June 2, 2025 • 48 mins
This episode is an interview with Matt Butler, a singer-songwriter who has performed in jails and prisons across America for a decade. He shares how music creates transformative spaces for healing in correctional environments.
• Matt's musical journey began after writing songs for a documentary about recovery high schools
• Music penetrates emotional defenses faster than conventional approaches, allowing inmates to be vulnerable
• Songs like "Good Friday" and "Time to Be a Man" directly speak to experiences of addiction and incarceration
• Hypervigilance in prison environments makes trauma processing nearly impossible
• Music temporarily changes the atmosphere, allowing emotional expression typically suppressed for survival
• Trauma and addiction form a vicious cycle that's particularly difficult to break while incarcerated
• Reentry challenges include practical barriers like employment, housing, and basic skills deficits
• Many successful recovery stories involve people transforming their past struggles into purpose by helping others
• Creating spaces where people feel safe and accepted is essential for healing from addiction and trauma
Please check out Matt's album Reckless Son, the one-man show he performs in correctional facilities across the country.
To contact Dr. Grover: ammadeeasy@fastmail.com
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to the Addiction Medicine Made Easy
Podcast.
Hey there, I'm Dr Casey Grover,an addiction medicine doctor
based on California's CentralCoast.
(00:22):
For 14 years I worked in theemergency department, seeing
countless patients strugglingwith addiction.
Now I'm on the other side ofthe fight, helping people
rebuild their lives when drugsand alcohol take control.
Thanks for tuning in.
Let's get started.
This episode has been on myto-do list for quite a while.
(00:44):
Today I am talking to musicianMatt Butler.
He is a singer-songwriter whoseniche is performing to
incarcerated people in jails andprisons.
I met him last year when hecame out to California.
One of the surgeons at myhospital heard his story and set
up an educational event whereMatt performed the music that he
(01:06):
plays in jails and prisons toour doctors and nurses, and so
we used his performance toeducate about addiction.
I had the pleasure of havingdinner with Matt later that
night after the event.
He's an incredibly intelligentperson and he has a lot of
insight about what happens injails and prisons, particularly
(01:27):
about how addiction is often areason why people get locked up
and how we need to do more totreat addiction.
So please check out Matt'salbum Reckless Son.
It's the one-man show that heputs on when he performs in
jails and prisons.
I will include excerpts fromtwo of the songs from the album
(01:47):
Good Friday and Time to Be a manduring this episode.
Here we go.
All right, apparently, it'sChristmas and my birthday today,
because I am speaking today toMatt Butler.
So, matt, welcome to thepodcast.
It's so nice to catch up withyou again.
Speaker 2 (02:06):
Yeah, merry, christmas and Happy.
Speaker 1 (02:08):
Birthday dude.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
What a special day this is.
Speaker 1 (02:12):
My wife always says that She'll be like oh my gosh,
is it Christmas and my birthday?
This is amazing.
So I've been.
After we met last year.
I've been really excited totalk to you, hear more about
your work.
Why don't you just start bytelling us what you do?
Speaker 2 (02:30):
Sure, I am a musician , I'm a singer-songwriter and
for about 10 years now I havebeen performing inside jails and
in prisons, really all acrossthe United States.
Speaker 1 (02:38):
How did you get started?
Speaker 2 (02:41):
Yeah, the origin story.
It began with being asked towrite music for a documentary
film called Generation Found,which is a documentary about
recovery high schools, which arehigh schools where the student
body are exclusively kids thatare in recovery from substance
use or other mental healthissues, and so I wrote a song
(03:02):
for that movie actually the song, just One, which is on that
record and when the film cameout, the film itself was almost
like some sort of a communityadvocacy tool where it would get
screened at colleges, peoplewould bring it to their
communities that were interestedin creating their own recovery
high schools and so forth, andthen it would be at galas and
(03:22):
charity events and I wouldactually tour with the film
where I would go to thesedifferent events and I would
perform the song live and as aresult I ended up meeting all
kinds of people that worked inaddiction recovery, nonprofit
stuff, advocacy, and there'sthis huge overlap, as I'm sure
we'll discuss today, betweenaddiction and incarceration.
So I met all kinds of peoplethat I wouldn't otherwise have
(03:47):
been exposed to, and at onepoint in that process, in that
journey, I saw a video of mensinging in what is called the
harp unit of the ChesterfieldCounty Jail and that initially
stood for Heroin AddictionRecovery Program and then later
became called helping addictsrecover progressively, to be
(04:08):
more inclusive of all kinds ofsubstance use.
And when I saw this video itjust struck me as music in that
context was really more of thissort of transcendent thing.
Watching that was like this iswhat drew me to music in the
first place.
Beyond some sort of likeentertainment, this was like
real, like soul, and I thoughtto myself maybe they'd be
(04:31):
interested in hearing some ofthe songs that I've been writing
for this film and songs thathad to do with substance use and
recovery and addiction.
And because of all the peopleI'd met in that process working
on the film, I had some people Icould immediately ask about it
and literally within a week ortwo someone had arranged for me
to go and perform at the heroinprogram of the Albany County
(04:52):
Jail in New York and I went anddid that show and it was just a
life-changing, epiphanal thingfor me and it went really well.
The sheriff was reallyimpressed and all of a sudden
people started talking about it.
While I was touring was reallyimpressed and all of a sudden
people started talking about itand while I was touring, people
would ask me if, while I was intheir town playing a show or
doing an event, if I would alsoperform at a jail that was in
(05:13):
there, or a prison, and I just Ialways said yes.
And it wasn't long until Irealized that those were the
most fulfilling shows and thosewere the experiences that I was
really after.
And then that was it.
Man, I started a smallnonprofit in order to fund
myself doing this, but I justwent on my own Kerouacian
adventure performing in prison.
I have crossed the country manytimes playing in prisons and I
(05:35):
have been doing it ever since.
That first show was November of2016.
And the last time I did it wasearlier this month.
I was at Clallam BayCorrections in Washington State.
Speaker 1 (05:48):
So you and I were talking a little bit before we
started recording.
Locking people up when theyhave addiction clearly doesn't
work right.
I often say I'd like tocongratulate drugs on winning
the war against drugs.
Right, drugs won.
Whatever we're doing hasn'tbeen working.
Talk to me about the responsethat you get from inmates when
(06:09):
they hear your songs.
Do you feel like you changeminds, change hearts?
Are they more open?
Talk to me about what that'slike.
Speaker 2 (06:16):
Yeah, that was the thing that was so striking about
it from that very first show on, was that like as an artist.
I had never in my life, assomeone who'd been playing music
since they were 15 years old, Ihad never in my life felt like
an audience had heard me thatway.
I had never felt as seen as anartist or as a human as I did in
(06:38):
those moments.
And I think there that in myexperience, people that
incarcerated, they can oftenfeel unseen and unheard, and so
in that moment of performing andthere is something about music
that just really penetrates pastthe intellect and penetrates
past certain types of defensesthat we have that it was this
(06:58):
sense of like being mutuallyseen by one another, and that
was just transformative for me.
I'd never really felt anythinglike that before.
They similarly instantly startedopening up about their
experiences, because typicallythe way these performances go is
they're not quite concerts andthat there's a real audience
(07:22):
performer divide.
They're much more of aconversational thing, where I
would play songs in order toalmost prompt a discussion, and
what I've been told is that withmusic and with these songs and
with playing it, counselors incertain programs will say to me
that a few moments of the musicwill do more to build trust than
they're necessarily able to doover the course of a year.
(07:43):
And that's not just to downplaythe amazing work that coaches
and counselors do in thoseenvironments, but there just is
something about music inparticular that, just like I
said, it just penetrates so muchfaster.
Speaker 1 (08:00):
I'm looking at the playlist I made on my iPhone for
your Reckless Son album.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
When did you write Reckless Son, and how does it
relate to when you startedactually playing in jails and
prisons?
Yeah, so I wrote that recordover the course of many years
and there are nine songs on thatalbum and the body of work that
(08:41):
that all came from was over 30songs that were written over a
period of years and some ofthose songs, like Good Friday, I
wrote before I ever even playedin a jail or a prison.
Those were based more aboutexperiences that I'd had and the
experiences of other peoplethat I knew growing up.
And because I had songs likethat when I first went into a
prison, that's what allowed meto make that initial connection,
because I've never beenincarcerated.
So it's like this idea thatlike how do I connect if I
haven't had this sharedexperience?
But there I do have sharedexperiences and I do have a
(09:04):
certain understanding of what itfeels like to be imprisoned in
my own mind, in my own body, inthat way.
And so once I started playingthose songs and that kind of put
me in this place where all of asudden these men and women were
opening up to me and sharingtheir stories, that's when I
started to write the rest of thesongs on that record that are
(09:28):
really from the character'sperspective, the character of
someone who's been incarcerated,and so those songs are really
written, you know, over thecourse of 2016, 2017, 2018.
And then I had the opportunityto make the record and put the
record out in 2023, along withthe sort of theater, the one man
(09:49):
show performance that I do withthose songs that you've seen.
At this point, I have to imaginethat I've worked relatively
intimately more with others,less than others, with over
25,000 people insidecorrectional facilities.
I perform for over 1,000 peoplejust this summer alone and this
fall alone, and I've been doingthis for 10 years.
(10:09):
The amount of stories that I'veheard, it's epic, it's
unfathomable.
But those songs, it was thisprocess of really intense
synthesis.
So much of this material comesin and then it has to be
rearranged by your unconsciousin order for it to come out in a
way that's truthful andauthentic.
(10:31):
But it, but those songs arereally.
It's like all of these peoplethat I met were synthesized from
the perspective of just onecharacter that's taken on the
moniker of reckless son.
Speaker 1 (10:43):
Yeah, the song.
Good Friday.
I hear my patients beggingtheir mother to let them in.
Mom, it's me, let me in.
I need to clean up.
And then the character in thesong acknowledges I understand
why you tell me no.
Speaker 3 (11:16):
Mama, let me in to take a shower.
Know I said like Good Friday,Mama, come and go.
And I know that's why you hadto tell me no.
Speaker 1 (11:35):
It just, man.
I just got goosebumps just now,but I can see how, when you go
to a correctional facility andyou present your persona
performing of the reckless sonwho's trying to get it together
with addiction, it just, it musthit home beyond belief yeah,
like prison is this thing whereyou walk in and inevitably it's
(12:02):
very intimidating and that'spart of what it is Like.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
Vulnerability is something that is a serious
liability in that environment.
And then you see somebody who'scovered in tattoos and they
have an intimidating presenceand then all of a sudden they're
talking about their mother andit's oh my God, it's impossible
not to feel the sense of empathy.
And then you realize that, likethe incarcerated are this
abstract concept to so manypeople, and then you meet
(12:28):
somebody and you hear them talkabout their experience with
their mom and you're like theseare really individuals with
stories and like this person,this is someone's son, like this
is someone's brother, this issomeone's father, potentially.
And that story Good Friday isone where I started playing that
early in this journey and I wasblown away because some of that
(12:51):
is my story and some of myfriend's story.
I was simultaneously comfortedand highly disturbed by how many
people related to it and saidit was their story.
And it is this thing wherewriting that song was also meant
to be like how do I put myself,even though I haven't had the
experience, how do I potentiallytry to empathize with the
(13:13):
mother character in that songand try to understand the pain
of what that must be like tohave to say no to your child in
that situation, when a motherhas been burned over and over
again as far as how much aparent might try to do, and the
(13:33):
lyric is good Friday, I'll comeand go, I'm going to come in,
I'm going to clean up, I'm goingto get a meal, I'm going to
take 60 bucks out of your purseand then you're not going to see
me again for another threemonths.
And it's like at some point amother has to protect herself
and put up a boundary, and it's.
I just can't imagine howpainful that must be, and that
(13:54):
was what that song was abouttrying to achieve.
Speaker 1 (13:56):
We talked about it with a family this week.
I was in clinic and I've got amom who does not know what to do
with her son and we both hadthis look of he's going to end
up incarcerated for a long time.
And, oh man, yes, I didn'trealize that you would
explicitly consider the mother'sperspective in that song, but
(14:17):
you nailed it.
The other song that, I have tosay, really threw me for a loop
was Time to Be a man of justsomething goes bad and dad hands
you a bottle of Jack Danielsand just go to town.
And I remember actually theinterview you did with NPR you
actually mentioned that oneinmate was like man.
That song, time to Be a man,really messed me up.
That was very profound.
Speaker 3 (14:39):
One night he came home he said I lost my job and
your mama's gone.
He pressed that bottle into myhands.
He looked me in the eyes and hesaid, son, it's time to be a
man Time to be a man, Time to bea man.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
I've been reading a lot of sort of almost spiritual
but anthropological literatureabout rites of passage and
coming of age and what is thismoment where we go from a child
to an adult in society and whatdoes that?
Initiation or coming of age isthis idea where you move from a
child's perspective, which ismuch more inherently and
naturally self-centered, to onewhere you're concerned more
about your community andsomething that's a greater good
and how do I serve somethinglarger than my own personal
(15:48):
interests?
And when that isn't availableto a young person, they'll try
to find it some other way andthey'll find it through
addiction, where they feel theybelong.
And incarceration is a rite ofpassage.
It's like you see it inGoodfellas, that scene where
he's walking out of the jail andall the mob guys are there
clapping for him and they'relike, yeah, you're one of us now
(16:10):
because you did your first bidand it was wild to me.
And that's what that song isabout.
It's like these sort of theserites, these kind of inverted
rites of passage that take placethis father figure who's saying
drink up, it's time to be a man.
(16:30):
And then this idea of when yougo to prison, the cop says to
you it's time to be a man.
And what was interesting to meis it was written ironically in
that sense.
But then when I started playingit in prison and I was terrified
to play it in prison, terrifiedto play that for the first time
in prison, because I was soafraid it was going to be
considered patronizing and thatit was going to be considered
patronizing and that was goingto not get a good reaction.
But when I started playing that, those guys, the words that
they heard, more than anythingwas time to be a man and they
(16:53):
felt that they wanted to hear,that they wanted to be told to
grow up and that they felt thatthey were children in a lot of
ways and it was like wow.
It was a much more literalresponse to it than I intended
and I was blown away by thatbecause the idea that they were
willing to express that in thatenvironment was such an
(17:14):
unbelievable act of courage inmy opinion.
Like just to admit to somethinglike that, to say in a prison,
I feel like a child, like I'venever grown up, Like that's the
place to be tough, that's theplace where you act like a man
like a tough guy and those kindsof admissions that I've heard
(17:35):
in that environment just blow meaway Because, like I said, I
believe they're just likemiraculous acts of courage and
the irony is that is the path tomanhood.
In my opinion, that is the pathto adulthood and in that context
I don't necessarily separatethe concepts of manhood from
adulthood.
I just use the phrase becausethe phrase is such a colloquial
(17:57):
phrase and has such an impactand such an implied meaning.
Speaker 1 (18:02):
So as I learn more about addiction, I'm really
learning about the interactionbetween life traumas and
addiction, and one psychiatristI interviewed on my podcast
described it to me like asnowball.
So let's game this out for oneof the individuals you played to
this summer Difficult home life, parent with addiction, maybe
(18:24):
physical violence in the home,verbal abuse in the home the
traumas begin.
Start to experiment with drugsand alcohol first.
Interaction with lawenforcement that's traumatizing.
Going to jail for with lawenforcement, that's traumatizing
.
Going to jail for the firsttime, that's traumatizing.
Going to prison, the violence.
Essentially in the world ofgangs, their currency is
violence.
It's how they keep each other'sdistance but hold their ground.
(18:47):
It's all about violence andjust the trauma, just like
snowballs and really and I'mquoting Dr Gabor Mate here but
everyone who has addiction hasbeen traumatized.
How are you respectful of theirtrauma when you bring in these
difficult songs, when you playfor them?
Speaker 2 (19:05):
Sure, I certainly agree with that and I think
that's one of the sort of thetragedies of the way the system
works in most cases.
I will say that there arecertain facilities I've visited
where the cultures areincredibly collaborative and
supportive and they have success.
But I think typically thetragedy is that hurt people go
into prison and they emerge morehurt and the thing that's sad
(19:28):
about that is that it's reallyin the country, in the whole
community, in the wholesociety's best interest that
people emerge from prison.
They come out of prisonhealthier than they were when
they went in even economically,that makes the most sense.
the recidivism.
Is this like massive economicproblem as well?
But?
But as far as your question andhow trauma is respected, one
(19:48):
one thing I'll say is that thetrauma is so evident and the
hyper vigilance is so evident,and I knowvigilance is so
evident and I know those twothings are connected that a
traumatized person is in a stateof fight or flight to some
degree and they're hypervigilant, like just as a sort of
anecdote.
When you play a, when youperform in a prison, you know it
(20:10):
can be an auditorium of 500guys.
If somebody opens the back doorof the gymnasium and steps in,
every single head in that roomimmediately pivots.
Everyone's attention will go toany single noise, any single
new person that walks in,somebody walks out, everybody
(20:31):
watches, everybody is so awareof every single thing that's
going on in the room.
That does not happen when youplay a theater.
That does not happen when youplay a singer-songwriter club.
If you're playing asinger-songwriter club and
somebody walks to the bar to geta beer, the entire club does
not go up and start watching theguy going to get the beer.
(20:51):
Do you know what I'm saying?
Yes, and that, to me, is justsuch an indicator of not only
the trauma but also the statethat that environment keeps
people in, which makes itimpossible to actually heal a
bit.
Your nervous system has to calmdown at some point right In
order to process the trauma.
Speaker 1 (21:09):
Yes, hypervigilance is one of the diagnostic
criteria for post-traumaticstress disorder and the first
part of healing is to get out ofthe trauma.
It's very hard to treat someonewith PTSD if they're still
being traumatized.
So, to answer your question, ifthey're still incarcerated, it
would be very unusual to makeprogress, unless, as you point
(21:30):
out, there are some verycollaborative progressive
programs.
But yeah, I have one patientand he actually wants to get
back to his community and talkto young kids about what it's
like getting into a gang andgetting into prison and he's
taught me so much about thestuff that he was asked to do as
a gang member in prison.
And with this gentleman, all Ido is listen for 30 minutes and
(21:54):
he's processing, but now he'ssafe, he's married, he's got
back together with his familyand his grandkids.
He's teaching his grandkids howto make models and wire
electronics.
But, yes, he could not haveprocessed that in prison, but he
can now.
Speaker 2 (22:09):
Yeah, the thing that the music allows is that somehow
and this is like the magic ofthis experience is that like
temporarily, changes the energyin that space where all of a
sudden, people seem to be ableto feel things that they're
otherwise not really allowedsafely to feel in that
(22:33):
environment.
So when you play a song likeGood Friday and you see a guy
start to weep, it's again it'slike a miraculous thing because
it's like that's not somethingthat you can really do in that
environment with any degree ofsafety, like you're not supposed
(22:53):
to be crying in there, and so,for whatever reason, music can
do that, where for that hour,two hours, three hours that
we're doing this work, all of asudden the vibration in the
space changes and people areable to experience an emotion
that they otherwise can't.
(23:13):
I played in a juveniledetention Clallam County
juvenile detention in Washingtonearlier this month and I
started playing Time to Be a manand within the first verse this
17-year-old kid started cryingand he said after the show he
said that his father had diedwhile he was in there and that
(23:38):
he had been stuffing down thepain of losing his father for
the past four months while hewas locked up in juvenile and
that he felt he could not allowhimself to feel anything about
that.
And as soon as I startedsinging that song I grew up in a
quiet town where most folksdon't want to stick around
(23:58):
except for guys like my dad assoon as I said the word dad, he
started crying and said to methis is the first time I've felt
anything about my dad whileI've been here.
And so the songs that tell meif I'm right about this.
But also with trauma.
You don't want to re-traumatizesomeone, but don't they have to
(24:18):
end the experience in some wayby feeling it, because they're
still going through it, likethey're frozen in it.
And then, or even with grief,if you can't allow yourself to
experience grief, it like stayswith you, it continues to weigh
on you.
Speaker 1 (24:35):
I'll tell you that I was diagnosed with PTSD at the
end of last year from my workbeing a doctor in the emergency
department the stabbings, theshootings, the domestic violence
, the sexual assault, thehangings and so I've learned a
lot about PTSD and my niche inaddiction medicine now is PTSD
and addiction.
And it's funny to say thatbecause a lot about PTSD and my
niche in addiction medicine nowis PTSD and addiction.
And it's funny to say thatbecause a lot of addiction
(24:56):
medicine is helping people toprocess their trauma.
But yes, the way I look at itis that essentially, ptsd is
when our fight or flightresponse is broken and it's
overstimulated and it goes offat improper times, and so what
the person has to do is findsafety so that they're not
(25:17):
actually needing their fight orflight response, and then they
have to process what they'vebeen through and it's like
negative energy that's storedand it has to come out in some
way and that could be talktherapy.
And one of my patients I talkedto her this week oh my gosh,
she's in her twenties too manysexual assaults to count.
(25:39):
She was held prisoner andhostage because of her drug use
at one point and I asked herlike how are we going to get the
trauma out?
And she's now in a very safeplace and she's got a good
connection with me.
I'm encouraging her to use artto draw and then to be able to
talk to me about what she'sdrawing.
And that may not work and wemay go down the direction of
equine therapy, where she's ableto focus on the animal and feed
(26:03):
off the animal's interactionwith her as a way to regulate
her emotions better.
There's so many ways to do it,but, to answer your question, it
has to come out somehow,otherwise, essentially, it's
this vicious feedback loop andthe best way to think of this is
that lizards have a fight orflight response, but they don't
get PTSD.
(26:24):
Humans have a complicatedenough brain that we always want
to know why that we always wantto know why.
So the lizard gets startled andit scurries off and then it
goes to do lizard things likeeating and sunning itself.
Right, humans are like I justgot beat up, like why me?
Why today?
What could I have done better?
What happened again?
What if those guys know where Ilive?
And essentially, the fight orflight part of the brain sends
(26:47):
it up to the frontal lobe, thecomplicated human part of the
brain, the complicated humanpart of the brain, and this was
never meant to be understood.
It was simply a survivalmechanism.
And so you get this viciousfeedback loop where the attempt
to process the trauma leads tounresolved questions and it
raises more anxiety what if ithappens next?
And then the human part of thebrain will send it back to the
fight or flight and it becomesthis like vicious feedback loop
(27:11):
and eventually we have to learnto process it and understand it
and be aware of it.
And, like I was just telling mytherapist yesterday, one of my
patients really triggered melast week and I was not ready
and I had to talk through it andtell her the why and what was
the reason why that was sotriggering for me.
And I've got to be ready fornext time because it's going to
happen again.
So, yes, so that was a verylong answer to your question,
(27:34):
but yes, people have to processit in some way.
And I'd be curious, matt, and Idon't know if you want to share
anything about your own reasonsfor getting into this, but
music can be extraordinarilytherapeutic to process one's own
trauma and you mentioned kindof some of your stories are in
your songs has it beentherapeutic for you.
Speaker 2 (27:54):
Yeah, I think first of all, a long answer is
appreciated, because this is myopportunity to speak to a pro,
an expert.
Here I'm trying to learn andI'll also just say I'm a layman
when it comes to everything,like I'm an amateur at
everything, everything but.
But I I know in my experiencewith music there's like a very
big difference betweenunderstanding something
(28:16):
intellectually and thenunderstanding something
experientially, or having it'slike the knowledge degraded in a
way, and, like I mentionedearlier about all of the stories
that I heard while doing thiswork, that they had to work
their way into my own conscious,and it was this process of
synthesizing all of thisinformation and being able to
(28:37):
put it out in a different way.
So for me there are things thatI can know with my head, but
being able to write a song aboutit, at least a good song about
it, to write a good song aboutsomething, something I have to
understand it with my heart andin that way I've for a while
thought about songs as thebyproduct of something they're
(28:58):
like secondary to somethingthat's like the actual work is
like something that's occurredin my heart and soul and
unconscious mind, and then it'slike the song is like a skin
that you shed and you're likethis is the result of a process
that has happened internally.
And so for me writing music isincredibly therapeutic and I
(29:22):
have cried writing the songs andsinging them myself.
And sometimes I'll sing a songlike Good Friday, and there'll
be a woman sitting there in thefront row and she'll start
crying and I'll start crying andit was hard for me at certain
points to perform certain musicbecause I felt like I was
(29:43):
re-traumatizing myself, sure,like I was reenacting something.
And I have had to, at differenttimes in in my life, take breaks
from certain music and takebreaks from the prison work as
well, and I will say that sortof covid was like a forced break
from that because nobody couldgo, no volunteers could go into
(30:06):
correctional facilities at thatpoint.
But there is like a line andI'm I'm sure you understand that
in your own experience.
And then there are people thatmy understanding is that, like,
sometimes people unconsciouslyseek to re-traumatize themselves
, and my wife has either beenconcerned about me doing that
sometimes when I get a littletoo rattled from some of the
(30:27):
prison work, becausesimultaneously I'll become the
receiver of huge psychic burdensfrom people.
But I know you had a reactionthere when I said something
about re-traumatization, so I'dlove to hear what you have to
say about that.
Speaker 1 (30:41):
Yeah, so I'm going to give a shout out to my CrossFit
trainer, who is the singlesmartest person I've ever met
and lived experience withdifficult life circumstances and
honestly knows more about PTSDthan anyone I know and she's an
incredible human and will workout and will just kind of free
(31:02):
associate with trying tounderstand how we can help
people.
And I've actually had some ofmy patients go see her because
of the safety that she createsin the workout and the free
space to be able to speak what'son a person's mind while doing
squats, burpees, whatever, andhere's how she described it to
me and this makes sense to me.
So a lot of my patients cannotsleep and it makes perfect sense
(31:28):
.
They have been traumatized,they've been beaten, they've
been raped, they've beenassaulted and when you're asleep
you are vulnerable and thebrain knows that.
And so insomnia is the braintrying to protect itself.
Now let's imagine a young womanis sexually assaulted by her
stepfather.
(31:49):
Hypothetically, thatmale-female relationship is
horrible, it's toxic, it'straumatizing, it's violent and
the brain wants to resolve it.
Remember, we talked aboutprocessing and moving on from
the trauma and a lot of timesthese women will gravitate
towards similar relationshipsbecause they're trying to
(32:10):
resolve the original trauma.
In other words, their brainsays I got to fix it, I've been
traumatized, how do I fix it?
And they get into arelationship and they see the
similar pattern and they'll getback into it and it's
re-traumatizing because they'restill trying to process the
original trauma.
I can't name the specificpsychological theory behind that
, but it makes perfect sense andit is so devastating for my
(32:33):
female patients because theretend to be these cycles of
domestic violence and abusiverelationships and that's how she
explained it to me is they'restill trying to process the
original trauma and then, as thenext trauma happens, it adds
more to what the brain is tryingto resolve.
That's heavy man.
That's what we do in addictionmedicine.
Speaker 2 (32:50):
Yeah, but it's that's like very I don't know, it's
just like very profound as well.
That's a big idea.
Speaker 1 (32:56):
Yeah, matt, I guess here's what I would say to give
you a sense of kind of what I'velearned from just talking to
people who have been traumatized.
And most of my patients havesome sort of legal history.
And the other addiction doctorin my practice, the very lovely
and beautiful Dr Reb Close, whohappens to be my wife you got to
meet her when you were out herein Monterey last summer but she
(33:16):
goes into jail and we doin-reach and we try to reach
people while they're stillincarcerated.
In fact, today she's going intojuvenile hall to take care of
patients.
And there's two things that Iwould say that I've learned that
really helped me when I feellike I'm not making connections
with patients.
The first is that addiction,incarceration there's a story.
So you go to prisons and jails.
(33:38):
I go to schools so in 2024, Ispoke to over 5,000 students and
when I go to these schoolsthese kids are just eager and
excited and they raise theirhands and they have great
questions.
And if I go to a fifth gradeclass and ask those kids what
they want to be when they growup, none of them will say
arrested, incarcerated, inprison, addicted, overdosing or
(34:00):
homeless.
And a lot of my patients have alot of guilt and shame and I
have to remind them.
I'll say don't forget me.
Being your doctor was neverpart of your original plan, and
we always have to reconciletheir lost dreams and to help
them move on and set new goals.
And the other thing I will sayis I think it was actually right
(34:21):
before we caught up with you.
Last year we adopted a dog.
Stay with me, I'll make thismake sense.
So we go to the animal shelter.
Speaker 2 (34:29):
I love dogs, man, I'm in right now.
Speaker 1 (34:30):
Yes, I'm a big believer in emotional support
animals.
I write tons of emotionalsupport animal letters for my
patients.
But so we go to the animalshelter.
We want to pick out a dog andthere's this little white kind
of husky looking dog and verydefensive body posture, the
tail's between the legs, she'shunkered in, she's scared, and
the other dogs are all bouncingoff the walls and we're busy
(34:50):
people.
We cannot deal with ourhyperactive dog.
So, and the other dogs are allbouncing off the walls and we're
busy people, we cannot dealwith our hyperactive dog.
So my daughter says hey, dad,look at that white one, she
looks cute.
So we asked the staff to gether out of the kennel and to
come to the meet and greet areaand she's again defensive
posture, tail between the legs,she's even shaking a little bit
and we're going.
Gosh, anxious dogs can bedestructive Like this is just
(35:11):
not going to work.
And they said hang on, one ofthe staff's been working with
her, let's just see what happens.
And this staff member comes outthat had been working with this
dog and the dog just lights uplike a Christmas tree you know
that dog's smile that they haveand the tail.
And we went.
She's scared and we took achance on her and so she is now
ours.
Her name is Pixie and she hasblossomed into the most loving,
(35:36):
incredible part of our family,and her nickname is Safe and
Loved, because that is what sheneeded and that is what all of
us need, and so what we try todo in my addiction medicine
practice is give people a placewhere they feel safe, and love
is maybe the wrong word becauseit suggests intimacy, but they
are cared about as human beings,and that's really where we've
(35:59):
made so much transformation isthat people feel safe and
accepted in our practice.
And what's so hard is that isthe antithesis of everything
that isn't happening in a jailor prison.
It is fear, it is shame, it isjudgment, it is being behind
bars, and I'm really curious asto what you get to see in your
work about people transitioningout.
(36:20):
The transition out is so hardbecause they're so distrustful,
they have so much trauma, familysuspicious spouses are worried
and there's no place for them toland that they can feel safe
and cared about, and we reallystruggle with trying to create
that in our practice.
But coming back to why Ibrought up these two stories,
(36:43):
realizing for me as a doctorthat no one ever wanted to be
addicted.
Growing up and understandingthat and realizing we all just
want to be safe and acceptedhelps me to see where people are
struggling the most and pointthem in the right direction.
And sometimes it's the medicine.
We've got to treat their PTSDwith medicine, but more often it
is just giving them a placewhere they can feel accepted.
(37:03):
And that's the beauty in mymind of AA meetings or NA
meetings is you go and you canfeel accepted.
Speaker 2 (37:11):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I think the re-entry thing islike and I certainly agree with
all of that and I love the storyabout the dog and I hope I get
to meet Vixie at one point.
She's lovely.
Yeah, but I think that alongwith that emotional component,
as far as re-entry, it justbecomes like to use a phrase
(37:35):
that I feel like it's like abuzz phrase but like this idea
of a path to normalcy.
I remember telling this story.
I made this very shortdocumentary a bunch of years ago
about a woman named Jenny whowas a mother who was
incarcerated and was to be takenaway from her children when she
was incarcerated.
And this little nine minutedocumentary we shot about her
sort of making her children whenshe was incarcerated, and it
was little nine minutedocumentary.
We shot about her sort ofmaking her way back in to
(37:55):
society.
And I remember showing it to myfather and he was really moved
because there was a part of themovie where she just was like,
oh, I just want to have Sundaybreakfast with my children.
And he was like, wow, it's likeeverybody just wants the same
thing in that way.
And when someone comes out ofprison and it's that much harder
for them to get a job, whensomeone comes out of prison and
(38:16):
it's that much harder for themto find housing, it's like
sometimes they come out ofprison and they're in debt
because they have differentkinds of fees they have to pay
to the jail, to the courts,their personal relationships are
damaged you talk about peoplehave to mourn their lost dreams.
That's the same thing.
It's like you have this losttime.
You have to accept that I havelost these years, which I'm sure
(38:38):
can be fruitful in some waysthat people can use them.
They can be spirituallyfruitful If accessed to you,
could be educationally fruitful,but for most part it's
something where, like you, youhave this thing taken from you
and, along with needing to feelemotionally safe and loved, you
need to be able to supportyourself, you need to be able to
feel productive, you need to beable to feel useful and
purposeful and all of thosethings that like allow us to
(39:01):
build self-esteem, becausewithout those things like, how
do you rebuild self-esteem?
And so to me, there are allthese pragmatic components to
the reentry experience that areso hard, and there's a part of
my show where I talk about ateenager that I met in Virginia
in a prison, named AJ, and theconditions of his life were so
(39:22):
shocking to me because it waslike this is such an
inevitability for him to beincarcerated Like an entirely
drug-addicted family, havingspent a lot of his childhood in
juvenile facilities, beingarrested at 17 and having to
spend four years in jail.
And then, at the end of thisstory, it's revealed to me.
He tells me that he can't readand to have an extensive
(39:44):
criminal record, to have all ofyour siblings either dead or
drug addicted.
To not have any work experienceI mentioned that the only job
he's ever worked is a job wherehe cuts lumber and everybody
that does that job with him.
They get high on speed whilethey do it, and with all of that
, along with the idea that itcan't even read, like how do you
put a resume together if youcan't read it?
(40:05):
And so how does someone likethat find their path to a normal
life?
How do they not end upre-incarcerated or worse?
Speaker 1 (40:15):
Yeah, I think that's actually where getting into
working in recovery istransformational.
So if you apply for a job atSafeway and you have a criminal
record, they may turn you away.
If you apply to work at a drugand alcohol treatment facility
(40:35):
and you're sober and you have acriminal record, welcome to the
team.
Most people that work in theaddiction treatment community
have lived it themselves or havereally close ties to it like a
family member, and what I cantell you is kudos or condolences
.
You run a nonprofit, we run anonprofit.
It's a lot harder than wethought.
Oh my God, it is yeah, but wehire folks that are in recovery
(40:56):
for our nonprofit and we havefolks that talk about when they
were homeless and talk aboutwhen they were incarcerated.
And it's amazing we have totalk about email etiquette and
Zoom etiquette and how tobalance a checkbook and we were
literally over lunch last summertalking about compound interest
and retirements and one of thegentlemen who works for a
nonprofit it's on my to-do listto record him on the podcast but
(41:18):
he one day and I wish I justput my iPhone down and recorded
he just spewed out what itreally takes to rehabilitate
after addiction, jail and prisonand it's years, it's needing
stability, it's needingmentorship and 30 days in a
residential treatment programjust isn't going to cut it.
And essentially he's I meanhe's doing great.
(41:42):
I think he's his two-yearsoberversary is like next month,
but yeah, it's.
I think one of the reasons whywe've done inReach into our
local correctional facilities isif we can get people into
addiction treatment as they comeout and then they can
transition to sober living, alot of them start to realize,
hey, maybe I want to be a drugand alcohol counselor and what's
(42:03):
so cool about that is theirdark past is what makes them
successful and it like flips thestory on its head and it's
really cool to watch.
And one of my favorite partsabout the whole idea of treating
addiction is when it'ssuccessful.
It's called being in recovery,because you get your life back.
It's just, it's amazing.
Speaker 2 (42:24):
It's just, it's amazing, yeah, to make that
transition and to be successfulin it takes such unbelievable
strength and character,fortitude and patience and
compassion and yeah.
Speaker 1 (42:34):
I wanted to ask you and I don't mean to bring up
another musician in ourconversation, but Jelly Roll is
a very interesting figure in thecircle that we've been talking
about.
Horrible lived experienceincarcerated and a lot of his
music gets played at AA meetings.
I know his song I Am Not Okayis very popular in residential
treatment programs.
(42:55):
Have you found any uptake withyour songs in the recovery
community?
Speaker 2 (43:01):
Yeah, I mean, I think that I'm obviously nowhere near
as famous as Jelly Roll andkudos to him, and he also seems
to use his platform for a lot ofgood works and seems to really
be concerned with giving back,and I think that's this
essential part of thattransformation as well.
It's like someone pulls you upon the ladder and then your hand
(43:23):
has to be down pulling the nextperson up.
Do you know what I mean?
100%.
I think that's how you stay onthe path.
I think that's how that's meantto work.
When I first started doing thiswork and I think I mentioned
this in the show that at onepoint I got a Facebook message
from a woman who had told methat she was listening over and
over again to the song Tell Lucythat I Love Her, and she was
(43:44):
actually watching a video of itbecause I had not recorded the
song at that point.
But so she's rewatching theYouTube video over and over
again and she said that herhusband had committed suicide
inside of a jail and that theyhad a son, they had a
three-year-old together and shewas listening to the song over
and over again because she feltit described how she thought her
(44:05):
husband must have felt leadingup to him committing suicide.
And when I got that message Iwas really blown away, obviously
, so much so that I had toinclude it in the show because
it just summed up a certainaspect of that experience so
well and the family's experience, like how having a family
member who's incarcerated can beso devastating to a family, not
(44:26):
just to that individual.
But I knew that when I got amessage like that I was like wow
, stakes are higher.
I've crossed a certain linehere where something I've
written has really become a partof somebody else's story.
And I am of the school where Idon't think songs originate from
(44:47):
the songwriter.
I think the songwriter is morelike an antenna and picks up
something and that the song isfloating around in this sort of
platonic, metaphysical universeand you just, if you're lucky,
you can pull one down.
But I think when you have agreat song in front of you, I
think a really honest songwriterwill be able to admit that
they're like wow, like Icouldn't have thought of that,
(45:10):
you know?
And who wrote that song?
Do you know what I mean?
Like that's really what it isand and, like I said, to be a
part of someone's experience ofthat kind of something so
intimate and to be part ofsomebody's grieving process that
way and I'm sure jelly roll isthat for a lot of people it's an
incredible honor and I feelvery lucky and humbled to count
(45:36):
that among my life experiences.
Speaker 1 (45:42):
Yeah, absolutely, Unfortunately, as the hour
always does, it has flown by,Besides coming to Monterey
County, where we'll set upsomething with the local jails,
prisons, juvenile hall justiceinvolved high schools, that sort
of stuff.
What are you working on now?
What's next?
Speaker 2 (46:01):
I'm writing up a storm right now.
I'm off for the summer.
I'll start touring again inSeptember, but I don't want to
jinx it.
I'm actually I'm writing amusical right now.
I wanted to write another show.
I was going to write anotherone-man show because I really I
love to write songs, but I alsoreally love to write stories and
(46:21):
I love the idea of combining abody of work with storyline.
But I realized I wanted to workwith other people.
I didn't want to write aone-man show again.
I really wanted to do somethingthat was more collaborative.
And then I wanted to write forall kinds of characters.
So I'm not a musical theaterguy.
I've never been in a musical inmy life.
I don't know anything aboutthem, I've seen two or three of
(46:41):
them in my whole life.
But I started writing songs andI started writing a story and
I'm like I guess this is amusical.
I don't know what else you'dcall it, but that's what I'm
doing right now.
Speaker 1 (46:50):
Love it.
I have to say, Matt, I alwayslearn so much every time I talk
to you.
I just want to say thank youfor the incredible music that
you write and I'm really excitedfor when you're back in
Monterey County.
We have a lot of connections inthe criminal justice system
here and I know your work willcontinue to make an impact and
will definitely help ourincarcerated folks here in
Monterey County.
Speaker 2 (47:09):
Amazing, and likewise I echo all of that you know.
Thank you for all the awesomework that you do.
Speaker 1 (47:18):
Before we wrap up, a huge thank you to the Montage
Health Foundation for backing mymission to create fun, engaging
education on addiction, and ashout out to the nonprofit
Central Coast OverdosePrevention for teaming up with
me on this podcast.
Our partnership helps me getthe word out about how to treat
addiction and prevent overdosesTo those healthcare providers
(47:41):
out there treating patients withaddiction.
You're doing life-saving workand thank you for what you do
For everyone else tuning in.
Thank you for taking the timeto learn.
Thank you, treating addictionsaves lives.
Welcome to the Addiction Medicine Made Easy
Podcast.
Hey there, I'm Dr Casey Grover,an addiction medicine doctor
based on California's CentralCoast.
(00:22):
For 14 years I worked in theemergency department, seeing
countless patients strugglingwith addiction.
Now I'm on the other side ofthe fight, helping people
rebuild their lives when drugsand alcohol take control.
Thanks for tuning in.
Let's get started.
This episode has been on myto-do list for quite a while.
(00:44):
Today I am talking to musicianMatt Butler.
He is a singer-songwriter whoseniche is performing to
incarcerated people in jails andprisons.
I met him last year when hecame out to California.
One of the surgeons at myhospital heard his story and set
up an educational event whereMatt performed the music that he
(01:06):
plays in jails and prisons toour doctors and nurses, and so
we used his performance toeducate about addiction.
I had the pleasure of havingdinner with Matt later that
night after the event.
He's an incredibly intelligentperson and he has a lot of
insight about what happens injails and prisons, particularly
(01:27):
about how addiction is often areason why people get locked up
and how we need to do more totreat addiction.
So please check out Matt'salbum Reckless Son.
It's the one-man show that heputs on when he performs in
jails and prisons.
I will include excerpts fromtwo of the songs from the album
(01:47):
Good Friday and Time to Be a manduring this episode.
Here we go.
All right, apparently, it'sChristmas and my birthday today,
because I am speaking today toMatt Butler.
So, matt, welcome to thepodcast.
It's so nice to catch up withyou again.
Speaker 2 (02:06):
Yeah, merry, christmas and Happy.
Speaker 1 (02:08):
Birthday dude.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
What a special day this is.
Speaker 1 (02:12):
My wife always says that She'll be like oh my gosh,
is it Christmas and my birthday?
This is amazing.
So I've been.
After we met last year.
I've been really excited totalk to you, hear more about
your work.
Why don't you just start bytelling us what you do?
Speaker 2 (02:30):
Sure, I am a musician , I'm a singer-songwriter and
for about 10 years now I havebeen performing inside jails and
in prisons, really all acrossthe United States.
Speaker 1 (02:38):
How did you get started?
Speaker 2 (02:41):
Yeah, the origin story.
It began with being asked towrite music for a documentary
film called Generation Found,which is a documentary about
recovery high schools, which arehigh schools where the student
body are exclusively kids thatare in recovery from substance
use or other mental healthissues, and so I wrote a song
(03:02):
for that movie actually the song, just One, which is on that
record and when the film cameout, the film itself was almost
like some sort of a communityadvocacy tool where it would get
screened at colleges, peoplewould bring it to their
communities that were interestedin creating their own recovery
high schools and so forth, andthen it would be at galas and
(03:22):
charity events and I wouldactually tour with the film
where I would go to thesedifferent events and I would
perform the song live and as aresult I ended up meeting all
kinds of people that worked inaddiction recovery, nonprofit
stuff, advocacy, and there'sthis huge overlap, as I'm sure
we'll discuss today, betweenaddiction and incarceration.
So I met all kinds of peoplethat I wouldn't otherwise have
(03:47):
been exposed to, and at onepoint in that process, in that
journey, I saw a video of mensinging in what is called the
harp unit of the ChesterfieldCounty Jail and that initially
stood for Heroin AddictionRecovery Program and then later
became called helping addictsrecover progressively, to be
(04:08):
more inclusive of all kinds ofsubstance use.
And when I saw this video itjust struck me as music in that
context was really more of thissort of transcendent thing.
Watching that was like this iswhat drew me to music in the
first place.
Beyond some sort of likeentertainment, this was like
real, like soul, and I thoughtto myself maybe they'd be
(04:31):
interested in hearing some ofthe songs that I've been writing
for this film and songs thathad to do with substance use and
recovery and addiction.
And because of all the peopleI'd met in that process working
on the film, I had some people Icould immediately ask about it
and literally within a week ortwo someone had arranged for me
to go and perform at the heroinprogram of the Albany County
(04:52):
Jail in New York and I went anddid that show and it was just a
life-changing, epiphanal thingfor me and it went really well.
The sheriff was reallyimpressed and all of a sudden
people started talking about it.
While I was touring was reallyimpressed and all of a sudden
people started talking about itand while I was touring, people
would ask me if, while I was intheir town playing a show or
doing an event, if I would alsoperform at a jail that was in
(05:13):
there, or a prison, and I just Ialways said yes.
And it wasn't long until Irealized that those were the
most fulfilling shows and thosewere the experiences that I was
really after.
And then that was it.
Man, I started a smallnonprofit in order to fund
myself doing this, but I justwent on my own Kerouacian
adventure performing in prison.
I have crossed the country manytimes playing in prisons and I
(05:35):
have been doing it ever since.
That first show was November of2016.
And the last time I did it wasearlier this month.
I was at Clallam BayCorrections in Washington State.
Speaker 1 (05:48):
So you and I were talking a little bit before we
started recording.
Locking people up when theyhave addiction clearly doesn't
work right.
I often say I'd like tocongratulate drugs on winning
the war against drugs.
Right, drugs won.
Whatever we're doing hasn'tbeen working.
Talk to me about the responsethat you get from inmates when
(06:09):
they hear your songs.
Do you feel like you changeminds, change hearts?
Are they more open?
Talk to me about what that'slike.
Speaker 2 (06:16):
Yeah, that was the thing that was so striking about
it from that very first show on, was that like as an artist.
I had never in my life, assomeone who'd been playing music
since they were 15 years old, Ihad never in my life felt like
an audience had heard me thatway.
I had never felt as seen as anartist or as a human as I did in
(06:38):
those moments.
And I think there that in myexperience, people that
incarcerated, they can oftenfeel unseen and unheard, and so
in that moment of performing andthere is something about music
that just really penetrates pastthe intellect and penetrates
past certain types of defensesthat we have that it was this
(06:58):
sense of like being mutuallyseen by one another, and that
was just transformative for me.
I'd never really felt anythinglike that before.
They similarly instantly startedopening up about their
experiences, because typicallythe way these performances go is
they're not quite concerts andthat there's a real audience
(07:22):
performer divide.
They're much more of aconversational thing, where I
would play songs in order toalmost prompt a discussion, and
what I've been told is that withmusic and with these songs and
with playing it, counselors incertain programs will say to me
that a few moments of the musicwill do more to build trust than
they're necessarily able to doover the course of a year.
(07:43):
And that's not just to downplaythe amazing work that coaches
and counselors do in thoseenvironments, but there just is
something about music inparticular that, just like I
said, it just penetrates so muchfaster.
Speaker 1 (08:00):
I'm looking at the playlist I made on my iPhone for
your Reckless Son album.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
When did you write Reckless Son, and how does it
relate to when you startedactually playing in jails and
prisons?
Yeah, so I wrote that recordover the course of many years
and there are nine songs on thatalbum and the body of work that
(08:41):
that all came from was over 30songs that were written over a
period of years and some ofthose songs, like Good Friday, I
wrote before I ever even playedin a jail or a prison.
Those were based more aboutexperiences that I'd had and the
experiences of other peoplethat I knew growing up.
And because I had songs likethat when I first went into a
prison, that's what allowed meto make that initial connection,
because I've never beenincarcerated.
So it's like this idea thatlike how do I connect if I
haven't had this sharedexperience?
But there I do have sharedexperiences and I do have a
(09:04):
certain understanding of what itfeels like to be imprisoned in
my own mind, in my own body, inthat way.
And so once I started playingthose songs and that kind of put
me in this place where all of asudden these men and women were
opening up to me and sharingtheir stories, that's when I
started to write the rest of thesongs on that record that are
(09:28):
really from the character'sperspective, the character of
someone who's been incarcerated,and so those songs are really
written, you know, over thecourse of 2016, 2017, 2018.
And then I had the opportunityto make the record and put the
record out in 2023, along withthe sort of theater, the one man
(09:49):
show performance that I do withthose songs that you've seen.
At this point, I have to imaginethat I've worked relatively
intimately more with others,less than others, with over
25,000 people insidecorrectional facilities.
I perform for over 1,000 peoplejust this summer alone and this
fall alone, and I've been doingthis for 10 years.
(10:09):
The amount of stories that I'veheard, it's epic, it's
unfathomable.
But those songs, it was thisprocess of really intense
synthesis.
So much of this material comesin and then it has to be
rearranged by your unconsciousin order for it to come out in a
way that's truthful andauthentic.
(10:31):
But it, but those songs arereally.
It's like all of these peoplethat I met were synthesized from
the perspective of just onecharacter that's taken on the
moniker of reckless son.
Speaker 1 (10:43):
Yeah, the song.
Good Friday.
I hear my patients beggingtheir mother to let them in.
Mom, it's me, let me in.
I need to clean up.
And then the character in thesong acknowledges I understand
why you tell me no.
Speaker 3 (11:16):
Mama, let me in to take a shower.
Know I said like Good Friday,Mama, come and go.
And I know that's why you hadto tell me no.
Speaker 1 (11:35):
It just, man.
I just got goosebumps just now,but I can see how, when you go
to a correctional facility andyou present your persona
performing of the reckless sonwho's trying to get it together
with addiction, it just, it musthit home beyond belief yeah,
like prison is this thing whereyou walk in and inevitably it's
(12:02):
very intimidating and that'spart of what it is Like.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
Vulnerability is something that is a serious
liability in that environment.
And then you see somebody who'scovered in tattoos and they
have an intimidating presenceand then all of a sudden they're
talking about their mother andit's oh my God, it's impossible
not to feel the sense of empathy.
And then you realize that, likethe incarcerated are this
abstract concept to so manypeople, and then you meet
(12:28):
somebody and you hear them talkabout their experience with
their mom and you're like theseare really individuals with
stories and like this person,this is someone's son, like this
is someone's brother, this issomeone's father, potentially.
And that story Good Friday isone where I started playing that
early in this journey and I wasblown away because some of that
(12:51):
is my story and some of myfriend's story.
I was simultaneously comfortedand highly disturbed by how many
people related to it and saidit was their story.
And it is this thing wherewriting that song was also meant
to be like how do I put myself,even though I haven't had the
experience, how do I potentiallytry to empathize with the
(13:13):
mother character in that songand try to understand the pain
of what that must be like tohave to say no to your child in
that situation, when a motherhas been burned over and over
again as far as how much aparent might try to do, and the
(13:33):
lyric is good Friday, I'll comeand go, I'm going to come in,
I'm going to clean up, I'm goingto get a meal, I'm going to
take 60 bucks out of your purseand then you're not going to see
me again for another threemonths.
And it's like at some point amother has to protect herself
and put up a boundary, and it's.
I just can't imagine howpainful that must be, and that
(13:54):
was what that song was abouttrying to achieve.
Speaker 1 (13:56):
We talked about it with a family this week.
I was in clinic and I've got amom who does not know what to do
with her son and we both hadthis look of he's going to end
up incarcerated for a long time.
And, oh man, yes, I didn'trealize that you would
explicitly consider the mother'sperspective in that song, but
(14:17):
you nailed it.
The other song that, I have tosay, really threw me for a loop
was Time to Be a man of justsomething goes bad and dad hands
you a bottle of Jack Danielsand just go to town.
And I remember actually theinterview you did with NPR you
actually mentioned that oneinmate was like man.
That song, time to Be a man,really messed me up.
That was very profound.
Speaker 3 (14:39):
One night he came home he said I lost my job and
your mama's gone.
He pressed that bottle into myhands.
He looked me in the eyes and hesaid, son, it's time to be a
man Time to be a man, Time to bea man.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
I've been reading a lot of sort of almost spiritual
but anthropological literatureabout rites of passage and
coming of age and what is thismoment where we go from a child
to an adult in society and whatdoes that?
Initiation or coming of age isthis idea where you move from a
child's perspective, which ismuch more inherently and
naturally self-centered, to onewhere you're concerned more
about your community andsomething that's a greater good
and how do I serve somethinglarger than my own personal
(15:48):
interests?
And when that isn't availableto a young person, they'll try
to find it some other way andthey'll find it through
addiction, where they feel theybelong.
And incarceration is a rite ofpassage.
It's like you see it inGoodfellas, that scene where
he's walking out of the jail andall the mob guys are there
clapping for him and they'relike, yeah, you're one of us now
(16:10):
because you did your first bidand it was wild to me.
And that's what that song isabout.
It's like these sort of theserites, these kind of inverted
rites of passage that take placethis father figure who's saying
drink up, it's time to be a man.
(16:30):
And then this idea of when yougo to prison, the cop says to
you it's time to be a man.
And what was interesting to meis it was written ironically in
that sense.
But then when I started playingit in prison and I was terrified
to play it in prison, terrifiedto play that for the first time
in prison, because I was soafraid it was going to be
considered patronizing and thatit was going to be considered
patronizing and that was goingto not get a good reaction.
But when I started playing that, those guys, the words that
they heard, more than anythingwas time to be a man and they
(16:53):
felt that they wanted to hear,that they wanted to be told to
grow up and that they felt thatthey were children in a lot of
ways and it was like wow.
It was a much more literalresponse to it than I intended
and I was blown away by thatbecause the idea that they were
willing to express that in thatenvironment was such an
(17:14):
unbelievable act of courage inmy opinion.
Like just to admit to somethinglike that, to say in a prison,
I feel like a child, like I'venever grown up, Like that's the
place to be tough, that's theplace where you act like a man
like a tough guy and those kindsof admissions that I've heard
(17:35):
in that environment just blow meaway Because, like I said, I
believe they're just likemiraculous acts of courage and
the irony is that is the path tomanhood.
In my opinion, that is the pathto adulthood and in that context
I don't necessarily separatethe concepts of manhood from
adulthood.
I just use the phrase becausethe phrase is such a colloquial
(17:57):
phrase and has such an impactand such an implied meaning.
Speaker 1 (18:02):
So as I learn more about addiction, I'm really
learning about the interactionbetween life traumas and
addiction, and one psychiatristI interviewed on my podcast
described it to me like asnowball.
So let's game this out for oneof the individuals you played to
this summer Difficult home life, parent with addiction, maybe
(18:24):
physical violence in the home,verbal abuse in the home the
traumas begin.
Start to experiment with drugsand alcohol first.
Interaction with lawenforcement that's traumatizing.
Going to jail for with lawenforcement, that's traumatizing
.
Going to jail for the firsttime, that's traumatizing.
Going to prison, the violence.
Essentially in the world ofgangs, their currency is
violence.
It's how they keep each other'sdistance but hold their ground.
(18:47):
It's all about violence andjust the trauma, just like
snowballs and really and I'mquoting Dr Gabor Mate here but
everyone who has addiction hasbeen traumatized.
How are you respectful of theirtrauma when you bring in these
difficult songs, when you playfor them?
Speaker 2 (19:05):
Sure, I certainly agree with that and I think
that's one of the sort of thetragedies of the way the system
works in most cases.
I will say that there arecertain facilities I've visited
where the cultures areincredibly collaborative and
supportive and they have success.
But I think typically thetragedy is that hurt people go
into prison and they emerge morehurt and the thing that's sad
(19:28):
about that is that it's reallyin the country, in the whole
community, in the wholesociety's best interest that
people emerge from prison.
They come out of prisonhealthier than they were when
they went in even economically,that makes the most sense.
the recidivism.
Is this like massive economicproblem as well?
But?
But as far as your question andhow trauma is respected, one
(19:48):
one thing I'll say is that thetrauma is so evident and the
hyper vigilance is so evident,and I knowvigilance is so
evident and I know those twothings are connected that a
traumatized person is in a stateof fight or flight to some
degree and they're hypervigilant, like just as a sort of
anecdote.
When you play a, when youperform in a prison, you know it
(20:10):
can be an auditorium of 500guys.
If somebody opens the back doorof the gymnasium and steps in,
every single head in that roomimmediately pivots.
Everyone's attention will go toany single noise, any single
new person that walks in,somebody walks out, everybody
(20:31):
watches, everybody is so awareof every single thing that's
going on in the room.
That does not happen when youplay a theater.
That does not happen when youplay a singer-songwriter club.
If you're playing asinger-songwriter club and
somebody walks to the bar to geta beer, the entire club does
not go up and start watching theguy going to get the beer.
(20:51):
Do you know what I'm saying?
Yes, and that, to me, is justsuch an indicator of not only
the trauma but also the statethat that environment keeps
people in, which makes itimpossible to actually heal a
bit.
Your nervous system has to calmdown at some point right In
order to process the trauma.
Speaker 1 (21:09):
Yes, hypervigilance is one of the diagnostic
criteria for post-traumaticstress disorder and the first
part of healing is to get out ofthe trauma.
It's very hard to treat someonewith PTSD if they're still
being traumatized.
So, to answer your question, ifthey're still incarcerated, it
would be very unusual to makeprogress, unless, as you point
(21:30):
out, there are some verycollaborative progressive
programs.
But yeah, I have one patientand he actually wants to get
back to his community and talkto young kids about what it's
like getting into a gang andgetting into prison and he's
taught me so much about thestuff that he was asked to do as
a gang member in prison.
And with this gentleman, all Ido is listen for 30 minutes and
(21:54):
he's processing, but now he'ssafe, he's married, he's got
back together with his familyand his grandkids.
He's teaching his grandkids howto make models and wire
electronics.
But, yes, he could not haveprocessed that in prison, but he
can now.
Speaker 2 (22:09):
Yeah, the thing that the music allows is that somehow
and this is like the magic ofthis experience is that like
temporarily, changes the energyin that space where all of a
sudden, people seem to be ableto feel things that they're
otherwise not really allowedsafely to feel in that
(22:33):
environment.
So when you play a song likeGood Friday and you see a guy
start to weep, it's again it'slike a miraculous thing because
it's like that's not somethingthat you can really do in that
environment with any degree ofsafety, like you're not supposed
(22:53):
to be crying in there, and so,for whatever reason, music can
do that, where for that hour,two hours, three hours that
we're doing this work, all of asudden the vibration in the
space changes and people areable to experience an emotion
that they otherwise can't.
(23:13):
I played in a juveniledetention Clallam County
juvenile detention in Washingtonearlier this month and I
started playing Time to Be a manand within the first verse this
17-year-old kid started cryingand he said after the show he
said that his father had diedwhile he was in there and that
(23:38):
he had been stuffing down thepain of losing his father for
the past four months while hewas locked up in juvenile and
that he felt he could not allowhimself to feel anything about
that.
And as soon as I startedsinging that song I grew up in a
quiet town where most folksdon't want to stick around
(23:58):
except for guys like my dad assoon as I said the word dad, he
started crying and said to methis is the first time I've felt
anything about my dad whileI've been here.
And so the songs that tell meif I'm right about this.
But also with trauma.
You don't want to re-traumatizesomeone, but don't they have to
(24:18):
end the experience in some wayby feeling it, because they're
still going through it, likethey're frozen in it.
And then, or even with grief,if you can't allow yourself to
experience grief, it like stayswith you, it continues to weigh
on you.
Speaker 1 (24:35):
I'll tell you that I was diagnosed with PTSD at the
end of last year from my workbeing a doctor in the emergency
department the stabbings, theshootings, the domestic violence
, the sexual assault, thehangings and so I've learned a
lot about PTSD and my niche inaddiction medicine now is PTSD
and addiction.
And it's funny to say thatbecause a lot about PTSD and my
niche in addiction medicine nowis PTSD and addiction.
And it's funny to say thatbecause a lot of addiction
(24:56):
medicine is helping people toprocess their trauma.
But yes, the way I look at itis that essentially, ptsd is
when our fight or flightresponse is broken and it's
overstimulated and it goes offat improper times, and so what
the person has to do is findsafety so that they're not
(25:17):
actually needing their fight orflight response, and then they
have to process what they'vebeen through and it's like
negative energy that's storedand it has to come out in some
way and that could be talktherapy.
And one of my patients I talkedto her this week oh my gosh,
she's in her twenties too manysexual assaults to count.
(25:39):
She was held prisoner andhostage because of her drug use
at one point and I asked herlike how are we going to get the
trauma out?
And she's now in a very safeplace and she's got a good
connection with me.
I'm encouraging her to use artto draw and then to be able to
talk to me about what she'sdrawing.
And that may not work and wemay go down the direction of
equine therapy, where she's ableto focus on the animal and feed
(26:03):
off the animal's interactionwith her as a way to regulate
her emotions better.
There's so many ways to do it,but, to answer your question, it
has to come out somehow,otherwise, essentially, it's
this vicious feedback loop andthe best way to think of this is
that lizards have a fight orflight response, but they don't
get PTSD.
(26:24):
Humans have a complicatedenough brain that we always want
to know why that we always wantto know why.
So the lizard gets startled andit scurries off and then it
goes to do lizard things likeeating and sunning itself.
Right, humans are like I justgot beat up, like why me?
Why today?
What could I have done better?
What happened again?
What if those guys know where Ilive?
And essentially, the fight orflight part of the brain sends
(26:47):
it up to the frontal lobe, thecomplicated human part of the
brain, the complicated humanpart of the brain, and this was
never meant to be understood.
It was simply a survivalmechanism.
And so you get this viciousfeedback loop where the attempt
to process the trauma leads tounresolved questions and it
raises more anxiety what if ithappens next?
And then the human part of thebrain will send it back to the
fight or flight and it becomesthis like vicious feedback loop
(27:11):
and eventually we have to learnto process it and understand it
and be aware of it.
And, like I was just telling mytherapist yesterday, one of my
patients really triggered melast week and I was not ready
and I had to talk through it andtell her the why and what was
the reason why that was sotriggering for me.
And I've got to be ready fornext time because it's going to
happen again.
So, yes, so that was a verylong answer to your question,
(27:34):
but yes, people have to processit in some way.
And I'd be curious, matt, and Idon't know if you want to share
anything about your own reasonsfor getting into this, but
music can be extraordinarilytherapeutic to process one's own
trauma and you mentioned kindof some of your stories are in
your songs has it beentherapeutic for you.
Speaker 2 (27:54):
Yeah, I think first of all, a long answer is
appreciated, because this is myopportunity to speak to a pro,
an expert.
Here I'm trying to learn andI'll also just say I'm a layman
when it comes to everything,like I'm an amateur at
everything, everything but.
But I I know in my experiencewith music there's like a very
big difference betweenunderstanding something
(28:16):
intellectually and thenunderstanding something
experientially, or having it'slike the knowledge degraded in a
way, and, like I mentionedearlier about all of the stories
that I heard while doing thiswork, that they had to work
their way into my own conscious,and it was this process of
synthesizing all of thisinformation and being able to
(28:37):
put it out in a different way.
So for me there are things thatI can know with my head, but
being able to write a song aboutit, at least a good song about
it, to write a good song aboutsomething, something I have to
understand it with my heart andin that way I've for a while
thought about songs as thebyproduct of something they're
(28:58):
like secondary to somethingthat's like the actual work is
like something that's occurredin my heart and soul and
unconscious mind, and then it'slike the song is like a skin
that you shed and you're likethis is the result of a process
that has happened internally.
And so for me writing music isincredibly therapeutic and I
(29:22):
have cried writing the songs andsinging them myself.
And sometimes I'll sing a songlike Good Friday, and there'll
be a woman sitting there in thefront row and she'll start
crying and I'll start crying andit was hard for me at certain
points to perform certain musicbecause I felt like I was
(29:43):
re-traumatizing myself, sure,like I was reenacting something.
And I have had to, at differenttimes in in my life, take breaks
from certain music and takebreaks from the prison work as
well, and I will say that sortof covid was like a forced break
from that because nobody couldgo, no volunteers could go into
(30:06):
correctional facilities at thatpoint.
But there is like a line andI'm I'm sure you understand that
in your own experience.
And then there are people thatmy understanding is that, like,
sometimes people unconsciouslyseek to re-traumatize themselves
, and my wife has either beenconcerned about me doing that
sometimes when I get a littletoo rattled from some of the
(30:27):
prison work, becausesimultaneously I'll become the
receiver of huge psychic burdensfrom people.
But I know you had a reactionthere when I said something
about re-traumatization, so I'dlove to hear what you have to
say about that.
Speaker 1 (30:41):
Yeah, so I'm going to give a shout out to my CrossFit
trainer, who is the singlesmartest person I've ever met
and lived experience withdifficult life circumstances and
honestly knows more about PTSDthan anyone I know and she's an
incredible human and will workout and will just kind of free
(31:02):
associate with trying tounderstand how we can help
people.
And I've actually had some ofmy patients go see her because
of the safety that she createsin the workout and the free
space to be able to speak what'son a person's mind while doing
squats, burpees, whatever, andhere's how she described it to
me and this makes sense to me.
So a lot of my patients cannotsleep and it makes perfect sense
(31:28):
.
They have been traumatized,they've been beaten, they've
been raped, they've beenassaulted and when you're asleep
you are vulnerable and thebrain knows that.
And so insomnia is the braintrying to protect itself.
Now let's imagine a young womanis sexually assaulted by her
stepfather.
(31:49):
Hypothetically, thatmale-female relationship is
horrible, it's toxic, it'straumatizing, it's violent and
the brain wants to resolve it.
Remember, we talked aboutprocessing and moving on from
the trauma and a lot of timesthese women will gravitate
towards similar relationshipsbecause they're trying to
(32:10):
resolve the original trauma.
In other words, their brainsays I got to fix it, I've been
traumatized, how do I fix it?
And they get into arelationship and they see the
similar pattern and they'll getback into it and it's
re-traumatizing because they'restill trying to process the
original trauma.
I can't name the specificpsychological theory behind that
, but it makes perfect sense andit is so devastating for my
(32:33):
female patients because theretend to be these cycles of
domestic violence and abusiverelationships and that's how she
explained it to me is they'restill trying to process the
original trauma and then, as thenext trauma happens, it adds
more to what the brain is tryingto resolve.
That's heavy man.
That's what we do in addictionmedicine.
Speaker 2 (32:50):
Yeah, but it's that's like very I don't know, it's
just like very profound as well.
That's a big idea.
Speaker 1 (32:56):
Yeah, matt, I guess here's what I would say to give
you a sense of kind of what I'velearned from just talking to
people who have been traumatized.
And most of my patients havesome sort of legal history.
And the other addiction doctorin my practice, the very lovely
and beautiful Dr Reb Close, whohappens to be my wife you got to
meet her when you were out herein Monterey last summer but she
(33:16):
goes into jail and we doin-reach and we try to reach
people while they're stillincarcerated.
In fact, today she's going intojuvenile hall to take care of
patients.
And there's two things that Iwould say that I've learned that
really helped me when I feellike I'm not making connections
with patients.
The first is that addiction,incarceration there's a story.
So you go to prisons and jails.
(33:38):
I go to schools so in 2024, Ispoke to over 5,000 students and
when I go to these schoolsthese kids are just eager and
excited and they raise theirhands and they have great
questions.
And if I go to a fifth gradeclass and ask those kids what
they want to be when they growup, none of them will say
arrested, incarcerated, inprison, addicted, overdosing or
(34:00):
homeless.
And a lot of my patients have alot of guilt and shame and I
have to remind them.
I'll say don't forget me.
Being your doctor was neverpart of your original plan, and
we always have to reconciletheir lost dreams and to help
them move on and set new goals.
And the other thing I will sayis I think it was actually right
(34:21):
before we caught up with you.
Last year we adopted a dog.
Stay with me, I'll make thismake sense.
So we go to the animal shelter.
Speaker 2 (34:29):
I love dogs, man, I'm in right now.
Speaker 1 (34:30):
Yes, I'm a big believer in emotional support
animals.
I write tons of emotionalsupport animal letters for my
patients.
But so we go to the animalshelter.
We want to pick out a dog andthere's this little white kind
of husky looking dog and verydefensive body posture, the
tail's between the legs, she'shunkered in, she's scared, and
the other dogs are all bouncingoff the walls and we're busy
(34:50):
people.
We cannot deal with ourhyperactive dog.
So, and the other dogs are allbouncing off the walls and we're
busy people, we cannot dealwith our hyperactive dog.
So my daughter says hey, dad,look at that white one, she
looks cute.
So we asked the staff to gether out of the kennel and to
come to the meet and greet areaand she's again defensive
posture, tail between the legs,she's even shaking a little bit
and we're going.
Gosh, anxious dogs can bedestructive Like this is just
(35:11):
not going to work.
And they said hang on, one ofthe staff's been working with
her, let's just see what happens.
And this staff member comes outthat had been working with this
dog and the dog just lights uplike a Christmas tree you know
that dog's smile that they haveand the tail.
And we went.
She's scared and we took achance on her and so she is now
ours.
Her name is Pixie and she hasblossomed into the most loving,
(35:36):
incredible part of our family,and her nickname is Safe and
Loved, because that is what sheneeded and that is what all of
us need, and so what we try todo in my addiction medicine
practice is give people a placewhere they feel safe, and love
is maybe the wrong word becauseit suggests intimacy, but they
are cared about as human beings,and that's really where we've
(35:59):
made so much transformation isthat people feel safe and
accepted in our practice.
And what's so hard is that isthe antithesis of everything
that isn't happening in a jailor prison.
It is fear, it is shame, it isjudgment, it is being behind
bars, and I'm really curious asto what you get to see in your
work about people transitioningout.
(36:20):
The transition out is so hardbecause they're so distrustful,
they have so much trauma, familysuspicious spouses are worried
and there's no place for them toland that they can feel safe
and cared about, and we reallystruggle with trying to create
that in our practice.
But coming back to why Ibrought up these two stories,
(36:43):
realizing for me as a doctorthat no one ever wanted to be
addicted.
Growing up and understandingthat and realizing we all just
want to be safe and acceptedhelps me to see where people are
struggling the most and pointthem in the right direction.
And sometimes it's the medicine.
We've got to treat their PTSDwith medicine, but more often it
is just giving them a placewhere they can feel accepted.
(37:03):
And that's the beauty in mymind of AA meetings or NA
meetings is you go and you canfeel accepted.
Speaker 2 (37:11):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I think the re-entry thing islike and I certainly agree with
all of that and I love the storyabout the dog and I hope I get
to meet Vixie at one point.
She's lovely.
Yeah, but I think that alongwith that emotional component,
as far as re-entry, it justbecomes like to use a phrase
(37:35):
that I feel like it's like abuzz phrase but like this idea
of a path to normalcy.
I remember telling this story.
I made this very shortdocumentary a bunch of years ago
about a woman named Jenny whowas a mother who was
incarcerated and was to be takenaway from her children when she
was incarcerated.
And this little nine minutedocumentary we shot about her
sort of making her children whenshe was incarcerated, and it
was little nine minutedocumentary.
We shot about her sort ofmaking her way back in to
(37:55):
society.
And I remember showing it to myfather and he was really moved
because there was a part of themovie where she just was like,
oh, I just want to have Sundaybreakfast with my children.
And he was like, wow, it's likeeverybody just wants the same
thing in that way.
And when someone comes out ofprison and it's that much harder
for them to get a job, whensomeone comes out of prison and
(38:16):
it's that much harder for themto find housing, it's like
sometimes they come out ofprison and they're in debt
because they have differentkinds of fees they have to pay
to the jail, to the courts,their personal relationships are
damaged you talk about peoplehave to mourn their lost dreams.
That's the same thing.
It's like you have this losttime.
You have to accept that I havelost these years, which I'm sure
(38:38):
can be fruitful in some waysthat people can use them.
They can be spirituallyfruitful If accessed to you,
could be educationally fruitful,but for most part it's
something where, like you, youhave this thing taken from you
and, along with needing to feelemotionally safe and loved, you
need to be able to supportyourself, you need to be able to
feel productive, you need to beable to feel useful and
purposeful and all of thosethings that like allow us to
(39:01):
build self-esteem, becausewithout those things like, how
do you rebuild self-esteem?
And so to me, there are allthese pragmatic components to
the reentry experience that areso hard, and there's a part of
my show where I talk about ateenager that I met in Virginia
in a prison, named AJ, and theconditions of his life were so
(39:22):
shocking to me because it waslike this is such an
inevitability for him to beincarcerated Like an entirely
drug-addicted family, havingspent a lot of his childhood in
juvenile facilities, beingarrested at 17 and having to
spend four years in jail.
And then, at the end of thisstory, it's revealed to me.
He tells me that he can't readand to have an extensive
(39:44):
criminal record, to have all ofyour siblings either dead or
drug addicted.
To not have any work experienceI mentioned that the only job
he's ever worked is a job wherehe cuts lumber and everybody
that does that job with him.
They get high on speed whilethey do it, and with all of that
, along with the idea that itcan't even read, like how do you
put a resume together if youcan't read it?
(40:05):
And so how does someone likethat find their path to a normal
life?
How do they not end upre-incarcerated or worse?
Speaker 1 (40:15):
Yeah, I think that's actually where getting into
working in recovery istransformational.
So if you apply for a job atSafeway and you have a criminal
record, they may turn you away.
If you apply to work at a drugand alcohol treatment facility
(40:35):
and you're sober and you have acriminal record, welcome to the
team.
Most people that work in theaddiction treatment community
have lived it themselves or havereally close ties to it like a
family member, and what I cantell you is kudos or condolences
.
You run a nonprofit, we run anonprofit.
It's a lot harder than wethought.
Oh my God, it is yeah, but wehire folks that are in recovery
(40:56):
for our nonprofit and we havefolks that talk about when they
were homeless and talk aboutwhen they were incarcerated.
And it's amazing we have totalk about email etiquette and
Zoom etiquette and how tobalance a checkbook and we were
literally over lunch last summertalking about compound interest
and retirements and one of thegentlemen who works for a
nonprofit it's on my to-do listto record him on the podcast but
(41:18):
he one day and I wish I justput my iPhone down and recorded
he just spewed out what itreally takes to rehabilitate
after addiction, jail and prisonand it's years, it's needing
stability, it's needingmentorship and 30 days in a
residential treatment programjust isn't going to cut it.
And essentially he's I meanhe's doing great.
(41:42):
I think he's his two-yearsoberversary is like next month,
but yeah, it's.
I think one of the reasons whywe've done inReach into our
local correctional facilities isif we can get people into
addiction treatment as they comeout and then they can
transition to sober living, alot of them start to realize,
hey, maybe I want to be a drugand alcohol counselor and what's
(42:03):
so cool about that is theirdark past is what makes them
successful and it like flips thestory on its head and it's
really cool to watch.
And one of my favorite partsabout the whole idea of treating
addiction is when it'ssuccessful.
It's called being in recovery,because you get your life back.
It's just, it's amazing.
Speaker 2 (42:24):
It's just, it's amazing, yeah, to make that
transition and to be successfulin it takes such unbelievable
strength and character,fortitude and patience and
compassion and yeah.
Speaker 1 (42:34):
I wanted to ask you and I don't mean to bring up
another musician in ourconversation, but Jelly Roll is
a very interesting figure in thecircle that we've been talking
about.
Horrible lived experienceincarcerated and a lot of his
music gets played at AA meetings.
I know his song I Am Not Okayis very popular in residential
treatment programs.
(42:55):
Have you found any uptake withyour songs in the recovery
community?
Speaker 2 (43:01):
Yeah, I mean, I think that I'm obviously nowhere near
as famous as Jelly Roll andkudos to him, and he also seems
to use his platform for a lot ofgood works and seems to really
be concerned with giving back,and I think that's this
essential part of thattransformation as well.
It's like someone pulls you upon the ladder and then your hand
(43:23):
has to be down pulling the nextperson up.
Do you know what I mean?
100%.
I think that's how you stay onthe path.
I think that's how that's meantto work.
When I first started doing thiswork and I think I mentioned
this in the show that at onepoint I got a Facebook message
from a woman who had told methat she was listening over and
over again to the song Tell Lucythat I Love Her, and she was
(43:44):
actually watching a video of itbecause I had not recorded the
song at that point.
But so she's rewatching theYouTube video over and over
again and she said that herhusband had committed suicide
inside of a jail and that theyhad a son, they had a
three-year-old together and shewas listening to the song over
and over again because she feltit described how she thought her
(44:05):
husband must have felt leadingup to him committing suicide.
And when I got that message Iwas really blown away, obviously
, so much so that I had toinclude it in the show because
it just summed up a certainaspect of that experience so
well and the family's experience, like how having a family
member who's incarcerated can beso devastating to a family, not
(44:26):
just to that individual.
But I knew that when I got amessage like that I was like wow
, stakes are higher.
I've crossed a certain linehere where something I've
written has really become a partof somebody else's story.
And I am of the school where Idon't think songs originate from
(44:47):
the songwriter.
I think the songwriter is morelike an antenna and picks up
something and that the song isfloating around in this sort of
platonic, metaphysical universeand you just, if you're lucky,
you can pull one down.
But I think when you have agreat song in front of you, I
think a really honest songwriterwill be able to admit that
they're like wow, like Icouldn't have thought of that,
(45:10):
you know?
And who wrote that song?
Do you know what I mean?
Like that's really what it isand and, like I said, to be a
part of someone's experience ofthat kind of something so
intimate and to be part ofsomebody's grieving process that
way and I'm sure jelly roll isthat for a lot of people it's an
incredible honor and I feelvery lucky and humbled to count
(45:36):
that among my life experiences.
Speaker 1 (45:42):
Yeah, absolutely, Unfortunately, as the hour
always does, it has flown by,Besides coming to Monterey
County, where we'll set upsomething with the local jails,
prisons, juvenile hall justiceinvolved high schools, that sort
of stuff.
What are you working on now?
What's next?
Speaker 2 (46:01):
I'm writing up a storm right now.
I'm off for the summer.
I'll start touring again inSeptember, but I don't want to
jinx it.
I'm actually I'm writing amusical right now.
I wanted to write another show.
I was going to write anotherone-man show because I really I
love to write songs, but I alsoreally love to write stories and
(46:21):
I love the idea of combining abody of work with storyline.
But I realized I wanted to workwith other people.
I didn't want to write aone-man show again.
I really wanted to do somethingthat was more collaborative.
And then I wanted to write forall kinds of characters.
So I'm not a musical theaterguy.
I've never been in a musical inmy life.
I don't know anything aboutthem, I've seen two or three of
(46:41):
them in my whole life.
But I started writing songs andI started writing a story and
I'm like I guess this is amusical.
I don't know what else you'dcall it, but that's what I'm
doing right now.
Speaker 1 (46:50):
Love it.
I have to say, Matt, I alwayslearn so much every time I talk
to you.
I just want to say thank youfor the incredible music that
you write and I'm really excitedfor when you're back in
Monterey County.
We have a lot of connections inthe criminal justice system
here and I know your work willcontinue to make an impact and
will definitely help ourincarcerated folks here in
Monterey County.
Speaker 2 (47:09):
Amazing, and likewise I echo all of that you know.
Thank you for all the awesomework that you do.
Speaker 1 (47:18):
Before we wrap up, a huge thank you to the Montage
Health Foundation for backing mymission to create fun, engaging
education on addiction, and ashout out to the nonprofit
Central Coast OverdosePrevention for teaming up with
me on this podcast.
Our partnership helps me getthe word out about how to treat
addiction and prevent overdosesTo those healthcare providers
(47:41):
out there treating patients withaddiction.
You're doing life-saving workand thank you for what you do
For everyone else tuning in.
Thank you for taking the timeto learn.
Thank you, treating addictionsaves lives.
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