From Trauma to Triumph: Nicholas Ruchlewicz's Journey

Summary
In this episode, Nicholas Ruchlewicz shares his journey as a trauma survivor following a motorcycle accident that resulted in a traumatic brain injury. He discusses the importance of mental health advocacy, the role of music in his healing process, and how tabletop games have helped him cope with his challenges. Nicholas emphasizes the need for community support and resources for trauma survivors, while also addressing the stigma surrounding mental health discussions. He provides insights on being an advocate for oneself in healthcare and the significance of sharing personal stories to foster understanding and empathy.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:21):
Guys, welcome to an exciting m Oude Pete for society.
My guest today is an advatarse tabletop role player, music
and concert lover. He's also a traumatic brain traumatic survivor
after being involved in a motorcycle crash. He had a
brain injury and a long recovery. Going through this, has
been able to use his struggles and other help others
as mental applicants. We welcome in the one, the Only, Nicholas,

(00:43):
the witch key. I know it's gonna mess it on.
Nicholas is just laughing at me. He's like, Okay, well,
welcome in.

Speaker 2 (00:48):
Man.

Speaker 1 (00:48):
Let's you tell everybody a little bit more about yourself.
I know you're you've spoke to Congress and everything else. Man,
You've done a lot of things here.

Speaker 2 (00:54):
Man, Thank you. Yes. So I am, as you mentioned,
I'm a traumas survivor, was in a single vehicle motorcycle crash,
a lot of trauma, including a traumatic brain injury, and
through that I've been able to help utilize this struggle
that I went through to just find other way to
help others through advocating. So I did actually with one

(01:15):
of the volunteer organizations I'm with trauma survivors. I did
actually network. I did actually go to the United States
Congress speaking to different state representatives staffers about the importance
of having a trauma system and national trauma system. So
that was very powerful and a lot of cool interviews
with my favorite musicians and meeting people from around the

(01:37):
globe who I've been able to reach because of my
different stories and how they touch different people. It's been
pretty cool.

Speaker 1 (01:44):
So who did you get to meet? Music wise? Here,
who's your favorite artist?

Speaker 2 (01:48):
My favorite active artist was is the band Lacuna Coil
from Italy and the lead singer, Christina Escavilla. She actually
did an interview. She allowed myself and another brain injury
survivors to interview her and we talked about she knew
about my trauma, about perspectives and growth and just how

(02:09):
things change. I mean, they're there. They had was a
redo of a twenty year old album, so it was
very topical because you know, that's what a lot changes
in twenty years, but it could also stay the same.
That was very neat.

Speaker 1 (02:22):
Well, that's awesome though.

Speaker 2 (02:22):
Man.

Speaker 1 (02:23):
We've interviewed a lot of musicians on the show. I've
had with Lucy Lenora from the panhunter. Turns out she
was a big mental health advocate and turned out so
she actually had BPD as well, which was interesting because
no one ever, I don't think she's ever told anybody
about it, because I didn't know anything about it until
I met her, and then she was telling us about it.
So but that's still cool, though, Man, you got to
go to Congress and everything else too, Like that, that's

(02:43):
so awesome, Like I don't even where to start. That's
that's amazing. Man, that's so cool though, Like, were they
really receptive of your plan everything else? I mean, you
got you get to go to talk to some of
the biggest people in the world here.

Speaker 2 (02:55):
Yeah, I talked to both she has senators and a
couple of our House representatives. So I will say that
some of them were very receptive. Let's just say that
we meet with everybody on all sides. Some of them
were very receptive, and it was really compelling because you know,
some of the staffers are not some of the senior staffers.

(03:18):
Our staffers are not overly you know, they're younger, and
I remember one of them one of the stories, one
of the survivors said to them, they got teary eyed
and they were like, whatever, whatever we can do to
help you, because they understand the importance of having this
group that we have. So Trauma Survivors Network is a

(03:38):
now international group, but originally started in the States and
but it's from a trauma center and there were people
that have been touched by trauma can come together and
speak and be safe. And trauma is the number one
cause of death between eighteen and forty five in the
United States. So it's a very important group to have

(03:59):
someone and be able to have that connection when you
feel all his loss. So that was something that was
very powerful hearing them and then many of the staffers
really wanted to know more, and just hearing our perspectives
is something that's very powerful that we have.

Speaker 1 (04:13):
Yeah, especially because it's the number one thing that's killing
people these days, you know. That's that's always a good
thing to bring awareness to that as well, you know,
and the fact it took time to listen to you,
that's really cool though.

Speaker 2 (04:22):
Man.

Speaker 1 (04:22):
You got to go out there and share your opinions
and your own you know, from your own insights, because
you know, you are a survivor yourself, you know, And
that's crazy though. So the no motorcycle accent. Okay, so
take us through. What exactly happened was where you stopped
and because my brother in law had been through an
accident where he was on his motorcycle and somebody just
plowed through them, So what was your situation?

Speaker 2 (04:40):
Fortunately I don't have any memory of it, which is good.
They know that I was in a bad situation a
year before and I had to I had a real
rough separation, so I had to move back home with
my mother and I just got a motorcycle license about
a year before, so I was excited to ride. I
just got a new bike and uh, but we just

(05:02):
had snow recently, so I didn't want to ride in
the road to ruin my paint job. So I got
a storage united to hold my crap when I was
trying to wait till I moved to my next place
and riding around. I rode around every night for you know,
that week, and then one night my dog's freaking out.
My mother was like, what's going on. My brothers said,
I don't know, and people came and evidently I hit

(05:24):
a wall in the in the unit. Nobody knows what happened.
They saw me last time on camera was at like
seven point thirty one, and then the police showed up
at eleven twenty or so at night, so it's front
lying there for roughly four hours. Jesus.

Speaker 1 (05:37):
So you don't remember any of this, okay, So what
do you do remember? You remember waking up in like
the er or something, and people's around you, because you
had to be confused, if you think about it, because
when you came to to finally realize where you were,
you're probably like, well, what happened? And you know, obviously
they don't know, you don't know, but all you know,
you know, what's the last thing you remember after that?

Speaker 2 (05:56):
Though, So technically I was never in a comba. I
was technical sponsored on the site. I made noises, but
I have no memory of anything until roughly March twenty
or so. So it was March fifteenth when it happened,
the IDEs of March, and they really became more lucid

(06:17):
when we were getting in the paramedic transport driver because
they said Kyle, and I said, oh, my girlfriend's brothers Kyle,
So that made me. That's when things started turning on.
So even though I was never in a coma, I
wasn't cognizant. So every brain injury is different, so my
right side brain injury. So that's the executive functions. It's
a lot of your you know, compulsory stuff, your problem solving.

(06:41):
So I have no cognition of where I was, but
we bring up the musician earlier. So when I was
going through that really hard divorce and separation, I turned
to music to really help me through some of the
darker times. Well, my girlfriend knew I liked music and
how much it was being so she would play my
Pandora radio station, which was my favorite band, Typo Negative

(07:02):
Oh Okay, which also had Lacunicil, Deftones, Opaths, Alice in Chains.
But so even though my brain wasn't there, when when
I was in a lot of pain, my blood pressure
would go high, but my music was playing it would
lower it. So the band was very fascinating when I
told that story, and they really appreciative for me reaching

(07:22):
out and doing it. So that's kind of where So
I have no memory. I have these ideas of dreams.
It wasn't a dream, it was just my brain coming
through lucidity. So just different you know, conversations with people
I thought I was having. They weren't really the people
I thought I was having with. But I have zero memory. Fortunately,

(07:43):
I think it's our body's way of protecting us of
what happened. There's something I've learned about recently called body memory.
So body memory is so sometimes if I have a headache, now,
sometimes I will start like getting anxious, if you will,
I'll start like almost panicking, And it's subconscious because maybe
that's my body realizing when it had that horrible injury.

(08:05):
That's the pain it remembers. I don't call it pain anymore.
It's a larger topic, but I call it being uncomfortable
because the word pain has a lot of power to it,
so I don't give it power me. I'm just very uncomfortable.
So when that's there, like my body was just like
panicking with it. Because we can't remember pain. Our bodies

(08:26):
can't remember pain. They just fear pain because it's something
that happened that people will say the worst injury or
something that they had all the pain they were in,
but they can't actually remember it. They'll just know about
the fear they had from it.

Speaker 1 (08:39):
Yeah, So let me ask you this though, before that,
did you have mental teasues beforehand? Or did they come afterwards?
And the only reason I asked it because I had
a guest on the show he had something similar with
his He had a traumatic brain injury as well. And
what happened to his situation was is that this shelving
fell on him, but luckily did the grounderneath them was
soft enough that when it compressed his head, he started

(08:59):
having issue afterwards. So, you know, he said he never
had any issues up to this point. He said after
his injury where he had to basically reteach himself how
to walk and all that other kind of stuff. You know,
he said, he started experiencing him. Now, was that the
same thing for you or was it just you.

Speaker 2 (09:12):
Know, I always thought that in my brain injury was
exacerbated in the underlying situation issues I had. So example,
right now, I have really bad ADHD and I was
very high functioning before my injury. But I think that
my brain injury exacerbated that ADHD because it's one of
the things that happens with the right side of brain injury,

(09:35):
not being able to concentrate or just your stuff going
too fast. So but back to the earlier statement, I
did have I did see it therapist. I did have
struggles again. I went through a really rough time, rough
patch and and we'll talk about tabletop game stuff too,
but so like in that, I didn't want to so
in my previous you know relationship, I wanted to, you know,

(09:59):
how do I help them? How do I help there?
And then I realized how to help myself through therapy,
and I started doing a lot and working on myself
and finding out what's best for me. And then I
got a real Like I said, it wasn't a pleasant
and rough divorce, but I left. But instead of staying
inside just playing video games are being depressed, I pushed

(10:20):
myself to go out and meet people, go to games,
go to tabletop games, path fine society, so we go
to game stores and meet people. And I was always
running everywhere meeting people. But I never wanted to say still.
I always wanted to push myself more. And then there's
a big organized play foundation organized play so we can

(10:41):
meet everywhere, and that was really important to me to
do it. So that is how I helped beat a
lot of my mental health struggles, anxiety and the control
that had over me. Then my trauma happened and it
all came back like it was very great at that point,
so I needed to use the tools I had, plus

(11:01):
learn new ones along the way.

Speaker 1 (11:03):
So talking of table type games, okay, so how how
in depth you like them? Because I played a lot
of different stuff. You know, I don't think I've done
Pathfinder yet, but I know I think all the working parts.
I would say, would you think it's easier for your ADHD.
So there's a lot of moving parts. You can pay
attention a lot of.

Speaker 2 (11:19):
That stuff, I think, So, I mean that's a good
way looking at I haven't thought of that. Yeah, I
think because it's definitely a lot of little parts, you'll
keep me engaged with it. Some of it certain games
that are you know, sometimes they get a little bit
too boring and my mind will water too much. But
half on your second edition at least has a lot

(11:40):
more intricate action stuff like that. But it's interesting. Again,
every brain injury is different. They call it invisible injury,
but you know, right side brain injury a lot of
times that controls and your problem solving skills, your analytical skills,
and your creativity. So I always said it's more challenging

(12:01):
than after a brain injury, having to go from a
fantasy game to a rule centric back to fantasy, so
you talk about using it. So I spoke to someone
recently about how much I used gaming to help my
rehab recovery from the right side brain injury, left side negligence.

(12:22):
I don't feel one hundred percent on my left side,
so I always like move pieces with my left hand,
and I was still in a wheelchair at the time.
It was a very difficult environment to go in a
lot of noises, so I tried to push myself to
being the uncomfortable, trying to do what I could to
see and I couldn't. It wasn't because of my brain

(12:43):
injury that I couldn't read. I saw two of everything.
I had to read learn how to use my eyes,
so I saw two of everything. So that's why I
couldn't read. Trying to learn the game and trying to
read through the rule books and stuff like that. It's
how I could really make my stuff as creative as
it could be.

Speaker 1 (13:01):
Definitely. Yeah, when you come to a lot of those
games like A D and D and all them, you
have to really create those characters. Man, you immerse yourself
in them. And when I play games a lot of
times I really enjoy those kind of RPG things where
you got to really dig deep into it and you
can control the different aspects of things. My brother and
I we were big avid gamers. He's the one actually
got me into more like deeper board games, you know,
and we started playing more complex ones, and then my

(13:24):
kids and I would play together too, and like you do,
we started to see that they can handle a lot
of these really complex, lot moving parts. I think one
of them we played what we were cattle salesman or something. Dude,
you didn't even notice the game had gone on for
four hours. Man, we were just sitting there and joining
because there's so many working parts going on, you know,
you're just so focused on all that you're not even
paying attention to the time. You're just having a good time,
you know. And I think it's awesome though, that you're

(13:45):
using that because you get to be able to get
more social. Do you do a lot of conventions at
all or anything.

Speaker 2 (13:48):
Like that, Yep, I do. I didn't do a lot
back then. I do it now. So I'm actually with
the game. I volunteer at the game company. I volunteer
organized plays found but for the publisher Pizo, so I'm
actually on their committee for PACs Unplugged, so I'm helping
organize PACs Unplugged for the role playing games there, for

(14:11):
the Pizo Pathliner stuff. But I also go to gen
Con and I'm a venturer. It's called a venture officer
for the organization. So I helped organize stuff all but
down the East Coast with gen Con, go to there's
big MAGFest down. I go to a lot of conventions now,
so the answer is yes, and it's interesting. So I've
used this ability. I'm not a great salesperson. I'm just

(14:35):
the ugly face of reality, but I'm really good at
when I can talk to people and get them excited.
I'm very excitable and I can help someone get just
getting someone to be able to help embrace the creativity.
And I can explain the rules relatively quickly to have
anybody be able to understand and be able to help
people find out how creative you can be. And I've

(14:58):
grown more custom doing that when I've challenged myself to
go out to meet new people, to you know, go
to conventions to try to bring something in someone that
didn't and it's very cool to give someone a good
time in a game they might not have ever realized
they would enjoy.

Speaker 1 (15:14):
I think it's something too. A lot of people say, oh,
what do you mean Born Games you Monopoly? I least
roll my eyes. I'm like, dude, we're not talking about Monopoly, man,
We're talking with so much deeper than that. They're like
a zool and a couple other ones that played. I
played that wasn't Zombie Side. Let me tell you reading
those rules.

Speaker 2 (15:28):
God, the Newest Zombie Side, speaking of you know, full Circle,
the Newest Zombie Side that was on Kickstarter. They had
someone that worked with them that did their theme song.
It was Lacunic Coil and they actually did an entire
music a song about Zombie Side. And they actually have
minis of the band in the limit edition Kickstarter, So
they are they are in the game Zombie Side. They are.

(15:51):
Christina is a huge gamer. They're all big gamers and
big nerd culture. That's so cool though, man, yeah, so's
she does a Twitch stream or anything else play games.
But yeah, they actually have their figures. They did a
college book based on their the game. But they actually
made miniatures of the five of them insidees on the side.

Speaker 1 (16:10):
That's so cool though. Yeah, yeah, like I said, and
I like the complex games. I liked all the you know,
figuring ou all the rules because me and my brothers
always do. He'd do a big bunch of kickstarters and
he'd go on his basemin man just man, he's got
walls on top of walls that just games. There's just
stuff down there, like, did have you ever played half
of these? Well, I'm trying these out, like he's older,
Like that's somebody still going on. I'm like, du dude,

(16:31):
are you ever gonna play these? No, let's let's crack
them on playing them, because those are when he comes
to visit, he'll bring them and we'll play them all
the time and we'll try different things, and they he'll
have like he was working his own games too. He's
working with a couple of friends. They were working on
a couple ideas, uh and things like that too. So
that's so cool. As soon as they saw Tabletop, I
was like, yes, Nicholas gets it. Yes, And we're not
talking about Monopoly. We're talking about some real games here,

(16:52):
you know, because I I love the creative aspect of
a lot of them, you know, because when you get
deep into it, then you have the power control everything
you're doing, and you know, especially Dungeons Dragons because I
never really got a chance to play a lot of it,
but I've seen people play it, and I'm like, dude, this
is so cool because you could be as creative as
you want and ate your own campaigns and things like
that too, you know. And it's so cool when you

(17:13):
get your kids to start playing too, because then you
can help them expand their you know, the boundaries of
just whatever they can come up and well, this is
fantasy can come up wherever you want.

Speaker 2 (17:21):
You know.

Speaker 1 (17:21):
It was so cool because then you started introducing all
the other things like when I was a kid, now
the Power Rangers and all these other things have these
games and stuff. I'm like, this is so cool because
you know, you're reliving your childhood, but then you get
to share it with them too, and plus you get
to teach them problem solving skills too.

Speaker 2 (17:33):
Yeah, that's one thing that's neat about so Pathfinder is
it's all derivative of the world's oldest role playing game.
It's all on the old ogl RC, so it is
the same thing, a fantasy based game, but we organized play.
We played people from around the globe, but it's really
neat playing with fathers and sons or mothers and daughters

(17:55):
or whatever and just seeing this whole generational people go
and seeing people pretty cool. When I went over to
London to see the band perform, I was in London,
but I was like, why not? So I looked and
I went to a comic book convention and there was
there playing path Find It there I got to play
with the people from London. So it's that's the neat

(18:15):
thing about this again. We've been able to use something
of good with this whole world. You know, playing people
around the world wherever they are is a neat thing
to do. And I'm a lot of people play online
and I don't dislike that. It's not for me. I
like the in person stuff. It's to get the me
trying to challenge myself to get out of my comfort zone.
I mean, that was one of the hardest things that

(18:38):
happened to me during pandemic, was all my social stuff
just went out the door. So I was very like,
it was tough for me to how do I what
do I do? What do I do? So I did
a lot of you know, how do I connect to people?
And what can I do for that, and I did
a lot of online volunteering through Trauma Survivors and talking

(18:58):
to patients and stuff like that. So anything I can
do to kind of again push myself to more of
my take the hard few first steps into the uncomfortable
all of a sudden it becomes second nature.

Speaker 1 (19:10):
Yeah, that's awesome. I love what trauma srivers doing it
so great, man, Like, so do you guys organize a
lot of events and things like that too, Like do
different things all over the place, And you know, where
can someone go if they want to find out is
there a good website from the checkout all that stuff
on so they can go see maybe they can volunteer
somemer time and you know, make somebody's day just trying
to help out.

Speaker 2 (19:27):
Yeah. So, I mean Trauma Survivors Network is uh traumas
Arenetwork dot org. So it's anybody that's actually been like
through a trauma center. But they have different organizational stuff
to help with. They have natural Trauma Survivor's Day, a
lot of community outreach. One of the goals that we
have well I shouldn't say we, well, I guess I

(19:48):
could say we am part of it. One of the
goals that we as survivors have is we want to normalize.
It is not a fair word, but we don't want
people to feel alone. So when we speak about it,
when someone says, we will find that traumas touched someone
into life. In my old company I was with, I
gave a talk at a town hall and I it

(20:09):
was May as Trauma Survivors Awareness Day and I spoke
in May in the town hall and two people came
up to me afterwards in the company and said how
trauma affected their family from a crash of some sort
or another injury. And I've also talked to a lot
of former soldiers who have had brain injuries, and just

(20:33):
hearing me and hearing others, it's very powerful to be
able to help give back. So that's the important thing
of it. It's just starting a communication with someone because
it allows us to not Let's see, when we speak
about it, we don't have we take the stigma away
from it, we take the power away from it, and
we're allowing others to come to approach us with empathy

(20:55):
instead of judgment. I think it's something that we're really
good at in doing what we've help create this more
that's awesome.

Speaker 1 (21:02):
I love it, man, I really do think it's great.
I think that you know you're right when you talk
about it more, you break the stig about the whole thing.
I think that's the whole thing. BEWD the podcast though, too,
it is just getting meant to all talked about more
and just you know, nothing won in general, but just
in general. If it's just like everybody's so scared of it,
but when COVID came, it caused everybody to start coming out.
Anxiety's depression, all these are things started showing up for

(21:23):
people that you know, it was magnified on a teape.
So one of my guests this morning he had OCD
and we were talking about it. It's like, I could
just imagine what it's like having OCD during COVID. Man,
you'd be out there with a six foot ruler to
make you some people stay away from you. And he
was like, yeah, but it was what it was like,
you know, And it was just because it brought it out.
Everybody was like, oh God, what is this new thing.
I'm scared of it. But then it's like we mentioned

(21:44):
it all the time, but then we don't want to
talk about it. From there, it's school shooting. So we
made had mental health issues? Okay, so what are we
doing about this problem? Oh, we're just gonna avoid it.
Why why did we avoid it? I don't understand, like
you can't mention certain words of people with them freaking
out going Oh god, we can't talk about it, guys.
It was crushing the city kind of thing. You know,
they're having a panic attack over nothing. But it's like
we're just trying to normalize these things that way people

(22:05):
don't have to feel so disincluded.

Speaker 2 (22:07):
It's one of the things I'm trying to do in
this lovely we won't talk about this lovely political aspect
we have atmosphere have. But one of the things that
I'm trying to do is speak to my local state
representatives to want to have a conversation with mental health
access and the barriers you face and the cost it
is even if you have good insurance or something, not

(22:29):
everybody takes it and what happens to it. So we
have all these these statements like you're saying, you know
mental health, you know crisis, but there is no solution.
You still put barriers up, and there's different rules in
different area and if certain laws of Virginia are a
little archaic when it comes to therapy. Basically, your therapists

(22:49):
having to tell that your it's insurance how long they
think you'll be in therapy before. That's not like I'm
very fortunate, you know, I can afford it most time.
But I've been going to therapy for a long time
and it helps me, you know, it helps me check
in with myself and figure out am I okay? Not
to be okay? Like where am I at? What am

(23:10):
I looking at? And it's one of the things I've
spoken to patients in recovery and so am a pure mentor.
So we talked to patients that are inpatient and I
will say to them that, you know, the pandemic was
the one time in the world that everybody has been
going through something at the same time. We all know it.
And that's what isolation was about and feeling alone. And

(23:32):
one of the things that we can do is as rehab,
you know, a cute rehab, you know, survivors going through
we could help people learn how to combat isolation, how
to combat that you know, not knowing by you know,
finding out more. And it's just ways we've been able
to you know, take this horrible things that happen and

(23:54):
you know, turn them a little bit better.

Speaker 1 (23:55):
I think you had a great point there when you
said that you though you have insurance, not only people
take it to me. That makes me laugh because it's like, well,
I have insurance, should cover these things. Why don't Why
doesn't it cover these kinds of things? These are things
I need, you know, just like I need a doctor
for certain you know, diagnosis of things. Why can't I
have the same thing for my mental health to help me,
you know better, you know, help myself get through these

(24:16):
things I'm dealing with, because you know, sometimes it's just
more figure out what it is or dealing with that
way you can better attack it, you know, and try
and you know, help yourself get through some of these
situations so it won't be so bad. But it just
makes me laugh because it's like then they don't cover
or they only cover part of it, and then it's
so expensive, and it's like we got to have a
breaking point at some point, you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 2 (24:35):
Yeah, I was. I tried to cut back on mine
with my insurance need to cover it anymore, And it's
just I wasn't feeling comfortable anymore. I was like, you
know what, I got to do this. It is what
it is. And then insurance tried to, you know, pull
a bunch over me. It's funny because they'll insurance people
will say I've heard from them, like, oh, well, you know,
we we have other ones in our network. And I said,

(24:57):
you're exactly right, you do. So let me just throw
it differ babysitter at your kids. I want to have
this person go. You know, you know, I don't really care.
This person's up the street, their coming. Love it. That's
exactly what you're asking is you're telling me this. I've
had something, and I had a very different actually, you know,
only I did a webinar recently. It was the first
time it came out before. But through my you know,

(25:19):
separation and divorce, I saw a therapist. I mean, you
know for many years, you know, six years almost and
actually over six years. And then my accident happened and
I didn't see her. And I saw her I came
back first time in wheelchair, and then a week later
she had a heart attack, so I didn't see her anymore.
So you had some of my life that was for

(25:40):
six years, and oh my gosh, it wasn't gone. So
I said, okay, I need to make this happen. And
I spoke about it before. But you know, I reached
out to five different people and three people called me back.
Two of them said that they didn't see nude patients,
and one of them said, I do, but I only
see during working hours and I've been seeing them for

(26:00):
almost ten years, over nine years because I knew how
important this was for me and that this is something
I needed to do for me.

Speaker 1 (26:07):
I love it, man, I think it's great. I think
it's you're so open about it and talking about it,
because a lot of people don't want to talk about
being in therapy because they go, oh, people think I'm crazy.
It's not necessarily the case. And I love that analogy though.
It's like, let me get a different baby, so your
kids have never met them. I mean, it's basically the
same thing. You think about it, because, like, you know,
just because you go to one therapist and you don't
like something they say or they don't feel right for you,

(26:29):
don't give up. You got to try other people there,
you know. And the other thing on the flip side
is why I tell a lot of people too that
think about therapy. I'm like, do me a huge favor.
I said, please, do not stay with somebody you feel
that it's not right for you. You're not going to hurt
their feelings switching up. They already know this is how
this works, you know, And this is what I told
you only I It's like, you know, I'm just going
to tell you just if you don't like it, you
don't feel the vibe, it's okay. You're not going to

(26:49):
hurt their feelings. At the end of the day. They
know this is how it works.

Speaker 2 (26:51):
You know.

Speaker 1 (26:52):
Some people don't fit well with other people, and it's hard.
Some people have to go through seven or eight of them.
I mean, it's just depends on how you're feeling about
it or what what it is you don't like, and
you know all those other kind of things like that too.
And it's and it's just crazy though that it's it's
so hard to get help, but we can get all
these other help for all these medications. When these medications
if you listen to me and my mother, actually this

(27:12):
is funny story. We were watching TV the other day
and we're looking at these drug commercials. They come on
Nick and we were over there, we're the other looking
at these and we're reading the side effects. That's all
we're looking for. This is the side effects. So if you
look at one one was an antidepressant and said, oh,
you'll have involuntary movement. Okay, So then the medicine for
the intoleigrated movement says it says the same thing for
what says the direct opposite. It's like, okay, well this

(27:33):
one gives you the symptoms that that other drug cares,
and it's like it's it bade us laugh because it's
like one is leading to the other. And then one
of them was like god, what it said something that
had us bowl chuckling, and we're like, yeah, I don't
want that at all. I'm not sure what that is
doing there. But if you look at the side effects
that these commercials are all flashy, great, so exciting, and
then some side effects include other than they start like
really monotoning what they are, and then you're like, if

(27:55):
you really look at what some of these symptoms are,
it's crazy the things that they're bringing up, and just
so they can give you another one to patch it in.

Speaker 2 (28:02):
Yeah, my mother, I lost my mother recently through she
was sick with lung cancer. But I remember her, thank you.
I appreciate it. It was it was a very long
little over a year ago, but it was scary because
she'd go to the doctor and my her ancologist was
one of the nicest men I've ever met, and I

(28:22):
told him I never want to have to recommend you
to anybody, because what a horrible way to recommend you
are an amazing doctor. But one of the things that
would always upset me, she would talk to him about like, oh,
these medicines, and I was like, well, he went to
medical school, he went this. Let him do it. Tell
your symptoms. That's what we have to do. Here's our symptoms.
We're having what works best. And actually, so I had

(28:45):
a lot of different medical ailments like growing up, and
I learned a lot about what happens with our lovely
body with different medical stuff. But a doctor long ago
told me when I took a medicine, he's like, all right, well,
let's give you zantac or whatever. So what about this one.
He's like, listen, you're right, I can give you the
top of the tier. You're right, But that thing controlled

(29:09):
a lot of its I like to start in the
very bottom and add to it and move it, and
that way we don't have to worry about the big
one because there's other little things that might have worked
along the way. But if you go right for the
big one, then you might be masking other stuff. And
I was like, you know, that's a makes a lot
of sense. So my again internal struggle I had before
my trauma really helped me with my healing because I

(29:31):
knew certain things to ask. I knew how to be
your own advocate because no doctors are there to hurt us,
but they don't know necessarily are the questions we don't know,
so they don't know what to basically tell us. So
it's important to be your own advocate and to ask
questions because you know, not everybody knows it when they
you know, nobody woke up and said, I don't have
a TBI, I want to have a stroke, whatever the

(29:53):
illness might be. So now what are you going to
go back to in your life? So what makes sense
and just trying to find out what works best for
you is what the best important things to do. And
that's one of the things that is nice about being
a trauma survivor. So I'm a pure visitor, which means
I go into the hospital and I speak to people
that are in trauma and recovery and all different types

(30:17):
of ailments, whatever the case may be. But it's nice
for them to because they can speak to me differently
than I might they might speak to someone else, because
when I say my story, all of a sudden, they're like,
oh my gosh, maybe I get something different. I'm not
here just to give them a shot or take any vitals.
I'm here to speak about here was my journey and

(30:37):
here's what worked for me. I can't ask how you're doing,
because that's a horrible thing to ask someone, how are
you doing? Like, I don't know, what do you think?
But it's really important me to let them know that
there are people out there that be willing to talk
if they need any help, ask questions everything else.

Speaker 1 (30:53):
Yeah, No, I think that's a great point, though. You
know how you doing today? Well, what do you think
I'm here in the hospital if not for my own reasons?

Speaker 2 (30:59):
You know?

Speaker 1 (31:00):
And I think you make a really good point about
advocating for yourself. A lot of people don't do that.
They go blindly trusting other people, you know, And it's
not not to say going there and start an argument,
you know, but just start asking more questions about things.
What does that do? What does this do? What is
that for? What are you giving me that for? Is
there other options? You know what I mean. Don't be
afraid to ask these questions to people when it comes
to yourself, your own heck care and you know, a

(31:20):
lot of these guys they want you to ask questions.
A lot of them try and involve you with you like, hey, listen,
what do you think about this?

Speaker 2 (31:26):
You know?

Speaker 1 (31:26):
And it was it was weird for me because I
wasn't used to going to the doctor, but I was
diagnosed with diabetes. I'd always go to my doctor and
always asked me questions on things, and I'm just like,
con dude, I'm you're the one. You're the medical doctor. Man,
you just kind of tell me what's going on, you know.
But he always involved me to ask questions and make
sure I'm like I'm doing my part too and looking
into these things and seeing what what benefits me and
you know, and you know, don't be afraid to say

(31:48):
no if you don't like something, you don't want to
do something. My wife's big on that too. She'll she'll say, no,
I don't want to do that. I'm telling you right now,
I don't want to do these certain things. And it's
okay to say no because you know, she she has
a little more medical background, so she understands things from
different aspects, or she knows a lot of the side
effects and stuff, you know, so it's a little different
for her. But don't don't be afraid to do yourn research.
Like they start mentioning these medicines, so you start looking

(32:09):
up and seeing what they are, to see what they do.
Can get curious about your own care because whatever you're
putting in your body, you know, you need to start
paying attention to these things because you don't know what
side effects are coming. And then read the side effects.
Like I know people are like, oh, do look at
the side effects because sometimes you want to see what
these things, the side effects you may be dealing with
are you know, because a lot of them, I'm telling you, man,

(32:30):
you start comparing them. It's just it just makes you
laugh a little bit because you're just like, what are
you putting in these things?

Speaker 2 (32:36):
Yeah, it's it's funny because I I was on I'm
on a Medicine'm on a lot of different medicines and
you know, getting different insurance woes, and you know, I'm
on an insurance now, and of course you have to
get generic, which is fine, but I started like feeling weird.
I was like, I'm not like I'm not waking up
easy enough, Like I feel really off, like waking up

(32:58):
and I look and I was just going through. I
was like, only difference was this medicine is a different formulary.
It's the same medicine, but a different one. So I
called them and I was like, well, we can't really
change it consider controlled. I'm like, it's not working, dude.
I had to buy without insurance, didn't matter. But I
stopped taking that new medicine for a day and I

(33:19):
saw how I feel and I was like, okay, I
didn't slept, I woke up okay without taking it. I
was like, okay, it was because of this formulary of
this medicine. So sometimes even the same medicine, just a
different formulary, different manufacturer, can't have that change. It was
really important to speak about your changees you feel, your mood,

(33:41):
anything different, something might have changed, What is different and
then look back timetable. I mean, one of the things
that I'm very grateful for is when I did not
want to take my pain meds when I was in
the hospital just a day. There's a lot of reasons,
just they freaked me out. I didn't want to do
it because I knew people that were hurt them and
I was like, I don't want to take them. But

(34:02):
I found I really had to do it. So it
was very adamant every time I took them to write
down when I took at the time everything and it's
crazy because I'm like looking, I was moving at some
point I looked down, so I was a little booklet.
I knew exactly what it was. And I started seeing
how often I you would take them, and I'm like wow,
And then you could see it wasn't for a while.

(34:23):
And the last time I took one of the pills
was July at twenty nineteen. Like I still have it
if I need it, it's right there, but I just
don't take it. I try to find other ways to
how to cope. And again, if I don't talk about it,
I find it doesn't it doesn't become more powerful, and
there's different meditation techniques I do blah blah blah. But anyhow,

(34:44):
that's a that's a love it meditation shause.

Speaker 1 (34:47):
A lot of people do meditations too. I tried these
anxiety medicines never again, never again. I tried it once.
I tried one on eymore. What it was. I took
a couple and my heart was racing. I'm standing there
and my heart's point a thousand miles an hour. I'm like, yeah,
this isn't right. This doesn't feel right, this isn't okay,
and it's like there's got to be something better than this,
you know. And it's just like it's scary some of

(35:08):
the side effects. It's like I feel like I'm having
a heart attack. My heart's racing a thousand miles an hour,
and I'm not doing anything. I'm just staying there having
a casual conversation with somebody, and all of a sudden,
I feel like I'm out of breath. And it's it's
a horrible feeling, you know, And especially when you start
putting all these medicines and you don't know what they are. Oh,
we got to take this for this, that for this,
and it's like, no, nope, I'm good. Thanks. Anyways, No,
I don't like these. I don't like how they feel,

(35:30):
you know, And it's okay, Like you said, keep track
of your symptoms, anything news you start adding checking, you know,
like be your own advocate, Like, don't be scared to
say something to people, especially that when you start feeling
weird like me, she tell them all your symptoms, because
I know when the other people do therapy too, they
go in there and they're like, oh, well, they don't
want to talk about anything. It's like, I'm not going
to go say anything. Then what's the point of going.
Then you're not going to give it a shot, you
know what I mean. And so Nikolas had a question

(35:52):
for you though, do you have any advice for people that,
you know, say, maybe they're dealing with a loved woman trauma.
Do you have any advice or them maybe to help
them out, like, hey, here's some things see dues and
don't say listen you probably shouldn't do this, but try
this instead.

Speaker 2 (36:03):
Just I know that Trauma Survivors Network has a lot
of resources for people that have been through trauma. The
important part to know is that trauma actually affects. Trauma
affects much more than just the person that went to
the trauma. It also affects their loved ones too in
different ways. So trying to be kind with that and

(36:26):
understand that there is a difference that it can have,
and just accepting that with a grain of salt and
understanding that everybody's going to make mistakes and everybody's going
to maybe say something the wrong thing, and just sometimes
having an argument. Is having an argument is generally not
I should say, not always worth it, but not having

(36:48):
an argument is better. Sometimes it will help you sleep
than trying to get the last word and edgewise anything else.
I learned amazing technique through my speech language pathologist SLP.
It's called stop and deflect. Someone's like coming at me
and instead of I was like, I would say like no,
I don't want to talk about it now, I'll just
be like I'm sorry, but you know, whether it's really
great out or did you see the baseball game? Stopping

(37:10):
it and deflecting it, So.

Speaker 1 (37:12):
Yeah, defusing it kind of to almost.

Speaker 2 (37:15):
So allowing someone that's experienced trauma just to know that
there are people out there that have experienced trauma similar
dissimilar doesn't matter, and there are ways and there are
groups to help. And again, our group is there's a
lot of different trauma in this world, and I am
talking about a specific you know trauma, you know center

(37:39):
type of trauma like a you know, I went to
Level one trauma center with a brain injury and a
separated props are well bleeding, blah blah blah. So again
everyone's different, but there are a lot of good advocacy
groups out there to give people the safe space to do.
And it is very much you know, you know, anonymous
where the year, what happens in there stays in there.

(38:00):
And I can only talk about my experiences openly. I
won't share anybody else's and that's important and that's something
that's good. And we'll find that there's a lot of
people out there have done some pretty cool stuff with
their trauma. Actually, the other person that was on the
interview with Christina Scavie and I, Andrew Davey, actually did

(38:22):
he was had an article by the website same you
dot org and I wrote to them too and wrote,
so same you dot org was created by Amelia Clark
when she actually she had a braining heroism from Game
of Throne. She had a game brainiurism first season a
Game of Thrones, and she started this brain injury organ
organization based on, you know, some of the lack of

(38:44):
care that she saw out there to give people resources.
You know, that's through someone's hardship they did. They were
able to create something for others, and that's really you know,
it's really neat that people that I've been able to
kind of get some of that stuff pushed along. Right.

Speaker 1 (39:00):
Well, Nicholas, we're at the part of the show where
I ask you two questions. I don't know if you've
ever seen one of these episodes. The first question comes
in from a good friend of mine. She wants a podcast.
It's called The Shit that Goes On in Our Heads? Okay,
So when we interviewed, she asked me a question. So
here's my question to you, Nicholas. If your mental health
had a song, what would that song be?

Speaker 2 (39:18):
I'm a mental health had a song, I will say
Trip the Darkness by the Kuncott.

Speaker 1 (39:23):
You check it out. We go check that out for sure.
I love it, man, I love it. Okay. So the
next question, and the reason this podcast exists, is that
if you could break this stigma about mental Ti'm talking
about anything that you see on a daily basis that
you just want people to stop, and you know they
may not realize they're doing this or just something you
keep hearing people say, what would that be?

Speaker 2 (39:43):
Are you okay? That's always you know what.

Speaker 1 (39:45):
I think it's funny because when you say that, though,
it's so true, though are you okay? It's like, clearly
I'm not if you're asking me, you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 2 (39:52):
Just you know, asking someone it's hard to answer if
like you're okay or something going on and just letting
someone know, do you need something? Are you do? You know?
Can I do anything for you? Or smile at them
fake until you make it. Sometimes that will help change
someone's you know, aspect of the day. It could change

(40:13):
out what they feel or do because someone smiled. And
you know, I always say like there's worst crap in
the world, Like hey, it's worst crap in the world.
Like sure, it's my way of deflecting of what bad
is out there that I have been through pretty bad,
but I haven't been through the worst. So sometimes that's
a that is a way just to People will generally

(40:34):
be kind and do it, but being your own advocate
is important. And standing in front of it is what
matters when you tell your own story, because when you
tell it, other people can't fill in the blakes. If
you stand up and speak it, it's your story, nobody else's.

Speaker 1 (40:49):
I still love it. I still love it. I love
how you that. That's a real great point, Nicholas. I
really like it. And you know, tell your own story
because you can know you control the narrative as well too.
I just love it, man, I think it's great. Thank
you so much for being here. Man, I appreciate thank you.
I gotta say I've been admiring your collection behind your head.
If anybody's not watching the video of this, I've been.
I've been admiring Nicholas's collection back then. So listen, man,

(41:12):
it's been great.

Speaker 2 (41:13):
Street creds pretty high. Listen. Thank you. I appreciate it.

Speaker 1 (41:16):
I love it, man. Listen. So what are your top
five table games? If you say somebody's trying to get
into the whole thing, what do you think you should
be some starters for them?

Speaker 2 (41:23):
Well? Fine, table Well, obviously I'm a path you win
for Pathfinder? How could how could you guess? I did that?
But any any games with friends that you want to play,
just honestly, games for fun. What are you playing games
for you to games to win? You're playing games with teamwork,
You're playing games for fun. Like I I love like

(41:44):
the board game or the card game joking, Hazard's like amazing,
It's super fun. But it's a funny game, and I
understand what I want to do with it. I don't
like player versus player games such as like Risk or
or any you know versut other I like it when
the players team up versus you know, the game or

(42:04):
the monster or whatever case. So it depends what makes
it to you, guys. Yeah, a good point, good point.

Speaker 1 (42:11):
Yeah, No, I agree. I agree, It's all good. There's
so many different ones out there. Like my mom was
a big Uno fan, so she played all like variations
of that kind of thing where you're younger, you know,
and stuff like that. And like I said, my brother,
when he got older, he started getting deeper into some
of these other games. He started pulling out some other
you know ones, and my kids their favorite one were
the Forbidden series, you know, like Forbidden Island for Forgetting Sky.

(42:33):
They really like those, Like the complexity of it was
just really cool for them, you know. Oh no, we're
in trouble. We got to hurry up and work together
and get these things done.

Speaker 2 (42:41):
You know.

Speaker 1 (42:41):
They like the aspect that they also like. Zombie Side
was another one they really dug into. Like as complex
as it was, they just like going out there killing zombies.
That's all they care. They're like, I'm just gonna go
out there and fight these zombies. You're not gonn run away. No,
I'm gonna go out here and make some noise. I
don't care. Like you're gonna make the noise they're gonna
hear you. Oh, I don't care. I'm gonna go out
there anyway. You know, there's just not they just making
all those sense like you realize, like this is gonna
bring more c They're gonna make more come right. Oh yeah, no,

(43:02):
it's okay. I'm right with that.

Speaker 2 (43:03):
You know.

Speaker 1 (43:03):
It's just so funny to listen to them go, oh yeah,
I'm right. The other one that really took off with
them they liked was called Stuff Fable, the one where
you the toys and you played to the book kind
of thing. That was kind of cool to introduce them
a little bit to it. Who They really enjoyed that
one because he had a lot of the decision making
as he goes. So, like you were saying, it just
kind of depends what fits into the category of what
you're trying to do, you know, Magic, the gathering anybody places.
I mean that one's still run forever. God, that game

(43:25):
got something place that and you giod if you're watching
me play turn one of that game, it's like you
you're sitting there two hours later and they're still done
their first turn.

Speaker 2 (43:32):
Like God, yeah, Now Magic and Pokemon and everything else,
everybody those are still I mean Magic still prints money.
I mean they now they do like they just did,
you know, Final Fantasy, Sevin. They just did Spider Man.

Speaker 1 (43:45):
Yeah, came out. I saw that one.

Speaker 2 (43:46):
I was like, yeah, I'm like, so again to each
their own. I mean again, that's so that's a card
game people will really enjoy. It's something I don't, yeah,
because I can't really I don't want to spend that
much money on it for it. I mean so that
I could just you know, pick up and play. And
that's a nice thing too. Again, what MIDI I am
Some friends of mine aren't gonna necessarily want to, you know,

(44:09):
play these games. But there's a game it's called Teleustrations.
Passions is after Dark where basically, you know, it's like
apples to apples, or someone writes something down and then
they draw and they pass it through. Well, we've played
it with basically cars and humanity cards essentially, but you
had some really graphic and interesting pictures. But that's a

(44:30):
group of people I would play with. They had a
lot of fun with it. They wouldn't play that with everybody.
What is the mindset we're trying to play exactly? And
that's a nice thing I found about gaming. When you
get to come together, there's a lot of people at
the table generally that might have the same ideas or
things that make them fun. So that's why it's nice
to go if they're playing tabletop role playing game D

(44:50):
and D path fine or whatever that people are coming in,
they're knowing what they want to do, and it's like,
I like a teamwork game, not an eyework game. Like
I want to work together with the party to create something.
So for me, that tends to be where I go
to listen.

Speaker 1 (45:06):
I'm gonna end this conversation in this episode. We'll tell
you this story really fast. Okay, So the reason why
you don't play card, Sigons and Manny with your family members.
Have I've had to sit there and explain to somebody
what a pixelated boucocky was Enough said right there, same here,
I literally said there. I've looked like I'm the weirdo
in this goddamn conversation explaining is. I'm like, you don't
know what that is? I looked at I'm like, you
know what that is? She goes, no, what is it? Pete?
And look at me and everybody got seven other people

(45:27):
at the table staring at you, like, well, what is
the pet Whant you explain it to us?

Speaker 2 (45:30):
Oh?

Speaker 1 (45:30):
Great, here you go. I'm gonna be the weirdo in
the group here now because I know what this were
to be.

Speaker 2 (45:35):
It's it is an interesting way too to tell what
your friends might be.

Speaker 1 (45:39):
Mabe. It's just some really strange sust you.

Speaker 2 (45:42):
Make racist You're like, oh wow, you would choose that, Okay,
that's up.

Speaker 1 (45:46):
Nicholas is like, I'm profiling every single money at this
table up. You know, you just don't know it based
in your choices.

Speaker 2 (45:52):
Yep.

Speaker 1 (45:53):
And with that being said, guys, we're gonna wrap up
this episode of Pete for anxiety. Nicholas thank you so
much for me and the man. I had a great
time hanging out with you. Do you want to plug
Radbody can find you if they need to reach out
to you.

Speaker 2 (46:02):
I appreciate it. I have a simple little link tree,
link Tree gifts of perspective and I just put my
different speech in any of my articles I've written and podcast.
So I'll look forward to helping people find any type
of connection I can get them.

Speaker 1 (46:19):
Definitely, I appreciate them. We're going to be on there
to you guys. Don't worry, we're gaining our time there anyways.
With that being said, guys, we wanna wrap on this
episode of Peter for Anxiety. You guys want to find
you have Pete Rick anxiety. I'm an ex all the
way down to TikTok, I'm on Spotify all the way
down to Pandora Radio now. And as I always say,
it costs nothing, actually nothing to be kind to somebody.
One kind act you could do, cause say some's life
for hell, you can you make their day? I'm Pete
for its anxiety sign off saying don't ask you your
day is today, say hey, how's your mental health today?

Speaker 2 (46:48):
Would