October 12, 2025 • 43 mins
The story starts with a crash—but not the kind you see on TV. Former Team USA bobsledder William Person maps the quiet damage of micro-concussions, relentless G-forces, and years of migraines, vertigo, and sensory overload that slowly stole his clarity. Then came one hour in a hyperbaric oxygen chamber. He walked out seeing colors he didn’t know he’d lost—and for the first time in years, the world looked vivid, sharp, and possible.
We dig into what that means for athletes and veterans living with CTE symptoms and post-concussion syndrome, translating the science of oxygen, blood flow, and neuroplasticity into clear, practical language. William’s account doesn’t hide the complexity: relief that arrives in windows, rebounds that test resolve, and the discipline required to stack small gains into a life. Along the way, we confront the system that too often says “you’re fine” while athletes fade—legal settlements that offer monitoring without care, research that goes missing in action, and a culture that celebrates speed but ignores the bill it sends to the brain.
Out of the fog comes a plan: a nonprofit recovery center that delivers hyperbaric oxygen therapy alongside supportive tools—sleep and light hygiene, anti-inflammatory nutrition, autonomic regulation, vestibular work—free at the point of use. We talk cost barriers, smarter fundraising, and why placing a center in the Midwest can make access real for people who don’t have the means to chase treatment. If you care about brain health, athlete safety, veteran care, or just the kind of hope that proves itself with results, you’ll find a roadmap here—and a reason to act.
If this conversation moved you, subscribe, share it with someone who needs it, and leave a review with your biggest takeaway. Your words help this mission reach the people who need it most.
Intro for podcast
information about subscriptions
Here is the link for Sunday's 4 pm Pacific time Zoom meeting
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_01 (00:02):
Well, hello, and welcome back to the Healthy
Living Podcast.
I'm your host, Joe Grumbine, andtoday we've got a very special
guest.
His name's William Person, andhe's a former nine-year team USA
bobsled athlete whose careerleft him battling the
devastating effects of CTE.
(00:23):
At his lowest point, he couldbarely get up off the floor,
lost in confusion, depression,and deteriorating brain.
Hope came when he discoveredhyperbaric oxygen therapy, which
restored clarity in histhinking, color in his vision,
and purpose in his life.
Today, William's on a mission toraise awareness of brain damage
in sports, the importance ofprotecting and healing the
(00:45):
brain, and he's on a mission toopen a nonprofit CTE recovery
center to help athletes andveterans heal at no cost to
them.
Wow, what a story.
William, welcome to the show.
Oh man, thank you for having me.
SPEAKER_00 (01:01):
I appreciate it.
SPEAKER_01 (01:01):
Yeah.
I uh I've run into a lot ofdifferent guests, and a few
athletes have been here andsharing their stories.
And usually it's uh, you know,somehow involving an injury and
how they've come around it.
Um, I've got a little experiencewith hyperbaric oxygen battling
with cancer, so I know the valuethat um it can bring to healing
(01:25):
anything.
You know, oxygen is uh it's afriend to all healthy cells and
a foe to all sick cells, so it'suh it's a good thing.
So welcome to the show.
And uh why don't you tell us alittle bit about your uh your
journey here?
SPEAKER_00 (01:40):
Well, actually, before we start, what type of uh
cancer you mind, Sarah?
SPEAKER_01 (01:45):
Oh no, not at all.
I I I do many episodes on this.
So about uh a year ago, I wasdiagnosed with squamous cell
carcinoma.
I had a giant tumor sticking outof my neck, and I had a doctor
tell me that, oh, well, you'reso healthy that it's probably
not cancer, which of course Iwanted to hear.
And so, you know, I believe inyou know, your body can heal
(02:08):
itself, and I'm I'm allholistic.
And so I just said, all right,I'll keep going.
And that was the fool's errandbecause uh the cancer was
growing away.
And uh I learned a lot, youknow.
My diet has been an instrumentalpart.
I I do a lot of work with plantmedicine and prayer meditation,
(02:29):
and I've created an amazing umcommunity of people that have
brought all the right pieces tosolve my problem.
And and what I learned is canceris so very unique to people that
it's as unique as you and I areas humans.
Yeah.
And so all these people thatcome up with this, oh,
everything, you know, this willcure everybody's cancer, you
(02:51):
know, maybe there's some truthto it, maybe not.
But the truth is everybody'sgotta find their own answer to
their problem.
Because as you know, with braininjuries, I had a brain injury
when I was 18 and I lost mytaste of sense and smell for 10
years.
And um it it came back.
You know, neuroplasticity is awonderful thing, and and uh my
(03:13):
my my brain healed itself, butyeah, but meanwhile, not
everybody's so fortunate, andthere's lots of tools that can
help everybody, and some toolsare really good for most people,
but you know, my knowledge hasalways been each of us has to
find their way, and um, so I'mhere to help, and so are you.
Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (03:34):
So did did your taste and smell come, excuse me,
did it come back afterhyperbaric oxygen or before
that?
SPEAKER_01 (03:40):
No, the hyperbaric oxygen was part of the therapies
that I do.
So I'm working with a doctorthat integrates Western standard
of care along with holisticsolutions.
So when you deal withchemotherapy or radiation or or
(04:02):
most of the the cancertherapies, they're all oxidative
stress.
And so what happens is thecancer cells don't like oxygen,
they like uh an anaerobicenvironment.
And so when you flood your bodywith oxygen, by whatever means
it rejuvenates the healthycells, feeds the mitochondria,
(04:24):
does all the good things forproviding good energy, and it
attacks the cancer cells withoxygen of stress.
So, in addition, I only reallydid the hyperbaric a couple of
times due to cost.
I I don't have one, and I didn'tit was just too costly for me to
use.
But I use um I make ozonatedglycerin um and I and I consume
(04:47):
that.
I do um food grade peroxide, Iinhale that with a nebulizer.
Oh um, I do sauna sweat lodgetherapy.
I mean, I do a lot of sweatlodge therapy, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (04:59):
Oh, yeah.
That's funny you said that.
Like you actually just told mywhole story inside your story.
SPEAKER_01 (05:06):
Yeah, it's a great story, and to hear it as applied
to different applications ispowerful.
And you know, our listeners arelooking for uh not only answers
of you know things that they'veheard about, you know, it's
always great to hear the one guytell a story, right?
(05:26):
But yeah, when another guy comesin and tells the same story with
a different application, and youand I never met before today.
So the fact that we're bringingour story from a different
background, a different uhapproach, a different target,
and still finding these results.
(05:46):
I think that's the kind of thingthat really brings some power to
the conversation.
SPEAKER_00 (05:51):
Yeah, I found a hypergratic action by accident.
Nice, yeah.
Uh Joe Namath, he put somevideos out, and uh in his in his
videos, he said it reversed hisCTE symptoms.
Yeah, and I was so shocked, I'mlike, you mean all these doctors
who told me who were ignoringme?
You know, nothing's wrong withme.
(06:12):
Right.
And so I didn't first of all, Ididn't think it was gonna work.
You know, everything else Itried and researched.
That was the first thing.
I didn't think it was gonnawork.
So, but when I tried it, I wasin that stupid chamber for one
stinking hour.
Wow.
And when I got out, so myglasses were slightly tinted
because I'm really sensitive tolights, sounds, and smells now.
SPEAKER_01 (06:32):
Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (06:33):
So when I came out of that chamber, I put my
glasses on a few times and uh Itook them off and then put them
back on.
And the salesman was thesalesman asked me, he said,
What's wrong?
I said, I don't know.
I don't think I've been seeingcolors lately, but now
everything's so bright.
I didn't know I wasn't seeingcolors.
I said, Right, I don't think Ineed my glasses.
He said, Oh, you're one ofthose.
(06:55):
And I was like, Oh, he's gonnatry to sell me.
Here we go.
Yeah, but no, he was right.
Some people get that immediaterelief.
Some people need like 60sessions and within like 30
days.
Right, right, right.
And so, but no, man, it clearedme.
Wow.
But I'll be honest, when I gothome that night, everything was
still good.
When I laid down, I fell asleepon the couch at about uh seven
(07:18):
o'clock at night.
I mean, it was about seven.
Okay, and I woke up at nineo'clock with a migraine.
Oh, it was one, I was, and Ithought I started thinking, oh
my god, I did damage.
Right.
I did take double.
Yeah, exactly.
All right, before I say the nextpart, is your uh podcast PG13 or
(07:39):
no?
SPEAKER_01 (07:39):
You're good.
It's a podcast where we're uh wecan go.
I mean, I try not to get crazy,but we'll throw an F bomb out
once in a while if we have to.
SPEAKER_00 (07:47):
No, no, just the symptoms.
Like, for example, when I wokeup with that migraine, I had to
unthinkable, I had an erectionwith it.
Okay, fair enough.
And those are two things thatdon't go together.
Like, yeah, yeah, yeah.
I wouldn't ever put those twothings together.
Yeah, nobody says, Let's go makelove.
I got a migraine, you know.
Like using your hiding in thedark somewhere, like you don't
(08:07):
want the browns you're touchingyou, or you don't want to smell
anybody's just like you know,yeah, yeah, exactly.
So when in that moment when ithappened, I was thinking like, I
was like, man, I did damage.
But I said, wait, these twothings are working at the same
time, right?
Maybe something good ishappening.
SPEAKER_01 (08:24):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
You gotta figure when whenthat's working right, that means
your body has got energy to putto that.
Yeah, and that means things aregood, uh you know, generally
now.
But migraine, on the other hand,can be an indicator of all sorts
of things, it can be a hormoneimbalance.
SPEAKER_00 (08:41):
Oh, I had them things since my first crash.
Yeah, my grands have been withme since my my first woke-up
crash.
Wow.
And uh yeah, they just neverknow when they're gonna show up,
though.
Like they just don't.
They're just like peekaboo, andwhen they get to, you know, it's
you don't sit down and just youknow, try to hide.
But on this particular day whenwhen that kicked in, that was I
(09:02):
woke up, it was I think it wasabout midnight or so.
I went and climbed into bed.
I woke up in the morning.
That that concussion, I mean,I'm sorry, the that migraine was
subsided, it was subsiding,going down.
Okay, but the erection was stillthere.
Oh, right.
Yeah, that was like 11 hours,man.
I was like, whoa, that's that'scrazy.
(09:22):
My cloudiness was gone for sixdays after that.
Wow, yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (09:26):
And I said, okay, was this just a you know, maybe
I just wanted this to workbecause then nothing else like
this is a you doubted it tobegin with, so it's not like a
placebo effect where you'relike, Yeah, I know this is gonna
happen.
You were like, I don't know ifit's gonna happen or not.
SPEAKER_00 (09:40):
Yeah, so they allowed me to come back the
following week.
Uh I went toward the end of theweek, it was starting to wear
off.
I could start feeling thatlittle sensations I had.
And then this time I came out ofthat one-hour chamber, yeah, it
was clear for nine days.
Like the cloudiness was gone.
Uh man, it was just like I wasjust looking at this world, like
(10:01):
it felt like everything was sovivid.
Wow.
And uh, for the first time in ain years, I realized I hadn't
seen the beauty in anything in along time.
SPEAKER_01 (10:10):
You know what's wild is I know people that have
overcome addictions and opiateaddictions will do a similar
thing where over time, like youdon't realize it, but you're not
seeing colors anymore.
And it doesn't happenimmediately, just sort of
another layer, another layer, alittle faded, faded.
(10:30):
And then when they get off ofit, all of a sudden, like
similar to like what you'resaying, it's like, whoa,
everything's all vibrant again.
I I didn't realize I didn't seethis.
SPEAKER_00 (10:40):
Yeah, and you know, and like for me, like the for
me, like my first bobsnake crashwas in 2002.
Okay, it was about a month.
We were racing a World Cup inSwitzerland right before the uh
2002 Salt Lake City games,Olympic games came out.
Like I had a really bad crash.
Um, like I had vertical for likea week.
Uh oh, vertigo is brutal.
(11:01):
Oh my, I still get it.
It shows up with the migraines,you never know which one's gonna
show up.
But yeah, but right now, it's assoon as if I use that chamber
enough, like uh it's rare now.
It's not all the time, but okay,it's like before I had just
every day was miserable.
SPEAKER_01 (11:16):
But but you're talking about like when you're
what you're talking about, likenow, even any reduction in
symptoms is unheard of withthese injuries, you know,
football injuries, all these,you know, any any sports
injuries where your head getsrepeatedly wrecked, there's
(11:36):
nothing, they don't haveanything they can do for it.
No, and they'll they'll tell youthat, you know, and so for you
even finding you know sometemporary relief would be
miraculous, but you're talkingabout maintaining this.
SPEAKER_00 (11:50):
Well, I was a little jealous, I'll be honest, because
um Joe Nangles had reversed hissymptoms, he didn't have any
more left.
Yeah, yeah.
I started doing research, and alot of people saying that, yeah.
And so for me, one time it gotto the point the doctors don't
say it.
No, because you know what,that's part of the problem.
Because um, um put this way Irace for nine years.
(12:12):
Okay.
So think about between one andsix trips down that track every
day.
It's like four or five days aweek.
Uh-huh.
Sometime it was two, butsometimes it was six.
You just never, you know.
Right.
Um, and I did that four or fivemonths of the year for nine
years.
Okay.
So that's literally a hundred.
So every time we went down thattrack, now that I understand
what the sport is, you getrattled around like crazy.
(12:35):
Yeah, you're getting the microconcussions on.
Right.
If you don't crash, you'regetting the micro concussions.
SPEAKER_01 (12:40):
Just like riding a dirt bike all the time over
whipped deducers getting beattogether.
SPEAKER_00 (12:43):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Absolutely.
So that damage was being done,and I'm I'm probably the best
case scenario.
I feel like if I had hundredsand hundreds of those micro
concussions, and I had sevenbobs that like just crashes,
like you know, roll it.
And uh, if I can come back, man,everybody has a good shot at
(13:04):
that.
SPEAKER_01 (13:05):
I couldn't agree more.
That's fantastic.
So you did you ended up uhpurchasing a hyperbaric chamber?
SPEAKER_00 (13:14):
Yeah, yeah, I did.
I have one in the back.
That's awesome.
Yeah, that's awesome.
SPEAKER_01 (13:19):
I I I I was close about several years ago.
Um, I was doing pretty well, andI was looking at setting up kind
of I have a uh garden therapycenter here.
We have a uh nonprofit calledGardens of Hope.
And I've got a two and a halfacre botanical garden, and we do
what we call therapeutichorticulture.
(13:40):
So people come out here andwhatever the modality of healing
is, they come and do it in thenature.
And yeah, the goal was to, inaddition to the sauna, the sweat
lodge, and all the other thingswe're doing, um have a
hyperbaric chamber.
And I got this close to buyingone one time, and then things
went sideways on me, and I neverdid it.
(14:02):
But we're gonna have to fixthat.
We're gonna have to fix that.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
It's still it's still in my inmy target.
Once I get to the other side ofthis, which I'm close to, um,
I'm gonna get back tore-rebuilding that whole healing
center again.
SPEAKER_00 (14:16):
Well, for me, like uh when I bought, um, like I was
so afraid of the technology thatI made sure I bought from a
place that had a storefront.
Okay.
Because I was so afraid, likeyou do the homework on it.
Like, first of all, do thehomework on CTE.
It's brutal.
Like those guys are murderingpeople or killing themselves,
like kids.
And they all say the same thing.
(14:36):
They were so such nice, sweet,gentle beings until they
weren't.
Yeah.
Or they weren't acting in theirthey weren't acting the same.
They were acting out ofcharacters with XL.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (14:48):
There's story after story.
Yeah.
It's not just from sportsinjuries, it's from any any
traumatic head injury.
SPEAKER_00 (14:55):
Absolutely.
And that's what I found on myjourney.
Like, there was, like, I met ayoung lady, uh, well, she was
probably in her 40s, and uh, shewas about to go to the doctor,
she was telling me about allthese symptoms she had.
I was like, wow, I said, Wereyou an athlete?
Because you line up with what myteammates and myself were going
through.
She's like, No, I'm no sports.
(15:16):
I said, and I asked her, I said,Well, this is a little personal,
but did you uh I know you'redivorced, like it did your
husband ever hit you, or she'slike, no.
And then she's like, I never hitmy head.
And then and then eventually shesaid, Except one time I went
snowboarding, I fell backwardswith my son, and I was and my
arms locked up like this.
(15:36):
Aha.
The reason why your doctorscan't figure out what this is is
probably is probably from folks'concussion.
You didn't get it treatedbecause back then they didn't
treat any of us.
Right.
You know, my first World Cupcrash was brutal.
Like my my my buddy was knockedunconscious.
Wow.
He was my roommate, and so wewent back, they sent us back to
(15:56):
the hotel.
I hit vertigo, and he has, youknow, he's unconscious.
Right.
They told us to go back and makesure you watch each other so you
don't go to sleep.
Which one was supposed to watchwho, you know.
Right, right, exactly.
I couldn't sit up without theroom spinning.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And I tell people on that day,it's it's another funny story.
(16:17):
Um, uh, you know who PrinceAlbert of Monaco is?
Sure.
Okay, he's the right draftbobsleds from Monaco.
Okay.
So right after my crash, he wasstanding there.
He was with uh the old tennis,older tennis player, what was uh
Anna Konakova.
Okay, and uh race bar driverMichael Schumacher was there.
All right, so I crashed, I'msitting with the paramedics.
(16:39):
Only time I've ever hadparamedics helped me.
Okay, and uh Prince Albert walksby and he winks at me, right?
So I'm cloudy, I'm not thinkingstraight.
And I and I live in LA, so Ihave a ton of gay friends.
I even have a gay cousin.
I actually just passed a fewweeks ago, but you know, I'm
always around gay people, it'snot a big deal.
(16:59):
Yeah, yeah.
But so when he winked at me, I'mnot thinking clearly.
So I'm thinking, oh my god,Prince Albert's in love with me.
And like I stopped isolatingwith him.
I said, I better not isolatewith him anymore.
I don't want to leave them on oranything like that.
Right, right.
But and it took me like it'sonly been about a year that I
realized thinking, thinkingback, like that guy wasn't in
love with me.
(17:19):
I just crashed.
I was trying, he just winked atme because in Europe they wink,
they don't, you know.
Right, right, right.
Yeah, it's a whole differentthing.
Yeah.
But when that brain is notthinking straight, it's like,
yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (17:31):
That's wild, but what a what an experience.
That's that's that's completelyuh you got a wealth of
experience there.
That's unbelievable.
So now you've got thishyperbaric chamber.
I mean, you you went from youwent you went hang on hang on
one second.
(18:02):
Sorry about that.
Anyway, um you've got all theseexperiences of of injury and
then and symptoms, and andyou're you're starting to
understand, you know, this isthis is a thing, you know, what
when when did it go from you'regoing through these traumas and
(18:27):
experiencing these symptoms towhoa, I've got a thing, like I
gotta deal with this.
SPEAKER_00 (18:34):
Well, um, I will say around 2012 I started 2012,
maybe a little bit before 2012 Istarted seeing doctors.
Okay.
But I thought it was diabetesbecause I had this thing where I
couldn't get out of bed in themorning.
Wow.
Um, I never drank coffee before,and I never drank Coca-Cola, I
(18:56):
didn't drink soda.
Okay, so I began to live off ofthat.
So every night, yeah, everynight before bed, I would put it
on my nightstand.
If I didn't have it there in themorning, I'm I'm not getting out
of that bed until probably threeo'clock the next day.
SPEAKER_01 (19:08):
Wow.
Now, as an athlete, you probablyhad a pretty good diet, and
we're living healthy as anythingbefore that.
SPEAKER_00 (19:16):
Yeah, and that that's what it didn't make sense
to me that we'll be disease.
But I've seen people with lowblood sugar before, and uh it
looked just like it.
That's the one thing about thehead injuries.
What I've learned, like um, alot of times there's so so many
misdiagnoses I've I've beenwatching.
SPEAKER_01 (19:32):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (19:32):
Uh what it really is, is the head injuries that
they never treated.
It's the only injury you canever have where they say, don't
do anything.
SPEAKER_01 (19:41):
You know, your body can generate any symptom, you
know, your brain is the controlcenter, so it's telling
everything what to do.
Yeah.
And so it can stimulate any kindof reaction that it sees fit.
I don't know why it would do it,but when it things are
misfiring, you know, it's anobvious, um, it's an obvious
(20:02):
thing that could happen.
You know, you can get hives, youcan get uh uh go hypoglycemic,
you hell, you could get astroke.
You I mean it with your buttonsdrink and boom.
I mean, it's the control center.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (20:15):
Well, what no, I guess the biggest thing that
catalysts that really kickedthis off uh for me, when I
started to understand more, uh,one of my teammates, uh, when I
moved, when I left TSA, I moveduh back to uh Los Angeles.
Before that, I was doing likefootball movies like Jerry
Maguire, Any Given Sunday kindof stuff.
Okay, but they put a I was afast guy, so they put this
(20:35):
uniform on me and I make Cubalook like he's a real football
stuff like that.
But it was just me running realfast, that's what it was.
And American people bought itand he got an Oscar behind it.
Nice so well, yeah, that's whatI was doing, and um, but like,
oh my gosh, I just glitched.
Like, I had that thing where I'mtalking in and I forgot we what
your question was.
And I just and uh yeah, I'msorry, Kate.
(20:58):
Do you remember what yourquestion was?
SPEAKER_01 (20:59):
No, I was just saying, where did you when did
you go from I've got all thesesymptoms to I've got all these
symptoms?
Oh, I remember same stuff everyday.
It's all right.
My chemo brain does the samething to me.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (21:10):
Between the two of us, we'll keep this thing
rolling.
Yeah, and so what it wants.
So I was doing I was doingHollywood before I was with Team
USA.
So when I finished, I moved toLA, I wanted to become a writer,
write more.
So I was doing that, and one ofmy teammates called me.
He he wanted to be a writer, sohe gave me, he would give me
these ideas and I would tell himhow to tweak it and make a good
movie out of it, right?
(21:32):
Uh-huh.
And uh, I'm just now connectingthese dots recently.
So, what I thought was creativewriting wasn't his mind was
slipping.
Oh.
So the very last time he calledme, he was speaking some
gibberish or some weirdlanguage.
I don't know what he wasspeaking.
Wow.
And uh, I couldn't, of course, Icouldn't understand it.
(21:53):
And um like eventually he got sofrustrated, he hung up the
phone.
Wow.
Now, my background is when Ijoined Team USA, I had just
written the first everindependent living transitional
housing program for youth.
Okay.
So it was new, and so the stateopened me as a pilot program.
I was a pilot, and so mentalhealth was my background.
My first job after college, myfirst job was uh I worked at
(22:16):
this place, uh San JoaquinCounty Mental Health.
It's the first mental healthfacility west of the Mississippi
River.
So everybody flocked there forthe mental health issues.
So I saw it from depression toschizophrenic, bipolar.
We had the Kremlin insane comethrough from evaluation
sometime, and even those peoplewho were still floating around
who had been lobotomized werestill so I saw it all.
(22:38):
So mental health is mybackground.
Okay.
So when he called me speakingthat gibberish, I knew he needed
help.
And I was like, Yeah, yeah.
I gotta help you, I gotta helphim, I gotta help him.
Every day I said that to myself,and then eventually uh I get a
phone call, and uh probably wentto his family's factory and he
hung himself.
Oh no, yeah, man, I I felt soresponsible and guilty, and um,
(23:03):
you know, and like I felt like Ididn't do anything that I should
have done.
Uh and then, but when hisautopsy came out, like he was in
stage four CTE.
Oh wow.
Yeah, and when I was told he hadthe worst brain that anybody's
ever seen, worst, so no footballplayer brain could compare is
what I was told.
And uh so I really I finallykind of started to forgive
(23:24):
myself because I knew that'snothing I could have done to put
a help for him.
Yeah, yeah.
But the big thing was duringthat time when I was calling
myself helping him, I neededhelp.
Right.
My bed was literally in myliving room on the floor, wow
mattress, and uh I was uh put itthere because it was the middle
(23:44):
distance between the bathroomand the kitchen.
Okay.
That's how I had to live for awhile.
And I don't know what I did allday.
Like a TV wasn't on, radiowasn't on.
I don't know what I did in thehouse all day.
Like there's some there's someblack spots in there somewhere.
SPEAKER_01 (23:59):
Yeah, yeah, I bet.
SPEAKER_00 (24:00):
Yeah, and uh so when his autopsy came out, I kind of
started connecting them dots.
There's a few other things thathappened.
Okay, and I was able to like, ohmy god, now this thing has a
name.
And as I start checking it withmy older teammates, it's all the
same crap, man.
SPEAKER_01 (24:17):
Yeah, yeah.
It's probably prevalent in, youknow.
You don't, you know, it's sofunny when you when at first
when I saw your bio and I seebobsledding, like I never
equated bobsledding with injury.
Like, you know, I you watch iton TV and they're going down
this thing, it looks prettycool, and but I've never done
(24:39):
it.
And you know, it's just likeskiing or um or or snowboarding,
you're bouncing and slappingaround all the time.
And uh, but but in the bobsled,it's even more because you're
inside of a vehicle that's justracking back and forth, and it's
it's uh it's crazy.
Or you're laying on a on a sled,I guess.
(25:00):
It's not really a vehicle, it'smore of a glass of milk.
Of a trajector of a of a uh of aI don't know, uh a projectile.
SPEAKER_00 (25:10):
Yeah, and that that happens sometime, believe it or
not.
SPEAKER_01 (25:13):
Yeah, right off the track.
Yeah.
Wow, wow, that's wild, wild.
So I know I'm getting a littlelight on time, but I can stretch
this a little longer.
This is a great conversation.
I don't want to nip it.
Um, but I also want to get to aplace where you've you've gone,
you've gotten your diagnosis,you now realize that you've got
(25:36):
a problem that needs to besolved.
So let's take us from thispoint.
Now you're you're in this place,you're you got your bed between
the bathroom and the kitchen,you're you're realizing that
more and more people have thisproblem.
You realize you've got thisproblem.
What's that next move?
SPEAKER_00 (25:55):
Honestly, I was praying for death.
Wow.
Because I was a counselor, I sawthe devastation that that did to
other families, and I couldn'ttake my own life.
So I was I was bargaining withGod every night.
Please.
Not another day.
Not an you don't know, no,please, not another day.
Wow.
Uh yeah, I did that until Icouldn't anymore.
(26:16):
He wasn't listening.
Yeah, he wasn't listening to me,man.
Like that's not a good one.
Yeah, and uh what happened withthe the biggest kick was um my
girlfriend, uh, she lived, shewe had a place in LA.
Okay, and I had just bought a uha place in the Midwest in St.
Louis, uh a lake house, a littlesmall lake house.
And uh and I bought that placebecause I was getting lost in my
(26:37):
own neighborhood in inCalifornia, and I was I was
afraid for myself.
I knew it was a matter of timebefore the switch goes all the
way off.
Right.
And I hadn't found hyperbreakoxygenia at the time.
And so my girlfriend, she's athey have a loving family, like
she's on the phone with her mom,and they're from New York, and
they talk loud.
Oh, yeah.
And that noise was killing me.
It was killing me.
(26:58):
So I told her we might have tobreak up.
Um I'm going back to the LakeHouse, I need a little peace,
but we we need to think aboutwhat we're doing.
So I was there, I found anarticle, came out called
Fledhead, written by the NewYork Times, uh, Matthew
Ferderman.
He wrote that article, and itreally diagnosed all my
teammates of what all they wentthrough, all the symptoms.
But I literally read thatarticle and I got on my knees
(27:20):
and I thank God all the symptomsmissed me.
Wow.
Sent that article to mygirlfriend, she circled some
stuff.
SPEAKER_01 (27:26):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (27:27):
And the first thing I saw was noise sensitivity.
Right, right.
And I went, oh, it was the veryreason I was over there in the
first place.
Right.
And I went down that list and Isaid, Oh my God.
I checked everything exceptParkinson's.
Wow.
Then this thing really had aname.
And then I that's when I startedtrying to, you know, I found a
class action to get medical andto get everybody some help.
(27:52):
Uh, but also the number onereason was is they want to keep
doing business as usual.
But I'm like, you have to want anew generation.
SPEAKER_01 (27:59):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (28:00):
That's the one thing I've told the judge is
non-negotiable.
Yeah.
I'll fold on anything else, I'llweaken.
But I'm not folding on that one.
SPEAKER_01 (28:09):
Yeah.
Yeah.
No, that's huge.
I mean, you know, so many timeswe're driven by information we
receive, but people aren'tcritical of that information and
they're not really vetting thesources.
And when the source ofinformation is somebody that
wants you to do the thing, well,they're likely to highlight the
good stuff and and ignore someof the bad.
(28:32):
And it's important, you know.
I part of me is like, well, youknow, buyer beware, but at the
same point, you got children,you got youngsters going into
high school, college that arethat are, you know, building a
dream based on something thatthey believe is true, and they
(28:52):
don't have any idea about theinherent danger of it.
And and and maybe there's maybethere are some answers to as far
as preventative goes, with youknow, safety equipment or better
built tracks or sleds, or Idon't know.
SPEAKER_00 (29:08):
I mean, I don't have the answer, but they'd have to
change the whole sport, change,take the turns out.
It's those turns.
Because, like, there's anotherpart of that puzzle, like uh,
there's only one other source ofgetting the same G forces that
we pull, it's the fighterproducts who do the F-15s,
right?
Which doing this and they'redoing the bank turns.
Yeah, but they're not doing itas often as you guys are.
Yeah, and supposedly we'repulling only five G's and
(29:31):
they're pulling like nine orfifteen or somewhere in there.
Yeah.
Uh so one time they came out, wetook them on the VIP ride.
Okay.
I did six rides that day.
I took them down once, and whenthey got to the end, they were
rattled.
Wow.
It made sense to me.
Yeah.
However, an article just cameout uh by the once again New
York Times last December.
They have the exact samesymptoms and issues as the Bob's
(29:54):
letters.
SPEAKER_01 (29:55):
Wow.
SPEAKER_00 (29:56):
So, but if you go for look for that article right
now, all the links, not of Workanymore.
They scrubbed it.
However, if you ever want to seeit, I got I got a link that
works directly.
Yeah, yeah.
Oh no, I'm interested in this,yeah, for sure.
Yeah, so they have the samesymptoms.
And uh, matter of fact, they didan episode of us on us on HBO
Real Sports when we first filedthe case.
And but if you go look for thatepisode, it's also been
(30:18):
scrubbed.
You can find every episodearchived, but you won't find
that one.
Well they're doing a really goodjob of really trying to uh I
don't know who it is.
I I don't want to slanderanybody.
SPEAKER_01 (30:28):
Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (30:29):
Uh but they're doing a good job of trying to sweep
this under the carpet.
But it's it's not just theAmericans, it's the Canadians,
uh or some of the Jamaicans thatspawn on in Europe.
Uh, it was an Australian guyjust jacked from an aneurysm.
So every time I get a migraine,like that's the one thing out is
on my heart out there, oh, it'snot an aneurysm because it's
such it's so extreme, you know.
SPEAKER_01 (30:48):
Oh yeah.
And uh yeah.
So what happened with thelawsuit?
SPEAKER_00 (30:53):
Well, I have receipts for everything that I
tell you.
Okay.
My lawyers have teamed up withthe lawyers from the Olympic
team.
Oh no.
There is an offer on the table.
I've been fighting sinceJanuary.
I'm the lead plaintiff, so I'msupposedly the only person who
can accept or reject the offer,right?
Okay.
So they presented the offer.
They will only evaluate athletesonly.
(31:15):
No treatment, no money to findyour own treatment.
Wow.
That's what's on the table.
My lawyers thought it was a goodidea to send it through to the
judge against my approval.
I showed up and I've beenrepresenting the class myself
personally.
So now it's literally the lastthree quarterings, it's me
versus this high-powered lawfirm and my lawyers.
Wow.
(31:35):
And so that's what I'm upagainst right now.
Wow.
Yeah, and I I matter of fact,uh, they're trying to make me
think that I'm crazy.
They said that this case wasalways only about medical
monitoring.
Wow.
The last quartering, I producedthe email they sent me.
It said medical monitoring andcare for life.
I said there's no care at all inthis thing that they're
(31:57):
presenting.
Yeah.
So so far, I've wanted I askedfor in the last three quarters,
I prevailed so far.
They haven't been able to closethis case on us.
Okay.
But the truth is I need lawyersto take over.
All right.
We had Robert, Robert Shapiro.
I got another one for you beforewe go.
Robert Shapiro, I spoke to him,right?
(32:17):
No way.
Dream Team.
Dream Team lawyer.
Wow.
And so I shared information withhim.
He said, I'll do aninvestigation.
I'll see if I can help you.
We made a few call phone callsto him.
We emailed back and forth.
He sends me an email.
He says, Will, I fired your leadlawyer.
I kept the counsel because Iknow them.
(32:38):
And we're gonna get you guys thehelp you need.
And I'm thinking, yes, finally.
Um, 24 hours later, he sends meanother email.
Will, can't help you?
What?
Unless the judge sides with youand does not accept this offer.
But he was moonwalking so quick,somebody got to him.
SPEAKER_01 (32:54):
I don't know who you got some heavy-handed somebody
in the background there, man.
That's where well, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (33:02):
I've been warned.
I've been, trust me, my life hasplayed out like the movie
concussion that's happened.
But they messed up.
I was dying when I filed thiscase, so I didn't care.
Like, right, what are you gonnado to me?
Kill me quicker?
Thank you.
SPEAKER_01 (33:14):
We we we got a lot in common.
I fought a battle with thegovernment, I don't have time to
get into it either, but it wasover medical cannabis and and
you know, me providing medicinefor people, and I stood my
ground just like you, and Iprevailed in the end, but you
know, they it was a differentthing because they they were
going after me instead of megoing after them.
But yeah, uh, you know, it youyou when you when you feel
(33:38):
righteous about something andyou know you can make a
difference, you do what yougotta do.
I I I wish I had a lawyer Icould hand you, I'd I'd I'd uh
send them off, but I'll put itin my mind, that's for sure.
Yeah, yeah.
Let's sort of fast forward toyou've discovered this
hyperbaric oxygen is uh is amiracle.
(34:02):
And now you've decided you wantto set up a uh a nonprofit, you
want to make this available.
Obviously, if you prevail inthis court case, that's gonna
open up all kinds of resources.
But until that time, you'reyou're still moving forward.
SPEAKER_00 (34:18):
Well, the thing with the lawsuit, I I never asked for
money for myself, so I won't getanything more than anyone else
will get.
Like that's you know right.
So, like when I first filed acase, I told my lawyers the same
thing.
I said, take care of my guys andwarn the new generation.
Because I really thought I'd bedead the next.
I I thought I had less than ayear left.
I didn't think I'd be here atthe end of this case.
(34:39):
Wow.
So any money that comes, it'llbe the I'll get the same
everybody else.
There might be a lead plaintifffee or something like that, but
I didn't request anything formyself because I I I was dying,
man.
SPEAKER_01 (34:50):
Right, right.
You're just trying to make adifference.
SPEAKER_00 (34:53):
Yeah, and so when um it's kind of like you get to
that point where um like thethreats and stuff was coming.
Like the uh people were tellingme this these people watching
you, they don't want thisinformation coming out.
Wow.
I got the emails that justshowed me, like he said this is
quotation, like this is not safematerial in quotations.
(35:13):
Wow.
And uh, but you know, I I acceptthe challenge.
I'm like, you know, yeah, yeah.
I was like, they well, theywell, they're gonna take me out.
Like, guess what?
I'm ready to go anyway.
Like, I can't keep living likethis.
But once that chamber showed up,it was night and day.
Wow, yeah.
Night and day.
SPEAKER_01 (35:32):
Well, that I I this is layers, you know.
We we we should probably have asecond conversation and and go
deeper into some of this stuff.
I I don't feel like we're gonnabe able to get everything I want
to get through in one episode.
And you know how people justdon't have a attention span for
(35:53):
the show.
But I definitely want to sort offast forward to your nonprofit
and the work that you're wantingto do.
And I most definitely want tohave you come back on and do a
second session here becausewe're we're really I had no idea
there was so many layers tothis, and uh I I I I'm I'm
(36:14):
riveted.
I I want to I want to hear moreand and I want to help.
So that's that's the idea.
SPEAKER_00 (36:19):
I appreciate it.
Yeah, absolutely.
Um like with a nonprofit, I justwant to offer to people the same
thing that I received for free.
I know I know the the loophole,like for example, once I once I
did it, it was free.
Now I needed this chamber and Icouldn't afford it.
As you hit it on earlier in yourlife, you said they were too
expensive.
Yeah.
And so I I don't want to chargefor this this service because
(36:41):
people won't be able to affordit.
It's too expensive, right?
Right.
You know, so I just want tooffer it for free.
So when my crowdfunding is setup only to get the uh equipment,
I'm gonna relocate back to theMidwest.
Okay.
But over there, I can for what Ican buy a building for, right?
That'll be just be like 10months of rent in LA.
Oh, I get it.
I I get it 100%.
This is something I want to bearound one of my days when I
(37:03):
leave this earth.
I want it to still be up andrunning.
So nice, nice.
SPEAKER_01 (37:06):
Yeah.
Well, I love it.
And uh, you know, I I I've beenrunning a nonprofit.
Well, I ran one for about 15years, and I've got about three
years into this other one, andI'm learning, learning about
fundraising and grants and allsorts of different partnerships
and things.
So yeah, um, I I there are a lotof tools that are at your
(37:28):
fingertips, but it's just likeeverything else.
There's a whole layers of of ofplaybook to learn and and get it
figured out.
But you've got you've gotexposure, you've got a
background that gets people'sattention more than mine.
And I'll bet you you'll be ableto partner up with a company or
or uh some different groupsthat'll help make this thing
(37:50):
happen quicker.
SPEAKER_00 (37:51):
As long as I can offer for free.
That's the number one.
Yeah, that's the be free.
Yeah.
Like I I put out a um, I knowyou got to go, but I put out a
video.
We had those mass shooting in uhNew York.
unknown (38:04):
Okay.
SPEAKER_00 (38:06):
I put out a video that day, and I said, guys, this
is the population is dangerous.
We know about them, but there'sanother population that we have
to help us, which is oursoldiers.
They come back with the samecondition and they're now the
best killers in the world.
And if we don't address that, weknow I said that on the
courthouse steps after after Imade the video.
Yeah, and the next week was themilitary mass shooting in
(38:26):
Minnesota, I believe.
No, Idaho, then there wasanother one.
Yeah, yeah.
I in my video, I said there'sgonna be a wave of them coming.
Right.
Starting the following week.
Like, yeah, yeah.
I probably gotta have anythingwith it.
SPEAKER_01 (38:38):
Yeah, my nonprofit, I offer all my services for free
to veterans, and that's it's thesame sort of idea.
Yeah, it's it's yeah, these guyshave put themselves in a place
that's got them all messed upand nobody really seems to help.
So I'm just like, well, you cancome out to the garden and just
hang out for a while, or youcan, you know, receive anything
(38:59):
that we offer free of charge.
And that's just one of thethings I love that.
SPEAKER_00 (39:03):
That's the same thing I want to do, man.
We we align very close.
SPEAKER_01 (39:06):
I love it, I love it.
Well, listen, uh William, I Imost definitely want to schedule
another session because there'sso many more questions I have.
Yeah.
Um, but if you could wrap upyour thoughts today into one
message for the listeners, whatwould that be?
SPEAKER_00 (39:22):
Guys, check my story.
I was in dementia.
Everybody got a parent orgrandparent who's gonna go
through that.
It brought me back two yearsago.
Look, look me up.
Go to my I got a uh TikTokchannel, one man with a chamber.
There's days when I, if I go 30days without treatment, I go
backwards.
I can barely talk.
Um I can't remember anything.
I I'm struggling, and and itbrought me out of it.
(39:44):
So that this thing is gonna helpa lot of people.
It's not just head injuries, butalso there's so many untreated
head injuries, what I want tosay.
And so this this place is soimportant, guys.
Um, please just make a donationand share it, share the cause.
SPEAKER_01 (39:59):
Aside from your uh TikTok channel, any other links
you want to share?
And that's the one that I reallyhave show notes too, so we can
put the links up for you.
SPEAKER_00 (40:08):
Well, the TikTok one is my most important one because
like I teach people how to livewith this, and really, even with
my like all because I was acounselor, I was able to kind of
put things in place as I wasgoing.
Like you, a person who has CTEis not gonna benefit from what I
say, it's gonna be the lovedones around them, just like I
told you.
Right.
I was diagnosed by a piece ofpaper, and I said, no, thank
(40:30):
you.
It didn't approve of me.
We can't see it on ourselves.
We only your loved ones aregonna see it on you.
Right, right.
The loved ones that's who'simportant in this in this
mission is the people aroundthem.
I love it.
And we can't survive withoutthem.
Like I wouldn't have made it,you know.
SPEAKER_01 (40:44):
Well, William, like I said, we got so much more to
talk about.
I'm looking forward toscheduling another episode with
you.
I want to really thank you forcoming aboard and sharing your
story.
I know that you're gonna bereaching a lot of people, and
frankly, I want to help.
So um, you know, let's uh let'scall this the beginning of
something that's gonna make adifference.
SPEAKER_00 (41:06):
Well, I appreciate that.
Appreciate that.
I'll come back anytime.
Let me know when.
SPEAKER_01 (41:11):
I love it.
Yeah, this has been anotherepisode of the Healthy Living
Podcast.
I'm your host, Joe Grumbine.
I want to thank all of ourlisteners and supporters that
make the show possible, and wewill see you next time.
Well, hello, and welcome back to the Healthy
Living Podcast.
I'm your host, Joe Grumbine, andtoday we've got a very special
guest.
His name's William Person, andhe's a former nine-year team USA
bobsled athlete whose careerleft him battling the
devastating effects of CTE.
(00:23):
At his lowest point, he couldbarely get up off the floor,
lost in confusion, depression,and deteriorating brain.
Hope came when he discoveredhyperbaric oxygen therapy, which
restored clarity in histhinking, color in his vision,
and purpose in his life.
Today, William's on a mission toraise awareness of brain damage
in sports, the importance ofprotecting and healing the
(00:45):
brain, and he's on a mission toopen a nonprofit CTE recovery
center to help athletes andveterans heal at no cost to
them.
Wow, what a story.
William, welcome to the show.
Oh man, thank you for having me.
SPEAKER_00 (01:01):
I appreciate it.
SPEAKER_01 (01:01):
Yeah.
I uh I've run into a lot ofdifferent guests, and a few
athletes have been here andsharing their stories.
And usually it's uh, you know,somehow involving an injury and
how they've come around it.
Um, I've got a little experiencewith hyperbaric oxygen battling
with cancer, so I know the valuethat um it can bring to healing
(01:25):
anything.
You know, oxygen is uh it's afriend to all healthy cells and
a foe to all sick cells, so it'suh it's a good thing.
So welcome to the show.
And uh why don't you tell us alittle bit about your uh your
journey here?
SPEAKER_00 (01:40):
Well, actually, before we start, what type of uh
cancer you mind, Sarah?
SPEAKER_01 (01:45):
Oh no, not at all.
I I I do many episodes on this.
So about uh a year ago, I wasdiagnosed with squamous cell
carcinoma.
I had a giant tumor sticking outof my neck, and I had a doctor
tell me that, oh, well, you'reso healthy that it's probably
not cancer, which of course Iwanted to hear.
And so, you know, I believe inyou know, your body can heal
(02:08):
itself, and I'm I'm allholistic.
And so I just said, all right,I'll keep going.
And that was the fool's errandbecause uh the cancer was
growing away.
And uh I learned a lot, youknow.
My diet has been an instrumentalpart.
I I do a lot of work with plantmedicine and prayer meditation,
(02:29):
and I've created an amazing umcommunity of people that have
brought all the right pieces tosolve my problem.
And and what I learned is canceris so very unique to people that
it's as unique as you and I areas humans.
Yeah.
And so all these people thatcome up with this, oh,
everything, you know, this willcure everybody's cancer, you
(02:51):
know, maybe there's some truthto it, maybe not.
But the truth is everybody'sgotta find their own answer to
their problem.
Because as you know, with braininjuries, I had a brain injury
when I was 18 and I lost mytaste of sense and smell for 10
years.
And um it it came back.
You know, neuroplasticity is awonderful thing, and and uh my
(03:13):
my my brain healed itself, butyeah, but meanwhile, not
everybody's so fortunate, andthere's lots of tools that can
help everybody, and some toolsare really good for most people,
but you know, my knowledge hasalways been each of us has to
find their way, and um, so I'mhere to help, and so are you.
Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (03:34):
So did did your taste and smell come, excuse me,
did it come back afterhyperbaric oxygen or before
that?
SPEAKER_01 (03:40):
No, the hyperbaric oxygen was part of the therapies
that I do.
So I'm working with a doctorthat integrates Western standard
of care along with holisticsolutions.
So when you deal withchemotherapy or radiation or or
(04:02):
most of the the cancertherapies, they're all oxidative
stress.
And so what happens is thecancer cells don't like oxygen,
they like uh an anaerobicenvironment.
And so when you flood your bodywith oxygen, by whatever means
it rejuvenates the healthycells, feeds the mitochondria,
(04:24):
does all the good things forproviding good energy, and it
attacks the cancer cells withoxygen of stress.
So, in addition, I only reallydid the hyperbaric a couple of
times due to cost.
I I don't have one, and I didn'tit was just too costly for me to
use.
But I use um I make ozonatedglycerin um and I and I consume
(04:47):
that.
I do um food grade peroxide, Iinhale that with a nebulizer.
Oh um, I do sauna sweat lodgetherapy.
I mean, I do a lot of sweatlodge therapy, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (04:59):
Oh, yeah.
That's funny you said that.
Like you actually just told mywhole story inside your story.
SPEAKER_01 (05:06):
Yeah, it's a great story, and to hear it as applied
to different applications ispowerful.
And you know, our listeners arelooking for uh not only answers
of you know things that they'veheard about, you know, it's
always great to hear the one guytell a story, right?
(05:26):
But yeah, when another guy comesin and tells the same story with
a different application, and youand I never met before today.
So the fact that we're bringingour story from a different
background, a different uhapproach, a different target,
and still finding these results.
(05:46):
I think that's the kind of thingthat really brings some power to
the conversation.
SPEAKER_00 (05:51):
Yeah, I found a hypergratic action by accident.
Nice, yeah.
Uh Joe Namath, he put somevideos out, and uh in his in his
videos, he said it reversed hisCTE symptoms.
Yeah, and I was so shocked, I'mlike, you mean all these doctors
who told me who were ignoringme?
You know, nothing's wrong withme.
(06:12):
Right.
And so I didn't first of all, Ididn't think it was gonna work.
You know, everything else Itried and researched.
That was the first thing.
I didn't think it was gonnawork.
So, but when I tried it, I wasin that stupid chamber for one
stinking hour.
Wow.
And when I got out, so myglasses were slightly tinted
because I'm really sensitive tolights, sounds, and smells now.
SPEAKER_01 (06:32):
Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (06:33):
So when I came out of that chamber, I put my
glasses on a few times and uh Itook them off and then put them
back on.
And the salesman was thesalesman asked me, he said,
What's wrong?
I said, I don't know.
I don't think I've been seeingcolors lately, but now
everything's so bright.
I didn't know I wasn't seeingcolors.
I said, Right, I don't think Ineed my glasses.
He said, Oh, you're one ofthose.
(06:55):
And I was like, Oh, he's gonnatry to sell me.
Here we go.
Yeah, but no, he was right.
Some people get that immediaterelief.
Some people need like 60sessions and within like 30
days.
Right, right, right.
And so, but no, man, it clearedme.
Wow.
But I'll be honest, when I gothome that night, everything was
still good.
When I laid down, I fell asleepon the couch at about uh seven
(07:18):
o'clock at night.
I mean, it was about seven.
Okay, and I woke up at nineo'clock with a migraine.
Oh, it was one, I was, and Ithought I started thinking, oh
my god, I did damage.
Right.
I did take double.
Yeah, exactly.
All right, before I say the nextpart, is your uh podcast PG13 or
(07:39):
no?
SPEAKER_01 (07:39):
You're good.
It's a podcast where we're uh wecan go.
I mean, I try not to get crazy,but we'll throw an F bomb out
once in a while if we have to.
SPEAKER_00 (07:47):
No, no, just the symptoms.
Like, for example, when I wokeup with that migraine, I had to
unthinkable, I had an erectionwith it.
Okay, fair enough.
And those are two things thatdon't go together.
Like, yeah, yeah, yeah.
I wouldn't ever put those twothings together.
Yeah, nobody says, Let's go makelove.
I got a migraine, you know.
Like using your hiding in thedark somewhere, like you don't
(08:07):
want the browns you're touchingyou, or you don't want to smell
anybody's just like you know,yeah, yeah, exactly.
So when in that moment when ithappened, I was thinking like, I
was like, man, I did damage.
But I said, wait, these twothings are working at the same
time, right?
Maybe something good ishappening.
SPEAKER_01 (08:24):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
You gotta figure when whenthat's working right, that means
your body has got energy to putto that.
Yeah, and that means things aregood, uh you know, generally
now.
But migraine, on the other hand,can be an indicator of all sorts
of things, it can be a hormoneimbalance.
SPEAKER_00 (08:41):
Oh, I had them things since my first crash.
Yeah, my grands have been withme since my my first woke-up
crash.
Wow.
And uh yeah, they just neverknow when they're gonna show up,
though.
Like they just don't.
They're just like peekaboo, andwhen they get to, you know, it's
you don't sit down and just youknow, try to hide.
But on this particular day whenwhen that kicked in, that was I
(09:02):
woke up, it was I think it wasabout midnight or so.
I went and climbed into bed.
I woke up in the morning.
That that concussion, I mean,I'm sorry, the that migraine was
subsided, it was subsiding,going down.
Okay, but the erection was stillthere.
Oh, right.
Yeah, that was like 11 hours,man.
I was like, whoa, that's that'scrazy.
(09:22):
My cloudiness was gone for sixdays after that.
Wow, yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (09:26):
And I said, okay, was this just a you know, maybe
I just wanted this to workbecause then nothing else like
this is a you doubted it tobegin with, so it's not like a
placebo effect where you'relike, Yeah, I know this is gonna
happen.
You were like, I don't know ifit's gonna happen or not.
SPEAKER_00 (09:40):
Yeah, so they allowed me to come back the
following week.
Uh I went toward the end of theweek, it was starting to wear
off.
I could start feeling thatlittle sensations I had.
And then this time I came out ofthat one-hour chamber, yeah, it
was clear for nine days.
Like the cloudiness was gone.
Uh man, it was just like I wasjust looking at this world, like
(10:01):
it felt like everything was sovivid.
Wow.
And uh, for the first time in ain years, I realized I hadn't
seen the beauty in anything in along time.
SPEAKER_01 (10:10):
You know what's wild is I know people that have
overcome addictions and opiateaddictions will do a similar
thing where over time, like youdon't realize it, but you're not
seeing colors anymore.
And it doesn't happenimmediately, just sort of
another layer, another layer, alittle faded, faded.
(10:30):
And then when they get off ofit, all of a sudden, like
similar to like what you'resaying, it's like, whoa,
everything's all vibrant again.
I I didn't realize I didn't seethis.
SPEAKER_00 (10:40):
Yeah, and you know, and like for me, like the for
me, like my first bobsnake crashwas in 2002.
Okay, it was about a month.
We were racing a World Cup inSwitzerland right before the uh
2002 Salt Lake City games,Olympic games came out.
Like I had a really bad crash.
Um, like I had vertical for likea week.
Uh oh, vertigo is brutal.
(11:01):
Oh my, I still get it.
It shows up with the migraines,you never know which one's gonna
show up.
But yeah, but right now, it's assoon as if I use that chamber
enough, like uh it's rare now.
It's not all the time, but okay,it's like before I had just
every day was miserable.
SPEAKER_01 (11:16):
But but you're talking about like when you're
what you're talking about, likenow, even any reduction in
symptoms is unheard of withthese injuries, you know,
football injuries, all these,you know, any any sports
injuries where your head getsrepeatedly wrecked, there's
(11:36):
nothing, they don't haveanything they can do for it.
No, and they'll they'll tell youthat, you know, and so for you
even finding you know sometemporary relief would be
miraculous, but you're talkingabout maintaining this.
SPEAKER_00 (11:50):
Well, I was a little jealous, I'll be honest, because
um Joe Nangles had reversed hissymptoms, he didn't have any
more left.
Yeah, yeah.
I started doing research, and alot of people saying that, yeah.
And so for me, one time it gotto the point the doctors don't
say it.
No, because you know what,that's part of the problem.
Because um, um put this way Irace for nine years.
(12:12):
Okay.
So think about between one andsix trips down that track every
day.
It's like four or five days aweek.
Uh-huh.
Sometime it was two, butsometimes it was six.
You just never, you know.
Right.
Um, and I did that four or fivemonths of the year for nine
years.
Okay.
So that's literally a hundred.
So every time we went down thattrack, now that I understand
what the sport is, you getrattled around like crazy.
(12:35):
Yeah, you're getting the microconcussions on.
Right.
If you don't crash, you'regetting the micro concussions.
SPEAKER_01 (12:40):
Just like riding a dirt bike all the time over
whipped deducers getting beattogether.
SPEAKER_00 (12:43):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Absolutely.
So that damage was being done,and I'm I'm probably the best
case scenario.
I feel like if I had hundredsand hundreds of those micro
concussions, and I had sevenbobs that like just crashes,
like you know, roll it.
And uh, if I can come back, man,everybody has a good shot at
(13:04):
that.
SPEAKER_01 (13:05):
I couldn't agree more.
That's fantastic.
So you did you ended up uhpurchasing a hyperbaric chamber?
SPEAKER_00 (13:14):
Yeah, yeah, I did.
I have one in the back.
That's awesome.
Yeah, that's awesome.
SPEAKER_01 (13:19):
I I I I was close about several years ago.
Um, I was doing pretty well, andI was looking at setting up kind
of I have a uh garden therapycenter here.
We have a uh nonprofit calledGardens of Hope.
And I've got a two and a halfacre botanical garden, and we do
what we call therapeutichorticulture.
(13:40):
So people come out here andwhatever the modality of healing
is, they come and do it in thenature.
And yeah, the goal was to, inaddition to the sauna, the sweat
lodge, and all the other thingswe're doing, um have a
hyperbaric chamber.
And I got this close to buyingone one time, and then things
went sideways on me, and I neverdid it.
(14:02):
But we're gonna have to fixthat.
We're gonna have to fix that.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
It's still it's still in my inmy target.
Once I get to the other side ofthis, which I'm close to, um,
I'm gonna get back tore-rebuilding that whole healing
center again.
SPEAKER_00 (14:16):
Well, for me, like uh when I bought, um, like I was
so afraid of the technology thatI made sure I bought from a
place that had a storefront.
Okay.
Because I was so afraid, likeyou do the homework on it.
Like, first of all, do thehomework on CTE.
It's brutal.
Like those guys are murderingpeople or killing themselves,
like kids.
And they all say the same thing.
(14:36):
They were so such nice, sweet,gentle beings until they
weren't.
Yeah.
Or they weren't acting in theirthey weren't acting the same.
They were acting out ofcharacters with XL.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (14:48):
There's story after story.
Yeah.
It's not just from sportsinjuries, it's from any any
traumatic head injury.
SPEAKER_00 (14:55):
Absolutely.
And that's what I found on myjourney.
Like, there was, like, I met ayoung lady, uh, well, she was
probably in her 40s, and uh, shewas about to go to the doctor,
she was telling me about allthese symptoms she had.
I was like, wow, I said, Wereyou an athlete?
Because you line up with what myteammates and myself were going
through.
She's like, No, I'm no sports.
(15:16):
I said, and I asked her, I said,Well, this is a little personal,
but did you uh I know you'redivorced, like it did your
husband ever hit you, or she'slike, no.
And then she's like, I never hitmy head.
And then and then eventually shesaid, Except one time I went
snowboarding, I fell backwardswith my son, and I was and my
arms locked up like this.
(15:36):
Aha.
The reason why your doctorscan't figure out what this is is
probably is probably from folks'concussion.
You didn't get it treatedbecause back then they didn't
treat any of us.
Right.
You know, my first World Cupcrash was brutal.
Like my my my buddy was knockedunconscious.
Wow.
He was my roommate, and so wewent back, they sent us back to
(15:56):
the hotel.
I hit vertigo, and he has, youknow, he's unconscious.
Right.
They told us to go back and makesure you watch each other so you
don't go to sleep.
Which one was supposed to watchwho, you know.
Right, right, exactly.
I couldn't sit up without theroom spinning.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And I tell people on that day,it's it's another funny story.
(16:17):
Um, uh, you know who PrinceAlbert of Monaco is?
Sure.
Okay, he's the right draftbobsleds from Monaco.
Okay.
So right after my crash, he wasstanding there.
He was with uh the old tennis,older tennis player, what was uh
Anna Konakova.
Okay, and uh race bar driverMichael Schumacher was there.
All right, so I crashed, I'msitting with the paramedics.
(16:39):
Only time I've ever hadparamedics helped me.
Okay, and uh Prince Albert walksby and he winks at me, right?
So I'm cloudy, I'm not thinkingstraight.
And I and I live in LA, so Ihave a ton of gay friends.
I even have a gay cousin.
I actually just passed a fewweeks ago, but you know, I'm
always around gay people, it'snot a big deal.
(16:59):
Yeah, yeah.
But so when he winked at me, I'mnot thinking clearly.
So I'm thinking, oh my god,Prince Albert's in love with me.
And like I stopped isolatingwith him.
I said, I better not isolatewith him anymore.
I don't want to leave them on oranything like that.
Right, right.
But and it took me like it'sonly been about a year that I
realized thinking, thinkingback, like that guy wasn't in
love with me.
(17:19):
I just crashed.
I was trying, he just winked atme because in Europe they wink,
they don't, you know.
Right, right, right.
Yeah, it's a whole differentthing.
Yeah.
But when that brain is notthinking straight, it's like,
yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (17:31):
That's wild, but what a what an experience.
That's that's that's completelyuh you got a wealth of
experience there.
That's unbelievable.
So now you've got thishyperbaric chamber.
I mean, you you went from youwent you went hang on hang on
one second.
(18:02):
Sorry about that.
Anyway, um you've got all theseexperiences of of injury and
then and symptoms, and andyou're you're starting to
understand, you know, this isthis is a thing, you know, what
when when did it go from you'regoing through these traumas and
(18:27):
experiencing these symptoms towhoa, I've got a thing, like I
gotta deal with this.
SPEAKER_00 (18:34):
Well, um, I will say around 2012 I started 2012,
maybe a little bit before 2012 Istarted seeing doctors.
Okay.
But I thought it was diabetesbecause I had this thing where I
couldn't get out of bed in themorning.
Wow.
Um, I never drank coffee before,and I never drank Coca-Cola, I
(18:56):
didn't drink soda.
Okay, so I began to live off ofthat.
So every night, yeah, everynight before bed, I would put it
on my nightstand.
If I didn't have it there in themorning, I'm I'm not getting out
of that bed until probably threeo'clock the next day.
SPEAKER_01 (19:08):
Wow.
Now, as an athlete, you probablyhad a pretty good diet, and
we're living healthy as anythingbefore that.
SPEAKER_00 (19:16):
Yeah, and that that's what it didn't make sense
to me that we'll be disease.
But I've seen people with lowblood sugar before, and uh it
looked just like it.
That's the one thing about thehead injuries.
What I've learned, like um, alot of times there's so so many
misdiagnoses I've I've beenwatching.
SPEAKER_01 (19:32):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (19:32):
Uh what it really is, is the head injuries that
they never treated.
It's the only injury you canever have where they say, don't
do anything.
SPEAKER_01 (19:41):
You know, your body can generate any symptom, you
know, your brain is the controlcenter, so it's telling
everything what to do.
Yeah.
And so it can stimulate any kindof reaction that it sees fit.
I don't know why it would do it,but when it things are
misfiring, you know, it's anobvious, um, it's an obvious
(20:02):
thing that could happen.
You know, you can get hives, youcan get uh uh go hypoglycemic,
you hell, you could get astroke.
You I mean it with your buttonsdrink and boom.
I mean, it's the control center.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (20:15):
Well, what no, I guess the biggest thing that
catalysts that really kickedthis off uh for me, when I
started to understand more, uh,one of my teammates, uh, when I
moved, when I left TSA, I moveduh back to uh Los Angeles.
Before that, I was doing likefootball movies like Jerry
Maguire, Any Given Sunday kindof stuff.
Okay, but they put a I was afast guy, so they put this
(20:35):
uniform on me and I make Cubalook like he's a real football
stuff like that.
But it was just me running realfast, that's what it was.
And American people bought itand he got an Oscar behind it.
Nice so well, yeah, that's whatI was doing, and um, but like,
oh my gosh, I just glitched.
Like, I had that thing where I'mtalking in and I forgot we what
your question was.
And I just and uh yeah, I'msorry, Kate.
(20:58):
Do you remember what yourquestion was?
SPEAKER_01 (20:59):
No, I was just saying, where did you when did
you go from I've got all thesesymptoms to I've got all these
symptoms?
Oh, I remember same stuff everyday.
It's all right.
My chemo brain does the samething to me.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (21:10):
Between the two of us, we'll keep this thing
rolling.
Yeah, and so what it wants.
So I was doing I was doingHollywood before I was with Team
USA.
So when I finished, I moved toLA, I wanted to become a writer,
write more.
So I was doing that, and one ofmy teammates called me.
He he wanted to be a writer, sohe gave me, he would give me
these ideas and I would tell himhow to tweak it and make a good
movie out of it, right?
(21:32):
Uh-huh.
And uh, I'm just now connectingthese dots recently.
So, what I thought was creativewriting wasn't his mind was
slipping.
Oh.
So the very last time he calledme, he was speaking some
gibberish or some weirdlanguage.
I don't know what he wasspeaking.
Wow.
And uh, I couldn't, of course, Icouldn't understand it.
(21:53):
And um like eventually he got sofrustrated, he hung up the
phone.
Wow.
Now, my background is when Ijoined Team USA, I had just
written the first everindependent living transitional
housing program for youth.
Okay.
So it was new, and so the stateopened me as a pilot program.
I was a pilot, and so mentalhealth was my background.
My first job after college, myfirst job was uh I worked at
(22:16):
this place, uh San JoaquinCounty Mental Health.
It's the first mental healthfacility west of the Mississippi
River.
So everybody flocked there forthe mental health issues.
So I saw it from depression toschizophrenic, bipolar.
We had the Kremlin insane comethrough from evaluation
sometime, and even those peoplewho were still floating around
who had been lobotomized werestill so I saw it all.
(22:38):
So mental health is mybackground.
Okay.
So when he called me speakingthat gibberish, I knew he needed
help.
And I was like, Yeah, yeah.
I gotta help you, I gotta helphim, I gotta help him.
Every day I said that to myself,and then eventually uh I get a
phone call, and uh probably wentto his family's factory and he
hung himself.
Oh no, yeah, man, I I felt soresponsible and guilty, and um,
(23:03):
you know, and like I felt like Ididn't do anything that I should
have done.
Uh and then, but when hisautopsy came out, like he was in
stage four CTE.
Oh wow.
Yeah, and when I was told he hadthe worst brain that anybody's
ever seen, worst, so no footballplayer brain could compare is
what I was told.
And uh so I really I finallykind of started to forgive
(23:24):
myself because I knew that'snothing I could have done to put
a help for him.
Yeah, yeah.
But the big thing was duringthat time when I was calling
myself helping him, I neededhelp.
Right.
My bed was literally in myliving room on the floor, wow
mattress, and uh I was uh put itthere because it was the middle
(23:44):
distance between the bathroomand the kitchen.
Okay.
That's how I had to live for awhile.
And I don't know what I did allday.
Like a TV wasn't on, radiowasn't on.
I don't know what I did in thehouse all day.
Like there's some there's someblack spots in there somewhere.
SPEAKER_01 (23:59):
Yeah, yeah, I bet.
SPEAKER_00 (24:00):
Yeah, and uh so when his autopsy came out, I kind of
started connecting them dots.
There's a few other things thathappened.
Okay, and I was able to like, ohmy god, now this thing has a
name.
And as I start checking it withmy older teammates, it's all the
same crap, man.
SPEAKER_01 (24:17):
Yeah, yeah.
It's probably prevalent in, youknow.
You don't, you know, it's sofunny when you when at first
when I saw your bio and I seebobsledding, like I never
equated bobsledding with injury.
Like, you know, I you watch iton TV and they're going down
this thing, it looks prettycool, and but I've never done
(24:39):
it.
And you know, it's just likeskiing or um or or snowboarding,
you're bouncing and slappingaround all the time.
And uh, but but in the bobsled,it's even more because you're
inside of a vehicle that's justracking back and forth, and it's
it's uh it's crazy.
Or you're laying on a on a sled,I guess.
(25:00):
It's not really a vehicle, it'smore of a glass of milk.
Of a trajector of a of a uh of aI don't know, uh a projectile.
SPEAKER_00 (25:10):
Yeah, and that that happens sometime, believe it or
not.
SPEAKER_01 (25:13):
Yeah, right off the track.
Yeah.
Wow, wow, that's wild, wild.
So I know I'm getting a littlelight on time, but I can stretch
this a little longer.
This is a great conversation.
I don't want to nip it.
Um, but I also want to get to aplace where you've you've gone,
you've gotten your diagnosis,you now realize that you've got
(25:36):
a problem that needs to besolved.
So let's take us from thispoint.
Now you're you're in this place,you're you got your bed between
the bathroom and the kitchen,you're you're realizing that
more and more people have thisproblem.
You realize you've got thisproblem.
What's that next move?
SPEAKER_00 (25:55):
Honestly, I was praying for death.
Wow.
Because I was a counselor, I sawthe devastation that that did to
other families, and I couldn'ttake my own life.
So I was I was bargaining withGod every night.
Please.
Not another day.
Not an you don't know, no,please, not another day.
Wow.
Uh yeah, I did that until Icouldn't anymore.
(26:16):
He wasn't listening.
Yeah, he wasn't listening to me,man.
Like that's not a good one.
Yeah, and uh what happened withthe the biggest kick was um my
girlfriend, uh, she lived, shewe had a place in LA.
Okay, and I had just bought a uha place in the Midwest in St.
Louis, uh a lake house, a littlesmall lake house.
And uh and I bought that placebecause I was getting lost in my
(26:37):
own neighborhood in inCalifornia, and I was I was
afraid for myself.
I knew it was a matter of timebefore the switch goes all the
way off.
Right.
And I hadn't found hyperbreakoxygenia at the time.
And so my girlfriend, she's athey have a loving family, like
she's on the phone with her mom,and they're from New York, and
they talk loud.
Oh, yeah.
And that noise was killing me.
It was killing me.
(26:58):
So I told her we might have tobreak up.
Um I'm going back to the LakeHouse, I need a little peace,
but we we need to think aboutwhat we're doing.
So I was there, I found anarticle, came out called
Fledhead, written by the NewYork Times, uh, Matthew
Ferderman.
He wrote that article, and itreally diagnosed all my
teammates of what all they wentthrough, all the symptoms.
But I literally read thatarticle and I got on my knees
(27:20):
and I thank God all the symptomsmissed me.
Wow.
Sent that article to mygirlfriend, she circled some
stuff.
SPEAKER_01 (27:26):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (27:27):
And the first thing I saw was noise sensitivity.
Right, right.
And I went, oh, it was the veryreason I was over there in the
first place.
Right.
And I went down that list and Isaid, Oh my God.
I checked everything exceptParkinson's.
Wow.
Then this thing really had aname.
And then I that's when I startedtrying to, you know, I found a
class action to get medical andto get everybody some help.
(27:52):
Uh, but also the number onereason was is they want to keep
doing business as usual.
But I'm like, you have to want anew generation.
SPEAKER_01 (27:59):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (28:00):
That's the one thing I've told the judge is
non-negotiable.
Yeah.
I'll fold on anything else, I'llweaken.
But I'm not folding on that one.
SPEAKER_01 (28:09):
Yeah.
Yeah.
No, that's huge.
I mean, you know, so many timeswe're driven by information we
receive, but people aren'tcritical of that information and
they're not really vetting thesources.
And when the source ofinformation is somebody that
wants you to do the thing, well,they're likely to highlight the
good stuff and and ignore someof the bad.
(28:32):
And it's important, you know.
I part of me is like, well, youknow, buyer beware, but at the
same point, you got children,you got youngsters going into
high school, college that arethat are, you know, building a
dream based on something thatthey believe is true, and they
(28:52):
don't have any idea about theinherent danger of it.
And and and maybe there's maybethere are some answers to as far
as preventative goes, with youknow, safety equipment or better
built tracks or sleds, or Idon't know.
SPEAKER_00 (29:08):
I mean, I don't have the answer, but they'd have to
change the whole sport, change,take the turns out.
It's those turns.
Because, like, there's anotherpart of that puzzle, like uh,
there's only one other source ofgetting the same G forces that
we pull, it's the fighterproducts who do the F-15s,
right?
Which doing this and they'redoing the bank turns.
Yeah, but they're not doing itas often as you guys are.
Yeah, and supposedly we'repulling only five G's and
(29:31):
they're pulling like nine orfifteen or somewhere in there.
Yeah.
Uh so one time they came out, wetook them on the VIP ride.
Okay.
I did six rides that day.
I took them down once, and whenthey got to the end, they were
rattled.
Wow.
It made sense to me.
Yeah.
However, an article just cameout uh by the once again New
York Times last December.
They have the exact samesymptoms and issues as the Bob's
(29:54):
letters.
SPEAKER_01 (29:55):
Wow.
SPEAKER_00 (29:56):
So, but if you go for look for that article right
now, all the links, not of Workanymore.
They scrubbed it.
However, if you ever want to seeit, I got I got a link that
works directly.
Yeah, yeah.
Oh no, I'm interested in this,yeah, for sure.
Yeah, so they have the samesymptoms.
And uh, matter of fact, they didan episode of us on us on HBO
Real Sports when we first filedthe case.
And but if you go look for thatepisode, it's also been
(30:18):
scrubbed.
You can find every episodearchived, but you won't find
that one.
Well they're doing a really goodjob of really trying to uh I
don't know who it is.
I I don't want to slanderanybody.
SPEAKER_01 (30:28):
Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (30:29):
Uh but they're doing a good job of trying to sweep
this under the carpet.
But it's it's not just theAmericans, it's the Canadians,
uh or some of the Jamaicans thatspawn on in Europe.
Uh, it was an Australian guyjust jacked from an aneurysm.
So every time I get a migraine,like that's the one thing out is
on my heart out there, oh, it'snot an aneurysm because it's
such it's so extreme, you know.
SPEAKER_01 (30:48):
Oh yeah.
And uh yeah.
So what happened with thelawsuit?
SPEAKER_00 (30:53):
Well, I have receipts for everything that I
tell you.
Okay.
My lawyers have teamed up withthe lawyers from the Olympic
team.
Oh no.
There is an offer on the table.
I've been fighting sinceJanuary.
I'm the lead plaintiff, so I'msupposedly the only person who
can accept or reject the offer,right?
Okay.
So they presented the offer.
They will only evaluate athletesonly.
(31:15):
No treatment, no money to findyour own treatment.
Wow.
That's what's on the table.
My lawyers thought it was a goodidea to send it through to the
judge against my approval.
I showed up and I've beenrepresenting the class myself
personally.
So now it's literally the lastthree quarterings, it's me
versus this high-powered lawfirm and my lawyers.
Wow.
(31:35):
And so that's what I'm upagainst right now.
Wow.
Yeah, and I I matter of fact,uh, they're trying to make me
think that I'm crazy.
They said that this case wasalways only about medical
monitoring.
Wow.
The last quartering, I producedthe email they sent me.
It said medical monitoring andcare for life.
I said there's no care at all inthis thing that they're
(31:57):
presenting.
Yeah.
So so far, I've wanted I askedfor in the last three quarters,
I prevailed so far.
They haven't been able to closethis case on us.
Okay.
But the truth is I need lawyersto take over.
All right.
We had Robert, Robert Shapiro.
I got another one for you beforewe go.
Robert Shapiro, I spoke to him,right?
(32:17):
No way.
Dream Team.
Dream Team lawyer.
Wow.
And so I shared information withhim.
He said, I'll do aninvestigation.
I'll see if I can help you.
We made a few call phone callsto him.
We emailed back and forth.
He sends me an email.
He says, Will, I fired your leadlawyer.
I kept the counsel because Iknow them.
(32:38):
And we're gonna get you guys thehelp you need.
And I'm thinking, yes, finally.
Um, 24 hours later, he sends meanother email.
Will, can't help you?
What?
Unless the judge sides with youand does not accept this offer.
But he was moonwalking so quick,somebody got to him.
SPEAKER_01 (32:54):
I don't know who you got some heavy-handed somebody
in the background there, man.
That's where well, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (33:02):
I've been warned.
I've been, trust me, my life hasplayed out like the movie
concussion that's happened.
But they messed up.
I was dying when I filed thiscase, so I didn't care.
Like, right, what are you gonnado to me?
Kill me quicker?
Thank you.
SPEAKER_01 (33:14):
We we we got a lot in common.
I fought a battle with thegovernment, I don't have time to
get into it either, but it wasover medical cannabis and and
you know, me providing medicinefor people, and I stood my
ground just like you, and Iprevailed in the end, but you
know, they it was a differentthing because they they were
going after me instead of megoing after them.
But yeah, uh, you know, it youyou when you when you feel
(33:38):
righteous about something andyou know you can make a
difference, you do what yougotta do.
I I I wish I had a lawyer Icould hand you, I'd I'd I'd uh
send them off, but I'll put itin my mind, that's for sure.
Yeah, yeah.
Let's sort of fast forward toyou've discovered this
hyperbaric oxygen is uh is amiracle.
(34:02):
And now you've decided you wantto set up a uh a nonprofit, you
want to make this available.
Obviously, if you prevail inthis court case, that's gonna
open up all kinds of resources.
But until that time, you'reyou're still moving forward.
SPEAKER_00 (34:18):
Well, the thing with the lawsuit, I I never asked for
money for myself, so I won't getanything more than anyone else
will get.
Like that's you know right.
So, like when I first filed acase, I told my lawyers the same
thing.
I said, take care of my guys andwarn the new generation.
Because I really thought I'd bedead the next.
I I thought I had less than ayear left.
I didn't think I'd be here atthe end of this case.
(34:39):
Wow.
So any money that comes, it'llbe the I'll get the same
everybody else.
There might be a lead plaintifffee or something like that, but
I didn't request anything formyself because I I I was dying,
man.
SPEAKER_01 (34:50):
Right, right.
You're just trying to make adifference.
SPEAKER_00 (34:53):
Yeah, and so when um it's kind of like you get to
that point where um like thethreats and stuff was coming.
Like the uh people were tellingme this these people watching
you, they don't want thisinformation coming out.
Wow.
I got the emails that justshowed me, like he said this is
quotation, like this is not safematerial in quotations.
(35:13):
Wow.
And uh, but you know, I I acceptthe challenge.
I'm like, you know, yeah, yeah.
I was like, they well, theywell, they're gonna take me out.
Like, guess what?
I'm ready to go anyway.
Like, I can't keep living likethis.
But once that chamber showed up,it was night and day.
Wow, yeah.
Night and day.
SPEAKER_01 (35:32):
Well, that I I this is layers, you know.
We we we should probably have asecond conversation and and go
deeper into some of this stuff.
I I don't feel like we're gonnabe able to get everything I want
to get through in one episode.
And you know how people justdon't have a attention span for
(35:53):
the show.
But I definitely want to sort offast forward to your nonprofit
and the work that you're wantingto do.
And I most definitely want tohave you come back on and do a
second session here becausewe're we're really I had no idea
there was so many layers tothis, and uh I I I I'm I'm
(36:14):
riveted.
I I want to I want to hear moreand and I want to help.
So that's that's the idea.
SPEAKER_00 (36:19):
I appreciate it.
Yeah, absolutely.
Um like with a nonprofit, I justwant to offer to people the same
thing that I received for free.
I know I know the the loophole,like for example, once I once I
did it, it was free.
Now I needed this chamber and Icouldn't afford it.
As you hit it on earlier in yourlife, you said they were too
expensive.
Yeah.
And so I I don't want to chargefor this this service because
(36:41):
people won't be able to affordit.
It's too expensive, right?
Right.
You know, so I just want tooffer it for free.
So when my crowdfunding is setup only to get the uh equipment,
I'm gonna relocate back to theMidwest.
Okay.
But over there, I can for what Ican buy a building for, right?
That'll be just be like 10months of rent in LA.
Oh, I get it.
I I get it 100%.
This is something I want to bearound one of my days when I
(37:03):
leave this earth.
I want it to still be up andrunning.
So nice, nice.
SPEAKER_01 (37:06):
Yeah.
Well, I love it.
And uh, you know, I I I've beenrunning a nonprofit.
Well, I ran one for about 15years, and I've got about three
years into this other one, andI'm learning, learning about
fundraising and grants and allsorts of different partnerships
and things.
So yeah, um, I I there are a lotof tools that are at your
(37:28):
fingertips, but it's just likeeverything else.
There's a whole layers of of ofplaybook to learn and and get it
figured out.
But you've got you've gotexposure, you've got a
background that gets people'sattention more than mine.
And I'll bet you you'll be ableto partner up with a company or
or uh some different groupsthat'll help make this thing
(37:50):
happen quicker.
SPEAKER_00 (37:51):
As long as I can offer for free.
That's the number one.
Yeah, that's the be free.
Yeah.
Like I I put out a um, I knowyou got to go, but I put out a
video.
We had those mass shooting in uhNew York.
unknown (38:04):
Okay.
SPEAKER_00 (38:06):
I put out a video that day, and I said, guys, this
is the population is dangerous.
We know about them, but there'sanother population that we have
to help us, which is oursoldiers.
They come back with the samecondition and they're now the
best killers in the world.
And if we don't address that, weknow I said that on the
courthouse steps after after Imade the video.
Yeah, and the next week was themilitary mass shooting in
(38:26):
Minnesota, I believe.
No, Idaho, then there wasanother one.
Yeah, yeah.
I in my video, I said there'sgonna be a wave of them coming.
Right.
Starting the following week.
Like, yeah, yeah.
I probably gotta have anythingwith it.
SPEAKER_01 (38:38):
Yeah, my nonprofit, I offer all my services for free
to veterans, and that's it's thesame sort of idea.
Yeah, it's it's yeah, these guyshave put themselves in a place
that's got them all messed upand nobody really seems to help.
So I'm just like, well, you cancome out to the garden and just
hang out for a while, or youcan, you know, receive anything
(38:59):
that we offer free of charge.
And that's just one of thethings I love that.
SPEAKER_00 (39:03):
That's the same thing I want to do, man.
We we align very close.
SPEAKER_01 (39:06):
I love it, I love it.
Well, listen, uh William, I Imost definitely want to schedule
another session because there'sso many more questions I have.
Yeah.
Um, but if you could wrap upyour thoughts today into one
message for the listeners, whatwould that be?
SPEAKER_00 (39:22):
Guys, check my story.
I was in dementia.
Everybody got a parent orgrandparent who's gonna go
through that.
It brought me back two yearsago.
Look, look me up.
Go to my I got a uh TikTokchannel, one man with a chamber.
There's days when I, if I go 30days without treatment, I go
backwards.
I can barely talk.
Um I can't remember anything.
I I'm struggling, and and itbrought me out of it.
(39:44):
So that this thing is gonna helpa lot of people.
It's not just head injuries, butalso there's so many untreated
head injuries, what I want tosay.
And so this this place is soimportant, guys.
Um, please just make a donationand share it, share the cause.
SPEAKER_01 (39:59):
Aside from your uh TikTok channel, any other links
you want to share?
And that's the one that I reallyhave show notes too, so we can
put the links up for you.
SPEAKER_00 (40:08):
Well, the TikTok one is my most important one because
like I teach people how to livewith this, and really, even with
my like all because I was acounselor, I was able to kind of
put things in place as I wasgoing.
Like you, a person who has CTEis not gonna benefit from what I
say, it's gonna be the lovedones around them, just like I
told you.
Right.
I was diagnosed by a piece ofpaper, and I said, no, thank
(40:30):
you.
It didn't approve of me.
We can't see it on ourselves.
We only your loved ones aregonna see it on you.
Right, right.
The loved ones that's who'simportant in this in this
mission is the people aroundthem.
I love it.
And we can't survive withoutthem.
Like I wouldn't have made it,you know.
SPEAKER_01 (40:44):
Well, William, like I said, we got so much more to
talk about.
I'm looking forward toscheduling another episode with
you.
I want to really thank you forcoming aboard and sharing your
story.
I know that you're gonna bereaching a lot of people, and
frankly, I want to help.
So um, you know, let's uh let'scall this the beginning of
something that's gonna make adifference.
SPEAKER_00 (41:06):
Well, I appreciate that.
Appreciate that.
I'll come back anytime.
Let me know when.
SPEAKER_01 (41:11):
I love it.
Yeah, this has been anotherepisode of the Healthy Living
Podcast.
I'm your host, Joe Grumbine.
I want to thank all of ourlisteners and supporters that
make the show possible, and wewill see you next time.
Popular Podcasts
My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark
My Favorite Murder is a true crime comedy podcast hosted by Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark. Each week, Karen and Georgia share compelling true crimes and hometown stories from friends and listeners. Since MFM launched in January of 2016, Karen and Georgia have shared their lifelong interest in true crime and have covered stories of infamous serial killers like the Night Stalker, mysterious cold cases, captivating cults, incredible survivor stories and important events from history like the Tulsa race massacre of 1921. My Favorite Murder is part of the Exactly Right podcast network that provides a platform for bold, creative voices to bring to life provocative, entertaining and relatable stories for audiences everywhere. The Exactly Right roster of podcasts covers a variety of topics including historic true crime, comedic interviews and news, science, pop culture and more. Podcasts on the network include Buried Bones with Kate Winkler Dawson and Paul Holes, That's Messed Up: An SVU Podcast, This Podcast Will Kill You, Bananas and more.
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com