I Lived Like A Zombie, Then Built A Nonprofit | Ep 385

I Lived Like A Zombie, Then Built A Nonprofit | Ep 385

We share raw stories of overdose, a car crash, grief, and a psych ward circle to show why asking for help became the turning point. From surviving reckless years to building Voices for Voices, we map a plan to make mental health care free, humane, and within reach.

• gratitude for global audience and milestone growth
• teen risk, bullying, and cold pill overdose
• Windsor trip aftermath and highway crash from sleep loss
• rock-bottom moment and choosing help in 2017
• grief after family losses and anxiety on the road
• loneliness in care facilities and the need to show up
• mission of Voices for Voices and why costs block care
• publishing arm elevating new authors, including a nine-year-old
• practical ways to support through sharing, subscribing, and donating
• long-term goal of a free mental health facility and helping three billion people

Please subscribe to our show on your favorite platform, follow us on Rumble and YouTube, and visit voicesforvoices.org to donate or grab merch. Share, share, share—be a voice for you or somebody in need

Chapter Markers

0:00 Gratitude And Milestones

1:46 Near-Death Teen Years Revealed

5:27 The Windsor Trip And Car Crash

12:04 Choosing Help After Rock Bottom

18:19 Grief, Family, And Perspective

29:00 Nursing Homes And Loneliness

39:00 Purpose Through Service

47:24 Celebrating Young Author Ryan Solomon

54:00 Why Voices For Voices Exists

#ZombieLifestyle #NonprofitJourney #LivingLikeAZombie #SocialImpact #CharityWork #ZombiesInRealLife #BuildingANonprofit #FromZombieToHero #CommunitySupport #AwarenessCampaigns #MentalHealthMatters #TransformativeExperiences #Volunteerism #InspiringChange #LifeAfterZombie #justiceforsurvivors #VoicesforVoices #VoicesforVoicesPodcast #JustinAlanHayes #JustinHayes #help3billion #TikTok #Instagram #truth #Jesusaire #VoiceForChange #HealingTogether #VoicesForVoices385

Chapters

• 0:00 Gratitude And Milestones
• 1:46 Near-Death Teen Years Revealed
• 5:27 The Windsor Trip And Car Crash
• 12:04 Choosing Help After Rock Bottom
• 18:19 Grief, Family, And Perspective
• 29:00 Nursing Homes And Loneliness
• 39:00 Purpose Through Service
• 47:24 Celebrating Young Author Ryan
• 54:00 Why Voices For Voices Exists

Transcript

Voices for Voices, Justin Alan Hayes: 0:02

Hey everyone, it's Justin here with Voices for Voices. Thank you so much for joining us on this and all the episodes of the Voices for Voices TV show and podcast. We're grateful to have you with us. As always, uh, we have uh a lot of a lot of great things happening with within our organization here as we uh start getting closer to the end of calendar year 2025, and we have nobody else to thank but you, our followers, our viewers, our listeners, you're coming in from North America, South America, Africa, um, Europe, Oceania, Asia, Greenland, uh, Antarctica. Yeah, we're just so thankful. Uh hundred countries and provinces and territories, a thousand cities. Just so remarkable to be at this position here, um, and to be getting closer to that total episode number of 400. Whereas as you've heard me mention, we were only supposed to hit uh 300 total episodes um before or by the end of calendar year 2025. But we found a way, we found a way, we found a way to continue uh to fight through adversity, uh, to keep going when the easy thing to do could have been to stop, to give in. And I think this is a a good reminder. I am just a couple days removed from my uh my birthday, so I'm in the forties, and by all accounts, if you ask some people, especially people back in my uh teens, late teens, even in in in in the twenties, uh, by all accounts, and I think I even fell into this uh line of thinking for a very short period of time of I don't know that I should be here right now. I I don't know. I know that growing up brings all kinds of growing pains even in the absolute um well I know that going back, and this is something I really haven't discussed a lot, um publicly, but privately and I don't know what that looks like. I know what a little bit of what the feeling was like back on because to me I gone through braces twice, have an acne of being somewhat bullied. Uh even when I was doing well on sport teams, I I remember I remember being bullied being made fun of. I get a royal kid sometime, right? I don't know what impact that really had on me, but I know for a little bit of time I remember thinking, so this is this is in my teenage years. Uh when I I mean I'll give you two two examples. One, you uh you already know the examples I'm gonna give, but the first one is uh overdosing on cold and cough pills. So by all accounts, um I shouldn't be here after what the amount that I I took, and then secondly, I was what they call kind of burning the candle both ends, where I was staying up late a lot, was not valuing sleep at all. Sleep was just another thing, it wasn't something that I felt I needed, I felt that I was invincible. Who didn't? Who hasn't felt that way at one time or another? And I remember coming back from oh geez, I was was I 19, maybe been 19. And some of the guys I was working with in the summertime, we went up to Windsor, Canada. Uh, the the drinking age for alcohol was I don't know where it's at today. I haven't kept up with that. Uh, but it was less than 21, and I think it was 18, maybe 19. And any of that, we were working together on the golf course uh day in and day out, and we decided, hey, we're we're gonna we're gonna head up to Windsor, Canada for a night, and we'll a dayslash night. So that's what we did. Uh, we either worked on a Saturday, or we would all work Monday to Friday, and then we would work either half a days on Saturdays or half a days on Sundays, and so it took us a minute to get, I think there's maybe five of us, could have been more, and and so that's what we did. We we were able to arrange, I think, where we would work on Saturday, and then we would go up to Windsor right after work, or grab a shower, and then we would go up. And as soon as we got there, right, just because it was it was at least a few-hour drive. So uh by the time I got there, it might have been like middle afternoon, anyways. So we were up super late, of course. We were partying and drinking and and and all that, so it was legal at the time where we were at. So then we drove back. I was a passenger, I was not a driver, and we we got back, and so I was hungover, dehydrated, we got home, picked up my car, and went to uh to a friend's house, was about two hours away. So this is after getting literally zero sleep, zero good sleep, and I shouldn't have gone, but I did. So I drove up, and on my way back home, I was starting to I guess zone out, uh start to I guess close my eyes when I was driving, because that's the only thing that can explain uh abruptly being woken up while driving the car late at night, because that's what I had had done up till then. We we would, you know, whether we were going to Windsor or not, we we would pull late nights and and we'd have to be at work sometimes at 6, sometimes 6 30, sometimes even earlier in the morning. And it was relentless. I mean, you're it's physical labor. So you're mowing grass, you're spinning bunkers, you're uh cutting fairways, you're mulching, uh, you're pulling weeds, you're doing all kinds of activities. And I just thought it was another one of those type of deals. And uh anyway, so on my way home, bruppy was awoken, the car uh veered off the right side of the highway, and I guess grazed the uh the guardrail, and then automatically I jerked the wheel because I was like, well, I have to get off the guardrail, and I must have hit the guardrail harder than I thought I did because when I pulled off, turned a wheel, the pull off of the guardrail went literally straight in uh to one of those cement barriers that separates traffic going north or south or east or west, or you get an idea, and so that's another big thing. I the airbag didn't come out sometimes that's a good thing, sometimes that's not so good, uh, but it didn't come out, and there I was all alone, my parents are out of town, and all I can think of is how am I gonna explain this to work uh and my family? So all that being said, so that that's an event that by all accounts could have also uh you know taken my life and many others. Again, we talk about you know alcohol abuse and all those things of blacking out and you know over taxing, you know, parts of the insides of my body, and and so by all accounts, you know, being with you here today in this episode, I shouldn't really I shouldn't be here when I look back at those types of events that's not my thinking now, and not even close to my thinking. Because number one, I really I didn't even have even at that time, I had thought, well, I don't even know if I'm gonna be able to make it to 40, age 40. I hadn't again, I had no plans and no thoughts of what that would look like, how that would happen, but I just remember in my mind thinking I'm having too much fun doing things I really shouldn't be doing. And like Aerosmith, you know, says living on the edge. I mean, I was very close to the edge, I was hanging over the edge multiple times, and so it's hard for me at times to come on this show and to share what I do share when I do share it, what I share because I could come across, and some people say, Oh, well, you're just looking for pity. I'm not looking for pity at age 44. I am not looking for anything even close to pity. What I'm merely trying to do is I'm trying to share events and things that I've I've been through personally, and again, those are just two examples off the top of my head of why in November of 2017, when I hit rock bottom mentally, why I made the decision to ask for help. Finally, the boulders were lifted off of my shoulders. I didn't have to take how I was feeling. And up until that point, I wasn't doing it the right way, if I was even trying at all. Because I think part of me maybe at that time was afraid, like, oh well, if I get help, I didn't really plan that part of my life, because like I said, I was just planning as the teenage years went on into the 20s and and so forth and so forth, that I was just in my mind, I was always going to be partying, I was always gonna be going out to the club and uh drinking absorbing amounts of alcohol and doing things again that I had no business doing. And so that's why I said at the beginning of well, I don't know if I should be here right now because on each for me, I guess, for each birthday, for each birthday of mine or birthday of someone of my family's and now with my dad having passed on and in heaven on March first of twenty twenty twenty-four. It really brings things in into focus. And for me having my forty-fourth birthday I I was reminded that each year over forty that man how did I make it? How did I make it here? How did I? How did I get this far? So you hear me and you hear you see me and I share everything that I possibly can. Not because I'm some gray person. It's because I'm actually the opposite. I'm just an average person. Give me an example. The night that I took all those Kol and Cough pills in my teens, was at Perkins, was out of my mind, and before I was taken to the hospital, thank God. I was just walking around the kitchen in Perkins looking for a bathroom, and then I My stomach was sick, so somehow I made it back to the table I was at and became very nauseated and uh felt like I was like walking in space, like I wasn't like my feet weren't touching the ground and walking. And so how I made it through that, I don't I I don't know. I mean God's the only only thing I can think of. For some reason, it wasn't my time to go. Just like when I towed my car after coming back from Windsor, Canada. Wasn't wasn't my time to go all the time partying and walking to and from the clubs and short sleeve outfits and some of the coldest weather. It's amazing that I didn't pass away from the cold weather, especially given the alcohol that I consumed prior to the walkover, and then the walk back. Sometimes I had a ride, sometimes I didn't. For me, it was well, this is just what you're supposed to do. Go out and you party, and that's what I thought, and that's where my assuming was very wrong, and I still make assuming mistakes to this day. I think we all do try not to assume, but we do, I know I do try not to, but we're human, we try not to judge, but we're human, and so with my dad having passed last year, it puts a whole new significance on being alive and wanting to make a difference, wanting to help people. I only cared about myself so much of my life. Some may say that that's all I care about now, and I would respectfully disagree with you on that. And so I think one of the reasons I'm here is to help. Whether I know it or whether I don't, whether somebody tells me or they don't. Episode 384. We had nine-year-old published author Ryan Solomon on, and we were just a small part of his journey. Yeah. I mean, it gives me goose once even thinking about that. We think about helping others and how we can do that. And sometimes the best way to help others is by helping ourselves. And so what I look at as a small part of the process and helping him uh achieve one of his one of his dreams of being a published author, being the youngest published author in the United States, and as far as we know, across the world. And it's moments like that, or times like these reminds me that what we do is important. It first starts with each day is not a given. We don't know how many days, how many hours, how many seconds we're we're gonna be left on earth again? If you ask me, twenty four years ago, or even earlier than that, I would have said, I'm probably not gonna make it to 40 because I don't want to have gray hair, I don't want to get old, I don't want to be one of those old people at the club, and so now I have a family and married, and I have gray hair, and I'm 44, and I know there's a lot of work I have to do on multiple fronts, but I couldn't be more happy with somehow, some way, voices for voices coming to my mind to the extent it did, first as an event, now as a TV show and podcast, now as voices for voices publishing, now as in voices for voices production, and now as voices for voices gaming, and the list goes on. Why I made it to 44, but so many others haven't, they've lost their lives tragically, or some just in their sleep, they turn in for the night, the evening, and to heaven they go. So there's not a second that goes by that I am not grateful, and I say that with as much humility as I possibly can because I don't know when my last turning in for the night is going to be all I can do is try to impact things, processes, individuals, and as positive of ways that I can think of, and it doesn't make me perfect. I know I'm not perfect, nobody is. And I have I put my money where my mouth is to help people to position us knowing there's so much more work to be done, so much. But it's because I believe I believe in myself. I believe in my mental health. I believe in the people that are that God has put and continues to put in my life that help me make better decisions and look at things from the outside looking in and going, wow, just as I did in November 2017 when I was at that table of 10 individuals in that psych ward. And we're going around the table and everybody saying their name and why they were there. By the time it got to me, I I was speechless. And people are put into my life of being able to help, and it's not always with money. People sometimes always equate. Well, I already help people, I already donate, I already do these things. But have you ever volunteered? Have you ever just sat on the phone with somebody and just listen? You don't have to say anything, you don't have to have the right answers, but just bend there, bend the London ear. I think the gentleman's name began to the letter H when I was in that site ward. He's an older gentleman, and he had the bracelets of you know a fall risk. So the staff could know he was a risk of falling out of his bed if he was walking, all those, all those types of things. And I think it was around that table when we were introducing ourselves at that first day at that group therapy. This gentleman said his name. I don't know if he gave his age or what. May gave him his age, doesn't matter. He was it's just an older, more experienced gentleman. And he said, I'm here because I don't have any family, I don't know if anybody cares about me. And I I don't I don't have a hard time taking care of myself. Anybody's had a family member or somebody that's known, somebody who's had somebody, and I remember thinking many times visiting my grandparents, yeah, at the skilled living, the nursing home, whatever you want to, whatever you want to call it. And so I would I would show up and it was hard. I'm emotional. And I remember there being literally a line of I don't know if they're all lazy boy chairs, and we're not sponsored by lazy boys, so I'm not gonna say lazy boys. I I did, but there were cushion chairs where you know the feet go up and you can lay back. And I mean, there probably was like 40 of them. This this vast room. Some were off to some were resting, some were mumbling, and so I would go see my loved one. Some days were good, some days not so much. That's nothing better or nothing different than us as humans, all humans. We have good days and we have days that could be better, and I remember I was talking with my loved one, and out of the corner of my eyes, I saw somebody slip and fall out of their wheelchair, and they were just laying on that hard floor, and there was a some form of an alarm, like a beeping, some type of a signal to let the staff know. And so I'm with my loved one, and it took a while five minutes, maybe more until staff came and helped the individual up on through a battery of tests. Yeah, like concussion and that. So that was one thing. I was just like, oh my gosh. So that uh I'm not and I'm not even bringing this up about the staff. I'm just saying these types of things happen, and I didn't know what to do, I froze. And there's so many of those individuals in those chairs, and some saying it in their wheelchair at the t at table sitting up, and I remember talking to staff a couple different times where sometimes they would just be sitting at at a round table with with some of the residents and they would mention that you know they're that I would be surprised on of how many that live there in this nursing home facility how many get zero visitors zero and I I mean they were seen by staff and if they had medication and help getting dressed and then going to the bathroom and yeah they and so I don't know I don't know what part that plays in me wanting to help people and it's not even just it doesn't matter what age people are none of us are perfect so we all have needs we all have things that we could use a little help with from time to time it's just times like those when I started to go you know what Justin I wasn't quite there at that time I wasn't quite at that that that breaking point but I was getting there during during the events I just described the week of my wedding my my grandma in her nineties passed away and knowing she wasn't well it doesn't didn't doesn't make it any easier because I felt guilty that I was gonna be getting married in like two days after she passed away as if my mental health wasn't already out because I'm very emotional as you can see this isn't yeah the ougies these are the welling of the tears and but that's just who I am and so there were there was that where I don't even know if and that's been yeah that was in 2017 in May of 2017 I don't I don't know if I've ever fully grieved because I was just having a heck of a time with my mental health to start and then to layer that on top and having a huge event of getting married and and then going on feeling guilty for going on a honeymoon which my mental health was just shot and it if we were on an upper floor we were lucky to be able to go to tropical destination and some hotels get off the elevator and then you can you can literally see like a almost like a 360 view and it's like oh we have to walk all the way around halfway to get to our room and I was just so afraid I'd still am I just was not in a I just wasn't in a a good mental state had nothing to do with the marriage part it was just my mental health was just shot and I had gone so long without talking and I just remember I was at home I couldn't even see my grandma because I couldn't I couldn't come to the reality well this episode we've we've covered a lot of what I want it to be and what it is and the takeaway that I'd like for each and every one of you the takeaway is the raw authentic wanting to help wanting to be all in not for the slogan the be all in but just to be I want to help people and it doesn't have to be related to money this show our show the one you've made one of the hottest in the world for downloads for viewing on YouTube on Rumble listening on Spotify on Buzzsprout on Apple on iHeart on you name it we are on it the Voices for Voices TV show and podcast we did not get to this episode just by fluke when times got hard as they tend to do we just started putting our head down and said we want to help maybe maybe eat maybe this show maybe the other show maybe maybe somebody somewhere can pull a nugget of information out I think I brought up on our TikTok live the other day if you haven't joined us we we've been going on tick tock live on our profile pretty often I guess because we have a lot of books for sale we have the adelaine comic book we have the young siren s-i-r-e-n born b-o-r-n we have the nine year old breakthrough author Ryan Solomon's first book the search for Drake Colton as D-R-A-K-E C O L T O N there is the Seaman just like you hear it there's enchantments embrace there is the House of You prescription for living which is the reason why Voices for Voices got started because if I wouldn't have put that book together about my mental health Voices for Voices wouldn't even have been a figment of my imagination because I think it over myself many times and one of those was putting my name as author and talking about intimate details and uh that was hard to do and then there's also the House of You five workforce prep tips for a successful career and there's more on the way there's so much more and so whether you can donate you can head on over to lovevoicesorg you can donate as much or as little you can subscribe to our show on wherever you listen to your podcast you could also subscribe follow us on Rumble or YouTube on our rumble or YouTube channels those are things that are free to do if you're able to chip in and donate money that would be fantastic we are this surprises a lot of people but we are voices for voices is a 501c3 nonprofit charity organization so if you live in the United States I'm not sure with country to country but if you live in the United States and you donate or you purchase any of our merchandise which includes our books at voicesforvoices.org you go over to the what we do and you'll see the shop click on shop and you'll see so many merch items that all go towards helping us help others mental health support to one day be able to have a facility where anybody anywhere can come when they're ready and get free mental health evaluations care for as long as they need they don't have to pay a cent traveling they don't have to pay a cent for family visiting them that's the big goal of voices for voices because when I was in the hospital with insurance the bill was very large and so I you know people look at me and say Justin you know you didn't have a problem you you have a problem paying and get that getting that care so you know we're just gonna switch to channel that's fine you can switch to channel we don't force anybody to do anything but what I'm here to tell you is if what I represent demographically and I have a bill that I had an expense that I had once I was discharged from the hospital for five days I know that double triple quadruple that amount is what others are looking at paying and so that's why one of the one of the reasons I think that I'm still here at least into the point where we can get this set up and get this get this moving we have a lot of moving parts a lot of partners a lot of people that are with us on this this I uh not just idea because it's gonna happen and so that's what I mean by helping people we have a big goal of helping three billion people at least three billion people over the course of my lifetime and beyond you can help us do that one cent one cent today one cent tomorrow one of the merchandise items is the the the black and white beanie that I'm wearing so again you want to head on over to voices for voices.org you want to look over on that kind of title under URL uh but where it says home and that you want to go to where it says what we do click that and then you'll see a bunch of options and you'll look for the word shop sh op click there and on the first row all the way to the right you're gonna find this beanie and I think five different colors so there's black and white I think there's red and white there's gray and white I think there's a navy blue and maybe a dark green like a hunter green with with the white lettering and this is stitch folks this isn't one of these ironed on deals and we also have the golden beanie you're gonna have to scroll all the way to the bottom right and you're gonna see a photo of a black and white beanie because we had to get them from another uh another factory so that's why we have them in two different places and you click on that beanie and there's maybe like 20 different options and one of those options is the golden beanie that has been just flying off shelves and then if you're on Amazon again check out voices for voices publishing check out David Solomon S-O-L O M O N Ryan Solomon's the son the nine year old breakthrough author youngest author in the world uh that is R-Y A N and S-O-L-M-O-N and Enchantments Embrace is written by Ryan's mom and David's wife Amanda Solomon you can find that electronically find this uh the young siren born uh you can find the Adalan comic book and you can also if you have Facebook head on over and uh once you drop a follow on mythical creatures around the world where almost a hundred thousand like minded individuals come together to unify the world not to divide the world so thank you for being with us we love you we support you we hope you have uh a great day you have the most prosperous life whatever that means for you and you can always come to voices for voices for clean content for support for authenticity for transparency and so until next time please subscribe to all of our uh podcast channels and share share share not share the singer i'm talking about share share the voices for voices podcast and tv show share our tick tock lives all under voices for voices and until next time please be a voice for you or somebody in need take care we love you all