068 I survived Jehovah's Witnesses, Abuse and Addiction

In this episode, CJ shares his story of growing up as a Jehovah’s Witness with an abusive father. He emulated his father in his later years, turning to alcohol to cope. He shares the darkest and lowest points in this period and the key moments that changed his life. From childhood trauma to breaking free and finding sobriety, CJ’s journey is about survival, transformation, and hope. Don’t miss this powerful episode.

BUY HIS BOOK: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DHV8BCRD
Website for more info: https://www.neverstaybroken.com

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

I was so terrified of being in the same room as my father and I peed the bed three times that night. He says you're only allowed to have two feelings. Those are angry and hungry. Try to be open to the things that are happening in your life.

SPEAKER_00 0:18

Hi guys, Janneke here from Multispective. I'm here to share with you a new episode where I interview CJ. Yet another very inspiring episode from an everyday hero who talks about being raised in the Jehovah's Witness with an alcoholic and abusive father who treated both him and his brother very, very differently and the ways that it affected him later on. It does get really interesting. He talks about some of the life choices that he made in his later on life and how he came to understand mental health for men. If you've ever battled with alcohol or abuse from parents who've ever been in the Jehovah's Witness and come out of it, this episode is for you. There's so much you can hear, and he gives really, really great advice at the end of the episode. Really inspiring. Stay tuned. Drop a comment letting me know your thoughts. CJ, welcome to Multispective. I'm so excited to have you here. How are you doing today?

SPEAKER_01 1:19

I'm good. I'm excited to be here. This is my first anything that I've done with podcasting probably in three years. And so I was nervous all day long until the camera turned on because I used to be a host. And so when the camera clicked on, I go into this mode, just like taking that breath before going out on stage.

SPEAKER_00 1:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:46

And so... I am excited to be here. I'm excited to finally get back into some sort of podcasting thing again. Amazing. Because I loved doing it, but life happens. For sure. And life has to come first, in my opinion. Life has to come first. And so getting to do this as a guest for the first time, maybe ever, I might have been a guest on one or two podcasts back in the day when I didn't know anything about podcasting or what i was doing but this is this is nice i am enjoying this

SPEAKER_00 2:24

yeah honestly i think like for me it was a game changer when i started as well i think there was like a creative element in me that needed to just like burst out of me and i just could never really think of like how can i be creative like i've tried the whole like drawing and i draw like a i draw really bad like my drawing is just horrible um it's just really embarrassingly bad

SPEAKER_01 2:44

do you have fun is it fun that's the point is it fun

SPEAKER_00 2:47

You know, the thing is, I always place very high expectations, like not expectations, but like I'm very critical of myself. So, yeah, I can get into that flow state. But when I stop and I look back at my work and I step out of it and I look at it and I'm like, what an abysmal piece of trash. Oh,

SPEAKER_01 3:03

imposter syndrome. Imposter syndrome. Oh, yeah. I remember when I first learned about that. That explained a lot about me when I first learned what imposter syndrome

SPEAKER_00 3:14

was. Yeah.

UNKNOWN 3:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 3:16

No. And so I think that I kind of like tried to explore different methods. I tried like the whole writing and poetry and this and that. And I think that for me, I realized that like, actually, I think I feel most creative when I'm connecting with people. And I was like, how can I kind of do this in a way where I'm actually able to explore this kind of like more creative side of me? And so, you know, someone suggested podcasts. Actually, it was a conversation that I had with a stranger and they were like, you somehow managed to get my whole life story in just like I don't know, this last half an hour, like you went from being a complete stranger to like, my whole life has been poured out to you. And so they were like, Are you like a therapist or something? Like, is this the line of work you do? Nope. So like, well, then you better get on to it, like do something about this, like start a podcast or something. And I think that was the first trigger for me. And the rest is history. Here we are. It's

SPEAKER_01 4:08

amazing. I've been told the same thing. I used to work a drive through window in

SPEAKER_00 4:12

a

SPEAKER_01 4:12

fast food restaurant for five. Yeah, I worked no four years. I worked there for four Right. Right. Yeah. Interesting. Yeah. Because stagnation for me is isolation. And they tend to be one in the same. They're bedfellows is a phrase that we use. Stagnation and isolation for me are bedfellows. They tend to happen at the same time. And so I try not to stagnate, whether I'm writing, whether I'm talking to somebody on a podcast, or just being with people in my day-to-day life, coworkers, people at the church, or just people in general. I still manage to get life stories somehow. And I think because it interests me. People interest me.

SPEAKER_00 5:54

That's exactly, I think, what I've come to learn after some time. It's like people are open. People want to share their story. They want to feel connected to others and they want to have a platform or a place where they can be heard. Everyone wants to be heard. It's just not enough people want to listen. And so if there is an individual that is there to ask the question, How are you? You know, tell me about yourself. Like what, what about you? You know, asking those simple questions sometimes can really open this whole, you know, like valve of like, you know, like amazing conversation, amazing connection. But yeah, I think that's, that's it. It's just like, it's hard sometimes to have people even ask those questions in the first place. So we don't get asked that enough. And so we don't share our story enough. And so when it does happen, you're like one in a diamond in the rough. We get gun

SPEAKER_01 6:44

shy. We get gun shy. And what's funny is just by asking that question to just random people. I mean, not like stopping people on the street and getting in the way of their, you know, or interrupting a business meeting or something like that, just to ask how everybody's doing. But you never know what you're going to get back. I remember when I was working at the fast food restaurant, I remember there was these two little old ladies that came in probably their late 70s or early 80s. And the way that they interacted with each other, they just bounced off of each other like like like like tennis and it was amazing and it just it perked me and i got interested and i asked i asked one of them i said i said hey can i ask you i just want to ask you a quick question because you guys seem like you've been friends for a long time i said what's the most fun thing you two ever did together and i just wanted to know because okay they're they're they're they've got my interest here like a pong video game at the register and i just i want to Can you tell me? Is it okay to ask? And I found out that the most fun they ever had together is they hang glided off a skyscraper in New York in 1979. That's crazy. And they're like 80 years old now. I said, are you serious? You hang glided off a skyscraper? And they said, yeah. I'm like, wow.

SPEAKER_00 8:09

so you never know yeah exactly there's so much that you can learn about yourself from that too either you explore something you're inspired you're inspired to go and do something on your own or you know it just changes the way that you see the world a little bit you're like you know actually that's actually a really good point I never quite thought of that you know and that can only happen when you've had certain conversations with people right so no that's amazing and it only

SPEAKER_01 8:36

happens with listening

SPEAKER_00 8:38

yeah

SPEAKER_01 8:38

which I think we struggle to do as human beings. We struggle to listen. Because why would I talk to you if you don't listen? But why would I listen if you don't talk? So somebody's got to be the first one to step up and say, hey, go ahead, I'll listen. I can't do anything about it, but I'll listen. And it's amazing how often that's plenty. You don't have to do anything. Just listen.

SPEAKER_00 9:02

Just listen. And that can be so powerful in its own way. So, CJ, we're here to listen to your story today. Isn't that a

SPEAKER_01 9:18

lovely segue? But beyond that, a lot of my story varies from his because I was born into it. So both my parents were Jehovah's Witnesses before I was born. I grew up in a small town here in Wyoming in the United States for the international listeners. And early on, I was a loner early on, and I didn't really get the interaction that you would normally get as a young child. But beyond that, I had behavioral issues or mental issues. From an early, early age, from the youngest age, I felt like I didn't belong. And that didn't go away for decades. And so I was raised in, my father was an abusive alcoholic. He was narcissistic, very, very controlling. And the life that I lived outside of the house, the life that I lived publicly, was much different from the life that I lived at home. Because my father controlled everything. And he was really quick to anger. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Right. Right. Were you not so

SPEAKER_00 11:46

close to your brother at

SPEAKER_01 11:53

that point as well? Right. Whether he did or not, he abused me, he controlled me, he beat me, and he would get gifts for my brother. After my parents divorced in 1995, when I say 95 or 96, after my parents divorced and my dad got his own place after a while, he made sure that I knew that I wasn't allowed over there. Sometimes my mom would still argue him into it, but he was very clear. Your brother can come visit, but you can't. And being a young teenager, when you're still trying to get the approval of your father, that was really heartbreaking for me. It was incredibly difficult for me to go through. And I tried for his approval probably until I was 29 or 30 years old. And he still did the same things. He would send messages through my brother that he wanted to reconnect and he wanted to be back in my life again. But every time I tried to contact him, he was busy or he had something else. So a lot of manipulation, a lot of narcissism. So my brother was treated a lot better as a child, but because I couldn't get back at my father, I got back at my brother. I would abuse my brother when we were kids. He's five and a half years younger than me. So when I was a teenager, he was seven or eight. And he would always have to do the things that I wanted. Because by that time, my dad was no longer living in the house. But my brother would get to go visit him. And I would have to stay home. And my mom was working. So again, I spent a lot of time by myself. And by this time, I'm out of the religion. But I don't know how to make those connections with other kids. I don't know anything except for... manipulation, control, codependency, coercion. I know how to get friends with all these negative talents or abilities or whatever you want to call them. I can use these manipulation tools to get friends, but I can't keep them because obviously they're not going to like the experiences that they're going through when their friend is damaged. But I didn't know I was damaged because that's what I was raised with. And so with a religion that kept a pretty tight hold on us and a father that was alcoholic and abusive and manipulative and a mother like I love my mother don't get me wrong she's she's still here she does everything that she can and she works very very hard but as I got into my adulthood and especially recently now that I've started therapy and I've actually started getting all this junk out I I've I realized the way she was raised, she was raised to get approval. She was raised to be there for other people. She was raised to give. So she doesn't know how to give to herself. And so she needs somebody else to give to her so she can give to them. And that's where the codependency comes in. That's where I learned my codependency is that my mom strives so hard for other people's approval, especially in relationships. And that's what I knew. And so So all these things coming together, I had no idea how hectic my life was. I had no idea how damaged I was until I met somebody that was truly healthy and would not abuse my weaknesses, which took a long time, especially because my relationships were based on what I learned. And I never really learned anything positive. My mom tried, but she didn't know either. And it's hard to teach somebody something that you don't know. So I had to spend a lot of time learning these things by myself

SPEAKER_00 15:52

right did you find that like because you know you mentioned that your mom was always trying to seek approval and it was really important for her to be you know basically approved by people that I'd imagine that you know her her cup would be half empty a lot of the times and she would need to emotional dump do you feel that you kind of became that person where she would

SPEAKER_01 16:13

absolutely absolutely and and and again I love my mother but I She doesn't understand that. And I'm learning how to be healthy and have a healthy relationship.

SPEAKER_00 17:20

and your mom where you feel like you kind of need to be there for her and listen to her and kind of be that supporting role for her but at the same time it's like now what do I do with all of this information how do I live with this stuff like it's just so much to handle

SPEAKER_01 17:34

and that's what my wife became she became my emotional dump until she couldn't do it anymore and so we split for three months and but now I have some knowledge and I have a direction that I can go and at the time I Right. Yeah. Yeah. Now,

SPEAKER_00 18:24

I just want to backtrack a little bit. If you can just tell me a little bit more about the role of Jehovah's Witness in your dynamic, in your family's dynamic, and how and why you decided to exit in the first place.

SPEAKER_01 18:36

Sure, sure. Because I don't know my mom's whole story, but I know some of it. My father was physically abusive to both me and my mother. My little brother, I don't know. I don't think so. Wow. Horrible. because my dad wasn't in a good mood or he was drunk and he had a bad day somewhere else. But at the same time, I don't want to paint my father to be a horrible, horrible person because that's what he was raised with. And the only way really for me to find that healing was to forgive the things that had happened to me. And so I can't have a resentment towards, excuse me, I can't have a resentment towards my father. I have to forgive him because I can't move on if i still have a resentment towards my father

SPEAKER_00 20:23

that's fair enough i think that you are kind of that um that person that might be the one to end the generational trauma you might be you know because you had to have gone through that forgive it but also have the awareness of what what had happened to be able to say okay it ends here we're not passing this down anymore like we're not going to continue this trauma but a huge step in that is forgiveness which is really hard for a lot of people who basically been abused. You know, it's like, well, that's your responsibility as an adult. Some may say it's your responsibility as an adult to take accountability for what had happened and end it right there. Or make better decisions in your own life because we've all gone through trauma. It has to stop somewhere. But I think we also live in a generation where we have access to information. We have access to sharing our experiences and getting the help that we need. Mental health is being talked about so much more that it still takes someone really, really brave to have to be able to do that but so kudos to you for being able to sort of like stop it right there and not pass that on into your own into your own like life right

SPEAKER_01 21:42

yeah it became frightening because I started to see a lot of my father in myself even though he hadn't really been a part of my life in 15 to 20 years and knowing that or believing at least that that was what I would become if Hmm. Hmm. Hmm. And so, but

SPEAKER_00 22:20

at the same time, it's like, how do you,

SPEAKER_01 22:22

yeah, it is because if that's all, you know,

SPEAKER_00 22:25

right.

SPEAKER_01 22:26

Then how do you do something different? And if you don't have anybody in your life to teach you something different, then again, how do you do something different? Now I'm not justifying by any means. I'm not justifying someone who's been abused, continuing the cycle of abuse. What I'm saying is that I, I can, see how a person that's been abused could find themselves in that situation where they're abusing somebody else,

SPEAKER_00 22:57

even

SPEAKER_01 22:57

though they don't want to and they don't mean to do it. You've got to reach a point where you say, this is the end of the road. I can't do this anymore. And I can tell you whenever you're ready at any point in this podcast, I can tell you exactly when my moment was because I very clearly remember my breaking point. Whether it's

SPEAKER_00 23:18

right now or in the future. I do want to go back a little bit. We will get there. We will get there. But I do want to know a

SPEAKER_01 23:34

little bit more about Jehovah's Witness. Right. Right. Right.

SPEAKER_00 24:20

And

SPEAKER_01 24:29

so what happened then? is fairly palpable. I was having behavioral issues. Any noise would frighten me. If I was too close to my dad, I remember one time we stayed in a hotel and I peed the bed three times that night because I was so terrified of being in the same room as my father. I was so terrified of being

SPEAKER_02 25:11

asleep

SPEAKER_01 25:12

because if he was mad at me when I was asleep, he would start beating me while I was in bed and he wouldn't just use his hands he had a belt and he had a pine 2x4 that he was very very fond of this 2x4 he would wake me up by beating me with this 2x4 and so being in the same room as my father I was absolutely terrified but of course having an accident in the bed he didn't like that either so seeing these things she finally the fear of what the organization was going to do or not going to do and the fear of raising two children Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. had to start living life on our own which wasn't easy for anybody but i don't regret

SPEAKER_00 26:54

i don't regret it and did your mom stay in the jehovah's witness when she left your dad and you got out yourself or did your whole family like you and your mom both of you guys got out

SPEAKER_01 27:03

yeah yeah my my mom myself and my brother we we all left the organization even my dad left because at that point the organization knew what was happening and they used their their Right. Right.

SPEAKER_00 27:47

Now, how did your life change after you got out of Jehovah's Witness? Was it really hard to reintegrate, especially when you were young for your mom?

SPEAKER_01 27:57

I know for me it was incredibly difficult because the thing about Jehovah's Witnesses is you don't – they call it worldly. They don't want you to have worldly influences, and they're very heavy on that word, at least at the time they were. And so growing up in the Jehovah's Witnesses organization, I – I didn't get to spend a lot of time with non-organizational children and families. I had some here and there, and I didn't realize until I got older how restricted I actually had been. So for me, it was incredibly difficult, you know, basically integrating back into society because I didn't know how normal children were. And I still had problems. Like, I couldn't speak up. I couldn't speak up and ask the teacher to use the bathroom. So I'd hold it until I couldn't anymore. And I had that reputation in school as the kid that wet his pants because it was a small town. And I had that reputation well into high school. And so I couldn't integrate. And the kids really didn't fit. It didn't seem like they wanted me to be a part of their societal circle. Now, for my mom, I think it was it was difficult for her but in a different way because now she's a single mom in a small town and all the men that know you're a single mom in a small town come out of the woodwork and so she faced this really uphill battle to find a man that would actually respect her for who she was and the fact that she had children and what she was trying to do for us without taking advantage of her her need at the time to get approval from people because she was still very very much governed by this need to get approval from people and so unfortunately for my mom it was quite easy to take advantage of her at the time because she was financial struggles emotional struggles and so what i remember after the divorce and after we got out of the organization was a lot of boyfriends there were a lot of boyfriends and that just made it worse for me because I didn't have a stable father figure when I had a father in the house and I didn't get a stable father figure after my father left

SPEAKER_00 30:35

afterwards right

SPEAKER_01 30:37

I've never had a stable father figure and so I think looking back I have a lot of forgiveness for my mother too exactly I have a lot of forgiveness for her because she was she was facing a very much an uphill battle and honestly as a teenager i didn't make it any easier because i had a lot of anger and i didn't know how to express that i didn't know how to express any of my feelings healthy in a healthy fashion

SPEAKER_02 31:03

right

SPEAKER_01 31:04

and so she still faces that struggle quite a bit right even all these years down the road

SPEAKER_00 31:08

now can you walk me a little bit through when did alcohol enter the picture for you

SPEAKER_01 31:14

oh 21 absolutely 21 um and Actually, no, no. We'll say for me, probably actually was 18. It didn't it didn't start having a serious effect on my life until I was 21. When I was 18, a college recruit promised me the world. And so because I at the time needed my own approval and I wanted out of the house and I wanted to be independent, the first college recruit that offered me anything, I went full throttle. and I went straight for it. So I ended up going to college up in Utah for a grand total of nine months. And, um, he, I had a friend that I made there. He was, he was of age. And so he would get me liquor and we, we would hang out. And he's actually a really good guy. He didn't know what he was doing to me. And I didn't, I didn't know either. So it wasn't like he was trying to take advantage of me or abuse me or, or in any fashion whatsoever. But that was my first intro into alcohol. Now, the thing about Utah is that at the time, at least, most of the liquor that they sold there was a lower quantity of alcohol. And so I got a nice little buzz out of it, but I never was able to get as into it as I got into it in my later years. Now, when I was 21, I moved back in with my mother when I was 19 or so. And when I turned Wow.

SPEAKER_00 33:00

So now this is like pretty reminiscent of like your childhood. You are drinking alcohol just kind of like your father was before and you are now heavy into it. What happens? What do you start doing with this?

SPEAKER_01 33:13

What do I start doing with? Sorry, you cut out there a little bit. What do I start doing with the feelings, the emotions,

SPEAKER_00 33:20

the alcohol? Yeah, with the emotions. Like how did you start, you know, dealing with your emotions at this point? You know, how were your behaviors during that time? Were you starting to get a little abusive or rough? or like violent, what happens?

SPEAKER_01 33:33

I very, I didn't want, and I didn't know how. I still, at that point, I didn't know how to deal with my emotions. I can't even say that I knew what I was feeling at the time because I wasn't raised to feel. My dad had a quote. He told me the two things. He says, you're only allowed to have two feelings. Those are angry and hungry. And he was really serious. And so as a child, that's all I knew. was anger, and I didn't know how to handle it. Now, as an adult, being of legal drinking age, I still didn't know how to deal with it. There was something, but the alcohol got rid of it, and that's all I knew. And so I began to drink really heavily every single night. I had a girlfriend at the time. It got her terrified because I could turn into a different person when I was drinking if something triggered And I didn't know what to do with it. I could turn into a much different person. And that's, I guess, one of my own regrets that I have. But at the same time, I guess it was part of my process. Now, when I was drinking, I would either cry or yell. Those were the two things that I knew how to do. That's what I carried with me. And it was like that for years until fairly recently. It wasn't until maybe four or five years ago that I started to see that I need to change. I need to do something different. But that's what I did with it. And that pretty simple answer. That's all I knew how to do.

SPEAKER_00 35:05

Can you tell me like a rock bottom moment that you had when you were drinking? Oh,

SPEAKER_01 35:10

of course. Of course. So when I was working the fast food job, I had two days off. Those were Wednesday and Thursday. And so Tuesday night after I got off work, I went to the liquor store and I got a fifth of vodka, the cheapest stuff I could find. I got a fifth and I brought it home thinking that would last me the weekend well I woke up sometime Wednesday morning and it was gone I had not intended to drink the entire fifth but I drank that fifth in a few hours and so I woke up and I waited for the liquor store to open because it wasn't even open yet and when 7 a.m. came around I waited five more minutes because I didn't want to look like an alcoholic now look it's funny to me now looking back right because I've gone through my healing process it's not going to be funny to someone who's going through it but I waited five minutes because I didn't want to look like an alcoholic. And then I walked down to the liquor store. And as I was walking in my neighbor, who was also my coworker and friend, she was walking out of the convenience store that was across the street from the liquor store. And she came over to me and she was begging me not to go in because she knew what I was going through. She's begging me not to go in and she's actually holding me and crying as she's begging me not to go in because she's afraid for my life at this point. And all I could tell her was I have to do it. I have to. And so I pushed her away and I went into the liquor store and I got another pint of vodka. And that that morning was my breaking point, because when I woke up after drinking that fifth of vodka, I woke up and I was so messed up in my head that I thought it was actually Friday And I thought that I was late to work and I thought I'd actually missed a whole

SPEAKER_02 37:06

shift

SPEAKER_01 37:07

and nobody called me. So I assumed I was fired because I was a no call, no show. And instead of trying to rectify the situation, my answer to the problem was more drink. And so when I got that other pint of vodka, I came home and I started mixing it. But that's when I realized if I don't stop this, soon I will not survive I saw the look in her eyes the pleading the fear the hurt and it started planning something in my head that I don't have to do this I said I have to do this and I believed I have to do this but why do I have to do this other people get out of this why do I have to do this what is it in my head that tells me I have to and so while I still finish that point I I did Did that day get onto the Internet and I found a documentary about a medication that was supposed to help people with alcoholism and I found somebody who could actually I could actually talk to them about this medication. And so it I started that step, but it was probably still a good year of drinking before I actually talked to that person and got on the medication.

SPEAKER_02 38:29

Right.

SPEAKER_01 38:29

But that. That would be my rock bottom. When I woke up on the floor with an empty bottle of fifth of vodka next to me, I thought I was fired. And I only cared about the drinking. That my solution was to drink it away because that's what I've been doing for 15 or 20 years. Right. But that's the day I realized I can't. I'm going to die if I do this for too much longer. I'm going to end up dead. And all the people around me that have been trying to say and haven't haven't been able to know it's on me but all these people have been trying to save me what am I gonna leave behind

SPEAKER_00 39:07

yeah

SPEAKER_01 39:09

I'm going to leave behind the legacy of a guy that drank himself to death. Sorry, go ahead.

SPEAKER_00 39:13

Exactly. I know you mentioned at some point that you did have an encounter with the police and you were you did experience being in prison for a while. Can you tell us a little bit about that?

SPEAKER_01 39:24

Yeah, of course. So I was I was arrested in 2007 and drinking had a lot to do with that because I couldn't I couldn't. process my emotions and so i spent a lot of time drinking i won't get into the details of what it was because i don't want to distract from from the overall message um but i i ended up doing five years and the thing about especially in the united states the thing about prisons is that they are not actually meant to rehabilitate you mentally you don't address your problems in prison you You don't address what got you there. It's basically, you spend five years, 10 years, 25, however long it is inside this big concrete building with razor wire and fences, and you're on timeout. You think about what you did. But another thing that happens when you have, there's a lot of overcrowding in American prisons, and I don't want to get too far into the politics of American prisons, but I know there is overcrowding. And what happens when you have Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. How bad am I really? And I really didn't want to die. that I had to cope with my emotional struggles and my childhood trauma was alcoholism and alcohol and women. And I used both of them in ways that I'm not proud of as an adult. I'm not proud of these things that I've done. And so what started us was she came through the drive-thru window repeatedly. Jasmine was with her. Jasmine was six at the time. And I was curious about Kim because Because she's black. And so I flirted with her because I was curious and I wanted to see. Little did I know the drastic effects that she would have on my life as a positive influence. And so what started as me just doing what I normally did to try to cope with what I was feeling inside, what started as just a test turned into a full on healthy relationship that has changed my life because I didn't know it at the time but Kim is the preacher's daughter and she has a habit of having positive effects on people's lives despite the things that she's been through and so she started guiding me and helping me to see that I deserved love I deserved better I deserve to be healthy and I deserve to be happy despite all the things in my life up until that point that had told me and basically proven to me otherwise because I was raised by a father that told me I didn't deserve good things. He didn't want me around. I was raised by a religion that told me that the only things that I needed to do in my life were to benefit the religion. And so Kim was kind of the antithesis of that. She showed me that I should do things for myself. I should believe in myself and I should love myself. But beyond that, she didn't know how to show me. As hard as she tried, she didn't And what actually got me started on doing those things for myself was when she left me after six months of our first getting together and dating. that's kind of what started to click. So I went to therapy and I got sober two days before she left me, but I didn't tell her that I'd gotten sober because I didn't know if I was doing it for myself or

SPEAKER_02 45:48

not.

SPEAKER_01 45:49

I didn't know, am I just getting sober so that she won't leave me was my mindset at the time. And so I got into therapy and I started actually talking and I can say very specifically, there's two little stories that I can convey to you that I can tell you what were the major, to me, the major changing points. And the first one is hilarious. Looking back, it's absolutely hilarious. Kim has this habit when she finishes a box of something, whether it's a TV dinner or a box of chicken or Little Debbie snacks or whatever, she loves the oatmeal cream pies. Instead of throwing the box in the trash, she'll tear it up and then she'll put it in the trash. And I remember thinking, I didn't dare say this out loud, but I remember thinking that is an absolute waste of time. You're, you're spending like two minutes on this box, tearing it up into neat little shreds. Why just cram it in there and get on with your day? What are you even doing? And so one day I was having problems because I had a little Debbie box and I was trying to put it in the trash, but it was kind of full. And so I crammed it in there and I shoved it down. And when I went to tie it, it popped back out again. And I said, And so I picked it back up and so I crumpled it the best I could and I crammed it in there and I tried to tie it up and it popped out again and I said some more choice words and I'm like, whatever, I'll just tear it up. I saw Kim do it. Well, maybe it'll work for me. So I tore up the box and I put it in there and I tied it up and everything was nice and neat and glorious. And I remember stopping for a second and going, huh, like 30 seconds ago, I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that this woman was absolutely 100% wrong about this. And I had built it up to be this big thing. But in the privacy of my own house, without her there, she proved to me through this process of struggling with this little box that she proved to me that she was right. But she never put it in my face that she was

SPEAKER_02 47:50

right.

SPEAKER_01 47:51

And so I thought for a second, well, okay, she's right about the box. So what else is Kim right about? So then I started to think about other things like, oh, she's been saying this. She's been showing me this. And it wasn't like an epiphany right there in the moment. But over the period of several days, I started thinking, well, what else could she be right

SPEAKER_02 48:10

about?

SPEAKER_01 48:11

And looking back at that, that was a big turning point in my own mindset that maybe she's being genuine. And the other one was in a therapy session. I was talking about something that me and her had gone through. And Kim had always told me, I love you, but you just can't see it. And I don't know how to prove it to you. And I didn't know how she could prove it to me either. And so I'm in a therapy session. and I'm talking about some ridiculous thing that I had done or said and I was starting to realize all the stuff I had put her through. And I absentmindedly, the words came out of my mouth. I wasn't even thinking about what I was saying. I said, wow, that woman must really love me. And then that was an epiphany because the words came out of my mouth that she loves me. And if I hadn't been trying to be so macho because my therapist was a female and I didn't want to cry in front of her because of things. Because of how I was raised and you can't do that. Hmm.

SPEAKER_00 50:05

Because,

SPEAKER_01 50:06

I mean, I could write a whole book on how the Little Debbies helped me heal. But those were the turning points. Those were the things that changed my mind and my heart. After all these years of struggling and finally finding a woman that wasn't taking advantage of me, wasn't trying to control me, she wanted me to be who I was. Whether we worked out or not, she wants me to be who I am. And so she's never tried to step in the way. I'm not promising her. she agrees with everything but she's never tried to step in the way but i mean that was it those two right there

SPEAKER_00 50:43

that's so amazing how like little you can have like we can have like little moments that just kind of just where the universe just like aligns itself and it just triggers something in you that gives you this breath of life that changes so much for an individual like so much

SPEAKER_01 51:02

exactly

SPEAKER_00 51:03

and oftentimes it comes back to yeah and oftentimes it comes back to really really accepting that people have your back and it's not just people are not just running the motions of saying it just because but they actually genuinely mean it but the thing is that that realization has to come from within because a person can sing those songs sing the praises over and over again but you're just going to keep cringing at it until you realize that this is as true and as real as it gets

SPEAKER_01 51:34

and the answer Right. Right. There will be signs. I'm not saying higher power. I'm not saying, but there will be signs. If you're open to listening, there will be signs. For me, it was a box of Little Debbies. It could be anything. But if you're open to it, then something at some point will come into your life and show you. You have to be open to things that happen in your life. It's not going to be a guaranteed good event. It's not going to be a guaranteed bad event. For me, it was frustration. that turned into realization but you have to be willing to be open to the things that happen in your life I was shut down for so many years because I didn't know what else to do I was shut down for so many years I could have been relieved of this pain a long time ago now I'm proud of myself because I am on this path now it was my path that I had I don't regret that I had to learn the hard way I I choose to be grateful for the fact that I learned at all because I was on my deathbed I mean my deathbed was it was in this building right here where I'm living right now my deathbed was the bedroom on the other side where I was laying on the floor next to an empty bottle and but slowly things started to kind of shift into place because by that point for me it was desperation but by that point I was open to something because my other option was not a bright future whatsoever. I had to be open. Now, what I'm here for, why I'm talking about this is because I don't want other people to have to go through that level of struggle that I did to find my realization. But now that I have it, I can look back and see things that I could have done to make it a that I could have done better again no regret because that's what I had to go through and that's what got me to where I am right now but one thing for me is to just be open to something you don't have to believe everything I have a sponsor one thing he told me was can you just consider the possibility that maybe you're not the biggest thing in the universe and I said well yeah I don't know what it is, but there's got to be something bigger than me, some kind of energy or a computer simulation or I don't know what, but there's got to be something bigger than me because I'm falling apart here, man. I can't be the most important thing in the universe. He says, okay, that's all you got to do. And if you can just consider the possibility that there's something, it doesn't matter what it is, you don't have to name it, but if you can consider the possibility that that something might be looking out for you and you deserve something better if you're struggling with an addiction. And that's it. That's all it took. And I was off to the races after that. I didn't realize that that was all it was. I didn't realize that I was holding that much in until someone said, hey, you're not so macho, dude. And I said, oh, yeah, you're right.

SPEAKER_00 55:29

Yeah. I love that. CJ, thank you so much for being on Multispective and sharing your story with us today. That was so moving and so empowering. It's been so much fun. Yeah, I've had such a great time with you. So much fun. Thank you.

UNKNOWN 55:43

Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 55:47

Thank you for showing us we are human. Also, a thank you to our team who worked so hard behind the scenes to make it happen.

SPEAKER_01 56:08

The

SPEAKER_00 56:11

show would be nothing without you. I'm Jenica, host and writer of the show, and you're listening to Multispective.