Robert Gallery Shares The Mental Toll Of Football & Healing After NFL Career With Raiders | Bussin'

00:00:05
Speaker 1: All right, We're good.

00:00:06
Speaker 2: You like go.

00:00:09
Speaker 3: Busting with the boys, hanging with the fast, betting on a game. No woman's gonna tell us what you do. Not be over here just drinking beer and making nad Baby, I'm hanging with the Fellers. He's busting with the boys. Bro.

00:00:46
Speaker 2: Welcome to another episode of Busting with the Boys. If you're in the car right now listening, please make sure that you are subscribed to our channels where they're listening on Spotify, Apple, Amazon on audio, make sure you're following or subscribed, and if you're watching the boys on YouTube right now, just again, we encourage you to subscribe. Helps the boys out a lot. We've got a lot to talk about. We got a lot to talk about. We have an awesome interview with Robert Gallery.

00:01:08
Speaker 4: Awesome.

00:01:09
Speaker 2: Yeah, his journey, mental health, all the stuff it is. It is very much worth your two and a half hours of time. We'll be breaking down our weekends, having some fun with some spicy road tier talk, best compliments to your wife, some final bites before we sign off and get into the interview. But this this episode is brought to us and presented by the Fandel Sportsbook, America's number one sportsbook. We got week twelve bills versus Texans, and we'll be watching the game live from our stream room. We'll have a same game parlay for you guys to tail. We'll have a nice little giveaway for you guys courtesy of Fandel who will also have a thirty percent profit boost token available for this Thursday's game. That is right, a thirty percent PBT for all customers who to use on their bills versus Texans. Bets will cook up some bets for you guys to tail. You can cook them up on your own and tell us about them on the stream or in the comns, and but make sure you are using the thirty percent profit boost token. Go to FanDuel dot com slash busting to start locking your picks now, gentlemen, we have a good weekend with a fun little weekend.

00:02:14
Speaker 5: Yeah, New Orleans.

00:02:16
Speaker 2: How was Nola?

00:02:18
Speaker 6: I just feel like it was cool. I was visiting one of my buddies. I used to live here, but I got just going back and I didn't get sick, but I had like PTSD from you guys being sick, So I was like this place just just kind of.

00:02:31
Speaker 2: Like stayed away from the oysters.

00:02:32
Speaker 6: Yeah, just try to eat like the most bland food. No, I mean I have a very bland diet to begin with.

00:02:39
Speaker 2: You get chicken, fingers and fries.

00:02:42
Speaker 6: Uh basically. Yeah. But it was just like I'm just uncomfortable in that city.

00:02:47
Speaker 2: Brought my own PB and is uncomfortable in that city.

00:02:49
Speaker 6: But it was great to see, like I saw some old buddies, so it was it was.

00:02:53
Speaker 1: It was a lot of fun.

00:02:54
Speaker 7: Is Nolah the best dirtiest city in the US.

00:02:57
Speaker 1: It's so dirty, the dirty ones.

00:02:59
Speaker 2: Yeah, number one dirtiest sitting in the US.

00:03:01
Speaker 8: I'd say it's definitely had like the biggest and the most recognition.

00:03:04
Speaker 1: I feel like a Dirty Boys.

00:03:06
Speaker 6: Broadway can be considered pretty dirty.

00:03:08
Speaker 7: I wouldn't even put those in the same Yeah, was a streak, there's like a smell everywhere.

00:03:14
Speaker 4: A fragrance.

00:03:15
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's the most popular dirtiest city.

00:03:18
Speaker 7: Yeah, you can throw like a Portland in there, but like I'm I have no desire to go to Portland.

00:03:22
Speaker 6: But you know, how's Saint Louis.

00:03:24
Speaker 4: Saint Louis clean.

00:03:25
Speaker 2: It's got some dirty parts, but yeah, for the most part, I wouldn't say Saint Louis is close to New Orleans.

00:03:30
Speaker 1: Philly's pretty dirty Philly.

00:03:32
Speaker 2: Philly seems like a dirty, little.

00:03:33
Speaker 6: Bit gritty, Like I feel like Philly's is more gritty than it is dirty, if that makes sense.

00:03:40
Speaker 1: Yeah, a lot of grit fighter mentality there.

00:03:43
Speaker 4: They probably New Orleans.

00:03:45
Speaker 8: Dirtiest destination city in the world.

00:03:48
Speaker 9: He really keeps it.

00:03:49
Speaker 2: Yeah, nice and dirty.

00:03:52
Speaker 1: The weather down there was actually pretty good.

00:03:53
Speaker 6: It was like seventy five eighty, but it wasn't humid it also it felt really good.

00:03:57
Speaker 4: Oh that's nice. That's nice. Would you do anything special this weekend?

00:04:02
Speaker 2: Yeah, we celebrated, uh a little Scottie. Joelee turned one. She turned one last Wednesday twelfth, Yeah, November twelfth, she turned she turned one last Wednesday. We had my uh my dad in town with Stephanie. We had my brothers in town with their significant others. Cody by the way, Cody just got engaged, so have a have a sister in law. And then uh, yeah, Charles's parents. Charles's parents came over. So it was very rare moment to have the grandparents, the brothers, everybody kind of like all in town.

00:04:34
Speaker 4: Nice little dynamic hanging out.

00:04:36
Speaker 1: Yeah, whyott is on the clock.

00:04:38
Speaker 2: Why it's on the clock.

00:04:39
Speaker 4: Yeah, I did his girl come?

00:04:45
Speaker 2: Why at the trip?

00:04:45
Speaker 4: Yeah?

00:04:46
Speaker 2: Yeah, Morgan.

00:04:47
Speaker 9: What'd you'll have on the menu?

00:04:49
Speaker 2: Arcouterier board? Oh board? Some cookies, a smash cake?

00:04:54
Speaker 9: What's a smash cake?

00:04:55
Speaker 2: Cake? Coud you just smash and eat with your hands up? Yes, it's one year old Boycott. He was very weary of the smash cakes. She didn't really. We were trying to like put the frosting and stuff in her mouth to taste it, but she she didn't care about those smash cakes. She wanted the rich crackers that were close by. Good good, Yeah, it's strong.

00:05:12
Speaker 4: Yeah, I know I've talked about this quite a bit on this show, but the addiction my oldest child has to sugar needs to be studied. She is so obsessed with and we try to like keep her away from sugar for the first three years. Was pretty good about it, and I think it just it just harbored everything because it is it is insane to watch itis right now, menace about it. She's a menas, great kid, outstanding individual, but it's like it's crack. Sugar is cracked to that child.

00:05:37
Speaker 9: Yeah, she old for you to throw.

00:05:39
Speaker 7: I don't know if there's like these like hacks where you can like put an ingredient on candy, like whether it's like a vinegar substance, where like she would have a bad reaction, which is like I.

00:05:49
Speaker 9: Don't like candy.

00:05:49
Speaker 4: That's a that's a Yeah, she's too old for that. She's too old. Set her, she's too quick, yeah, yeah, she's yeah, she's too aware of what's kind of going on right now. Oh win rebel. Dude, Uh my weekend, I mean, dude, forty eight hours. We flew Wednesday, flew to New York, flew back Thursday morning, spent lunch with my family, flew to Arizona Thursday and night. I had to handle a little something something over there. But after I handled that something something me Tanner, his wife, his wife's kids, Jack and Scotland, which, by the way, I have no idea what I did to those kids. I'm their favorite person in the entire world. I am their favorite person. Scotland is six five or six, and then Jack is in that three four category. But they were just they stayed up late to see me. Yeah, and like we play like they had a ball and it's just like it's just it's the power of yes with them, dude, you say yes, you play with them. They do things that their parents get mad about. But I'm just hey, we can kind of do whatever around here, right.

00:06:43
Speaker 8: You have the look of if I was ages four to nine, I would be like, Yo, this guy is the coolest person to ever exist. Let's smaller than everyone, he has tattoos, and you just never know what's going to come from gives high five.

00:06:57
Speaker 4: Ye oh oh yeah, and you just got to fine. Like with the younger kids, especially when starting to get out of the agehe I'm like, oh, I got to actually be cool for her to So that's a taking time bomb for us. But everybody under the age of eight, I do. I find one thing that they're obsessed with, and I just beat that ship into the ground with roots.

00:07:14
Speaker 2: The high five. Yeah.

00:07:15
Speaker 4: At tigh five with Scotland Tanner's daughter stepdaughter, it's cartwheels meet and her trying to watch me do the splits. If I try to just splits in front of her, she think it's the funniest thing in the world. And Jack's just a homie bro, little Jack, He's awesome. Me sit there and be like, man, I kind of want a boy. Yeah, I kind of want a boy. He's a little psycho.

00:07:32
Speaker 2: Boy did that?

00:07:32
Speaker 4: We go to zips Man.

00:07:35
Speaker 1: Photo.

00:07:36
Speaker 4: It was the best I've had. It was the best I have ever had. Just continues to exceed expectations, continue. It just keeps on, dude. Just when you think like we've had enough of it, I'm sure it's gonna not taste as good as time it is.

00:07:50
Speaker 2: I go not that thing out.

00:07:51
Speaker 4: I'm in a full suit, and uh, it's Tanner's sister, Valentina, her kid Madeline's there with both her kids. And Tanner was doing this already, golfing. I don't think this is something that does more charity work than Tanner. I don't know if he ever actually raises money, but he's always on like a hunt or a golfing or whatever, but he's always doing that. I get the zips waiter comes by. We exchanged pleasantries about our mustachers. He's got one. I complement him. He gives it back and I said, yeah, I was actually fishing for one, so thank you, and then I give him the whole spiel. Buddy. I don't live here anymore, but I used to live here. This is what I need. If you could just say make it with love to the chef that being credible, and he really did it, he truly did and it was buddy, it's so fucking good. It's so good. And my foot was starting to feel a little bit better. So I treated myself a little bit. Yeah this foot man, get back Friday. Put the I'm like, hey, I've been traveling so much. Joan's like, hey, the next two days like put your foot up and just rest your foot, Like we have to figure out what the hell's going on with this thing. So I rested for a couple of days. Sunday night, my daughter has a rehearsal or not a rehearsal, like I don't know this thing. She started a band with two other girls and they wrote their own songs, and this lady helped them write songs ladies paying the piano of the ukulele. While these kids are like going back and forth seeing not bad, I will say they are not. It's not a bad club. There After that, we go to Hugh Babies and I'm starting to feel like, Okay, I can actually walk. I can't like press off my foot, but I'm like walking without a limp and I'm like a little milkshake kind of sound nice right now, baby, once again, just falling into the trap that got me in the situation again. And Buddy, I woke up this morning at three am, foot ballooned up, go to stand up to take a piss, and it's just fucking hell. It is just hell. I've lost thirteen pounds. I am, I am pray, I am, I am not I. At one point in time, boys, I was a highly successful Pro Bowl football player, possibly arguably the best tackle in the NFL. Now I am just less than I am pray. I'm a shell of myself. If a large gust of wind take off when I'm outside, I might fly away. Haven't worked out in three weeks. I look at my body and I'm just like, what the fuck is this? I look at the man, I'm just like, what are you doing here?

00:10:08
Speaker 2: Huh?

00:10:09
Speaker 4: You're just oozing away? And I am dude, I am getting to the point where I'm just I'm just always in pain. I am always in pain now and it just sucks and it won't go away and I can't fix it. I've been on pain pills for like twelve days straight. That's like kind of tight, because you gotta feel kind of nice at certain times, but other times, I've been through this game before. To come down is horrible. My personality is like, how do we get more? And so I'm just like fighting the good fight. And I don't like where I'm at right now. November twenty twenty five. I don't like where I'm at.

00:10:43
Speaker 1: You got one week to get it together, buddy.

00:10:47
Speaker 4: Yeah, I'm I'm in the movie Saw. I'm in the movie one hundred and twenty seven hours and there's a knife staring at me right now, and I'm like, do I just cut my foot off? It might be better than what is happening right now. It is awful, bro, It's awful, and it sucks too, And be like, oh Taylor, oh no, what happened to your foot? You're in a boot and I have to go hide?

00:11:08
Speaker 2: Go out now.

00:11:08
Speaker 4: I don't rough out, but I think I had gout and I rolled in my foot and then I looking at my my foot. I don't even know if I actually tore a look at my foot. I'm just like kind of sitting there and be like, they think this, So I'm just gonna say it like that so it looked like less of a bitch. There was a time dude, when you would have a boot on after a football game and it was low key at badge of honor, like, yeah, I played through it, I'm gonna play next week. I think about junior year in Michigan State, had a high ankle sprain and a broken hand, and I was at the bar at Rick's American Cafe, slugging beers in a boot and a cast on my wrist, and there was a piece of me that's like, you fucking earn this beer, and what're you gonna do next week? You're gonna play Now. I'm thirty four, and my kids are like chopping at the bit, be like, hey, Dad, play with us. If you could play Burgoin with us, just go on your knees. And I'm like, I just truly I can't do it, and I'm I'm on the couch. I'm withering away. I'm slowly to tear. I take so much pride, dude, taking care of my body because I've taken so many shots in the head and I played so recklessly in football. I know there's a vegetative state in my future, and so I just try to stay ahead of the chains. And here I am with a fucking boot on man, Damn Mitch. A vegetative state is somebody that's in the hospital can't like non responsive.

00:12:19
Speaker 5: I didn't mean to say you're already acting.

00:12:22
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's accelerating, and I like to think I am very conscious about my health. What I eat, it's how I how I train, Like stay ahead the chains, cold tubs, hot tubs, saw us get a little n ida every once in a while.

00:12:37
Speaker 2: Like it's crazy to think a milkshake can take you out, bro, dam Like that's where you are.

00:12:45
Speaker 4: Man, I know, dude, I know, and it's like everything you just said hurt. But it's like he's what what am I mad about? Because there's truth and that's what sucks. Bro.

00:12:55
Speaker 1: I think you see how far you can go.

00:12:58
Speaker 4: No, dude, let me tell you something. Know, Like I like you guys, have you had gout? Has anybody here had gout?

00:13:05
Speaker 9: You're at the beach one time?

00:13:07
Speaker 4: And what did he say?

00:13:08
Speaker 7: I honestly didn't take it seriously because when your buddy's hurt, you're like, thank god, you're being a bitch.

00:13:13
Speaker 9: I know.

00:13:14
Speaker 7: But then I'm hearing it from you and I'm like, maybe I should have taken them more serious.

00:13:17
Speaker 2: Dude.

00:13:17
Speaker 4: People some more empathy with people in the comments who are listening to this right now. If you've had gout, please explain to these boys what it's like.

00:13:24
Speaker 2: People are. People are I've been seeing people.

00:13:26
Speaker 1: There's a lot of aud was.

00:13:28
Speaker 8: Like a World War two disease when I was first due.

00:13:31
Speaker 4: It is literally it's the people call it the king's disease, like in medieval times. That's legit how it looks, by the way, except for the dude's left foot as crazy as.

00:13:39
Speaker 1: Well, drop a feet pick for the people.

00:13:41
Speaker 4: But dude, and medieval times, kings and like higher end people in these worlds would get them because they wouldn't exercise, the heat, read and meat all the time, and so it was literally like a distinguished disease they called the King's disease. And I fucking hate it, man, I literally I feel so defeated. I feel so defeated right now, and I just don't I don't want to be the guy that's on antibiotic every day. Wake up with my fucking Onday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday pills and I have to open it up, take it out and take that. And if I don't take it then I get sick or whatever. That's the start of the end, Like, how do I fix this? How do I get it right? I've worked so hard, and I know this is I listen bos, you guys don't deserve me just fucking vomiting on you guys right now. But give me some time here. I have worked so hard since my football career has ended of trying to get my gut health back in order because of all the steroid packs and all the pills and all the things that the tourtal shots over and over and over again I've done. I've tried so hard to fix those things. I've taken a steroid pack in the last couple of weeks. I'm on this uric acid thing right now. I'm taking tram it all and I'm just looking at myself like, bro, you're going to fuck your gut up again. If not, it's already fucked up and it sucks.

00:14:54
Speaker 2: Onward.

00:14:55
Speaker 4: Somebody else tell me something bad that's happen to them misally JP, I'll.

00:14:58
Speaker 2: Say this, Yeah, I mean, back's not the backs on all the way there, but I'll say this. Since eight thirty this morning, I've had twelve missed calls from spammers, Like there is a there's an epidemic right now, like spam callers good, and I don't know what to do.

00:15:09
Speaker 7: One two minutes ago and I've had four since I've been on this bus.

00:15:13
Speaker 2: Do I've blocked like forty numbers and they just keep coming.

00:15:17
Speaker 9: Bro, I feel better that you're getting them.

00:15:18
Speaker 7: But all weekend, I legitimately probably got thirty plus spam calls messages galore, and I'm like, did I die enroll in something where they ship my number out?

00:15:28
Speaker 9: It is so frustrating.

00:15:30
Speaker 4: The problem is, too, is if I heard, if you ignore it, it's actually better than blocking it because if you block it, they know that's an active number, so they go and send it off to other places.

00:15:39
Speaker 2: I heard.

00:15:40
Speaker 4: I heard something to think about. But hey, thank you. I know you guys are dealing with a lot now too, and it is annoying. Bro, Yeah I bet I bet it sucks. Yeah.

00:15:51
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's probably the worst thing going on right now for people besides gout. Yeah, I mean having to ignore my phone and put them on silence send them in the voicemail right right before the holidays. Yeah. It's frustrating, man, it's annoying. Yeah, but yeah, that's that's probably the worst thing going on right now that I'm dealing with, I think Scotty could be. Is there such thing as like a twelve month sleep regression.

00:16:19
Speaker 4: Yeah, we'll talk about it.

00:16:20
Speaker 2: There's always some sleep regression. So like six times trying to you know, just quieter, down, down, Like, dude, why are you yelling? Bro? Get with your ship?

00:16:30
Speaker 4: Figure it the fuck out?

00:16:31
Speaker 2: Then?

00:16:32
Speaker 8: How far away is she from talking? When do kids start talking?

00:16:35
Speaker 4: She should be getting going.

00:16:36
Speaker 2: She gets dad dad, Yeah, Gaga.

00:16:41
Speaker 4: Lady Gaga a big fan of her.

00:16:43
Speaker 2: She can go, she can do the snake noise. So seems like we're close.

00:16:50
Speaker 1: She's fluent.

00:16:51
Speaker 4: Dude, Willow was talking quick. Like, if I had Willow first and then Win second, I'd be looking at when what's going on here? But because I had to win that, will was just like kind of they're always around each other. Start talking real fast, start walking real fast. It's dope that you got Scotty to one though. I feel like this year is flown by for y'all.

00:17:08
Speaker 2: Celebration. Man, get the kid to survive for a year.

00:17:12
Speaker 4: Yeah, you've made it. Like at this point, it's on them. Yeah, you just gotta you can walk now. Yeah, make a sandwich, dude, and get a job those types of things. But yeah, dude, gout fucking still doubtful. I'm still goutful. And it's just like I just want to feel good, dude, I just want to feel good. Have I not earned that? And then Jared's dumb ass he go I walk in and I'm like, hey, guys, I'm in such a bad mood today that actually I'm in a good mood. Like it's it's reversed to me, and Jared goes, isn't there like a super rich hospital you can go to that fixes it? I go, Jared, do you think he's like some sort of aluminum like cloaked group of people. I just go drink some child's blood, and all of a sudden it's fixed. Because if there is point me in that direction, dude, I need to fix.

00:17:59
Speaker 7: This in his mind, though he legitimately believes there is that hospital.

00:18:03
Speaker 4: No doubt, and still it Jared and I, man, we've had a little bit of we've had a back and forth last week or so. There's there's gotta be mare if somebody has an Illuminati type of crew that is interested in having me be a part of it, and I am the most vulnerable.

00:18:25
Speaker 8: I could be right now, it exists for sure.

00:18:27
Speaker 4: I gotta believe. Bro, how's Brad Pitt look that good?

00:18:30
Speaker 1: Saying?

00:18:31
Speaker 4: I took a little selfie video this morning, like a victory, Hey, victory Monday. Got myself a black coffee, Michigan hat, throw on saaleball, all that thing. I'm looking at myself in the selfie video thing, and I'm like, look, how old you look?

00:18:40
Speaker 2: Dude?

00:18:41
Speaker 4: You haven't slept eight hours in three weeks? Like hours?

00:18:46
Speaker 2: You look good? You look good, buddy, trying to give you some optimism. Thank you.

00:18:50
Speaker 4: I feel like shit, though slowly withered away. You cannot cure gout.

00:18:57
Speaker 8: Not yet, bro, not yet be the first.

00:19:01
Speaker 2: Can you go back to that jack?

00:19:03
Speaker 1: Click off that.

00:19:06
Speaker 2: You're on the yuric as? Are you staying hydrated?

00:19:09
Speaker 4: I could use more.

00:19:10
Speaker 2: Let's get some more high purine foods in your diet.

00:19:13
Speaker 4: What is purine?

00:19:14
Speaker 2: What is that?

00:19:15
Speaker 1: Who knows?

00:19:15
Speaker 2: Sounds like dog food?

00:19:16
Speaker 4: Purina Tailing says to me the other day, She goes, have you been drinking more to the type of Water's like if someone does can in water. The alkalis ball, they said, the gout and then it went away and I'm like, dude, I'm all about unique styles of health and wellness. I'm bigging the juices and the turmerics and all that stuff. But my mental headspace where I'm at, I'm thinking, what the fuck are you talking about?

00:19:41
Speaker 2: Dude?

00:19:42
Speaker 4: What water?

00:19:44
Speaker 8: Yeah, plastics, We've crossed the line with waters. There's way too many waters that get too many waters, too many water.

00:19:50
Speaker 4: You have to get a cankin water system in my house.

00:19:52
Speaker 1: But I need it.

00:19:53
Speaker 4: I need it.

00:19:54
Speaker 1: You can probably get it.

00:19:55
Speaker 4: Probably just point me in the door from that Luminati crew and I'll get that done.

00:19:58
Speaker 7: It says best foods for Cherry's, Vitamin C, coffee, skim milk, water.

00:20:04
Speaker 4: Okay, good, I'll those thirteen more pounds the next week.

00:20:07
Speaker 2: Get you some cherries, man, Yeah, I do.

00:20:09
Speaker 4: I used to take tar Tart cherry pills and I've recently just reordered it. But I haven't had meat or like red meat in three weeks, two weeks. Whatever it is. I just don't understand, man, Yeah, I don't understand.

00:20:22
Speaker 2: You'll get there.

00:20:23
Speaker 4: You think, so, yeah, like this camp.

00:20:24
Speaker 2: Maybe because you've had you've had a few situations just with your foot, because I want to say you had something going on when you're playing on that last year your.

00:20:32
Speaker 4: Foot was like, Bob, that was my first bout of gout.

00:20:34
Speaker 2: Yeah, so it's when was the last one? Was? How long ago?

00:20:38
Speaker 7: Was?

00:20:38
Speaker 4: That is my third season not playing football?

00:20:41
Speaker 2: Yeah so three years ago. You've had some episodes and as somebody too, like you take care of yourself as much as anybody, so knowing that it's like a diet type thing, it's very surprising. I know.

00:20:51
Speaker 4: Here's what I have to do, dude. I truly have to understand that my life of eating junk food it has to be over in order to be happy. And that's sucks because I have to rewrout my brain. Like Thanksgivings right around the corner. I'm terrified. I'm terrified of our Thanksgiving day.

00:21:07
Speaker 5: One day.

00:21:10
Speaker 4: It was one day yesterday, dude, I'm not joking, Mitch. I was on the ups. I was like, oh, I might not wear a boot do work tomorrow.

00:21:16
Speaker 2: I might be.

00:21:16
Speaker 5: I might be.

00:21:17
Speaker 4: I might put my trucks back on. I might put my vans back on. That's how good I was feeling. I'm out there playing air hockey with my youngest thumbmeater, but like we're getting we're getting after it, having a good time.

00:21:26
Speaker 1: And Bro, do you think your those shoes are could be.

00:21:31
Speaker 2: The shoes could be a fact.

00:21:32
Speaker 4: That's a structural thing, though, But I've been doing it my whole life. Might have flat feet. It's not like I need arch support. I have no arch in my foot. I have no arch. Yeah, little flippers. Bro Will loves talking about my thumbs and my feet.

00:21:46
Speaker 7: Bro.

00:21:46
Speaker 4: Yes, she was a significant factor. Fuck dude, No.

00:21:51
Speaker 9: You might have to get some like Hoka or something.

00:21:53
Speaker 2: Yeah, Bro, get some old guy shoes. Man, get them clouds start walking. Yeah, I get some.

00:22:00
Speaker 4: I remember, dude, I remember being at Michigan and the trainers. I was having foot paint because I was wearing a Dida shoes. I didn't know at the time, but my freshman year of college football, they're like, hey, I think the problem is you're wearing vans all the time. Like you shouldn't be wearing vans. You need something with more art support. And I think I was like, I'd rather kill myself basically did not wear vans. And here I am, dude, thirty four years old, and I have to while you're telling me I can't wear the number one thing I associate myself with as far as like clothing goes.

00:22:34
Speaker 6: Would you rather stick with Vans and still have foot Is shoes or have to change up your style?

00:22:39
Speaker 4: Bro, it sounds like I'd rather change up my style. I can't live like this, dude, I cannot live like this. Answer, thanks, Mitch. I know, I'm sorry, man, that's song. Yeah, man, I'm just.

00:22:51
Speaker 1: No, it's okay. I I we were talking earlier.

00:22:54
Speaker 4: So you called me a vegetable like five minutes ago. You're already there.

00:22:58
Speaker 6: I phrased that wrong. I said, you're it's getting closer. But what we were saying earlier this morning, it's like you're in such a bad mood that it's almost like yeah, it's.

00:23:07
Speaker 4: It's like almost Actually it's funny to me where I'm at.

00:23:09
Speaker 6: Yeah, but like we're just no, just nowhere, all on your side. If you need anything, let us know, right.

00:23:16
Speaker 4: Yeah, years aund my team and that actually really means a lot because I feel so alone right now, dude, I'm finding this fire so alone, right Yeah, Yeah, it's awful.

00:23:27
Speaker 2: Should we get into some spicy road tier talk and best compliments to give your significant other?

00:23:31
Speaker 4: Nothing transitions better from gout than that. So yeah, let's do it.

00:23:33
Speaker 2: Well, maybe some optimisms, you know, throw out some ideas, just get out of the conversation.

00:23:39
Speaker 4: Let's get out of there. We're going to make our own together, Like we're all gonna think take this one.

00:23:43
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think we can. We can all throw stuff out there. I think you look gorgeous. That could be on the list right tier three. Yeah, well here's I think you look stunning. You look gorgeous.

00:23:55
Speaker 4: But here I like those. This is where I think it takes it a step above. Like you're in a regular converse sta like you get home from work and may how is your day? And she just starts talking like, hey, by the way, you look out standing today.

00:24:05
Speaker 1: Like you you look really.

00:24:07
Speaker 4: Good, and she's like kind of like throwing back off. She goes really and You're like, yeah, Like why would I just say that?

00:24:12
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know smooth?

00:24:13
Speaker 4: That to me, that happens like five times a week at my house.

00:24:17
Speaker 2: I like, I like looking at your and be like dead ass is looking right?

00:24:20
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I'll have that thing looks crazy.

00:24:26
Speaker 2: Yeah. I don't know if she likes it, but in my mind, I'm thinking this is a huge compliment, Like she'll be you know, I might be coming down from putting ruor Scottie down, she might be finishing up in the kitchen. I'll just like walk up, say she's at the sink, I'll just walk up behind her and just whispering her You're like I need that, Yeah, and then to do a little dry hump. Yeah. We'll just just press it on her real quick, put it on her head. Yeah. She'll be brushing with a zero sensation for them at all, like the right cheetes. If I catch her like putting the ad dish in the dishwasher, like brushing her teeth, I'll just walk up behind, grab her hips and kind of dry hump her a couple of times.

00:24:59
Speaker 1: Yeah, will about to have a mug shot out there.

00:25:04
Speaker 2: Dude, hate to the married to the married man, you guys, don't you guys, don't you know spontaneously dry you hump your wife every now and then.

00:25:11
Speaker 8: No, crazy, don't do that.

00:25:16
Speaker 1: I do.

00:25:16
Speaker 4: Dude, like the you know in high school when like you like are cuddling with a girl whatever, and you're clearly hard as a rock, clearly and like you think this is a good idea for me to press my hips into him as much as possible, so they know, like the options there if you want it. I still love doing that. I still love being a gilet and just be kind of chubbed up and just be like fucking and it's got to be so annoying to them. I'm just.

00:25:43
Speaker 2: But what's the compliment you're giving her while you're doing Yeah, you got.

00:25:48
Speaker 4: Nine years married, tyther N, nine years married, still fucking done. You still still give me some Which sucks about this show is I know that tales grandfather tales dad. He listens to the show like Chuck listens to show religiously. So Chuck, I'd like to apologize, but I do do that.

00:26:04
Speaker 5: Is that like a compliment you still got it?

00:26:07
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's a that's a that's a body language compliment. Yeah, I think here too, action.

00:26:12
Speaker 9: Speaking, I feel like a really good one too.

00:26:15
Speaker 7: Is noticing a haircut or new nails, yeah, or clothing, just any anything that like they have gone out of their way to get done. That goes a long way with women because for guys, it's like we're happy that you're happy, but you know, no, we're not.

00:26:32
Speaker 9: Getting pedicures and manicures.

00:26:34
Speaker 4: You know, it's frequently unless you if you want eyebrows, eyelashes.

00:26:37
Speaker 2: You're right too, especially clothing they get something new, like Tar had a jacket going on. I'm like, you're mess with that jacket.

00:26:43
Speaker 9: Noticing it before they have different things.

00:26:46
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think is.

00:26:47
Speaker 9: Where you hit the home run.

00:26:48
Speaker 4: Hell yeah, dude, that's.

00:26:49
Speaker 2: A good stuff right there, Jack, good stuff.

00:26:52
Speaker 8: Sitting hit a new little like hair dress combo on Saturday, and I was like, God, they okay, I see you and just that you could tell it went a long way.

00:27:02
Speaker 2: God, dang, okay, I see you. Yeah. I need that on the list as well.

00:27:06
Speaker 8: God yeah, I love that.

00:27:12
Speaker 2: Clump. You got one to add to the list.

00:27:15
Speaker 10: Outside of them, my big one is like if Lynn says she's like a busy day, I have to do this, this or this. When I get home, I'm I try to like hit back on those topics like oh wow, like it's nice and cleaning here, it smells good. Just kind of compliment like things she was stressed, things she was stressed about.

00:27:30
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's good.

00:27:32
Speaker 2: Yeah, remembering remembering, Yeah, just like like appreciating the stressed.

00:27:37
Speaker 1: Yeah.

00:27:38
Speaker 4: Yeah, you guys don't like that one, No, no, no, no, I do. I'm thinking in my head, like yesterday Dylan's like, hey, like, I feel like I've been like a single parent for the last couple of weeks. And I'm like, hey, you really have, and I cannot thank you enough. Yeah, for how I've had to deal with this, And it's really I haven't been able to do a whole lot of shit. So that's really big of you. And you could just tell she was like she needed the acknowledgment, which I think we all needed sometimes.

00:28:00
Speaker 8: It was big before we hop off. The world needs to know clumb had an aura dump on me just a second ago. He has a pizza named after him in his hometown local pizza spot.

00:28:10
Speaker 10: It's a special pizza. It's called Theah the Clump Pizza. It's a buffalo chicken pizza, but instead of buffalo sauce, it is mango haamanaro sauce on the pizza. You get a specially you got a pizza named every now and then.

00:28:22
Speaker 1: It's in the rotation. I'll show you a picture of it.

00:28:24
Speaker 2: Oh you were him back in the No no, no, oh you were hold on hold on no no no, Hey god, dang, okay, I see.

00:28:34
Speaker 10: This is gonna turn so poorly bad of how it happened. It's not because of my high school football playing days. It's because my family goes there every Friday and they just love our family. So like, just order the pizza and he's like, no one ever orders this, this is awesome, it's great. So they put it as a special and it like sold out. So we always joke that was all like I kind of created my own.

00:28:53
Speaker 2: Yeah you guys did. Man, that ain't a joke. It's from eating pizza though, it's not from like anything.

00:29:00
Speaker 4: Yeah, what dude, you love you never worked a day in your Life's.

00:29:04
Speaker 2: Community universal shout.

00:29:07
Speaker 6: I'm sure Will would love to have a pizza named after him at home team.

00:29:10
Speaker 2: Would love that.

00:29:11
Speaker 9: He's on Twitter every Friday.

00:29:13
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, we'll be We'll be back over Thanksgiving.

00:29:18
Speaker 1: I'll send you a picture of it.

00:29:19
Speaker 4: The nice nice. I also have something named after me.

00:29:23
Speaker 2: All right, onward, what what do you got a name?

00:29:26
Speaker 4: That brown jug Southwest the Southwest Burger.

00:29:29
Speaker 2: Tell us about the story. Man, let's hear the like Perry.

00:29:31
Speaker 4: You guys know Perry and I played football there and they're like Taylor on Southwest Burger.

00:29:35
Speaker 2: That's what it is. That's awesome.

00:29:37
Speaker 4: I think I think that's awesome. Yeah, hell yeah, dude, thank you very much. I don't know. That's a good question. I like to think. So I like to think. So, what time does Nebraska Penn State play this week? So we hope to be able to stream that as well.

00:30:00
Speaker 2: Yeah, we'll be on the stream. I'll be balls deep in that Nitney Lions Huskers game.

00:30:04
Speaker 4: Well, that'll be eleven am. We're streaming at eleven am this week. Yeah, what do you mean we'll be on the stream. I wish we were streaming for that.

00:30:12
Speaker 2: Oh, I wish we were streaming. Got you, got you? Yeah, we'll be all right, we'll be solid. All right, let's get into the final bite, brought to us by McDonald's. New Buffalo Ranch sauce has arrived, and it pairs perfectly with your snack rat, mccrispy sandwich and mccrispy strips. It's got the zang tang of buffalo with the creamy, cool, mild ranch. It's mild and wild at the same time. It's a sauce that balances itself and compliments our crispy chicken. Again. This episode of Bust with the Broys is brought to you by McDonald's and they're all new Buffalo Ranch sauce. There's a new sauce in town at McDonald's, tangy, creamy Buffalo Ranch. Order now. And now we give our sharpest takeaway heading into the weekend. Heading into the week, let's say whether it's a bold prediction, a hot take, or a storyline that's flying under the radar. The final bite gives fans the one thing to keep in mind before finishing their week and tuning in the kickoff as they dip their mccrispy strips and this new Buffalo sauce denim dipping in denim.

00:31:13
Speaker 1: I got a final bite.

00:31:15
Speaker 2: Oh oh okay, Mat Taylor.

00:31:17
Speaker 6: My final bite is Taylor's gonna get over this gout and this foot thing and it'll never happen again for as long as he lives, and for whatever reason it was just a spell. He's gonna be able to eat whatever he wants, do whatever he wants, and it'll never happen again.

00:31:32
Speaker 4: It will never happen again. That is my favorite dude. I would dip all day in denhim with that. I would dip all day in.

00:31:37
Speaker 9: That my final bite.

00:31:40
Speaker 7: And I don't even take pride in saying this because the Balls play the Gators in games of this weekend.

00:31:46
Speaker 9: Historically we lose in Gainesville all the time, and then we have Vandy.

00:31:50
Speaker 7: So if the worst possible case scenario, my final bite Tennessee, Nebraska and the Music City Bowl.

00:31:57
Speaker 2: Oh sho would be electric bro.

00:32:01
Speaker 9: Right right in Nashville we'd have to go to.

00:32:04
Speaker 7: It'd be like the ninth Music City Bowl for the Balls in the last two nurs.

00:32:08
Speaker 2: I'd love to get a link into Nashville.

00:32:11
Speaker 4: That'd be awesome. And what's great about that is you guys are supposed to play at the Debressos Like we're not playing guys.

00:32:15
Speaker 7: Yeah, next year, I don't want to talk about that.

00:32:20
Speaker 2: JP clumb Do you guys have a final bite heading into the weekend, because you guys already know what mine's.

00:32:25
Speaker 1: Going to be.

00:32:26
Speaker 8: Yeah, I mean, after what happened to me this weekend, one of the only things that could cheer me up is that I the McDonald's breakfast for my final bite after leaving that Texas A and M game.

00:32:41
Speaker 1: How I felt, how I feel right now?

00:32:43
Speaker 2: What's your order? What's your breakfast order?

00:32:46
Speaker 8: So I go back and forth between two things. I'll give you this one. This is what I had most recently. I was actually inspired by your tweet last week to go get McDonald's breakfast and I got bacon or bacon sorry, sausage, egg and cheese, bagel meal plus breakfast.

00:33:02
Speaker 2: Burrito, A little two for breakfast burritos.

00:33:05
Speaker 1: Bro.

00:33:06
Speaker 8: The breakfast burritos are maybe the best fast food breakfast burritos to ever exist. Yeah, I'm out there the breakfast burrito streets.

00:33:13
Speaker 4: Now you're in the community.

00:33:14
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm in then.

00:33:16
Speaker 2: And when you take a bite too, and there's almost a little pop of cheese that comes into your mouth.

00:33:20
Speaker 8: Yeah, and there hot sauce.

00:33:24
Speaker 2: You're a bagel guy for your breakfast sandwich, over the biscuit and over.

00:33:27
Speaker 9: The mcgriddle bagels.

00:33:30
Speaker 7: The Nashville McDonald's JP and like four people they like called him out on Twitter McDonald's for bringing back the bagels.

00:33:36
Speaker 8: Oh wow, I'm McDonald's had at the house.

00:33:39
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:33:40
Speaker 8: And I was also a part of the snackcraft campaign.

00:33:44
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I do remember that. A Rico Bosco hit me up when he saw that tweet, like, hoo fucking I'm getting I'm getting McDonald's, I'm getting mc I'm getting McDonald's for breakfast on this Friday morning. He was like, bro get the steak, egg and cheese bad, trust me, and usually my order. I love getting the sausage the breakfast burritos, and I like getting just for nostalgia purposes, bacon, egg and cheese mcgriddle. And I also got a steak, egg and cheese bagel. Like he was saying, but it was very it was subpar, Like it was good, But I feel like he puts such an expectation on it because I'm not like for me on the McDonald's it's mcgriddle and bagel sandwich or mcgriddle on biscuit sandwich.

00:34:23
Speaker 4: On pancakes and either the hash Browns are all time. Might be the number one thing on their roster in that Orange high Sea.

00:34:37
Speaker 1: We might have to next the next final bite.

00:34:38
Speaker 8: We might have to create a starting five and then a reserve five, just like a basketball team starting five on the menu, and then who's our bench on the me.

00:34:47
Speaker 2: Yeah, I like that because they have a great roster and that bench is deep. Yes, I mean. My final take is We're gonna go into Happy Valley Saturday night, double digit underdogs Nebraska TJ Latife. We take down the Nitney Lion, Foxhole game, Foxhole game. Yeah, we got an opportunity fish strong here. I will probably be ranked by the time we play. Get the ranked. Win monkey off our back against the Alwahaul guys.

00:35:11
Speaker 4: I was ranked before they lost to USC. They're gonna be out now.

00:35:15
Speaker 2: You think they probably they might be able to snip at twenty four to twenty five in there.

00:35:20
Speaker 4: Yeah, it would be nice. Yeah, because you guys gotta get that off your That's the next that's the next step. Yeah, right there. My final bite hot take. If the Rams and the Seahawks played again, the Seahawks win that game. Yeah, they win that game. Bag, I think for your fortune overs to Sammy D. What I hate for that game is is my expectation in that game was for Sam Donald to go in and be able to outduel Matthew Stafford. But it ended up being more of a defensive game than anything else, which is great. It's great for football just how complete both those teams are. But for Sammy D to have foreignerceptions, a lot of the haters are gonna come out of the woodwork and be like, oh, you know, he's really not great quarterback. He's had a good year, but he's not like an elite top five guy. I think those guys play again, and I believe they they do play again, right, they haven't played twice yet, so they will play again. I am taking the Seahawks in that game. Mark it down right here.

00:36:13
Speaker 8: Final final bite, keep Shane Beemer.

00:36:16
Speaker 4: Final final Bite. Michigan makes the playoffs.

00:36:20
Speaker 2: All right, Good to go boys, Big hugs, shiney kisses, and enjoy Robert Gallery. This is an incredible interview. Listen all two and a half hours of it, leave comments, subscribe, Make sure you're subscribed. Big ug, shindy kisses. We will see you later. All right. Quick break from the episode to bring you Olli Pop ollip Ollipop Times. SpongeBob collaboration the Pineapple Ya Soda from Bikini Bottom, Pineapple Paradise, Juicy Pineapple with a splash Amanda in Pure Liquid Joy. Just like SpongeBob himself, Each packs a little treasure hunt. You never know which one you're gonna get. They have these little, hidden, little hidden SpongeBob canned designs in each four pack. You can collect them on unlocked sweet rewards at Drinkollipop dot com. Slash SpongeBob your boy is. I've been a soda fiend my entire life. We've all learned how sugar is not the best thing for you. Soda is filled with sugar, not Ollipop. When I found Allipop, your boy was elated. I have a couple flavors that I'll mention down here at the end, But I love soda, but most of the time it doesn't love me back. Ollipop actually supports gut health with nine grams of prebiotic fiber and only two to five grams of sugar per cam. It tastes like soda, but it's actually good for you. They have an incredible lineup of flavors Vintage Cola, Classic root Beer, Cream Soda, Orange Squeeze, Doctor Goodwin, Lemon Lime, and more. My two personal favorite I just came across this one recently, which might climb the charts and be my number one, but Classic Grape is currently my favorite. Another one that is climbing rapidly boys Apple Crisp. Apple Crisp. It is incredible. Think apple juice with that little carbonation. Get two dogs off a four pack of Ollipop at drinkolipop dot com. Slash bussing works on any flavor of four pack including SpongeBob with any retailer and Olipop is Solda Online, Drinkollipop dot Com or Amazon and available in almost fifty thousand Taylor's nationwide, including Costco, Walmart, Target, Public's, Whole Foods, Kroger, and HB Drink Lollipop Boys. We also bring you simply Safe. What do you want to keep safe in your life? Family? Kids, that new car in the garage. Traditional security systems only take action after someone has already broken in, and that's too late. Simply Safe is setting the new standard and home security With active guard outdoor protection, simply Safe monitoring agents can help prevent break ins before they happen. AI powered cameras backed by live professional monitoring agents that monitor your property and detect suspicious activity. If someone's lurking around, those agents see and talk to them in real time, activate spotlights and even contact the police. You can get fifty percent off your new simply Safe system with professional monitoring and your first month free at simplysafe dot com. Slash busting again at simply safe dot com slash bussing. There's no safe like simply Safe, and shout out simply Safe for keeping the shop safe and secured while the boys are away. They do, they do sponsor and also they equip our shop. Here busting with the boys, guys, Let's level up your nicotine routine with Lucy. Go to Lucy dot Co slash busting and use promo code busting to get twenty percent off of your first order. Lucy has a thirty day refund policy if you change your mind again, that's Lucy dot Co. And use code busting to get twenty percent off your nicotine pouches. And here comes the fine print. Lucy products are only for adults of legal age and every customer is age verified. Warning, this product contains nicotine and nicotine is an addictive chemical. Let's get to the Robert Gallery episode that has brought to us. This interview is brought to us by bud Light. Bud Light has always brew for simple ingredients for a clean Chris taste. Bud Light is the official beer sponsor of the NFL, the NFL Draft, Tight In University, the UFC, and Shane Gillis's twenty twenty five tour Post Malone, Dustin Pourier, Amitt Smith, Baker, Mayfield, George Kittle, Peyton Manning are all of the bud Light partners, so you can stock up now on bud Light head www dot bud light dot com, slash to find a store near you. Easy to drink, easy to enjoy. Enjoy this interview with Robert Gallery.

00:40:07
Speaker 4: Play Joe.

00:40:08
Speaker 9: Let's give it up for our guests today. We got a two time.

00:40:11
Speaker 4: All Bank Ten, one time All American Outland Trophy winner, and a man who has had an incredible story that we're gonna break down on this beautiful Tuesday morning. Let's get up for Robert Gallery. Excited to have you on.

00:40:26
Speaker 2: Right before we started, we were talking about the ego and the Big ten going around right now. Yeah, and if Robert would have been a great guest to have on before leading up to the Iowa game, maybe after the Iowa game. Talking about Michigan football. A lot of Big ten energy in this bus right now.

00:40:41
Speaker 4: A lot of big Yeah.

00:40:42
Speaker 2: I was looked tough this year.

00:40:44
Speaker 1: Yeah, they're doing well. I was back last week for the game and just to seem steamroll through that. It's nice. It's nice to see when you don't just squeak it out, but they're rolling. That quarterback makes a big difference for them and they're a fun team to watch. We're moving the ball and you know it's Hawk football.

00:40:58
Speaker 2: We got God to beat your ass at the end of the year.

00:41:01
Speaker 4: Nine and one so far the last ten. Yeah, I was one the last ten. Great school. I feel like you guys' rivalry, it's like it's a rivalry, but there's a level of mutual respect in it. Is that Am I correct in saying that.

00:41:14
Speaker 1: Respect is a big word?

00:41:16
Speaker 2: I think, yes, it's yeah, O, there's but it's a rivalry, rivalry that kind of like came about or kind of gets forced in whenever we made the move to the Big Ten, as I would in Nebraska, going to play at the end of the year every season from here on out. But it's there. I wouldn't say that there's like people love each other right, true, but.

00:41:35
Speaker 4: People are also understanding, like if your kid wanted to go to Iowa at the end of the day, you would be okay with it.

00:41:40
Speaker 2: I personally wouldn't. Some some folk in Nebraska might be okay with it.

00:41:43
Speaker 1: So I did, I did hear that? And the sad part is, I guess I have a great My wife played for the women's basketball team there. We have a great relationship with that no at Iowa. Okay, yeah, no, No, wouldn't have married her. I mean another start. But we have a great relationship up with the head coach there, and I know you have two girls and we were talking. We were just back and we were just talking with her, you know. So they are ready to see your girls come up. And they actually sent a bunch of stuff for you. That is so sweet. You know, there's some women's basketball T shirts. I threw in a Kirk Farance poster just because I figured you put it up somewhere. But I know you'll do it's best for your girls and get him ready to go be a Hawkeye.

00:42:26
Speaker 4: That is so coind. Not a lot of people come on this show and give out gifts. Let's get it. That's so sweet. That is so cold. What do you say? Well, what do you is it signed?

00:42:38
Speaker 2: Some you smalls?

00:42:40
Speaker 1: You know he's won a few games, you know few.

00:42:43
Speaker 2: I respect this. I respect this. I respect it so much that if you guys beat us, I'll post a photo with Rue with this little phone paper.

00:42:52
Speaker 4: That's a wild just walking. I told Will's got to gross hair for a year, and it looked like the world was coming down to him. You're giving a gift and you're like, if I lose, I'll have ru hold this up. No problem.

00:43:01
Speaker 2: I just respect the U. I just respect him being on his toes coming in the bus. Yeah, fair enough.

00:43:07
Speaker 1: At A little bit might be too that I did take a recruiting visit to Nebraska. I never got offered, So there might be a little bitterness in our relationship with that or did not.

00:43:18
Speaker 2: But that's because you were probably you were an athlete, right right, Yeah, No, I was was Gallery that came to be Robert Gallery, all American all that stuff, like you know who was the head coach at the time of Nebraska.

00:43:30
Speaker 1: You know, that's a good question. That was at I don't even remember. Don't remember that trip.

00:43:36
Speaker 4: Early two thy ninety ninety nine was when you were a senior in high school. That's wild because you don't you look our age, which is really upsetting for me. And so you you're from Iowa, you go to Iowa?

00:43:48
Speaker 1: Was it?

00:43:48
Speaker 2: Ever?

00:43:49
Speaker 4: How many offers did you have?

00:43:51
Speaker 1: It's like four Purdue Northwestern, Iowa State and Iowa had four.

00:43:56
Speaker 4: And I was clearly like you wanted to go to Iowa.

00:43:59
Speaker 1: I did. My older brother played there. He was an all big ten punter there from ninety three to ninety six. So I was hanging around the university. I was hanging around the program, all the guys that were there, the Tim Dwight's, the Jared Devrizes, the So I'm in the dorms as a junior high kid hanging out with these guys. So in my mind, it was like, this is where I want to go because I knew the culture and I knew all the guys. You know, It's it's cool to be recruited and go check out the other places. But at the end of the day, I knew I was going to Diowa.

00:44:24
Speaker 4: Yeah, it didn't matter what other school offered you if it was like an Alabama SEC school, Michigan Michigan.

00:44:31
Speaker 1: Yeah, but I don't. I was an athlete, right, I played basketball. You know, I was a second state in the high jump. You know, I ran the four by one, but I.

00:44:38
Speaker 2: Wasn't the one.

00:44:40
Speaker 4: This is fucking out of control.

00:44:42
Speaker 1: Yeah, so we were, you know, we were How were you jumping? I still have the school record at six or five? Yeah, I mean I could. I had some hops, now.

00:44:50
Speaker 2: Dude, that is nuts.

00:44:51
Speaker 1: Yeah. So I was an athlete, right, So I wasn't. You didn't turn on my VHS tape that I sent all these schools and see like this killer football player. He saw an athlete that could run. You know, my high school we didn't. We didn't throw the ball either, So I'm they showed me blocking, that's for sure, because we would go entire games and not throw the ball. But I wasn't high. Michigan wouldn't have sniffed me. I sent them a VHS tape. No return call.

00:45:13
Speaker 4: Really, And what were you wainning when you got to Iowa?

00:45:17
Speaker 1: I showed up about two hundred and thirty pounds, soaking wet.

00:45:19
Speaker 4: Okay, yeah, so there was you had a red shirt year on the horizon.

00:45:23
Speaker 1: No problem for you, for sure. It was my senior year high school. I was right at two ten, and they told me when I showed up, like, you need to put some pounds on. So before we weighed in, I drank two gallons of water. Been on that program, yes, So I was like two thirteen, just full of water.

00:45:39
Speaker 4: Yeah.

00:45:39
Speaker 1: But by Christmas my first year, I think I was two seventy five or two eighty. I got on that lifting program and that eating program. They're like, when you wake up, you drink a protein shake in the middle of the night, and if you wake up again, you drink another one.

00:45:50
Speaker 2: Dude.

00:45:51
Speaker 1: But we had that Chris Doyle program. Chris Doyle was our string coach and we had his program of putting lean mass on and it worked.

00:45:58
Speaker 4: Now as Chris Doile, the streak coat was he there for a very long time with Kirk Farence, he was there for a while.

00:46:02
Speaker 1: He was there for the first year when Kirk started. So ninety nine is when Kirk came, Chris Doyle came. That's when it all started. When I my first year and Chris had was there for fifteen plus years, eighteen years.

00:46:12
Speaker 2: Where was Dobson at at the time, James Dobson. So that's a mutual connection that we have.

00:46:17
Speaker 4: This whole thing got connected, correct.

00:46:19
Speaker 2: Yeah, Yeah, dob hit me up and I was talking to me about Robert Gallery and knowing that Dobson he started at Iowa before he came and was our head strength coach at Nebraska, So you knew about all the Doyle programming. I'm sure we were doing a lot of the stuff in Nebraska that you guys were getting into and doing because Doyle was like ahead of his time in the strength training program. But but yeah, Dobson because he had to have been young.

00:46:41
Speaker 1: Yeah, and he was assistant ninety nine. He came with Doyle and he was there my entire career until they moved on later on. He was there quite a few years. But yeah, James, James is the best. We kept in contact over the years. And yeah, he learned from that, the Doyle stuff and then put his own stuff into it. And he's just a great human being.

00:46:58
Speaker 2: That was his like authority figure vibe that young as an assistant.

00:47:04
Speaker 1: You know, you look back on it, and we were you know, obviously we were all a lot younger. You look back at pictures of Coach Ferrence in nineteen ninety nine, you're like, yeah, holy Kyle. But James, James was a young guy. We were all just trying, right, they were. They were trying to put in their program and we were bad right nineteen ninety nine, we were one to ten, you know, my red shirt year, right, So everyone's trying to bring in the toughness. But it was Coach Doyle and James like bringing in that like if you don't do it right, get out the door, right, And it was yeah, there was.

00:47:29
Speaker 4: A week out the week type of mentality for sure.

00:47:31
Speaker 1: And if you did stuff right, they loved you. Right. It was it wasn't hard for sure, but those you know, guys like me, we fed on that, you know, the Iowa guys, the people they brought in for that culture, that we fed on that stuff. And if they called you out, you're like, oh you know, oh yeah watch this, Yeah you know what I mean.

00:47:46
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, there're three California guys. They were like, I gotta go, I gotta get that. I had to get the hell out of here quickly.

00:47:53
Speaker 1: Right.

00:47:53
Speaker 4: So you're you're with fantasy read your your your first year. The next year you're.

00:47:57
Speaker 1: Starting started at tight end? Really, yes, true athlete, Yes I.

00:48:02
Speaker 2: Was tighten you you can potentially claim being a part of the group.

00:48:07
Speaker 1: For a very small time. I think I had three catches, one of which was at Nebraska. We ended up losing that game, but I did have a catch in that game. So my first year, my red shirt freshman year, started at tight end, and then four games in they came to me like, hey, we need to have a discussion, and then I moved the tackle and the rest is history.

00:48:30
Speaker 2: How did you like playing for coach Farents.

00:48:31
Speaker 1: I loved it. He's the best is I was just back. He's a guy I talked to regularly. He hasn't changed since nineteen ninety nine. He's just the most steady, genuine person you've ever met. Now you see him right, obviously, he was twenty seven years younger when we first started. But you see him now getting emotional. It's cool because I knew him twenty seven years ago when we were just trying to get a program turned around, right. He was coming in. He was a young new coach or newer coach, right head coach. And he's just the genuine human being. There's no raw rah. It's it's everything he says is meaningful and to the point and and just just genuine. It's hard to say I took my son back for training camp. You know, my son's in his office hanging out with him. It's there's no like, oh, Roberts here, we gotta fake this and make him feel included. He's like, this place is your place, and your son. Lincoln's so Lincoln's high fiving him, knocking him right, running in and out of his office. He's just a genuine, genuine human being. And you know that's why he's had so much success.

00:49:27
Speaker 4: And your son's name is Lincoln, very interesting in Nebraska, Lincoln, Nebraska.

00:49:33
Speaker 2: You didn't think that comes back.

00:49:35
Speaker 1: I did not think of that. I'm I'm a car guy, so it's actually more after Lincoln Continental.

00:49:42
Speaker 2: But now but now now he's gonna he won't be able to help. But think about it now.

00:49:46
Speaker 4: Now yeah, yeah, now from now on, Lincoln, I definitely should name you Ford.

00:49:53
Speaker 2: You for UH. Coach Faris was the first head coach I had to call and basically say that I wasn't coming to Iowa. And it was so painful, but he was incredible to me. Whenever I made that call, my parents like you have to call the schools like Iowa. I was very much like considering Ira and they recruited me hard and I had a.

00:50:11
Speaker 1: Cool You said you were considering Iowa.

00:50:12
Speaker 2: Yeah, I was considering Iowa because my brother. So, my brother was a year younger than me, and he was a very good wrestler growing up. He was like he was a senior national champion coming out of high school. So when I would go on my recruiting trips, we would take a you know, family road trip and We'd hit Missoo because Miszoo had a good wrestling program. We hit Nebraska because Nebraska had a good wrestling program. We had Iowa because I was unbelievable at wrestling, So a lot of a lot of majority of my decision. I wanted to go to a spot to where I know my brother could go and wrestle too, so we'd go to school together. So Iowa was very much in the conversation. I forget my recruiting coordinator, but had a cool relationship with coach Farence. Super awesome dude. It's cool hearing you talk about him, because he did seem very genuine, whether I got to sit and meet with him, talk to him on the phone. Doyle kind of intimidating, bald dude. Like they had the chains going on everywhere in the weight room. It just seemed like a spot where you go and get yoked. Yeah, you get after it around there. Yeah.

00:51:07
Speaker 1: Bubble.

00:51:08
Speaker 2: They just had a bubble. They didn't really have an indoor. I visited Iowa right after after Nebraska, so the difference in facility was like you walk into the bubble and it was a humid like you know, they didn't have like an indoor very well.

00:51:20
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, we were behind the times with the.

00:51:22
Speaker 2: Behind the times, like we're building a new weight room. But I had I had cool. I had a cool visit. I had a cool visit at Iowa.

00:51:28
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's great, they're both. You know. My first day, my first day at camp with the freshman coach, Doyle was holding the bag. So it was just a freshman and I'm a skinny, tight end, scared shit, let's right, just want to come in and make it. And he was holding the bag and I remember the first one I came off. My hands slid up off the bag, smacked him in the face, and my shoulder problems in high school, and my shoulder came out of the socket, and I'm like, oh God, is this for me? So he's look staring at me, right, and he was a massive man back then. He's staring at me. I just jacked him in the face and I'm trying not to cry because my shoulder came out and just had to go back to the drills. And I'll never forget that day because he looked at me and just told me to keep your hands down. I'm like, yes, sir. She was this massive, scary human being, But the greatest guy out.

00:52:11
Speaker 2: There are the is the dorm situation? Was it called the six pack?

00:52:16
Speaker 1: We didn't have that then? Okay, yeah, no, I don't know we had the dorm coach was too gritty for me.

00:52:23
Speaker 4: Some could say that, yeah, the way you talk, how I've trained with you. Yeah, I could see that.

00:52:27
Speaker 1: Ye didn't the shiny lights.

00:52:30
Speaker 2: Didn't have all the pretty stuff.

00:52:31
Speaker 1: That's all right, dude?

00:52:32
Speaker 4: Is it the Maybe the most scared anybody can be in their entire life is your freshman year when you go from high school to college and it's your first workout with the entire team, not the freshman workouts, but the first one. Like when I first got to Michigan, whichevergus is the head coach we had Mike bar West was just like world renowned head coach, and we did like this tabata type of workout where it's like three sets of twelve squad, three sets of twelve hand clean like very high reps, high volume and also high weight, and then we do like high perchase feeding. And by the time we got to the hyperchery jumping, I was like hit like a full body cramp, like dying. And after that everyone started jogging out to the field to go do our sprints and our running after that. So it was like just a hell of a day on a Monday. My bars walks up and he's got this like super rasp, like he swallowed glass voice, and he goes, welcome to Michigan. How do you leave my dick in your mouth? And then walks away. I'm thinking, I got to get the fuck out of here. There is no way I'm going to make it.

00:53:26
Speaker 1: This is not for me.

00:53:28
Speaker 4: And then you had to go shower for the first time, and then for all the boys, and you're like, do I wear underwear? Do I not wear underwear? Like it's a dude, it's a mental warfare.

00:53:36
Speaker 1: Is when you go in like I think we did, Like we were not grown men, right sky, you know. And you walk in and Colin Cole he came from Florida. He was a grown man when he showed up as a freshman, and I'm like, I gotta play against this guy. I mean, three and twenty pound yoke dude from Florida. And I remember thinking, oh my god, this is not going to work.

00:53:57
Speaker 2: Yeah, dude is yeah, we have bring it is of mind. Fuck did you walk in there. You're not developed whatsoever compared to the college the grown men that are in college. You're skinny, got a little pecker. You're walking the shower, just fear, fear, fear, who's gonna look?

00:54:11
Speaker 4: Maybe they are, maybe they aren't. You accidentally look at another guy. He's black. It's way different than yours.

00:54:16
Speaker 1: We got good story, cold tub story, but we had uh Khalil Hill. He came and just stood at the top of the cold tub and said, I'm gonna get here and get to see what it's like to be all you white boys. We were just just standing at the top of the top of the coach the helicopter. In the helicopter, I remember thinking, oh my lord, what is this.

00:54:35
Speaker 2: You're like, You're like, I'm going to keep my shorts and spandex and everything on. Yeah, terrifying. What's it like to be you guys?

00:54:43
Speaker 4: Yes, Jesus Christ, What what was the moment You're realized, Oh, the NFL is a real option for me as a player?

00:54:51
Speaker 1: You know, Honestly, I was so you know, and this sounds easy to say now, but I was so in the moment the entire my entire career. It wasn't until after my junior year. A great junior year. That's we were eleven in one season Orange Bowl before we went down to the Orange Bowl and got throttled by USC. But that's another story. But great year, right, Brad Banks is our quarterback. Our offensive line was five guys that ended up playing in the league. After that season, coach Ferns brought me in and you know, he said, hey, there's guys are going to be calling you. There's a chance you could come out early and probably be in the top ten. And honest to god, till that point, I had no idea. Really did I know I was playing well? Yes, but it was I was so in the moment till that point. I wasn't thinking about you know, I wasn't the kid that showed up in college like this is my step to the NFL. Right do you watch that stuff and be like I want to play in the league for sure? But it wasn't on my mind. I was just worried about getting better and better. And it wasn't until my junior year when coach brought me in. He's like, you know, it's your choice. You know, could probably be a top ten pick. And I was remember thinking like really. You know, it sounds dumb or ignorant, but I really I really hadn't thought about it because it was just enjoying the process of what we had been doing to that point.

00:55:57
Speaker 2: And too, it's like it's early two thousands now, like you got all this social media and everything going on like you do now to where everybody knows absolutely everything for sure.

00:56:04
Speaker 1: Yeah, we had dial up internet, I remember. I remember.

00:56:06
Speaker 2: Yeah, now there's combines for eighth graders, right, exactly.

00:56:08
Speaker 4: Getting combined as nuts.

00:56:10
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah it is.

00:56:12
Speaker 4: Well, so what did you end up leaving earlier? Did you end up staying first?

00:56:15
Speaker 1: I stayed. Yeah. It was one of those things. I'm like, oh, I don't you know, I want to get my degree. You know, I was the old school Iowa farm kid. My parents told me go to school and get your degree. Yeah, so I wanted to get my degree. And I said, well, can I get I'm gonna I'm going to get better, right because I didn't think I was that good yet, right, And coach said, yeah, I see you being better. I see you'd be able to be a you know, a top one or two pick, right, Like that's what we shoot for for you. And so I was like, great, like them, I'm here, Sandy.

00:56:40
Speaker 2: Yeah, how do you feel like that infiltrated your brain? Like your ego?

00:56:44
Speaker 1: I mean it was.

00:56:45
Speaker 2: It was because you going from not being like not you were aware that you're good, but being that good or seen from NFL scouts as like oh if I had left, I could be a top ten pick. Now you know it. Coach is also saying like, I think you could be one or two if you stay another you can get this much better here, here, and here. How does that affect you going into your senior year?

00:57:05
Speaker 1: I mean it was tough. It was. That was the point where I kind of switched to to. Up to that point, it was just having fun. Right my first few years, you're getting your ass kicked, right, you're just trying to make it. First day, I first day they moved me to tackle. I'm going against Fred Wakefield versus Illinois, who's a senior and a beast All American. Just hoping to not give up a sack. To my junior year. We're dominating, but it's just fun. So that started that senior year was when it was like, oh, there is expectation, Oh I am pretty good, and that's kind of when it crept in, it's like I need to be perfect, Like, oh, I'm that guy. So you know I could have sixty nine of seventy plays on film. Now I can say it. Back then I would never, but now I can say it that I, you know, dominated those sixty nine plays and had one bad one and it would ruin it for me. I'm like, I'm supposed to be I'm supposed to be the guy that's perfect, and it's so unrealistic, but that's how my mind thought, right.

00:57:51
Speaker 2: You're probably like I want to be the greatest to ever do it.

00:57:54
Speaker 1: Well, it was that was just my mindset, like like we all right, you just grind and grind and grind. It's like that's great, Like this, oh I achieved this great moved to the next thing, right, You never really thought about that because it's like, okay, well that's great, big deal next.

00:58:07
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:58:08
Speaker 1: Yeah, And so I mean it was still fun, but it was definitely more, you know, more pressure. I thought about it more. It's like, you know, in a game, to where something would happen, my hands will be wide, Oh he got me. Whatever next plan will go killing to where something would happen. It would ruin the rest of the game, I'd be stealing. I don't know that can't happen to me like this.

00:58:28
Speaker 2: Yeah, the rest of the week when you're watching films, like even for me, like when I was seeing like be where I could potentially be a late round pick, like before the season and everything else, and agents are trying to talk to you, like it infiltrates your mind. Like we were in the locker room last week and Clay was kind of like, I bet you were the man at Nebraska, and like, how were you in Nebraska. I'm just thinking, like my senior year kind of feels like a blur because I feel like I didn't enjoyed in a way like I look back, I'm proud of how I went about everything, but enjoyed in such a way to where I felt like the man or was having all this fun. Like I just felt like I wanted to be drafted so badly to where any bad plays it would like ruin your damn weekend.

00:59:07
Speaker 1: Absolutely. Scott Pioli was a GM at New England at the time, very close friends with coach parents, and he had visited that week and I kind of, you know, lost it, but I was talking to him about it, like, oh, I got him, you know this, I messed this one play up. And I remember him leaving me his business card at my locker and on the back he wrote, lighting up Francis right, because he was talking to me about like, dude, relaxed this, it's fun, like you're playing great, Just go out and do what you've been doing the last couple of years. But I was so intent on everything has to be perfect because now I want to be this right when they threw that out there, oh you could be you know, you could have been top ten, you could be at the top of the draft. So now that that's a new goal and anything that affected it would affect me for days and weeks. But it was still fun and was still able to you know. I was the level of competition too. I was still playing very well, But it was just the mental part of it.

00:59:57
Speaker 4: Yeah, the mental park definitely as soon as expectations get put on you, because when you get to college, it's like, how do I just put myself in a starting role or a contributor at the very least, And you do that, it's like, how awesome is this? And I'm wearing a uniform in college and playing and then to slowly but sure like their expectation. After expectation, you continue to move the goalpost for yourself, but it ended up working out. You go second overall to the to the Raiders. What is like in the early two thousands, what is the draft process like for you? Like combines? Is it still in Indianapolis?

01:00:23
Speaker 1: Yep, still an Indie. So go to the combine, you know the typical and it.

01:00:27
Speaker 4: Was sounds like you went nuts based on your high school athleticism.

01:00:31
Speaker 1: Yeah, I did. I did well. You know the one thing that is true, Yeah, the one I ran very well. I want to say it was sub five electronic. I think four eight nine handheld was what they had me. And so I ran well, jumped heavy?

01:00:43
Speaker 2: Are you at this point?

01:00:45
Speaker 1: I weighed in at three twenty.

01:00:47
Speaker 4: Unit, almost one hundred pounds more than the first day you walked in Aisle?

01:00:50
Speaker 1: Exactly? Did the I remember, I won't forget the bench press, so did the bench press and in the I don't remember what team he was with at the time, but he had a big ego and he said I was bouncing right because they I was a fast bencher, like as fast as I can. I'm like, I'm gonna go in there and put up you know, this many thirty some as fast as I can. Well, he didn't count a bunch of them, and he's like, nope, because I was going too fast, so you got a pause. So I remember coming out, right, So I've tuck to the media right after that, and I'm pissed off because he counted twenty six, right, so that was not the standard. I think I did thirty four, but he didn't count eight of them, so I'm pissed off about that, right, So that was the whole combine. I remember stewing on that the rest of the entire combine, trying to do interviews and meet with gms, and all I can think about it is like, this motherfucker didn't count these many reps in my bench press.

01:01:38
Speaker 4: So I think four sounds way better than twenty six.

01:01:41
Speaker 1: Well sure, yeah, yeah, I'll be hot too tight. Yeah. No, So it was you know, combine. It was. It was great. It was you know, not what it is now. Obviously there wasn't all the cameras, so that was great because you know, you just go in there and you did your stuff. When we got out of there, and I ended up showing that that guy in the bench press when we I redid it at Iowa. There, it's a good story behind coach Doyle coaching on that one. Yeah, they came to Iowa. So we have our pro day and he's like, all right, we'll show them. We're gonna do thirty two and then you're gonna stop and rack it. So scouts come in. I come in. They set it up. Had one bench with you know, forty five on each plate, aro on each side. Next rack had two forty fives, next had three, and next had four. So I sat down with the one and did a bunch of reps. Moved to the next bench, did a bunch of reps. Now I've got three plates on each side, two a few reps, four plates on each side. Knocked out like three of them. Then went and sat down and did my my test and did stopped every I mean arrogant, but stopped every single time. Stopped one thousand and one, did thirty two of those, racked it and walked out the door just a big They're watching me warm up, and like you know, when I sat down at the bench with four forty five's on the side there, I can remember them looking what is this kid doing. Doyle was like, we got a plan, just do it, sat down, knocked out a couple of those, did my reps, and walked out the door.

01:03:03
Speaker 4: I love that, dude. Oh this is uh the RAS score. RAS is relative athletics score. And you're at perfect ten.

01:03:10
Speaker 1: Interesting, I've never seen that.

01:03:11
Speaker 2: There you go.

01:03:12
Speaker 4: If that's a little ego booster for your right here. Can't get better than ten, brother, can't get better than ten.

01:03:16
Speaker 2: And you got you got to give sub five out of your language.

01:03:19
Speaker 1: That's a that's a four nine perfect.

01:03:22
Speaker 7: Yeah.

01:03:22
Speaker 2: Yeah, you ran a four nine. Yeah, that's a four nine.

01:03:24
Speaker 4: Yeah. Sub five doesn't sound as good.

01:03:26
Speaker 2: Short shuttle four eight three, that's quick.

01:03:30
Speaker 1: We had we had some good teaching coach Doyle and Dobson. Yeah, oh yeah, those guys knew how to teach that. And the you know, the athletic ability helped. But those guys were great teachers, man. I owe the credit to them.

01:03:40
Speaker 4: What is this stuff we would do, Adopson, where the pushing and the pulling of the sleds? What was it called gpp GP. Did you guys do gpp at Iowa?

01:03:46
Speaker 1: Huh?

01:03:46
Speaker 2: All right, I'm sure they did some version of it at Iowa. Again, like sitting down in the whole recruiting process, like my dad was a sick o working out growing up, like the Franco training and different things, so I kind of understood some West Side bar bell and a lot of those variations in concepts of training. And everybody was super high on Doyle. So getting to sit down and listen to Doyle speak and then getting the train with Dobson throughout my career in Nebraska, like it did feel like they were you guys, I will I remember all my visit, you were the only school that had the tendo units happening at that point. And so obviously Dobson Nebraska, we're getting those tendo units to kind of measure your speed, power velocity. So very much like ahead of like I stayed, I wasn't a combined guy, but just staying and training with coach Dobson throughout to get ready for Pro Day and everything else, Like, yeah, they are very good teachers. You never run the forty. You're always doing like tens and twenties, and you never cap out to where you know you're like I have no clue what I'm going to run, But yeah, I enjoyed. I enjoy training with Dobson during that during that time getting ready for the for the pro day.

01:04:49
Speaker 1: Oh, they were ahead of their time. You know. Yeah, they're way ahead of their time. Well, here we go.

01:04:55
Speaker 2: Is this a real thing or is this AI? Hold on a second?

01:04:58
Speaker 4: Four six two you lie?

01:05:00
Speaker 2: People have different versions. We can call Dopson right now and he said four five four five six electronic.

01:05:08
Speaker 5: Electronic doesn't mean your phone is this?

01:05:11
Speaker 1: Oh perfect? Ten? I see you here, he said.

01:05:15
Speaker 2: Oh, and it's not even a team for Tailor, it's Pro Bowl.

01:05:21
Speaker 4: Yeah, dude. When I went to the combine, I was like, this is I'm going to excel in this. It was definitely my my world.

01:05:29
Speaker 2: Uh, just the the short speed, the short shuttle, like four four nine is great, Like four four nine is awesome for a left tackle of your size. Yeah, you just knowing you hit you're in the four threes like that is incredible.

01:05:43
Speaker 4: Dude, the short shuttle. It's funny that Will brings it up because Will in twenty eighteen when Will came to the Titans, we worked out with Dobs in the summertime, so we would run together, we do these GPP things. We would do this French eccentric work that Rex would always put us on. But whenever we would do the short shuttle will beat me like edge me out by like this much barely get me, we would always me, hey, you must be pretty fast, I'm pretty good at that. It was always wils like go to daniel A caring from me like you're pretty QUI because I'm really good at these.

01:06:14
Speaker 1: It was cheating, and back then it was cheating. Kevin Casper broke some all time records at the combine, but it was almost cheating because there was a certain the first step was a certain way.

01:06:23
Speaker 2: There was a two step those first five yards.

01:06:25
Speaker 1: And it was it was cheating. Even the three the way you.

01:06:28
Speaker 2: Jump around that that the tip of the yl, the way you like jump around and get around. And there are some like certain skills that if you just sit there and practice it and can perfect it, it's you get shaved so much off of your time.

01:06:41
Speaker 4: Yeah, after I read my forty of the combine, I don't think I cared about anything else. Like we jumped, we did broad jump, vertical jump, and then it was forty and the way they set it up was there was like the I was o l twenty three, so I was number twenty three, and then the first group was one through twenty two. So I was the first one to go and run the forty in my group, and I was I was shitting myself. I was so nervous. But once I ran, I knew I ran under four nine, I was like, fuck, the rest of this can kick rocks. Right. Well, I remember doing the l don't we're doing the short shuttle and you spend so much time, like you right the five ten five, it's like two three, Yeah, through like two steps and then you try to get to the other side on three. But yeah, as soon as I ran the forty, I was like, nothing else matters anymore. That's all I really wanted.

01:07:24
Speaker 1: Yeah, that would come mine up so much too, right, Like, you get to that point.

01:07:27
Speaker 4: Everything to you talk about the expectation like you're so like all that matters is the combine, and once combin's over, you're.

01:07:33
Speaker 1: Like tweak, tweak to hamstring, like two weeks before right now, Yeah, this is the biggest job in review my life.

01:07:39
Speaker 2: Right.

01:07:40
Speaker 1: Doyle's like relax, you know, Toyo and James like you'll be fine, Like just we'll get you out there. But same thing. I got through that felt great, and I'm like the rest of this is, I'm good the same thing and knew knew it was good. I looked up somebody gave me the thumbs up. I'm like, I'm great. Yeah, yeah, move, I know I did fine, it's all yeah.

01:07:55
Speaker 4: But you were at you were in Oakland for actually before we even get into Oakland, the drafting thing that you're there for Kirk Farance, and it's like beginning part of his career that's obviously lasted as long as it has. Do you have any like great Kirk Farens stories that maybe no one really knows the early days.

01:08:11
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think they were just right. They were trying to figure out who they were. But I had a line coach and Joe Filben. So when I got to college in high school, my mom would cut my hair high and tight, right haircut. Every week. Mom would fade it up. She did a real nice job on a fade. But get to college, right, poor, Yes, I'm on scholarship, but I got no money. We're living in the dorms, got nothing. So I started growing my hair out all right, So the hair is getting long, and my line coach kept telling me every day had come in the office, he cut your fucking hair. Cut your fucking hair. So I one day I finally was like, man, you know, I'm a young kid, right, still obviously a new player. Go knock on Coach Farence's office. I'm nervous as hell. I'm like, hey, coach. He's like yeah, it's like coach Philbin keeps telling me to cut my hair, Like do you care? Do you want me to cut my hair?

01:08:53
Speaker 2: Right?

01:08:54
Speaker 1: Just a scared little kid. Yeah, and he goes come in here, walks in and he shuts the door. He goes, I'll get shit, what your hair looks like. I just want you to play good football. Let's copy that, coach. And so from that point on. But no, he was just he's the same guy the speeches you see now, he was the same just go to work. It was him and Doyle and Dopts. It was just like you go to work, do things right, and you know they love you, right. That's It's just that's the culture there. So he wasn't. He's not a big flashy guy. He's not jumping up on the surfing the team. He's he is who he is, and I think that's what everybody loved about him back then, and now you see it, and that's what you really love about the guy. He is just a genuine just the same guy, doesn't change for anybody. Right, he's not buying into the new hype and all this stuff. It's just the coach Farren say that we knew. So that's that's probably you know, it's typical of him, very not a big flashy story, but it was you know, that's just who he was. Just like, I don't care about that. Let's play football.

01:09:51
Speaker 4: Being consistent for a quarter century, it is pretty incredible.

01:09:54
Speaker 2: Any like initiation stories with the O line room or as you being to a young cat, no, and what line were you where you were like, hey, let's get him uncomfortable like we'd have we'd have old lineman like when we were fresh, when they come up and put their leg up on the bench, they be button naked, just try to make you feel very uncomfortable.

01:10:13
Speaker 1: Well, we do a little bit of that right stand close in the cold tubs. Some of the you know, walk into walk into the meeting rooms and you know, you graze up against a guy or a new young guy. That's kind kind of kind of weirded out, but it was you know, I wasn't a I wasn't big into that. It wasn't a bunch of talking. It was more the hey, we come in and go to work, right. I'd tell the stories these kids, you know kids as I was older, they were younger. You know, I'm sorry, I'm this or I'm I'm tired and I'm not doing it. So I told the story when I was Again, when I was a freshman, we were learning to do uh cleans, overhead cleans, right, so I do one. Well, I came too close to my head and I caught my forehead with the bar on the way up. Still did the clean while I can just feel blood running down my face. So I gash my head open, and Doyle and Dobson are looking at me, and I'm just like put it down, and I kept going and like you all right, and I'm like wiping all the I mean, he's running.

01:11:04
Speaker 4: Down my field like the most badass ever, right.

01:11:06
Speaker 1: And they're like, go get that checked out. So I tell the story to the to younger guys like, hey, we don't give a ship what you do, but you know, right, something like this happens. I'm this tough. This is what happened, and I kept going, well, when did you fix it? Well after the workout. You know, It's just stuff like that to make him feel like, oh, you're not You're not as tough as you think you are.

01:11:26
Speaker 4: Just then, yeah, you want to be tough. This is how tough.

01:11:32
Speaker 2: Just head butts the wall starts bleeding.

01:11:33
Speaker 4: Yeah, And so you go second overall to the writers. Correct who who had the first pick that year?

01:11:38
Speaker 1: It was Eli? What was the the whole Eli? Philip Rivers swap right.

01:11:45
Speaker 4: So you're sitting there in the background going, I know I'm not going number one. Let me just sit back and hit this too, no problem.

01:11:50
Speaker 1: Right, and leaning up to it right. It was just you know, Eli's Eli's saying pre draft right where in New York? Ended up going to New York? You know, I'm you know, I'm probably not going to go there, and I'm like, you know, I'm the smart asking back, like, shit, I'll go number one. I don't give a shit, right, you know you don't want to go there, I'll go there, right, you know, not knowing where I would end up thinking more four or five, But it was you know, that was that was great because that took a lot of the media attention. Right, I'm a small kid from you know, small town Iowa. Went to New York for the experience. Took my family. We were a fish out of water, right, We my family did not belong in New York. It was a fun experience, but we were just you know, all that took away the you know, took all the media attention. So that was great.

01:12:28
Speaker 2: That's awesome when you're going when you're going into Oakland to that franchise and you're coming from Iowa where you had a lot of success. What was your first years of experience like in a place like Oakland Cluse, you guys were pretty bad, Like the Oakland Raiders were pretty bad. It was very much the entire time you were there.

01:12:44
Speaker 1: Yeah, it was you know going in I'm sure like for you guys, the first year was just for me. It was just the joy of playing football and getting paid for it. I mean, it didn't matter. We were four and twelve. I believe my first year didn't matter what the record was. I remember walking out in Denver. It's nuking snow, right and I'm gonna cut off t shirt and it's Newke and snow. I just remember thinking, I get paid to do this. Right. That was kind of the first year for me, like holy cow, like we the the wins and losses didn't affect me as much. It was just like holy shit, like I made it to here. I get a paycheck, I get to come do this every day. But you know, as time went on, like you guys know, you know that the wins and losses count, you know, and they matter, you know, and and it messes with you. But yeah, we have we had a ton of turnover, right we talked. I had five head coaches in seven years when I was there. Uh So that part of it. It was tough because every year you start over, like every team does every year, right, you guys talk about it on your show. Well we're shooting for big things this year, right right, and every year get you know, you got to buy into that, Well, coach has gone up up, Let's learn a new offense, let's learn a new system. So it was it was fun to be a part of that organization and you learn, you know, you only know what you know, right, you know how it was done there. Uh So it met a bunch of great guys and you know, there's some great memories, but you do it to win, right, and it's just unfortunately there wasn't a lot of much at all winning. You know during my career.

01:14:06
Speaker 2: There when you're a second overall pick and you're starting to stack like as a team bad years. Given everything that is known about Robert Gallery, when are certain moments of pressure starting to affect you differently, whether it was expectation living up to be in a second overall pick, when was that starting to take place for you as you look back on your career, you.

01:14:27
Speaker 1: Know, I think going into my third year, So third year, new head coach. Right, they brought back Artshelle out of retirement from twenty some years. Right, So we have our offensive.

01:14:35
Speaker 2: Coordinator coach, he was retired for twenty years.

01:14:38
Speaker 1: Yeah, you didn't coached, I think it was for almost twenty years.

01:14:41
Speaker 4: Our classical Davis.

01:14:44
Speaker 2: Glass. We're working. We're going to fire the second head coach. This is the guy. Yeah.

01:14:48
Speaker 4: Sometimes to go forward, you have to go backwards.

01:14:50
Speaker 1: Yeah, and then you know, so it is you know, it is what it is. Right, Our offensive coordinator was running a bed and breakfast in Idaho, I think, right, So I think that was the year that it was like, oh man, right, and it was you know, it was tough, right, So we're we're putting stuff in and I think that was year I didn't play well. That year, you know had you know, Jackie Slater came in as a as a line coach, and Jackie is one of the best players to ever play, right, but he had a certain way and it was one of those to where you're going to do it this way. I tried to do that way. It didn't work, and I did not play well, you know, it was injured, did not play well. So I think that was the year it was like, you know, so then that's media is coming on and that's part of it. I mean, you want to do well, but it was you know, I'll admit I struggled that year, right, trying to do the straight sets back and the thing I'd never done and what I got successful at. So at that point it was, yeah, it's tough, right, and there you know, we're one and I think we're two and fourteen. That year, you know, it was just bad, right, So you know you're adding a year after year and and as you guys know, right, there's you know, the new guy comes in, they're supposed to you know, save the franchise or you know, that's the expectation, right, the unrealistic expectation. And then when you're not playing well, when stuff goes bad, it goes bad. Right as a team, right, we all looked That's that's what was great at Iowa. When we were doing good, I look so good because I had four other dogs next to me on the line, right, and we were just that good that it made Robert Gallery look that much better. Right. So when you're you get in those other situations, yeah, it's tough, and you want to win, right, and you don't want to year after year be starting over. So some of the expectation stuff. And then you know media, you know, now you got NFL Network and all this stuff, and it's like now it's in your face, right, And now you're around NFL fans and they're great, love NFL fans, right, but they're also seasons going bad. They're leaving a note down your door telling you to get out of town. And it's like, oh, this is this is a little different deal.

01:16:31
Speaker 4: Yeah. And when you met your wife at Iowa, she played basketball there, she comes with you to Oakland, I'm assuming yep, how is she handling this pressure with you? As like you get in this third year, you're starting to think, am I going to get another contract? Like the excitement of getting paid in the league is kind of like now dwindled down. This is part of what you do now. It's like I need to exceed this type of expectation I have in my own head to get this new contract because that's the new standard I have of myself. People are leaving notes like how is your wife and you handling this as a couple in Oakland when you guys both from Iowa.

01:17:00
Speaker 1: I think it was just we favre as part of the gig right, it's a you know, we get it right. Losing winning helps everything right for an organization, for a person. But yeah, where there are tough times and you know, nobody in that organization was happy those year in and year out, right, So it was you know, we we dealt with it, you know, like everybody else. Right, it was just back to work. I didn't try and put too much thought into it, like, but like we do, we get on something and you're you know what bothers you because you want to be successful, you want your team to be successful. You want to write, and I just kept going deeper.

01:17:29
Speaker 2: You know.

01:17:29
Speaker 1: After the third year, I went back and trained with with Doyle and Dobson. I went i with City and lived at my buddy's house and trained with the with those guys two days, two times a day, and just kind of going back to the you know, the things that made me successful. And you know, and then the next year Tom Cable comes in and you know, great coach and an you know, things get back. We're doing better as a team. You know, he's my style of play. So you just I don't know, you don't really dwell on it. You don't have time to think about it. You just do what always made you successful, and that's just go back to work.

01:17:59
Speaker 2: Well. At what point in your career was it was the image starting to shift from he's going to be our savior, drafting him second overall to where the noise of bust and he's not playing well. Is that popping up going into the third year like when you were like when you're like when you're explaining that, you know, people are leaving notes on your door or now it's in your face, like what are the moments that you're thinking about to where you felt like the shift was now starting to come, like I have to fucking play better. This pressure, this expectation started to come with all this. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:18:30
Speaker 1: It was probably that third year, right because it was bad. I mean it was offensively, it was terrible for everyone, you know, as a team. So after that that year, I think some of that was right, you get you know now NFL networks and I only remember the guy. I don't even know where the guy is now or but Jamie Dukes was on there. I guys probably don't remember him.

01:18:47
Speaker 2: Yeah, I recognize the name of.

01:18:48
Speaker 1: So he was on NFL Network and that's the first time I saw it. Happened to be watching NFL Network and he's you know, we're one in eight at this time, and you know, he he came on and you know, was bad mouthing us, and it's like, oh, that's like he's talking about me. Yeah, you know, so it was you know, after that year.

01:19:05
Speaker 2: But then you know, in the moment, I if like if stuff's like written in it's like at me, I know, as a as a player, and you're singing for the first time, like you're enraged, right, Like I would be like I'm just thinking these well in the.

01:19:20
Speaker 4: World we grew up in too, It's like we have the social media was in full force. So like, you go after a game and you make the mistake of putting your name in the search bar and you see all the comments. Man, you see maybe you have a good game. You see seven comments are like this guy had a good game. You're like, that's kind of nice. But then you see two or three it's like this guy sucks, he got beat on this plane, and you're like, dude, they're right, Like there's a piece of you that like agrees with them.

01:19:42
Speaker 2: Before whatever. We're thinking, like, I wonder if my coaches secretly feel this way, because that's really like, ultimately, you're you're wanting to please your teammates, you want to please your coaching staff because you know how much work you put into it, and just that little bit of the outside noise now would now have me thinking, I wonder if my coaches, Like I wonder if these conversations are being had and the coaches rooms and they're just you know, you know it's not coming out to me in front of me, but you just start playing these weird, these terrible assumption games, right, it just starts infiltrating your mind, dude.

01:20:11
Speaker 4: We had a it was twenty eighteen. I just got off a suspension. Was it twenty eighteen?

01:20:15
Speaker 2: I was spending?

01:20:16
Speaker 4: Yeah, twenty nineteen. I got off suspension and we played the Bills and we ended up losing that game. It was like a field goal game, like twelve to nine. They end up beating us. After the game, our head coach, Mike Rabel, his notes were like somehow publicly brought to everyone's iPad so you could see the notes that Rabel put on the players. And the first play of the game, we ran like this play action pass. We throw a ball down the field fifteen twenty yards, I run down, hit a guy late in the pile. I get a penalty, brings us back. And the note Rabel had was why are we paying him this much? And I remember seeing that note just being like, that's I want to kill myself right now. It was the word because you're already suspended, you're coming back, and it's like the worst feeling. So it brings up all those like do the coaches really feel this way?

01:21:01
Speaker 2: Yeah?

01:21:01
Speaker 1: And you're just like, man, yeah, the good or they're bad because it's funny. And then that's when you learn about like mental health. Right, you didn't think of it back then, but it was like you read that stuff or you hear then you are start doubting yourself and you press harder. But then you know after you know, coach k Able came in, ran the system that I was used to, Like we had a lot of success, moved to guard was playing really well. You're six five and six, six and seven right and after the season and he's like, oh, you know, if we would have won more games, you would have made the Pro Bowl. Well that's great, thanks, but you know, it's it's the same thing. It's like, oh, oh great, so you know, people recognize I'm playing real well, but we were four and twelve, right, so did you take this? It was a double sided compliment. It was like, oh, that's awesome. Then it's like, well that sucks right because we didn't you know, because we didn't win games. Like so you know, you're playing at a high level, but it's like, eh, but it doesn't really count, you know what I mean. Like the mental warfare of all that stuff, and.

01:21:52
Speaker 4: You had so many different personalities, like obviously the owner has his own unique personality. Jerry Rice your rookie year, JaMarcus Russell. I think Lane came and was your coach at one point. It had to be very unique walking in this locker room and seeing all these different characters, Like what was JaMarcus Russell.

01:22:07
Speaker 2: Likes you and you said that. I'm like, oh shit, you played with JaMarcus Russell.

01:22:11
Speaker 4: That's the classic. They give him a playbook, right with like a one hundred dollars bill at the end of the playbook and he like never opened it up or something like that.

01:22:17
Speaker 2: Yeah, something like that.

01:22:20
Speaker 1: Game of Blank. Yeah, yeah, the story is a game of blank disc to film. Yeah, it was, you know part of it. You you know, I have compassion now for a young kid coming is anointed the you know, coming out of college. He's anointed the guy, right and not everyone. Again, this is where we're old now, or I'm old because I think of it compassionately about I had a great family and a great you know, my mindset coming in. I knew certain things where you see certain kids coming now, right, and it's they don't have maybe the mindset you do, or the upbringing or I'm not saying JaMarcus had a bad upbringing. I'm just saying his life experiences. So he's comes in, he's anointed this guy, right, driving a Rose Royce and write all stuff I would not do. It was it was all the thing of making it to the NFL, and it was you know, it was obviously a tough go. We had a we had a lot of personalities come through there, right, you know, we had you know, uh J Warne Sap played with Warren Sap. Right, Warren was there at the end of his career. Just You're walking into this locker room and it's like, man, weird different people, which is cool, which is cool for you know, NFL locker rooms. Yeah, but it's also so Warren and I got along well. Warren was great. Warren was not afraid to voice his opinion good or bad to somebody. But you know, I'm still a young guy. I think my favorite guy of all time was Ted Washington, so big. Ted was there my rookie year and Ted was the I don't know how Ted is now. Ted was the biggest human being I've ever seen. Right, puts his hand down at dtackle first OTAs and he looks at me and he goes, don't fucking touch me, or I'll kill you. So I'm a rookie and I'm like, I gotta go. So I'm back and forth, like what am I going to do here? But I remember seeing his hand look like a bear Paul, right, he put it down in the ground. So same thing right, high school to college, college to the pros. And I'm like, how am I supposed to block this human being? And he just told me he's going to kill me if I touch him. So I block him and he grabbed me and he's like, I told you, don't touch me. Right. But Ted was the greatest guy in the world. He was just his personality, you know, Tyrone Wheatley, Right, Tyrone was you know, blocked for him, so that some of these guys when I was, especially a young guy, you they were just that stuff I'll never forget. And the guys that I looked up doing this is just a badass. Right. Tyrone would tell me get out of my way. I'm going to run through the middle of your spine and he would, right, he would not cut around you, he would he would come right through you. But those those experiences in the locker room that made it fun because coming from a small town in Iowa, right, we had you know, experience and diversity at Iowa, but you know, coming from where I came from, I go to Oakland and it's just a different, different deal, you know. I remember my rookie year had an old hootie had a Ford or Buhicle saber that I drove in college. So I took it with me. Right, and I'm at a gay station off on ninety eighth Street getting gas because it's cheap, right, And I'm pumping gas and one of the guys on the team, the black guy, stopped and he's like, what are you doing here? I'm getting gas. I gotta work out. He goes look around, buddy, like you're the only white guy here, like you should not be getting gas here and right, So it's like this big world for me. It's like, oh copy right. Yeah he was dead serious, right, but it was like, oh, looking out for you. I guess I'm not anyway anymore. Right, So it's funny there's experiences like that, and then like that bond that I created with him, He's like, I got you, Like there's certain parts you you know, you don't go here, you don't drive through right for whatever reason. Right, this is this is not where you grow up. Those relationships in the locker room were awesome.

01:25:41
Speaker 4: You uh sot, Like, at what point in when you're in the league are you starting to deal with some of these like mental things you talked about the shoulder early in your career that comes out your first day at IOWA, Like you have these injuries ailments that essentially like coaches just like playing football, Like they're gonna give you the meadroll dose pack. They're gonna be the pain pills, like we need you to play. So here's the band aids over and over again. And obviously a big reason why you're here is a lot of the mental health stuff and all the things you have had to go through. What at what point in your career did you start to feel these things taking a toll on your body and mind?

01:26:13
Speaker 1: Yeah? I think you know two three years in it started. I started having some injuries, right, Like I was a warrior in college. You never missed anything, never missed a game, never missed practice. Right when I went to the combine and gave my medical sheet, there was nothing in there because I never missed anything.

01:26:24
Speaker 2: Right.

01:26:25
Speaker 1: Yeah, I had injuries. I broke my hand, but I didn't miss stuff, right, so like everybody else, you your body breaks down or you have an injury, I had a surge start having surgeries, right, so that stuff's wearing on your on you mentally, right, you know, I'm three four, five sixty seven surgeries in some of them big ones, some of them little ones. And then as you know, year four and five, as you know, I was like you right, like I love the dirty part of the game within the rules, but the dirty part the late cleaning up piles, the chop blocks, to all the stuff to slow a guy down from how he was going to play. And so as these things are happening, right, you're getting them off the ground after trying to cut someone and you catch them on the side of the knee and you're like, oh, you know, staggering drunk getting back to the to the line because you're you know, you got your bell rung.

01:27:09
Speaker 4: Someone notices it. You're like, that's a shoulder. Yeah, you always got there's always your guy in the corner that has your back for sure. If you get your bell run a little bit.

01:27:15
Speaker 1: Yeah. And so as those things started having more lasting effects, that's when I noticed, especially you know, you're six seven eight, that's especially in year eight, I'm like, well, you know, got my bell rung right? And I didn't have a clue what was going on, right, and I did. I had a knee injury earlier that year, the ego right, So I knee injury, missed a game and I come off and they're like, you know, that's when they started taking the helmets or you know, if they took your helmet, you're out. And I remember stagging off like it's my knee. It's my knee, right because I missed a game well for at MCL and he's arguing with me. I'm like, it's my fucking knee right, like I'm fine, and and so that went back in and it just wasn't all there. So those those times to where then you get home and you're dizzy and you know, the brain fog and all the things. You know, it was part of the game, you know, That's that's what I thought it was. It was part of it, and it was I was. I was a guy like like you, like you that was not coming out. A lot had to happen for me to come out of the game, right, like major injury to where there's physically you can't go.

01:28:11
Speaker 2: Yes, your Lineman from Iowa.

01:28:14
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's what made you successful.

01:28:15
Speaker 2: And the long hair got the cut off tea like absolutely in the middle of the winter. Yeah yeah, yeah.

01:28:22
Speaker 1: So as the as the years one on, I noticed that stuff and then like everybody else, right, like you're trying to make it to the next week. You know your your eight, I'm you know, you're doing what you got to do to make it to the next week, right, the turtle shot, you know, I tell everyone without tortle shots, I couldn't kept playing. I don't know if you guys could get the shot, but they were. They were towards the end of my career, were trying to make it so you couldn't get the shot. You had to take the pill. Pill.

01:28:45
Speaker 4: Pill didn't work, and they would say the pill works faster than the shot. That there's no way.

01:28:50
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know there was.

01:28:51
Speaker 2: Once you get that shot too, you just feel like you've you know, life change went back in time.

01:28:55
Speaker 1: Oh, absolutely right, And so that was just to me, it was just part of it. But is the you know six seven eight. I noticed that stuff, and then then I noticed other things, right, the not only the injuries and the surgeries, right, you're going into you know, surgery seven, right, whether it's a you know, ankle scope, elbow scope, or having my back fused. Right, I had some major major injuries and major surgeries.

01:29:16
Speaker 4: Is it backfusion the biggest one.

01:29:19
Speaker 1: Yes, yep, So that was you know, you're six, you know, came back, but yeah, you you know, they pull your back open, they put rods and stuff in there, and but yeah, you just rehab and get back to work. That was part of it. But coming out of those surgeries, I don't want to do this anymore. Right, You're going for a scope and they're going to put you under, and you're just like, I just don't let me wake up, right, because the it just wears on you. You're not tough. It's like, you know, it's like a hangover, right, you know, you can't handle the hangover as much. So you know, as time went on, it was that. And then I then I noticed it. You know, after games, I'd get in the car and my wife would say something, I'd lose it, right, and so I'm just thinking, this is just me, right, I care about our team, I care about success. Right. To me, it was like you win, you're lose. It's black and white, right, And that was how my mood was so good or bad. I never was able to handle the losing very well because it meant a lot, right Like you guys, there's stuff meant a lot like you don't you know, the paycheck's great, but the winning is why we do this. So I noticed things with that where my trigger getting, you know, snapping right for no reason, or she said something and now I'm dealing with kids. You know, my daughter's at home and something happens, or and I just noticed a switch goes off to where things go kind of dark. So that's that's when I kind of started noticing that stuff, but never really dealt with it till after I retired.

01:30:33
Speaker 2: Now, when you're trying to deal with it, what are things that you're doing that nobody else is seeing to where you're trying to mask some of whether it's pain like you were you getting in the pain pills heavy, like were you drinking? Like things that your wife might not have been seeing at the time, until when you look back and kind of check yourself, you're like, man, I was really kind off the rails and nobody understood it.

01:30:53
Speaker 1: Now she knew what was going on in what I was doing. You know, I feel like I did it with within the mind. Yeah, but painkillers, you know, the sleeping pills didn't work to go to sleep, so then you're taking percoset instead.

01:31:04
Speaker 2: Right.

01:31:04
Speaker 1: It was just anything to like, I need to sleep, right, I get done with a game my body. Here's sleeping pill doesn't work. So thirty beers and three percoset, four percoset, this is going to make me go to sleep. Right, So yeah, you know, you know that was the coping right, like, and it wasn't an everyday thing, but it was like, you guys, I'm sure I was in extremes, right, No matter what I was doing is extreme. So if I'm gonna sit on drink, I'm gonna drink ten twenty beers like that's that's what we do, right as fast as you can, not not trying to not knowing it, but it's like drinking cups of water. Right. And so then it was the same with the whatever you can do to feel better. And so she noticed things and it was, you know, more surgery. So then it's taking painkillers and you know, trying to get them to work better. So you have a couple of drinks. Nothing that I was hiding but definitely it was abusive, right, and it wasn't the right way to deal with them. But also, you know, you had to do what you had to do to get to the next game to be able to play, you know, I mean that was my mindset, and right, you know, I do it all over again.

01:32:04
Speaker 4: There's so many different ways you can justify it too. When you're like trying to get to the next game, Like you're taking care of your family at this point. I'm assuming you have kids, like you want to. This person is asking for this type of help, and you're like, I have to help all these people around me, and if I don't get to play, I don't get to get paid. So I have to do these things. This is why it's okay for me to take these pills and drink these beers. So there's always something you can tell yourself to keep that kind of decision making prossure going that way.

01:32:27
Speaker 1: And I don't think it was you know, was it abusive in those moments? Right? Is it? Is it normal and not abusive to drink fifteen twenty beers after a game? It's probably to a normal person abusive, But that's very common between us, right, we Right, it was.

01:32:40
Speaker 4: Away games, so yeah, it was you on the flights. They have cases of beer right in to them.

01:32:43
Speaker 1: It wasn't every single night of the week the hogs.

01:32:45
Speaker 4: Yeah, drinking beer. Yeah, it's a very normal thing.

01:32:49
Speaker 1: That's want. So you know it was it abusive, yes, but it was also that's part of being a young guy. It wasn't every single night I was doing that, right. But as you just right, there's also the business side of it. You're getting older, You're making a bunch of money, right if you miss games because you're hurt. I mean, we know the business side of it. So you're like, I gotta do whatever I gotta do, Like this paycheck is nice. I'm trying to set my family up for life, right, So whatever I got to do, right, whether that's taking pergoset to go to sleep instead of painkiller or instead of sleeping pills, great, I'll do it. Right. You're not thinking about what it's doing to your body, but it's yeah, part of its part of the business. Like this, there's gonna be a business decision at some point here, right, So I gotta do whatever I can to make sure I keep playing. Right.

01:33:27
Speaker 2: How long did you? How long did you.

01:33:28
Speaker 1: Play eight full seasons and then once Camp retired in camp by ninth.

01:33:32
Speaker 4: Year, okay, retired, and what you're here in camp?

01:33:35
Speaker 1: In Camp? I went to Camp. I got released from Seattle, signed with New England, went there and it was just you know, had had my eight ninth and tenth surgery before after that year in Seattle or during went there and my body just wasn't there. Mentally, I was, I was gone, right, I was, it was, But physically I was like, I can't move. I'm trying. And I got to an organization, signed with an organization, the Holy Cow, right, like, this is a winning organization. This is what I wanted my whole career. So I wanted to and I my standard wasn't my standard at that point. And so a couple of weeks in the camp, I went in and was like, you know, coach, I appreciate the opportunity, but it's time for me to be done. And it was the mental part too, I mean it was you know.

01:34:17
Speaker 2: What was going on, but what was going on all encompassing? Yeah, because I'm assuming that conversation is probably very hard.

01:34:23
Speaker 1: Yeah, it was, you know, it was the physical part to where I'm I'm struggling to move right, trying to be fluid, and then you know, so ego right comes in because I'm like, I am not what I used to be right, and I can't move and you're getting you know, getting beat at practice, and I was like, oh my god, I can I do this? And then you know, the mental part of it was was equally as tough. Right, there was points and not a you know, it's hard to say, but there was a point where I'm like, I wish I'd just blow something out so I could be done, right. And that's where how bad it had gotten mentally because I didn't you know, I felt like if I retired, chose to retire, then you know that I was quitting or I was it was this this thing right. That's but if something happened, it could just be like, oh you had to right, And so that mental part of it, it's, you know, you're in a because I remember running, I kept pulling stuff and my body here. I remember doing the conditioning test and I'm like, I wish I just blow an achilling so I could be done. I'm like, well, you know, so now you're now you're judging who you are as a person. Like you coward, Like who says that to themselves? But it's the mental side of it that going into that year and it was taking pinkillers to get out, Bed just couldn't move and decided, like, you know, the good part is I, you know, I was with it enough to know that I don't want to be this. I don't want to be the guy that does this till he's non functioning. And I felt like that's where it was leading. And so I had the conversation with Coach there and it was like, I think this is best for both of us, you know, because I was I was like, I don't want to waste your time, Like, yeah, you're not getting what I was a few years ago.

01:35:49
Speaker 4: Did you quickly after quickly or maybe not quickly? Did you after you decided to retire? Did you have this identity crisis of like, okay, what am I? Who am I?

01:35:57
Speaker 2: Now?

01:35:57
Speaker 1: For sure? Yeah? You get home and you know, I, you know, I chose, you know, I chose to be done. But now you're home and you're watching your buddies still play, right, they're still going to practice. You're trying to you know, can't turn the TV on when you're home because you're like, oh, I should still be doing this right and I should be there with them.

01:36:12
Speaker 4: Because I'm sure at some point your body starts to feel better, you know, like you know what, maybe I could do X, Y and Z, and then you pop on a game You're like, why aren't I doing this right?

01:36:19
Speaker 1: Yeah, So it was definitely the identity. And I remember screaming at my wife one day. I was, you know, I'm not a I'm not an f and stay at home dad, right, because I was trying to let her do her thing her whole life. You know, my whole career was everything for me, right. She took care of the kids like you like, concentrate on your career. And I just remember, like that, what am I? Right? And that's terrible to say that because I'm proud to be a father, but you this identity like I'm not a stay at home dad every day. This is not what I do. So yeah, that's tough. I think we all go through that. And then you're dealing with other stuff on top of that. You know mentally that that doesn't have you thinking clearly. That makes it even harder. And now you know, like I said, now you're now I know, I don't have to go to practice. So now I'm at my buddy's drinking beer, you know, three nights a week right now. Now, now I need to lose weight because I don't need to be three on twenty pounds. So I'm drinking tequila instead because my body can process it better. But drinking the same valume with tequila that you know when I was drinking beer. Right, So it's this whole thing that this transformation, and you wonder who you are, what should I do? And you know what, am I going to go get a job? Right? You've been making all this money, right, getting these big checks, and I'm going to go you know I liked old cars, Right, I'm gonna go work at my buddy's shop. I'm gonna go san Bondo for twenty five dollars an hour. You're like, yeah, you know what I mean.

01:37:29
Speaker 4: It's like clearly world, yeah.

01:37:31
Speaker 1: Yeah, And now I'm thirty some years old and or I don't want to, you know, go get a job and you know, work with a bunch of twenty year olds. Right, So it's just this whole ego and identity of who you are and what you were, and that's what you did your whole life. That's all you knew, right, that's what we did. And then you get done, You're like, oh shit, they ain't calling. Like when you say you're done, you're done right right, I'm not in a band to where we can go to the local bar and just keep playing, right, Like when you're done with the sport, that's it?

01:37:58
Speaker 2: What the what was the break point to start diving into your mental health and figuring out that there could be a lot more going on?

01:38:06
Speaker 1: I think the breaking point for me as time went on. So now we're three four, five years post retirement, and all these reactions and in moods and all these things got more intense. So now my kids are laughing or giggling at the breakfast table and I lose it, right, I go from zero to two thousand, and I'm so angry and smashing my fist on the table to get them to be quiet. But I'm also realizing that, hey, this is not a normal reaction, right, So why did that that just happen? Right? So it's instance after instance, and I'm coping with alcohol, right, not every day, not every week, but when I did, it was how big of a bottle of tequila did I have?

01:38:45
Speaker 2: Right?

01:38:45
Speaker 1: You know, we go to a kid's the fundraiser for the school. Right I was socially I did you know? I was. I'm not a social person, you know. Even before all this, right, I would always you know, I had social anxiety. I didn't like that. Even in college, I didn't like all the attention, right when everything's great and everybody like you're the greatest ever. I didn't like the attention, you know, for the good or the bad. And so now we go to school fundraisers and you know, I take my bottle of tequila in with me because the stuff they serve at the bar I don't like, right, So that makes a lot of sense, all right. So now it's you know, doing things like that. So and I'm realizing these things as they happen. I'm like, this is not normal behavior that I took my own tequila brand in because the bar doesn't serve it, you know. And then I'm having these reactions to my wife or the kids. We went to dinner one night her my mother in law, was in town, and I just remember it because of the reaction I had. We walked into my wife, It's like, oh, let's sit inside. So we're waiting for the lady to see this, and then she goes, oh, the sun came out, we should sit outside, and I remember going dark. I mean, I want to I want to strangle her. And I hate to say that, but I was so angry that she changed from wanting to sit into out inside to outside, and I had no idea why I was. I'm like, why am I reacting like this? So in my head, I'm fighting myself because I mean, it doesn't make sense, right, you guys look at me, like why with that trigger? Yeah, it made zero sense to me.

01:40:02
Speaker 2: So these things, how's your wife reacting when you're having these reactions and knowing that we're we're kind of in a song and dance around dad right now at times?

01:40:11
Speaker 1: You know, Honestly, at the time, I think she saw I was an asshole, right she. I don't think she understood. She didn't understand why things were happening. You know, when someone does that, you'll be like, what is wrong with him? Right? These are me popping off or getting upset, or the days I'm fine and all of a sudden, I'm just either super depressed or super angry. I mean, anger more than you should have right, stuff that shouldn't set you off. So it was tough because I think she was like, what is going on? Right? She also knew I was going through stuff right being done, she knew, you know, the injuries and those things took a toll. But so the rock bottom, I think was a couple instances like that to where I'm like, you know, I'm aware of all this, right, Because then I feel like the biggest piece of trash on the face of the earth because I lose my stuff because my kids are laughing right or I'm sitting in a chair like you know, hurting them or or making it stop, and I'm like, I'm a terrible human being. And so I think that was rock bottom for me when I'm having these thoughts And then then I'm beating myself up because I'm like, they're better off without me, right, Like, this is this is who I am. This is not a life for them. I love my family, It's the greatest family on the face of the earth. I love my wife. She's you know, she's been through it all with me. But I'm like, they don't deserve this. I I they're better, they're better off without me, And so you know. It happened to be a morning we were working out. We always worked out in the morning, and and broke down in our driveway. I was just I remember sitting down and she's like, you're okay, and I just start bawling, and I'm like, I need help because all this stuff had been going through my head and I hadn't told her. She knew I was struggling, and she saw these outbursts, she saw these things that happened. But in my mind, I'm like, I shouldn't be here, Like they're better off. They don't need to see their dad losing his shit over nothing. They don't need I don't need to be this depressed guy sitting in a chair shaking because I think something else is going on, right, And so that was probably rock bottom. It was rock bout them for me. And the fact that I actually asked her for help and I just remember saying, just in tears, like I need help. I'm struggling. I don't I think I'm losing my mind, you know. So that that was kind of the start of it, and so, you know, just happened to be at the same time that through my workers comp case, you know, I'm going through that whole process, which is great, you know, ten years later, but they had me get a brain scan. So going and get a brain scan, and this was a very close in proximity to when I asked for help, you know, I asked her for help. I reached out to a couple of friends that you know, had been through you know, been through their own stuff, to like, hey, I'm struggling, like, you know, how do you deal with this? But I get this brain scan, and that's when it was really kind of the aha moment because they pulled up my brain scan. He's like, you know, all these symptoms you're having, the rage, the anger, the depression of this, of that, right, and then put up a healthy brain on there, and then put up my brain. You know, it was a spec scan at the time, and it was you know, it looks looked like someone had taken a baseball back to it, right. And so my wife was there and I remember she's crying in obviously you look at it. And I started laughing and she looked at me and she's like, what the fuck are you laughing at? And she was mad, obviously mad, and I just said I'm not crazy because I had thought to that At that point, I thought I was losing my mind. You're getting an answer, right, So I'm like, oh, this is the reason, right, and so you know, I just that sticks in my head. But that was the point where, you know, kind of my healing journey started and I knew, Hey, there's there's something going on, not just me. I'm not just a ex athlete that can't handle being done, that doesn't have an identity, Like there is a physical, physical issue that is causing these outburst and these thoughts and these suicidal ideation and these all these different things, and there's a reason that's happening. And now we got to either do something or continue the way we are.

01:43:41
Speaker 2: Did you ever get extremely close to killing yourself?

01:43:45
Speaker 1: I did, Unfortunately, Yes, it got bad enough to where with the you know, suicide nightmares at night, and then it turned to suicidal ideation during the day to you know, I felt like I was a burden on my family. Right, So You're having these thoughts that and you see your self acting in a certain way, and I'm like, they are better off with that, And I believed it. I believe that, and I told my wife on multiple ocations, you guys are better off without me. Here's all the stuff, right, because I'm aware of these reactions I'm having, and I'm aware that I'm getting triggered by my kids to where or my wife to where I want, you know, like physically think I'm hurting them. Right, So now I'm sitting in the chair thinking I'm hurting them. And there's a couple instances and she's like, what is wrong with you? And I'm literally sitting there shaking because I thought I was hurting my children. Never physically touch them, thank god, right, But the story in my head it was that I was so now I feel like I'm a terrible human being because I think, how could you have this thought about your children? Yeah, and so you know, not proud of it. There were times that I thought, you know, and a friend of mine that I meant, military friend, he ended up taking his life. He said it best, he said, nobody wants to commit suicide. They want the noise to stop. And that's what I wanted. I just I can't live like this. I can't be around and function around my children and have these thoughts. I need the noise to stop. And there were there were times I had, you know, my pistol in my gulp compartment of my truck, and I'm like, this would be really easy right here, right, and and so you know, never never attempted it, thank god, but there are multiple times that it got to that point, unfortunately. And you know, then it was like, oh, everybody's gonna think I'm a coward, right, So then it's driving down the highway and it's just and then yeah, then there's a semi coming. All right, Well, if I just swerve over in front of this semi, I won't look like a coward, right. And so it was the not thinking clearly part, on top of all the other things that I'm affecting people that I love, I'm affecting them and and that's but I wanted to be better. I wanted I was aware of this, and so when that stuff started happening, that's that's when I reached out for help. And that's what kind of started the whole journey.

01:45:45
Speaker 2: When you're when you're having By the way, I'm sorry for asking that very bluntly too. I was just kind of like listening you start talking about the suicide ideation and everything else, and it's just I'm almost just sitting here in my check because I'm captivated by you storytelling, and I just had to know.

01:45:58
Speaker 4: I'm glad you asked because I'm thinking, I wonder how I can ask it.

01:46:00
Speaker 2: And knowing that he yeah, knowing that he's having the rage and the outburst, and I can only imagine the shame and embarrassment that you quickly have after that, or people looking at you and you're telling these stories and you're shaking in your chair and then you're seeing on the scans like, uh, how and how badly in shape your brain has been. And then once you said like the suicide ideation, I'm just like, yeah, if you're you've already been saying that they're better off without me. I'm just thinking to myself, like, I wonder what he's meaning by that. So then whenever I had that land, I'm like, I just need to I didn't know how to ask it either.

01:46:31
Speaker 5: Yeah.

01:46:32
Speaker 1: No, it's and the good thing is now I can sit here, right, and that'll be the rest of the story. But I can sit here and talk about it and not be nervous. Right, you asked that, I'd be sweating because I'm like, yeah, it's every single day. Yeah, And so it's a very real part of it, and I don't think enough people talk about it, and that's you know, that's that's real talk like that was Yah was very very close. I'm not proud of it, but that was part of the journey. And and unfortunately for a lot of people it gets that way and if you know, you keep hiding it, that's that's the issue.

01:47:00
Speaker 4: Yeah, And for you to be able to sit here and have this conversation and talk about these super deep things so calmly, it just shows how much growth that you've had. And I'm sure there's people that are watching this that might struggle struggle similarly that don't know how to put it into words. So you could be absolutely helping somebody right now just by being as vulnerable as you are with two guys you just met.

01:47:20
Speaker 2: Boys.

01:47:21
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01:49:31
Speaker 1: Like, yeah, I think it was some of both. I think some of it. Like I could tell when when I went dark. My wife would say I went dark, like my eyes. She's like, your eyes were dead. And I could tell when your mood changed because like instantly everything went black. So yeah, completely, body language, everything, And so I knew that in the moment because something would happen and I remember just this anger. But I know, I'm like, why is this happening? Like so I'm having that internal dialogue right, But then it got to the point where I would have these moments and then get done right. I you know, times on my Harley. I'd get on my Harley to let loose right, to get this stuff out of my head. And I'm doing eighty ninety mile an hour and a thirty five down Lake Shore Boulevard in Lake Tahoe. We even through cars, and I remember, you know, in that moment, that's just what it was. It was like making it all stop, right, And then I get to town and I'm like, what did I just do? Right? I look back at the carnage behind me, like, oh god, I was just doing that, like and knew it, but it was just in the moment. It was just like we even in and out of cars on the side of the road, and like then all of a sudden it snapped back in. I'm like, oh my god, what am I doing? Like I'm gonna kill myself? Like and so a little bit of both, but it was that was the hard part. That's how it's hard mentally to cope with because there's times I'm like I don't know what's going on, or I snap out of something and I'm like, oh, that's not right, Like I did I just I'd ask my wife did that just happen? Did I just do that? Did I just have that reaction? She's like, yeah, you know really? And so that that was a tough part, and that's what I think led to the other the very negative thoughts, because you know, now you're doing this, like what, I'm gonna hurt somebody, Like, right, I gonna hurt wife, I'm hurt kids, I'm gona hurt something in the street. I'm gonna right, this is this is getting back.

01:51:04
Speaker 4: Did your wife ever express concern for her wellbeing and the kids well being? Ever have fear of that?

01:51:10
Speaker 1: I'm talking about it now. I don't know. I don't think now. Did she walk on eggshells for a few years, Yes, if you ask her, I think she she's like I was never for whatever reason, I wasn't. I wasn't scared you were gonna hurt us because I just didn't think that's who you were, you know, and that's someone that really believes in you to be able to say that because my actions were showing different. So she was she scared? Yes, I think she walked on eggshells to make it so these things didn't happen, Right. She talks about it, to try and do these things so if she could see them coming, to make them not as intense, or to stop them altogether, like kids start laughing, Stop, I'll go out of the room, right, all these different things too. But I think were the reactions scary? Absolutely? So? Luckily I don't think I just you know, it's spiritual to say, but I think I think she knew who I was. That's what she said. She's like I knew who you were. I knew you, you know, I believed you wouldn't hurt us, right, you know? But were we scared at times and nervous? Absolutely, because the reactions were so intense.

01:52:10
Speaker 4: Yeah, relatively strategic too about getting kids out of the room. No one will started to trigger you starting to realize those types of things, right, Very brave and strong on her part too, absolutely to see like the truth in you and to be able to work through that with you and like let you go through your process. So when you guys are sitting there and you look at the brain scans, she's crying, you're laughing, she calls you an asshole, and you're like you there's a level of relief that you have because you're looking at these scans and being like, I'm this isn't just a me thing. This is something that's happened to me, so I have and I'm sure it was extremely settling for you to be like, Okay, like I see the problem now, now I can work on a ways to resolve this problem. What is the first step you guys take when you're in this meeting room? How quickly do you start working on different therapies? To help your.

01:52:53
Speaker 1: Brain instantly, right, Because I remember asking the neurologist and I said, well, is this bad? You know where does this on the level of that? Right? And I'm sure you've seen seem sure you've seem better, and he goes, I've seen, I've seen worse. It's pretty bad. Yeah, And I was in that just in that mode of.

01:53:06
Speaker 4: Which in a sick way. I don't know how you you felt in that moment, but for me, it's like when I like get blood work done or I like, uh see my levels and all these things, like I kind of want it to be really bad because I know, like, oh, if i'm I can be this much better. Absolutely, there's a weird like sick o mode you go into. It's like make it as bad as it can.

01:53:22
Speaker 1: Write an ego right, And I'm like, yeah, I do something, I do it.

01:53:24
Speaker 4: Right right now, it can be the best at much farther I've come right exactly, So.

01:53:28
Speaker 1: You know, I asked him that and they said, you know, not so many words that you know you have you know you have CT right like this is you know obviously you can't tell post mortem and they pull your brain out there like he's like all the symptoms your brain scan, you have CTE and if you do nothing, you're going to become a statistic. Well I knew what a statistic was in my life. Say what does that mean? She's like, this leads to suicide? Like this is that these people that are having these reactions, and gave examples of other guys, athletes, other people in the past that have done things. Right, That's that's what a statistic is. So at that point I'm like, okay, and again the all are not thing. I remember just feeling hope. So I'm like, well, let's do it. What do I need to do. He's like, well, you need to stop drinking. You know, I'm that first thing. You know. Alcohol is the worst thing in the world for your brain, number one, number one depressant in the world, you know. So I tried that. I didn't do very well at it. I toned it down. But everything else they threw at me, I did you know? They were you need to be in a hyperbaric chamber, you know, every day for the rest of your life, they said. So I rented one. I did two hours a day for a month and a half to see you, and then I ended up buying one.

01:54:27
Speaker 2: Right.

01:54:27
Speaker 1: Luckily, through our retirement stuff and reimbursement fun I bought one. Yeah, so I'm doing that. I'm doing ivs. I'm getting all my levels checked right because all my hormones are messed up, right, So I'm doing blood work every few days. I'm taking you know, getting different ivs of different medicines that are supposed to help with brain regeneration. Figuring out my sleep. Right, I couldn't sleep. I'd be up tweaking at night because I'd wake up and go back, couldn't go back to sleep. Well, sleep, learn that sleep is very big on brain health, right obviously, So learning that right.

01:54:54
Speaker 11: Thought, Yeah, your body right, just the way he led to saying and as he's saying it in his mind's like obviously, and you're like yeah.

01:55:06
Speaker 1: But in the moment, you don't think of that.

01:55:07
Speaker 4: If you, if you, if you're not doing something, and then you just someone just explains it, You're like that makes all this.

01:55:12
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, like that's a general statement, but when you're learning the actual details why it's so beneficial, that's like the aha, what's like like the alohol it seems good for you, It's like, oh for real?

01:55:24
Speaker 1: Yeah, And you don't sleep on when you drink a bunch like, oh, that's how I used to get that's weird. Howlckhim. I wasn't getting good RESTful sleep when I drink ten ten doubles of tequila.

01:55:32
Speaker 2: Yeah.

01:55:32
Speaker 1: Yeah, So doing all this, you know, any like I said anything they threw out me because I wanted to be better, right, and it was kind of hope for me. I'm like, oh, okay, I'm again not back to that. There is a cause, like, let's fix it, full war, let's let's do it. So I spent a year and a half doing that. Anything they threw out me, you know, light therapy, anything I could to help with my brain health. And I'm seeing a therapist. So finally call right, this is pre brain scan and it's not funny, but it is. I it's like, I need to talk to somebody. I didn't know how to get a therapist, right. The NFL offers that stuff. So I called the suicide hotline that they give us on our sheets, called Suicidehighlight. They're going to hurt yourself. I'm calling them for a reason, but no, I'm not right, and okay, we'll get you a therapist. Well, took them a week to get me a therapist that was covered through my insurance. I'm like, this is not the way, so I you know, okay, I'm gonna find something else. So got hooked up with somebody else, got a therapist. So I'm doing doing all that stuff right. Talking these things out right fired that therapist right, because I'm talking about like the you know, the the level that I take everything right, She'd like, well, how much do you drink? Well, how big is a bottle? Like I'm not trying to glamorize it, but you know, I might drink once a week, but if I had the full bottle of tekeil, I drink the whole thing. I was fine. That's the messed up part. My wife's like, how are you functioning? Like I'm fine, Like I'm drunk, but I'm not stumbling, I'm not puking. I can handle it, right. So I'm talking about that, and I'm also talking about, Oh, then I trying to cope. So I'm gonna go on a bike ride. So I go on, you know whatever, the longest bike ride I can to try and get my heart to explode, right, because it's everything's an extreme and He's like, well that's not healthy. I remember saying that, and I'm like, well you don't get us then, right, because we do everything extreme, Like there's no like this is healthy, right you just you know you you go for a nice little jog, right, No, you go to like grind out all the bad stuff, right, right, And so work through the therapy, you know, I'm I'm doing all these treatments and am I a little bit better? Yes, you know, five five percent better, ten percent better, but still having a ton of ideation. Right, there's still days, right, I'm telling my wife again, like when you go into it and be like here's all the stuff right like this, I can't be around you guys like this is And she' said what are you talking about? Right? And I meant it I did because at that point I'm like, I'm a I'm not a good father, I'm not a good husband. I can't barely function. I'm trying to do I'm trying to get healthy and it's not working. And then so it happened to be I was started listening to military podcasts. I'm a huge military supporter. You know, my dad was in the Marines. I just I have affection for those guys and what they've done and just like kind of like you guys, like there are people right, they think like us, they say mannerisms, they yes, right. And so I was listening to the Team Never Quit podcasts that Marcus Latrell does, and I had to listen to a bunch of them listen to because every story was like, oh, Okay, this guy made it right. He did he alcohol abuse, all the rage, depression, all this stuff and tells their feel good story. And then it happened to be listening to one of those and Marcus Capone who was another he played actually played college football and then was a thirteen year seal and he was on there talking about his journey and I'm like listening to it and again back to this moment to where I don't know if I'm really here or not. I'm listening. I think that I'm talking in the radio. So I'm driving. I was we're still living in the Bay aer it's time and driving up to Tahoe to our cabin to give my wife and kids a break from me, and I remember listening to them. I'm like I'm in the radio talking right, and I'm like I'm losing my mind because I thought my voice was coming out of the rad and I called my wife and I was like, hey, I'm on the radio. What are you talking about? Like, listen to this podcast. It's me talking, right, because it was the story all the stuff TBI and and then it was his wife, Yeah.

01:59:13
Speaker 4: I'm on the radio right, and say yea, yeah, yeah, it was right funny.

01:59:17
Speaker 1: But that's funny now because she's like yeah, I'm like, no, turn it on right now. She's like, okay, I'm putting the kids to bed. I'll listen to the podcast later, and you know, it's but in my head, I'm like, no, it's me. And she's like, man, you're off your rocker, right, But thank god, you know I told her numerous times ago, I said you should leave me, like you know, and I meant it because I'm like, I'm a mess, Like this is happening right, I'm like, this is not sane, the fact that I'm calling you and telling you that I'm on the radio and I mean it. I don't just mean, oh, this is my story. I'm I'm talking on the radio. So I hear that, and then Marcus Capone and his wife are on there and he went through all this stuff, right, So I'm like, holy cow, this is me.

01:59:53
Speaker 4: Uh.

01:59:53
Speaker 1: And then at the end his story was, you know, he went to Mexico did this psychedelica to theray be with this drug called iba gain and I knew nothing about it. And then he's talking about his recovery and how it changed his brain fog and his mental clarity and took away all this his ego and his rage and all these things that I'm like, oh shit. So for me it was hope. I'm like, holy cow, there's there's something i can do because all this other stuff I've been doing for a year and a half is not working.

02:00:19
Speaker 4: And it helped a little bit, but nothing substantial.

02:00:22
Speaker 1: Right, And so listen to it. Call my wife, beck, you gotta listen to it. I'll listen tomorrow, all right. So I get to our He's.

02:00:30
Speaker 2: Like, I crushed this podcast.

02:00:33
Speaker 1: That was good. So I reached out. So they had started an organizations called VET Solutions, and because he had healing and he wanted to help, you know, obviously with the suicide epidemic and with veterans, he wanted to help his guys. And so I'm like, I'm gonna try. So I get on the web internet and get their website. Emailed them, thinking no way, but hey, for that night I felt good, like there's hope. Next day and get a call from his people. Then Marcus and Amberg Campone call me and we talk that day for quite a while and multiple days in a row, and he's talking about all these things, right, He's like, well, hey, there's there's other stuff you can do first, like I did, you know, hyperbaric therapy in this and this and then and I finally stopped like, hey, not to be rude, hold my beer, like I've done all this, Like everything you're talking about, I've done. And so he was talking about this medicine, you know, drug and you know how it helped him, and they had sent two hundred guys, two hundred veterans, so his organization deals with special OT veterans. Them. He put me in contact with some of his guys who had gone through this treatment. And there's no way, right, But he was talking about the brain fog because I had super bad brain fag, right, just all day in a haze, and he's talking about how that goes away and the ringing in my ears, right, I couldn't There was always a ringing, right, So on top of the emotional stuff, it was the actual brain stuff. And so, long story short, we talk about it on and off for a week and he's like, Hey, I'm taking a group of my kind a well known you know, some higher profile veterans. There's four of them. We have one extra spot in three weeks if you want to join, Like, you seem like a guy that would fit in with this, and I think this will help you. And so I'm like, I'm in right. He's like, Okay, well, we gotta you know, we need there's a few things we got to do beforehand, right, because you can.

02:02:18
Speaker 4: Before you go into that out at this point in your life, how much experience have you had with other drugs other than just marijuana, like psychedelics, different things like did you ever take part in any of those things, like in college or NFL.

02:02:34
Speaker 1: To this point?

02:02:34
Speaker 5: None?

02:02:35
Speaker 4: So this point none, nothing. I'm on a phone and you're like, I'm in on trying this thing, and I'm assuming TJ.

02:02:41
Speaker 1: Yes, yep. I mean I'd smoked weed a couple of times in my life. It didn't work for me because I tried that when I was coping to like, oh, you know, Kyle Turley found healing through marijuana. I reached I reached out to him, right, like, trying all these different ones, and it made me feel sick or I was out right, it was just it wasn't yep, it wasn't my thing. So I had zero experience, knew nothing of That.

02:03:00
Speaker 2: Helps shut it down for maybe momentarily, but.

02:03:02
Speaker 1: Right, yeah, and so I'm learning about this and he puts me on the phone with the doctors and they're explaining it and that. You know, at that point, I didn't care. I'm like, I'm in. But it was like, knew nothing about psychedelics and they're talking about the hallucinations. Right, I knew the you know, I went through dare like, I'm sure you guys did. Yeah, some of the stories, right, you know the people that did psychedelics and jumped off the roof, right.

02:03:23
Speaker 4: The crazy stories, Yes, scare tactics.

02:03:26
Speaker 1: But by the way, dare t shirt actually bought one a few years ago.

02:03:31
Speaker 2: Shirt.

02:03:33
Speaker 1: That's awesome.

02:03:34
Speaker 2: So now, are you on prescriptions too before you out there because you're obviously doing the hyperbarak, you're doing all these things, but I'm assuming working with therapists and doctors there's probably some prescriptions.

02:03:42
Speaker 1: Yes, indepressants, And that was part of the deal when he said, hey, we got to so they put me in contact. And that's the thing about iby gain, which so I be gain is the highest highest powered psychedelic theory is so you know, there's psilocybin, there's ayahuasca. It is here compared to here, I mean, it is the highest power now at all altill has. You know, if you're on it can react with SSRs, it can react with antidepressants and send you into cardiac arrest. So it can also kill you. And I'm like, it's all good. I'm fine, right, yeah, right, I don't care if it kills me. It kills me, it's better than the way I'm living right now. I mean funny, but not funny. But that's the way. I was like, if it kills me, it was supposed to because this way to live is not the way I want to live. And so, yes, I had to. That treatment was three weeks from that date, and they're like you have to get off this, this and this right, So and I was on a high powered antidepressant and so I call my doctor and she's like, you can't get off that fast. I mean, you have to wean off this for months. And I said, you know, I remember the conversation. I says, is it going to kill me? And she said, no, it's not going to kill you, but you're going to have bad side effects, like you're going to lose your mind like it is. It is hard to come off this stuff. And said, I don't give a shit if it's not going to kill me, hung up on her, you know, and I quit taking it. I did a half pell for one day, and I'm like, I got four days to do this. It's going to stop taking it. So I get, you know, but my wife knew, right, my friend and I knew that there was going to be side effects.

02:05:02
Speaker 4: So my wife, are you in Tahoe by yourself still or are you back home?

02:05:05
Speaker 1: We are living full time in Tahoe at this point, so we moved up there and so I'm there my wife, you know, she knows, she knows what I told her. They said, oh, I'm gonna have effects from this, and so her and couple friends are checking on me. Right My my buddies would come over at five in the morning to make sure I was okay. And because I always got up super early and worked out, and she's working me through this. But I had huge side effects. I mean I showed up at my buddy's shop. My my buddies are steel workers, like old school metal forgers, younger than me, but they do the old school way. And I remember showing up at their their shot just raging. I didn't know how I got there and just losing losing my shit and I don't know I got here and almost didn't and they're like whoa. And I learned later they're like, oh dude, you scared us, right, So this is during that process of what I'm weaning off of, you know, when I went cold turkey on these medicines. So they got me through it, you know, my wife got me through it. And then you know, three weeks later, I get on a plane to San Diego meet up with this group and then to go down to Pest. You wanted to go get this treatment.

02:06:11
Speaker 4: Jesus, that is fucking wild.

02:06:14
Speaker 2: I would have been. I would have been terrified. Yeahs oh, no, doubt was one.

02:06:20
Speaker 8: Right.

02:06:20
Speaker 4: Now, We've been around somebody with a manic episode before and it's like you really don't know how.

02:06:24
Speaker 2: To handle it.

02:06:24
Speaker 1: Yeah, Well, later, I asked them in there because I remember it because I remember losing it. But they were like, you know, I came back after healing, and then I was like, hey, what what happened that day? Because I, you know, recalled it and relived it in my in my treatment. But they're like, oh god, you just get shadows like and told me what happened. I'm like, oh god, I'm like, you know, then I kept asking my wife what else did I do? Right, Like, yeah, what what did I do at home? You know? So it was kind of one of those like funny but not funny, but I'm like, oh God, like you kind of forget how bad stuff was. But yeah, those they were they were like, oh you scared us. Like they're working class, their dudes, and they're like, we were frightened.

02:07:01
Speaker 4: Yeah.

02:07:01
Speaker 2: Yeah, you can only imagine you're you're a guy saying you're on a podcast. It this is prescribed, Rob, say you're on a podcast. Tell them therapist? Is he gonna kill me?

02:07:10
Speaker 5: No?

02:07:10
Speaker 2: Click? Hang up quick, cold turkey. We don't know what kind of side effects are about to come out of rock right right now?

02:07:15
Speaker 4: Yeah? So you okay, you fly to San Diego, you meet up with Marcus Latrell and four or five other high profile vets. Yeah, you guys getting a van head down to TJ just south of TJ, Like are you in the middle of the desert, Like talk me through this entire process as if I'm going to go take it as well, and you're giving me the map to it.

02:07:34
Speaker 1: Yeah. So it was it was full circle. So, you know, I listened to all the Marcus's podcast and then I get there and he's come out with this story. We've talked, I've been on his pocket, We've talked about it, right, So I'm not nothing that is not out there. But I remember walking in. I'm like, holy shit, I'm out of my mind right, Like I'm like just trying to survive to get to the streatment course. Yes's Marcus a trail and I remember going up to him like idiot, Hey, I don't know if you like doing your podcast, but it saved my life a few times, like listening to it, and I remember looking at me and look back down that was in I'm like, right, and so all these these guys are in the same boat. I am right, getting off all their They're sixty pack from the VA, so getting a van driver us through Tijuana. You know, we go to a you know, a gated kid it's a nice spot, gated community. But we're going through Tijuana, right, and now I'm like where it right? So now I'm like kind of sobering up. And I'm like, you know, so you go into these episodes to where you're out of your mind, not thinking clearly to like I'm fine, Like I'm not really like that, right, that stuff didn't happen. I'm not you know, I'm not suicidal. I'm not this and I'm driving through Mexico thinking where am I going? Like again, I've taken it too far? Now I'm driving through the hood of Mexico, right, and I get.

02:08:42
Speaker 2: Up your story even more?

02:08:43
Speaker 1: Right, I'm not I don't travel a ton, And I'm like, I grew up in a small town and I live in a small town. I'm not a world traveler, right, so I haven't seen these other countries and I'm like, oh my god, where are we going? So get take us to the facility. It's a it's in a gated community. It's a home, you know, it's just a normal house. And then we walk in and it's it's like a medical center. Right, there's part of it that looks like a healing you know, like what you think of a psychedelic treatment center. Then we go upstairs and it's lay down, take a shirt off, blood test, make sure we're on nothing, EKG. Checked to make sure your heart's healthy, you know, so you know in the case we're lying, you know, right, yes, because this medicine they've told us, right, this stuff can counter counteract with things and it can kill you. Or if you have a weak Herder heart problem, it's harder on your heart.

02:09:26
Speaker 2: Right, and you're like three weeks cold turkey right.

02:09:28
Speaker 1: Right, right, right right, So you know, I'm scared. Now, I'm scared, like what did I do? I'm taking this too far again, right, So I'm now I'm beating myself up again, Like what are you doing? You're in Mexico in this random house with a bunch of Navy seals and fighter PILs. You know, these guys, what am I doing? Go through the process, you know, get checked in, they do all these tests, and then we all sit down and it's a you know, it's a therapy session, right, It's like why are you here? Right? And it's for whatever reason you know I wanted healing, and I was very honest as were these other veterans about why they were there, what they wanted to get rid of. Right, that's part of this medicine is in any plant medicine is you know, take this from me. And I remember saying that take this rage from me, take this self hatred, take all these things. Right, So there was ceremonies involved, Right, So we do a fire ceremony. You write the stuff down, you burn it, and then they hand you a cup with some pills in it. Right, and it's it's this, it's this medicine. It's a root bark. It's an African root bark, and it's in a capsule and you know, down the hatch. And then they take you upstairs to room. There's five mattresses on the ground. Hook us up to the EKGs, get us, you know, comfortable and and this then then it starts, right waiting for the for the for the medicine to kick in.

02:10:44
Speaker 2: What's the fear levels? Like as you throw it down the hatchet, you go up, lay down on the bed. It's like get comfortable. And at this point you're just waiting for I don't even know what I'm.

02:10:55
Speaker 4: Because I'm thinking, like, uh, when I first envisioned this, it's like you're in the desert Zakaria. Everyone's got like a handler type of thing. You're running around different places, but you're just laying down for this whole thing.

02:11:06
Speaker 1: It is this this medicine is very I mean it melts you into the floor. There you can get up and move. Not too many people are you're either getting nauseous or but it is I mean, it literally feels like it melts you into the floor. There's there's not a lot of moving.

02:11:17
Speaker 4: And how quickly is this medicine taking place? Like are you fasted at this point?

02:11:21
Speaker 1: Yes, so we had Neaton since breakfast that morning and now you so that's a breakfast and then this is eight o'clock at night and we're taking so you're fasted and within an hour, you know, you start I start hearing the buzzing. So I'm scared, Like I'll admit, I'm in tears laying there like you know, I guess you either fix me or kill me, right, because I wanted healing at that point, right and to me, it was the last ditch effort. I didn't know if this didn't work. If I was going to make it, quite honestly, because it'd just gotten bad again and I didn't know if this wasn't the answer because I tried everything right, and so that was my thought during this. Well, then you start having the reaction to the medicine, right, so there's and they tell you things that are gonna happen, but like this buzzing and then these feelings, and I'm like, and I don't like that, right, That's probably why I hadn't you know, Dare worked with me, right, I was scared of drugs. Yeah, and it's like this is you know, I am very much like I like to control everything, and now I'm out of control. So it was super scary, and it is. It kicked in more and more. Right now I'm panicking and like my heart's racing and I'm like, I'm not going to die, and so all these things and they're great, they work you through this. You have therapy sessions before, they have coaching to tell you how to deal with that, and so I just like, you know, they had told us just be curious and just give into it. So I just did this breathing stuff they taught us. And then then the medicine fully kicked in, and so now you know, you have eye shades over your eyes. You're laying on the ground, and now different. Now there's buzzing, and now there's now I'm seeing lights and I'm like, holy shit, my first experience with psychedelics. Right, So I'm seeing these lights coming in and then all of a sudden, I see things. And they kept telling us be curious. Right, So we have a therapist next to you, right, and I'm like, you know, I'm seeing this or They're like, just you know, be curious to go look at it, you know, so in this mask, and so I know, I'm take my mask off to make sure I'm still in the room. Right, guys are puking because a lot of guys purge, right, so they had not a win on their part, but they had little tin buckets for our puke buckets. So everything's super intense. So all I hear is ding ding ding, you know, guys, like it's like the most intense thing you've ever been a part of. So you've got four other guys working through stuff already in the medicine.

02:13:28
Speaker 4: You can obviously hear them talking about what they are going through.

02:13:31
Speaker 1: Right, So this is everything. It's super intense. So then I get fully into it, right, and I just remember, you know, seeing, you know, hearing these things, seeing the lights. Right, So I felt like I was up in space, like with all these lights coming at me like the stars. And then all of a sudden there was like these movies and I'm watching this movie. So it was this continual movie flying through space of my life, like different things, right. And I didn't have I didn't have childhood trauma like I have a great family, I have great parents. Did I get a whooping every now and then because I deserved it?

02:14:03
Speaker 2: You know what I mean.

02:14:04
Speaker 1: So I'm not working through child abuse or sexual abuse right, like some of these veterans are right. But it was just more a story of my life, whether it was football, whether it was Iowa, whether it was a prose, whether it was different things. I'm watching this movie float through the sky, which sounds crazy unless you've done it. But it was this continual show right going through this. I remember watching him like why is it showing me this? And then I'd grab stuff. I'm like, oh that was sweet. You know Iowa, when we beat Michigan at Michigan, I'll take that kept up my heart may or may not have been in there, but things like that, right, stuff that I'd grab and I'd throw it to my throat, to my heart, and I want to keep that. It makes me feel good, right, And then I'd grab stuff out of the movie and I'd sling it out in the universe, and I just remember that that reel just floating off into space. So I'm watching all this stuff and it's right, and you're like, is this for real? Right? So you're in and out of it, go through that for which seemed like hours. Then there's a point I don't remember anything. I'm like, I must have fallen asleep whatever it was. I wake up the next morning, So this is twelve hours later. Right, You're in this trip for ten to twelve hours? Holy shit, so wake up, like what time is it? Right? Well, instantly I thought nothing happened, because in that moment, I couldn't remember anything, and I'm like, I fucked this up too, Like first thing I said, I'm like I screwed this up to like I'm a failure again. And then I go to get up right, And that was the instant feeling because I didn't recall all of these things like instantly, and then I go to get up and now I start throwing up. I can't get up, like my legs don't work. Like I'm like, oh, I messed myself up, like again failure right, Like trying to get up to go to the bathroom because ID lay there for twelve hours, couldn't function my legs. They put me in a wheelchair, rolled me to the bathroom, and go to the bathroom. So I'm living through this that morning, finally things start coming around. But I'm definitely sick all day, throwing up all day, could not function. But things started coming back. I'm like, the real part came back to me because I feel a little bit better now and I'm remembering, like, holy crap. So I'm writing in my journal as they tell us to remember all these things I saw. I threw this away. I kept this. What was that? So you're trying to process these things you remember that happened. So that second day is a gray day, right, they're getting IV's, you're super hydra. Gray is like a down day. It's a you're gonna just feel gray, right, You're gonna you're gonna feel sick like it is. It is physically. The medicine is physically demanding on you physically and mentally, but it's physically demanding high heart rate all night, you know, for twelve hours of your heart beating super fast. You're dealing with So it's you're gonna feel like crap, right, that's it. So that's why they call it the gray day. Gotcha, So do nothing that day, try and get some food in. I just feel deathly sick. Finally able to get up and somewhat walk that night, go down and have a little suit. There's a picture of all of us and I just looked like death warmed over, right, and go to bed, get up the next morning and then that day. So now we do the second medicine, which is five me o d MT. So they like pairing it with ibagain and five me o because they say the IBA gain like defrags your brain does all this healing, and the five me e o is more of a spiritual, a spiritual trip you take to deal stuff, loss of ego. Do you experience death right? More things? I'm like, So I get through this iby gain and now it's the next morning and you smoke five d NTU smoke right, it's toad poison. It comes from derived from a toad, a poisonous tote.

02:17:32
Speaker 4: Yeah, called DNT like blasting off right, It's like a rocket ship sending you into space.

02:17:36
Speaker 1: Yes, uh, And so now I'm scared again.

02:17:38
Speaker 2: I'm like, yeah, I gotta go on another fucking drift good death drug.

02:17:42
Speaker 4: Right, like they say, like the last that seven seconds of your life or whatever that you recall everything like, that's d MT. That's a chemical thing that comes off in your body.

02:17:51
Speaker 1: So they had talked to us about this, and so I'm scared again, right, I'm like, I feel deathly sick from the iby gain, still feel terrible, and I'm just like what am I doing right? And they're telling us, Okay, we're gonna like the pipe, you know, it's a crap pipe looking thing, and I'm like, what am I doing right? But I just feel so terrible leading into it. I'm like, this part of it, right, just trust the process, and so go in. We go in one at a time, and they do. They light it, and I mean it like you say, rocket ship, It sends you, right. It took a drag, went back, wasn't all there? Asked for more? Got up took the second drag, and it was, like you said, they call it the you know, the the death draw. I mean you I experienced death like I went to I went fully out. I came out of my body. I was not in that room where I began. I felt. I could tell I was in the room for the most part, right, I could feel the floor. This was an out of body experience. I went to the white light, right, And they had talked about this and I never believed it. But I'm like, oh, I'm dying. This is it? Like to me? It was what death was.

02:18:51
Speaker 4: What are your emotions while you were going towards this white light? Are you actually like, is the feeling of death in this moment like high anxiety, fear or is it more more of like a freeing feeling?

02:19:01
Speaker 1: It was free? It was. It was the most beautiful thing ever. Right, really, I remember floating. I like to up to what you know. I was born and raised Catholic. I you know, I have a vision of what my God is and and what death is. But it was that exact thing. Go into the white light. Oh this is it. I mean, I was so freeing, and so I get to get to the white light and and you know, my God is there and I'm talking to God, and all of a sudden, I lose it and I'm like, I'm a failure, I'm a piece of shit, I'm a terrible father, I'm a terrible husband. Send me to hell. And I'm screaming at him, right so I'm like, I don't deserve to be in heaven. And then he's like, you need to talk to her. And then my wife appeared from behind him, and I'm screaming at her, telling her the same things, and all of a sudden, it was just calm, and this weight was lifted off me. And I figured out was like my ego because they talk about ego loss, like literally, this something left my body and I was like, oh, I do like instantly, I deserve to be here. I'm a good father, I'm a good husband, i had a good career, all these things. This negative self tough was gone. And then it was this overwhelmingly peaceful feeling. I'm like, oh, I wish I would have known this, but now I'm dead, but I was super peaceful. Well then I came back into right. I feel myself back on the floor and I'm coming out of it and I'm like, wow, right in my life. I remember asking like am I dead? And they're like, oh, You're not dead, buddy. But it was this overwhelming feeling of freedom, clarity, and came out of it, and it was the most enlightening thing you've ever seen. Like it's unless you've experienced it. And this is not just me, right, there's talk to people who have gone through it. Is the most enlightening thing you've ever seen. And so came out of it, go back in the room, and I just felt like I was instantly back right that sick feeling I had twenty minutes earlier. Now I'm just like bright eyed. There's no ringing, I don't feel like, I don't feel sick, I don't feel any of those negative effects. And I literally felt like like I could go run a marathon. I remember walking back in the room, right, and all the other guys are looking at me because I went last, and I'm like, I'm back, bitches, That's exactly what I said. I'm like, I'm back right. So it was the hearing things and like after coming out of it, they sit you in the grass to like come back, and I remember touching the grass right and feeling the energy from the earth, and I'm like, what is all this? Right? I could hear everything. I could hear the birds, I could hear the ocean that was two miles away. I felt like I was in the movie Big where the grass was like super tall around me, like I was a midget, and I could hear all the grass rustling and all these sensations and things that I could hear and feel. I was like, oh, and I didn't know it at the point, but I'm just like, holy cow, this is amazing. Go back in the room, talk to the guys, and everybody's just like right, and you're enlightened. So something worked, right, right, So get through that. But I definitely I was like, oh, something's different. We went to the beach and we did for a walk as a group. I remember watching the waves, one wave at a time. I'm like, man, I am something's going on. I can see every single wave turning in the water, like the droplets coming off it, and I'm like, am I still high? Like no, this is like you're in the moment, you're you know, so someone You're like, yeah, whatever, hippie, right, But I was like, whatever is this is great? I remember turning to Marcus and like saying to him, like, hey, I'm supposed to be worrying about something. I'm worried and I'm supposed to be worrying about something, but I'm not worrying right, just babbling. Yeah, because it was clear. Everything was clear. There was nothing nothing in my head. It was complete clarity. And then so next day we drive back to San Diego. My wife came and met me down there with some of the other wives and walked into the restaurant and we met on Matt that we originally left from, and she says, you know, when she walked in, she's like, I knew something was different. She's like, I could see your eyes. Your eyes were wide open, they were bright white, because she had said it that in the past. She's like, your eyes were just dead, like you just he had no life in your eyes. You were always tired. And she's like, I knew instantly something was different. And she's like I could to see it the way you guys are all giggle in and laughing and like these grown badass men like hugging each other and crying and just she's like, you guys were so happy and so fast forward. We stayed in San Diego, San Diego for a couple of days to reintegrate, because they talk about that, right, you're gonna have this life changing experience and you got to reintegrate, Like, may not be the best thing to go back home to kids, right initially, So we spent a couple of days in San Diego and we just started learning. She noticed it more I notice it now or I recall it now, but noticing things that happened that were different. So I had a therapy session the second day I was back, get on my computer won't connect to the internet. Now, if that had happened pre treatment, that computer probably wouldn't have made it through it. I probably would have been broken against a wall, right, because you're a loser. You're a piece of shit. If you're late to a meeting, you guys, I'm sure have PTSD like that about I do being late anything. Yeah, And so I'm I just remember trying to get onto it, and I'm like, okay, it must be something, right, and my wife's running around like a maniac, and I'm like I remember thinking like what is going on? She came and grabbed the computer, took off out the door. I just remember sitting there. I'm thinking, like, man, what's going on with her? She comes back. I ended up getting on my phone. I was three minutes late and there was no big deal. I'd do my therapy session with the lady and I got off and I said, hey, what's going on. She's like, what do you mean? And I'm like, you run around like a crazy person, right, And she's like And I remember her just looking at me like what are you talking about? Like, and she later said like if that would have happened in the past, like, do you know what would have happened? Do you know what your action would have been? Do you know how you what you would have done to that computer? Or what you would have said to me? And so things like that started happening. We fly back home, come in the house. You know, my wife had warned the kids, hey, dad might be different. Well, six hours later, I'm on the floor whipping them around in their sweatshirts, you know, slinging them around like mops, creating chaos like you wouldn't, you know, screaming and yelling. And I'm down there tickling them and I remember looking at her and she's I remember the look on her face shoes, just like, mouth wide open, like what in the hell is going on? Didn't recalled in the moment. I remember her reaction, but I didn't really put anything whatever right playing with the kids. And so time goes on, days, weeks, months, and my reactions are different. And for me personally, there's no there's no brain fog, I'm super clear, no bringing in my ears. There's zero suicide stuff, there's zero depression, there's zero anxiety. I'm like going to pick the kids up at school with my wife and talking to the other moms and the dads, and she was like, you haven't You've never done this? Yeah right. I was the guy that sat in the car and waited for the kid to come get in. I didn't want to interact with anybody. And so I'm just a different human being. And so as time goes on, we learn more and more things.

02:25:43
Speaker 2: Now, are you getting back into the routines of like the cold tub and hyperbaric.

02:25:48
Speaker 1: And yeah, so I had a lot of that stuff, but I added a lot of stuff because they teach you that through this too. It's like, hey, you know meditation, you should learn to meditate, right, That's a big part of being in the moment and helping this treatment stick. So I'm trying to learn how to meditate. Right I'm doing and I got right back into my routune up early. But I loved it. It wasn't for survival. It was you know, it's because I wanted to do it made me feel good. Cold tub was great. I you know, would go for a walk and be like stoked to be alive. Right before I went, I was training for a five k because my buddy and I said we're going to do it, and he's the one that ended up taking his life. But I'm like, oh, I'm going to follow through on this. So I'm out running and remember acrossing the street and looking at the trees, like, man, the treats are so beautiful and green and everything was vibrant, and oh that Semi stopped for me. Right I'm across the street where in the past, I'm like, you know, that same instance happened before I went, and I would stop there and be like, Okay, it'll look like an accident. Just step out in the road because Semi's not going to stop.

02:26:42
Speaker 2: That's crazy.

02:26:42
Speaker 1: So it's a complete same instances are happening, and it's a different reaction. I'm like, oh that's weird. This is great. So just all those things start happening. The clarity, Like if pre treatment I was forgetting my kids names, I'd be like, what's she doing? She said, what are you talking about?

02:26:58
Speaker 2: Like her?

02:26:59
Speaker 1: What's her name? It's like Hayden, you know. So those things are happening. And now I'm like I'm crisp, Like I'm up every morning and I go for a bike ride and i go wake surfing and then I'm like I'm going to do this and like I'm just high on life. So this happens, you know, for three four months, right, and I remember the first day I got my first anxiety. I'm like, oh, what is that? You know I was anxious, right, it wasn't a big deal with something small. It's like, oh, I'm nervous to go to this thing. Right, So over time things started popping back in, right, But I had this new thought process of things, and so fast forward, right, because this is not this medicine is not a magic pill. It's not you know, it took multiple times for me, so now we're in it. You know, things started coming back. Then I started having some ideation again. I got COVID and took the whatever the pill is for COVID that has you know they say on there it can have a metallic taste. So I remember having my first suicide nightmare. I had COVID, took this medicine. I remember waking up gripping my neck because I had thought I had a gun in my mouth because of the metallic taste from the medicine. So it was my first suicide nightmare again. So I went originally twenty twenty one. Now we're pushing close to twenty twenty three. Things have popped back in. I'm not near as bad as I was, but still having some of the old.

02:28:12
Speaker 4: Sea starting to see something, this old programming come back there.

02:28:14
Speaker 1: Yep.

02:28:15
Speaker 2: How long? How long did you have the residual from the trip? Like nothing clarity.

02:28:22
Speaker 1: Fell like four months of absolutely nothing, I'm talking no anxiety, the most high in life. And then then at about a year little things started popping back in, right, some of the anger stuff started coming back, some of the uncontrollable outburst or you know, like I said, jump my Harley and go ninety mile an hour into town. Christmas My, you know, I don't talk about this a lot but Christmas before twenty twenty three, my parents were out and I remember taking my son for a haircut and I was in the truck and I'm like, Mom and Dad, I'm struggling again. And I said, I if I if I mess up, because at this point it wasn't like, oh, this is how I'm gonna make it go away. But I'm like, I'm gonna screw up. I screw up on my hardley. I'm going to screw up and I'm kill myself. I'm going to screw up. And I'm very much with it, and I've learned a lot of things. And I told my parents, Hey, you guys were great parents. If I mess up and kill myself, it's not your fault. Right. So I was back in that bad spot again. Yeah, And so was it as bad. It wasn't as bad. It wasn't near as bad. But when you've been to super clarity and then things come back, it's like the first day, it feels way heavier. And it wasn't before. It was all the time, So I could deal with it all the time. I was in that mindset all the time. Now it was a little bit here, a little bit there, but it seems more intense. So I go back for treatment again twenty twenty three, So that's two years from my first one very similar experience on iby game. I thinks super sick. I felt like it, you know, defrag did things. I worked through some stuff, a lot of the same visions, new visions. Then the real turning point for me was the next day the five MEO DMT again. So I smoke the fivemeo and I die. I saw that I'd killed myself. It wasn't this peaceful death that I saw the first time. I messed up and I killed myself right whether it wasn't necessarily suicide. It was a vision of me on my Harley right weaving through cars, and I'm watching that, and I killed myself, And then I saw what it did to my family. I'm watching down from the sky now I'm up at that I'd gone to that killed myself, went to the white light. I'm watching down. I see what it did to my family. So I'm watching my kid's age and I'm seeing how it messed them up. I'm seeing what it did to my wife, because before I left for this second treatment, I had told my wife again I'm a burden like, and I got back to that mindset that you're better off without me, unfortunately, and so it showed me in this I saw what it did to them, and I was like, oh god, this is not right. I remember thinking like, oh, I'm going to mess them up, right, and that's sounds like a crazy person, but I didn't think that before. I thought I gotten back to this old Robert right even you know, maybe not all the time, So this is going to mess them up. And then I saw what it actually did to them. Woke up out of this. I actually started throwing up, so I reacted to the you know, and I think I woke up kind of towards the end of this trip, and so I thought I died. So they're cleaning my mouth right, some puke and they're cleaning my mouth out, and I start raging because I thought, I literally think I'm dead. I'm like, this is hell, like I whatever it was, I was in a spot I thought I was dead, and I grabbed the therapist and I'm raging streaming and I'm like, I eft up my family, I'm a you know, streaming and just I'm throwing them on the ground and just complete rage. And I remember my female therapist was there that we work with, and I grabbed here and I'm like, you got to call my wife tell him. I'm tell her I'm sorry. So I think I'm dead. I'm back on Earth, out of this trip, but I'm still half in it, I think. But I literally thought I was dead, and so this happens. I later found out. I raged for like twenty minutes, and they're calming me down, and some things happened, and finally I calmed down and realized I was back on Earth and I wasn't actually dead, but I can asking them like did I die? Did you guys resuscitate me? It was that profound uh. And so I come out of it and I was just in shock. So we're before it was blissful, and this time I was like, I mean I was in shock for hours, even till we got back. I got back home and I'm telling my wife about it, and I'm like, I think they're lying to me. I think they had to resuscitate me, like I pushed it too far. And so as I process all this, but what I what did stick and the rewiring the medicine, what it did do is that it made me, see what would happen if I did screw up and did take my life in one way or another, And that is stuck with me since that day, Like if something pops up, now, I know full well on my worst day, I'm better off here and my family's better off without me, or is better with me. Even the days. You know, if I have a bad day or I get angry and that stuff doesn't happen since then you know it happens like we happens when you're a dad, and you know the normal angry exactly.

02:32:55
Speaker 4: If anybody's watching this and plaything and I'm assuming this, you can tell me if I'm wrong. But like you're not going to take this medicine. All your issues are always going to be fixed, but you're going to have better tools and better understanding of where your value is in life exactly.

02:33:07
Speaker 1: Yeah, and these like this instance for me is like, oh, I'm I'm you know I and I didn't believe it before, and I truly believe it even you know, no matter what happens, right, even worst case I never want to happen, I get dementia, I'm better off here. My family needs me, right, And so that's what this experience showed me. And so since then it's been you know, I have the tools now and it rewired some things. They're showing that, you know, I begained specifically actually scientifically rewires your brain. Right, it's growing new white brain matter. So doctor Nolan Williams, you know, God rest his soul, he has passed since this study, but he did a study with thirty vets special ops vets and improving it. Right, That's a big part of this movement with this medicine. It's actually proving not only the spiritual part, but it is you know, creating new neural pathways. It is actually fixing brain damage or working around it. Right, some of my damage is still there, but I'm creating new neural pathways around it. And so knowing all this on top of the spiritual stuff, since then, I have the tools, and I know I knew after these treatments that my something was working on my brain. I mean for days afterwards, I would in months or weeks, I could just feel like a buzzing in my head. Right, I'm like something, something's working up there right, right, and then I notice all the again, all the emotional changes. And so since twenty twenty three, Right, none of that stuff has really come back, right, Like, yes, do I get anxious? Yes do I It is not the magic pill, but I have the tools, right, I know now to right if something pops in, it's like nope, I see that vision of what it did to my family, right, And I don't have these over the top reactions like I did before the brain fog and that stuff has gone. Do I still have days I get a little brain fog? Yes? Right, you know late, you know, sure, like you guys, you're like late in the day, it's like, oh wow, that's something's not working right, you know. But for the most part before it was twenty four to seven. Now I'm super clear, right to get talking fast because I'm like, I'm just crisped and everything's working good. And so I know not only the scientific part of it, but the spiritual part of it. I know I'm a different human being. And my wife will still bring stuff up, you know, some huff and I'll get frustrated be like, oh, I overreacted on that, and I'm very aware, right, Oh, I shouldn't reacted like She's like your son just walked out in the street and almost got hit by a car when we were, you know, instance, going to our get on our boat, and I grabbed him and I lit into him like you gotta right, And then I felt bad. I'm like, oh, the old Robert's back and she's like, that's what a dad should do. That is a normal reaction. Yeah, And so she's like, no, you're She brings it up to me all the time. She's like, you know, I can she can trust me to take the kids to soccer practice, basketball practice and not worry about me one forgetting where I'm at or two having a reaction around people. So it's daily stuff happens. And you know the fact that I flew here by myself, She's like, just a little step like that. Five years ago, you couldn't do that. I would have had to be with you because you would either lost at the airport, you know, I wouldn't have forgot where you were, whatever these things were. So it's that my life is different now because of the tools I have, and I know that some of the work it's done right. I went through the some of the you know, you guys will find it funny, but I went through some of the brain concussion stuff pre pre medicine and post medicine. Right, so I pre medicine, I'm doing, you know, jump through the hoops right all right, you know the ten years of stuff they make you jump through to try and get something out of it. And I finally was like, I don't care. I don't care about this, you know. So I had had a couple of doctor's appointments pre medicine and a couple post medicine. So I come back post medicine and it is I'm like, you know, pre medicine, I'm talking about you know, suicide and talking about these things, and post medicine, my my scores are better, My everything's better. And they're like, oh, you don't qualifying. Of course I don't, right, But at that point didn't care because I I mean, that showed me because some of my scores and some of the things that happened pre and post. I'm like, I'm definitely a different person. My scores are better, Like I cleared my recall and it's kind of funny, but I'm also like, of course, of course I went and did something else then. Yeah, And you know a lot of guys do it, you know, want the money or want the because they deserve it. But I was just like, I just I want to be healthy. So I kind of laughed it off, and it's like, oh, this is showing me now on top of everything else that that I am, things are fixed or drastically better.

02:37:25
Speaker 2: Yeah. Have you gotten a brain scan since the first one you got where it was like you look like somebody took a baseball bat to it?

02:37:32
Speaker 1: I did the part where So my initial brain scan was a spec scan. It's called a spec scan, right, which measures It gives you a three D image. It measures the surface of your brain pretty much things that are living or not living. So it measures electrical current in your brain, it measures blood flow. What they are finding out. So I got the same scan afterwards, thinking oh, I'll see it drastically better. But what I learned is that's not the correct scan to do that. Now does that measure damage? Absolutely, But they're learning, and this is where this medicine is new. These neurologists are learning that that scan for whatever reason, there's been a few people like me, it doesn't show a drastically better brain. Now why is that? Well, depression all these things is inflammation. So I had huge inflammation on my brain. So that's why certain parts were lit up, and then it shows the dead parts. I begain takes inflammation away, so now some of this actually some of it looks worse or the same because I have less inflammation. It's not actually creating the surface of a new those areas that were damaged. It's the internal stuff. So a long winded way of answering that is. And fMRI actually looks deep into the brain. That's what doctor Nolan Williams used at Stanford, and they can see the new white brain matter. They can see the new neural pathways. So I'm messed up, which I can accept now, right, So right, you're.

02:38:54
Speaker 2: Thinking, damn, I WISHONA had this scan or MRI before, so you can actually see for sure whether it's rewire.

02:39:00
Speaker 1: Or exactly the actual where they can sign and they did it in the study from Stanford. You can look at the study and it shows the brain new areas internally, where mine was more the surface of how is everything currently working. It's not the in depths of new things starting. So long story short, it was kind of a bummer, but it was also that's why I didn't want to get another one, because I'm like, I know, I feel better, and at the end of the day it was the wrong scan to do. It was right to figure out the damage, but the neurologe say, hey, we don't understand it either, right, for whatever reason, the psychedelics part of it, because of the infamation. This is not the right scan. This is more of a surface level where the fMRI goes deep into it, which I am going to get at some point, but it would have been nice to have a baseline. But you look at these the study they did and they have pre imposed fMRI and it's black and white on there that there is new stuff growing and that that's that's the standard for what you.

02:39:52
Speaker 2: Need from the psychedelics. There isn't there somebody that put like, what was it, like fifty million dollars toward a Yeah.

02:40:00
Speaker 1: Through this process, I became, you know, the military community became my old football family, right. So you know, Marcus is a very close friend. We talked almost daily. He's just a guy that we check in. It's you know, telling stories. O, Hey, this happened and I used to react like this. Guess what I did? I laughed, right, like just stuff to We talk about how we used to be now we're different. Our wives talk. But through the community I met and Marcus dam Or Capone with VET Solutions. They started really they treated, they've treated a couple thousand guys now right, and it's and I'm not talking at works for a couple. I mean, you could bring of the two thousand they've tested. You bring almost all two thousand in here, and you're gonna hear the same story, really right, one level or another, sometimes one treatment, sometimes two took two for me, but you're gonna hear the same story. It is. The results are astounding. And so I got introduced to some people you know, with this study through Stanford and then they started going A group put together to go to Texas, were trying to get money from Texas to study it. So former Governor of Texas, Rick Perry, he asked me to be involved. He's heading all this or was. So we were in Texas working with politicians, legislators and they signed a bill and again I'm a small lego in this thing, but gave my story. They signed a bill that put fifty million dollars towards the study of ibegame for PTSD TBI addiction. It's choose on addiction. I haven't drank since my first treatment in twenty twenty one. Haven't had a drop of alcohol. I have zero interest in having any alcohol. It is, so it's huge for addiction. So they originally started using IBA gain with heroin addicts. They still do, like eighty some percent of heroin addicts will go through this treatment and not touch heroin again. So it's huge, huge for addiction. You know, Marcus, these guys were on numerous right, they call it the military sixty pack right of antidepressants, all these things. The majority of them are not on any of their pills. A ton of these guys don't drink. Marcus has never drank again. Right, There's tons of stories like mine. So Texas put the money sign that bill here a few months ago, so they're going to start studying it. They're going to do trials on veterans, on athletes to try and get this pass because it is currently a Schedule one drug, right, it's so there's that loophole to jump through to get it off Schedule one. So they're got that money, and then we started the which I'm a part of, also is the American I Begain Initiative. So other states now are trying to pull fronts from their state to study it so there's scientific proof and they want to continue it to show Hey, this is just not a spiritual drug. This is not what everyone thinks it is. This is a medicine that will drastically help people's mental health and help fix parts of their TBI, like it did me and has done other guys. So there's lots of things going on within this realm of this medicine that there's not a there's not a stigma of the you know, psilocybin or ayahuasca. There's because it's so unknown. But that's why we're having, you know, having success and things like that. And that's what brought me to create my foundation, which is Athletes for Care. And so I saw all these veterans and I saw what I was doing for them. I saw what it did for me, and going through this couple of year process, you know, I was like, I want to help guys. Because I finally opened up after healing, called a couple of my friends that I disappeared for like ten years, right, guys I played with and like, hey, sorry, you know, I just was going through some stuff. Here's what happened. And like Oh. So then I had guys reaching out, hey I'm going through this, or I the anger part resonated with me, like what's that like? Or the suicide stuff, And so I'm like, man, I could help people, right, right, because I'm not the you know, I thought I was the only guy, right, I'm the only NFL football player that got done. Yep. Well I'm the only guy out there going through this, right, and I don't want no one else wants to hear about it, right, And so I started having these stories and I'm like I want to help, right because I'm like that in my wife's like, you know, saved our saved your life, saved our marriage, it saved you know, saved you like you're back as a human being. And so started Athletes for Care. And what we want to do is, you know, be a voice for athletes. I want you know, we're doing this storytelling because that I went on Marcus's podcast. Right, the outreach we got from that, we get guys, ex athletes and all sports calling like, hey, this is me, right, the same thing you talking. I think it's me, you know, whether it's all the stuff, some of the stuff, So educating athletes that hey there are other options. And I'm not saying I begin as the magic pill, everyone should go do it, but when other things don't work, it's an option. It's another modality of something that can help. It helped me. I can show you two thousand other guys that it helped drastically, and so we want to be a resource, and I want to be a resource for these guys. And I've had more and more people reach out and I'm sure, like you guys, I know these guys. Right. There's guys we played with that you see around town or you see at an event and you're like, dude's got a screw loose. Yeah, right, And it's not I don't mean to make it funny, but there's they're either coping with alcohol or drugs. And I've been around these guys and I'm like, oh man, they need this medicine. Because these guys you play.

02:45:16
Speaker 4: With and you look at them and you'll have like a concerning conversation with like a teammate, being like that's a guy you have to worry about after football, Like a lot of guys you have to worry about. But some guys just even when they're playing, You're like, I can see where something could happen there for sure.

02:45:30
Speaker 1: Yeah, and you know, and it's not always right. I was pre pre this healing, you see. And it's unfortunate like these guys that make the news because they do something drastic, right, whether it's suicide or hurting right, you know, hurting their neighbor or there's been instances of that to where you're like, this dude's lost his rocker right right now you look at it, and I'm like, check his brain, right, and a lot of it now they are checking their brain. So it's TBI related issues, right, they raged anger a lot of stuff. And so being able to tell the story and be a resource for these people that are going through what I did. Yeah, it's not fun, right, sit here and tell you the stories about my kids and those things, right, but it's healing for me and the amount of people that it is, Like, dude, you saved my life by talking about it because you were you know, strong enough to like put your shit out there, right, like thank you. And so that's that's why I continue to do this with athletes for Care because there are lots of guys that are suffering, and there's you know, there's there's ways of healing. And that's why I want to be help push this medicine forward and just be a resource for guys. Hey, maybe maybe I begain isn't for you, but hey, won't you try this right once't you try the cold waterer therapy. Won't you try these breathing exercises?

02:46:41
Speaker 2: Right?

02:46:42
Speaker 1: I'm I've turned into a super focused hippie, right because you know, like you, we've talked about it, the the longevity stuff. Right. I get up and I do breathing exercises. They want to Jane, and it's there's so many things you can do. But that medicine for me got me years ahead and I know, fix some stuff. But now I'm addicted, right, I'm addicted to doing those things and I do. I get up at four in the morning, I go get my cold sub, I do my meditation, I do my breathing, I do my workout, I do my hyperbaric chamber. I know these tools. If I walk into a gym and I get activated because it's loud, I'm still I don't like chaos, right, That's who I am. I'm very straightforward as a dad, as a coach, as a person. But I walk in and I get activated because you know, everyone's not us. I don't know how you guys are with your kids. I'm guessing we're very similar, right, this is not a free for all. Right, kids act a certain way right walking to a gym and people are bouncing off the walls and no judgment on their parenting. But it activates me. Right. But now it's not this over the top activation that I have to leave the gym. It's like, I'm okay, not my kids. It's not my problem. My kids are doing what they're supposed to do. I can walk in, I can sit down. I cannot be up there shaking because of the reaction. And so I know, sitting here to watch my daughter and enjoy what she's doing or whatever one of my kids I'm watching, or if we're coaching. Now I'm coaching, and you know, with my wife, we're coaching basketball. We're about to start the high school basketball season, coaching girls. And it's the greatest thing in the world. I couldn't have done that five years show.

02:48:08
Speaker 4: When you talk about being your vulnerable state and saving as many people, there's like you hear a lot of stories about people who have gone through processes either similar to yours or whatever, and how they've you know, changed so many people's lives. Has your wife ever told her side of the story and been vulnerable in those senses because you talk about you know, as you're telling me this story, I'm thinking, like, it's amazing the amount of growth you've had and how you're very humble sitting on this bus talking about these hard times that I've had and this is the process that it took, and this is where I'm at now, And I just think about your wife and as you come out of this first medicine and she's singing a different version of you, there's probably a bunch of stones that haven't been on turned for her of like different things that maybe you did that she hasn't healed from, and there's a process for her to heal through. Has she ever been able to kind of tell her side of the story and these things?

02:48:56
Speaker 1: It's funny you ask. We just did it. We went to Iowa that week, did some mental health work with the Athletic department with current student athletes, you know, not regarding psychedelics, just more mental health in general. Met with the psychiatric department. We're collabing with them at the University of Iowa. But we sat down and she had a couple hour interview and it's the first time she's told her story. She's given tidbits on different things that she's people she spoke to with different articles that they'd done on me. But we have that in the pipeline to come out. Because I took a good friend of mine from Iowa. He played in the league. He was struggling and I talked to him about this two years ago, and about a year and a half ago he reached out. He's like, I need help, I want I need to go do this. So I went down with him to Mexico just to hold space. And I remember, this is when it hit me, like you said, because I was down there and I called my wife and said, hey, can you call such and such as wife and kind of tell her what's going to be like when they get back, because remember how much we struggled, right, because she was she was for a long time. She was like, oh, it's great, you're fixed. Awesome, right, Like I've been living through all this stuff and it's awesome.

02:50:04
Speaker 4: She has multiple years of going through all these things.

02:50:07
Speaker 1: Yeah, so she you know, that's when it hit me. I was like, we need to if she wants to, and she did. She's willing to tell it because it's the wives and the kids that go through it. And so she called my buddy's wife and and it was great because she wasn't really into him going down there. She's like, what is Robert doing? Like they're going to make he's taking him to Mexico? Do drugs? Trust us? Right? Well, then he gets home and I waited. I didn't want to call an ask how's he doing. A week later, get a call from our text It's like, I'm sorry, I didn't believe in this when you left. He is a different person. Thank you so much and the stuff you told me. And then we were like, okay, well, now here's this going to happen, right, You're gonna get some resentment coming up, just like my wife did. And she did. She called my wife and was like, yep, it's there, he's fixed. It's all great. You know, tell me to relax. Yeah, right, because I'm the one reacting now. So it's a big part of this whole story, is the entire part of it. And that's what Marcus and Amber Capone did for me at Vets They are my best friends now one of my best friends because they took that call from me, right, And that's why I want to help other guys. And it's just another it's a way of of healing, right, because we all have our issues, right, We're always going to have our issues. Right. But and it's not not that it's not everyone in the world, but you know, athletes especially right, you come out of being what we were and the identity and all these things, and like we're full bore, you know. So I want to start with that and help guys, you know, get healing. And that's you know, this is how I know how to do it.

02:51:35
Speaker 2: Yeah, I just I sit here and think it's like, how do you reach another Robert Gallery out there? That's more so in the phase of the years until you decided like, hey, I need help, the moment on the on the driveway where you look at your wife and you say I need help, like the guy that isn't wanting to hear it. I feel like that's always the that's always got to be the challenge.

02:51:57
Speaker 1: Right, it is, And I think that's I think talking about it, I've learned. I've had numerous guys that have like, Hey, seeing you talk about it, they reach out and like, I'm having the same thing. Seeing you talk about it made me reach out. Am I ready to go to Mexico? No, some of them are. We've helped guys get down there. Yeah, But I think it's just the vulnerability. So it's not just me, right, it's you hear you know, that's just this day and age too. Is like not only athletes, but you hear Marcus Latrell talk about it, you hear DJ Shipley. These guys are the baddest dudes on the face of the earth. And what they did right, and you hear them talk about it right, And that's what did it for me, Like to sit in a room and cry with a bunch of Navy seals and hug and tell them you love them, right, the stuff that you're like ten years ago, none of us would have said that, right, you know what I mean. So to be vulnerable and talk about this, you know, we've been getting a lot of outreach and guys like, hey, something's going on. You know, I don't know if I'm ready, but but this, you know, stay keep me in the loop on what you're doing, because just that talking about it makes people think it's okay to like, oh shit, that's me. And we've had guys. I've had a couple of guys that reached out, had heard my story on a different podcast or a news article, went and did the medicine and went on their own like wanted healing, went and did it and then reached out again or reached out then post treatments like dude, you save my life, like and that's pretty cool.

02:53:13
Speaker 2: In with Marcus Latreel at the first spot, like yeah, I don't know if you like your stuff, but you saved my life.

02:53:18
Speaker 1: Yeah.

02:53:20
Speaker 2: Yeah.

02:53:20
Speaker 1: It's like you know the days it's that I'm you know, working on the business side of having a foundation, right, I tried to raise money and do all these things that you got to do to keep running. And you get an email like that and you're like, holy cow, like there is a reason, and it's it's pretty cool, and you know, sit and talk to guys. There's been numerous ex players that I've been at vents with and what are you up to now? And it just wasn't me preaching like you should do medicine. It's just more out this is what happened. I went dark, did this found healing in this and they're like, oh right, I've had numerous guys like the rage thing. He's like, and it's like they relive what I was doing, and so I hope they, you know, find something that helps them. But there's lots of guys like that. It's not everybody. I'm not playing, you know, like you guys, I'd go do the whole thing all over again. I'd go back to Iowa and do the same stuff and hit the same way and be the guy that was trying to kill people with my head. Yeah, because that's what I was. I was. I was not a finesque guy, right. I was a smash a face mask through your face.

02:54:15
Speaker 2: Mask type of guy, be ready to die on the field.

02:54:17
Speaker 4: And so yeah, there's those moments on Saturdays in the Fall where you're just like, man if I died out here, this is an honorable death. I'm willing to do it.

02:54:24
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a sick part about it, and I'm still right. That's also the thing with the medicine. It's not I'm not a hippie now, like yes do I do. I am right because you've seen me or I can like in the airport, right, things are getting activating me. Right, it's like chaos. I don't like chaos. There's a bunch of noises because I can hear. Now, I can hear, and I'm thinking clearly, and I'm like, oh, there's a lot going on in here. Sorr sit in the corner right close my eyes, and I'm sure people like, who is this massive tattooed dude in the corner. And it's awesome. It's a it's a great feeling to be you know, healed and be that much far ahead of where I I was and to be able to offer it to other people and guide them through maybe before they get to where I get. That's my whole My whole goal with athletes for care is to be there before they get to where I got. Telling my wife like, here's all this stuff, right, let's get you the rage stuff now that you're recognizing, Right, that's what leads to this other stuff. That's part of TBI. That's the reality of it, right, not blaming the league, not blaming anyone, Like I said, I do it all over again, but like, let's offer healing. And that's a big part of what we're doing and why I'm on here.

02:55:33
Speaker 2: What's your relationship, like with football.

02:55:35
Speaker 1: Now you know when I got.

02:55:37
Speaker 2: And how's it changed? Since it's probably the bitter taste you had in your mouth when you left it.

02:55:41
Speaker 1: Yeah, I can sit and enjoy and watch a game with my son because he loves it. Am I going to choose to on a Saturday or Sunday in December when it's dumping snow out stay and watch it, watch the NFL games on Sunday ticket rather than being on the mountain snowboard and absolutely not right. I'm not a I was never that way, Like, I'm not a guy that sit and watches it every weekend. But I can turn it on now. My son can turn it on, like Dad, let's watch the football game? Like sure, buddy. Yeah, pre all this, I would lose it, like turn that stuff off. It was just all this hatred.

02:56:15
Speaker 4: Towards footballs for the devil time of Yeah.

02:56:17
Speaker 1: It was. I hated it. I didn't want to watch it because it brought back all the negative stuff. Well, you're a failure. You should still be playing. I'm forty five years old. I shouldn't be playing still, right, But it was all these things that go through your head as an ex athlete to where now it's fun with my son to watch it. It's like, oh, yeah, George Kittle's on the you know, it's you know, I know George and his family. And to hear my son be so excited about oh, you know, I was watching Receiver and you know, am I gonna sit and watch it? I will because he wants to.

02:56:43
Speaker 4: Dude, isn't it you're bringing up George Kittle. Isn't it so crazy that you went to Iowa and a young eight year old George Kittle waited in line for an hour for you to take a photo with you as a kid, and then now because of how long you waited and signed those photos and autographs and all those things, he's now a guy that does that because he saw you do that. And now your kids watching George Kittle being like, holy shit, George Kittle.

02:57:06
Speaker 1: Yeah, and that just nuts. It's amazing. And to hear that I heard the you know, George and his dad shared that story with me and I had no idea, right and showed me the picture and it's yeah, it's it's a big deal because we get in the thing. It's like, you know, I remember doing that. I remember standing there because I'm like, I can't let these kids down. I was that kid. I was that kid when my brother was playing waiting for Tim D. White to get an autographed Yeah, and so to have that relationship with them, you know, and George is actually George has been great. Like we're doing a fundraiser with him through All True. It's a rally fundraiser. They're they're actually giving away a Himalaya e V defender a vehicle. Right, So if you go to All True dot com and check that out. George is all show exactly. Carl Rudolph started it and and George does a lot of things for them. We have a lot of things intertwined, Like he's big in the military community. You know, what he's done with his career, you know, is great, but all the other stuff he does, so it's great to partner with them. You know, they're going to help raise funds through that All True fundraiser for our organization for Athletes for Care and just just good human beings right there. You know that's the Midwest, the Midwest in them and and you know the Iway guy. So what else what else is?

02:58:16
Speaker 2: Yeah? How how hard was it to eventually love your career and love what you accomplished and love what you did because I can imagine, I can only imagine how angry you probably would be at times being a number two overall pick. And like I just I can just tell listening to you loved the game of football. You loved fucking grinding, you loved putting on one hundred pounds, you loved imposing your will against the opponent and working out and grinding and getting better. And for your career, you know, we're all psychos, we all want to be the greatest. For it not to work out and in a way of the expectation of the world and everything else. I'm sure that you were very bitter for a while. And because you talked about your ego death, you talked about you speaking on it, and it was very fleeting. But loving your career when you said you were coming out of and from the spiritual side of everything, I'm sure that was very hard.

02:59:11
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, it is right. We're competitors. That stuff doesn't go away. But this, you know, this whole journey led me to there's a lot of other thing you guys know it right, Like, there's a lot of other factors that go into what happens. Right, So I look back at my career at Iowa and why was I so successful there? Because the head coach that started in nineteen ninety nine is still there in twenty twenty six, right, So it was the same coach, the same system, right, and all these other things. But it's about right you look back and yeah, you played ten years. You think you should have played twelve, You played twelve, right, it doesn't matter, right at the end of the day, that's who we are as competitors. Could have played twenty years and I'm sure I'd be sitting here and playing I should have played twenty two, right, Like this whole expectation of what you should do. Yeah, So it's yeah, it's it's also looking at things in a healthy way. There's a lot of things that are in life or out of your factors that affect what happens, right, and you have a story in your head of how you want things to happen. But it's, yes, it's a sit here and like, I'm proud of what I did. Right. I didn't dwindle it away because I was out, you know, not not putting everything into it. And so yes, it's it's it's a much better relationship now. And that's you know, I wouldn't be here, you know, that's part of the spiritual part of it. I wouldn't be here talking about this if all that stuff didn't happen, right, So it's part of the process it was supposed to be for me. Did I still want to go to the playoffs every year or a year never? You know what I mean? Like, yeah, yeah, that stuff still bothers me, right, it gets the playoff time and I'm like, I mean, it doesn't debilitate me, but I'm like, ah, that's a'd January see the winning team just like man, yeah, feeling yeah. And and as you guys know, when you're winning, it's it's fun, right, it's and it's easy, right. And then you're like, I got bullrust there, but it didn't matter because we were rolling and he got it out and like you know, and that happens in a you know, you're losing and you're you know, down twenty and your were past blocking every single one, like hold on, yeah, yeah.

03:01:07
Speaker 4: That's the worst. When you open up the second half and you're like two minute boys, hold on to your nothing for the rest of the game.

03:01:13
Speaker 1: You're praying to.

03:01:13
Speaker 4: Get a couple of slides. Hey, that's the worst feeling in the world when it comes to a career, dude, Like we've talked about it. I still miss playing football, but I am extremely proud of Like if you if you're able to be proud of what you were able to accomplish and put it giving one hundred percent effort at the end of the day, like the result of you know, everyone has this like idea in your head of like how you're going to write the end of your story, and everyone has it the same way, like Tom Brady did it, or these other you know one guys did and it's like, if you gave everything you had to it, and then there's nothing to be upset about because you you put everything you had into the game.

03:01:48
Speaker 1: That'bsolute the most.

03:01:48
Speaker 2: Important had to have been very freeing too to kind of have that ego death. Let it go, love and appreciate it because we all know, like I know that you being two hundred and twenty thirty pounds with high jump records or four by one, you would have never imagined somebody coming to you and say, hey, you're going to gain one hundred pounds you're gonna be an Outland Trophy winner, You're gonna be an All American, You're gonna be the number two overall pick in the NFL and be an offensive lineman and play for eight nine years in the NFL. You'd be like, Yeah, you're fucking crazy being a farm boy from small town Iowa. So it is. It's like you've done a lot of badass shit that absolutely everybody would trade places for. And it's really cool that you've learned. You've had this process of learning and very much lows and now you're getting new experience highs again and love yourself and be a family man and do all these things and start a foundation that you've started and changing people's lives. So dude, I appreciate you for sharing all this. I'm sure it gets still at some point no matter how much you talk about it. I'm sure there's some still some discomfort at times, like having to pull from old memories that you probably feel shame and embarrassment from. So dude, thank you for sharing all those sincerely.

03:03:01
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, it's it's like I said, it's been. It's great for me. It's right, this process helped me enjoy like you said other things in life. Right, my I'm one of eight guys in the Ring of Honor in Kinnick Stadium at the University of Iowa. Right, it's eighty right, and that like something I am so proud of. And I went post medicine to where I didn't really I was still right embarrassed or whatever it was. Right, there's all these other factors, and I'm like, that's one instance where I'm like, I remember standing there that day they unveiled it, and I'm like, holy shit, I'm one of eight dudes in the history of Iowa football that has their name on the stadium. Like, I did some really big time stuff, right, doesn't That's not who I am just because my name's there, but that to be able to really enjoy that stuff, and we all did it right as our careers went on your next thing, next thing, next thing, next thing, and now stand back and truly enjoy the process of what you did and what you accomplished from it. It's it's a it's a very amazing deal.

03:03:57
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's awesome.

03:03:58
Speaker 4: I got one more question for you. I was so hung up on your first d MT trip and You're like going to the light and you see God and you're like, I saw God the way I see God? How clear was this trip for you? Was like we're all sitting here right now talking absolutely what does God look like?

03:04:15
Speaker 1: There's two things I don't get into, politics and religion. No, but for me, right, it was the typical what I learned in in CCD class when I was beard beard, long white hair, the white robe. Right.

03:04:28
Speaker 4: Was he a heavier set guy or medium build?

03:04:30
Speaker 1: What we look at medium build, white guy? Right? Yeah, God's white.

03:04:35
Speaker 2: We're not judging that.

03:04:37
Speaker 1: But yeah, it was like very crystal clear. Yeah, and so yeah, some of those things and that's part of this too. We can laugh about it now. But the people that have gone through we talk about these things you see and you're like they get it. Or if you've experienced things like that, you're like, holy cow, right, like talking about seeing the light and doing these different things. The death, you're like, you know, I'm very clear what it's going to be like when I do die. Like that came out of that too, like that peaceful. It's like, oh, this is this is not bad, right, It's not a scary thing. Yeah, you know, some of the stuff that happened in there but it's yeah, it's it was crystal clear.

03:05:11
Speaker 2: Yeah. I saw my god, he had a thirty Rex sitting next to you.

03:05:15
Speaker 4: Yeah. Yeah, tuxedo T shirt on mullet.

03:05:21
Speaker 2: Shirt.

03:05:22
Speaker 4: I bro, that's got to be such a crazy feeling in your head to be like, yo, this is this is the guy everyone's talking about all the time. This is him.

03:05:29
Speaker 2: You know, I was gonna say the tuxedo T shirt just cutting have to.

03:05:32
Speaker 4: Yeah, he got his belly out a little cropped up and me too, squat. Yeah yeah, Now that's all. Your story is incredible. Man, We all the things Will said. I would love to double down on that, but like, thank you for sharing your story with us. It's awesome and I hope that anybody who hears this that's going through something they reach out because that's the mental health side is so important. So thank you.

03:05:52
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, that's what you know, that's I want to continue. We have you know, websites set up, you know, and like like any foundation, right like that, you know, people feel inclined to donate. There's a donate page on there because this we can help send guys for treatment. Right Because unlike what most people think, not all professional athletes have money or save their money or had careers like we did that we put stuff away, you know. So we're raising money to help with the research and you know, help send guys that need help that are in financial meaning. It's not as football guys, right, there's UFC guys. We've got hockey guys. We've got tons of guys. So that's a big part of this is also but that's all on our website and just a resource of things you can do and people to reach out to.

03:06:34
Speaker 4: What's the average cost to take one person down.

03:06:37
Speaker 1: There's a couple of different facilities, but you know, anywhere from six thousand dollars to ten plus, but the place that the majority of that I've gone to is just over six thousand dollars, you know, to get there. The treatment, it's the doctors, it's the pre impost therapy, integration, reintegration, so not you know, not cheap. But I also came out of it and like dude, I would have paid sixty thousand dollars. Right, It's easy for me to say, but I also think it's such a profound thing that's like, holy cow, let's figure out how to make this happen. And that's what Vets has done. You know, they give grants. You know, we want to do that if we start raising enough money. We want to give grants to guys that are a need that can't can't financially do it and give them part of a grant. And so you know the other thing I would love to, you know, give a small plug too, is this experience is easy for me to talk about it and you listen to me and like, okay. But there's a new documentary that actually just came out on Netflix that Marcus and Amber Capoem were a part of with their organization. It's called In Waves and War and it's very very good. I've seen them multiple times. Just got released. It's on Netflix and it gives a good idea of this process. More scientific stuff on the medicine, but it's some great storytelling like mine that you'll be like, oh I heard that from Robert right if you go watch it, because it's it's very similar and it's just bringing awareness to guys.

03:08:01
Speaker 2: We talk about, you know, things that we can laugh about. We do have a final question. It's brought to us by bud Light. It is it is comical, you know how people would do anything for a nice I've heard that, what is something in your life that Robert Gallery would do anything for? And you've seen Brendsey's Taylor. It's a coin thing. You can't say family, Oh yeah.

03:08:27
Speaker 4: Can't say family.

03:08:31
Speaker 1: I think for me it would be being able to consistently live in the moment, to be in the moment, like I'm very much more in the moment now than I was, But I've had that feeling of being in the moment for days on end. Right post medicine work, there's times where I you know, I'm on my routine to go into guys like us, we push and push and push, right, got to be great, gotta do this like you guys started this like we got a ticket to the next level. You're doing this, But to go to be able to be in the moment, gym, watch my daughters play basketball and just be in the moment watching them, not worrying about like, oh, they screwed this up, right. It's that mentality of high level athletes, right, I'm guessing you guys are the same. Or as your kids get older, you just push and push all you should have done that. But there's been instances where I've been in the moment. I've been on a snowmobile in the middle of the mountains and I can see every single snowflake that's coming towards me. I'm like, oh, I am in this moment right now, right there's me the snowmobile. I'm out. It is nuking snow and there's nothing else and I can see every single snowflake flying at me. So I'm so it's like a meditative state. And I've been in a gym where I just I'm in pure enjoyment of watching my daughter do something she likes, not being like, oh, she should have done this, or why didn't she do this? Or she didn't enough protein this last week, so that's why she's tired. Right, this thing that that high level. I'm guessing you guys are the same. It's like go, go go, But when you've seen that, calm miss So. I would like to say to be in the moment all the time the rest of my life. Just be in the moment with whatever's going on, whether that's good or bad, Like the past doesn't matter, the future doesn't matter. Like sitting here talking with you guys, right, just be which it is. It's great, right, Like that's why it's easy and you can talk about it because it's like you're completely in the moment. I'm not worried about anything other than right, the great stories and about how you know most people listening to this will be Hawkeye fans and not you know, Nebraska after this.

03:10:21
Speaker 8: So right, that's true.

03:10:24
Speaker 4: It is true.

03:10:25
Speaker 2: It always comes back to the Big ten. It always comes back before we came on the bus too. He's like, I got a gift for your daughters. Would you want it now before or would you want me to give to you on the podcast. So I'm just thinking like, oh, that's a solid dad given another day, a gift for his girls or something like that, like we can wait till the bus. And now that he pulled it out, I'm like, ah, he got me.

03:10:46
Speaker 4: I mean that's a solid gift.

03:10:47
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a solid gift. Very heady play by you.

03:10:50
Speaker 4: You know that was given to you by Robert Gallery, guy who's names on the stadium.

03:10:53
Speaker 1: Yeah, right right, And I know the coach very well, like my wife's still very close. So you know, maybe there's some scholarships in the future, but I know how you said you wouldn't send them there no matter what. But I'm also thinking, I mean, they look good in the black and gold, right, black and gol car kids team up right. I think you a little younger than mine, But.

03:11:13
Speaker 2: I've already started incorporating Like we had on our for the Dad's podcast, we curated this story, this Ai story of good guys and bad guys, and the good guys are huskers and the bad guys or haul guys. So trying to Indoctrinatom into thinking it's uscer football and I was the bad guys.

03:11:30
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, we do play each other in a few weeks, so we might need to figure out offline here how to get back to that game and then we can posture up on the opposite side lines. Okay, duel it out.

03:11:40
Speaker 2: I don't know.

03:11:41
Speaker 1: We might have to try and make that happen.

03:11:42
Speaker 2: Yeah, we will definitely have to have fun, some more fun because I do have fun with George each year. I used to have fun with the when he was a teammate of mine, Brandon Sheriff, we'd have fun with it every year too. But we'll come we can come up.

03:11:54
Speaker 4: He was a stunt he and Yellen Trophy as well. He's a stud.

03:11:58
Speaker 2: Tackle that went to guard and he was a monster, bro, Like hitting him thinking rich was not fun.

03:12:04
Speaker 1: Yeah, he's a good dude too. That's that's the cool part. Like you guys, right, we played with all these people and different people, but like they're just good dude. They're dudes. Right, at the end of the day, we're all sitting here, bs and right, and the dude's a dude.

03:12:19
Speaker 5: Right.

03:12:19
Speaker 1: There were savages, right, like some guys that were you know, I grew up watching Kyle Turley of right, Like, I'm sure you had somebody, but it was I want to be Kyle Turley. Got a jersey made from you know, with my name on the back but his number and the Saints, Like I want what do you think the hair came from? Right, Like yeah, dude ripping Telman off, Like, oh, that's that's the type of player. That's who I want to be, right, And then we all get together. I met him, like, dude, you were my hero, Like, you know, it's pretty cool.

03:12:44
Speaker 2: Yeah, dude, thank you, bro, thank you big hug Seiny Kisses Pastes podcast around, Leave comments and we will see you next week. Next week,