2. The Addicted Mentality

Episode Transcript
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(00:12):
Hey, it's Alex with it sensitive. Today we have Brian ge what's up?
What's up? And we're gonna betalking about mental health, similar to
last not week a couple of weeksago now, and Brian G and I
know each other from high school actually, so that will be a fun conversation.

(00:34):
But we'll touch on mental health,addiction, and family a little bit.
But before we get started with that, I just had ice cream for
breakfast this past Saturday because it's Nationalice Cream for Breakfast Day. So what's
your favorite ice cream? I wouldhave to say I like the cookie Brownie
mix, anything cookie brownie mix,But I don't know that I could do

(00:56):
it for breakfast. That's interesting.I didn't know there even was a national
ice cream for breckfad this day.Well, now you know, I'll have
to remember that. Maybe I'll celebrateit next year in February. Great February.
It seems counterintuitive a little bit.Yeah, So funny story about knowing
each other from high school. Brianand I actually were in this similar program

(01:19):
called Junior ROTC and we ended upbeing on the drill team together and did
an armed exhibition duet. We've doneseveral of them, yeah. And the
other way we also knew each otheris me and my brother don't have the
same last name and don't look likeyou like, and Brian didn't know that

(01:42):
my brother was related to me.Yeah. It was a house party that
I was invited to and I showedup and seeing Alex there and I'm like,
oh shit, you're at the sameparty. That's awesome. She's like,
I live here and I'm like,whoa. I did not know that.
Ever since then we just kind ofbecame friends. Yeah, it's pretty
awesome. So I promised somebody Itell this story before we get into the

(02:06):
deep. It's sensitive stuff. Butduring one of our duets, which for
those of you who don't know,is us spinning around nine pounds in one
grand old school World War two rifles. They're heavy, super heavy, and
we were doing super cool like movementsand spinning the rifle. And I was

(02:29):
kneeling on the ground and you werestanding right above me spending that rifle yep,
and I spun I think it washelicopter, and I was coming back
around to swing it to my side. I smacked you right in the head
with it. Yeah. Literally,when you think about it, think about
a bobblehead. My head just wentleft and right, bobbling, and I
kept spinning the rifle and we keptgoing. And part of the military drill

(02:53):
is that you keep your bearing.We still got second place. Yeah,
and if I remember right, therewas no blood drawn, no, which
I'll hurt, like, yeah,bitch, that was a good time.
Hell yeah. So the funny thingis we're talking about high school and both
of us have been on our ownjourneys over the last several years. I'm

(03:15):
in there, we're in our thirtiesnow. I think we're both in our
thirties. Yeah, yeah, Andwe've definitely watched each other grow a lot
over this last several years, growand go through hell, grow through hell.
Basically, I would say, yeah, I grow through hell is accurate,
and we're here to normalize that alittle bit. Today. We'll be

(03:38):
talking about a lot of different stuff. It's going to be a little bit
tough, but we're going to normalizeit. So the first thing talking about
our journeys is I'll kind of openup a little bit about mine and let
Brian get into what he's went throughwith alcoholism and addiction and how that's related
to mental health and for me.I was more on the end of the

(04:00):
spectrum where I was been eating alot as a way to cope with depression,
anxiety, being sad, and beeneeating, for those of you that
don't know, is like eating alot of food until you feel like super
fool or you know, just waytoo much because it makes you feel better.
You get that oxytocin and that dopaminefrom eat over eating. But there's

(04:27):
other things that do that too,and that's where alcohol and drugs and things
of that nature come into play.You know. I've always been kind of
experimental since even before I was evenin high school. I think I got
my first bottle of vodka in eighthgrade from one of my friends. He
stole it from his mom, andI bought it from him in class,

(04:48):
and so that's kind of where itstarted. Now. Granted, when I
was younger, i'd say about likethree years old, that's when I had
my first rum runners. So alcoholhas always just kind of been present in
my life. And then, youknow, gone on turning fifteen and up,
then my parents started let me drinkon New Year's and then from there
going to eighteen, I was hangingout with people that were already, you

(05:09):
know, at the end of theirtwenties into their thirties, and they were
teaching me how to drink. Andwhen I say teaching me how to drink,
I mean like hard liquor. I'mnot talking just you know, casual
drinking beer on a Saturday. I'mtalking about partying almost every night and drinking
hard liquor that anything above ninety twoproof. If it was under that,

(05:29):
we weren't drinking it. And thisis when I was eighteen, So yeah,
that's pretty tough, man. Theirony is my mom offered to let
me drink at a pretty young agebecause it's very common in European culture,
but like I never had the desireto because it's always on the table,
you know. The same with drugseven She's like, you know, if

(05:54):
you're want to do drugs, justtry it at home and be safe about
it. Which's just funny because yourmom was my mom and I actually did
drink and smoke with her a lot. So funny how that happens, right,
right, But yeah, like whenwould you say, like the alcoholism
just kind of kicked in for you, Like when it was really more of

(06:14):
a problem as opposed to just drinkingcasually a problem. I would say I
was getting into being about twenty sixAbout twenty sixteen, twenty seventeen, I
would say, is when it started. I was going through a lot of
rocky relationships, both like you know, in a relationship with my son's mom

(06:36):
at the time, and then justalso the friendships that I was involved in.
You know, got to that pointwhere the drinking just felt really good.
I mean, let's stem back.I remember my first uh, Irish
car bomb. I was eighteen,and I had one of my best friends
made an Irish car bomb for me, and uh, she said, make

(07:00):
sure you drink that thing all theway down because if you stop halfway through,
you will throw up. So Ichugged that thing all the way down,
and eighteen, I was eighteen,chugged that thing all the way down,
and then from my lips all theway down to my toes went numb.
And when I say went numb,I mean in a great way,
like the greatest feeling ever. Fromthere on I knew, I was like,
this is the feeling I want righthere. So, you know,

(07:24):
going back forward twenty seventeen, twentysixteen was when I was starting to get
to the point to where I wasdrinking hard liquor every day. I wasn't
much of a beer drinker, dranka lot of hard liquor, so I
drank, you know, that,almost every day, and then it got
to the point to going into liketwenty eighteen, twenty nineteen, it became

(07:44):
daily. And how old were youthen twenty eighteen? I was twenty five,
twenty six somewhere around there. SoI mean, this wasn't you know,
this is like good five years ago. My alcohol problem has been stemming
for since about twenty eleven, sothat's when it first started coming up.
You know. I started drinking backin twenty eleven and was steady since twenty

(08:09):
eleven up until last year. Soyeah, I mean that it was something
that was just there. It iseasy to get my hands on, and
you know, it's not something youhave to wait for. You can just
go to the liquor store, gasstation, anywhere you go. It's readily
available. So it's just easy.No matter what it was, I could
get my hands on it, andyou know, just get that feeling to
go away as soon as possible.You know, it's interesting you say that

(08:31):
because I'm thinking about my own journeywith overeating, and I've been overweight my
whole life, like since high school. You knew me back again. And
it's kind of strange now that I'mthinking about this, because I feel like
people don't talk about overeating or undereating or eating in general being like an

(08:52):
addiction. But I feel like alcoholismis more visible in the addiction feel like
ways to get help. And itwasn't an so I started getting mental health
help or weight loss hope that westarted talking about eating being in it not
an addiction per se, but itbeing like the driver behind or a coping

(09:13):
mechanism for my mental health exactly.And it sounds like alcohol was like a
coping mechanism potentially for you as youwere going through a lot of stuff.
Yeah. I mean the thing too, is alcohol wasn't the start. I
mean, so back when I wasin high school, I think it was
my freshman year I started taking Adderallthat was for fun. I wasn't prescribed
it. It was for fun.Sophomore year, junior year, I started

(09:37):
kind of experimenting with vicodin, andthen going into my senior year, started
experimenting with xanax. But in themidst of all that too. By the
time I was sixteen, I think, I, you know, it was
more of a pothead than anything.I smoked weed religiously, and that's what
I always thought I was gonna do. I always thought that weed was for

(09:58):
me, like that's it, LikeI didn't need anything else. And then,
you know, I got hit withthe charges back in twenty ten,
when I was in a whole differentlife. That's something we can touch on
too if you want to. Butbut yeah, I was in a whole
different life. And so then afterI got out of that, I quit
smoking, and I quit smoking andI quit doing everything. I was on

(10:20):
probation for a year and a half, so I got off everything. I
wasn't on anything. And then bythe time that year and a half of
probation was up, I felt freeagain, and I was like, okay,
well I'm free. So first thingI did was started smoking weed,
and then after that started drinking alcohol. So it all stems. I mean,
there's a stem. I don't reallylike to consider anything being a gateway

(10:43):
because I started with pills and Ihad dropped the pills for weed, and
then I stopped smoking weed and wentto alcohol. I don't consider it gateway.
I'd just more consider it, youknow, finding the thing that feels
the best at that time. Youknow, I think that's a good call
out because I've talked to people aboutmarijuana being still a tool for addiction,
because I here a lot of people, unfortunately, including my brothers, say,

(11:07):
oh, marijuana is not addictive,But I'm like, anything can be
addictive if you have an addictive personalityor a reason to get addicted. Correct.
Absolutely, I mean marijuana absolutely doeshave an addiction you know, mechanism
to it that may not be registeredthe same way as what other addictions are,

(11:28):
but it's no different than like say, smoking cigarettes. Somebody that's addicted
to nicotine. You're addicted to nicotine. You're the same way that you could
be addicted to THHC. You cravethat high. It's an addiction. You're
you know, you're going with auta cigarette, Then what's going to happen
to your mood? You know,you're just gonna be all over the place
until you have your nicotine. Samething happens with people with weed. You
know, you're all over the placeuntil you get your THHD and it calms

(11:50):
you down. It's an addiction.Oh yeah, I absolutely agree, and
I feel that way about eating sometimestoo. I'm much better now than I
used to be, but like Iremember being younger, I think we all
joke because Snickers made it popular,But the term angry hangry can sometimes be
more of an issue of like mentalhealth and less because of physical hunger.

(12:13):
And I say that because I've wentthrough being angry more out of mental health,
like I am so starving or Iwait so long between eating because I'm
so stressed out that like my eatinghabits are erratic, and then I BINGI
and I eat so much until Ijust feel sick or until I'm just so
fool, or I get to thepoint that I'm hungry because I'm just not

(12:35):
properly taking care of myself. Andfor me, a lot of that stemmed
from like depression, and I wasunfortunately in denial that I was in depression
because I talked about this on thetop not topic but podcasts with Lauren about
it's hard to talk about. ButI went through counseling and high school because

(13:00):
my teachers saw me self harming andthey referred me to a service to see
a counselor. And I went throughcounseling for like four years pretty regularly,
and I remember standing on a stagetelling them that, oh yeah, I
was able to, you know,manage depression without medication, and that was
a big deal for me. Andthen I graduated high school and I'm like,

(13:22):
oh, I'm an adult, nowI can control my life. And
that wasn't the reality, Like depracticewas still absolutely a problem. So I
think it's important to like recognize,like also denying mental health problems. It
is a problem sometimes too. Isee it as the same way as you

(13:45):
know, somebody that's wanting to getoff the substances, you know, you
have to want it, and soit's the same with your mental health.
You have to want to get rightwith yourself, you know. I mean
there's a very easy way of gettingkind of succumbed into the mental side where
it's just it's dark and it's scaryand it shuts you down and you just
want to lay in bed and allyou're doing is wasting way of the days,
the weeks, months, and itgoes by, and it's because one

(14:09):
you don't know what to do orhow to go about it, but two
you don't necessarily want to do anything. And that's a problem in your mind.
So that's where it's like you haveto want it for yourself the same
way that you have to, youknow, want to get off of,
you know, drugs. Absolutely.So it makes me curious because my like
transformation came just recently as well.Like I was living in like this disassociated

(14:35):
state regul guarding depression and overeating forso long, and even though I tried
to lose weight using fad diets andthings like that, like none of that
really stuck fair long term because Ididn't address underlying issue. You know,
I'm curious for you. You know, I talked about in episode one that
the catalyst for me was I justgot to a fuck it moment where I

(14:58):
was like I was tired of tryingevery single eight loss drug. And then
finally my doctors convinced me to trymental health therapy and I was like,
I don't need that, Like that'sbullshit. But what kind of changed for
you that caused you to go throughyour transformation? So one of my biggest
problems that I face with my mentalchallenges is that I have a tendency to

(15:22):
be reckless. I have reckless tendenciesthat are that can basically mimic suicidal tendencies.
But the only difference is is thatI'm not you know, suicidal to
the point where it's like I'm goingto kill myself. What it is with
reckless tendencies is is that you willgo and do something extremely dangerous knowing that
the outcome could possibly be death.And so for me, that could be

(15:45):
you know, going and driving onehundred and ten on the freeway with my
eyes closed. That could be youknow, going out in the middle of
the woods with not enough resources andgetting myself completely lost and just you know,
trying to figure out what's next.I have reckless tendencies to where I
just liked kind of act on lifeand let life take its terms. So
my biggest thing with the reckless tendenciesthat happened was last year in June,

(16:10):
my mental health was just at itslowest. I went through just the complete
lowest of the low with my mentalhealth, with my alcohol addiction, and
basically one weekend I was out driving, drinking and driving in my truck.
I actually wrecked my truck. Iwon't go into too many details about that,

(16:32):
but I actually did wreck my truck. It was a one person accident.
There was nobody else involved. Itwas just me. So yeah,
there was no injuries, even myself, but nobody was involved besides me.
But I wrecked my truck and aboutkilled myself. Very next day on Sunday,
I went out on my motorcycle,did the same thing, was drinking

(16:52):
and driving, and I ended upalmost killing myself on my motorcycle. It
took four or five different people toget a hold of me, to find
me, to figure out even whereI was to get my ass home so
that way I didn't kill myself onmy motorcycle. And it was just that
Monday, I woke up and Iwas completely hungover, but I went through

(17:15):
mental anguish knowing what I had justdid that weekend and how I almost died
on my truck Saturday and almost diedon my motorcycle on Sunday. And on
Monday, I woke up and said, something's got to give. I can't
keep doing this because it's just goingto be grief for somebody else, you
know, anybody else My mom themost who you know, I don't want
her having to bury her son,just had to bury her husband. But

(17:37):
you know, I found out thatI needed to stop. I needed to
stop with the alcohol. And soI took my advice and I made my
own you know, phone calls reachedout to several different facilities to detox,
but I did it to where itwasn't in Ohio. I couldn't be here,

(18:00):
you're in Ohio, and I detoxbecause I was already around everything negative
in my life. So that's aboutwhen I found out, you know,
about June of last year, witheverything that I was doing, and how
reckless I had became, and justhow involved. So to put it into
perspective as well, I was offthe deep end with the alcohol. I
was drinking about a twenty four packof cors Light a day along with a

(18:22):
bottle of whiskey a day. That'sthat was a day. So yeah,
that's how That's how far off thedeepened it was. And that's not including
you know, trips to the barsand stuff like that. I don't know
how many drinks those were shots beers, but when I got home, easily
a twenty four pack and a bottleof whiskey, I don't know how you
aren't shitting yourself, dude, Like, well, I don't know either,

(18:44):
but I can also tell you,uh, you know, just another little
fun thing. So I actually hada bottle of absinthe and ported from Germany,
and it's like one hundred and thirtynine proof. It's called Hamlet Hardcore
Black and it literally says on thebottle, do not take as a shot.
It's considered the shot of death.And I took two shots of that
shit two separate nights. So I'vetaken four shots of it, you know,

(19:04):
two shots each on two different nights, and I don't know how I
woke up the next day, tobe honest with you. So, man,
you're lucky to not be dead,dude, several times over, several
times over. And that's where youknow, I kind of look at that
as you know, God gave menot just my second chance, but my
third, fourth, fifth, Andthen, honestly, I have a very

(19:27):
very had a very very very rockyrelationship with my dad, but honestly,
after he passed away, I feelthat he has been looking over me and
he's the only reason. Also whyI'm not dead right now is because of
all the reckless and stupid shit I'vebeen doing. I think he's also been
kind of keeping one hand on meat the same time. Yeah, I

(19:51):
it well, First of all,your proverbial fucket moment came like, I
don't know, a year after mine, but like that transformation was about the
same because I felt I felt likemy transformation really started in May of twenty
three, which was in yours wasJune of twenty three, and we were
two very different people, and I'mreally we're on this like similar path together

(20:17):
in very different ways. And acouple of things I noted during that was
you had people you cared about andpeople who cared about you who helped like
bring you back to reality when itcomes to mental health, Like what for
you like really kind of like honedin, Like I that support network for

(20:44):
you? Like what really like rangthose bells for you? What do you
mean? Exactly? Like my biggestsupport system has really just been my mom.
She's been the one that's kind ofkicked my ass into gear to get
me to get the ideas flow.And I would say, because it's like
I don't know what to do,I don't know how to do something,
she throws the idea out there andthen I can run with it. As

(21:06):
long as it gets thrown out thenI can run with it. So she's
just kind of like that guiding lightand where I go next or how I
do something next. I guess she'salways been there for me in that sense.
So she's really been like the onebiggest support because over time, you
know, I had to do everythingfor myself and I've had to wont everything
for myself. I've cut off allmy old friends that I did you know,

(21:27):
things with that I you know thatcaused my life problems. So yeah,
it's just that support system of mineis very, very small. You
know, that's super helpful because Ithink everybody has a person in their life
that can be a guiding light,and they might not always be the same
person, but I think, youknow, for me, like friends have

(21:49):
been a big crux for that tolike keep me going, like Cass was
in my first episode as my cohost. But there have been times like
we have had a leaning on eachother, which is why we talked about
wheat together. Is because we've beenthrough a lot together and there are times
like I didn't want to be fuckingbe here anymore, even as a grown
as adult, and similar to whatyou were saying is like you didn't necessarily

(22:12):
like want go like I'm going togo off and kill myself with that reckless
behavior. I've done very stupid thingstoo, where I'm just like speeding and
weaving in and out of traffic justbecause I can't control my anger and I
just have all these feelings I don'tknow what to do with. That's that
tunnel vision. Yeah, and sometimesyour friends just bring you back down to

(22:34):
reality or like recenter you or freefocus you, or in your case,
you know, your mom helped kindof like like kind of give you that
face, that proverb face slap rightright, yeah, I mean, because
my problem is is that I literallyhave a mass appeal with, you know,
the street life and people of thatnature where things it's just I'm infatuated

(22:55):
by it, but not necessarily youknow, I want to get involved in
it. But I like the thingsthat are involved in the streets, like
the you know, the different thingsthat people do that aren't necessarily law abiding.
Things like that just infatuate me.And I find it, you know,
interesting to say the least. Yeah, I could imagine. Yeah,

(23:18):
I find it interesting to say theleast. So I tend to find myself
with bad friends, and that's whereit's like I have to kind of retrain
myself into getting with the right groupsof people. And that's exactly what I've
been doing this year's you know,I've been networking and changing my whole friend
group up anyway. So you know, I think you hit the nail on
the head right there, because oneof the big things that I've noticed with

(23:42):
my transformation and my mental health isthat I've had to lean on my friends
in a very different way. I'vehad to open up emotionally to them when
I haven't before. I thought Iwas emotional because I'm vulnerable sometimes with people.
But something I tell my therapist alot is I can be Vonne without
having my emotions behind it. Itcan be very disconnected. And I didn't

(24:06):
share my owner enter ba bah bahmy innermost feelings with my close friends,
and I've had to lean on themover this last year to like have them
help me, like to open up, and and our relationships have changed drastically,
And my friends could have easily walkedaway. Yeah, and thankfully I

(24:29):
have a really good core group offriends who stuck around and are the right
people for me. But for you, like that looked different that you had
to find entirely different friends that werein completely different groups. Oh, yeah.
I mean, yeah, it's justwith the people that I was around,
you know, I mean they've alwaysbeen into doing drugs and into you
know, doing outlaw shit. Imean, I've got friends from all over

(24:52):
different places. You know, I'mnot trying to talk about any of them,
so but yeah, I mean I'veI've got to get myself to where
it's like I have a better networkpeople, and I'm actually working on just
building like a solid team of justpeople that I know I can rely on.
As well as to touch on thehonesty thing. That is one thing
I've always been very closed off.I don't like to socialize with people about

(25:12):
my problems. I don't like totalk about myself and the nature of what's
wrong with me, what's going onwith me. That is something that you
know, going through the changes thatI have, has been one thing that
I've been focusing on is being honestand being upfront and you know, completely
open with people about what is goingon with me, because figuring it out,

(25:33):
bottling it up that that shit hurtsso much more than just letting it
out. You know. It's interesting. We talked a little bit before we
started about mental health, and we'vementioned anxiety and depression and PTSD a little
bit. But I found it interestingyou said you took adderall in high school
recreationally, but you recently told methat you were diagnosed with ADHD formally.

(26:00):
You know, are you feeling likein your current mental health state like that.
Some of these diagnosises are helping understandyourself a little bit. They definitely
get me to where I understand what'sgoing on with me. I don't understand
myself now. I don't understand whattriggers certain things to happen and when and
why. That's something I'm still learningto figure out. But what I'm actually

(26:25):
currently trying to do is figure outhow to embrace it and how to shake
it off. So, for example, when I get like really bad spouts
of anxiety, I challenge it.I get myself to the point to where
I change it. Because anxiety istwo things. It's fight or flight.
And my whole life, uh,with the way that I was treated growing
up, I have, you know, a lot of trauma from my childhood,

(26:49):
a lot of you know, abuse, physical abuse. So my thing
was not ever fight. I wasnever fighting back. It's always been flight.
So when my anxiety kicks in andit's always flight. I always have
to flee the scene. I alwayshave to get away from whatever is causing
the anxiety. Here lately, I'vebeen embracing it and challenging it. So
it's like I basically I'm telling myanxiety, Oh you want you want some

(27:11):
all right, let's do this,Let's see how it goes. Let's tussle,
let's go ahead and fight each othernow. Yeah. And what it
is is, you know, whenyou don't want something to be there,
it's going to be there, andit's going to be a pest and it's
going to be a pain in yourass for as long as it can because
it knows you don't want it tobe there. But if you take that
anxiety and you sit there and you'relike, oh, okay, I do

(27:33):
want this to be here. Yeah, let's play with this. Let's see
what it's doing, and then eventuallyyou're retraining your brain to kind of alleviate
that you know cause of anxiety andyou know where it stems from. So
I'm glad you brought up PTSD becausepost traumatic stress disorder can present itself in
a lot of different ways. AndI think when most people think PTSD.

(27:56):
They think about the military, especiallypost Afghanistan Iraq war, and think about
people who have been through physically traumaticexperiences, but mentally traumatic experiences are peer
to PTSD, even with the military, but even outside the military. It
can present itself in ways similar towhat you just said that fight or flight.

(28:19):
Yes, and I was giggling alittle bit because you said your tendency
was for flight and I when Istarted paying attention to my internal cues,
mine was fight. Yeah. Myfists would ball up, my body would
get tense, I would want tothrow somebody against a wall. Yeah,
and seeah, I was that guythat was getting thrown against the wall.

(28:40):
That's why minus flight. To beclear, I did not throw him against
the wall. No, I'm noteven talking about Alex. I'm talking about
my childhood stuff. So yeah,no, but uh well you did hit
me in the head with a rifle, so you were fight then, all
right, are you like asking forredemption? Like do you want a free
shot or something? But yeah,so like with that PTSD fight or flight,

(29:07):
I didn't notice it until my therapiststarted me to like asking me to
pay attention to my internal self.Yeah, and I was always so worried
about my external self and what otherpeople perceived me as is I wasn't giving
a shit about myself and loving myselfenough to even care about how it's feeling
internally. And so I'm a helper. If you know me, I've probably

(29:32):
said a couple of times, I'ma semi professional volunteer, but and that
means sometimes I give too much atthe expense of myself exactly. And you
were saying things about reckless. I'vephysically been reckless, but I've also been
reckless and overextending myself. I oncewent on the same year that my mom

(29:52):
had two open heart surgeries and shehad a fifty to fifty percent chance to
live, which was extremely mentally stressful. I went on two disasters deployments to
Hurricane Irma and Hurricane Harvey, withinlike a week of each other. Wow,
And I was so mentally spent,and I ended up having to take
a mental healthy from work the yearafter. And I was still in denial

(30:15):
that I had issues with depression orPTSD or anxiety. I didn't know why
I was having problems because I wasn'tlistening to my internal self. That's where
it's similar to addiction, because it'sthe addiction. You know, you you
don't want to admit that you havea problem, absolutely, And I think
you know, when we touch aboutmental health, I think the important part
here is like that monitoring your internalself and your internal world and how you're

(30:41):
feeling is so important as like theexternal things you're doing, whether that's drinking
or smoking or overeating. And Ithink that's where things get difficult, right
because like sometimes that's hard to sortout on your own, is like what
your internal world is telling you.So you know, kind of touch on
that now. Being eighteen when Itruly started drinking, you know, that's

(31:06):
when it started, was eighteen.Adulthood that's when you turn to adult.
So from eighteen until last July,I have been drinking my whole entire adult
life. You know. There hasbeen no time that I have taken i
would say, more than a monthoff of substances and been sober. So

(31:26):
yeah, I mean it's just thatthat whole thing. I'm trying to relearn
what adulthood is like now outside ofalcohol abuse and substance abuse, and it's
a very challenging thing to try torelearn who you are as a person.
And try to relearn, you know, just all of life and how to
cope and how to handle things,especially after all the trauma you've been through

(31:48):
and all the you know, mentalhealth disorders that you go through. It
gets to that point to where youdon't have anything to cope besides yourself,
and a lot of the times itcomes and very intrusive thoughts, and those
thoughts just they eat away at you. But you have to find that balance
and you have to find a wayto fight those thoughts back, you know,

(32:09):
keep yourself preoccupied. And I considermyself a well oiled machine. I
don't stop. I sleep probably twothree hours a night if I'm lucky,
and then I can wake up againseven eight o'clock in the morning the next
day, full energy, ready togo back at it again. That's just
how I've kind of been functioning,trying to, you know, relearn how

(32:30):
to not you know, drink,cause that's like I can't tell you how
many times I don't mentally crave thealcohol. I don't have it in my
head where it's like I want tohave a drink, but I think that
my body still physically craves it,and it doesn't know what's going on,
and it doesn't understand why suddenly thiswas taken away, you know, cause
we're talking thirteen years of abuse.I'm only six months off of alcohol.

(32:52):
That's you know that six months seemsmore like six days to me. That's
what it feels like, is likemore like six days. So it's like
trying to, you know, justrelearn everything, trying to tackle things and
then go home at the end ofthe day and not be like, all
right, I'm ready for a beernow. The whole thing. It's just
it's it's very agonizing sometimes and itcan it can really eat at you,

(33:15):
but you have to find that thatbalance to stop it from eating. Yeah.
You know, it's interesting you saidthat because one of the things that
we touched on too earlier is thatyou've always been a pretty small guy all
your life, and you know,you were talking about how that's a sensitive

(33:35):
issue for you because you have problemsgaining weight, and you know, I
think we mentioned earlier one off offthe podcast that part of that was the
alcoholism. But you know, it'syou're retraining your physical body to do something
different, and you have your owninternal physical narrative versus mental narrative of what's

(33:57):
going on. And that's similar tofight or flight, you know, is
your body's physically doing something that you'retrying to retrain after all these years.
Yeah, And I mean also tokind of add to, you know,
some of the stuff we were talkingabout with like the eating disorders. After
I got off the alcohol, Ithink for a good two three months that
I wasn't drinking, I literally replacedthe alcohol with food. That was my

(34:19):
coping mechanism, and that's what Iused to feel better. And I mean
it wasn't good food. It wasjunk food, it was shit. It
was like brownies and you know,just stuff like that, but it was
my coping mechanism. I was goingthrough and using food as my outlet since
I wasn't drinking anymore. So thatthat went on for like a good you
know, few months, and thenafter that I started trying to do psychiatry.

(34:43):
So now it's like I'm trying differentmedications, which I absolutely hate.
I absolutely hate so much. Thetrial and error of it is, you
know, it's the absolute worst.I've also been put in that position where
I've had too many things prescribed atonce, I've had too any dosages upped
at once and a couple months back, I ended up developing early signs of

(35:07):
serotonin syndrome and I was getting manicepisodes, and so I ended up having
to quit Takingloft cold Turkey. SoI was going through withdrawals again from another
substance. You know, I'm gettinglike the Brain's apps, which I still
get every now and again. Butyeah, so it's like I'm going through
like the withdrawals from Zoloft now.So it's like, you know, you
go through withdrawal after withdrawal, justtrying to fight off all these things that

(35:29):
you ended up putting on yourself overthe years. So yeah, I mean
it sucks. The trial and errordefinitely sucks. It's one thing I can't
stand. And that's one thing thatI have a problem still admitting, is
that, like I need to beon medication. There's got to be something
out there that can culm this downand make it easier for me. But
I'm I'm not in denial that Ineed medication. I just personally don't like

(35:50):
being put on medication. Yeah,and I think you and I are similar,
Like I'm not a fan of beingon medication either. That's how I
kind of reached my fuck at momentas I refused be on mental health drugs.
And I said in episode one aboutthe weight loss that part of it
was initially because the military, butI just like program myself, like I
can handle this without medication. ButI think something my therapist said that was

(36:13):
super helpful was sometimes our brains justneed a little bit of help and thinking
about it in the sense of it'snot there to make like there's no medication
and you could probably attest to thisthat is a magic bullet that just makes
mental health better, not at all. It's mental health work. If you
have medication, is doing the workon yourself mentally, whether that's with a

(36:37):
therapist, a psychiatrist, whatever,and medications there to help you. And
then there's also naturally that level oftrial and error finding what's right for you.
And I think a lot of peopleget frustrated with that because that trial
and error's fucking shitty. Yeah,you feel shitty, it's not fun,

(36:58):
there's side effects, and you're like, what the fuck is the point.
I don't feel better, I feelworse right, And I mean, for
me, like my problem too isthat like my brain doesn't shut off.
It literally goes on forever, andI mean to attest to that, like
I literally just got this put onmy arm. It is a knife going
through a brain and it says stopthinking. That is like my straight up

(37:19):
attestament to me, because my braindoes not stop thinking, and I literally
want to put a knife through it. Not in a suicidal way, I'll
put that out there, but it'slike I want my brain to just stop.
But it's like I don't have theability to shut off my brain.
My brain can literally wake me upin the middle of the night because I
have a thought that's going on andsuddenly I have to wake up and think
about it, like I have tobe awake to think about it the proper

(37:40):
way. Yeah. So it's just, you know, you you kind of
end up in a position where yourbrain doesn't stop and then you just kind
of are hardwired to keep going.And that medication thing, I I do
research and everything, and it's likeall I see or the side effects,
the you know, the possible issuesof taking the drug, what you can't

(38:02):
mix it with this and that,and that in itself makes me paranoid.
You know that that fucks with mypanic disorder. So it's like here I
go doing the research into this stuff. But then there's one thing that I
am curious about that like I wouldmind, wouldn't mind trying to see you
about. And it's all natural.And that's like I've been learning a lot
more about how people have been microdosingpsilocybin here recently, and how when you

(38:27):
take it in a microdose, youknow, you do it for two weeks
at a time, every other day, and then you take a week off,
so that way you're not building upa tolerance, You're not you know,
abusing, you're not getting to thatthreshold of crossing the line of hallucinating.
It's literally meant for mental health.And so from some of the studies
that I've been seeing and reading aboutpeople you know, attesting to the use

(38:50):
of psilocybin and microdoses, they saythat it's you know, kind of rewired
their brain restarted it. So,yeah, you don't necessarily have like an
end all for mental health, butyou have a way to reset it possibly,
And that's something that I would dabblein in the sense that obviously it
would help my mental health. Iwouldn't, you know, want to try

(39:12):
to do mushrooms to hallucinate or anythingat this point, like, all it
is for me is focusing on myself, what's ahead of me, and doing
things the right way. So wheneverI talk about anything like that, it's
it's all in the sake of thisis what I've done research on, this
is how it has benefits, andthis is what it can do for you,
not oh, hey, let's golook at unicorns and go have a

(39:32):
blast. So yeah, no,I think that's a good call out because
I've seen a lot of things aboutketamine trials as well, and used in
the mental health context by counselors andthings like that, well certified folks,
right, but there's still a lotto learn about the mind, and there's

(39:52):
no surefire way to figure things outand fix things right. And I think
that's why it's important to normalize someof these converss, is because you're not
going to really know or realize what'sgoing to be helpful for you unless you
learn and understand and maybe experience things, whether it's personally or with other people.
I was gonna say to add tothat, just just to add to

(40:14):
that talking about you know, likethe ketamine and microdosing psilocybin and stuff.
I just want to say, alwaysdo that under supervision, don't ever do
that alone, and always make surethat you know you have somebody that's very
well aware of when you're doing it, so that way they can monitor you
and keep an eye on you.Absolutely. Yeah. And that's the thing
with all of these, even theprescription medications, as I've heard of people

(40:36):
who self medicate in the sense theyup or down their dose without talking to
a professional, and it that canbe detrimental. I a little bit I'm
going through is I have side effectsfrom birth control with mental health like irritability,
and I'm talking to different doctors andalso taking be appropriate with just brand

(40:57):
name well Butrin. And when Igot up to the three hundred dos just
recently several months ago, I startednoticing that I just had intrusive suicidal thoughts,
Like I had no intention of wantingto kill myself, but all of
a sudden in my head, Ijust had these intrusive thoughts stick a gun
to your head. Yet the crazything is I had no desire to actually
kill myself. My life has beenreally good, but the medication caused me

(41:20):
to have these intrusive thoughts. Andhad I not been actively working with my
doctors on medication changes and my therapiststo talk about how I was feeling like
I would not have caught that itmight have been related to the medication,
and I had to be brave enoughto tell. I told two people at
the time when I was having thosethoughts, Cass who was on the pot
first episode, because she's my closebest friend, and my therapist. And

(41:45):
I even doubted telling my therapist becauseI didn't want my therapist to think I
was fucking crazy, hold down commither. That's the thing, and that's
the reason why a lot of peopledon't like the whole, you know,
admitting the suicidal thoughts thing is becausethey're afraid they're going to be thrown in
a saan asylum. And that's notnecessarily the case. Just just for reference,

(42:06):
I was not thrown in the insaneasylum, right, That's what I'm
saying, Like, that's not necessarilythe case when it comes to being honest
and telling, like your therapists andpeople these things, you're not they're not
going to, you know, callup a psych word and have somebody come
booky into the crazy house. Likethat's not how it goes, you know,
mental health very well, like yousaid, it's not like you actively
were going to go and put agun to your head. It's just an
intrusive thought. It's something that happeneddue to medication. So obviously they know

(42:30):
you and your right mind aren't goingto do that. We just need to
monitor her while you know this ishappening, so that way we can make
sure that something doesn't happen. Andyou know, very real, you know,
rest in peace to Matthew Perry.The biggest thing with him and that
whole ketamine thing, you know,I mean, ketamine is something that he
was monitored, but he chose togo and get it in a sense where

(42:52):
he was not being monitored. Andso that's why very you know, very
strong on the bee monitor do thingsbeing monitored. You know, you if
it's not working for you, youhave to be very clear about that to
your doctor and make the changes thatyou need. And that's what I've had
to do so far with my psychiatrist, and I have been put on several
different medications now and it's like I'mwilling to do it because I'm not going

(43:15):
to try to find something that couldwork for me, but I'm going to
go to the streets to get itinstead. So always always be under supervision
when you're, you know, doingsomething with any kind of medication, but
especially with mental health medication, becauseit can become very lethal, very fast,
and your own and your own world, it will turn you upside down.

(43:37):
Absolutely. I think that's a greatcall out because I think it's easy
when you're being professionally medicated to justsay a little bit more, a little
bit less isn't a big deal,but internally monitoring yourself all the time is
hard. I can't tell you howmany times I've told my therapists, like
how the fuck do I manage changingmy mentality, fixing PTSD, managing how

(43:58):
I'm feeling on medication and being afucking human, being an adult, like
at a job and doing everyday things. And she's like sometimes I you know,
She's like I don't know, notbecause she's being a dig or something,
but you know, but the realityis like, sometimes you just fucking
need help, and sometimes you haveto lean on others, people like none

(44:20):
of us are going through life byourself, as much as we love to
be loners. Like I've been thatperson. I was that person for a
long time, Like I got toshit. I can do it by myself,
pull your fucking self up by thebootstraps, because we were all taught
that that's not how life really works. Like we have to lean into other
people to like go through life.And one of the big things I've learned
from these PTSD books is more andmore that there's being research done on PTSD

(44:45):
and things like emotional neglect, whichdo affect mental health a lot. You're
referring to, like the extreme behaviorslike driving and things like that, some
of that's driven by emotional neglect.That have learned from these books is that
community is so so, so soimportant and that community can be anything.

(45:08):
That can be church, that canbe your friends, that can be the
gym, that can be your colleagues. But you have to find like your
people who are your support network tolike lean into when things aren't going well.
Like those people you can lean intowhen things are going well, but
also lean into when like things aren'tgoing well, and like trust them to

(45:29):
like be there for you. Andif you're like me and you don't have
necessarily like the support group, aswe were talking about earlier, how I've
developed like an unhealthy habit of makingfriends. There's always hotlines available. I
have utilized them. You know,some people don't like to admit to that.
They don't like to, you know, think about having to call a

(45:49):
hotline. But I have definitely calledhotlines for my mental health just to speak
to somebody, you know. Andthose people on the other end, they
are very very receiving of what's goingon with you. They're very you know,
helpful, and they're very kind.I didn't call It's not a suicidal
hotline, but it was a mentalhealth hotline. I was, you know,
just in a very deep mental statewhere I just I felt like I

(46:12):
was losing control. And this ladythat I talked to on one of the
calls that I made, it wasalmost like I was talking to somebody I
knew my whole life. So ifyou don't have an outlet, and you
don't have the friends that you canrely on, call the hotline. Don't
be ashamed to Yeah, no,I really appreciate you saying that. Is
I've never really had to lean intothat too much myself personally, but you

(46:36):
know, I think that's a goodcall out because recently I was having a
really really bad week and my therapistwasn't available, and my university at the
age of thirty three, had aservice where you could just like chat with
someone because I needed something in realtime because I was having PTSD response and
all the normal shit wasn't working.And she just did like an awareness exercise

(46:58):
with me. I didn't have toher my whole life story. I didn't
have to tell her shit. Butshe's like, you know, notice five
things in the rooms, you know, touch four things, like just bringing
yourself back to like that mindfulness inthat moment is so helpful and sometimes you
need somebody to guide you through that. Yep, yeah, you know.

(47:19):
Kind of going back to the PTSDstuff is like you can have like bodily
reactions to stuff and maybe it's notfull blown PTSD. There's people who have
full blown PTSD and diagnosed with it, but you can still have bad reactions
that you need help with, likelike every day and you not have like
a chronic disorder, right right,but those same things still help. Whether

(47:42):
it's an acute, one time thingthat you're overwhelmed and you can't handle it,
or if it's like an everyday thing, like my entire life revolves around
that. So your PTSD how doesyour PTSD come out? So for me,
like I internally start like feeling likeI'm in danger. And so usually

(48:06):
when we started like figuring out whatmy triggers were, they were like really
weird things like I like somebody walkingbehind me in a hallway, and I
would feel like they're following me.And I'd be in like work, where
it's normal for somebody to walk behindyou, but like my fucking biceps would
tense up, my fists would tenseup. I would like want to turn

(48:27):
around and this random person I don'tknow when to go fucking slam them against
the wall and tell them to stopfollowing me. And I knew it was
illogical and made no sense, butlike that internal anger was so fucking real
that I was in danger that therewere a couple of times I debated doing
this to some random fucking stranger ina hallway. Yeah, And so your
PTSD comes out in a physical sense, yes, So my PTSD comes out

(48:51):
in like the mental sense. Sowhat it is for me is I get
intrusive thoughts, and those intrusive thoughtsare things of my past. I constantly
think of, you know, thingsof my past, things that happened to
me, things my dad did tome, things that, you know,
just anything, and what it isis it basically prevents me from being able
to think about anything else, frombeing able to see anything else. And

(49:14):
it's almost like my ADHD I guesskind of combats it too, because those
intrusive thoughts, I mean, itsticks, and it rolls and it rolls,
and it's like I can't stop them. I can sit there and try
and think about other things, orI can listen to music and sit there
and think about the lyrics to thesong, but then it's like thirty seconds
later, I will find myself drawnback, being super quiet and just thinking

(49:35):
about those intrusive thoughts in my head, and it just it basically paralyzes me.
It makes me just sit there andjust stare at one thing, and
I'm like, just I can't reaanything. Yeah, so checked out because
it's like, damn, like Iwent through that. And one of the
biggest things too, that you know, kind of messes with me a lot,
which I'm still trying to figure outhow to fix, I guess,

(49:57):
is the child trauma that I wentthrough with my dad and the way that
I grew up with him he passedaway in twenty twenty one, and after
everything in my life that he putme through, it was like he was
able to just pass away within fiveminutes and just be gone and you know,
leave it all behind. And nowI have to live with all of
this stuff and I had no closurefrom him whatsoever, and I'll never be

(50:22):
able to get closure from him.So that's something that eats away at me
a lot too, as far aslike my PTSD goes, is just thinking
about the fact that I'll never haveclosure for my dad for why he treated
me the way he did and whywe grew up the way we did,
and you know, just the shitwe went through. It was like he
was just able to, you know, cause us all this hell and then
fucking leave without a trace basically.So that stuff really hits me a lot.

(50:49):
You know, it's interesting you saythat because I touched on it earlier,
that childhood emotional neglect, and I'vebeen learning more about it through books.
There's a couple of books that Iread and I think I mentioned in
this and the It's Hard to TalkAbout podcast with Lauren, but I'll put
links in the episode content. Butadult children of emotionally Immature Parents really cover

(51:12):
a lot of how parents not handlingtheir emotions really well end up kind of
impacting their children and how we handlecertain situations. Running on Empty is another
one that's specific about childhood emotional neglect, and it's very in depth and it
talks about different ways that people handlethat emotional neglect. For anybody not familiar,

(51:37):
there's attachment theory that you know,children and human beings have attachment types,
and if you're not securely attached,it comes out in different ways like
avoidant attachment, anxious attachment. I'mnot a psychologist. There's plenty of books
and content out on it, butwhat a lot of these books talk about
is if your parents aren't presenting theseattachment styles helping you as a child to

(52:00):
learn how to deal with emotions.This emotional neglect, this childhood and emotional
neglect affects how we interpret our worlds, and our internal worlds get fucked up
for lack of a better term,and then we have to learn as an
adult how to refucking process everything,and we're like, what's fucking wrong with

(52:20):
me? Oh? I have Ihave huge self esteem issues because of my
dad and just the way that hemade me feel growing up. It's like,
uh, when I was a littlekid, you know, he always
would call me girl names. Mydad would call me girl names. He
would literally call me like Brenda andshit like that, and like anytime I
would do something, he basically wouldtell me that if I if I wanted

(52:44):
to do that, I would neveramount to anything in life. So it's
like my dad shot down anything andeverything that I ever loved growing up.
So it's like I have huge selfesteem issues even to this day, where
it's like I feel like what I'mdoing isn't right, or what I'm doing
isn't good enough, or what I'mdoing, I just I don't, you
know, I don't belong here,like these people don't approve of me.
Like I just don't feel like Ifit in anywhere because my dad literally destroyed

(53:07):
my whole self image of myself.So, you know, I feel that
in a couple of senses, bothwith my weight and also with coming out
as bisexual. I mentioned the firstpodcast that I'm by towards the end of
the podcast, but I just cameout in May of twenty three, and
one of the things I started realizingas I was going through this journey was

(53:30):
I was not. I was goingthrough my life just being heteronormative, like
just oh, I'm I must bestraight. But in high school I messed
around with girls and I enjoyed it, but I never explored it because my
mom always had a very negative reaction. She would be kind of silly about
it. She'd be like, oh, like, I'm totally cool if you're

(53:50):
gay or a boy, you knowwhatever. But then she would be like
are you dating this person and belike angry, and it like taught me
like, oh, I can't likeshe's saying one thing, but she's doing
something else and it freaks me thefuck out. So to kind of put
that into a thing too, whichI don't like this. I don't I
will say it, I don't wantto say it. But so basically,

(54:14):
my dad was an asshole. Hewas a piece of shit to some degrees.
And he told me that if Iever were to bring a black girl
home, he would disown me.And so it's like, really, now,
like that's not something that like I'mnot okay with that, Like I'm
not cool with that at all.Like that's why because the different color of
their skin like that had such abig fucking issue that you're gonna disown me

(54:37):
for that, Like, fuck that, that's so stupid. It you know,
you're right, and that's why weneed to normalize this conversation because I
never knew that about you. Yeah, it's like he considered your dad overtly
racist. That's the thing. Imean, he doesn't make it clear.
And that's the thing. He neverdid make it clear. It's not that
he my dad was you know,just all out racist, but he definitely

(54:57):
did make it known that he proovedof certain things, but it was only
in the household. And it's likewhat am I supposed to How am I
going to go out to my friendsand say, oh, yeah, my
dad doesn't let you know, thisperson come over because of their skin color.
Like so yeah, it's like hedidn't make it known, and it
means it's the same thing. Likeyou knew my dad, so like you
saw how he acted around you oraround everybody you know, went to all

(55:19):
the ROTC meets, how he was, Like, my dad was a very
sociable, personable person when he wasat home. He was not that that
was not at all what he was, and it was just he was hiding
everything behind a mask and wanted tolook great in the community, but did
not give a shit at home,and that that in itself is just like
a hard hitter right there. Soyeah, like a lot of things that

(55:40):
my dad said not to do,I never listened to him. I love,
I love everybody, so I lovethat about you, and I think
that's why we're still friends all theseyears later, you know, like,
uh, you know, I toldhim my a former therapist of mine when
I first came out, that's whoI first came out to. I was

(56:02):
feeling conflicted because of similar reason,because we were all taught growing up because
of media and society norms or yourparents, because that's who teaches you like,
this is the way things are.And for me, that's heteronormativity.
That was, hey, you're juststraight because everybody else is fucking straight.

(56:22):
That's normal. It's normal a manand a woman, and that's what society
taught us. And I told thistherapist when I was coming out, I
was like, I don't know thatI can be bisexual or that I can
be an advocate for the LGBTQ community. And she's like, well, why
is that, And I'm like,well, because I used to think gay

(56:43):
as being a choice and you choosewho you were with. And one of
my best friends came out in highschool and I didn't believe her when she
first told me. I'm like,Oh, you're just it's a phase,
because that's what we're fucking taught.Yeah, just like you were taught don't
bring a black person home. Youeasily could have walked away and be like,
Okay, I'm just not going tobring black person home because that's what
I'm being taught. But when Istarted questioning that, and when I started

(57:06):
living my adult life and realizing,over time, my view on the LGBTQ
community changed because I realized it's nota choice and that's how people are,
and it was becoming more normalized tosee those types of people in our community.
Columbus, Ohio is considered pretty gayfriendly, you know. I was
like, oh, you know,like that's who you are, that's your

(57:28):
internal being being, you know,lesbian, gay, bisexual trands like you
are presenting yourself in the way thatyou feel right. Just similar to skin
color. You can't change your fuckingskin color. If you're fucking gay,
you're fucking gay. Yeah, andit it. I told my therapist at
the time, I was like,well, I can't be an advocate and

(57:49):
I can't be bisexual because I usedto think negatively about those types of people.
And one of the things she saidthat was very enlightening for me is
that, but you know both sidesof the coin. You know what it's
like to be accepting and not accepting, and that can help convince other people
it's okay to be different, it'sokay to be yourself, it's okay to

(58:13):
change the way society is telling usto be because the societal norms of fifteen
years ago isn't necessarily the case now. Well, see that's why I always
this is just like a my thoughtprocess thing. But this is why I
say, you know, the tholesaying get with the times, that didn't
happen until US millennials grew up,because those boomers were not getting with the

(58:34):
times, they were not going todo it. And now you are seeing
a new normal, which is everybodybeing able to come out and be themselves
and being able to do their ownthing, and everybody you know is honestly
being more open about you know themselves. That's not something like you said fifteen
years ago, wouldn't like that.So it wasn't until US millennials grew up
and said, Okay, well enoughis enough with the Boomer nonsense. So
we're gonna go ahead and you know, roll these things out now. And

(58:57):
so now that is what it isus millennial Those are the product of rolling
things out for the road of thefuture of generations to come to be able
to take on, you know,who they want to be as a person.
You know, I love that yousaid that for a couple reasons.
First of all, that's why we'rehaving this conversation, and that's why this
podcast exists. It's sensitive and weneed to normalize it. And I agree

(59:20):
and disagree with you. For acouple reasons, Millennials are paving the path
to being more open, more expressive, to being yourself. Generally, Boomers
grew up in an age talking aboutemotional neglect. They grew up in an
age where they were parented different andtheir viewpoint on life is different. However,
and I volunteer with the American RedCross. Most of those folks are

(59:45):
retireing age. They're in their sixtyseventies, and I always joke with people,
I have a bunch of sixty seventyyear old friends. And it's weird
in the sense that I am unfortunatelygoing to go through a phase of my
life where I'm going to lose alot of my friends because they're older.
And when I say friends, I'mlike, these people have my back,
like like like we're tight, right, And some of them have been the

(01:00:07):
most open, expressive, great mentors, but we don't always agree or see
eye to eye. Some of themare very progressive. My friend Linda and
Wisconsin. Hey, Linda, she'sso open and progressive and I love it.
And she's in her seventies and she'ssuper active, and I swear to
god, she's a mini millennial inthere. But others I know are overtly

(01:00:30):
just the way they were raised.They are in their habits and in their
patterns, and that's not going tochange overnight, right, I mean thinking
about that on like a scale,like think about you know, in the
entire world, the number of gaypeople that are out there, that percentage
number is probably what like three fourmaybe five percent of the entire world.
Very small. So that's the samething. Apply that to the boomer So

(01:00:52):
you've got your boomer friends that arein that very small percentage of not you
know, the same thinking of anormal, you know boomer that grew up
the way they did. Some obviouslydo have their ways of changing and being
able to get with the times,as we're saying, But then the other
ones, which is like, Ithink the bigger percentage is what I'm I

(01:01:12):
guess getting at a boomers is youknow, not getting with the times.
Yeah. So, And here's myargument with that. I'm not here to
convince anybody to change their mind.I'm here to help people understand exactly.
And I think that's the difference exactthat some people, especially with the political
climate, is the goal shouldn't everbe to convince somebody to see exactly to

(01:01:34):
eye. I don't want you tothink like me, right, the world
would not be what it is ifwe did. But if we can understand
each other even when we disagree,and amicably have a conversation like we are
now. I just told you Ifucking disagree with you. You didn't come
throw me down? Oh No,I mean ever, you got to be
able to agree to either agree toa disagree or just understand that if you
don't agree with something that it doesn'tmatter. That's not for you to choose.

(01:01:55):
You know, your choices are yourchoice is just like your choices are
your choices mine or mind yours areyours. You know, So I might
not agree with you, but thatdoesn't mean that I'm gonna sit here and
bash on you or hate you.And I say this big time talking politically
because I, you know, domiss the times back when political topics were
more well yeah, So it's likeI didn't know what you believed in.

(01:02:22):
You didn't know what I believed in. You know, you didn't know if
I've supported this president or that presidentor these you know, topics. Whatever.
Everybody's political views were to themselves andkept that way. And it's like,
I kind of wish we went backto that because for me, you
know, I'm a center right leaningperson. I would say I'm very much
in the middle, but more rightleaning. I do have a lot of

(01:02:45):
friends that are, you know,either center left or full on left.
I don't have a problem with anybodyyour political views or yours, just like
mine or mind. It's not goingto make me change how I feel about
you. You support who you support, it's how you feel. But the
only thing that makes me care aboutyou is person is how you carry yourself
as a person. Absolutely, AndI think a good point with that that

(01:03:06):
kind of ties back into that mentalhealth discussion and addiction. Is something I've
noticed and I've talked to people about, is there's this push towards extremism,
extreme left, extreme right. Youhave to be one or the other and
there's no center. And the realreality is there's a lot of center.
There's nobody that agrees one hundred percentwith any a politician, yep or whatever

(01:03:28):
thing. But just like whether it'seating, alcohol, mental health, medication,
you have to find a balance andnot go way too far to one
end or the other. You know, if we're talking about eating, you
don't want to overeat to the pointyou feel so gross that you need to
vomit, But you don't want tounder each to the point that you're starving
yourself. Same with alcohol. LikeI hate saying this phrase because I need

(01:03:50):
a better version, but everything inmoderation and every part of life is so
important. Yeah, I completely agreewith that. I mean, definitely a
moderation. I'm learning that big time. That is a huge one for me.
But yeah, I mean it's justtrying to figure out that balance you
know with yourself and how you carryyourself is what really matters. Ultimately,

(01:04:12):
it doesn't matter who you believe in, what you believe in, who you
follow, as long as you carryyourself as a solid human being, than
the end of the day guarantee meand you will get along. I appreciate
that. You know, we weretalking a little bit earlier about PTSD and
recent experiences and how that presents itself. You know, you had mentioned a

(01:04:34):
little bit you just went through anexperience like just yesterday that you wanted to
share that I found very interesting becauseit actually had to do a teeth out
of all things. Yeah, that'sa little bit different. Yeah, So
I actually have been trying to breaktraumatic experiences or come with what is it.

(01:04:54):
What's the term for overcoming trauma.There's like a special term for it,
trauma growth maybe, But yeah,it's like trying to get over the
fear of stuff. So it's likesomebody has a fear of spiders. It's
like he kind of start introducing themto him for that. Okay, so
yeah, but then we're just gonnastick with learning from our traumas or trying

(01:05:15):
to break traumas. I'm trying tohave a breakthrough with my trauma. Like,
yeah, so about thirteen years ago, give or take, I actually
had a root canal done on myteeth or on one of my front teeth.
Back when I was in fifth grade, I slept and fell on the
floor busted my teeth out. That'sthe short story. So anyways, years

(01:05:39):
later, I ended up having toget a root canal on one of my
front teeth. And when I hadthat done, I think I was like
sixteen or seventeen at the time,and I was upside down in that chair
for like a good two hours,and he probably put about like ten shots
of novacane in the roof of mymouth, along with more shots and novacane
in my gums. And even afterall the novacane, I still felt every

(01:06:03):
little bit of everything that they weredoing in there. Yeah, so it's
like when he went to go drillthe hole in my gums, when he
went to go and vacuum the routeout, I felt every bit of it,
all of them. And then onceit was finally done, they you
know, sat me upright. Igot up and walked to the bathroom and
I collapsed on the fucking toilet,like not sitting on the toilet, like

(01:06:25):
I went to go take a leak, and I literally collapsed and fell like
onto the toilet. My mom endedup having to come into the bathroom and
picked me up. I went intoshock and they put me on an oxygen
tank to bring me back and everything. Yeah, it was really bad.
And so it was just a veryvery traumatic experience and from that I stopped

(01:06:45):
going to the dentist for thirteen years. When I was eighteen, I was
supposed to get crowns on my twofront teeth and I never did because just
have how traumatic that experience was thatroute, and I was like fuck that.
I was like, I'll keep thesetwo press for as long as they're
in there, I'll just be twofists. Well, so my temporaries,
you know, actually lasted me likeall the way up until now, and

(01:07:08):
they didn't break or anything. I'mjust I'm breaking traumas. And so I
decided that, Okay, one ofmy biggest self esteem issues that I've been,
you know, having struggles with ismy teeth. You know, I
want better teeth because I don't likethe way my teeth look. So the
only way I can do that isto break trauma. And so I actually
went yesterday for my first round ofgetting crowns fitted and everything. I got

(01:07:30):
my temporaries. They had to dosix of them, which was the most
I've ever sat for for It brokemy record of two my teeth that I
busted out, but I ended upgetting Canine to knine crowns. So here
in about three weeks I'll have mypermanent crowns. And yesterday, sitting in
that chair, I'll tell you what. I took a klonopin before I went

(01:07:51):
to the dentist, and I satin that chair, still full of anxiety,
just real with anxiety, just riddledwith the thoughts of you know,
this is going to be bad,this is going to be awful, Like
I'm just gonna die here. I'mgonna have to be put on oxygen machine.
Yeah, like all these thoughts gothrough your head. It's like trying
to break traumas. And it's likeyou're sitting there and me, being the

(01:08:13):
person that I am, can't sitstill. For shit. I'm literally sitting
in this chair like not being ableto move because he's grinding down my teeth,
and I'm just sitting there trying toembrace it. As I was saying,
you know, it's like with theanxiety thing. Instead of trying to
do the flight, I'm trying toembrace it, trying to welcome it so
I can basically scare it off.So afterwards though, when I went home,

(01:08:33):
oh, I felt the full effects. I couldn't fight the anxiety anymore.
The anxiety at one and I wentand laid in bed and I passed
out because there was no way.It just it took so much out of
me mentally and physically that the lastthing that I wanted to do was be
awake. And so yeah, Ijust went to sleep. And I'm,
you know, just wanting people toknow that it is possible to overcome those

(01:08:57):
traumas. You know, thirteen yearsbut I did not go to the dentist.
That I did not take care ofmy teeth. I stopped going to
the doctors for twelve years even youknow, I just I stopped once I
became an adult. You know,it's like you were saying, it's like
you're an adult, you do whatyou want. I was an adult.
I could do what I want.I didn't want to go to the doctors.
I didn't want to go to thedentist. So I stopped, and
eventually, you know, it kindof took its toll on me. But

(01:09:21):
you always can change it. Youalways can change the outcome and provide something
better. You just have to breakthe cycle and begin somewhere. For me,
that's with my teeth. And I'mvery happy to say now that by
the end of this month, Iwill have brand new teeth finally, So
that'll be one lest thing about myselfthat I'm you know that I dislike.

(01:09:41):
You know, I'm super proud ofyou, Brian, because well, one
in your teeth look hella good rightnow, thinks I appreciate it. They're
only fake. There are crylics.I got nails for teeth right now.
They're pretty, very pretty nails inyour mouth if anybody wants to paint my
teeth. But I mean, Ithink the important thing you just said there

(01:10:02):
is change. Change is so hard, but it happens all the time,
and we're constantly going through it,whether we choose to or not. Yes,
And I will say I hate change. I hate the process of change,
but I love the feeling at theend when that change finally breaks through

(01:10:23):
and you have found this thing thatyou've needed your whole life. And you
know, I mean for me,it's overcoming so many things, so many
things. I mean, I couldtalk about all the things that I've you
know, seen, done, beenthrough and everything, and it's just it's
a lot, you know, it'sa lot to take in and you just
you've got to find that point whereyou say enough is enough. Yeah.

(01:10:45):
Absolutely. You know it's interesting tooabout that because we talked about in the
first episode weight and we talked aboutbeing overweight as well, and I mentioned
it earlier about skinny and how that'ssensitive topic for you, you know,
because being underweight or the self esteemrelated to that kind of stuff is important.

(01:11:11):
It's just being overweight or being addictedto alcohol or drugs like our labels,
right, But there's also the otherend of those spectrum where it's just
as sensitive to be underweight and becalled skinny or you know, to your
point, you or like your teeth, was something with your self esteem that
was super important. That helps youfeel more confident about yourself. And that

(01:11:32):
doesn't mean that it defines you,but that was something that you did for
yourself, which I admire because sometimesdoing building up your self esteem, which
mind sucks sometimes too. Like I'mmy own worst critic. It's just about
doing the little stuff that brings youjoy and brings you happiness, you know,

(01:11:53):
and just you know, again inthat moderation, if fixing your teeth
like helps your self esteem, helpsyou feel more confident, like, then
go do that right absolutely, Butyou have to drive yourself. You have
to want yourself to do it,like more than you've ever wanted anything.
I mean, seriously, it's alot internally to go through the thoughts of

(01:12:15):
you know, what it's gonna taketo overcome these things, and a lot
of people they look for overnight successor overnight changes or things to happen immediately,
and as soon as you start lookingthat way, you're setting yourself up
for failure. You have to kindof step back and look at things by
the day. And when I sayby the day, it's you know,

(01:12:35):
as they say, one day ata time. It's one of those things
you literally take it one day ata time and you don't sit there and
say, oh, well I'm gettingclose or oh I'm one step closer.
You go through the process and youembrace the process, and then you reach
the end and you're like, holyshit, I'm done. That's it like
I finished that. Hell, yeah, you know, phrase that comes to

(01:12:56):
mind, and I forget who coinedit or who said it, but it's
choose your hard, right, Likefor me, being overweights hard, but
so is losing weight. Yeah,so which heart am I choosing? Right?
Right? You know, I'm sufferingfrom knee conditions and issues right now,
like with my meniscus, and Ican deal with it being three hundred
and ten pounds, or I canchoose to change and change my lifestyle and

(01:13:20):
see if I can lose weight ina healthy manner that maybe takes some pressure
off that knee for physical reasons.You know, I'm not wanting to lose
weight anymore because I used to hatemyself because I was overweight. Similar to
how you said you sometimes, youknow, hate that you're underweight, Yeah,
because you just lose weight. It'sthe same, I mean. And

(01:13:41):
that's the thing too. It's likeyou know, with bullying, bullying is
an all around thing, and soit's like, you know, just as
much as somebody doesn't like being calledoverweight, you don't like being called underweight.
Don't like being called scrawny, Idon't like being called skinny. I
don't like being told that I needto put some weight on, or that
I need to, you know,do a certain thing. It's like,
okay, well you're telling me theobvious, Like I already know this.

(01:14:01):
I don't need your fucking input totell me something that makes me already feel
a certain way about myself. Soyeah, it's like for me, the
problem is is that I just Icannot put weight on, and I hate
it. You know, I wouldabsolutely love to be at least, you
know, twenty thirty pounds heavier,But it's like, as soon as I
put that weight on, if somethinghappens. And this is where like mental

(01:14:21):
health plays a huge role. Ifsomething happens mentally, if I have like
a huge flare up of anxiety,I can drop twenty pounds in a month
easily. And it's not even trying. It's just it's what happens, and
that it's just it's something that Iabsolutely can't stand. But hopefully, if
I'm anything like my dad and I'llhit fifty years old, my metabolism will
slow all the way down and I'lljust finally be able to gain the weight

(01:14:44):
I want. Yeah. No,I often joke with my friends who are
skinnier than me and they you're like, oh, I want to gain weight.
I'm like, I'll give you afew extra pounds. If only it
worked that way, right, Yeah, let's see lighthearted jokes like that.
Don't bother me like that. That'sthat's bonding in a way, you know.
I mean, that's like in away of a sense of bonding because
it's like saying like, oh,yeah, well I don't want this,

(01:15:04):
you can have it, and it'slike a ha ha ha. It's like
I'll take it. Like but yeah, I mean in the sense like oh,
well I wish I had that,or I wish I wasn't like this,
or I wish this. It's likesaying those things like you don't know
what you are talking about. Youreally genuinely don't. And the reason I
want to say this to add toit, people that grow up fatherless,

(01:15:25):
they say they wish they knew theirfather. They don't understand what they are
saying when they say stuff like that, especially with somebody like me who comes
from knowing my father, having myfather in my life the whole time,
and I'm sitting here in high schooltelling my mom she needs to divorce my
dad. You know, there's certainthings too, where it's like I wish

(01:15:45):
I didn't know my dad. Alot of my problems mentally would not be
here if it wasn't for the factthat I didn't know my dad. So,
you know, it goes both ways. Where you got to feel both
sides of the spectrum. You gotto understand fatherless you know kids that that
shit sucks, but it also sucksto have a father in your life that
is abusive and that will tear youdown every chance they get. Yeah,

(01:16:08):
it's interesting you say that because that'ssomewhere where we contrast as well. We
contrast and wait, but I alsodon't know my father and you have,
and reflecting on my life, therehave been very few times where I've said
I wish my I knew my dadfor similar reasons. Why you just said
is that people would ask me like, oh, do you wish you knew
your father? Because I, legitimatelyI don't know his name. He's never

(01:16:28):
been a part of my life,like I just grew up with my single
mom, And a lot of timesmy answer was I don't know, probably
not because if he was a shittyass person that he decided to not show
up in my life in the firstplace. Do I really want him to
need him there in the first place? And that's the thing. It's like
for me, I didn't need mydad there in the first place, but
I didn't have a choice. SoI just say, it's like, be

(01:16:49):
careful with what you say and whatyou wish for. And you know,
it's one of those things where yougot to understand life is completely different for
everybody. Yeah, and understanding wherepeople are coming from too, right.
And I think that's where normalizing theseconversations, talking about these sensitive topics are
important, is because I couldn't understandwhere you're coming from unless I talk to

(01:17:11):
you about it, and unless wefelt comfortable enough to be vulnerable about it
exactly. And that's one of thebig reasons I chose to start this podcast
was because I have very great conversationswith amazing human beings, you being one
of them, one of many,and I'm like, how do you how
do we have this conversation with everybodyelse? How do we get people to
be more confident having this conversation?And one of the realities is you have

(01:17:36):
to have the tough conversation in orderto normalize it, in order to get
to the point that it's okay totalk about, right, Yeah, And
I'm glad that you do these podcaststoo, because this is something that definitely
does need more attention brought to it, more normalized, and something that can
be more accepted in the sense thatwe all can talk to each other about

(01:17:58):
our problems and not think we're abunch of great you know. I mean
that's not the case. It's thefact that we all went through something and
that we all need help getting outof that thing. And at the end
of the day, as long asyou have that support, as you've been
saying, then you're good as gold. You know. You just you have
to want it. That's the onlyother thing is you have to want it
and you have to work for it. You can't just have that overnight success

(01:18:20):
mentality that will eat you up quickerthan it will help you. Absolutely choose
your heart. Yep. So withthat being said, I think, you
know, I that's a good kindof spin off point. Is there anything
else you wanted to share with usbefore we break for episode two? Here?

(01:18:41):
I just say, you know,follow your heart. Really, I've
honestly been following my brain my wholelife, and it's been working against me,
and so now I've been following myheart. And ever since I've been
following my heart, I've been,you know, feeling a lot better.
Granted I still go through a lotobviously, but those are the challenges that
come with following your heart. Youknow, the brain is a I don't

(01:19:02):
want to say a terrible thing becauseit's not, but it is an evil
thing at times, and it willtear you down and then your heart's there
to pick you back up at theend of the day. So just love,
I mean, you know, lovemore than you hate. Obviously,
there's things that we do hate.Yeah, love, I mean, just
yeah, take appreciation for the thingsyou have, and you know, instead

(01:19:25):
of one of the things that youwant, enjoy the things you have.
Absolutely practicing that gratitude. When wewere talking about change earlier, I work
with a program called Change Enthusiasm Globalthat really focuses on emotions related to change,
and gratitude is a pillar to that. For a reason, there's studies
that show that practicing gratitude mentally havean impact on how your brain chemistry works.

(01:19:49):
And sometimes it's fucking hard being grateful. Of sundays, I'm just so
shitty in such a bad space.But sometimes just like reflecting on even the
small in the big things, thepeople I have in my life, for
the fact that I'm in this housethat I'm in renting it, and or
my freaking cat or whatever. Youknow, just being grateful in some way

(01:20:11):
is important to just to remind youwhere you're at reground yourself. Talking about
following your heart, I did wantto give you a shout out that Brian
g is currently working on his business, Burning Desires. He actually did some
work for me recently that looks prettybadass. He burned some wood for me,
did some paint and it just it'sso professional and I love it.

(01:20:33):
And I'm really excited to see whatyour future brings with your artwork because you
have such a talent, Brian,and that's you following your heart and I
am just like thrilled for you tosee where this goes. Thank you,
I appreciate it. Yeah, Idefinitely have quite a few business endeavors coming
up this year that people can lookforward to. For sure. I won't

(01:20:54):
announce anything obviously. The wood BurningDesires is out. It's got its own
website, woodburningdesires dot com. Youcan it out feel free to just browse
or buy something or have something custommade. I do it all. The
other thing that I'll say I'm workingon is talking about normalizing, you know,
with the podcast and everything. Ijust want to also say that what

(01:21:16):
I'm gonna also be doing is writingan autobiography about my life, but I'm
going to do it in the stateof the mentally ill. So what it
does is it's going to portray It'snot going to be like a normal biography
or autobiography. What it is isit's going to portray what mental illness looks
like through you know, the spanof the years, you know, and
it's going to show how mental illnesscan come out and it's going to show

(01:21:38):
how it can develop. So whatyou'll get to learn is my life completely
through my brain. And it's goingto be like one of the hardest things
that I ever write. But Ijust I believe that an autobiography full of
you know, somebody's thoughts through mentalillness is something that needs to be put
out there because you know, it'slike you're talking about thinking about like thoughts

(01:22:01):
of like suicide and stuff like that. You talk about stuff like that and
people are like, oh, well, they're gonna put me in a saane
asylum, like it's it's crazy,it's crazy to think about that kind of
stuff, like, oh man,that's not normal, that's not right.
He shouldn't be thinking like that.This autobiography is going to have all of
that in it. It is goingto have all those things in it that
are going to make you say likegoddamn, like he that's wrong, Like

(01:22:24):
there's something wrong with him, seriouslywrong with him. But all it is
is awareness. It is meant tobe made into awareness. These are things
that I have overcome. These aremental illnesses, challenges, things that I've
faced, So obviously it's something thatI can recoup and go back to.
But yeah, it's gonna be avery heavy hearted autobiography about my life.

(01:22:46):
Well, I tell you what,Brian, I cannot wait, and I'll
be more than happy to have youback on the podcast again when you go
to release it, so we canreally share some of that perspective, because
you showed me just a small littlenippet of what that might look like.
And I think it's a really rawform to normalize to your point, mental
health. Yeah, just like ourinternal worlds. And I think it's important

(01:23:12):
as we talk about reflecting on ourselvesand our internal worlds, is like to
know, like sometimes our internal worldsdon't make sense. Yeah, yeah,
let me see, I'm going totry to find something because I have something
in here that I've written down andit's basically it's just it puts a lot
into perspective with mental illness. Absolutely, And you know, another topic will

(01:23:35):
cover in a future episode will betraumatic growth, which is a fairly new
mindset or field that's being studied andstill has a lot of study to go.
But I think when I look atyou and I I would absolutely say
we're products of traumatic growth. Yeah, we definitely are. But yeah,

(01:23:58):
so it's like stuff you know thatcome from like a mental standpoint. And
this is a piece of writing thatyou said will be in your new autobiography.
No, this isn't a I doa lot of writing. I try
to do a lot of what Ido is I'll do inspirational writings. I
will also write down a lot ofwhat looks like mental illness, you know

(01:24:19):
what I mean. Like it's basicallybringing light to mental illness. Now,
again, a lot of this stuffis for for me Obviously, I don't
typically share it with everybody, butwhere to go? I know I had
it in here, and I'm gladyou brought that up, actually, because

(01:24:40):
I think writing is one of manytools in addition to gratitude is right.
Just writing for yourself for no particularreason, just to vent or to process
or to journal, I think isimportant or you know, because you know,
you tell your friends things, butwhen you're processing your own internal world
sometimes, know, it takes quitea bit to figure that out, and

(01:25:02):
sometimes putting it on paper, evenif it doesn't seem to make sense when
you put it down, just helpsyour brain to categorize that and look at
it in a different way, youknow. And I found it very helpful.
And my journey is I've done somemood tracking and journaling, you know,
to I look back and I waslike, I forget how much I've
changed. And I look back andI was like, holy shit, I

(01:25:24):
wrote this like two months ago.I'm a completely different different person. Yeah,
so this is this has just kindof put a perspective like what you
know, a mental illness writing canlook like. And so this would be
like kind of something to expect inthe autobiography kind of thing. So it's
the coming and going of already knowingyou're at a loss, but what is

(01:25:46):
your focus? A true test oftime, the plot to the crime committed.
Are you going to steal yours andtake what's mine? It's what's been
dealt to me a dozen times.The aftermath will have you bring in a
toaster in the bath, and soyeah, it's just stuff like that.
It tells you that things are area little dark and scary, but it's
gonna be okay. You're on theother side of that. Yeah, well,

(01:26:09):
Brian, I absolutely appreciate you bringingyour full authentic self with me today.
I hopes, you know, whoever'slistening to episode twoot that you maybe
took something from what we talked abouttoday. We've touched on everything from alcoholism,
addiction, drugs, overeating, PTSD. You know, we talked a

(01:26:30):
little bit about the political spectrum inthere too, and just being real human
beings, and I think, youknow, maybe there was a little bit
of something that might help you throughyour day. As always, we're open
to feedback and new content ideas.I'm really excited to say coming up,
we actually have some pelvic health discussions. I know from both a women's point

(01:26:51):
of view, but also men's pointof view. Pelvic health is something that
definitely doesn't get talked about a wholelot, and we have actually a couple
will experience experts, but also wehopefully we'll be having a physical therapist called
it poor physical therapist on with usas well. So very excited and looking

(01:27:11):
forward to what you got coming up. Yeah, I appreciate you, Brian.
So that's all for today. Thishas been episode two of It's Sensitive
and we'll catch you guys on theclip side. Goes normalize something, take
care of yourself absolutely,

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