May 29, 2025 • 52 mins
In this powerful 200th episode, Mike and Angie pull back the curtain and offer an unfiltered look into their shared journey—from childhood trauma and toxic beginnings to deep healing, transformation, and the co-creation of a purpose-filled life. It’s a raw, real, and riveting account of pain, persistence, partnership, and personal power. Angie steps fully into the light, sharing her story of unimaginable suffering and how she transmuted it into strength, wisdom, and devotion. This episode is a soul-stirring reminder that rock bottom can become sacred ground—and that rebuilding isn’t only possible, it’s divine.
Key Takeaways
- Your Past Doesn’t Define Your Future
Even the most painful, chaotic, and traumatic beginnings can lead to a life of beauty, depth, and divine purpose. - Real Healing Requires Radical Responsibility
The turning point came when victimhood was traded for ownership—when blame gave way to transformation. - You Can Rebuild Anything—Even a Marriage
After filing for divorce, the space was created to heal, recommit, and build a new relationship rooted in truth. - Speaking Your Desires Activates the Universe
When Angie voiced what she truly wanted—a better life, stability, purpose—the opportunities unfolded like magic. - Purpose Is Born Through Pain
Angie’s journey from pills and psych wards to real estate success and spiritual empowerment proves nothing is wasted.
Notable Quotes
- “I just knew that I always wanted better. I always knew that I wasn’t… that I was different.”
- “When you're addicted to chaos, peace feels like boredom.”
- “All an argument is, is two people fighting to see who’s the bigger victim.”
- “There’s no way we’d be sitting here seven years later with you still holding that space.”
- “It’s no longer Angie versus Mike. It’s Mike and Angie versus the problem.”
Music Credit: "What's Left of Me" by Wes Hoffman & Friends
Join the Movement
This episode is an invitation to rise—into your alignment, authenticity, and spiritual power. If you’ve ever felt like something inside of you is trying to break free, this is your sign to let it out.
Want to Go Deeper?
Visit www.innerwealthglobal.com and explore tools, programs, and offerings that guide you back to your aligned life. It’s time to live from the inside out.
My Social Media:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mikekitko
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mike_kitko
Tiktok: https://www.tiktok.com/@mikekitko
Subscribe to my YouTube: / @mikekitko
Mike Kitko is an executive self-mastery coach, speaker and author. He found external success through powerful titles, incomes, and material possessions. He ultimately fell into depression, toxic abuse of alcohol, and the near collapse of his family before he began a journey of internal happiness and success.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Do you ever wake up feeling like there's something
missing in your life?
Do you ever feel the need toescape your business?
Are you running your life or isyour life running you?
I'm Mike Kitko and I'll helpyou design and create a life so
authentic and aligned with whoyou really are that you'll get
excited just to wake up.
I'll help you create realwealth, success and freedom from
the inside out.
(00:23):
Welcome to the Inner WealthPodcast, where we learn and
choose to live inspired each andevery day.
All right, these are some of myfavorite episodes.
This will be the fourth timethat we've done a podcast
(00:43):
episode together.
The first was at the Waterbury,second was Turks, third was
Outer Banks.
And here we are.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
Oh yeah, I guess we did the 100th episode up at
Waterbury.
Speaker 1 (00:56):
We did, we did and we kind of had this planned a
while ago that we were gettingclose to the 200th episode and
we were going to jam togetherand we started putting ideas
together of having it in adifferent podcast, a more
professional.
I guess this is our basementstudio we were going to put in.
But you know, we just wanted toget on here and jam and just
(01:17):
have some fun.
But welcome my beautiful bride.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
That's me.
Speaker 1 (01:23):
That's her, Angie Kitko.
Today is our 200th episode 200.
200.
That's a lot.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
That's a lot of talking.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
Every single week since August of 2023, I believe.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
No longer than that.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
Longer than that.
Speaker 2 (01:42):
Holy cow 2022,.
I believe.
Speaker 1 (01:44):
Yeah, because there's 200 episodes one week, 50.
That's four years, holy crap.
That's a lot of podcasting andit is a lot of talking, and I
don't have a lot of interviews,because I only have interviews
with people that I really,really want to sit across and
talk with about their life, andmy wife I can't get enough
talking about her life.
So here we are again.
(02:04):
Are you happy to be here?
I am why?
Speaker 2 (02:08):
Because it's nice to hear somebody else.
I'm sure it's nice to heareverybody else's voice once in a
while Today, no, I enjoy doingthis with you.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
They're a lot of fun they are, and I've got on my
desktop and at some point we'regoing to rebrand this and it's
going to be the inner wealthpodcast with Mike Kitko and
sometimes Angie.
We're going to do that.
I just I haven't rebranded thatyet but we will, because and
then we'll make it and sometimesAngie will make it more about
us instead of just me andjamming, because I have a lot of
(02:38):
fun just collaborating with mybride, my spouse, to celebrate.
I had a couple ideas about howwe were going to celebrate our
200th episode and you know itwas going to be about talking
about the.
You know, every week, mecreating content and you sitting
there listening to whatever,and I was like that'd be boring.
(02:59):
What we've never done before isI've never interviewed you
solely to have you tell yourstory and help people understand
who you are at a deeper level,because your story is
fascinating and you are sofreaking strong, you are so
powerful, you are so brave, youare so committed and I want to
(03:23):
help everybody understand howthat all came to be and where we
came from.
Okay, okay.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
I have no idea what he's doing.
By the way, I got a brief.
Speaker 1 (03:34):
All she needs to do is answer the questions, and I'm
going to do the asking which isweird and she's going to do the
answering You're not going toanswer for me.
Sometimes I will.
So I probably will, but I thinkwe'll start where I think the
(03:55):
best part of a story.
If we don't anchor thechildhood circumstances, I think
everything else will be lost.
So tell us about childhood,don't leave the really dark
stuff out, right.
And of course, if you want toadd all the light, you want.
(04:15):
But tell us the struggles thatyou faced in your childhood,
where you came from, and kind ofset the foundation.
Speaker 2 (04:23):
I mean I don't even know where to start and I mean,
yeah, geez, that's, that's aloaded question like I could sit
here and just talk for hours onthat.
Um, so my parents divorced whenI was two, so I was born to a
19.
My mom was 19, my dad was 21 um, both I don't know much about
(04:45):
my mom.
She died when I was reallyyoung.
But that's, I can get to that,it's going to get there.
Speaker 1 (04:49):
How old were you?
Speaker 2 (04:50):
I was six when she passed away.
She was 26.
I was six so I don't even thinkI ever really lived with my mom
and dad.
They kind of gave me to mygrandma right away.
We lived right across thestreet.
Half of our family lived on oneblock in alexandria, virginia,
beautiful, cute little block.
Yeah well, it wasn't cute then,like now it's cute because it's
(05:10):
been all all the yeah, um.
So yeah, they kind of gained mygrandma and, uh, I lived with
her most of my childhood upuntil my dad.
Oh man, I know you were, thisis geez, this is so much um this
is the good stuff though.
Yeah, so I live with my grandmaand when I was I mean I grew up
(05:31):
in again, grew up in Alexandria,virginia, and saw my dad get
stabbed at a drug deal gone badat the People's Drugstore on
Monroe Avenue.
Remember hitchhiking placeswith him and it was crazy.
My dad was a heroin addict.
I don't know what my mom wasaddicted to, but you don't have
one heroin addict and then onesober person.
(05:52):
So you know, I've always kindof created this vision of her
being this perfect person in myhead and over the past few years
I've realized that's absolutelynot true.
Speaker 1 (06:01):
There's never one toxic person in a relationship,
there's always two.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
No, my mom was a bit of a hellfire.
From what I've been told bysome family members A lot of
people they don't want to talkabout her just because her death
was so tragic, but she was ahellfire and she ran away from
home when she was 16 years oldand was with my dad off and on
going underage at clubs.
Speaker 1 (06:23):
Been told I was a lot like her, and when you said, oh
fire, I was getting ready to.
Speaker 2 (06:28):
That's about all I've been told.
You're just like Carol Ann.
So anyway, I live with mygrandma.
My grandma was my best friend.
I remember she would go to workevery day.
My granddad was always reallysick.
He passed away when I was three.
I remember waking up.
I slept in bed with my grandmaand I remember waking up to her
bawling her eyes out one morningbecause granddaddy had died.
(06:49):
And so after her granddad diedshe had to get to work and she
was a housekeeper at one of thelittle motels in Old Town,
alexandria.
She'd get me on the bus to goto school every morning and then
she'd get on the bus and she'dgo to work.
And I remember getting on thebus to go get our government
cheese and getting on the bus toto go do all this stuff.
Um, and that was only for a fewyears, and my dad met.
(07:10):
My dad met someone else and and, um, they were going to have
this great life together.
So my dad pulled up in hislittle blue van one day to my
grandma's house and took me awayand um, there's emotion yeah,
went to go live with him and mysoon-to-be stepmom I can't
remember if they were marriedyet or not, but anyway, and uh,
(07:31):
yeah, my stepmom was, was justas you're addicted, as my father
was and um, she came with awith a child already my, my
stepsister and um, that's reallywhere things got really, really
bad, because they were bothheroin addicts.
They were both really badheroin addicts and that just
went on to years and years ofjust severe abuse and neglect
(07:57):
and being kicked out of housesand in and out of houses and
cars being repossessed andwatching drug deals go down and
just all kinds of it was justhell.
Speaker 1 (08:10):
Going from house to house, never really having a
home of your own.
Speaker 2 (08:12):
Yeah, yeah, stealing food.
God bless my stepsister,because there were times we had
no food and she would go andlike literally steal food for us
.
Speaker 1 (08:19):
You told me about stealing toilet paper.
Speaker 2 (08:21):
Yes, and you know, I'd love to talk with her One
day.
Maybe she'll open up and she'lllet she and I do talk about
this, because we talked about alittle bit of North Carolina
like how we would, we'd love tokind of get some of this out.
But yeah, we had no toiletpaper and so we went to the
little in Manassas Park,virginia.
We walked into the little pizzashop.
Summer without electricity,running water.
(08:42):
Borrowing hot dogs Borrowing hotdogs from neighbors, and I mean
, this spans years and years.
This wasn't just.
This was.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
But it was consistent right.
There was always.
There's always lack and alwaysneglect.
Speaker 2 (08:55):
Yeah, yep.
So yeah, just all the years ofabuse.
My father he allowed his drugdealer friends to molest us kids
and just not knowing what wasgoing on, walking in with the
needles in their arms, watchingmy dad overdose.
I mean I remember putting mydad overdosing, seizing on the
(09:17):
floor, having to get him intocold water.
I mean just a lot, it was justa lot.
Yeah, yeah just a lot.
It was just, it was just a lot.
Yeah, yeah, so fast forward itto 15, oh yep, so I don't want
to talk about that becausethat's not my story to tell that
part.
Um, I found out some prettydisturbing secrets in the family
(09:39):
and, again, that's not my storyto tell.
So I don't, I don't want totalk about it right now and I
know the story and it'sdevastating and it's absolutely
vile.
Speaker 1 (09:48):
what happened and what?
Yeah what?
Speaker 2 (09:52):
one person would serve another person up to yeah,
and see, I was 14 years old andI had just gotten—my stepmother
was extremely abusive, I mean,she hated me.
She hated me because Irepresented my dad, having
previously loved another womanenough to have a child with her.
So that's sure free.
And I was pretty and I wassmart and all the boys always
(10:14):
liked me and and yeah, I just Ieverything just came easy to me.
Everything always came easy tome.
And I think and she absolutelyhated that my grandma loved me
so much and she hated the hat.
She hated just, she just hatedeverything about me.
And so I finally got sick.
I got sick of this shit and Ijust knew that I always wanted
better.
I always knew that I wasn't.
And my, my step-aunt said thatthey always knew that I was
(10:37):
different from when I was.
They met me when I was four orfive years old and they said
they always knew, they alwaysknew I was going to get out,
which is really cool.
He doesn't say that and Ialways my step-aunt I don't call
him my step-aunt my aunt Di.
She was a very successful she isa very successful caterer in
Washington DC and I rememberwe'd go to her house and she had
(10:58):
like all these luxury downcomforters and lotions and smell
like everything always smelledpretty.
I was like this is what I want,and even from like a very, very
young girl when we go and staywith them.
Like this is what I want, thisis who I am.
So I'm 14 years old.
Left home, I had an olderboyfriend.
He was not me, no, not him.
He same age as you, so he's sixyears older than me.
(11:18):
So kind of weird.
Looking back now, I was 14, hewas 20 it's kind of weird uh,
but yeah, I mean thank god forhim because I, I, I paged him
one day and he knew that the thecode I paged him meant to pick
me up from the bus stop in themorning and he picked me up and
I said I'm never going backthere and he said okay, and uh,
so I stayed with him.
(11:39):
From then on his um, his momand I are still very, very close
, very, we keep in touch.
And uh, yeah, thank god forthem because I, they, they took
care of me for for six years.
Speaker 1 (11:50):
But then this guy came along and and I came along
and I had almost nothing and hewas rich yeah and uh.
Speaker 2 (12:02):
so when I say things came easy to me, this is this is
a really great example of.
So I left home 14 and I turned15 and I had so my dad.
When my mom died she worked forthe Department of Defense, she
was a secretary.
So when she passed away I gother pension, I got Social
Security benefits and there wassomething else.
So there was some financesinvolved that my dad and stepmom
(12:24):
got every month from me beingin there.
Well, when I left home and thegovernment found out, they're
like well, you don't get themoney anymore.
So my dad said you come backhome and I said no, and then I
tried to get him to sign me intoschool.
He told me that I had to comeback home for them to get his
money back and I said absolutelynot.
(12:45):
And because he wouldn't sign meinto school, so I started
working.
I was working at a little cafein Bethesda, maryland, called
Sutton Blaze Gourmet and thisguy used to come in every single
day and he would order cheese,bread and an espresso.
And one day he started askingme.
He said how come you're neverin school?
And something just told me totell him.
(13:11):
Tell my story.
So I did.
The next day he came in he hada letter and he slid it across
the the counter and I opened itup and it was from his law
offices law offices of miles andstockbridge in rockville,
maryland, and mr james j demaesquire.
They uh offered to represent mefor pro bono in an emancipation
case against my dad.
And so, yeah, took my dad tocourt when I was 15, 16 years
(13:32):
old, got fully emancipated, yeah.
Speaker 1 (13:37):
Emancipated at 15, 16 .
Yeah, and we met.
So keep going, tell the story.
When you know we met inabnormal psychology class, and
tell the story and give somedetail to that too.
Speaker 2 (13:53):
Yeah, so I am.
Because I was an emancipatedminor, officially an adult,
under the Board of the State ofMaryland, and I was able to take
a college entrance exam.
To get to college I didn't haveto get my GED and took it, got
in to Montgomery College and,yeah, I didn't know what I was
(14:14):
doing.
I was just going to college, Iwas just taking random classes.
I didn't have a major oranything doing.
I was just going to college, Iwas just taking random classes,
I didn't have a major oranything.
And yeah, one day I bumped intoa normal psychology class.
I'm pretty sure I had platformshoes on and leopard print.
And leopard print.
Yeah, I probably just came fromthe club.
To be honest, I was a totalclub kid with a coke problem.
(14:36):
That actually came before it,yes.
But yeah, I stomped into thisclassroom in my little platform
shoes and somebody stole my bagthat day from the bookstore.
I came out, I just chomp, chomp, chomp into the room and I was,
oh my God, somebody stole mybooks and it was my English 101
book and he said you can borrowmy book, angela.
(14:57):
I'm like who?
Speaker 1 (14:58):
Because you got a tag .
You had your work tag.
She was an intern at IBM, soshe had her work tag and I just
called her.
What was on her tag?
That's it.
Speaker 2 (15:06):
Yeah, and I sat down in front of him and I remember
turning around he had his littleChuck Taylors on.
I said, where's Chuck Taylorsanymore?
Speaker 1 (15:14):
Yeah, she didn't like me, like me and I didn't like
her.
It was pretty obvious that weweren't fit to be together.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
We were neither of our other.
Our tied.
You were my fellow snow.
Speaker 1 (15:26):
You were obnoxious I still am and I was quiet.
I was a quiet guy in that class.
You were also elderly in thatclass Elderly, I was 27 years
old.
Speaker 2 (15:38):
Yeah, we were all 19, 20 years old in that class.
Because it was a 100-levelclass, he'd already had his
bachelor's degree.
Yeah, I just, he was justtaking for funsies I was just
burning some GI Bill.
Speaker 1 (15:47):
I took biology 101 and abnormal psychology 101 just
to burn.
I love science classes so yeah,I was just there for funsies
and I was obviously meant to be.
But the story I love out ofthat class is when we, when we
turned in our papers at the endof at the end of the course I
(16:08):
think of papers or or just anexam or something my paper and
she went up to get hers and shesaid, yeah, I got a c and that
kind of slightly set the tonefor a long time.
Speaker 2 (16:22):
But the ninth grade drop out and I was getting b's
and c's in college.
I was doing pretty damn good.
I was around myself.
Speaker 1 (16:29):
No, it was funny.
Okay, now, every day at the endof class and when I was in the
marine corps, what we would dois is we would have our work day
and I worked in an electronicslaboratory in the Marine Corps
and and at the end of every daywe we wrap up the day, we clean
up the clean up the shop and weempty all the trash and then
(16:49):
we'd all go to the club and theE club, right, the enlisted club
and at the end of every class,in uh, abnormal psychology I
would say anybody want to go outand grab a beer?
And everybody would say no.
And then there was this one dayafter the term ended, when I got
(17:09):
a phone call.
Speaker 2 (17:10):
No, it wasn't.
The term had ended because heate the stuff.
Speaker 1 (17:13):
Because, no, we were nearing the end of the class.
Speaker 2 (17:19):
It was December 11th, no, and uh, yeah, it was.
We were nearing the end of the.
It was, it was December 11th1999.
And uh, myself and my ex-fiancethen fiance and we were heading
out for a night the club groupand um, I said we had, literally
we had walked out of our condoand I stopped and I said let me
call this kid.
He's been wanting to go out allsemester, this kid.
Speaker 1 (17:43):
I wasn't that desperate.
Speaker 2 (17:45):
But I was just like.
He's been asking me to go outall semester and so I walked
back in, picked up the phone offthe wall and dialed the number
he gave me he was at workbecause he worked swing shift
design and I said hey, we'regoing out to the Shark Club.
You want to meet us?
He had no idea where it was, sohe had to meet us at the Exxon
gas station on ConnecticutAvenue and I went to the Shark
(18:06):
Club and he bought me my martini.
I first met him.
Speaker 1 (18:09):
Yeah, I was just literally being innocent in all
of this.
Speaker 2 (18:14):
I had no intentions, I just I thanked her for, you
know, with a drink for forinviting me.
Yeah Well, and we had beendoing project, we had he had
been on projects all semestertogether.
So back then it was acceptableto to go and it was abnormal
psychology.
So it was acceptable then to goand we had to have a field trip
to the, to the psychiatric ward.
Speaker 1 (18:36):
But there was, there was no spark at that moment.
And at that time there was,there was no spark, there was no
interest, there was no spark,there was no nothing.
So it was just interesting howthat that worked then.
And then, when there's thiswhole story about a transfer and
and and Well, I left, mike, heis in your Jeep Cause I met
Exxon.
Speaker 2 (18:54):
You didn't know how to get there and so I jumped
into the Jeep.
I got you over to the clubbecause it was in, but that's in
Maryland.
It's just a wonky little townLike.
There's just little sidestreets and he doesn't know
where he's going, even with GPS.
And this is back in 99.
Remember it was on GPS.
So, yeah, we were leaving.
There was an altercation in the.
I had to go.
I was going to get my keys frombetween me and my ex-fiancee at
(19:16):
that point and he said if youwalk away or not?
don't you ever come back home?
And I said something clickedand he said cool.
So I jumped in his Jeep and Iasked him to take me to my
friend Dorothy's house.
Dorothy wasn't home.
Speaker 1 (19:29):
She came home and never left, and that is the true
story.
Speaker 2 (19:34):
True story of Mike and Angie.
Speaker 1 (19:35):
When I said there was a whole transfer.
I don't know if we're going toget into that.
I still remember the story, butthe point is that she came home
and never left and it waspretty toxic.
It was pretty toxic from thebeginning.
I mean, we didn't have.
We sat on a lot of well, weblacked out a lot, we did a lot
of drinking and we did a lot ofpartying and we did a lot of.
(19:57):
We went to a lot of ravensgames and the very first day we
was a week after we startedliving together because we never
not lived together, really um,I took her to a ravens game and
I was crazy drunk at the end ofthe game.
We had a great time tailgating,but I had a.
(20:18):
I was was completelyobliterated, if that's a word,
and I started buying Sambucashots for the entire ball.
And that's when she kind oftook my card and called it the
night.
Speaker 2 (20:33):
Signed his name on his credit card, received
everything.
Then he lost my car.
I had to pay a little city kidin Baltimore to find my car.
I remember the name of therestaurant it was parked near
and that was it.
So the kid found my car.
Speaker 1 (20:45):
And then we drove home Right, or back to my
parents probably.
But the point being is itstarted pretty toxic.
This whole thing started toxic.
And then, you know, we movedout of that apartment because it
was a little beat up apartmentthat was mine, but we moved into
a house, bought a house, boughta car first because her fiance
(21:10):
wanted her car back.
So I bought a car and gave hermy old car.
She said she was going to makepayments on that car, but she
never did and I guess I just letthat go and overlooked that.
Um, I think you made onepayment and then never made
another.
You did, you made a payment Ithink we'll talk about that you
made a payment, then you nevermade another one, and then we
(21:31):
bought a house and then we gotpregnant and it all happened
pretty, pretty quickly and itwas like you know, it know it
was just a whirlwind and itwasn't always fun.
No, it definitely wasn't alwaysfun, because, I don't know, we
weren't, there was no spark inclass and I don't know for me if
there was really a spark, itjust felt, it was just a series
(21:55):
of yeses, but there was no realconnection, and I'm talking
about soul connection.
I mean, we were living togetherand we were doing life together
, but there was no real deep,purposeful, meaningful bond but
I don't know if either of usknew what the purposeful,
meaningful bond was.
No, I'm just looking back, Ijust remember what you used to
say we're soulmates and I'm likeare you crazy?
(22:16):
We freaking argue all the timeand we fight and all we do is
black out, get black out drunkbut okay, I do not get black.
Speaker 2 (22:22):
No, that was something you got, like you did
a couple, a couple times, but um, sorry.
Speaker 1 (22:28):
So we're pregnant, yeah, and we have a kid, and her
name is Caitlin McKenzie Kipko,and she is our older daughter
and she just graduated college,like two weeks ago.
So we have raised a whole assadult human being.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
It's pretty awesome and she is the very first person
on my side of the family tograduate college, so super cool.
Speaker 1 (22:50):
So Katie, katie's born in April of 2002 and we're
sitting there at at our house,in our townhouse, and I remember
this day and I remember we werein our bedroom and we were
holding katie and and I rememberangie saying you know it would
be, and it was like I don't knowif it was easter.
(23:11):
I think it might have beeneaster and we went up to.
Speaker 2 (23:13):
It had to have been because she was born in april.
Speaker 1 (23:15):
Yeah, and we went up to baltimore and spent easter
with my parents and then we wentup to Baltimore and spent
Easter with my parents and thenwe went down to Alexandria and
spent Easter down in with someof her family and her aunts.
And we were at our townhouse inthe bedroom and Angie said
these words.
She said, mike, wouldn't it beawesome if we just kind of like
moved away and just focused onour little family and not had
(23:37):
this chaos of driving all overand seeing all this family?
And that was like a Saturday.
And a couple of days later andyou can't make this shit up A
couple of days later I go towork on Monday and they pull us
in a conference room and theysay, hey, we're shutting this
field office down because thehome base for the company I
(23:57):
worked for was in Beaverton,oregon.
And they pulled us in and saidwe're shutting this field office
down and we're going to move.
We're going to ask some of youto move to Beaverton.
And there was five of us thatthey asked and I was one of them
and it was almost like Angielike just spoke that into
existence why don't we move?
And we got invited and theypaid all of our travel and they
(24:20):
put us up in a, in a littlecondo and and they, they gave us
spending money and it's likethey we couldn't have had a
better right and we we got whatwe wanted.
And when we we lived in oregonfor 10 years, we basically
raised our girls there and andthat's what they knew was home,
and he fell into a deeperdepression.
(24:42):
Yeah, in Oregon.
Speaker 2 (24:43):
Oh, in Oregon, yeah, it was.
It was bad, not just, not justa depression.
I mean, we, we had Katie, wewere out there by our, by our,
by ourselves.
Speaker 1 (24:53):
Yeah, we had nobody we had.
Speaker 2 (24:54):
We had nobody.
As much as I didn't want that,the hecticness of all the
multiple family holidays andcrap, we got out there and I was
totally alone, totally alone.
Speaker 1 (25:04):
And I was working and Angie hadn't, didn't have a job
right away.
No, you did, you did, but thenyou quit.
Enterprise transfer, jim, youas well.
Speaker 2 (25:14):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (25:15):
So they gave you a position in the accounting
office right, we're recruiting,I was recruiting, recruiting.
So she went to work, but thenshe started having some health
problems and that's when shebecame a stay-at-home mom, and
that's when things reallystarted to slow down.
Speaker 2 (25:29):
Yeah, that was definitely not good for me, yeah
.
And then I think that when itreally started, when we lost, we
had Katie.
And then, when Katie was a yearold, we got pregnant again and
we lost our boy when I was sixmonths pregnant and that was
very, very, very difficultbecause when he passed away they
(25:52):
still had to carry him for twoweeks in the womb before they
could get me in for surgery toremove him.
And I think that was, I thinkthere was a mix I was probably
still dealing with postpartumwith katie and then get pregnant
and lose the baby in thistragic way, and then the the
absolute trauma of having tocarry your dead child and you
(26:14):
and that wasn't the end.
Speaker 1 (26:15):
So you carried, you carried him and they did a.
Basically, what is it called?
A DNC?
A DNC, but there's another wordExtraction.
Okay, that's the word I waslooking for, and then they left
some in there.
So she went into labor again toextract, to eject some of the
(26:38):
parts that they left.
So it's like I don't, I don'tknow like I want to sum it up to
this point.
It was like one tragedy and one, you know, one hurtful event
after another, and and it waslike it wasn't getting any
easier, it just kept gettingharder and harder and it's like
the all the stress and tensionand struggle and all this
(26:59):
turmoil just kept building.
Speaker 2 (27:00):
Well, and then after that they said they weren't even
sure if I was going to be ableto get pregnant again.
And then at that point I wasdesperate to give Katie a
sibling.
And then we got pregnant withMegan.
Yeah, we got pregnant withMegan, but then Megan's
pregnancy was yeah, it was.
Speaker 1 (27:14):
Yeah, Megan, it was both of them.
Both pregnancies were difficult.
They weren't easy and we're nottrying to make everything bad
news, but it was.
We didn't have an easy firstfreaking 16 years together, and
before that you didn't have avery easy life.
I don't think either of us did,but I didn't.
At least I didn't have thefreaking poverty and the
(27:36):
addiction, growing up in theaddictive state.
You know circumstances theaddiction.
Speaker 2 (27:40):
Growing up in the addictive state, you know
circumstances and it wasdefinitely all of that trauma
compounded is what pushed meinto the addiction piece because
you know, at that point I wasso mentally unstable and
emotionally unwell and and notknowing how to deal with any of
it, not even recognizing it asas as trauma and and just having
you know I came from a veryIrish family and just swept
(28:02):
everything under the damn rug oryou drank it away, and not
knowing how to process or haveanybody to process it with, or
even us just having healthydiscussions like we do now.
Speaker 1 (28:14):
Sure, and I think we had none of them.
No, it was all about sports ordrinking or just superficial
shit, nothing really deep andmeaningful.
Speaker 2 (28:24):
It's all compounded.
So doctors kept prescribing memore and more medications and
drugs and I was in and out ofthe hospital and in and out of
psych wards and in and out ofrehabs.
It was just, it was a lot.
Speaker 1 (28:33):
I had to call 911 a lot to have her, like, removed
from the house, taken to a psychward.
And our girls grew up in psychwards.
They and we just had aconversation, probably a month
or two ago, where Katie said Iremember always going to the
hospital but I didn't know therewere a psych.
They were psych wards.
But yeah, that was we.
Our kids grew up going tovisitation at the psych wards
(28:56):
and rehab and just everythingelse and at some point Angie was
taking four to 500 pills amonth.
It was like crazy and butthat's, that's just Oregon.
Then then we, then we move.
You know, once again I rememberAngie saying hey, we, I don't
want to live here for the restof my life and if we are going
to move, we got to move beforethe girls are in middle school
(29:18):
and they were entering.
They were like just a fewmonths, not not long.
It was like six months before,before, before Katie was was
going to be graduating and goinginto middle school and by when
Angie speaks something intoexistence.
It tends to happen because myphone started lighting up with
recruiters and we interviewed inSan Diego and I I went to
(29:42):
Connecticut or Illinois andChicago and St Louis and we had
a couple other options down in.
You know other other ones inCalifornia and different,
different recruiters calling Um.
Cause I was.
I was an executive leader incorporate America and I was.
I had done some really goodwork at Stanley Black Decker,
the company I was with.
(30:02):
So I was being recruited byother companies that kind of
knew what was going on, what washappening, and we had our pick
and we chose St Louis Missouri,right outside of St Louis
Missouri, and that's where welive today.
So we've been here for 13 years.
But when we got here it kind ofgot worse.
When we got here, if it wasn'tbad enough in Oregon, when we
(30:24):
got here, it got worse before itgot better.
But Angie fell deeper intodepression and I was going to
work and we're still drinking.
I remember on Fridays when Iwas pulling away from the plant
and you would send me picturesof the two 12 that you had just
bought and and you were homeprobably clean and usually
cleaned on Fridays and and youhad your music up and we were
(30:45):
going to go drinking a lot afterthat.
But the point being is she felldeeper into a depression and
things just slid downwards evenmore until I got there was there
was a lot of volatility in ourmarriage.
Let's just say that.
We're not going to go into deepdetail.
There was some infidelity bothways and and uh, we I got fired
(31:07):
from my first position that thatthe energy company that brought
us out to Oregon or to Missouri.
And then, uh, and I was withthose guys for about 18 to 20
months and then we had fivemonths worth of severance.
They they treated us really andthen we had five months worth
of severance.
They treated us really well andthey gave us five months worth
of severance and we drank it all.
We used to pick our girls updrunk from the bus stop at 2.30
(31:31):
and it didn't get any better.
And then that severance wasgoing to run out in January of
2015.
And in December of 2014, I gota job offer.
So we went into Christmasknowing that I was going to have
a job after, after the holiday.
So we drank a lot because andthen I had that job for 15
(31:51):
months because she wasn't in anybetter shape.
I wasn't in any better shape.
Our marriage wasn't in anybetter shape.
Nothing had been cleared,nothing had been cleansed,
nothing had been healed.
Speaker 2 (32:01):
We were just we were making money, though, so we were
making money, so that's all wereally cared about you know, I
there was.
I never had a stable place tolive.
I one time switched schools Idon't remember how many times in
one year I had lived like nineto ten times because we moved so
much.
So like, oh, my girls have astable home, they have a stable
school, we've got money, they'renot.
(32:22):
Yeah, so I think you're doingbetter.
Speaker 1 (32:25):
And Angie thought when we hit six figures in my
new book, she wrote the forward,the first forward, and she said
we had a traditional marriagein that I would complain for
what, he would go to work and Iwas a nagging wife at home
complaining for more Right.
(32:47):
And it's exactly what it was.
It was like more, more, more,more.
But we hit the a hundredthousand dollar mark and Angie
thought and this was, I was inmy thirties and Angie thought
that that was going to solve allof our problems.
Speaker 2 (32:58):
When we hit that hundred thousand, I mean I used
to go, we used to go and have touse our food stamps to go and
buy a five cent piece of candy.
So like 95 cents was a big dealback then and you know as a
child in that serious you knowthat poverty stricken time and
so shit, making $100,000 a yearI'm like damn we made it.
Speaker 1 (33:19):
Yeah.
And I thought that was gonna fixeverything, but it's nothing
and again that was back inoregon, but you didn't touch it
and that.
And then things when I hit thehundred thousand dollar mark,
nothing got better.
She sank deeper into it andinto addiction.
But anyway, then we were here,I got fired for the second time
and that's when everything,that's when everything changed.
You know, the first time I gotfired it was like, okay, I used
(33:42):
to have a boss.
His name was Marty Schnur andMarty was awesome and he was the
president of our division inStanley and Marty I remember him
joking.
He said if you haven't beenfired once as an executive,
you're not a professional.
So the first time I got fired,I'm like I'm executive, right,
but uh, but the second time Iwas like, all right, something's
(34:04):
got to change.
And and I started going on thisjourney.
I hired a coach and and Angiewas like you're, and that was
actually a school friend of mine, guy that I went to to uh, to
grad school with, and he wasdoing some coaching, he was kind
of new in the coaching spaceand I started paying him and
she's like what You're payingyour friend?
You're paying him to be yourfriend, are you a therapist
(34:36):
working out?
And I started losing weight andI started reading and I started
meditating and I startedjournaling and I started you
know I've got books all overthis house but I started leaving
all these cool things that Iwas learning.
I started leaving them like onsticky notes at the kitchen
table saying, angie here, like,read this, read this, read this
you know dog-earing pages andjust leaving her writing things
(34:58):
and just getting her to try tolean in a little bit and she
wanted nothing to do with it andI was trying to bring her along
and I'm trying to get her tolearn what I was learning and to
feel what I was feeling, causeI was finally starting to feel
really good and in my body andkind of in my mind,
understanding what was happeningin my mind and my body, I
started feeling really good.
I wanted her to experience thattoo, and she didn't want that
(35:22):
at that point.
And I don't know, maybe, maybethat's wrong.
You often say it's not that youdidn't want it, you didn't
think it was available to you,or that you were just, or you
were worth it.
Speaker 2 (35:30):
Yeah, it was just.
It was just again and I didn'tknow this at the time we talked
about this on on episode 102 isI just didn't know.
I didn't feel worthy of beingthe person capable of making
those changes.
So it was just, it was aself-worth issue, like you know.
I think it was.
Yeah, I think, recognizing allthe the horrible things and the
horrible person that I was forso long like there was, just
(35:53):
didn't think it was available tome.
I think I was worth it.
Speaker 1 (35:55):
Not anymore, you're not a horrible person anymore.
And three months in, prettyawesome, and we did the best we
could.
We weren't even horrible, wewere just doing the best we
(36:16):
could.
And a couple months into thisjourney, when she wasn't really
opting in, in fact, as I startedon like five interviews and I
came up runner up in all of themand after a while I was like,
okay, well, I guess that likewhole job thing is closed and I
decided to, you know, start acoaching business.
Because, to be honest, when Iwas in corporate, the only thing
I ever loved was developingpeople and developing teams.
I didn't love the wholecorporate thing and I didn't
(36:38):
love the job thing, but I didlove having somebody to develop
and to coach and to teach and Ilove that.
And I loved developing myorganization, I loved developing
my functional leaders.
But there was an epiphany onceI'm sitting there listening to
him, I'm like he's doing exactlylike my dream job and if he
(37:02):
could do this, why can't I dothat?
That's kind of like when thatwhole thing started to happen
and unfold and that's when Ikind of committed, I told Angie,
I said I'm going to start acoaching business and she said
no, you need to go get a job.
Speaker 2 (37:16):
You work Monday through Friday, nine to five.
We give you four weeks vacation, 401k insurance.
Speaker 1 (37:27):
Yeah, we need benefits.
We need benefits, we need a job.
And I committed and I was inbut I filed for divorce.
It just still wasn't goodbetween us and there were lots
of attacks and I mean, it's justthat old life had expired but
we were still living in remnantsof that old life.
But I knew that that chapterwas done and I filed for divorce
, not knowing that we were goingto put everything back together
.
(37:48):
But I just made a post yesterday.
I said when one person startsdoing the inner work and the
other person doesn't, one of theunintended sad consequences is
growing apart.
And when one person's doing theclearing work and spiritual
work the inner, the mental, theemotional, the healing work and
(38:12):
one person's not, it's just amatter of time before you're not
going to be together anymore.
And that's what I felt.
I was like, okay, this is done,I'm moving on.
And I filed for divorce andAngie was high when I told her
that, really high when I toldher pharmaceutical addiction, so
not like street drugs.
But when I told her I was high,she laughed at me and belittled
(38:35):
me and the next day she wascrying and we had long, long
conversations and I was.
I was still wasn't committed torebuilding the marriage.
But I put a pause on thedivorce and I said let's, let's
test your commitment, let's seeif you're really committed to
this.
And from there we went to NAthat night and there's been a
(38:55):
couple of relapse.
There were a couple of relapsesup to like.
This is 2016 and we're talkingabout 2017, 2018 2017 is the
other books, so 2019.
So shit, it's 1819.
So anyway, there were a couplerelapses and when that last
(39:16):
relapse happened, it's like thatwas it?
Yep, that was the one, yeah,yeah.
And we just keep stacking winsand we just keep.
It's not all like butterfliesand unicorns and rainbows.
I'm not easy to live with.
No, you're not.
I'm not.
And I'm not either though You'reeasier to live with than you
(39:40):
think, you make my life easy.
The point being is it's not allbutterflies and rainbows.
We do have challenges, we dohave obstacles.
Our business goes up, ourbusiness goes down.
There's still financialinsecurity that creeps in every
once in a while, but what's notpresent is a lack of commitment
to each other, a lack ofdedication to each other.
(40:01):
We don't threaten divorce.
We don't talk about ending ourmarriage.
Speaker 2 (40:07):
It's no longer us against us, it's no longer Angie
versus Mike or Mike versusAngie.
It's Mike and Angie versus usagainst the problem the
challenge.
Yeah, and someone you know, youtalked about that that when the
unintended consequence of oneperson growing, someone on that
post had said or you just createspace for the other person, but
that space is very limited.
And that's what I think andthat's where that's what you
(40:31):
created that space for me, butit was.
There's no way that we would besitting here seven years later
just with you still holding thatspace, because that's just,
that's just not possible.
Speaker 1 (40:40):
Yeah, well, it there's.
I think, and I know that, Iknow the, the comment, I think
the assumption there is that thethere's no attacking and you're
both living your lives, becausewhen you were attacking and you
just kept attacking as I keptgrowing, you kept attacking more
and I think it was insecurity.
Right, it was just.
It was just insecurity.
(41:00):
Hey, even girls, even our girls, tried to get me to stop
growing and stop doing thespiritual work that I was doing,
because they didn't know who Iwas becoming, they were
unfamiliar with who I wasbecoming.
Suddenly I, you know, I startedfeeling like Zen and and I
started doing like monk shit andand our, our operations
assistant, cara Dossi, is likeme, me monk Mike, because I sit
(41:24):
in long periods of solitude andsilence and with my eyes closed
and just feeling like good.
But yeah, that wasn't the oldMike.
Speaker 2 (41:35):
Well, when you're used to a life of chaos and
peace feels like boredom, whenyou're addicted to chaos you
said it, but when you'readdicted to chaos, and peace
feels like boredom when you'readdicted to chaos.
Speaker 1 (41:42):
you said it, but when you're addicted to chaos, peace
feels like boredom.
So you tend to create somechaos in your life.
But here's the cool part, andthis is the part.
This is where I was thinking wewere going to go before we
started this.
Angie has gone from poundnobody knows a pound I'm gonna
(42:07):
give him a baseball.
Is that the first?
No, no, no, that wasn't thefirst one.
No, angie explored uh mlms andstarted working in network
marketing and did that for alittle bit and decided that that
wasn't for her.
Then there's pound class, andimagine a fitness program where
(42:27):
you have two drumsticks andthere's loud music and you tap
and you move and there's alittle bit of dancing and stuff
involved.
And she took some pound classesto learn how to lead that and
she did a great job for a whileand she had a lot of fun with it
until she didn't.
Speaker 2 (42:44):
Well, COVID hit and then, yeah, there was no place
to teach and we tried doing avirtual yeah.
Speaker 1 (42:49):
And now one day she said you know what?
I'm going to go get my realestate license.
And she got a partner in realestate, our good friend, katie
Chatfield, who used to be ouroperations manager in
Interwealth Global.
They Her Wealth Global.
(43:12):
They build, or they started, areal estate investing company.
They walk houses relentlessly.
They've made tons of offers,haven't closed their first deal
yet, have come very, very closeto closing the first deal.
They will.
But they are pros.
They've become pros at walkinghouses.
They're doing the work.
I've worked with many peoplewho said that they wanted to
start a real estate investingbusiness and they didn't take
any action whatsoever.
It was all talk, no action.
(43:33):
But these ladies have freakinggone crazy with submitting
offers, walking properties,education.
Angie decided that she wantedto get a real estate license,
agency license and she actuallydid that.
She has her license.
She's a licensed real estateagent.
Now she just held her firstopen house this last Sunday.
(43:55):
She crushed it.
Speaker 2 (43:56):
Do another one this Sunday.
Speaker 1 (43:57):
She's networking with real estate investors.
She's networking with realestate agents at her brokerage.
She's showing up more in thereal estate space at her
brokerage.
She's showing up more in thereal estate space.
Her life and I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm trying to be respectful
about this and not demeaning.
If you were to look at her lifejust a couple of years ago, it
was really Mike Kitko and hiswife, angie, because it's like
(44:21):
when she walked into a room shewas Mike's wife and I never
wanted that, but that's, that'swhat, what existed.
And now she goes places andshe's Angie Kitko and they know
her and she's her own brand andshe's she's living in her own
power and she's becoming knownfor who she is and what she does
, what she brings to the table,not just as a plus one for me,
(44:44):
and that feels really, reallygood for me.
Speaker 2 (44:47):
Yeah, it also feels good being Mike's wife.
I always enjoy being Mike'swife.
Speaker 1 (44:51):
And I love when we go to real estate meetups and I'm
Angie's husband.
Speaker 2 (44:55):
Yep Right.
Speaker 1 (44:56):
Yeah, cause I'm there supporting you instead of you
supporting me, and I think thatfeels really, really good is
finally being able to show up tosupport you in something that
you're doing instead of viceversa.
It feels really good.
It is so freaking fulfilled.
I'm so blessed to have you justin my life and as my wife and
as my support, my greatestcheerleader and it's finally
(45:19):
good to be a cheerleader for youfor once.
Damn it, whew.
So the whole point of thisepisode was to celebrate our
200th episode.
Speaker 2 (45:34):
And congratulations.
Thank you, that's a hugeaccomplishment, hunter, thank
you, I appreciate that that's alot of topics.
He'll say to me what should Ido my podcast on?
I don't know, if I had thattype of creativity I'd have my
own damn podcast.
Speaker 1 (45:49):
Yeah, you just say the same thing over and over a
lot.
So you know how a little bitago you said, oh, we covered
that on the 100th podcastepisode.
But when you record a podcastyou assume that not everybody's
listened to every episode andyou unpack the stories, right,
but a lot of the same things.
But in a lot of cases they'rethe same thing, said different,
(46:10):
right, so that you see them andyou understand them from
different angles.
And we just keep.
I just I have a bit of wisdomand I keep deepening my
understanding of the wisdom andI keep sharing the deepening of
that understanding of the wisdomand it keeps like growing in my
life and people's lives.
But the purpose, the secondarypurpose, was to celebrate 200
(46:34):
episodes when we jumped on here.
It's to help you understandAngie and her story that, no
matter how much suffering youexperience as a child you
experienced as a child no matterhow much suffering that got
amplified in the second andthird decade of your life, the
(46:55):
fourth and fifth decade can bedecades of rebirth and
reinvention it's not too late.
And re-reconciliation let's saythat I'm looking for more
re-words, but we canreinventself anytime we want and
heal, but it takes.
It takes getting into, uh, intoa place where we get, we, we
(47:17):
develop a healthier sense ofself-awareness.
Start to reshape ourself-concept, because our
self-concept is our ownlimitation and also it also
means coming to terms with.
Speaker 2 (47:28):
You're not a victim.
Yeah, and that was the thingthat was one of the biggest
things was I was stuck in such aheavy victim mentality.
It's all these things that justkept happening to me.
Speaker 1 (47:41):
And we were both looking for a way to be a victim
and one of my favorite books,the Big Leap by Gay Hendricks.
He said all arguing is is twopeople fighting to see who's the
bigger?
Oh, me too, me too.
I'll say it again All anargument is is two people
fighting to see who's the biggervictim?
And when you frame it like that, it's a holy shit.
I never want to argue, everagain.
(48:02):
Little bitch right.
So I hope you guys had fun herein angie's story.
You have anything else you wantto share?
Speaker 2 (48:11):
no, just again congratulations on on your
future.
I think that's the yeah, I'mvery, very proud of you.
Speaker 1 (48:16):
Thank you so much, very proud to be your wife
there's going to be another 200episodes and then we'll do this
more and at some point we'regoing to rebrand it to the Inner
Wealth Podcast with Mike andMike Kikko and sometimes Andy.
Speaker 2 (48:31):
Every time you say and some I feel like the cartoon
.
Speaker 1 (48:35):
I think that's fun.
But look, over the comingmonths we got some really cool
stuff happening All right In.
For a year I've been writing abook and I've written a bunch of
books that never got, that arestill on my laptop and never got
published.
But we are on August 19th we'republishing a new book and it's
(48:56):
called.
It's called inner world outerworld and it's my soul project.
When I when I released my myfirst book, the imposter in
charge that book, it was goodbut it wasn't the one that I
wanted to write.
I wrote that as more of amarketing book instead of an
expression of my soul.
But this is an expression of mysoul and Angie wrote the first
(49:17):
forward and a lot of people thathave read this book said that's
actually the best part of thebook.
So even if you only get to thefirst forward, it's well worth
it.
But we've got that coming up.
We've got the Choose yourDestiny workshop.
The next Choose your Destinylive workshop live intensive is
(49:38):
August 22nd and 23rd.
So we launched the book onAugust 19th.
The 22nd, 23rd we had theworkshop, so it's going to
parlay nicely.
We've got a retreat with ourmastermind in September In Park
City, utah Park City, utah.
It was super.
Those are always awesome.
We've got an eight-bedroomhouse lodged in the mountains.
It's going to be amazing.
Speaker 2 (49:58):
And as a current connoisseur of the secret lives
of Mormon wives, I'm reallyexcited to go to Utah.
Speaker 1 (50:08):
Here's something that is still in the formative
stages.
That I'm really excited aboutis Auntie and I are
collaborating on somethingcalled Unbreakable, and what
we're looking to do is takecouples on a retreat maybe a
three-day retreat get somewherein seclusionlusion, in isolation
, where it's just us and we take, we help these couples take a
(50:30):
great marriage and make it evengreater.
We're not looking to be you'rein crisis, looking to be a
therapist, but we're justlooking for people that are.
We're going to be looking forpeople that have really, really
solid relationships, that theywant to make unbreakable Right.
And it is going to be a higherend offering.
It is going to be a premierretreat, so we're going to we're
(50:55):
going to look to make this onebig and really juicy, and I'm
excited for that and that helps.
You know, that is kind of whatinspired me to say Hey's start
talking about the whole story,not just bits and pieces of it
On the last three episodes.
Cool.
So we're going to end here.
(51:16):
Thanks for continuing Everysingle week to show up and
listen to this podcast and watchthe podcast and hear the same
things over and over Again andto hear the same intro and the
same outro, because I loveconsistency.
But thanks for yourfollowership, thanks for your
viewership, thanks for your love, your devotion to us, thanks
(51:38):
for your support, thanks foreverything, because without you
guys, we wouldn't have made itto 200 episodes, right, but you
guys make it easier to makegreat content and to put it out
in the world.
So, from the bottom of my heart, thank you for everything that
you've supported us through andall the love that you've given
us.
And this is the end of the200th episode.
(52:00):
And now we've got 200 more tomake.
Let's go, guys, until next week.
Love you all.
More to make.
Let's go, guys, until next week.
Love you all.
If you enjoyed what you heardand you want to learn more, go
to wwwinnerwealthglobalcom formore tools and resources.
Do you ever wake up feeling like there's something
missing in your life?
Do you ever feel the need toescape your business?
Are you running your life or isyour life running you?
I'm Mike Kitko and I'll helpyou design and create a life so
authentic and aligned with whoyou really are that you'll get
excited just to wake up.
I'll help you create realwealth, success and freedom from
the inside out.
(00:23):
Welcome to the Inner WealthPodcast, where we learn and
choose to live inspired each andevery day.
All right, these are some of myfavorite episodes.
This will be the fourth timethat we've done a podcast
(00:43):
episode together.
The first was at the Waterbury,second was Turks, third was
Outer Banks.
And here we are.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
Oh yeah, I guess we did the 100th episode up at
Waterbury.
Speaker 1 (00:56):
We did, we did and we kind of had this planned a
while ago that we were gettingclose to the 200th episode and
we were going to jam togetherand we started putting ideas
together of having it in adifferent podcast, a more
professional.
I guess this is our basementstudio we were going to put in.
But you know, we just wanted toget on here and jam and just
(01:17):
have some fun.
But welcome my beautiful bride.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
That's me.
Speaker 1 (01:23):
That's her, Angie Kitko.
Today is our 200th episode 200.
200.
That's a lot.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
That's a lot of talking.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
Every single week since August of 2023, I believe.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
No longer than that.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
Longer than that.
Speaker 2 (01:42):
Holy cow 2022,.
I believe.
Speaker 1 (01:44):
Yeah, because there's 200 episodes one week, 50.
That's four years, holy crap.
That's a lot of podcasting andit is a lot of talking, and I
don't have a lot of interviews,because I only have interviews
with people that I really,really want to sit across and
talk with about their life, andmy wife I can't get enough
talking about her life.
So here we are again.
(02:04):
Are you happy to be here?
I am why?
Speaker 2 (02:08):
Because it's nice to hear somebody else.
I'm sure it's nice to heareverybody else's voice once in a
while Today, no, I enjoy doingthis with you.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
They're a lot of fun they are, and I've got on my
desktop and at some point we'regoing to rebrand this and it's
going to be the inner wealthpodcast with Mike Kitko and
sometimes Angie.
We're going to do that.
I just I haven't rebranded thatyet but we will, because and
then we'll make it and sometimesAngie will make it more about
us instead of just me andjamming, because I have a lot of
(02:38):
fun just collaborating with mybride, my spouse, to celebrate.
I had a couple ideas about howwe were going to celebrate our
200th episode and you know itwas going to be about talking
about the.
You know, every week, mecreating content and you sitting
there listening to whatever,and I was like that'd be boring.
(02:59):
What we've never done before isI've never interviewed you
solely to have you tell yourstory and help people understand
who you are at a deeper level,because your story is
fascinating and you are sofreaking strong, you are so
powerful, you are so brave, youare so committed and I want to
(03:23):
help everybody understand howthat all came to be and where we
came from.
Okay, okay.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
I have no idea what he's doing.
By the way, I got a brief.
Speaker 1 (03:34):
All she needs to do is answer the questions, and I'm
going to do the asking which isweird and she's going to do the
answering You're not going toanswer for me.
Sometimes I will.
So I probably will, but I thinkwe'll start where I think the
(03:55):
best part of a story.
If we don't anchor thechildhood circumstances, I think
everything else will be lost.
So tell us about childhood,don't leave the really dark
stuff out, right.
And of course, if you want toadd all the light, you want.
(04:15):
But tell us the struggles thatyou faced in your childhood,
where you came from, and kind ofset the foundation.
Speaker 2 (04:23):
I mean I don't even know where to start and I mean,
yeah, geez, that's, that's aloaded question like I could sit
here and just talk for hours onthat.
Um, so my parents divorced whenI was two, so I was born to a
19.
My mom was 19, my dad was 21 um, both I don't know much about
(04:45):
my mom.
She died when I was reallyyoung.
But that's, I can get to that,it's going to get there.
Speaker 1 (04:49):
How old were you?
Speaker 2 (04:50):
I was six when she passed away.
She was 26.
I was six so I don't even thinkI ever really lived with my mom
and dad.
They kind of gave me to mygrandma right away.
We lived right across thestreet.
Half of our family lived on oneblock in alexandria, virginia,
beautiful, cute little block.
Yeah well, it wasn't cute then,like now it's cute because it's
(05:10):
been all all the yeah, um.
So yeah, they kind of gained mygrandma and, uh, I lived with
her most of my childhood upuntil my dad.
Oh man, I know you were, thisis geez, this is so much um this
is the good stuff though.
Yeah, so I live with my grandmaand when I was I mean I grew up
(05:31):
in again, grew up in Alexandria,virginia, and saw my dad get
stabbed at a drug deal gone badat the People's Drugstore on
Monroe Avenue.
Remember hitchhiking placeswith him and it was crazy.
My dad was a heroin addict.
I don't know what my mom wasaddicted to, but you don't have
one heroin addict and then onesober person.
(05:52):
So you know, I've always kindof created this vision of her
being this perfect person in myhead and over the past few years
I've realized that's absolutelynot true.
Speaker 1 (06:01):
There's never one toxic person in a relationship,
there's always two.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
No, my mom was a bit of a hellfire.
From what I've been told bysome family members A lot of
people they don't want to talkabout her just because her death
was so tragic, but she was ahellfire and she ran away from
home when she was 16 years oldand was with my dad off and on
going underage at clubs.
Speaker 1 (06:23):
Been told I was a lot like her, and when you said, oh
fire, I was getting ready to.
Speaker 2 (06:28):
That's about all I've been told.
You're just like Carol Ann.
So anyway, I live with mygrandma.
My grandma was my best friend.
I remember she would go to workevery day.
My granddad was always reallysick.
He passed away when I was three.
I remember waking up.
I slept in bed with my grandmaand I remember waking up to her
bawling her eyes out one morningbecause granddaddy had died.
(06:49):
And so after her granddad diedshe had to get to work and she
was a housekeeper at one of thelittle motels in Old Town,
alexandria.
She'd get me on the bus to goto school every morning and then
she'd get on the bus and she'dgo to work.
And I remember getting on thebus to go get our government
cheese and getting on the bus toto go do all this stuff.
Um, and that was only for a fewyears, and my dad met.
(07:10):
My dad met someone else and and, um, they were going to have
this great life together.
So my dad pulled up in hislittle blue van one day to my
grandma's house and took me awayand um, there's emotion yeah,
went to go live with him and mysoon-to-be stepmom I can't
remember if they were marriedyet or not, but anyway, and uh,
(07:31):
yeah, my stepmom was, was justas you're addicted, as my father
was and um, she came with awith a child already my, my
stepsister and um, that's reallywhere things got really, really
bad, because they were bothheroin addicts.
They were both really badheroin addicts and that just
went on to years and years ofjust severe abuse and neglect
(07:57):
and being kicked out of housesand in and out of houses and
cars being repossessed andwatching drug deals go down and
just all kinds of it was justhell.
Speaker 1 (08:10):
Going from house to house, never really having a
home of your own.
Speaker 2 (08:12):
Yeah, yeah, stealing food.
God bless my stepsister,because there were times we had
no food and she would go andlike literally steal food for us
.
Speaker 1 (08:19):
You told me about stealing toilet paper.
Speaker 2 (08:21):
Yes, and you know, I'd love to talk with her One
day.
Maybe she'll open up and she'lllet she and I do talk about
this, because we talked about alittle bit of North Carolina
like how we would, we'd love tokind of get some of this out.
But yeah, we had no toiletpaper and so we went to the
little in Manassas Park,virginia.
We walked into the little pizzashop.
Summer without electricity,running water.
(08:42):
Borrowing hot dogs Borrowing hotdogs from neighbors, and I mean
, this spans years and years.
This wasn't just.
This was.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
But it was consistent right.
There was always.
There's always lack and alwaysneglect.
Speaker 2 (08:55):
Yeah, yep.
So yeah, just all the years ofabuse.
My father he allowed his drugdealer friends to molest us kids
and just not knowing what wasgoing on, walking in with the
needles in their arms, watchingmy dad overdose.
I mean I remember putting mydad overdosing, seizing on the
(09:17):
floor, having to get him intocold water.
I mean just a lot, it was justa lot.
Yeah, yeah just a lot.
It was just, it was just a lot.
Yeah, yeah, so fast forward itto 15, oh yep, so I don't want
to talk about that becausethat's not my story to tell that
part.
Um, I found out some prettydisturbing secrets in the family
(09:39):
and, again, that's not my storyto tell.
So I don't, I don't want totalk about it right now and I
know the story and it'sdevastating and it's absolutely
vile.
Speaker 1 (09:48):
what happened and what?
Yeah what?
Speaker 2 (09:52):
one person would serve another person up to yeah,
and see, I was 14 years old andI had just gotten—my stepmother
was extremely abusive, I mean,she hated me.
She hated me because Irepresented my dad, having
previously loved another womanenough to have a child with her.
So that's sure free.
And I was pretty and I wassmart and all the boys always
(10:14):
liked me and and yeah, I just Ieverything just came easy to me.
Everything always came easy tome.
And I think and she absolutelyhated that my grandma loved me
so much and she hated the hat.
She hated just, she just hatedeverything about me.
And so I finally got sick.
I got sick of this shit and Ijust knew that I always wanted
better.
I always knew that I wasn't.
And my, my step-aunt said thatthey always knew that I was
(10:37):
different from when I was.
They met me when I was four orfive years old and they said
they always knew, they alwaysknew I was going to get out,
which is really cool.
He doesn't say that and Ialways my step-aunt I don't call
him my step-aunt my aunt Di.
She was a very successful she isa very successful caterer in
Washington DC and I rememberwe'd go to her house and she had
(10:58):
like all these luxury downcomforters and lotions and smell
like everything always smelledpretty.
I was like this is what I want,and even from like a very, very
young girl when we go and staywith them.
Like this is what I want, thisis who I am.
So I'm 14 years old.
Left home, I had an olderboyfriend.
He was not me, no, not him.
He same age as you, so he's sixyears older than me.
(11:18):
So kind of weird.
Looking back now, I was 14, hewas 20 it's kind of weird uh,
but yeah, I mean thank god forhim because I, I, I paged him
one day and he knew that the thecode I paged him meant to pick
me up from the bus stop in themorning and he picked me up and
I said I'm never going backthere and he said okay, and uh,
so I stayed with him.
(11:39):
From then on his um, his momand I are still very, very close
, very, we keep in touch.
And uh, yeah, thank god forthem because I, they, they took
care of me for for six years.
Speaker 1 (11:50):
But then this guy came along and and I came along
and I had almost nothing and hewas rich yeah and uh.
Speaker 2 (12:02):
so when I say things came easy to me, this is this is
a really great example of.
So I left home 14 and I turned15 and I had so my dad.
When my mom died she worked forthe Department of Defense, she
was a secretary.
So when she passed away I gother pension, I got Social
Security benefits and there wassomething else.
So there was some financesinvolved that my dad and stepmom
(12:24):
got every month from me beingin there.
Well, when I left home and thegovernment found out, they're
like well, you don't get themoney anymore.
So my dad said you come backhome and I said no, and then I
tried to get him to sign me intoschool.
He told me that I had to comeback home for them to get his
money back and I said absolutelynot.
(12:45):
And because he wouldn't sign meinto school, so I started
working.
I was working at a little cafein Bethesda, maryland, called
Sutton Blaze Gourmet and thisguy used to come in every single
day and he would order cheese,bread and an espresso.
And one day he started askingme.
He said how come you're neverin school?
And something just told me totell him.
(13:11):
Tell my story.
So I did.
The next day he came in he hada letter and he slid it across
the the counter and I opened itup and it was from his law
offices law offices of miles andstockbridge in rockville,
maryland, and mr james j demaesquire.
They uh offered to represent mefor pro bono in an emancipation
case against my dad.
And so, yeah, took my dad tocourt when I was 15, 16 years
(13:32):
old, got fully emancipated, yeah.
Speaker 1 (13:37):
Emancipated at 15, 16 .
Yeah, and we met.
So keep going, tell the story.
When you know we met inabnormal psychology class, and
tell the story and give somedetail to that too.
Speaker 2 (13:53):
Yeah, so I am.
Because I was an emancipatedminor, officially an adult,
under the Board of the State ofMaryland, and I was able to take
a college entrance exam.
To get to college I didn't haveto get my GED and took it, got
in to Montgomery College and,yeah, I didn't know what I was
(14:14):
doing.
I was just going to college, Iwas just taking random classes.
I didn't have a major oranything doing.
I was just going to college, Iwas just taking random classes,
I didn't have a major oranything.
And yeah, one day I bumped intoa normal psychology class.
I'm pretty sure I had platformshoes on and leopard print.
And leopard print.
Yeah, I probably just came fromthe club.
To be honest, I was a totalclub kid with a coke problem.
(14:36):
That actually came before it,yes.
But yeah, I stomped into thisclassroom in my little platform
shoes and somebody stole my bagthat day from the bookstore.
I came out, I just chomp, chomp, chomp into the room and I was,
oh my God, somebody stole mybooks and it was my English 101
book and he said you can borrowmy book, angela.
(14:57):
I'm like who?
Speaker 1 (14:58):
Because you got a tag .
You had your work tag.
She was an intern at IBM, soshe had her work tag and I just
called her.
What was on her tag?
That's it.
Speaker 2 (15:06):
Yeah, and I sat down in front of him and I remember
turning around he had his littleChuck Taylors on.
I said, where's Chuck Taylorsanymore?
Speaker 1 (15:14):
Yeah, she didn't like me, like me and I didn't like
her.
It was pretty obvious that weweren't fit to be together.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
We were neither of our other.
Our tied.
You were my fellow snow.
Speaker 1 (15:26):
You were obnoxious I still am and I was quiet.
I was a quiet guy in that class.
You were also elderly in thatclass Elderly, I was 27 years
old.
Speaker 2 (15:38):
Yeah, we were all 19, 20 years old in that class.
Because it was a 100-levelclass, he'd already had his
bachelor's degree.
Yeah, I just, he was justtaking for funsies I was just
burning some GI Bill.
Speaker 1 (15:47):
I took biology 101 and abnormal psychology 101 just
to burn.
I love science classes so yeah,I was just there for funsies
and I was obviously meant to be.
But the story I love out ofthat class is when we, when we
turned in our papers at the endof at the end of the course I
(16:08):
think of papers or or just anexam or something my paper and
she went up to get hers and shesaid, yeah, I got a c and that
kind of slightly set the tonefor a long time.
Speaker 2 (16:22):
But the ninth grade drop out and I was getting b's
and c's in college.
I was doing pretty damn good.
I was around myself.
Speaker 1 (16:29):
No, it was funny.
Okay, now, every day at the endof class and when I was in the
marine corps, what we would dois is we would have our work day
and I worked in an electronicslaboratory in the Marine Corps
and and at the end of every daywe we wrap up the day, we clean
up the clean up the shop and weempty all the trash and then
(16:49):
we'd all go to the club and theE club, right, the enlisted club
and at the end of every class,in uh, abnormal psychology I
would say anybody want to go outand grab a beer?
And everybody would say no.
And then there was this one dayafter the term ended, when I got
(17:09):
a phone call.
Speaker 2 (17:10):
No, it wasn't.
The term had ended because heate the stuff.
Speaker 1 (17:13):
Because, no, we were nearing the end of the class.
Speaker 2 (17:19):
It was December 11th, no, and uh, yeah, it was.
We were nearing the end of the.
It was, it was December 11th1999.
And uh, myself and my ex-fiancethen fiance and we were heading
out for a night the club groupand um, I said we had, literally
we had walked out of our condoand I stopped and I said let me
call this kid.
He's been wanting to go out allsemester, this kid.
Speaker 1 (17:43):
I wasn't that desperate.
Speaker 2 (17:45):
But I was just like.
He's been asking me to go outall semester and so I walked
back in, picked up the phone offthe wall and dialed the number
he gave me he was at workbecause he worked swing shift
design and I said hey, we'regoing out to the Shark Club.
You want to meet us?
He had no idea where it was, sohe had to meet us at the Exxon
gas station on ConnecticutAvenue and I went to the Shark
(18:06):
Club and he bought me my martini.
I first met him.
Speaker 1 (18:09):
Yeah, I was just literally being innocent in all
of this.
Speaker 2 (18:14):
I had no intentions, I just I thanked her for, you
know, with a drink for forinviting me.
Yeah Well, and we had beendoing project, we had he had
been on projects all semestertogether.
So back then it was acceptableto to go and it was abnormal
psychology.
So it was acceptable then to goand we had to have a field trip
to the, to the psychiatric ward.
Speaker 1 (18:36):
But there was, there was no spark at that moment.
And at that time there was,there was no spark, there was no
interest, there was no spark,there was no nothing.
So it was just interesting howthat that worked then.
And then, when there's thiswhole story about a transfer and
and and Well, I left, mike, heis in your Jeep Cause I met
Exxon.
Speaker 2 (18:54):
You didn't know how to get there and so I jumped
into the Jeep.
I got you over to the clubbecause it was in, but that's in
Maryland.
It's just a wonky little townLike.
There's just little sidestreets and he doesn't know
where he's going, even with GPS.
And this is back in 99.
Remember it was on GPS.
So, yeah, we were leaving.
There was an altercation in the.
I had to go.
I was going to get my keys frombetween me and my ex-fiancee at
(19:16):
that point and he said if youwalk away or not?
don't you ever come back home?
And I said something clickedand he said cool.
So I jumped in his Jeep and Iasked him to take me to my
friend Dorothy's house.
Dorothy wasn't home.
Speaker 1 (19:29):
She came home and never left, and that is the true
story.
Speaker 2 (19:34):
True story of Mike and Angie.
Speaker 1 (19:35):
When I said there was a whole transfer.
I don't know if we're going toget into that.
I still remember the story, butthe point is that she came home
and never left and it waspretty toxic.
It was pretty toxic from thebeginning.
I mean, we didn't have.
We sat on a lot of well, weblacked out a lot, we did a lot
of drinking and we did a lot ofpartying and we did a lot of.
(19:57):
We went to a lot of ravensgames and the very first day we
was a week after we startedliving together because we never
not lived together, really um,I took her to a ravens game and
I was crazy drunk at the end ofthe game.
We had a great time tailgating,but I had a.
(20:18):
I was was completelyobliterated, if that's a word,
and I started buying Sambucashots for the entire ball.
And that's when she kind oftook my card and called it the
night.
Speaker 2 (20:33):
Signed his name on his credit card, received
everything.
Then he lost my car.
I had to pay a little city kidin Baltimore to find my car.
I remember the name of therestaurant it was parked near
and that was it.
So the kid found my car.
Speaker 1 (20:45):
And then we drove home Right, or back to my
parents probably.
But the point being is itstarted pretty toxic.
This whole thing started toxic.
And then, you know, we movedout of that apartment because it
was a little beat up apartmentthat was mine, but we moved into
a house, bought a house, boughta car first because her fiance
(21:10):
wanted her car back.
So I bought a car and gave hermy old car.
She said she was going to makepayments on that car, but she
never did and I guess I just letthat go and overlooked that.
Um, I think you made onepayment and then never made
another.
You did, you made a payment Ithink we'll talk about that you
made a payment, then you nevermade another one, and then we
(21:31):
bought a house and then we gotpregnant and it all happened
pretty, pretty quickly and itwas like you know, it know it
was just a whirlwind and itwasn't always fun.
No, it definitely wasn't alwaysfun, because, I don't know, we
weren't, there was no spark inclass and I don't know for me if
there was really a spark, itjust felt, it was just a series
(21:55):
of yeses, but there was no realconnection, and I'm talking
about soul connection.
I mean, we were living togetherand we were doing life together
, but there was no real deep,purposeful, meaningful bond but
I don't know if either of usknew what the purposeful,
meaningful bond was.
No, I'm just looking back, Ijust remember what you used to
say we're soulmates and I'm likeare you crazy?
(22:16):
We freaking argue all the timeand we fight and all we do is
black out, get black out drunkbut okay, I do not get black.
Speaker 2 (22:22):
No, that was something you got, like you did
a couple, a couple times, but um, sorry.
Speaker 1 (22:28):
So we're pregnant, yeah, and we have a kid, and her
name is Caitlin McKenzie Kipko,and she is our older daughter
and she just graduated college,like two weeks ago.
So we have raised a whole assadult human being.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
It's pretty awesome and she is the very first person
on my side of the family tograduate college, so super cool.
Speaker 1 (22:50):
So Katie, katie's born in April of 2002 and we're
sitting there at at our house,in our townhouse, and I remember
this day and I remember we werein our bedroom and we were
holding katie and and I rememberangie saying you know it would
be, and it was like I don't knowif it was easter.
(23:11):
I think it might have beeneaster and we went up to.
Speaker 2 (23:13):
It had to have been because she was born in april.
Speaker 1 (23:15):
Yeah, and we went up to baltimore and spent easter
with my parents and then we wentup to Baltimore and spent
Easter with my parents and thenwe went down to Alexandria and
spent Easter down in with someof her family and her aunts.
And we were at our townhouse inthe bedroom and Angie said
these words.
She said, mike, wouldn't it beawesome if we just kind of like
moved away and just focused onour little family and not had
(23:37):
this chaos of driving all overand seeing all this family?
And that was like a Saturday.
And a couple of days later andyou can't make this shit up A
couple of days later I go towork on Monday and they pull us
in a conference room and theysay, hey, we're shutting this
field office down because thehome base for the company I
(23:57):
worked for was in Beaverton,oregon.
And they pulled us in and saidwe're shutting this field office
down and we're going to move.
We're going to ask some of youto move to Beaverton.
And there was five of us thatthey asked and I was one of them
and it was almost like Angielike just spoke that into
existence why don't we move?
And we got invited and theypaid all of our travel and they
(24:20):
put us up in a, in a littlecondo and and they, they gave us
spending money and it's likethey we couldn't have had a
better right and we we got whatwe wanted.
And when we we lived in oregonfor 10 years, we basically
raised our girls there and andthat's what they knew was home,
and he fell into a deeperdepression.
(24:42):
Yeah, in Oregon.
Speaker 2 (24:43):
Oh, in Oregon, yeah, it was.
It was bad, not just, not justa depression.
I mean, we, we had Katie, wewere out there by our, by our,
by ourselves.
Speaker 1 (24:53):
Yeah, we had nobody we had.
Speaker 2 (24:54):
We had nobody.
As much as I didn't want that,the hecticness of all the
multiple family holidays andcrap, we got out there and I was
totally alone, totally alone.
Speaker 1 (25:04):
And I was working and Angie hadn't, didn't have a job
right away.
No, you did, you did, but thenyou quit.
Enterprise transfer, jim, youas well.
Speaker 2 (25:14):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (25:15):
So they gave you a position in the accounting
office right, we're recruiting,I was recruiting, recruiting.
So she went to work, but thenshe started having some health
problems and that's when shebecame a stay-at-home mom, and
that's when things reallystarted to slow down.
Speaker 2 (25:29):
Yeah, that was definitely not good for me, yeah
.
And then I think that when itreally started, when we lost, we
had Katie.
And then, when Katie was a yearold, we got pregnant again and
we lost our boy when I was sixmonths pregnant and that was
very, very, very difficultbecause when he passed away they
(25:52):
still had to carry him for twoweeks in the womb before they
could get me in for surgery toremove him.
And I think that was, I thinkthere was a mix I was probably
still dealing with postpartumwith katie and then get pregnant
and lose the baby in thistragic way, and then the the
absolute trauma of having tocarry your dead child and you
(26:14):
and that wasn't the end.
Speaker 1 (26:15):
So you carried, you carried him and they did a.
Basically, what is it called?
A DNC?
A DNC, but there's another wordExtraction.
Okay, that's the word I waslooking for, and then they left
some in there.
So she went into labor again toextract, to eject some of the
(26:38):
parts that they left.
So it's like I don't, I don'tknow like I want to sum it up to
this point.
It was like one tragedy and one, you know, one hurtful event
after another, and and it waslike it wasn't getting any
easier, it just kept gettingharder and harder and it's like
the all the stress and tensionand struggle and all this
(26:59):
turmoil just kept building.
Speaker 2 (27:00):
Well, and then after that they said they weren't even
sure if I was going to be ableto get pregnant again.
And then at that point I wasdesperate to give Katie a
sibling.
And then we got pregnant withMegan.
Yeah, we got pregnant withMegan, but then Megan's
pregnancy was yeah, it was.
Speaker 1 (27:14):
Yeah, Megan, it was both of them.
Both pregnancies were difficult.
They weren't easy and we're nottrying to make everything bad
news, but it was.
We didn't have an easy firstfreaking 16 years together, and
before that you didn't have avery easy life.
I don't think either of us did,but I didn't.
At least I didn't have thefreaking poverty and the
(27:36):
addiction, growing up in theaddictive state.
You know circumstances theaddiction.
Speaker 2 (27:40):
Growing up in the addictive state, you know
circumstances and it wasdefinitely all of that trauma
compounded is what pushed meinto the addiction piece because
you know, at that point I wasso mentally unstable and
emotionally unwell and and notknowing how to deal with any of
it, not even recognizing it asas as trauma and and just having
you know I came from a veryIrish family and just swept
(28:02):
everything under the damn rug oryou drank it away, and not
knowing how to process or haveanybody to process it with, or
even us just having healthydiscussions like we do now.
Speaker 1 (28:14):
Sure, and I think we had none of them.
No, it was all about sports ordrinking or just superficial
shit, nothing really deep andmeaningful.
Speaker 2 (28:24):
It's all compounded.
So doctors kept prescribing memore and more medications and
drugs and I was in and out ofthe hospital and in and out of
psych wards and in and out ofrehabs.
It was just, it was a lot.
Speaker 1 (28:33):
I had to call 911 a lot to have her, like, removed
from the house, taken to a psychward.
And our girls grew up in psychwards.
They and we just had aconversation, probably a month
or two ago, where Katie said Iremember always going to the
hospital but I didn't know therewere a psych.
They were psych wards.
But yeah, that was we.
Our kids grew up going tovisitation at the psych wards
(28:56):
and rehab and just everythingelse and at some point Angie was
taking four to 500 pills amonth.
It was like crazy and butthat's, that's just Oregon.
Then then we, then we move.
You know, once again I rememberAngie saying hey, we, I don't
want to live here for the restof my life and if we are going
to move, we got to move beforethe girls are in middle school
(29:18):
and they were entering.
They were like just a fewmonths, not not long.
It was like six months before,before, before Katie was was
going to be graduating and goinginto middle school and by when
Angie speaks something intoexistence.
It tends to happen because myphone started lighting up with
recruiters and we interviewed inSan Diego and I I went to
(29:42):
Connecticut or Illinois andChicago and St Louis and we had
a couple other options down in.
You know other other ones inCalifornia and different,
different recruiters calling Um.
Cause I was.
I was an executive leader incorporate America and I was.
I had done some really goodwork at Stanley Black Decker,
the company I was with.
(30:02):
So I was being recruited byother companies that kind of
knew what was going on, what washappening, and we had our pick
and we chose St Louis Missouri,right outside of St Louis
Missouri, and that's where welive today.
So we've been here for 13 years.
But when we got here it kind ofgot worse.
When we got here, if it wasn'tbad enough in Oregon, when we
(30:24):
got here, it got worse before itgot better.
But Angie fell deeper intodepression and I was going to
work and we're still drinking.
I remember on Fridays when Iwas pulling away from the plant
and you would send me picturesof the two 12 that you had just
bought and and you were homeprobably clean and usually
cleaned on Fridays and and youhad your music up and we were
(30:45):
going to go drinking a lot afterthat.
But the point being is she felldeeper into a depression and
things just slid downwards evenmore until I got there was there
was a lot of volatility in ourmarriage.
Let's just say that.
We're not going to go into deepdetail.
There was some infidelity bothways and and uh, we I got fired
(31:07):
from my first position that thatthe energy company that brought
us out to Oregon or to Missouri.
And then, uh, and I was withthose guys for about 18 to 20
months and then we had fivemonths worth of severance.
They they treated us really andthen we had five months worth
of severance.
They treated us really well andthey gave us five months worth
of severance and we drank it all.
We used to pick our girls updrunk from the bus stop at 2.30
(31:31):
and it didn't get any better.
And then that severance wasgoing to run out in January of
2015.
And in December of 2014, I gota job offer.
So we went into Christmasknowing that I was going to have
a job after, after the holiday.
So we drank a lot because andthen I had that job for 15
(31:51):
months because she wasn't in anybetter shape.
I wasn't in any better shape.
Our marriage wasn't in anybetter shape.
Nothing had been cleared,nothing had been cleansed,
nothing had been healed.
Speaker 2 (32:01):
We were just we were making money, though, so we were
making money, so that's all wereally cared about you know, I
there was.
I never had a stable place tolive.
I one time switched schools Idon't remember how many times in
one year I had lived like nineto ten times because we moved so
much.
So like, oh, my girls have astable home, they have a stable
school, we've got money, they'renot.
(32:22):
Yeah, so I think you're doingbetter.
Speaker 1 (32:25):
And Angie thought when we hit six figures in my
new book, she wrote the forward,the first forward, and she said
we had a traditional marriagein that I would complain for
what, he would go to work and Iwas a nagging wife at home
complaining for more Right.
(32:47):
And it's exactly what it was.
It was like more, more, more,more.
But we hit the a hundredthousand dollar mark and Angie
thought and this was, I was inmy thirties and Angie thought
that that was going to solve allof our problems.
Speaker 2 (32:58):
When we hit that hundred thousand, I mean I used
to go, we used to go and have touse our food stamps to go and
buy a five cent piece of candy.
So like 95 cents was a big dealback then and you know as a
child in that serious you knowthat poverty stricken time and
so shit, making $100,000 a yearI'm like damn we made it.
Speaker 1 (33:19):
Yeah.
And I thought that was gonna fixeverything, but it's nothing
and again that was back inoregon, but you didn't touch it
and that.
And then things when I hit thehundred thousand dollar mark,
nothing got better.
She sank deeper into it andinto addiction.
But anyway, then we were here,I got fired for the second time
and that's when everything,that's when everything changed.
You know, the first time I gotfired it was like, okay, I used
(33:42):
to have a boss.
His name was Marty Schnur andMarty was awesome and he was the
president of our division inStanley and Marty I remember him
joking.
He said if you haven't beenfired once as an executive,
you're not a professional.
So the first time I got fired,I'm like I'm executive, right,
but uh, but the second time Iwas like, all right, something's
(34:04):
got to change.
And and I started going on thisjourney.
I hired a coach and and Angiewas like you're, and that was
actually a school friend of mine, guy that I went to to uh, to
grad school with, and he wasdoing some coaching, he was kind
of new in the coaching spaceand I started paying him and
she's like what You're payingyour friend?
You're paying him to be yourfriend, are you a therapist
(34:36):
working out?
And I started losing weight andI started reading and I started
meditating and I startedjournaling and I started you
know I've got books all overthis house but I started leaving
all these cool things that Iwas learning.
I started leaving them like onsticky notes at the kitchen
table saying, angie here, like,read this, read this, read this
you know dog-earing pages andjust leaving her writing things
(34:58):
and just getting her to try tolean in a little bit and she
wanted nothing to do with it andI was trying to bring her along
and I'm trying to get her tolearn what I was learning and to
feel what I was feeling, causeI was finally starting to feel
really good and in my body andkind of in my mind,
understanding what was happeningin my mind and my body, I
started feeling really good.
I wanted her to experience thattoo, and she didn't want that
(35:22):
at that point.
And I don't know, maybe, maybethat's wrong.
You often say it's not that youdidn't want it, you didn't
think it was available to you,or that you were just, or you
were worth it.
Speaker 2 (35:30):
Yeah, it was just.
It was just again and I didn'tknow this at the time we talked
about this on on episode 102 isI just didn't know.
I didn't feel worthy of beingthe person capable of making
those changes.
So it was just, it was aself-worth issue, like you know.
I think it was.
Yeah, I think, recognizing allthe the horrible things and the
horrible person that I was forso long like there was, just
(35:53):
didn't think it was available tome.
I think I was worth it.
Speaker 1 (35:55):
Not anymore, you're not a horrible person anymore.
And three months in, prettyawesome, and we did the best we
could.
We weren't even horrible, wewere just doing the best we
(36:16):
could.
And a couple months into thisjourney, when she wasn't really
opting in, in fact, as I startedon like five interviews and I
came up runner up in all of themand after a while I was like,
okay, well, I guess that likewhole job thing is closed and I
decided to, you know, start acoaching business.
Because, to be honest, when Iwas in corporate, the only thing
I ever loved was developingpeople and developing teams.
I didn't love the wholecorporate thing and I didn't
(36:38):
love the job thing, but I didlove having somebody to develop
and to coach and to teach and Ilove that.
And I loved developing myorganization, I loved developing
my functional leaders.
But there was an epiphany onceI'm sitting there listening to
him, I'm like he's doing exactlylike my dream job and if he
(37:02):
could do this, why can't I dothat?
That's kind of like when thatwhole thing started to happen
and unfold and that's when Ikind of committed, I told Angie,
I said I'm going to start acoaching business and she said
no, you need to go get a job.
Speaker 2 (37:16):
You work Monday through Friday, nine to five.
We give you four weeks vacation, 401k insurance.
Speaker 1 (37:27):
Yeah, we need benefits.
We need benefits, we need a job.
And I committed and I was inbut I filed for divorce.
It just still wasn't goodbetween us and there were lots
of attacks and I mean, it's justthat old life had expired but
we were still living in remnantsof that old life.
But I knew that that chapterwas done and I filed for divorce
, not knowing that we were goingto put everything back together
.
(37:48):
But I just made a post yesterday.
I said when one person startsdoing the inner work and the
other person doesn't, one of theunintended sad consequences is
growing apart.
And when one person's doing theclearing work and spiritual
work the inner, the mental, theemotional, the healing work and
(38:12):
one person's not, it's just amatter of time before you're not
going to be together anymore.
And that's what I felt.
I was like, okay, this is done,I'm moving on.
And I filed for divorce andAngie was high when I told her
that, really high when I toldher pharmaceutical addiction, so
not like street drugs.
But when I told her I was high,she laughed at me and belittled
(38:35):
me and the next day she wascrying and we had long, long
conversations and I was.
I was still wasn't committed torebuilding the marriage.
But I put a pause on thedivorce and I said let's, let's
test your commitment, let's seeif you're really committed to
this.
And from there we went to NAthat night and there's been a
(38:55):
couple of relapse.
There were a couple of relapsesup to like.
This is 2016 and we're talkingabout 2017, 2018 2017 is the
other books, so 2019.
So shit, it's 1819.
So anyway, there were a couplerelapses and when that last
(39:16):
relapse happened, it's like thatwas it?
Yep, that was the one, yeah,yeah.
And we just keep stacking winsand we just keep.
It's not all like butterfliesand unicorns and rainbows.
I'm not easy to live with.
No, you're not.
I'm not.
And I'm not either though You'reeasier to live with than you
(39:40):
think, you make my life easy.
The point being is it's not allbutterflies and rainbows.
We do have challenges, we dohave obstacles.
Our business goes up, ourbusiness goes down.
There's still financialinsecurity that creeps in every
once in a while, but what's notpresent is a lack of commitment
to each other, a lack ofdedication to each other.
(40:01):
We don't threaten divorce.
We don't talk about ending ourmarriage.
Speaker 2 (40:07):
It's no longer us against us, it's no longer Angie
versus Mike or Mike versusAngie.
It's Mike and Angie versus usagainst the problem the
challenge.
Yeah, and someone you know, youtalked about that that when the
unintended consequence of oneperson growing, someone on that
post had said or you just createspace for the other person, but
that space is very limited.
And that's what I think andthat's where that's what you
(40:31):
created that space for me, butit was.
There's no way that we would besitting here seven years later
just with you still holding thatspace, because that's just,
that's just not possible.
Speaker 1 (40:40):
Yeah, well, it there's.
I think, and I know that, Iknow the, the comment, I think
the assumption there is that thethere's no attacking and you're
both living your lives, becausewhen you were attacking and you
just kept attacking as I keptgrowing, you kept attacking more
and I think it was insecurity.
Right, it was just.
It was just insecurity.
(41:00):
Hey, even girls, even our girls, tried to get me to stop
growing and stop doing thespiritual work that I was doing,
because they didn't know who Iwas becoming, they were
unfamiliar with who I wasbecoming.
Suddenly I, you know, I startedfeeling like Zen and and I
started doing like monk shit andand our, our operations
assistant, cara Dossi, is likeme, me monk Mike, because I sit
(41:24):
in long periods of solitude andsilence and with my eyes closed
and just feeling like good.
But yeah, that wasn't the oldMike.
Speaker 2 (41:35):
Well, when you're used to a life of chaos and
peace feels like boredom, whenyou're addicted to chaos you
said it, but when you'readdicted to chaos, and peace
feels like boredom when you'readdicted to chaos.
Speaker 1 (41:42):
you said it, but when you're addicted to chaos, peace
feels like boredom.
So you tend to create somechaos in your life.
But here's the cool part, andthis is the part.
This is where I was thinking wewere going to go before we
started this.
Angie has gone from poundnobody knows a pound I'm gonna
(42:07):
give him a baseball.
Is that the first?
No, no, no, that wasn't thefirst one.
No, angie explored uh mlms andstarted working in network
marketing and did that for alittle bit and decided that that
wasn't for her.
Then there's pound class, andimagine a fitness program where
(42:27):
you have two drumsticks andthere's loud music and you tap
and you move and there's alittle bit of dancing and stuff
involved.
And she took some pound classesto learn how to lead that and
she did a great job for a whileand she had a lot of fun with it
until she didn't.
Speaker 2 (42:44):
Well, COVID hit and then, yeah, there was no place
to teach and we tried doing avirtual yeah.
Speaker 1 (42:49):
And now one day she said you know what?
I'm going to go get my realestate license.
And she got a partner in realestate, our good friend, katie
Chatfield, who used to be ouroperations manager in
Interwealth Global.
They Her Wealth Global.
(43:12):
They build, or they started, areal estate investing company.
They walk houses relentlessly.
They've made tons of offers,haven't closed their first deal
yet, have come very, very closeto closing the first deal.
They will.
But they are pros.
They've become pros at walkinghouses.
They're doing the work.
I've worked with many peoplewho said that they wanted to
start a real estate investingbusiness and they didn't take
any action whatsoever.
It was all talk, no action.
(43:33):
But these ladies have freakinggone crazy with submitting
offers, walking properties,education.
Angie decided that she wantedto get a real estate license,
agency license and she actuallydid that.
She has her license.
She's a licensed real estateagent.
Now she just held her firstopen house this last Sunday.
(43:55):
She crushed it.
Speaker 2 (43:56):
Do another one this Sunday.
Speaker 1 (43:57):
She's networking with real estate investors.
She's networking with realestate agents at her brokerage.
She's showing up more in thereal estate space at her
brokerage.
She's showing up more in thereal estate space.
Her life and I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm trying to be respectful
about this and not demeaning.
If you were to look at her lifejust a couple of years ago, it
was really Mike Kitko and hiswife, angie, because it's like
(44:21):
when she walked into a room shewas Mike's wife and I never
wanted that, but that's, that'swhat, what existed.
And now she goes places andshe's Angie Kitko and they know
her and she's her own brand andshe's she's living in her own
power and she's becoming knownfor who she is and what she does
, what she brings to the table,not just as a plus one for me,
(44:44):
and that feels really, reallygood for me.
Speaker 2 (44:47):
Yeah, it also feels good being Mike's wife.
I always enjoy being Mike'swife.
Speaker 1 (44:51):
And I love when we go to real estate meetups and I'm
Angie's husband.
Speaker 2 (44:55):
Yep Right.
Speaker 1 (44:56):
Yeah, cause I'm there supporting you instead of you
supporting me, and I think thatfeels really, really good is
finally being able to show up tosupport you in something that
you're doing instead of viceversa.
It feels really good.
It is so freaking fulfilled.
I'm so blessed to have you justin my life and as my wife and
as my support, my greatestcheerleader and it's finally
(45:19):
good to be a cheerleader for youfor once.
Damn it, whew.
So the whole point of thisepisode was to celebrate our
200th episode.
Speaker 2 (45:34):
And congratulations.
Thank you, that's a hugeaccomplishment, hunter, thank
you, I appreciate that that's alot of topics.
He'll say to me what should Ido my podcast on?
I don't know, if I had thattype of creativity I'd have my
own damn podcast.
Speaker 1 (45:49):
Yeah, you just say the same thing over and over a
lot.
So you know how a little bitago you said, oh, we covered
that on the 100th podcastepisode.
But when you record a podcastyou assume that not everybody's
listened to every episode andyou unpack the stories, right,
but a lot of the same things.
But in a lot of cases they'rethe same thing, said different,
(46:10):
right, so that you see them andyou understand them from
different angles.
And we just keep.
I just I have a bit of wisdomand I keep deepening my
understanding of the wisdom andI keep sharing the deepening of
that understanding of the wisdomand it keeps like growing in my
life and people's lives.
But the purpose, the secondarypurpose, was to celebrate 200
(46:34):
episodes when we jumped on here.
It's to help you understandAngie and her story that, no
matter how much suffering youexperience as a child you
experienced as a child no matterhow much suffering that got
amplified in the second andthird decade of your life, the
(46:55):
fourth and fifth decade can bedecades of rebirth and
reinvention it's not too late.
And re-reconciliation let's saythat I'm looking for more
re-words, but we canreinventself anytime we want and
heal, but it takes.
It takes getting into, uh, intoa place where we get, we, we
(47:17):
develop a healthier sense ofself-awareness.
Start to reshape ourself-concept, because our
self-concept is our ownlimitation and also it also
means coming to terms with.
Speaker 2 (47:28):
You're not a victim.
Yeah, and that was the thingthat was one of the biggest
things was I was stuck in such aheavy victim mentality.
It's all these things that justkept happening to me.
Speaker 1 (47:41):
And we were both looking for a way to be a victim
and one of my favorite books,the Big Leap by Gay Hendricks.
He said all arguing is is twopeople fighting to see who's the
bigger?
Oh, me too, me too.
I'll say it again All anargument is is two people
fighting to see who's the biggervictim?
And when you frame it like that, it's a holy shit.
I never want to argue, everagain.
(48:02):
Little bitch right.
So I hope you guys had fun herein angie's story.
You have anything else you wantto share?
Speaker 2 (48:11):
no, just again congratulations on on your
future.
I think that's the yeah, I'mvery, very proud of you.
Speaker 1 (48:16):
Thank you so much, very proud to be your wife
there's going to be another 200episodes and then we'll do this
more and at some point we'regoing to rebrand it to the Inner
Wealth Podcast with Mike andMike Kikko and sometimes Andy.
Speaker 2 (48:31):
Every time you say and some I feel like the cartoon
.
Speaker 1 (48:35):
I think that's fun.
But look, over the comingmonths we got some really cool
stuff happening All right In.
For a year I've been writing abook and I've written a bunch of
books that never got, that arestill on my laptop and never got
published.
But we are on August 19th we'republishing a new book and it's
(48:56):
called.
It's called inner world outerworld and it's my soul project.
When I when I released my myfirst book, the imposter in
charge that book, it was goodbut it wasn't the one that I
wanted to write.
I wrote that as more of amarketing book instead of an
expression of my soul.
But this is an expression of mysoul and Angie wrote the first
(49:17):
forward and a lot of people thathave read this book said that's
actually the best part of thebook.
So even if you only get to thefirst forward, it's well worth
it.
But we've got that coming up.
We've got the Choose yourDestiny workshop.
The next Choose your Destinylive workshop live intensive is
(49:38):
August 22nd and 23rd.
So we launched the book onAugust 19th.
The 22nd, 23rd we had theworkshop, so it's going to
parlay nicely.
We've got a retreat with ourmastermind in September In Park
City, utah Park City, utah.
It was super.
Those are always awesome.
We've got an eight-bedroomhouse lodged in the mountains.
It's going to be amazing.
Speaker 2 (49:58):
And as a current connoisseur of the secret lives
of Mormon wives, I'm reallyexcited to go to Utah.
Speaker 1 (50:08):
Here's something that is still in the formative
stages.
That I'm really excited aboutis Auntie and I are
collaborating on somethingcalled Unbreakable, and what
we're looking to do is takecouples on a retreat maybe a
three-day retreat get somewherein seclusionlusion, in isolation
, where it's just us and we take, we help these couples take a
(50:30):
great marriage and make it evengreater.
We're not looking to be you'rein crisis, looking to be a
therapist, but we're justlooking for people that are.
We're going to be looking forpeople that have really, really
solid relationships, that theywant to make unbreakable Right.
And it is going to be a higherend offering.
It is going to be a premierretreat, so we're going to we're
(50:55):
going to look to make this onebig and really juicy, and I'm
excited for that and that helps.
You know, that is kind of whatinspired me to say Hey's start
talking about the whole story,not just bits and pieces of it
On the last three episodes.
Cool.
So we're going to end here.
(51:16):
Thanks for continuing Everysingle week to show up and
listen to this podcast and watchthe podcast and hear the same
things over and over Again andto hear the same intro and the
same outro, because I loveconsistency.
But thanks for yourfollowership, thanks for your
viewership, thanks for your love, your devotion to us, thanks
(51:38):
for your support, thanks foreverything, because without you
guys, we wouldn't have made itto 200 episodes, right, but you
guys make it easier to makegreat content and to put it out
in the world.
So, from the bottom of my heart, thank you for everything that
you've supported us through andall the love that you've given
us.
And this is the end of the200th episode.
(52:00):
And now we've got 200 more tomake.
Let's go, guys, until next week.
Love you all.
More to make.
Let's go, guys, until next week.
Love you all.
If you enjoyed what you heardand you want to learn more, go
to wwwinnerwealthglobalcom formore tools and resources.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
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
Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang
Ding dong! Join your culture consultants, Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang, on an unforgettable journey into the beating heart of CULTURE. Alongside sizzling special guests, they GET INTO the hottest pop-culture moments of the day and the formative cultural experiences that turned them into Culturistas. Produced by the Big Money Players Network and iHeartRadio.