0:00

All right , daniel Regan , are you okay with being

0:02

recorded on a podcast ? Absolutely , there

0:05

goes that liability . This

0:07

is I Took a Hike . I'm your host . Darren

0:09

Mass , founder of Business Therapy Group and part-time

0:12

wilderness philosopher . Here we step out

0:14

of the boardrooms and home offices and into the

0:16

great outdoors where the hustle of entrepreneurship

0:18

meets the rustle of nature . In

0:22

this season-ending episode , we hike

0:24

the trail alongside Daniel Regan's

0:26

harrowing journey from literally the

0:28

bottom of the rock all the way to

0:30

the top of recovery to form new

0:32

beginnings as the founder of Healing

0:34

Us Centers . Our topics delve

0:36

into some of the most profoundly impactful

0:39

conversations that I have ever

0:41

encountered . That I have ever encountered . We

0:46

explore the harrowing journey of a hard drug user , from the early entanglement of

0:48

mewling for the cartels , enduring

0:50

multiple arrests , and the unwavering

0:53

determination of a mother who

0:55

refused to let her child succumb

0:57

to the darkness . This is an inspiring

1:00

tale of resilience , as Daniel

1:02

shares his life's hardship towards

1:04

recovery and discovers a newfound

1:07

will to survive , living a positive

1:09

and purposeful mission . There

1:11

are moments that are profoundly challenging

1:14

to absorb , serving as a

1:16

wake-up call for many to confront

1:18

the raw truth of pain , anguish

1:21

and despair , intertwined

1:23

with the harsh realities that plague

1:25

society . Experience this

1:27

transformative and inspirational

1:30

journey when I took a hike with Daniel

1:32

Regan . This

1:43

episode is proudly brought to you by Brand

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and join me in the chat fora

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. Thriving journey to success . All

2:18

right , daniel , if anyone's done a background

2:20

research on you , you have had some challenges and I want to hear

2:22

about those challenges . The way that

2:25

I got connected with you is through your sister

2:28

. Yes , she took an opportunity

2:30

. Maybe she saw me on a post

2:32

on LinkedIn , since I do a lot of that , mm-hmm

2:35

. And she reached out to me and said my

2:37

brother has an awesome story and

2:39

he's very successful and

2:42

he's been through F and hell

2:44

and back . And then

2:46

you applied and you shared some of

2:49

your videos and content that

2:51

you've had and I remember

2:53

seeing one of those bits . You

2:55

were on a Chris Hansen special

2:57

. Yes , now I'm going to pause

2:59

, not to catch the predator .

3:00

There we go .

3:02

You were on a different one , yes , but

3:04

yeah , it's not to catch a predator , go . You were on a different one , yes , but yeah , it's not to catch

3:06

a predator . But you were on a special called

3:08

crime watch and I remember it was

3:10

friday night or whatever , and

3:13

I was watching those shows at that time in

3:15

my life and I remembered the exact

3:18

episode . I don't know how many I must have

3:20

watched , but when I clicked on that link I was like

3:22

holy shit , I saw this episode . So

3:24

why don't you start off by

3:26

telling us what was

3:28

hell ?

3:28

like hell is hell ? Not

3:31

so much for the physical things that come with

3:33

it all those , those are terrible

3:35

. But what the mental

3:37

anguish that you go through as an

3:39

individual , that you're

3:41

living and existing at

3:44

the bottom of society

3:46

really and just the

3:48

bottom of self . You don't know who

3:51

you are anymore . You start

3:54

to adopt a feeling

3:56

that that's all you can be and there's

3:58

no fixing you . There's no other avenue

4:01

in sight , there's no other opportunity for you , and

4:04

the scariest part of being there was that

4:06

I was accepting that and I

4:08

didn't think there was any other route for me . And

4:10

that acceptance of that

4:12

fate led me to some really dark

4:15

places in my mind and in

4:17

life , and I didn't know if

4:20

I . I didn't think I'd ever get out and

4:22

I was on the pathway to end

4:24

it as quick as I could . Wow .

4:27

And just so we can draw attention

4:29

to it . What

4:31

was the hell reason ? Why did you get

4:34

there ? What were you doing ?

4:35

I think everything stems . You

4:37

know , it's a snowball effect For someone

4:40

to get there , it's just not

4:42

one day and then the next right . There's

4:44

a perspective that's grown over time

4:46

and we feel a lot of the

4:48

times . I always say your gifts can

4:51

be curses in a lot of ways

4:53

. I've always been a very empathetic

4:56

person , always cared about the world , always wanted

4:58

to make an impact , always felt the

5:00

the hurt in the world . So I I

5:02

always dealt with that . I mean

5:04

, I saw , saw one of those commercials on

5:07

TV where you get , you know , 99

5:09

cents a day you could save a child and wherever

5:11

. Oh , you're that guy you fell for that

5:13

no , no , I mean , but I saw

5:15

that as a four-year-old kid and

5:17

I started saving my food every

5:20

dinner and , you know , stick it under my bed

5:22

. My mom will tell you stories of these kind of things

5:24

all the time .

5:25

So your character is good , but I just wanted to

5:27

clarify your hell was a major

5:30

substance abuse and I'm not talking about a middle

5:32

. I'm not talking about smoking a joint outside

5:34

of school . I'm not talking about

5:36

just a party drug with your friends

5:39

at a club . You were in a

5:41

literal hell hole .

5:42

Of course . Yes , what

5:45

I'm getting to is basically that

5:47

feeling of uncertainty . All the time it

5:49

was reaffirmed in my life in multiple different

5:51

facets , because when you're focused

5:54

on the negative , what happens is you find it right

5:56

Anything that I'm attracting

5:58

into my life and setting an attention for that's

6:00

what ends up being attracted .

6:02

Well , the same goes for positive too . If you have a positive

6:04

mindset , you find it . If you have a negative mindset

6:06

or surround yourself with negative people or junkies

6:09

, you will be a culmination

6:11

of those people or that situation .

6:12

Right , so you know , that

6:14

mindset was very . It was

6:17

reaffirmed in multiple different facets . My

6:19

mom got cancer when I was younger and stuff like that

6:21

. I had a hard time with change

6:24

. I didn't know how to adapt to

6:26

life's changes . I wanted to control

6:28

and keep things comfy and

6:31

in doing so I kind of would

6:34

always find myself in a state of chaos , because life

6:36

is always changing . Nothing is permanent , right

6:38

. So I was dealing with this

6:40

and , unfortunately , before I learned how to

6:42

regulate that or cope

6:45

with it , I found substances

6:47

and it seemed to cure

6:50

that fear , that anxiety

6:52

.

6:53

It seemed to help me cope thoughts in the mind

6:55

right so what was the first substance

6:58

you tried ?

6:59

marijuana . It was the first one . Who didn't

7:01

? Yeah ?

7:02

now it's legal yeah it's typically the first .

7:04

Right now it's legal and not even cool . Yeah , typically

7:06

alcohol is the first , but I

7:09

actually I could care

7:11

less about alcohol . I

7:13

never have really cared for it

7:15

, but we'd got

7:17

into that and it just seemed to cure all

7:20

my issues . All of a sudden I was

7:22

making friends , because it was easy to make friends

7:24

that are doing the wrong thing . It's easy to get into

7:26

those circles . You just have to do the wrong thing with them

7:28

, right ? And uh , it

7:31

just kind of took on a life

7:33

of itself , because I became the kid that

7:35

was daring

7:37

and would try different things

7:40

. And you know , I

7:42

came into middle school with a cool story of the

7:44

weekend , of what I did and got up to . So peer

7:46

pressure was just .

7:48

It was more .

7:50

There was peer pressure , but no one actually was making

7:53

me do it . It was what

7:55

I was getting from doing those things right

7:57

. So the validation of others , like

7:59

wanting to know what my weekend was like , what I got

8:01

up to . And , of course , as get

8:04

older , other people are trying weed now , so

8:06

you got to up the ante . Right

8:08

, you have to up the ante , yes , and I

8:10

was . I grew up . My parents are great

8:13

parents , so they struck

8:15

me with the fear of God with drugs

8:17

. You know you smoke weed , you're going to fall down and die

8:19

, kind of thing .

8:20

This is your brain on drugs . Yeah , exactly , dad

8:26

, I learned this is your brain on drugs .

8:27

Yeah , exactly , dad , I learned it from you and all those 80s stupid commercials that

8:29

we laughed exactly .

8:29

No one bought that shit , but I could . I give out , your mom is clearly

8:31

. I've seen the interviews your mom is clearly

8:34

a good mom . You didn't grow

8:36

up in a neglected home .

8:38

You were just that kid that

8:40

fell prey to influence yeah

8:43

, and you know , once you

8:45

try weed and you didn't fall down and die and you had a great

8:47

time and you were laughing and giggling and all that stuff

8:49

, you're like , ah , I guess they lied

8:51

to me about everything , oh shit

8:53

. So that's where it

8:56

kind of took effect . And you

8:58

know I have family members that also

9:00

were into drugs and

9:02

substances so it was

9:04

easy to get introduced to them . You know

9:06

, everybody thinks it's like a drug dealer lurking

9:09

in the corner of an alley . It's never

9:11

. It's someone that you trust and love . That's probably

9:14

going to show you the way with this , whether it's a friend

9:16

, a family member , whatever it may be .

9:17

Yeah , I think you know I've

9:19

been in these situations as well . It's

9:21

someone you look up to . They're

9:29

getting high and like , hey , you want to try , but they don't realize what they're doing because they

9:31

have already self-justified their own medication , correct ?

9:32

so it's like hey , you want to be at the level I'm at right , try this , it'll be cool .

9:34

Yeah , but uh

9:37

so how old were you when you , when you smoked your

9:39

first ? What joint bowl first .

9:41

Yeah , it was a bowl , but uh , that

9:43

was 12 . That was my first one .

9:47

That's about typical .

9:48

I look back at pictures of myself at 12

9:50

, and I'm like , oh my God , I was a baby and

9:52

in my head I thought I was grown .

9:54

you know Well of course you were always older

9:56

in your mind when you were younger

9:58

, but when you get older you are

10:00

younger in your mind . Of course that

10:06

works out . It's funny how that works out . All right , so you go on from there . What's the next

10:08

drug ?

10:09

So cocaine was next . Okay

10:11

, what age ? I love cocaine

10:14

. Yeah , I loved it

10:17

. Gave me a sense of control over my life , felt

10:20

like I could do anything , so

10:22

you fell with .

10:22

Superman , Exactly Now

10:24

. Were you doing cocaine at

10:27

parties , or was it ? You

10:29

know I need a quick bump before school .

10:32

No , at this time it was parties

10:34

, it was recreational . Next

10:36

came psychedelics . I've always

10:38

been a hippie at heart , so you

10:40

know got into psilocybin

10:42

, lsd , things

10:44

like that . Okay , a lot of my friends

10:47

in my friend group now are entrenched

10:49

in drug culture , so

10:51

we're dealing drugs , we're

10:54

kind of being

10:57

the people that introduce others

10:59

, okay . Um , and we had a close knit

11:01

of friends . We all went

11:04

across together dirt bike stuff like that

11:06

, okay . So we go into the woods and party , okay

11:08

.

11:09

And that was college for me .

11:12

Yeah , and many others . By

11:14

the time we were leaving high

11:16

school , oxycontin started

11:19

. That became really big .

11:21

So you were getting pills of Oxy ? Were you just

11:23

ingesting the pills or grinding them and snorting

11:25

them ?

11:26

I didn't mess with them at first . To be honest with you

11:28

, I hated downers . I

11:30

loved loved uppers . Love

11:32

speed , love doing hippie , flipping

11:35

things okay , like ecstasy

11:37

mushrooms . And then

11:39

we uh , I broke my back

11:41

dirt biking . I ended up up crushing

11:43

my L3 , l4 , l5 . Oh

11:45

wow .

11:46

I think I know where this is going now .

11:48

Yeah , okay , so my

11:50

friend , what age ? Was this . This was

11:52

right before I left high school . Okay

11:54

, so this was 17 , 18 .

11:56

Very impressionable kid at

11:58

that point Correct , very susceptible to

12:01

not understanding right and wrong and

12:03

addiction . Exactly Got it .

12:07

So this isn't a forewarning for all parents

12:09

.

12:09

What you're about to hear is

12:11

reality . It's what happens , and

12:14

a lot of our opioid crisis

12:16

comes from wisdom teeth .

12:18

Yes , it does , and sports injuries

12:20

.

12:20

And sports injuries . So , yeah , this is

12:22

a good message to hear . So you

12:25

get prescribed opioids

12:27

yes , oxy , oxy

12:30

30s .

12:31

Yep , okay , which is strong ? So

12:33

my , my friend , nick

12:36

unfortunately nick's not here anymore

12:38

. Okay , he passed away , but

12:40

he , uh , he , he

12:42

knew how to sell these things . That's what he was doing . He

12:45

was also learning how to doctor shop . So

12:48

what he was doing is getting

12:50

five to seven

12:52

different doctors to prescribe

12:54

him pills . So he was getting

12:57

anywhere between 400

12:59

to 830 milligram Roxy's

13:02

a week . Wow .

13:05

And sold them for 15 . And the doctors ?

13:06

didn't know yet what they were doing .

13:07

They knew no , but they didn't know what

13:09

was going to happen . Obviously .

13:11

They all knew Really . Yeah

13:13

, everything was under the table . Ah

13:16

, cash , oh , understood

13:18

. I mean , he

13:21

was brilliant at it . He would get homeless people

13:23

in Newark , okay , and he would have

13:25

a line of them . Everybody was

13:27

getting these pills . He'd hook them

13:30

up with a couple .

13:31

And the doctors knew what was going on . Yeah , oh

13:33

, wow . I mean , they pretended not to know

13:35

. I hope they all lose their license .

13:37

They did certain things to kind of cover their tracks

13:39

, but everybody knew

13:41

these weren't good doctors or

13:43

home wall kind of places , crooked doctors

13:46

, okay .

13:46

so so you get these pills yeah

13:48

, so he he goes score .

13:50

You know , my friend has a legitimate injury .

13:54

I'll teach him how to doctor shop , but you

13:56

already were getting a prescription for oxy

13:58

, yeah , but I hated it .

13:59

okay , I really didn't like taking downers

14:01

, but when I started doctor shopping

14:04

, you know I had thousands

14:06

of these things . I'm making money

14:08

. How much ? Now I'm in

14:10

college . How much money are you making ? We

14:13

were making probably

14:16

close to $10,000 a month . Wow .

14:18

Did you realize ?

14:19

it was wrong . Yes

14:23

, but I had this kind of rebel mentality

14:26

. Okay , that we , uh , you

14:29

know you justify it and rationalize

14:31

the most rational stuff

14:33

well .

14:34

so I often say this on the show human

14:36

beings were born with two things that separate us

14:38

from the animal kingdom one posable

14:41

thumbs it's great for tools and

14:44

two , the ability to rationalize everything

14:46

. If you're making a lot of

14:48

money , you could rationalize it . You

14:51

can give yourself a reason or an excuse

14:53

. You could steal the loaf of bread if you're

14:55

hungry Absolutely .

14:56

Okay , so it's

14:59

amazing how we can do this

15:01

and that's the it's survival , yeah

15:03

, and it's the abuse of the prefrontal

15:05

cortex . Right there you

15:07

go .

15:07

Science not , uh , yeah , all right

15:11

so you

15:13

are now dealing , you're

15:16

bringing in a substantial amount of money

15:18

.

15:18

Yes , for 18 uh

15:20

, yep , 18 , going on 19 and

15:23

uh , at this point , like I'm in college

15:25

. So now I'm doing , I'm

15:28

doing cocaine and ecstasy

15:30

is like every day . You know , now , because

15:32

I don't have my parents , I'm really

15:35

good at living two different lives . So

15:37

I was a straight a student , okay

15:39

, captain of the swim team through high school , oh

15:42

, wow , tsa student

15:45

for engineering . I got a full-ride

15:47

scholarship to FTU .

15:49

So your parents had no knowledge .

15:52

I mean , there's little signs , but there's so much evidence

15:55

, I'm doing it right then .

15:56

Because why correct something if everything else

15:58

is working right ? Correct . So they're thinking

16:00

maybe you're partying every once in a while , but they don't

16:02

realize how bad the habit is yeah , they think I'm

16:04

smoking weed every once in a while .

16:06

But yet you're still getting straight A's , and chances

16:08

are you know your parents grew up in

16:10

the 60s and all right , that

16:12

didn't kill anyone , whatever , okay

16:14

, and so now I'm in college , I don't have

16:17

their oversight , I don't have to pretend

16:19

to be anybody else , so it's just , you

16:22

know , balsa to the wall in that direction

16:24

. So I got addicted to

16:27

partying and having ecstasy and

16:29

cocaine all the time . That

16:32

stuff is very expensive .

16:34

And you're dealing to everyone around , correct

16:36

. So you're the fun guy that everyone comes

16:38

to .

16:39

Yep exactly . So I take on that personality

16:41

of being that guy

16:43

and eventually one time

16:46

you know all my dealers for Coke and

16:48

everything else they run out

16:50

. They don't have anything . This

16:52

is when opiates really started becoming so popular

16:55

that that's

16:57

what they were selling heroin or pills .

16:59

Okay , before

17:03

we go into , that ?

17:04

how many pills a day were you doing Once I started using at this

17:06

point because they ran out of coke

17:08

and everything else I

17:15

started with about a quarter of an oxy and in

17:17

two months I was doing 14 a day .

17:18

14 a day , Wow .

17:21

So at that point

17:24

I'm totally lost

17:26

. I'm gone

17:28

, I can't go to classes , I'm

17:30

avoiding my house , I'm not calling

17:33

home . My whole life just downhill

17:36

real quick and it gets real ugly

17:38

real quick , doing

17:41

things that , putting myself in really dangerous

17:43

situations , going into Patterson

17:46

and , you know , getting

17:48

drugs from gangs , making

17:53

alliances with them . You're making alliances with gang members

17:55

. We had to because it was a cost

17:57

thing .

17:58

What does that look like ?

17:59

Well , they like you . You

18:07

know I'm the white boy that can get through

18:09

things a little bit easier . If I get pulled over , I'm usually let go . So typically

18:11

you become a mule for the gangs and then I get cheaper

18:13

product . So that's what's

18:16

happening , because now I'm using

18:18

my own supply . So

18:20

, uh , you know that took over

18:23

then my I remember my college roommate that you know I was

18:25

involved with . You know that took over . Then I remember my college roommate that you know I was

18:27

involved , you know , doing all this stuff with . He brought heroin

18:29

one day when we made one of these runs

18:31

to Patterson and I

18:33

remember going to him and being like what

18:36

is wrong with you ? Like why would you bring that in

18:38

here ? We don't do heroin , we're

18:40

classy , you know drug

18:42

addicts , he's like it's the

18:44

same thing . I'm like , no , it's

18:46

not , it's heroin , it's different . And

18:48

he's like , no , just try some . It's

18:51

the exact same thing . And

18:53

I was hurting . We didn't have anything

18:55

yet so I tried

18:58

it . I'm

19:02

like , oh , my God , it's the same thing

19:04

. Injected , no

19:07

, snorting . We were only snorting at this time and uh , only snorting . But uh

19:09

, he , uh . I was like how much was that ? He goes , it's five

19:11

dollars . So it's cheap so

19:15

that five dollars is about equal

19:17

to sixty dollars worth of pills . So

19:20

I was like it's cheap game , it's easy and

19:22

it's cleaner , correct ? So we

19:24

were selling pills and buying heroin that's what

19:26

it turned into which was very economical

19:28

for us at the time .

19:30

You were using that smart calculated brain

19:33

Right Not for the Purpose of good

19:35

, but yeah , I ended up

19:37

.

19:37

I came home for summer break and

19:40

I got pulled over in my car

19:42

and I had everything in my car because

19:45

we just moved out of our dorm room and

19:47

I was found with 200

19:49

Oxycontin and a list of people

19:51

who owe me money and about like $15,000

19:54

in cash . You're guilty and they knew

19:56

what I was doing .

19:57

You're guilty yeah .

19:58

There's no question . Luckily I had some prescriptions

20:00

over in my name , so you know

20:02

. I told them I was a bus boy and it was

20:05

my tip money that I've been saving . They

20:07

weren't buying it . No , I was

20:09

stupid .

20:09

They have to arrest you , no matter what . It's up to the

20:11

DA . I was arrested .

20:12

Yeah , my parents are waiting for me at home for

20:14

dinner . They have no idea I've been arrested .

20:17

And they have no idea what you're doing .

20:18

No , and I talked them out of it and

20:21

said look , I know what

20:24

you think this is . I'm not going to say whether

20:26

I am or not doing these things

20:28

. I am taking these pills

20:30

. I am getting more than what I should be getting

20:32

. I'm like I'll

20:34

introduce you to the doctor so you can

20:36

take care of the problem as

20:38

long as I can go right now and

20:41

they allowed that to happen no

20:43

jail , no jail .

20:45

Hey listener , Thanks for hiking along with us . Discover

20:48

more episodes at itookahikecom , or

20:50

to recommend an adventurous guest , apply to be a

20:52

sponsor or to simply drop us a line . All

20:56

right , let's continue on this trail . So what year was ?

20:57

this , so this was the line . All right , let's continue on this trail . So what year was this ? So

20:59

this was .

21:01

You got arrested , just to be clear , right .

21:03

Yeah , I got arrested .

21:04

The officer has no choice . They have to uphold the law Correct

21:06

.

21:07

Okay and I was charged . They

21:09

didn't charge me for dealing , even though they had more than enough

21:11

evidence .

21:12

They didn't charge you for dealing Okay .

21:13

No , they just charged me for the

21:15

pills that were not in the prescription .

21:18

Okay , so I'm going to ask this polarizing question

21:20

Do you believe that you

21:22

were not charged for dealing because of the color of your

21:24

skin ?

21:27

I believe I wouldn't be able to . This

21:30

situation wouldn't happen unless

21:34

I was who I was . I was , you know

21:36

. I got a , got

21:38

pulled over in freehold . I'm

21:40

from Freehold , I'm white . I

21:42

wouldn't , probably have that opportunity yeah

21:44

. Do you believe that

21:47

was fair . I

21:49

mean , at the time I thought it was fair because I wanted to get

21:51

away with it .

21:53

Yeah , and no , I'm not trying to set you up for anything . This

21:55

is just the unfortunate reality

21:58

of the polarization of society

22:00

. Yeah , Do you believe

22:02

at that time that was fair , or should you have

22:05

been arrested and sentenced to

22:07

something ?

22:08

I 100 . Let

22:10

me , this is like . There's many

22:13

different layers to this . I think anybody

22:15

who is addicted to drugs shouldn't be

22:17

punished because they're addicted to

22:19

drugs . I fully agree with that . I believe

22:21

that they should have an opportunity to get well . I

22:24

fully agree with that .

22:25

Over that Dealing , though , is a different story .

22:27

Dealing is a different story , but I do agree

22:29

there's levels of dealing .

22:30

Peer pressure , especially in the young

22:33

minds of teenage

22:35

children , can cause

22:37

your life to take a different path and

22:40

you don't know how or when to say no

22:42

, and sometimes it's that one

22:44

pill that gets you Correct . So

22:46

I do agree , especially if

22:48

you are under a certain age , that

22:50

you should be given the opportunity

22:52

to not go to jail but get help

22:55

Correct when you're dealing that's

22:57

a different story .

22:59

Yes , I agree , and

23:01

you need to . There needs

23:03

to be consequences to actions right , equal

23:05

and opposite , and I totally , 100%

23:08

deserved a

23:10

chance to get myself well , because

23:12

really the only reason I'm dealing is to support

23:14

my drug habit .

23:16

It goes hand in hand sometimes , right , and how much

23:18

was this habit ?

23:18

dollar .

23:19

Wise is to support my drug habit . It goes hand in hand sometimes , right .

23:21

How much was this habit ? Dollar wise , I was using about $400 a day

23:24

. That's a lot of money . Yeah , it's

23:26

hard to do Every day , seven days a week yes , no breaks

23:28

, no breaks .

23:29

Were you high all day , all night .

23:31

Yes , but you get your

23:33

tolerance builds up so you're

23:36

able to function and you regulate

23:38

it in a way .

23:39

I have friends where they smoke pot all day , all night . I

23:41

don't know how they do that , but to them that's normal

23:43

.

23:44

Yeah , well , with THC , you have

23:46

THC receptors in your brain , so

23:48

basically they get clogged up after a while and

23:51

you don't feel high anymore , got it . So that's

23:54

why they take a break every once in a while . Yep

23:56

, okay , got to knock it off , yep

23:58

, and then All right .

24:00

So $400 a day , habit , yep

24:02

, you get arrested . Handcuffs that

24:04

had to be scary , it was .

24:06

I'm scared to death County . No

24:08

, when I tell you I was in

24:11

and out in three hours . I was in and out in three hours , all

24:13

right you got a lucky break . Yeah

24:15

, back to the street . Now I had a clean

24:18

record . So , not anymore , not

24:20

anymore , okay , but I

24:22

actually still have a clean record to this day . Okay

24:25

, because they set me up with

24:27

, you know , their special detectives

24:30

. I had to go

24:32

into these doctors , wear a wire and

24:35

do deals with

24:37

these doctors . Okay , everything was

24:39

recorded , and

24:41

so you were an

24:44

informant Became a snitch .

24:45

Yeah , okay , so we all know

24:47

rat snitches and all that . Of course

24:49

, that's the movie stuff . Yeah , real life

24:51

. You became part of the solution , so

24:54

you are now

24:56

back on the streets . Did you

24:58

learn your lesson at all ? As you were an informant

25:00

, you were sober or what happened ?

25:03

Not at all . All right , so you're an informant

25:05

and you're still getting high . I'm trying to live this double life

25:07

right , but now I'm home from college

25:10

, I'm with my parents again . They're

25:13

starting to notice some stuff up

25:15

with me , they're aware , correct , they

25:18

have no idea . I've been arrested , some stuff up with me . They're

25:20

aware , correct , they have no idea .

25:20

I've been arrested your night , no idea that I'm being an informant . Wait , wait , wait

25:23

. They had no idea that you were arrested

25:25

.

25:33

Nope , no idea , I was 19 . I was in .

25:34

I told you I was in and out in three hours . They're waiting for me for dinner

25:36

at the house while I'm being

25:38

arrested .

25:39

That night it was so surreal , but that

25:41

addictive ego just tells you you're just so

25:43

good , you just feel like you got away with it and

25:46

your parents had no idea . No idea

25:48

, I sat back down at dinner .

25:49

They're like where were you ?

25:50

Probably got held up with traffic . I

25:52

totally got pulled over for speeding ticket or

25:54

something . It was just normal for me . I

25:56

had a super WRXX

25:59

, so I was always speeding Okay

26:01

understood . Loud , farty , exhaust . Yep

26:04

, gotcha , you're that guy , I'm that guy . Okay

26:06

, thanks , still that guy . All good

26:08

, all good , but they had no idea

26:10

. I mean my mom

26:12

. After it all came out , she just

26:14

starts second guessing her

26:17

motherhood , you know which is ?

26:18

not her fault .

26:19

No , not at all .

26:21

You're an upper class human being

26:23

in an upper class town , Nice

26:25

, educated parents right

26:27

, Mm-hmm the classic cliche

26:29

. How could this happen to my boy ? We

26:32

were always there for them .

26:33

Yeah , I mean , my family was like the Brady

26:35

Bunch .

26:38

But that's the crazy part , is it happens ? Oh

26:41

, it knows no bounds it knows no bounds . Good

26:43

people , bad people , it doesn't matter , anyone

26:45

can have that situation , in

26:47

your case , a back problem . Mm-hmm

26:49

, you were probably going

26:51

to go there , by the way , chances are .

26:54

Yeah , I was well on my way even without that .

26:56

That expedited .

26:57

Accelerated yeah .

26:58

All I was well on my way even without that . That expedited , accelerated , all right . So now I'm

27:00

going to jump back . You're an informant , you're

27:04

an arcing , you're doing drugs . Are

27:06

you still dealing as you're an informant ?

27:08

No , the dealing stopped . I

27:10

was too scared . But I still

27:12

have a $400 a day habit Of heroin

27:15

, of heroin , of snorting .

27:17

Yep Ever doing , of heroin , of heroin , of snorting , yep ever doing ?

27:19

injectables . Uh , not until later , until later yeah

27:21

, all right .

27:22

So what happens next ?

27:23

so so , basically , I have this habit

27:26

and I'm at this

27:28

point I have to resort to stealing

27:30

. That's the only way

27:32

to get the money for the day . What

27:34

were you stealing ? Anything and

27:36

everything . Did you steal my car radio ?

27:38

No , I did not , I didn't have mine .

27:40

I was really big into see . I always

27:42

had like a business mindset in a crazy

27:45

way . So like I started this

27:47

junk business where I was picking up people's

27:49

junk , selling the metal I

27:51

was doing odd jobs doing you know

27:53

power washing and stuff like that , and

27:55

copper was a big one for me , oh yeah

27:58

.

28:00

So I came from the telecom industry . Copper is very good to recycle .

28:02

Yeah , so undisclosed . I'm

28:04

not going to give locations or anything . No

28:06

, no , please don't . But you know we would

28:09

like new building sites , you

28:11

would you were that guy , yeah , the one that

28:13

the contractors hate .

28:14

Correct , I got you .

28:17

So we would do that stuff . I

28:19

live on a farm so there's a lot of random

28:22

stuff , tools , everything around the farm , so

28:24

I'm stealing from there , taking

28:26

from my dad's wallet , when I can

28:28

Like anything and everything . Do

28:31

you think they knew ? What

28:34

Did they know they would catch ? They would

28:36

ask me questions Like where'd my 20

28:38

go ? You know , I thought I got away with

28:40

it , but they knew where I was going . You

28:43

know I would hack into their

28:45

online banking system

28:48

, transfer money to myself . We did this last time

28:50

too .

28:50

Sorry , forgot

28:52

our one turn because the marker is not there . Gotcha

28:55

Did this last time , all right , so

28:57

your dad called you out on it . Maybe once in a

28:59

place .

29:00

Yeah , and I mean

29:02

you're talking only like a span of you

29:05

know , the June is when I got out of school

29:07

. Yeah , like end of May , june , and then

29:09

by July is

29:11

the first time my , my

29:14

mom's like you need to go to treatment . Got it ?

29:15

So she at this point , your family's having the discussion . My mom's , like you need to go to treatment , got it . So she , at this

29:17

point , your family's having the discussion . They know

29:19

they're aware .

29:21

Yeah , what . What exacerbated

29:23

and made my parents know like I

29:25

need to do something . They need to do something about it is

29:27

uh , my uncle came down for the weekend

29:29

from New York . He has a prescription

29:31

for anxiety medications . I

29:34

ate the whole bottle and found me it

29:37

was Xanax .

29:39

Oh , that's a very abused

29:41

drug . Yes , I was hurting .

29:43

I couldn't get my heroin that day .

29:45

What's the difference in the high between

29:47

Xanax and heroin or an opioid ?

29:49

Completely different , better or

29:51

worse , not enough

29:53

. Personally , I hate Xanax because I

29:56

black out . Every time I take it I forget everything

29:58

. I lose my phone , my wallet . I have conversations

30:00

with people I can't remember and this time

30:03

I've basically like sleepwalking around

30:06

and had a whole conversation with my parents about

30:09

what I've been doing . Basically had a whole

30:11

conversation about how I need help and

30:14

didn't remember . I woke up the next day to

30:16

my family sitting around the kitchen table and they're like we're

30:18

going to get you some . Remember ? I woke up the next day , it's my family sitting around the

30:20

kitchen table and they're like we're going to get you some help . I'm like what are you

30:22

talking about ? Like you don't

30:24

remember anything from last night . I'm like I

30:26

have no idea what you're talking about and

30:29

so that's just started my journey

30:31

.

30:32

What was that ? They send you to a treatment

30:34

facility they did .

30:36

Now they're very , very . You know , like most families , you

30:38

have no idea what to do in this situation .

30:40

Yeah , no one does yeah , you can watch

30:42

every show in the world , but when it's you , yeah

30:45

you're , you're in a panic mode they have no idea

30:47

where to start .

30:48

Yeah , where do you send me ? What do I need ?

30:50

yeah , there's a lot of self-doubt and blame on themselves

30:52

a lot of questions it probably came

30:57

between your parents relationship a a little bit Correct

30:59

.

31:00

Oh , a lot , A lot of it Showed you some fighting

31:02

.

31:02

It's your fault . No , it's your fault . You didn't

31:04

hug him enough . Type stuff .

31:07

Not so much that it

31:09

was more of what needs to be done . My dad

31:11

comes from a poor

31:13

background . He grew up in Manchester , england Okay

31:16

, and had an alcoholic

31:18

mother has

31:21

seven siblings , so there is a potential gene

31:23

for abuse ? Oh , 100% , okay , yeah

31:26

, it runs in both sides of my family . Okay , just

31:29

, we all have different ics . Yeah , workaholic

31:31

my grandfather was a gambling

31:33

addict , got it . My

31:36

uncle had drug issues .

31:38

So it does stem in my

31:40

family , so then I can imagine your parents were

31:42

saying it's your family that caused this .

31:44

No , your family no it's just

31:46

my dad wanted to take the harder route . Let

31:48

him figure it out . It's a phase kind of thing

31:50

when my mom was like , no , we need to do something

31:52

before he dies , break a cycle Right .

31:55

And uh , so you go to rehab , where

31:58

and how long ?

31:59

So the first time , like most parents

32:01

, they call the number on the back of their insurance

32:03

card . And you

32:06

know , this is the screwed

32:08

up part of the industry where people they

32:12

don't know the toxicity that

32:14

exists in any health care industry

32:17

.

32:17

Well , health care is a business it is and its purpose is a business it is and

32:19

its purpose is to drive down the cost

32:22

Correct and

32:24

make sure that Also keep you

32:26

patient . Yeah , they're providing

32:28

you only enough .

32:30

Right , so they

32:32

call the number on the back , of course , they send

32:35

me to the cheapest

32:37

treatment center that they could find

32:39

. Okay , which is where it

32:42

is in Bowling Green , pennsylvania . Yeah

32:44

, it was a homeless shelter

32:46

Awesome , as well as like

32:48

a soup kitchen , okay , and

32:50

a treatment center all in one , okay .

32:52

So they're not treating you , they're treating other

32:54

people , correct ?

32:56

Okay , I mean it was a horrible experience and

32:58

I was 20 years old

33:00

. I had no intention . I'm like

33:02

how am I gonna be sober if I live to 80 ? Yeah

33:05

, how am I gonna be sober for 60 years ? It

33:08

doesn't make sense . How do I have fun without

33:10

?

33:11

drugs .

33:11

How do I ? It's

33:13

been my identity for so long . How

33:16

am I the party guy without drugs ? How am I gonna

33:18

be the life of the party ? How am I the party guy without drugs ? How ?

33:20

am I going to be the life of the ?

33:20

party . How am I going to be cool ? How am I going to fit in All

33:23

those kind of questions swirling around

33:25

. So I went into the

33:27

first treatment center . Horrible experience

33:30

flooded on the second day there's

33:32

mildew . I got sick . I

33:35

was in a room with someone that had

33:37

alcohol-induced

33:39

dementia .

33:40

Oh , so he keeps waking up Real alcoholic .

33:43

Yeah , he keeps waking up , thinking I'm his wife

33:45

and screaming at me . So

33:48

I was just like I need to get out of here and

33:51

convinced .

33:51

Did that scare you To

33:54

the point where you would just say you know what ? I don't want to be

33:56

like this .

33:57

No , Because I already thought I was a

33:59

dirtbag at this point . I

34:02

was already going into that mode

34:04

that there's nothing

34:06

better for me and like

34:08

I didn't see another side

34:11

of life . I didn't see anything being

34:13

different you accepted your position Correct and

34:17

I felt bad . There was a lot of shame and guilt . I

34:19

didn't want to upset my family , I

34:22

didn't want to steal from them , but I

34:24

did these things already . So like there's kind of

34:26

like a how am I ever gonna get forgiveness

34:29

? Kind of thing yeah , you know

34:31

, I wouldn't forgive myself , kind

34:33

of deal and so

34:36

convinced my parents that I

34:38

was cured in two weeks and

34:40

I'm all better .

34:42

Did they believe it ?

34:43

Ready to go ? Of course they did , because every

34:45

parent does .

34:46

They want it . No , it's confirmation

34:48

bias .

34:49

They want it to be over . Yeah , because they're scared

34:52

too . Yeah .

34:53

And their pain , which you know , you're putting

34:55

yourself and the people who love

34:57

you in jeopardy .

34:58

Yeah , so I come home . Mom

35:01

has like a whole plan for me . We

35:03

got all these great things . You're going to wake up , you're

35:05

going to do this , and blah , blah , blah .

35:07

She got her boy back .

35:08

She got her boy back . She actually got

35:10

me a dog , thinking that

35:13

the dog is going to .

35:13

That's the best medicine I'm going to have medicine

35:20

.

35:20

Yeah , I was totally down for it . But she thought it would give me responsibility

35:22

and structure . But she wasn't wrong . I just wasn't ready . Within

35:24

a week , less than a week , my

35:26

drug dealers lived right across the street from me .

35:29

That's rule number one is you separate from anyone

35:31

that brings you back or had association . Yeah

35:33

, it's very hard .

35:35

I was very young and immature . There's no way you

35:38

were gonna separate me from my friends . So

35:40

relapsed , went down

35:42

real quick , real fast . It's like

35:44

zero to a hundred .

35:46

Went right back to where I was Straight back to

35:48

heroin .

35:48

Yep , okay . And then

35:50

my mom caught me because she took

35:53

off her wedding

35:55

ring to wash the

35:57

dishes and grabbed it

35:59

. You did not yep , and

36:02

I grabbed it to go sell it . I got to the pawn

36:04

shop and I couldn't , I couldn't

36:06

do it , I couldn't , I couldn't sell it . All right

36:08

, good , so all right , I was about to hate on you

36:10

for a second . Yeah , I

36:12

couldn't do it are you married ? Yes , you are you said ?

36:14

you're married . Yep , imagine . The

36:18

most ceremonial

36:20

gift you can ever give

36:22

your spouse in a moment of pure

36:24

love is

36:27

now swiped by

36:29

your child . Mm-hmm , yeah

36:31

, it was filled with pure evil at the

36:33

time .

36:34

Pure evil , that's evil , and that's

36:36

what drugs do that's what drugs do ?

36:37

Okay yeah .

36:39

They don't care , they don't

36:41

. You're so in

36:43

your head you're gonna die . You're so in

36:46

fight or flight response and

36:48

you're so in survival mode that

36:50

they're , and you lost who you are at this point . So

36:52

you have no moral compass , you

36:55

don't . You don't have any core

36:58

beliefs anymore . They're

37:00

gone .

37:01

You're not a member of society .

37:03

You lost everything that you were , you're not a contributing

37:05

member of society .

37:06

You are now a drain .

37:08

You are a robot solely going

37:11

trying to sustain , getting

37:14

the only need that you need at this time

37:16

, which is drugs . You will forfeit sex

37:19

relationships , water , food , shelter

37:21

, security .

37:22

You're on pure survival , all for that substance

37:24

. So let's fast forward to the Chris

37:27

Hansen special Yep , where I saw

37:29

your mom's scared

37:31

face talking to

37:33

the camera . She

37:35

found you kicked open

37:38

the door of a crack house , needle

37:40

in your arm and about to die

37:42

. So let's talk about that

37:44

. And then we're pivoting to why you're

37:46

such an awesome human .

37:48

Yeah , so I went back to treatment , ended

37:53

up in California this time . Real treatment . What was that

37:55

? A real place ? Yeah

37:58

.

37:58

I mean , they're all real places . No , but like a place that gelled

38:00

with you .

38:00

Yeah Well , no , yes and

38:02

no . It was a nicer place , 100%

38:05

Good counselors . They

38:07

were a 12-step model of care and I

38:09

went out there and I

38:11

really wanted to make it work in

38:13

a way , not for myself , but just

38:16

not to hurt others anymore . Okay , that's

38:20

the thing . You're not going to really make change happen unless you have that

38:22

internal motivation at the end of the day , and external

38:24

only takes you so far . Yeah , so

38:27

I got about 60 days of recovery and

38:30

then , uh , was in a sober living . Someone

38:32

started using lined myself

38:34

with them . I was off to the races

38:37

. This time I met methamphetamine

38:39

, oh , and , like I told you , I love

38:41

speed , so I found my new love . At this

38:44

point , did you stop heroin for meth ?

38:48

Yeah .

38:50

Yeah , I would still use heroin every once in a

38:52

while , but it's more to come down than to get high . All

38:54

right , so before we pivot

38:57

, that's shocking . Yeah , I've heard of people with

38:59

a lot of heroin , but it's more to come down than to get high .

39:00

All right , so before we pivot , that's shocking . Yeah

39:02

, I've

39:04

heard of people , when they're too

39:06

into a psychedelic trip , smoking weed and that

39:08

brings them down . But using heroin

39:11

to come down off of meth , yes

39:13

, okay , it's a downer , I get it . So

39:16

what does heroin feel like before we pivot

39:18

to meth it ? So ? So heroin

39:20

feel like before we pivot to meth ? Walk me through the feeling

39:23

, because we all hear heroin stories . You're not

39:25

the first , you're certainly not the last , but

39:28

no one , I think . If for those

39:30

who have not tried it , myself included

39:32

, what is it like ?

39:34

for me it's like a warm hug

39:36

, warm hug , you know you

39:38

fall asleep . I mean

39:40

, sometimes you nod out , but

39:43

it's not like . Isn't that a waste ? It's

39:45

not like falling asleep though You're

39:47

going into like a warm

39:50

bath of euphoria

39:53

. For me , methamphetamine

39:56

was the whole grill for me , okay .

39:58

Now we all hear horror stories about that . Yeah

40:00

, In fact , on the show in

40:03

season two , someone who is a phenomenal

40:06

person , inspirational . He's

40:08

a business coach . His

40:10

name is John Firth . Mid

40:13

episode he had asked what's

40:15

the most shocking thing a guest has ever told you ? And we're sitting

40:17

on a bench what's the most shocking thing a guest has ever told you

40:19

? And we're sitting on a bench in Liberty State Park and

40:22

I told them a few things and they were pretty shocking to

40:24

me . And then he said well , I

40:26

have a substance abuse problem currently . Wow

40:29

, and I said , okay

40:31

, coke , weed . And then I made a quip

40:33

Well , you have your teeth , so it's definitely not

40:35

meth . And he goes no , no , no , no , meth . Yeah

40:37

, and I held my composure

40:40

because that's what I do , a business therapist

40:42

. You can't shock me . But my mind

40:44

went bonkers . How

40:46

could this individual talking to me be actively

40:49

having this conversation while high on ?

40:50

meth .

40:51

I've met neurosurgeons that do surgeries high

40:53

on meth okay , jesus , okay

40:57

Yep

40:59

, as all people on this trail just

41:01

shocked themselves . What the what

41:03

? Mm-hmm . Neurosurgeons .

41:05

Neurosurgeons Working on your brain . So

41:08

yeah , so I'll get

41:10

there , because I met him in my last treatment center , but

41:13

he we don't say his name

41:15

. Obviously I won't say his name . I don't

41:17

know how he's doing . I haven't spoke to him in years but

41:19

I hope he's not doing . He was practicing

41:22

medical medicine . He was doing surgeries

41:24

and Literally smoking meth

41:26

in the operating room while

41:28

doing surgeries . Yeah

41:33

, Tweaking filmed himself doing it .

41:37

Expletive yeah meth

41:39

is one of those things that like so

41:41

now , if I need brain surgery , I need to say by

41:44

the way , do you do meth ?

41:45

in the cup , please wait .

41:46

So do the nurses and the anesthesiologists

41:49

and the people in the room they all know what .

41:51

They're the ones who made him go to treatment .

41:53

You know that person should be thrown in jail

41:55

for life period .

41:57

I don't care if he's got a habit , because

41:59

what it does to you ? The

42:02

world becomes gold , it becomes the

42:05

most exciting thing ever

42:08

and you are the king of it . That's

42:11

what it makes you feel . It doesn't matter what

42:13

it is , you will beat it , you will

42:15

take control of

42:17

it , you are it in all

42:19

of it . It makes you extremely hyper

42:21

focused . It allows

42:23

you to stay up and work past

42:26

any kind of physical barrier .

42:27

Listen , I took Adderall in college to

42:29

study for tests . I get that . That's nothing

42:31

.

42:32

Multiply that by a hundred thousand . I'm going

42:34

to say this with my hat off .

42:36

Kids . Drugs are bad . Stay

42:39

off of them .

42:40

Well , it deteriorates , you you know , very

42:42

quickly , because you can only sustain that level

42:44

of energy for so long . Now

42:46

, when I was using , the longest I stayed

42:48

up without sleep was 11 days . 11

42:51

days straight , no sleep .

42:53

Just tweaking . So right there , we know sleep deprivation

42:56

is you

42:58

go into a psychotic trip , correct

43:00

, and you can't fall asleep . It's not like you didn't

43:02

try , you just can't , you can't , you

43:04

can't 11 days and now you're hallucinating

43:06

. So you're the zombie

43:08

you see on the New York City street walking like this

43:11

. That person's on meth .

43:13

No .

43:13

No , no , that person's on heroin ?

43:15

That's heroin . Yeah , that person's on heroin ? That's heroin , yeah . Tweakers

43:18

is . I'm erratic .

43:19

So the one that's doing this , yeah , like itching all around that kind of

43:21

thing .

43:22

So it's like a South Park special , correct .

43:26

My mind is blown and I hope these people

43:28

go to jail . I'm sorry I hope they

43:30

get treatment and lose their license to practice .

43:33

Yeah , I mean when he told me that I was like what

43:35

? Yeah , dude , like I thought I was

43:37

bad , I didn't up with that . Okay

43:39

, it's on another level , all

43:41

right , you know , pivoting back , so I

43:43

end up on meth . I go wild

43:45

, I'm . I'm mulling

43:47

for the cartels out there to supply my

43:49

habit mexican turtles . I'm in , uh

43:52

, palm springs , california , so we're very close to tijuana

43:54

. Okay , so again I'm the white

43:56

boy .

43:56

So is that a shit your pants scenario when you're talking

43:58

to anyone in the cartel ? Yes , I

44:01

would Do

44:03

you have any stories of that where it's

44:05

just like you thought you were not coming home ? Many

44:07

of them . Pretty much every interaction so

44:10

is it kind of like hey , gringo , come

44:12

here and then gun to your head type situation

44:14

Yep .

44:15

Like having to switch . You know , they

44:17

never want to tell me where they are

44:19

, so I'd have to meet somewhere . You'd

44:22

have to get the bag over your head , they'd have

44:24

to drive you to the next place . Meanwhile

44:26

I'm 20 years old . You

44:28

know , I'm tiny . A guy

44:31

From the use of meth I was 97

44:33

pounds . Because I'm not eating , oh

44:35

my God . And so I'm tiny . I mean I'm wasting , god , and

44:37

so I'm tiny . I mean I'm wasting away and

44:40

getting a bag thrown over my head .

44:42

I had a girlfriend at the time You're getting a bag thrown

44:44

over your head .

44:45

Yeah , like you got the hood so that's literally

44:47

where you're going . Oh yeah , the movies

44:49

are real .

44:51

Are you really afraid ? Are you just so high that you're

44:53

just like okay , cool , I need my drug

44:56

?

44:56

It's the only way that I'm going to get it it . You know , and they know

44:58

that they got you . Yeah , they're gonna use

45:00

me for what I'm worth , which is I'm gonna get

45:02

through the border without many questions and you

45:04

got through the .

45:05

So you , I used to watch this show arrested

45:07

abroad , where I think that's the name

45:09

of it , and it was all about these

45:11

essentially mules people that were lured

45:13

out of countries . You know , honest

45:16

, innocent people , but they were enticed by

45:18

a $10,000 payday for just putting

45:20

something in their in their suitcase .

45:21

Yeah , for me . They would give me a couple ounces

45:24

of meth , which you

45:26

know was a huge score for me and you would

45:28

cross the border . Yeah , so we

45:30

would go over with a Toyota

45:32

Corolla . You know that had secret compartments

45:35

in the back , whatever this

45:37

is in San Diego . Drop it off somewhere

45:39

. They would take it somewhere else , they would load it up

45:41

, bring it back to you . Did you ever feel

45:43

like you were about to get caught ? Oh

45:46

, every , every second . Why

45:48

didn't you get caught ? Well , again

45:51

, because I'm an American citizen , I'm white

45:54

, I look like a kid that was just gonna go

45:56

enjoy spring break .

45:56

Yeah , but every other mule that you see is also a white

45:58

American citizen . They get caught , so why not you

46:01

?

46:01

Well , you've got to think At the border , what are they processing

46:04

, like hundreds of thousands of cars a day ? Got it ? It's

46:06

just a lot of probability . I'd

46:08

like to think , because I'm just so good at mulling

46:11

, but that's not the case . It's just the

46:13

luck of a draw , okay

46:21

, but it's . You're scared , you don't ? You're just crossing your fingers and hoping you

46:23

get through and you're just thinking about I'm gonna go get high after this , so that's all you're

46:25

thinking all right , all right , I understand .

46:27

So how many trips did you take ?

46:29

um , we did about seven , seven

46:32

trips , like that and it was only

46:34

meth .

46:35

And you said how many .

46:36

I mean , honestly , I don't really know what . They put it in the back of the car

46:39

. You don't want to ask , I don't want to ask , you don't

46:41

ask , you don't look you don't touch it .

46:42

What was the scariest moment in front of ?

46:44

the cartel . The

46:46

scariest part is I had a girlfriend at

46:49

the time . You know , obviously , being

46:51

a girl in those situations , you're extra vulnerable

46:53

.

46:54

She was physically with you . Yes , At

46:56

the cartel also a drug user , I imagine .

46:57

Yes , we were both using . She's the one who

47:00

introduced me to injection . She

47:02

was a nurse , so she taught me how

47:04

to inject Meth , meth , all

47:06

of it . It didn't really matter at this point .

47:08

All right , let's go there in a second , but so

47:11

the scariest moment in front of the cartel .

47:14

Scariest moment is that we ended up out

47:16

some kind of you know

47:18

, flop house kind of ordeal . It's a stash

47:21

house In Mexico . No , this was

47:23

in California , okay , and

47:25

you know we're in the desert , so you go through

47:27

like massive areas

47:29

of nothing .

47:30

And then you come to like a little town . You're driving over bodies

47:33

that have been buried Probably yeah , okay .

47:35

You end up at this little house . I

47:37

think they were just messing with us . But

47:39

you know they started , like you know , grabbing her

47:41

, telling her what they're

47:43

going to do . He's going to have to watch

47:46

.

47:48

Just you know , messing with us . How old are these cartel members

47:50

? I have no idea . The kids or adults .

47:52

They probably range . I mean , all of them look older

47:54

than probably what they are . Okay

47:56

, just because you , just because they're all tattooed up and stuff

47:58

like that , but they're like hardened criminal .

48:01

Yeah , these guys are hardcore , so

48:03

I imagine it must have been something like

48:06

Breaking Bad when they meet Tuco .

48:09

Yeah , it's something like that . I mean that's an exaggerated

48:11

standpoint , but oh that's exaggerated Cause

48:13

.

48:13

that scared the shit out of me when I watched Breaking

48:16

Bad at least a dozen times .

48:18

Yeah , I do love that show , but when they meet Tuco

48:20

you're like that dude that dude's

48:22

crazy .

48:23

And then they meet his uncle .

48:25

Yeah , I mean , I mean he would do meth

48:27

and he was always blasted out Tuco in the show

48:29

.

48:29

I mean , these guys didn't really yeah , they didn't

48:31

.

48:31

They didn't mess with their supply . You know

48:33

they were businessmen . At the end of the day , they're

48:35

just willing to kill you to get a business

48:38

deal . You know you , you're a pure

48:40

number .

48:40

You are a commodity to them correct

48:43

and uh .

48:44

So you know all this was happening . That was

48:46

the scariest point because I didn't think we were going to

48:48

get out of there . You know , I was worried

48:51

about my girlfriend at the time that you know she's

48:53

. They're just going to keep her there and do

48:55

whatever and I'm not going to be able to do

48:57

anything . Like I said , I'm 97 pounds . One

48:59

of my fight there was about 15 guys there

49:01

, so yeah , all strapped up

49:04

. How did you ? get out of that situation

49:06

so I think they're

49:08

just messing with us basically at the end of it . I mean

49:10

yeah , it was about

49:12

40 minutes of them just messing with us like

49:14

I , and I really didn't think I'm getting

49:16

out of there they take your driver's license

49:19

so they know who you are . Type of situation oh yeah , they

49:21

know everything . Yeah , they're looking you up

49:23

on facebook , you

49:25

know , you know , telling you , you know

49:27

your mother's name , that kind of stuff , oh shit , you

49:29

know . So I mean , I don't

49:31

know if they are that capable , as I say they

49:33

are , but of course , though , you

49:35

you were in a room with 15 adult

49:38

men tatted and their life

49:40

of crime .

49:41

They could have easily done whatever they wanted

49:43

to do with both you and your girlfriend and buried

49:45

you and no one would ever know you existed

49:47

.

49:48

Correct ? Yeah , there is no law At that time . 100%

49:50

when we were .

49:51

You could have buried me in the backyard and no one was going to find

49:53

me there , but

50:05

they didn't because you were of use to them as a mule , correct ? And what did they

50:07

give you in that situation ? Um , for that , for that job , we got about two ounces of meth . Two ounces , yeah

50:09

. Making a hand gesture , oh , that's two ounces of meth . A brick , yep . Two ounces of meth in exchange

50:12

for literally two people's lives . And

50:15

how much money did you make ? I ?

50:17

didn didn't make anything , I just used old meth

50:20

oh so walk me

50:22

through why they would give you two ounces

50:24

of meth . It was cheaper for them to give me meth

50:26

and cash they're

50:28

going to make . Oh , so that was your payment for mulling .

50:30

Yeah , that was my payment .

50:30

Yeah , I didn't care about cash at this point , talk

50:32

about an addictive business model .

50:34

Yeah , their product costs them virtually nothing . Yeah , their product costs them

50:36

virtually nothing . Right , it gets

50:38

you hooked to come back . Right , the

50:40

drug in America that is very popular

50:42

is called money . Mm-hmm , right , that's what keeps you

50:44

working at your desk , correct For a job

50:47

. Money is the addiction that we all

50:49

suffer from , and in your case

50:51

, the real addiction is true

50:53

addiction . You have no choice . Mm-hmm , oh

50:56

, geez , guys , are we learning in

51:00

all of your days on the , on

51:02

the force , yes , whatever you call it . Have you ever

51:04

heard this story like this ?

51:06

so you're aware of this

51:08

oh yeah , what was up ?

51:11

I don't know what branch they belong to , but

51:13

I probably my one of my

51:15

last cases , about four

51:18

years ago , was a kilo

51:20

of meth , so it started as coke

51:22

. Kilo , yeah it started as coke on

51:24

Renwick Street in the city of Newburgh

51:26

Turned out it was meth . Sonola

51:28

cartel was pushing it into Newburgh through

51:31

some hubs

51:33

in Jersey Philly there's

51:36

a . Florida Connect and Arizona Connect , but the majority

51:38

of it . The mules are crossing the California

51:40

border right down to Tijuana

51:43

, but that was insane .

51:44

But have you ever heard the story from

51:46

the mule like this ?

51:49

Yeah , interviewing them . Yeah , yeah , interview them , because

51:51

usually that's that's your only way into the

51:53

bigger guys .

51:55

So I'm obviously not recording you guys on video

51:57

, because there's probably people that would love

51:59

to know who you are , so we're

52:01

going to go by the names of Bob and Michael

52:03

the doctor thing man

52:05

.

52:06

That was like some of my last big cases were working

52:08

on these doctors in Queens and

52:10

it seemed like every person

52:13

we locked up in Manhattan had

52:15

a pill bottle with the same

52:17

doctor from Queens .

52:18

They obviously lost their license . I hope it was

52:20

a giant case .

52:22

I mean the DA that we worked with . She wrote a book about

52:24

it and everything . It

52:26

was pretty impressive . But at one point there was

52:28

a doctor downtown

52:31

Manhattan , one of the hospitals Boy

52:34

, I wish I could remember what hospital . Anyway , there was a doctor there

52:36

and he was geeked out

52:38

of his mind constantly on

52:40

heroin . Geeked is like a inside

52:42

term .

52:42

Yeah , he was like yeah , just smashed always

52:44

.

52:45

And he had a substantial habit

52:48

and he was in the operating

52:50

room operating and him and another surgeon

52:52

were taking turns in shifts . His

52:55

shift was up , he came out , he

52:57

was not feeling well , needed needed more heroin

52:59

, overdosed and died

53:01

mid surgery . Oh my god

53:04

. So you can see how that can screw things .

53:05

That's a lawsuit oh my god .

53:07

Yeah , it's not like you can find another neurosurgeon

53:10

just running on by exactly no , it's no bounds

53:12

, that's so , but it's it's unfortunately .

53:13

Have you guys ever felt bad for the mule like ? Have you heard this ?

53:15

story that's . I mean , that's like you . You ever felt bad for

53:17

the mule Like . Have you heard this story that's

53:20

?

53:20

I mean , that's like you know

53:22

you're in the game . Next thing you know you have an addiction

53:24

and then you know the gang's using you

53:26

as a mule . I mean they're using you any chance

53:28

they can , because it's true , well , he's a number , right

53:30

, he's just a tick .

53:32

Until I actually struggled with my own addiction

53:34

problem . You had your own addiction problem

53:37

While working , and

53:39

once I got past

53:42

that , it started moving on .

53:43

So you were a detective at that point , yeah , and

53:45

you were . What were you addicted to as a ?

53:47

police officer like a

53:49

substantial part of my career . I

53:51

mean it was just active , you know , and

53:53

it all . What were you addicted on Pills

53:56

. Same thing pills how . Started

53:58

as an injury in the Marines and

54:01

you know . Then they were just like here . You know how many do

54:03

you need . What do you want Like ? What do ?

54:04

you need Because you're a Marine . Yeah , you can take it , do

54:07

whatever . Yeah , well , the VA

54:09

sucks .

54:09

And then it just slowly

54:11

progressed to the point where

54:14

I

54:16

had a surgery , I had to

54:18

have another surgery and

54:23

after that surgery , while I was home , I started to feel better , like no pain

54:26

. And

54:29

then I saw myself taking these pills when I wasn't in pain and

54:31

I'm like , man , I gotta , and you're a cop . Yeah

54:33

, I identified it and I was able to put my finger

54:36

on it for a while and

54:38

I was home for oh , I was home

54:40

for oh , I was home for a broke , something

54:42

at work , like my foot or something like that , and I was out

54:44

for a while and then I just like

54:46

a switch went off and I said I'm

54:48

done , that's it .

54:50

So I had to detox in my

54:52

house in my base and you can't tell anyone

54:54

because you're a cop . Yeah , and cops don't have have

54:56

p tests they , um , they

54:59

do .

54:59

But I had a prescription for everything . You know

55:01

. I had a prescription . I doctor shopped .

55:03

This doesn't shock you . Well , with our

55:05

treatment centers , we specialize in PBA

55:08

officers and VA .

55:09

When you mentioned your treatment center , I know

55:11

it's the farm , I know that's where

55:14

the guys go . So , guys , we're going .

55:15

We're probably midway through this . This episode is going to

55:17

be a long one , because this is a great story , not

55:19

great in that sense .

55:23

Everyone needs to hear this episode . I never sympathized with

55:25

these guys until I had my own experience .

55:27

Until you were on that side .

55:28

And then I was like man , I

55:30

get it , like I get it .

55:32

Did it make you a better cop ?

55:35

I wouldn't say better man it gave me a lot of false confidence

55:37

. I wouldn't say better man . It gave me a lot of false confidence .

55:39

Did it make you understand the

55:41

plight of a informant

55:44

a little better ? Oh yeah , so

55:46

would you be more lenient on them ? Never more

55:48

lenient .

55:50

So you upheld their game better ? Yeah , but I was

55:53

always . I had like I don't want to say a soft spot

55:55

, but I was empathetic . Like

55:58

I have conversations with these guys , I'm like , look man , like I

56:00

get it .

56:01

Yeah , these are relationships .

56:02

I don't know how else I could tell you , like I

56:04

get it . That's the best I can do for

56:06

you . Like I understand where you're coming from , whatever , but

56:08

now we you know there's also stuff that we got

56:10

to do .

56:19

I got a job to do . Or are you Mike ? Which one are you ? I'm Mike , you're Mike , that's Bob . Okay , when I first

56:21

met Mike , I asked him this question Did you ever have an informant die on your watch ?

56:23

Yeah yeah , I had my business up . That's

56:26

funny . He had my business card in his

56:28

pocket when they found him dead .

56:29

And he was killed because he was an informant .

56:31

He had the 20 bucks on

56:33

him that I gave him the 20 bucks I gave

56:35

him .

56:35

So he was killed because he was discovered as an informant

56:37

I .

56:39

I don't know if it was because he was discovered

56:41

. I think that he was just involved

56:43

in a lot of man . He was a street guy did

56:45

you feel bad ?

56:47

no you didn't feel bad ? No , mike

56:50

, I asked you this question did you feel

56:52

bad when your informant was killed ?

56:55

I . That was something I always knew was . I actually

56:57

would tell him that all the time .

56:58

He's going to get killed .

57:00

Yes , I said , if you don't change paths

57:02

, you're either going to be in jail forever or I'm going to

57:04

be standing over you one day .

57:05

But it's bittersweet though , because you want him to continue

57:07

as an informant . You , essentially , are using these

57:09

informants as your own mule to

57:11

bust the bigger guys , as much as the bigger guys

57:13

are using the drug mule guys

57:15

I was informing with , like

57:17

the cops that were doing

57:19

this , like I

57:22

mean they were nice guys , like they , I mean they're

57:24

in it .

57:24

I I felt bad for them because their their

57:27

job is to go into my

57:29

life , like some of these guys have been undercover

57:31

for years and biker gangs

57:33

, and like I couldn't imagine faking , the

57:35

pressure of faking . We

57:37

saw the sons of anarchy and what you're

57:40

I mean you got to use drugs

57:42

. If you're in those situations Like you can't be

57:44

fake .

57:45

You know what I ?

57:45

mean Do the undercover ones

57:48

? You can't . It's a big

57:50

misconception . Like you can see how you

57:52

can get into a situation where you may

57:54

have to , or something like that . All

57:56

right , so let's just say the job has zero

57:59

tolerance in going into it . You know that .

58:01

So what I'm about to say is a completely contrived

58:03

scenario . But I'm in a biker gang , I'm

58:06

an undercover cop and my test

58:08

you know the old cliche are you a cop ? No

58:10

, okay , well then you can't . That's bullshit . We know that's

58:12

not true . A cop can tell . They

58:16

say okay , prove , you're not a cop . Here's a line

58:18

.

58:20

It happens , but nowhere near as much

58:22

as you would think .

58:23

Most of the gangs that I've been involved

58:25

with like the top guys . If you're at

58:27

that level , they're not messing with the stuff

58:29

. No .

58:31

And if they're trusting you to come into their

58:33

business .

58:34

They don't want you messing with the stuff . I

58:36

mean , I was scum of the earth .

58:38

They expect the lower

58:40

level guys , the users .

58:44

The ones that are in the street risking their life every day

58:47

.

58:48

You know , using it as a business to make money .

58:50

They know that they're really not All right , so another

58:52

question about informants Did you get a sense

58:55

that the majority , if not all of your informants

58:57

, or none , were happy

58:59

that they turned at least a life of good

59:02

or had an opportunity to be good , or did you

59:04

feel like they were reluctant ?

59:06

You know they were . It

59:08

was like a mix . Some

59:11

of them used the money and the resources that we gave

59:13

them . Oh , you gave them money . Oh , yeah , yeah

59:15

.

59:15

Good money , yeah yeah , just for their own good

59:17

or to buy , yeah , yeah whatever they wanted .

59:18

A lot of times they used it to get high , um

59:21

, so we would pay them to to

59:23

go in someplace and make a buy . You know we

59:25

give them like 40 , so it's like my kids , keep

59:27

the change .

59:28

Yeah , yeah , okay , yeah , go in there . Except I'm giving them

59:30

a 20 , you know , and I expect 14 back

59:32

. We do that a few times .

59:33

And then I get a warrant and I go to

59:35

a location that we boom the door , we lock up a

59:37

bunch of people , I get a supplier and all that . Then I'll

59:39

go back to that informant . I mean , you

59:42

know , hey , meet me at wherever and I'll give

59:44

them , you know , probably a couple grand and that comes from

59:46

the police department .

59:47

Right , it's not your money , no , no , the police department has

59:49

their own funds for that . Where were

59:51

you getting your drugs from all legal um

59:53

?

59:54

mostly yeah

59:56

, from the pharmacy and the doctors again .

59:57

your name is bob , so no , no one knows you . Wow , but

59:59

when you were getting your street

1:00:01

, when you were giving informants drugs , was that

1:00:04

from cases or people that

1:00:06

were arrested ?

1:00:07

So we never gave informants drugs .

1:00:09

What about you , mike ?

1:00:10

Never , ever ever , never , never .

1:00:12

So it's not like Hollywood .

1:00:17

If we were in a situation we were in a case where

1:00:19

that was part of it and we had to 99.9%

1:00:23

of the time , I feel like they would have been fake . They

1:00:25

would have been fake drugs . Your informant's killed

1:00:27

on that one . The

1:00:29

agencies really wouldn't

1:00:32

let you mess around with real

1:00:34

drugs . Once

1:00:36

they came in , they never

1:00:38

went back out .

1:00:40

All right , let's go on with our journey . This

1:00:42

is a season three finale

1:00:44

. Eye-opening , because I am not that

1:00:46

person Now . I have dabbled

1:00:48

in your world a little bit , but

1:00:50

not with extremes to that extent , and

1:00:53

I don't have an addictive personality . So

1:00:55

I was confident in any

1:00:57

time I used a drug to party

1:00:59

or for the night . I was confident I would

1:01:01

return , not needing it the next day . But

1:01:04

you have to know your powers and your limits . I

1:01:07

am not telling people to

1:01:09

never use drugs . In fact there are drugs

1:01:11

that are really good out there . This study is on psilocybin

1:01:13

and ketamine

1:01:16

to help depression are

1:01:18

showing far better results than the prescription

1:01:20

drugs , which are equally , if not worse , right

1:01:23

.

1:01:24

So it is a good versus evil . We utilize those at our treatment

1:01:26

centers .

1:01:26

Yeah , and psilocybin growing in the

1:01:28

ground is a natural drug versus the

1:01:30

prescription for whatever this pharmaceutical

1:01:33

company made up just to get the

1:01:35

money out of your wallet and get you addicted , correct

1:01:38

?

1:01:38

You know we get it . It's good versus evil . I

1:01:40

mean it's a balance when you're dealing with mental

1:01:42

health , with a lot of those you know , a

1:01:49

lot of them are outdated , those medications . Of course , A lot of them come

1:01:51

with serious side effects that would lead to depression anyway .

1:01:52

Or or the . The one I love is , if you are having increased

1:01:55

suicidal thoughts or hard thoughts

1:01:57

of harming yourself because of the use of this anti-depression

1:02:00

, yes , please speak to

1:02:02

your . Stop using it immediately , right ? That wording

1:02:05

right there tells you this is not for you

1:02:07

yes , and there's no long-term

1:02:09

studies on this so let me , let me

1:02:11

pivot now . Let's

1:02:13

go to the moment your mom kicked in the crack house

1:02:15

door . What happened ?

1:02:17

so I'm running and gunning in california . I

1:02:19

kind of come to the conclusion that I'm not going to

1:02:21

hurt my family by

1:02:23

, I'm just going to disappear , essentially

1:02:26

. So I'm running and gunning to the fullest

1:02:28

extent , completely just

1:02:30

living in a state of psychosis . My

1:02:33

drug habit at the end of this is about three

1:02:35

grams of bath salts .

1:02:36

Methamphetamine about a teener , Three

1:02:38

grams of bath salts which are legally purchased ? Correct

1:02:40

, Because we don't . The laws

1:02:43

can't outlaw things as quick as

1:02:45

they come out . Correct ? Are bath salts illegal

1:02:47

now or legal still ?

1:02:49

Depends what formula .

1:02:51

So some chemist in

1:02:53

the Dutch world comes up with a new formula

1:02:55

.

1:02:56

Yeah , it's all shipped over from China

1:02:58

. They have super labs that do

1:03:00

this stuff Okay , but it basically

1:03:03

gives you the effect of methamphetamine and

1:03:05

LSD together . Oh my god , that is not

1:03:07

a person .

1:03:07

I want to hang out with for the night .

1:03:08

Yeah , so I'm

1:03:10

doing that methamphetamine and

1:03:13

then I'm using Xanax and heroin to come down

1:03:15

after I've been up for too long and I'm seeing

1:03:17

too much stuff . Okay , and so

1:03:20

my mom wants to rescue me . She's

1:03:23

trying to figure out where I am . She

1:03:25

gets a hold of my girlfriend's

1:03:27

mother and finds

1:03:29

out that she's going to go out to California

1:03:32

to try to get to my girlfriend . The

1:03:35

mother said that she's been in contact with

1:03:37

my girlfriend because at the time it

1:03:39

was tax season , so my girlfriend's

1:03:41

trying to get her taxes back so we could use

1:03:43

it for drug use . The mom said

1:03:45

hey , I got the check . I don't want to mail

1:03:48

it or whatever . I'm going to drive it out to you .

1:03:50

Us , we didn't care , it's like an intervention

1:03:52

tax , yeah , so her mom's coming out here

1:03:54

, but she doesn't .

1:03:56

Her focus is her daughter Doesn't

1:03:58

really want to help my mom , so my mom's

1:04:00

just like screw it . I'm going to go out to California

1:04:02

and she literally hid at the airport

1:04:05

in a bush and waited for this woman

1:04:07

to leave the airport and saw

1:04:09

my girlfriend pull up for her and my

1:04:12

mom literally jumped in the car and hijacked the car . I

1:04:14

might have been running with gangs , but my mom's

1:04:16

the only gangster in the family a

1:04:19

mom with her baby , you know

1:04:21

, in in jeopardy , just

1:04:23

like a father they do everything

1:04:25

. So she jumped in the car

1:04:27

. You're taking me to my son right now so

1:04:30

they pull up to the . At this point we're living

1:04:32

in an abandoned hotel and uh

1:04:35

, she squatting , yeah , squatting

1:04:38

in the hotel and she I

1:04:40

hear the pounding at the door and honestly , I thought it was the cops

1:04:42

and I was just about to shoot

1:04:44

up some more meth . So you really were shooting

1:04:47

up meth . Yep and the

1:04:49

door opens , do you ?

1:04:50

have track marks still scars .

1:04:52

No , not really . I'm very vascular

1:04:54

, okay , so it's very

1:04:56

easy Bro for vascularity . Yeah

1:04:58

, so IV use was very easy for me . I actually

1:05:01

was so skinny that I had veins that ran

1:05:03

down my ribs into my stomach and I used those

1:05:05

veins , not my arms . So your mom

1:05:07

knocks on the door . So

1:05:09

my mom knocks on the door . No

1:05:11

one answers because I think it's the cops . And

1:05:13

then she basically kicks the door open and

1:05:16

I stood there with a spoon and needle

1:05:18

in hand and

1:05:22

I just saw a silhouette and light coming through and I hear my mother's voice

1:05:24

and I'm in a state of psychosis so . I'm like

1:05:26

what the hell is going on right now

1:05:29

, and the only way I could describe

1:05:31

it is like I regressed to like a four year old state

1:05:33

and I didn't like what

1:05:35

I was doing . I you know , I saw myself

1:05:37

wasting away in front of in

1:05:39

the mirror . I hated myself

1:05:41

, you were ready to die . I was ready to go and

1:05:44

I was trying to Actually

1:05:46

the shot that I was going to shoot

1:05:48

up was a full gram and a half in one

1:05:51

shot . You were about to do a shot to kill yourself

1:05:53

. Yeah , every shot

1:05:55

at this point for the last , like three days

1:05:57

, up till my mom was there , I just kept putting more

1:05:59

and more kind of I'm

1:06:01

suicidal , but I didn't have really

1:06:03

the balls to kill myself , yeah . So

1:06:05

like I would just put a little bit more to

1:06:08

see if that one was the one that I go . So this

1:06:10

is kind of like fear and loathing in las vegas yeah

1:06:12

, a little bit , except different drug obviously alcohol

1:06:14

, and one of these it was like

1:06:16

the second day I I did overdose

1:06:19

. Overdosing on meth is different than heroin

1:06:21

. How so ? It's kind of it's because

1:06:24

it really has to do with your heart , like all

1:06:26

I could really describe is I think I had like a mini

1:06:28

stroke and I went unconscious and

1:06:30

you know , the people I'm with just dragged me out to the alleyway

1:06:33

on the side of the building and I just happened

1:06:35

to wake up from it and came back too

1:06:37

know that was happening and and the

1:06:39

shot that I had

1:06:41

ready to go was , uh , it was

1:06:43

about a gram and a half of meth , that's a lot

1:06:45

, which is a lot of meth like usually a gram

1:06:48

will last you like three days , so I was

1:06:50

doing a gram and a half , so you knew at

1:06:52

any moment you were going to do the dose that would

1:06:54

do you in

1:06:55

yeah and you wanted that I did , and

1:06:57

you think that when your mom knocked on

1:06:59

that door , broke it down , down

1:07:01

and saw you that was . If she hadn't

1:07:03

done that , you would have been dead that night .

1:07:05

I very well could have been yeah , and

1:07:09

I was okay with it at that point . So

1:07:12

she comes in and I regressed

1:07:14

to a four-year-old state . I was just like Mom , like

1:07:16

, because I'm in California

1:07:18

, I'm 3,000 miles away , like

1:07:22

, how like mom , like because I'm in california , I'm three thousand miles away .

1:07:23

Like how did you find me here ? You know , this is like the I saw my life flash before

1:07:26

my eyes .

1:07:26

Yeah , real , and I . I followed her back to the car , um

1:07:29

, and she's driving me to , uh uh , mutual

1:07:32

friends and she was gonna her

1:07:34

. Her plan was that she was gonna get me on a plane and compete

1:07:36

, kind of do like , chain you to a radiator style

1:07:39

recovery , get me back to new

1:07:41

jersey . But I was well , you'll die

1:07:43

. I was a mess . I mean , I was . I was

1:07:45

up for multiple days . At this point , you need to

1:07:47

be weaned off , otherwise you'll die . Yeah , and

1:07:49

and the drug mindset came through about like

1:07:51

halfway through the drive and I and she , I

1:07:53

remember asking me , like what

1:07:55

are we dealing with , dan ? Like what do we need to do

1:07:58

? And , um , you know , I lifted up my

1:08:00

shirt and pulled up my arms . I'm like this is what you're dealing

1:08:02

with . And like I was a mess , like I had

1:08:04

, you know , track marks all over the place and

1:08:07

you know I'm 97 pounds a mess

1:08:09

and I'm

1:08:11

screaming at my mom . You can't save me . Like

1:08:13

let me go . Like

1:08:22

you're , we're gonna go here and get you help . I'm like there's no

1:08:24

point . Like let me die , mom . And I couldn't imagine being my mom

1:08:26

and hearing your son say this , like

1:08:29

pleading with you to let him die . Like

1:08:31

and I'm dead set , like I

1:08:33

am vicious with it . And

1:08:35

now I try . I'm trying to leave the house . No one's listening

1:08:37

to me . I'm trying to leave the house . They called the

1:08:39

police on me and

1:08:42

they 5150'd me , which

1:08:44

is when they take away your rights , you're in danger to yourself

1:08:46

or others . And they didn't have to do

1:08:48

this . Like , thank God for the cops Good

1:08:51

cops , yeah

1:08:53

, they wanted me to get help and I was

1:08:56

ferocious man .

1:08:57

I was not in a good state of mind . You got the strength

1:08:59

of ten men .

1:09:00

Yeah , so they're

1:09:02

trying to tell me that they're going to take away my rights

1:09:04

.

1:09:09

I'm reciting the Constitution that they can't

1:09:12

do that .

1:09:12

And one cop takes out his taser , hits me in the neck

1:09:14

. I

1:09:17

thought he hit me with a bat . I thought he took his baton out and hit me . That's what

1:09:19

it felt like and I was like you mother

1:09:22

, like how are you going to hit me right now ? So

1:09:24

I got up and I punched him right in the face .

1:09:26

I broke his nose .

1:09:27

Yeah , I broke his nose .

1:09:28

Wait , you hit a cop

1:09:30

. Oh yeah yeah , how are you having

1:09:32

this conversation with me , and not in jail ?

1:09:35

I don't know , man , I have a guardian

1:09:37

angel or something . Yeah , I got four more

1:09:39

tasers to the neck after that you broke a cop's nose

1:09:41

.

1:09:41

No charges .

1:09:44

No , I didn't get any charges , you're going to ask the same question

1:09:46

.

1:09:47

You weren't who you were . The

1:09:49

color of your skin probably a little

1:09:51

different .

1:09:52

No , yeah , I

1:09:58

think honestly . Where I was , there's a lot of rehabs in that area . So they see it time and

1:10:00

time again kids that aren't from that area , that get lost in the

1:10:02

mix and that , and then they're dealing with it . So

1:10:04

there's a frustration on their part

1:10:06

to help right if I get this

1:10:08

person help , then I don't have to deal with it kind of

1:10:10

mentality , right ? Have you seen these , these police

1:10:12

officers ? These cops after uh

1:10:14

, yeah , I've seen some of them

1:10:16

in in the mix and not all of them

1:10:18

yeah , of course . Yeah , I mean

1:10:21

I . I wouldn't have this chance of life

1:10:23

if it wasn't for them putting up with that all

1:10:25

right .

1:10:25

So how so you beat up a cop ? They

1:10:27

tase you a whole bunch of times . You've got the strength

1:10:30

. I fall down .

1:10:31

I I have a scar from falling into

1:10:33

you do the uh into

1:10:35

a table . I cut my whole , my whole eyelids

1:10:37

hanging off my face I pissed myself

1:10:40

um . I didn't know they had straight jackets

1:10:42

. I thought that was a like a thing in the movies I was

1:10:44

putting in a stray jacket put in the padded room yeah

1:10:46

, they never padded me down

1:10:48

, though , so I ended I still had three

1:10:50

grams of basalt on me , so in the

1:10:52

padded room .

1:10:52

So now you're entering a holding cell with with drugs . So

1:10:55

okay , stack these charges .

1:10:56

So I uh take everything out . You

1:10:59

, my hands are bound and stuff . So like I managed

1:11:01

to get them open with my mouth and stuff and get

1:11:03

them on the ground and I snort the three grams

1:11:06

in the floor of the pad room . You

1:11:08

know they rush in . They're like what the fuck ? They

1:11:11

hit me with some kind of shot in my butt . I'm

1:11:13

out , cold , gone , and

1:11:16

I wake up in the ambulance on a drive

1:11:18

to a psych hospital somewhere in

1:11:20

Aurora , california , and

1:11:23

I'm locked up there for days . It

1:11:25

took me five days to come down . Every

1:11:28

day I tried to escape somehow

1:11:30

. One day I ripped the light switch

1:11:32

off the wall and I used that to unbolt windows

1:11:34

. To try to push the window out and escape . I

1:11:38

ran down the hallways . I'd call my mom like you need

1:11:40

to let me die , and I'm like I'm leaving

1:11:42

, and I run down the hallway , get tackled

1:11:45

, shot in the butt , wake up . It was like Groundhog's

1:11:47

Day . I just kept waking up in this padded room and

1:11:49

then on the fifth day , my mom came in to visit

1:11:51

me and I crawled in her lap and I cried

1:11:53

and I'm like I don't , I'm

1:11:56

sorry and I don't know

1:11:58

what to do . I

1:12:00

don't know where it

1:12:02

goes from here . I don't know what I'm

1:12:05

to do . I

1:12:08

just feel like a lost cause . If you want me

1:12:10

to try something , I'll try something . That's kind of where I

1:12:12

was , so you're at a state of I

1:12:14

want to kill myself .

1:12:21

I can't do it , so I'm just going to keep upping my drugs until I do

1:12:23

it . So now you are fighting for your life because you don't have the drug to where you've given

1:12:25

up on life and you're like fuck

1:12:28

it , my life is . So , whatever it is

1:12:30

, I'm just going to now commit to being sober

1:12:32

I I .

1:12:34

No , I was just I . I was just broken

1:12:36

I I . There was no commitment

1:12:38

, it was just , it

1:12:40

was just . Uh , I put down the sword if

1:12:43

that you gave up . Yeah

1:12:46

, yeah , I went with the flow yeah , I'm like

1:12:48

I'm gonna just go with the flow

1:12:50

. I mean , I was beaten up at this point I was

1:12:52

. I was a mess man like just

1:12:55

emotionally all over the place , spirit completely

1:12:57

broken and just physically drained

1:12:59

. I haven't eaten in months

1:13:01

. I'm

1:13:04

just a mess , you know . And

1:13:06

it just so happened my grandfather

1:13:08

was reading , saw a commercial for

1:13:10

a treatment center that happened to be like right down the street

1:13:13

from me and the only way for me to get out

1:13:16

of this place is I literally

1:13:18

had to have someone that was going to

1:13:20

guard me from the psychiatric

1:13:22

hospital to this location

1:13:24

. And they just so happened to provide that

1:13:26

service where they would make sure I got

1:13:28

to the next place . Because I'm a ward of the

1:13:30

state , I'm literally the property of California

1:13:33

at this point . So I was forced into the

1:13:35

next treatment center and it

1:13:39

was the

1:13:42

whole other side of life . This place was

1:13:44

in Malibu , california it's

1:13:48

on the cliffs of . Malibu . No , no , it's called

1:13:50

passages , oh passages yeah , you

1:13:52

know , I once was an addict .

1:13:53

No , I'm not yeah , yeah , I've seen that commercial and , um

1:13:55

, wow , it was .

1:13:58

You know it was absolutely stunning . I had a five-star chef and infinity

1:14:00

pool . I was like this was you know it was absolutely stunning . I had a five-star chef in Infinity

1:14:02

Pool . Oh , so there's . I was just like this is amazing . You know

1:14:04

they're wooing you at this point Well

1:14:06

, yeah , I mean it was . All those

1:14:09

things were great you know what I

1:14:11

mean and awesome . That's not what gets you sober

1:14:13

, though .

1:14:13

No , but that helps you realize that there's

1:14:15

something better in life to at least

1:14:17

experience .

1:14:18

It gave me a sense of maybe

1:14:21

there's something to go after

1:14:23

in life , maybe I'm worth

1:14:25

it if I somehow ended

1:14:27

up here by chance .

1:14:29

Like you know , I started believing in

1:14:31

something more you

1:14:34

know , you started believing that you could do it .

1:14:36

Yeah , that I had a little bit more self-worth , Like

1:14:39

maybe I'm worth trying for Okay

1:14:41

Well clearly you are because someone was

1:14:43

worth fighting for you .

1:14:45

Correct , it's your mom . Yes , all right , so

1:14:47

you're here . How long are you at Passage

1:14:49

?

1:14:49

I'm here for 30 days and

1:14:52

what was fantastic about this program is that I got eight different therapists

1:14:54

that I met with individually each week and

1:14:56

they all had different disciplines , so they really pulled

1:14:59

me apart in a million different

1:15:01

ways . I attribute a lot of my

1:15:03

success today to a

1:15:05

man named noah rothschild , who

1:15:07

his discipline was inner child

1:15:09

work and really unraveling

1:15:12

. You know what is this unhealthy

1:15:14

perspective that you have that keeps leading you

1:15:16

to this cycle , this unhealthy cycle

1:15:18

? So this guy saved you . Yeah

1:15:20

, I attribute a lot of my

1:15:22

mindset today to the

1:15:25

work that we did together while at Passages

1:15:27

and beyond Passages , because I kept

1:15:29

up with him . So , this works this

1:15:32

.

1:15:32

You're still over for at least 30 days .

1:15:34

What was great about this is it was non-denominative . So

1:15:36

a lot of these 12-step treatment centers what they do

1:15:38

is they say , hey , here's a box of recovery , this

1:15:40

is how you recover . Fit into this

1:15:42

box , you'll find life . If you don't fit

1:15:45

into the box , you're gonna die . That's pretty much the

1:15:47

synopsis of the teachings in most

1:15:49

of these places . That's the Minnesota model

1:15:51

of recovery . The this

1:15:53

place was cold , completely non-denominative

1:15:55

, like there is no box of recovery

1:15:57

. You build the box of recovery . It's yours . We're

1:16:00

going to give you all the materials and tools

1:16:02

to build this box . It's up to you

1:16:04

to take the action , but we're

1:16:06

going to let you experience all these different things

1:16:08

. Yeah , and I love that . I was like , oh my

1:16:10

God , I can build my own house of recovery . And

1:16:13

a lot of things spoke to me . I

1:16:23

took to a lot of Eastern medicine and philosophy and Buddhism and inner child work

1:16:25

and DBT tools . All these different things started exercising , eating healthy . I was just on

1:16:27

fire . I'm like , oh my god , I could do this . Yeah , and

1:16:30

then at the end of that treatment

1:16:32

center , I'm like , yes , okay , I just got to keep this

1:16:34

up and do these things . Now this

1:16:37

is 2010

1:16:39

, 2011 . So at

1:16:42

the time in New Jersey , a

1:16:44

lot of these holistic therapies like now everybody

1:16:46

likes holistic things , yeah , but at the time

1:16:48

, like yoga studios weren't even really a thing in New

1:16:50

Jersey yet . I was like a California

1:16:52

thing , yeah . So I was gonna go home

1:16:54

and I met with my discharge

1:16:56

planner and they handed

1:16:58

me my aftercare plan of what

1:17:01

I'm supposed to follow when I leave and

1:17:03

it was go to 12 step meetings , 90

1:17:05

meetings in 90 days . I'm like wait , wait , wait , wait

1:17:07

, wait . You just literally taught

1:17:09

me this way for 29

1:17:11

days and now you're telling me go

1:17:14

do that other thing that didn't work for you all those

1:17:16

times before . Yeah , and I'm like how

1:17:18

does that make sense ? Yeah , it's hypocritical

1:17:21

. So I call my mom and I'm like

1:17:23

mom , like let's go this way .

1:17:24

What am I gonna ?

1:17:25

what am I gonna do , you know ? And I'm literally

1:17:27

upset crying with her on the phone and

1:17:31

she's like if it doesn't exist , we'll build it , dan

1:17:33

it doesn't exist , we'll build

1:17:35

it man , your mom is a warrior , yeah , she's

1:17:37

a badass . And I'm like

1:17:40

, okay , whatever you say , ma . And so

1:17:43

I came home , built a recovery

1:17:45

plan we had to search far

1:17:48

and wide for the things that I was into and

1:17:50

built a recovery plan for myself and I was doing

1:17:52

fantastic . And then she

1:17:55

pushed me into doing prevention work . She

1:17:57

went to some presentation for back-to-school

1:17:59

night or whatever for my sister . There was a

1:18:02

guy speaking about his story and

1:18:04

it was a prevention type of scenario

1:18:07

at high schools and she was like

1:18:09

my son would be great for this . And

1:18:12

I got hooked up with him and

1:18:14

I was nervous as hell . I didn't want to tell my story

1:18:16

. I didn't do public speaking . I was actually

1:18:19

a very shy kid . You know , again

1:18:21

that that change thing , all that

1:18:23

old stuff that I was dealing with with the child

1:18:25

that went away by using

1:18:27

drugs , came flooding back

1:18:30

without the drugs , you know . So

1:18:32

I'm not adapting to change . Well

1:18:34

, again , I'm socially

1:18:37

awkward and nervous

1:18:39

and anxiety and all that kind of stuff

1:18:41

. So I remember

1:18:43

sitting at my first speech and I literally had

1:18:45

to read my own story off a piece of paper because I

1:18:47

was so nervous I couldn't even remember me and

1:18:50

I'm shaking , and after

1:18:52

that I had like five kids come up to me and they're

1:18:54

like I have a brother who I have a dad

1:18:57

who a mother who you know . Thank

1:18:59

you for saying that . I

1:19:05

needed to hear that there's hope on the other side and I'm like wow .

1:19:07

I made a difference , you know . I mean , I thought I was awful , you know

1:19:09

, and you lived many years

1:19:11

where you were low .

1:19:12

Yeah , yeah , yeah yeah

1:19:15

, I was well seasoned at that point , as

1:19:17

I like to call it . So I

1:19:19

I started doing that . I started doing speeches

1:19:21

at schools . I pretty much hit every

1:19:23

high school in the state of New Jersey doing middle schools

1:19:26

. My mom got involved with me doing it

1:19:28

and she's like let's make an elementary school program

1:19:30

. So she was Crazy Susie and I was

1:19:32

Traffic man Dan and

1:19:34

we had a right

1:19:37

lane and a lost lane and kids

1:19:39

had to tell you which way

1:19:41

to go with all these decisions they had to make . It was

1:19:43

like a play and elementary school started

1:19:46

wanting that presentation and all my

1:19:48

friends , every single one of us from

1:19:50

high school , my group of friends there's 14

1:19:52

of us Only one didn't do drugs . The

1:19:54

rest of them ended up addicted . So

1:19:57

they started seeing me doing well and

1:19:59

hearing me doing well , seeing me do these speeches , seeing

1:20:01

me on facebook , and they're like what are you doing

1:20:03

? that's working because they wanted it yeah

1:20:05

, and I'm going back to school at this point for social

1:20:07

work , so I'm in psychology classes

1:20:10

. You're purposeful . We had a dream

1:20:12

uh , to you know

1:20:14

, start a treatment center and uh

1:20:16

, so I'm going to school

1:20:18

, working horse shows , doing all this

1:20:21

, just grabbing life by the horns . And I

1:20:23

started helping my friends build a recovery

1:20:25

plan for themselves , started helping people get into

1:20:28

treatment , got certified

1:20:30

as an interventionist . So then I

1:20:32

started traveling around

1:20:35

the world . I mean , we did interventions

1:20:37

in Scotland and England and all

1:20:39

across America . I was getting called by families

1:20:42

and I loved it . It was like exciting

1:20:44

for me . It was a way for me to pull somebody out of

1:20:46

the wreckage and , you know , being on

1:20:48

the other side of the table kept me sober at the end

1:20:50

of the day , you're finding extreme purpose

1:20:53

and it's almost like a new addiction .

1:20:55

Your addiction is helping yourself and staying

1:20:57

sober and helping others .

1:20:58

Yeah , helping others

1:21:00

it was is helping yourself and staying sober and helping others . Yeah , helping others , it was what I always wanted

1:21:02

, like back from the kid when I'm hiding the food

1:21:04

underneath his bed , I I just , from

1:21:07

the work that I was doing , I really became in , in

1:21:09

tune , in my authentic self . I

1:21:11

like wasn't afraid to be goofy and

1:21:13

quirky , and I didn't have to be the cool

1:21:15

kid , I didn't have to be the life of the party , I just was

1:21:17

. You found yourself , yeah , and I like it

1:21:20

just seemed everything

1:21:22

, even when it's bad , you're

1:21:25

going to get to the other side of it . You know that's

1:21:28

how everything became so . Challenges

1:21:30

in life , those lulls of life , those valleys

1:21:33

. I look forward to them

1:21:35

because I know something great is going to come out

1:21:37

the other side , as long as I stay to and

1:21:39

I keep Dude high five for that .

1:21:41

Well , that's a low five you gotta be a nerd in that one . Let's go

1:21:43

this way .

1:21:46

Holy cow .

1:21:48

So my mother and I , after a bunch

1:21:50

of my friends , started asking me what to do

1:21:52

. I was like there seriously

1:21:54

needs to be a place for people to come

1:21:57

to that are like me , that , you

1:22:00

know , don't particularly do the 12 steps

1:22:02

. Um , you know , I was 21 at

1:22:04

the time . So how do I meet girls

1:22:06

in sobriety ? Like , how

1:22:08

do I fit in as a 21 year old into

1:22:11

this world when I don't drink

1:22:13

? You know , I started getting into fitness

1:22:15

and doing mud man axes and all those kinds

1:22:17

of things . And uh , by

1:22:19

the way .

1:22:20

This is your addictive personality . So there's

1:22:22

a good addiction and bad addiction . We know that

1:22:24

the dude at the gym pumping iron

1:22:26

like crazy is addicted to not only

1:22:28

looking at himself , but addicted to the pump .

1:22:31

Arnold said right , it's better than a comic right .

1:22:33

Can't do an Arnold voice , but anyway

1:22:35

. But you have an addictive personality

1:22:37

, so whatever you're into positive

1:22:40

or negative will be your addiction . So

1:22:42

I promise that this story and

1:22:45

Daniel Regan's journey would

1:22:47

be very positive , so

1:22:50

let's hear it . So what do you do

1:22:52

now ?

1:22:53

So now I realize that there's a lot

1:22:55

of people that are like me , that are

1:22:57

not really fitting into this Minnesota model of

1:23:00

recovery , that are interested

1:23:02

in the things that

1:23:04

help me get sober . I

1:23:07

love helping people , so we

1:23:09

need to create a place for them to come . That's

1:23:12

where my mother and I started our nonprofit

1:23:14

organization . That's where my

1:23:16

mother and I started our nonprofit organization

1:23:19

called Coming Full Circle Loud and Clear . Coming

1:23:21

Full Circle Loud and Clear . Okay . So everything

1:23:24

was about being on that other side

1:23:26

of life , right , coming full circle from where

1:23:28

you're at , because that's where we

1:23:30

were being your authentic self

1:23:32

, loud and clear , right . So that's where the name

1:23:34

came from , okay , and what we did was we built

1:23:36

a community of people that were going to have

1:23:39

good , sober , social fun and

1:23:41

we were going to grab life by the horns . We

1:23:44

have self-help groups throughout the week

1:23:46

. We're going to do wellness recovery

1:23:48

action plans for everybody and

1:23:50

built a community , and it started literally with

1:23:52

like six people at our kitchen table and

1:23:54

has grown massive . We have multiple locations

1:23:57

right now with the nonprofit . This is today , today . Okay

1:23:59

. So how many locations do you have ? So we have multiple locations right now

1:24:01

with the nonprofit . This is today , today . Okay , so how many locations do you have

1:24:03

? So we have three locations for the nonprofit and

1:24:06

four sober livings underneath

1:24:08

that . So you've been sober for how

1:24:10

many years ?

1:24:10

now 13 years , 13

1:24:13

years . That episode that I saw was

1:24:15

what ? 2013 ? Yeah , right

1:24:17

, yeah , okay .

1:24:20

So 11 years 12 years ago . So Sober , at that point Okay .

1:24:24

All right , so you were three years sober when it fell . Okay , so the

1:24:26

dates line up .

1:24:27

Okay . How many people have

1:24:29

you helped . I know from

1:24:31

a data standpoint . On

1:24:33

average we help about

1:24:35

you know 20,000 families , because

1:24:38

help is very .

1:24:39

Thousand families .

1:24:41

Yeah , it gets over yes . Because

1:24:43

we help them in many different levels .

1:24:46

I'll give you the single clap . That's

1:24:49

mothers , fathers , children

1:24:51

, mm-hmm , spouses , friends

1:24:54

. 20,000 people have

1:24:56

found sobriety through you , okay

1:24:59

so our program ?

1:25:00

because so we do . You know , individual

1:25:04

sports are always important

1:25:07

to me and I really attribute

1:25:09

that to I have

1:25:11

a really good way of honing

1:25:14

in on chaos . Okay

1:25:17

, I , you

1:25:19

know , when you're riding a dirt bike , racing a car

1:25:22

, skiing downhill , doing

1:25:24

these extreme sports , a

1:25:26

lot of people aren't good at them because

1:25:28

they try to control what they're

1:25:30

doing and to really

1:25:32

go fast , to really be

1:25:35

able to conquer that

1:25:37

sport , in a way , is you have to let

1:25:39

go , you have to let go of the fear , you have to let go . You have to let go of the

1:25:41

fear you have to let go of that . You're not actually

1:25:43

controlling anything , you're just guiding it .

1:25:45

So the fear , uncertainty and doubt which I speak

1:25:48

of often , the FUD factor , holds

1:25:50

a lot of people back from business success or

1:25:52

life success right as an adult

1:25:54

. Our adult brain has more fear than a child

1:25:57

brain . That's why children can learn

1:25:59

activities like skateboarding right

1:26:01

or riding a bike a lot easier than

1:26:04

an adult Correct . So they just

1:26:06

, they let go and they just trust the environment

1:26:08

. So yeah . Yes

1:26:11

, experience has its fear consequences . So

1:26:13

you're , you're deep , you're deprogramming

1:26:16

that fear , that FUD in the people

1:26:18

you're helping .

1:26:19

Okay programming

1:26:22

that fear , that FUD in the people you're helping . Okay , so I tapped into a

1:26:24

lot of this in my recovery , Knowing what that feeling feels

1:26:26

like of letting go and being

1:26:28

able to let the motorcycle do its

1:26:30

thing and just guide it to where it needs to

1:26:32

go , not fear the you

1:26:34

know obstacle in your way that it will make it over

1:26:37

, and that kind of like recovery

1:26:39

. You got to let go and let

1:26:41

it , let it do its thing and

1:26:44

, um , that's a lot of our programming . So

1:26:46

we push people like I just got . I just

1:26:48

took everybody skiing um two

1:26:50

weeks ago and , uh , you

1:26:53

know , they never skied before , they never had that experience

1:26:55

. The more experience that someone gets

1:26:57

in a positive light right , they build more

1:27:00

connection that plugs them into life . The

1:27:02

opposite of addiction is connection .

1:27:04

So the opposite of addiction is connection

1:27:07

.

1:27:07

Yes , well , what does our addiction

1:27:10

try to do ? It tries to take you away from everything

1:27:12

you plug into life . So in order to

1:27:14

fight that or counteract it , I plug you back in

1:27:16

. So the more experience that I could

1:27:18

give you , more opportunities that I can put

1:27:21

in front of you . It's your responsibility to

1:27:23

take that commitment and action

1:27:25

, to take

1:27:27

a hold of that opportunity . But that's

1:27:31

what we do . We provide you with opportunities to have

1:27:33

positive experiences , to do something

1:27:35

that you've never done , to learn how to challenge yourself

1:27:38

, and not necessarily conquer

1:27:40

it , but just try it and to see how it fits

1:27:42

you , because that's how you discover

1:27:45

yourself . I mean , life is really about

1:27:47

discovering yourself . Every

1:27:49

time we're comfy , we stop growing . Only

1:27:52

in uncomfortability do we grow . So

1:27:55

is this a business ? This

1:27:57

is purely a non-profit . Oh

1:27:59

non-profits are businesses . It's a

1:28:01

business . It was never .

1:28:04

I never made a dime , so you

1:28:06

didn't make any money , no , so how do you make money today

1:28:08

?

1:28:08

So so , we

1:28:11

, through this helping

1:28:13

people , what we were discovering is that , you

1:28:15

know , the treatment centers industry

1:28:17

is failing . It's

1:28:20

really built on people coming back in

1:28:22

through those doors , so they want you to come back

1:28:24

Right . And I'm finding

1:28:26

that at our nonprofit we're doing work that

1:28:28

counselors should be doing and

1:28:30

we don't really have the proper set up to do that

1:28:32

, nor can I ever find

1:28:35

enough funding to get this done the

1:28:37

proper way , and then I feel like

1:28:39

I'm doing a disservice to people . So

1:28:42

I started wanting to

1:28:44

open up my own treatment center to basically

1:28:46

fill in these gaps , and

1:28:49

so we started this journey of trying

1:28:51

to open up our own place , probably

1:28:54

in 2014 . It

1:28:57

took me a while to find someone to

1:28:59

invest in a 24-year-old

1:29:01

man who just had addiction issues and just

1:29:03

has these big dreams . And

1:29:06

I did find those people . My

1:29:09

mom and I found them and

1:29:12

they literally gave me a million dollars

1:29:14

without even operating agreement and

1:29:17

said make it happen . And

1:29:19

that was 2015 . I

1:29:22

got . I started with two sober livings

1:29:25

and started

1:29:27

the licensing process for

1:29:29

the treatment center . We

1:29:32

all go . I had rose colored glasses . That's

1:29:34

probably the biggest thing that I've always

1:29:36

dealt with . I'm a very optimistic person

1:29:38

, that mindset of if

1:29:40

I just go through this , I'm going to get to the other side

1:29:43

. Um , I don't really . I

1:29:46

believe in planning , but I believe not

1:29:48

over planning , because you could get into the reeds

1:29:50

of just giving yourself anxiety over something rather

1:29:53

than just jumping in and doing . Um

1:29:56

, and I learned that from my mom mostly

1:29:58

and uh , so we

1:30:00

just jumped head first into and I thought

1:30:02

you know , hey , you're going to get this license

1:30:05

. You just have to do this piece of paper and , like you

1:30:07

, fill it out , they give you your license and it's not that

1:30:09

process whatsoever . Um , business

1:30:11

is hard , not . Profit is still a business , yes

1:30:13

, but but not just

1:30:15

from the license , not just from

1:30:17

a structured business

1:30:19

standpoint , but you're fighting society

1:30:22

at the same time , because just finding

1:30:24

a place for my treatment center took

1:30:26

four years , because it's not

1:30:28

in my backyard , I'm not going to have those people here

1:30:30

, and I had to go through four years of fighting

1:30:33

with different towns to even find a building

1:30:35

that they would allow me to open them

1:30:37

. Then the licensing process happened . Submitting

1:30:40

my application to when I actually got a license

1:30:43

took about 26 months and

1:30:45

it's not my fault , it's just

1:30:47

the way our state works and

1:30:50

I literally

1:30:52

the hippie in me came in and I

1:30:55

literally had to chain myself to

1:30:57

a bench at the Department of Health and

1:31:00

the chef from the rooftop was like

1:31:02

there's people dying here , we need beds

1:31:04

. And like you're just not answering my emails

1:31:06

. Like this is ridiculous . Like I have everything

1:31:08

in order . I have a building . I built out

1:31:10

the building at this point . I'm paying for that overhead

1:31:13

. I have to have all these people on

1:31:15

staff . You know , I was scared

1:31:18

because we blew through that million . We

1:31:21

, you know I was . I was scared because we blew through

1:31:23

that million . We blew through another 400,000 and I needed

1:31:25

to come up with more money for operating . When we opened

1:31:28

and um we , uh , they gave

1:31:30

me my license about like five days from me

1:31:32

training myself because when I was there , someone

1:31:35

overdosed in the bathroom at the department of health

1:31:37

and and I said and

1:31:39

I had it on film on Facebook Live and

1:31:41

I was just like literally there's people

1:31:44

dying in your building right now and you can't

1:31:46

even answer your phone for me to help them . And

1:31:50

yeah , obviously probably pissed some people

1:31:52

off , but

1:31:54

you know , I've always been a fighter

1:31:56

in that way , an advocate , and

1:31:58

I will continue to be the

1:32:00

plow and create change

1:32:02

. Sometimes it

1:32:05

causes some obstacles in my life

1:32:07

with business , because there's a lot of

1:32:09

people that don't want to mess with me because

1:32:11

I'm the loud guy in the room that , so

1:32:13

that's okay .

1:32:14

So this is . I mean , I

1:32:16

took a hike as a business inspired , right

1:32:18

, it's a

1:32:20

passion and I like to tie things to business

1:32:23

and that's why your story is

1:32:25

a successful journey . Clearly , you

1:32:27

have endured far

1:32:29

more than many people in this life . Right

1:32:32

, you've been through it all and now you are running

1:32:34

a successful business and you're learning the lessons that every

1:32:36

business owner will learn . It ain't

1:32:38

easy Not at all . You've got to fight

1:32:40

for what you think is right . You have to fight

1:32:42

for , in your case , permits and the ability to

1:32:44

conduct business . You have to fight for your first client

1:32:47

. You have to fight for everything . You have to

1:32:49

raise capital . You've done that all . So

1:32:51

what are your biggest learning lessons in running a business

1:32:54

?

1:32:57

The biggest lessons is keeping myself

1:33:00

is not losing my authentic

1:33:02

self in the business Because

1:33:04

, um , being

1:33:07

in the human services , you got to die Like

1:33:10

I . I like working in the trenches . Yeah

1:33:12

, I , I , I

1:33:14

like working in the trenches . I'm empathetic

1:33:16

. You want to do everything , um

1:33:19

, but balance doesn't balancing

1:33:21

that with business . Business doesn't always allow that