(01:04:40):
psilocybin, but then his last resort was ibogaine, which was
a weekend, which is perfect, because I have such a busy life. I can't. Ayahuasca
is like eight days old. I can't do that. I haven't got time for that.
And so, yeah, I literally needed the most powerful thing. And. But
Amber talks about how straight away, as soon as he got off the
soon, she picked him up, you know, she broke into tears. She knew it had

(01:05:01):
worked. Wow. And that's the same with me. Alana dropped me off at San Juan
Capistrano train station, and I was on the way down. I was like,
I don't need this. I'm just doing it for you and the kids. I was
already resisting, and then 72 hours later, came back.
I was eight pounds lighter. And then Alana. Yeah. Just broke down in tears. No
way. She said, yeah, that's the dean I met. Oh, my God. In
Aberdeen. Yeah. Before the injury. And so, yeah, it's powerful.

(01:05:25):
It's hard to explain if you haven't done it, but, yeah,
definitely worth looking into. I'm going to. I will report
back and let you know anyway. Amazing. Well, next up,
I've got your wife. She's out there waiting for us, so I'm going to switch
over to her. But thank you so much for spending this time with me today.
Thank you. I'm definitely gonna have to have you back on. And I also want
to shout out, like, I wore this in top. I was about to say you

(01:05:46):
had the England top. Yeah, I saw it just because you. Guys were coming on.
But what's crazy is you have Portland, Oregon, and that is such a huge
part of my life. Oh, wow. Yeah, I spent. So. So my
mother married an american Mormon missionary. That's from Grants pass, Oregon.
So she's from Sheffield. Yes. And so they married.
And it's not my dad. My dad lives in Nottingham still, but they married and

(01:06:08):
moved to Oregon. And so I spent most of my life.
Good. From 16 to I was in the National
Guard, so I spent a lot of time there. I mean, my last duty
station was Portland, Oregon. Amazing. So that's crazy. That wasn't planned. That wasn't planned. That
wasn't planned at all. No. Yes. It's very, very cool. Anyway, I'm so
thankful. Where can people find you? And just a reminder for

(01:06:29):
everybody, Dean Stott, relentless is the book Netflix.
Toughest forces on earth. Where else can people find you? They can find me on
Instagram and Facebook, or you can go to my website,
deanstot.com. there'll be a few announcements coming out there soon as well.
Amazing. Well, I can't wait to go watch the rest of the show. I got
to go to your premiere. That was so cool.
And you really are, quite frankly, the coolest guy I've had on the show so

(01:06:52):
far. So anyway, on episode ten or eleven, they'll get
cooler. Guys, I'm excited. I'm excited. Yeah. Well, I don't know. I don't know. Because
you guys are a power couple and that's what we really care about. I like
the women on the show, too. You. Thank you. Thank you very much. Have a
good one. Thank you. Thanks for watching.
You

(01:07:14):
our channel.

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