12-Step Recovery: The Mentorship Model That Changes Everything

What if recovery isn’t just about quitting—but about rebuilding your masculinity through real accountability, mentorship, and community?

Full show notes + all sources: https://empoweredchangece.com/american-masculinity-podcast

In this episode, licensed addiction counselor Kevin Peterson shares how 12-step recovery changed his understanding of masculinity—and how men can move from isolation and control to connection, community, and personal growth.

We dig into why healthy masculinity means showing up, not doing it alone—and why mentorship and accountability change everything for men in recovery. Whether you're in the process, supporting someone who is, or just reflecting on your own masculinity, this conversation brings hard-won insights and honest truth.

For more about Kevin's work visit: www.chronichope.us

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Chapters:
00:00 — Why Masculinity and Recovery Need Each Other
09:00 — The “Fixer Trap” and How It Fuels Codependency
16:00 — 12-Step Mentorship and the Power of Community
26:00 — Your Family Can’t (and Shouldn’t) Meet Every Need
35:00 — Finding the Right 12-Step Meeting for You
42:00 — From Helping to Controlling: The Hard Line for Men
44:54 — Kevin’s Personal Reflections on Masculinity

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The American Masculinity Podcast™ is hosted by Timothy Wienecke — licensed psychotherapist, Air Force veteran, and men’s advocate.
Real conversations about masculinity, mental health, growth, and how men can show up better — as partners, leaders, and friends.
We focus on grounded tools, not yelling or clichés. If you have questions or want a tool for something you're wrestling with, leave a comment or send a message — your feedback shapes what we build next.
Note: While this doesn’t replace therapy, it might help you notice something worth exploring.

Transcript

0:00

Guys come in and we've just lost a lot of the spaces where men used to mentor younger men. I'm sober, therefore I am, you know, I am perfect. Quite the opposite. You need masculine and feminine mentorship in your life, and you need both perspectives again. Accountability, you know, which I think is a huge part of masculinity, consistency, accountability, and transparency. How can the 12 Step program help guys refine their masculinity in healthy ways? What does it look like when men take their healing away from control and isolation into connection and growth? If you're curious about either of those questions, you're in the right place. My name's Tim Winneke, this is American Masculinity, and on our 12th episode we're bring on Kevin Peterson. Kevin is a multi-decade clinician who's been in recovery for 35 years. He did what the most noble of us do. He took his experience and his pain and figured out how to use that to help others. We're so lucky he's in the world, and I'm really happy to bring him on to share his insights with you. Remember, this isn't therapy and this isn't gonna be recovery. This is gonna help you be a little curious about these processes. If these are resources that you need, go find him. This will be a little crack in the door, but it won't get you there. So if this sounds good, if what Kevin's pitching to you sounds like something you're looking for. Go find it. I hope you get the help you need. With all that said, let's get started. Hey Kevin, thanks so much for coming on, man. I'm really excited to have this conversation with you. Oh, it's my pleasure, man. It's great to see you and I, I have been looking forward to this all week. This is fantastic. Stick. I always like talking to you about addiction because you're one of my trusted people around Integration of 12 Step Like You and I's perspective differs a little bit as I don't think it's required. I think it's just very, very useful. But you're one of the people I can call if I need to and say what am what's going on with this meeting in this part of town? Why doesn't this person like lining up and it's fantastic. So I'm really excited that we're gonna share some of that here with the folks. Me too. I guess the, the first thing that I wanna ask about is masculinity in 12 Step. So we know addiction is primarily guys, right? Uh, more men than women struggle with addiction. Women struggle harder when they do, but how does 12 Step influence your masculinity and your client's masculinity? Okay, we're gonna start right off with just jumping right in. Uh, the deep end has been found, uh, that's a great question. You know, and, and it's, uh, it's one that I've actually been reflecting on, uh, for a couple of different reasons. One, uh, is that last Monday, uh, was, uh, 34 years for me sober. Mm-hmm. And so when we get to our anniversaries, we tend to. Ruminate or think or you know, look at that. And so I was looking at your questions and sort of searching on that. And so here's the thing that I think is really important for me, and the answer to the first part of the question, the 12 steps. You know, alcoholics anonymous, cocaine anonymous, narcotics anonymous, whatever you want to, wherever you want to go with that. When you look at the 12 steps, the first half, half of the first step says. We were powerless over alcohol. Insert blank, whatever, and fill in the blank. And that's the last time we talk about drugs or alcohol. Yeah. In the 12 steps. And then the second half says, and our lives have become unmanageable. So, so you can look at, you know, 11 and a half steps are gonna be focused on how you behave, how you interact with other people, how you rub elbows, how you treat people, uh, the kind of treatment you accept from people. And that's the, that's kind of the, I would say the big secret, right? Or not secret, but like mm-hmm. You know, is that in the recovery world, you know, um, people that come just to get sober, that's great, but they're, they're only getting about 5% of what we offer. You know, what we, we offer, the other 95% of what we offer is learning how to rearrange your life and, and go after things. So, so for a man, like when I got sober, I was 27. And I mean, I think I might have had some concepts or ideas. I had done a lot of therapy with my dad. I had, you know, read Iron John and stuff like that and really got into Joseph Campbell. So I was definitely sort of delving into what is masculinity, what isn't. But for me it was very much, uh, I could read all that stuff intellectually, but I didn't know how to. Put it into practice. You know, I didn't, I didn't understand what that meant. So through the 12 step process, you know, all the, the different parts, I started realizing that that's where I was applying it. You know, and it, you know, a big piece is obviously, you know how we, you know, we, we write inventory in the fourth step, right? And inventory has three parts, right? There's, there's resentment, there's fear, and then there's sex. It's actually conduct. It's not sex. It, it's, it's how we behave in relationships. And you know, the first time I went through that with my sponsor back in Los Angeles, you know, I had long resentment list of, and everyone, you know, everyone says the same thing. I'm not mad at anybody. It's like, yeah, nice try. You, you walked in here today, pissed at the guy that took your parking spot, so let's just start there, you know, and that's okay. You know, you just gotta work your way through that stuff. Right? And then, and there's a process, right? The resentment has a, a pro, we call it four column inventory, and it has a, there's an exercise that you go through. Fear is the same thing, but as time goes and you, and you continue to do the process, the 12 steps over and you write inventory over and over, you start getting to the core, right? I'm afraid of being alone. You know, I'm afraid of re recreating my parents' marriage, you know, I'm afraid of that. I'm never gonna find anybody, you know, and I'm not afraid that I'm, I'm, this is gonna, I'm just gonna be miserable the rest of my life. You know, that's the core stuff we start getting at. And then in conduct, you know, we start looking at how we treat people in relationships. Did we arouse jealousy, suspicion and bitterness? Did we cheat on them? Da da da. I mean, we really just take full accountability. That was the first time in my life that another man helped me take full accountability for my behavior. And then in the fifth step, we share that, and then six and seven we garner. What we call the character defects, which really, like when I was reading my inventory to my sponsor, he would say, write this down. You know, um, I, I use women for fill in the blank. Um, I lie, I cheat, I steal. So by the time we got done with that, I had my list of character defects and it was very straightforward and simple. And, and then, then we get to the amends piece. And for me, you know, there was a lot of. Uh, making amends was a lot of going after the relationships that I've had and, and, and explain not, not making amends, which means offering to make it right. You know, not apologizing, we apologize, but we're like, that's just the beginning, you know? Now there's accountability. Well, right. And, you know, please tell me, please tell me how, so here's the four parts of amends. Here's what, here's what I remember doing. Please tell me how it affected you. Have I left anything out that's, I don't like that part, you know, and then how can I make it right? And we really, if you take it seriously and you really do it, you know, you're, you're the, the big fear, right, is that you're always putting yourself in the other person's hands, but you're really not, you know, you're putting yourself in into your higher powers, hands, or whatever you want to call it. You know, again, accountability, you know, which I think is a huge part of masculinity. For me, you know, is, is, you know, consistency, accountability, and transparency. A man shows up and ma and, and that shows up in ma masculinity. And now, and the other side of that too, right, is that I want to be clear, this isn't about being perfect, you know, because I think part of being sober and part of being in recovery and part of being masculine or being a man is admitting to being imperfect and making mistakes. And, and it's okay to make those mistakes and. You know, certain mistakes. You know, it's, you know, if you struggle with infidelity, it's not okay to keep making that mistake over and over, you know, but you learn that there, you know, you learn that, that no. That's not okay. You know, a lot of guys, honestly, I swear to God I'm not making this up. A lot of guys are like, oh, you know, everybody cheats. And I'm like, no. Everybody that drinks and does drugs does, yes. But you know, people that are sober are really battling to change, not just get rid of the drugs and alcohol. That's, that's like the ticket to the show, you know? That's just, yeah, that's the price of admission, right? The real show is how do I learn how to treat other people? With dignity, respect, integrity, and how do I treat myself with that? You know, how do I honor my parents? How do I honor my partner? How do I, how do I show up for my friends and my family, uh, and, and differently and, and behave differently? And when I make a mistake, am I willing to show up and be like, I, I, that was wrong. I shouldn't have done it. That was me, you know? Well, so it sounds like a lot of this for the 12 step is the, the mentorship of it. That, and, and I think, I, I don't think, I know, I keep seeing this across my practice where guys come in and we've just lost a lot of the spaces where men. Used to mentor younger men. And 12 Step is a beautiful place for that because it's part of it, like immediately you walk in and somebody tries to step up to be your mentor. And like you're talking about how we engage with people integrates into the way we exist in the world, in our problems. And so of course that has to be addressed. Well, absolutely. And that's, you know, that's the thing. And I mean, and here's the, here's sort of one of the central cores of that concept for us is. We can get you sober and keep you sober. That's really not that hard, believe it or not. But if we, if we don't change the way you live, you will start drinking again because you're back into that rhythm of lying, cheating, stealing, hustling, cutting corners. And so drinking and doing drugs starts to become normal again. And mm-hmm. And I, I wanna be clear, we're not trying to be perfect. We're not trying to be puritanical. We're not trying to. I'm sober, therefore I am, you know, I am perfect. Quite the opposite. You know, it, it gives us a path of how to behave. That is an instructional path from older men, right? That are like, you know, here, let me show you, I mean, this is one of the beauties of that process for a sponsor is I never tell people what to do. I'll tell 'em my opinion. You know, but I'm like, this is your lesson. You need to learn this. Now I want to explain to you that when I was, when I was in that situation, this is what I did. You need to do whatever you're gonna do. And, um, but I just, I'll share with you my wisdom and my vision and my concept, but having space to share that on purpose is just hard to find anymore. And it's one of the reasons why, like, I refer back to 12 steps so often for my sober clients, like last. I think it was just a few months ago. I had a guy who hit his 20 year of sobriety, but was moving back into being a DI dry drunk, and we just ran him. He just ran the steps again, right. He just re-engaged in the process, picked it up from where he was in his life, and found new and different things. It's one of those that as you work them, just like most clinical tools, I would say most tools for self-exploration work like this, you can do 'em once and you learn a lot. But the more you do'em, the deeper you get. And yeah, they putter out at some point, but you can always come back to them after some dirt's been thrown back on. Well, and, and in that process, right, in that, so in that 12 step process, when we get to 12, it's about carrying the message and sharing it with other people and making yourself available as a sponsor, you know, and. That is probably the greatest joy, right, of, of recovery is, is having someone that you're connected with and talking to and, and, and just, you know, and look, everybody screws up. Everybody does it wrong. The first couple of times, you know, it's just like therapy, right? The first, your first out of the gate, you're like, oh my God, what was I thinking? You know? And, but the critical thing there is that within our community. You know, we, we offer to everyone what's going on. You know, I mean, and the, and the cool part is a, a healthy recovery community, let's just be clear, A healthy recovery community, your sponsor will look at you and say, I don't have any experience with that, but you should go talk to that guy. That guy. I mean, this happened to me in my first year. I, I was in the, in the hole with the IRS, I owed him like seven grand, you know? And I thought, oh my God, they're gonna come get me, you know? And I talked to my sponsor and he was like, oh, Kevin, I owe them half a million dollars. You know? And he is like, give you a little bit of perspective there. Yeah. He goes, I'll, he goes, you're fine. Call the phone number. Make a deal. They'll pick the pay. Everything's gonna be fine. Like. But I needed that guy to say, Hey, you know, here's what's up and here's why and how, and, and all the way to me, going back to graduate school, I, I have a friend in Boulder who's a nurse who's sober, who friend Brad. And, you know, he, he was, he was going to nursing school in 2007 and I, I sat him down. I'm like. Okay, I'm 43 years old. I'm 17 years sober, and I am miserable. You know, this is, this is horrible. And he's like, yeah, let's talk about it. I said, and, and, and he had left the business world to go to, uh, school. And I'm like, how did you come up with that? He's like, well, you know, so much of what we talk about in recovery is. You know, making ourselves available to others and helping others. And he's like, the people I look up to, the men I look up to, they are, you know, they're doctors, they're nurses, they're, you know, social workers. They work in corrections. You know, they, these are people that have dedicated their lives to helping other people. And he is, he realized that's what I wanted. And I'm like, you're singing my tune. And he's like, I think you'd make a great therapist. And I said, yeah, I think so too. I think that's one of the things that distincts community from like, um, like a support group or something like that. It's a group of people who know enough about each other to be able to show up and be of service to the community in their lane. I mean, that's the whole thing, right? Is that like I go, uh, back in Jacksonville, I go to a meeting Saturday morning and Sunday morning, and they're both men's meetings. And not, 'cause I don't like women and I don't like being around women. I actually like going to meetings with women. I think they're fun and they have really inter, it's nice to engage and interact. And by the way, Todd just popped into my head in the co-ed meetings, I got taught how to behave and how to treat women because the older women and the older guys would watch me when I first got there and I was using it like a bar, and they would pull me outside and go, we don't do that here. That behavior's unacceptable. And I'm like, what do you mean? You know? And they're like, mm-hmm. You know, and, and, uh, and so, and now of course I find myself pulling guys aside like, Hey, we, you're making this an unsafe space for these women. It's not okay. And by the way, it goes both ways. You know, there, there are women that are constantly, you know, looking for the next guy to fix them. And, uh, and even in the L-G-B-T-Q community as well, in in recovery. Yeah. The next partner to fix as well. Yeah. Right. Yeah. So I mean, those lessons are, are just sort of, you know, generationally passed on and, and I, I loved my father. My father was the reason I got sober. He is the one that cornered me and said, you either get sober or you're out of the family. And then, and he held his ground. You know, I credit him with starting the process of saving my life. But we never had these conversations, you know, and, and, and no fault of his, I mean, I love my dad and he passed away, um, four years ago. I'm sorry you lost him. Oh, thank you. I mean, it, it just, you know, it was just, this just wasn't him, you know? And I know his dad didn't have the conversations with him. You know, and they wouldn't even know how. And I, and I'm not saying I replaced my dad quite the opposite. I got to a space where I really learned to love and respect my father for what he did. My mom was a prescription drug addict and, and a lot of mental health issues. And God bless her. I loved her too. You know, my dad dealt with that. My dad was very successful While maintaining a household with, with someone that was really struggling. You know, which created an interesting example. So what I witnessed as marriage is one person who's got it together and handles things and one person who's kind of a disaster and has to be handled. And so in my first marriage, what do you think I looked for? You know, and, and I followed the exact same model. Well, I think that's the other beautiful thing about good communities. We've talked about this. I really dislike the idea. I. That a family unit is supposed to be all we need. All we need, and particularly as children, there's no way one or two people can be everything a child or a person needs. And so I think there's a lot of people that come into therapy or come into 12 Step that are looking for those, those spaces that their fathers didn't fill, their mothers didn't fill, and you can find them there. But it also, as you find those supports, it lets you see where your parents were for you. Which is a really, really healing place to be. And I will also share with you in, in, in a similar parallel route, I found women to, this doesn't gonna sound wrong, but like, you know, mother me or, you know, treat me like a son and, and, and, and be very kind and loving with me. Um, and, and show me, you know, what's appropriate, what's not appropriate, and here's a big piece, what I should be accepting from women, what I shouldn't be accepting from women. You know, behavior, and that also contributed to my masculinity is, is the women mentoring me as well and saying, Hey, look, I, I, you need to be careful for X, Y, z. Don't, don't fall into these traps where you're not the white knight. You know, you don't have a cape on, you know, you're a man. You're a good man. You're a solid man. Yeah, but you're not everything. Well, and I, I think that touches on something really important that I haven't talked about much yet, but there's this big push in the manosphere that men only need men and women are just there for whatever. And you need masculine and feminine mentorship in your life. You need people that are a little bit further along than you may be in this, and you need both perspectives and. It doesn't matter whether it's like a butch lesbian or an a effeminate, uh, male friend. There's a different energy in what they see in the world and what they can guide you through. It was like 20 something years ago. I had a, a, a female friend that I was working with. I. And, you know, and I was 36 or something along those lines, you know, way back, way back then. And a long, long ago. Yeah. Yeah. In the, in the previous century, you know? Um, and, uh, she and I were chatting and we, I was talking about dating and this, that, and the other thing. And she's like, can I give you some advice? And I was like, yeah, sure. And she's like, you're sober, you're spiritually based. You're educated, you have a career, you're a good man, and you like children. I'm like, yeah. She goes, you don't gotta be putting up with any woman's nonsense. And she's like, you need to understand Kevin. It's not like we were in college where everyone's chasing the hottie, you know? And, and she goes, women do the same thing, by the way. And I was like, yeah. Mm-hmm. And she's like, that's over at this age. People have either been married and divorced and been burned, severely burned, um, or they've been too scared to get, you know, get all the way in and, and she's like, you need to be super picky and super careful. Now, I did not listen to her advice the first time. Mm-hmm. But I, the second time when I was 50. And I met my current wife, my current and final wife, and I was really upfront with her in the opening conversations. I was like, look, I'm 50 years old and this is what I want. I want a partner, and I want a partner that's gonna continue to work on their mental health, where their sobriety career. You know, et cetera, et cetera. And I, and I want a partner where we can have really blunt and uncomfortable conversations together. And, and we talked all that stuff out for like the first couple of weeks she was actually out of the country. Yeah. You know, well, that, I'm glad that slowed things down. So those conversations had some room to breathe. Right. And, and that really, I would tell you, that was foundational for me in, in learning that it, it was okay for me to say those things. You know, I wasn't being selfish or rude or inconsiderate or demanding or, uh, what's the current term? Narcissistic or any of those, you know, overly masculine things. I was like, no, I'm just telling you this is what I want. Well, and if you're not, you can be kind and direct at the same time. And, and I think that's where a lot of people get it mixed up. There is a kindness in direct to take to say to somebody, this is what I'm looking for and who I can be to you. Is that what you want? Can you provide that to me? Like, and if not, then that's, that's what friends are for. That's what community's for. Like, there's dozens, hundreds, thousands of lovely people that I adore in my life that will not be my wife. But I think also, you know, and again, sort of circling back into the, the 12 steps in recovery and how that plays into masculinity, those were the places where I found. Um, people to sort of walk me through that. I had, I had a woman in LA when I was back living there in the early nineties, who, um, you know, she was my mother's age and, uh, we were, we worked at the same place and went to meetings and I. And one time we were sitting and chatting and, and I was like, oh yeah, no. You know, I cook, I clean, I do my own laundry, blah, blah, blah. I'm very self-sufficient, self-sufficient. She looked at me and she's like, I have a question for you. And I, I said, okay. She goes, I don't want you to get offended. And I said, okay. She's like, where, where was your mother? I'm like, what do you mean? She's like, Kevin, most men your age. Don't know how to do that stuff. They're not self-sufficient. They don't know how to cook. They don't know how to clean, they don't know how to do laundry. They might have an idea, but you're very efficient at all of those things. And generally that's something that's done for you as a child. I'm like, oh yeah, that, that wasn't my house. You know, we, we had to learn how to handle that stuff on our own. So, and I'm gonna tie this back. My wife today, my lovely, amazing wife Amy. You know, we got married in 2016 and we had some rough times. You know, we've had some, there's been some big challenges, right? There's been, she had cancer in 2018. There's been a lot of, uh, all of our parents have died. You know, um, and, and there's just been a lot of trauma, a ton of trauma, and we're really, we've come out of it to another side, but we had a, we had a conversation, I wanna say, a couple of years ago and, and I was like, look, here's the thing you need to understand. This is how I was raised. I came home and I didn't know if it was gonna be mom, drunk mom, or stoned, or passed out mom. And so it, I never knew what I was coming into the house. I never knew. I never knew it was the house gonna be clean and we lived in a beautiful multimillion dollar home. Was it gonna be clean? Was there gonna be dinner? You know, was it gonna be organized? You know, was, and, and those are the things I said. Those are the things I crave. I crave structure, I crave, you know, having someone cook for me and not because you're the woman. I was really clear. I'm like, that's, I don't see that as your job. I'll cook. I love cooking, but my thing that I love and, and embrace is when somebody cooks for me or takes care of me, and I I don't mean like a child, like an infant. I know, I know. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. Just some tending, I, that's how I refer to it for me is like just a little tending when I'm having a rough day goes a long way or just in the general connection of our relationship, I was giving her clear path is. These are the things I like and want and that make me feel safe and secure, and she has done the same thing. These are the things that I want from my partner. Got it. I will do those things. You know, again, I learned that in sobriety I. Yeah, that is the one hilarious thing when you walk into a meeting, which by the way, everybody listening, there are open meetings where you don't need to be in recovery to go. And if you have someone in your life in recovery, I really advise you to go do that at least once. But one of the things I love about being in that room is. Everyone's pretty straight line. Like there's not a lot of like dissemination or like backbiting. Everybody's very direct in whatever's going on for the most part, and it's, it's kind of nice. Yeah, no, no doubt. I mean, people tend to be pretty genuine and pretty authentic. Now the other side of that is, right, you know, people that are new. Are still struggling with, you know, staying sober and, and you know, waking up. I'm like, oh my God. There's also, there's a lot of, uh, you know, people that are newly sober, you know, tend to start having feelings and emotions that they haven't had for a long time. And so they really struggle with that and, you know, they gotta sort through that. By the way, I am also a massive advocate in the world of recovery and in the rooms of recovery of that's not a's responsibility. Our job is to get you sober and teach you how to behave like an adult. That's it. Therapists will help you learn how to process your emotions and your feelings. That's their job, and they're there to help you for that. But if you aren't sober, they can't do their job, you know? Yeah. Our job becomes helping you manage the consequences of your use, which frankly. And I, and I love my therapist friends. We're just better at that because it's our personal experience, you know? Well, I also, it, it breaks down, I, I did an episode that's, I think it's gonna come out next week on levels of care, and essentially it just puts you into case management when somebody's actively using, you're not doing therapy, you're doing case management. If you're doing your job well. You're trying to help them see the consequences of what's happening, how to cope with 'em, and so that they can make an informed decision about when to stop. But your idea is that kind mirror of would this happen if you weren't there that Friday night? Would this happen if that hadn't have been part of the equation? Absolutely. I'll tell you from my experience when I was still drinking and using, when the, when therapists would start saying stuff like that to me, I would be like. Oh man, I gotta find a new therapist. You know? I need somebody that'll just tell me to shut the hell up and do the thing. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I didn't come here for accountability, you know? Did that ever change for you or does that still just where you go to 12 step for that? No, I think the two can go together. I think someone who's enlightened, uh, on both sides, right? I think a good sponsor and a good therapist. Uh, and here, and here's, here. I'll throw this in too. So I used to go to a church in downtown Denver. Central Presbyterian is big, beautiful old, gorgeous Presbyterian church. And the minister, there was somebody I really looked up to. He's really awesome. And I, and my AA meeting, one of my AA meetings was there too. So, and, um. Uh, the minister was this great guy named Mark Ramsey. And, and, and he and I were talking about, you know, my sobriety, church, faith, et cetera, et cetera. And he's like, Kevin, I wanna be really clear. It's not my job to get you sober or keep you sober. That's a's job. My job is to help you expand your faith. And, but I, and I can't do that if you're not sober. So. I want you to go to meetings. I would never tell you not to go to meetings. I want you to go to meetings, but I also want you to engage in what we offer because I think we can enhance your understanding of the world and your life. And I was like, yeah. And I think the same thing goes with therapy, right? I think for me, I have a wonderful therapist that I think walks on well. I, she walks on water, but she's pretty awesome. She does. In your sessions. Yeah. Well, right. She's very 12 step savvy. She, she knows the gig, you know, she's very, very knowledgeable. And to be totally blunt, she's confided in me a little a smidge that that was her family system and that's why she does this. You know? And, and I need someone for my therapist. I need someone that understands my world and or two of my worlds, right? My therapy world and my recovery world. And she's perfect for me. She's absolutely perfect for me. Yeah.'cause she integrates, but how many therapists did you go through to find her? Bro, I was, uh, at that point I was 30 years sober. Okay. And I, I've done therapy pretty consistently for the last, well, since 2008, right? So when I went back to graduate school and, and, and they, I had wonderful therapist. There's not to say anything like that, you know, but it's, but here, okay, so here's what happened. My father passed away in July of 2021. My mom died in 2014, towards the end of the year of 2021 and rolling into 2022. I was really struggling, I mean, really struggling. And uh, and my wife said, she's like, I, I want to talk to you about something, but I just don't want you to get mad or angry or defensive, and, and I'm like, too late, you know? Well, now I am. Let's go. Yeah. And I'm like, what's up? And she's like, you're so angry. You're so angry. And I, she goes, I think you need some help. I think you need to talk to somebody. And I was like, and I had been seeing someone that it just wasn't going anywhere, you know? Or did, ran its course, right? And, and I was like, yeah, you're right. No, you're totally right, honey. You're completely right. I said, I have someone in mind. I'm gonna call her and make an appointment with her. And, and I called her and we had a phone conference and she said, well, Kevin, I wanna let you know something. I process grief and loss through trauma. So if you're up for that journey, I'm up for working with you. I was like, oh, this is gonna suck, and it's been amazing. Better on the other side though. Well, and it's still, still there's, it's still there. Grief never goes away entirely. That's a hole in your life that you gotta learn how to operate around. Yeah. Or with it. I mean, it's just, it's part of who you are. You know, it's, it's the, it's as we get older, we experience more grief situations and we have to learn that that's part of life. Guess where I learned that? You know, and I learned that, uh, in a lot of the 12 step engagement in my sponsorship engagement, where, you know, we would go through courses of life together, right? Marriage, divorce, you know, a struggling financially success. School graduation. Well, and those transition points are so key to have mentorship around and, and I think like that's one of the things that a lot of people don't generally understand is that if you've been going through your life and you've been doing okay and all of a sudden you're not, it's usually around a time that's something pretty big changed. And it's because the way that you've been operating the world isn't working for your new world. And that's where 12 steps great because someone in that room has made that that step. Yeah, absolutely. You know, I mean, just the, the, even when it's just sort of an off comment of someone. I remember my first year sober, I, I, I had, I, I had always had jobs where I made a lot of money and so I was always very generous and gifting and presents and at Christmas, uh, which we could do a whole episode on that, let tell you, I've had to learn a lot about that process. But, um. I was working a really, like a subsistence level job man, and I was living like in a $400 a month room in a house, and I was barely getting by and I was in an AA meeting and I was freaking out and I was like, I don't know what I'm gonna do. My, my family, you know, we, we we're generous and da da da, and I'm just worried, what's my dad gonna think? And this old guy, his name was Ed. And he looked at me, he's like, Kevin, the gift you're giving your family is that you're sober and that you're alive. And you know, that's, he goes, you have, do you understand what a massive gift that is that you're giving them and how house they're, how happy they'll be. And he said, and you know, as far as your dad get 'em a tie. And if he doesn't like it, Kim and I was like. Oh right. Perspective. I'm, I'm highly amused that your room at the low point was 400 a month in a house.'cause that's exactly where I was right before I joined the military. In that same kind of situation of just like, I can't get it together. I'm not finding work. This isn't going well. I need something. Yeah, man. And it sounds like you had some, some good guidance and it got you where you needed to go and now you're doing just fine. You know, I mean, my life's great. It's not perfect. It's great, you know, well, you meaning goes a long way. And once you can find a way to have money and have meaning meaningful work in your life, you and I, I wanna be really clear here. You don't need to do like public service work to be happy. If your job pays you enough for you to give you the freedom to go do that, that works too. But you need both. Absolutely, and, and, and, and you know, I mean, just to be totally blunt, I think at 18 years old, the last thing I should have done is gone to college. You know, that was, that was a huge mistake in judgment on my part. And, but it was what was expected. You know, um, I should have followed you. I should have gone to the military. Well, yeah, and that's, that's been really nice with the newest generation of guys is they're slowing that down a lot more because they watched somebody of us crash and burn through it. And we know that guys generally don't make it through college. Now, their first time, like I think only one in four was the data quote in Reeves' book. I'll, I'll double check that and put that up. But it makes sense sometimes to be out in the world before picking. Education and debt. The problem I'm finding lately with some of the young guys is they don't go out into the world. They stay living at home. They don't go get the crap job you need to get outta the house and go work the crap job. I know it's harder because of the cost of living and everything has gotten so much worse and it's so much harder to survive on your own with a subsistence job, but you gotta find something and'cause that gives you the direction. To find your thing and a reason to go find it, it's too comfortable at home. Absolutely, man. I, I could not agree with you more. I mean, and I, I mean, I, you know, so I mean, after I flunked outta college and went back home and I was, you know, bartending and, and selling weed, 'cause it was, you know, 19 8 90 and that's what you did. You know, and well, and that's a good side gig when you're bartending. Yeah. Well, I mean, yeah, I mean, nowadays they call it a side hustle, you know? That's just what we did, you know, and it's not even illegal anymore. And, um, when I, as I was, my, my dad confronted me when I was 26 and I didn't get sober till I was 27. And in that nine months of that space, right, that August to May, and I started seeing a therapist with him, a guy, a great guy, and I started. And we started having these amazing conversations where he and I started putting all our cards on the table, him telling me about his life and the expectations placed on him, me telling me, and it was, everything was, there was no, there was no jockeying for position. Uh, and, and it was, you know, it was amazing. Right? Yeah. There was safety because that was what that space was for. Right. Exactly. But one of the byproducts of that is I started looking around at my life. And I was like, I am 27 years old and I'm bartending at a really nice restaurant in a really nice place, but I have achieved, you know, I have maxed out. I'm, I'm probably making, you know, a couple hundred dollars a day. This is 19 90, 19 91, 2, $300 a day salary. You know, blah, blah, blah, and hourly or whatever. But this is, it. It, it is not gonna get any better. You know, and I saw the guys that were twice my age doing the same thing I was doing, and I was like, oh, no, no, no, no. Well, and service work can get really isolating too, just because you're working such off hours from everybody else that it makes it really hard to have a life outside of the service industry. Yeah. Well, and then you know that that industry tends to have a lot of folks that are struggling, you know, because it's quick cash and easy. I want to kind of, 'cause I've been kind of struggling with how to direct some clients in this, so I was looking forward to talking to you about it. Let's say that someone's newly sober, they, they've hit their wall and they need to go get sober and they're gonna go shop meetings. One of the things that I think a lot of people don't fully understand about 12 Step is if you're in a metropolitan area. There are literally hundreds and they have drastically different feels with drastically different people. Which means that when you walk into one and it doesn't feel right, stay for the meeting and then go find a different one. What could speed up that process for people? When you've got clients through that, what do, what are the tips you give them when they're shopping those meetings? Like if somebody, like it's a client or even a, like a friend. I had a friend call me today actually, and I was like, you know. You wanna find your tribe, you know your people, right? So what that means is you, you probably want to, when you look through the guide, there's a great app now, by the way. It's just a, it's a folding chair, which is what we use. Men, women, gay topics, speakers. I always tell people, go try a speaker meeting. You just, you just have to listen for an hour. You don't gotta talk. And you know what? Try a men's meeting, you might feel more comfortable there. Try a women's meeting. You might feel safer. For women especially, they just, it's so important for them to feel incredibly safe. And, and, and I think that's really critical. My wife only goes to women's meetings. She's like, I'm at the point where that's just where I want to be. Well, and I don't think there's anything wrong with needing gendered space. Right. And, and I don't, I don't think that's a masculine or a feminine thing. I think we just need to be around each other sometimes for a certain kind of problem, a certain kind of energy. And so what I'm, what I'm hearing you say is the, essentially you've just gotta go and do the reps, but go try different things, like go to different areas of town, go try different types of meetings. Don't just kind of go hit the three meetings closest to you. Well, yes, and you can also be like, if you live in Cherry Creek, try the Cherry Creek meetings. They're probably your people if you don't like it. Try another one. And uh, the other side of it too is some people, some people are early morning

people, man, they love that 7: 40:46

00 AM stuff. You gotta pull my fingernails out to get me to do that, you know. But I like going to a meeting about eight or nine o'clock in the morning. I. It's when I'm there, it's when I'm emotionally present. It's really funny as I've gotten, I used to go to meetings that would start at seven or eight in the evening, and I love them. I, dude, I'm in bed by, you know. Yeah. That's a little, that's a, that's a little heavy for a late night thing for me anymore. My last session ends at four. Right, exactly. And, and so I encourage people and, and because I know the, the atmosphere or the stratosphere in Colorado when somebody says, Hey, I've got a guy who's 40 years old. He's got kids, he's got a wife, he's in the commercial real estate business, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I'm like, oh, okay. Send them here. I know where those people are. Yeah. You're one of the, you're one of the numbers I have for that and I, I think that's important. If somebody's moving into recovery, that's why you need a therapist that understands addiction and recovery. Because even if we don't know the meetings, we should know someone who does that. We can call and get you some guidance. Absolutely. I mean, absolutely. And, and I'm happy to dispense that to anyone at any time. I mean, I definitely get emails and texts and calls like, Hey, I have a woman, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I'm like, oh, yeah, yeah, no, go here. Call this person. Check it out. See what you think. Well, that's one of the reasons why I, I found you and why I like you so much, is that you are a guy who joins community by being of service comm to community, and you can't beat that in a person in your life. I think it's super important, and you mentioned this earlier, for therapists to learn more about the 12 step community because what I tend to get, I'll just be honest. What I tend to get is they're listening to their clients, tell them how awful it's, and then they talk to me and they're like, well, she didn't want to go to aa. It's too religious. And I'm like, you've known me for 10 years. Do I strike you as a particularly religious person? No, I've been going to AA for 34 years, my friend. Why would you take the, the knowledge of someone who's tried it once and is still drinking as opposed to doing your own understanding of who we are and what we are. And by the way. We have atheist meetings, we have agnostic meetings. We have Buddhist meetings. So don't, don't throw me that. I mean, I see those posts on our therapist Facebook stuff all the time. No religion, no aa. I'm like, oh my God, you just don't understand us. You know? That's, that's not who we are. Well, I think it's just there's a lot of. Animosity between the recovery community and the mental health community. And that's why I like teaching the lat courses so much because that tends to be where you find the bridge people, right? Either people that are outta the recovery community coming into trying to get that mental health community built like you did, or people showing up in the mental health community. Understanding that therapy isn't the only thing that can help people and shouldn't be the only thing helping almost anybody. Well man, I wanna be respectful of your time and I still gotta grab your stories here about you explicitly. So I, I think we gotta just kind of jump into the, the personal questions and I've, I've been excited 'cause I know you've been thinking about it. What's a truth about masculinity that you learned before you were 12? That's still true today. And I would say I learned this through example, not through anyone telling me I'm gonna use my dad as my reference, uh, was his job to provide and make sure that we were safe and protected. And, and that we had food, clothing, housing, education. That was his job is to make sure that we had the wherewithal to make those things occur. And I'm not saying exclusive, like I would say being in a provider's role is a masculine role and that doesn't need to gender the role, right? That I'm not saying what equipment somebody has to have, but there is something very masculine. About being the person that goes and gets what the family needs on a structural level while having somebody make sure that they're leading and taking the lead on the emotional things. And it doesn't mean that you don't cross those boundaries and back up the other person's lane, but I, I do think one of the ways that we've been talking about masculinity that's been kind of damaging is this idea that being a provider isn't masculine and it, and it just is and it's okay that it's, it just doesn't need to be like a man doing it. Right. It's not, it's not only masculine, but I would just say that in my world, that's how I was brought up and I was like, oh, okay. Got it. Well, and it sounds like your father was an exemplary dad for a guy of his time. He provided Well, he provided the structure and stability he could, and he was not exactly the most emotionally communicative guy in the world, which that was his generation. Absolutely. Yeah. I think that's been one of the really fun things about this question in particular is so many guys it's, it's usually about the dad, right? You don't learn lessons that early based on what people tell you, you will learn by watching. And so that question has been really, really fun. The next one is, tell us about a time when your pursuit of manhood hurt you. Oh yeah, no. Ironically, it was my first marriage. I was trying to step in my first, my first wife was divorced, her husband was in prison, and she had two small children. And man, I rode up on that white horse and put on my Superman outfit, and I was like, I have got this, and I will be, and I will be handling things from here on out. I will be solving problems and taking care of everything. Then I started chasing. The drama, right. Every time there was drama, I'd fix it. Mm-hmm. You make sense? Yeah. It made you feel safe. Right? But instead of having the boundary of, okay, so I'm here to provide everybody's safe. Everybody's got food, everyone's got, things are good. We got insurance. I make money. Things are groovy. When she started creating all the, the drama and the CRA by overspending and causing trouble and stuff like that, I kept chasing that and trying to fix that. Because I thought that was, I could handle that like it was my role. Right. And, and it was something I was taught by my dad. Right.'cause he had the same problem. And that's not my job. If you're doing things to destroy your life, I, I will speak to you and tell you, I think this is a mistake. And as my partner, I would like, you know, we need to talk about this and, and sort through this, but I'm not gonna clean up your messes. Yeah. The, the fixing mentality. Yeah. It's a hard one. And coming out of a family of addiction, it's so like, because that's what we did as kids, right? Not only the dad, but everybody was just trying to fix the mess from the person using all the time. I. That was your job. And ironically, it was also one of the things that made my first marriage not go well. We have that in common. How about that? Who would've thought? Yeah. Well, and it's, it's interesting too because one of the things around that that I think a lot of people don't understand when they talk about it, 'cause we talk about it from the fixer perspective, right? That like that's in you and you're trying to do this. But one of the things that often gets left out is you're setting up the other person for failure. You're structuring things to be the fixer, which doesn't let them be the competent adult that they probably are, and they're usually not asking for it. You're creating a, a, a codependency where you are the, you're the rescuer, you're the enabler, you're the problem solver. You're the fixer, which doesn't allow the other person to learn how to take care of themselves and solve their problems and learn from their mistakes when you're constantly jumping in to fix. Yeah, they're like, what you're teaching them is, I don't have to do this. He'll take care of it or he won't let me do this. That kind of dynamic becomes controlling at a certain point. And the other, the subliminal message to that or the under the underside underbelly message to that is he thinks I'm incompetent. They think I'm stupid. And that's the message that that gets sent across when someone is constantly trying to fix you. Yeah, falling into that pattern is probably the single greatest regret of my life. Was my, that happening in my marriage as well. It's a hard thing to come out on the other side of, and I very much relate to that story. Like I knew we had things in common. I didn't know about that one. Who would've thought? And look what we do for a living. Hey, those who can't do teach. And that's my, that's my quote. I live by these days. Yeah, right, exactly. All making, making our mistakes and getting better. Uh, speaking of getting better, we can jump into the last question. Uh, tell us about a time where pursuing masculinity and manhood empowered you. So in April of 2018, my wife had a routine colonoscopy and uh, the results came back that she had colorectal cancer and the next day she had another full body scan and they found out that she also had kidney cancer. And that launched us on basically a nine, well, let's be clear, a nine month journey of treatment and then another two years. Of recovery of chemo, radiation, surgery, and I became her primary caretaker. My, all the programming that I had that, you know, this is my wife, this is my partner, and it is my job to protect her and help her and, and not fix her.'cause I knew I couldn't fix her or save her, but it was my job to make sure that things were in order so she could be helped and taken care of. And according to my wife. I did a very good job, and, uh, she's like, I can't imagine doing this with anybody but you. And then just to throw a bonus thing here, two years ago this week actually, we were in Copenhagen, Denmark, and the day before we left, she tripped and fell on a cobblestone street and broke her ankle in three places and, uh, had to spend the night in the Danish hospital. And then we flew home. They, they. Put her in a soft cast and gave her a bunch of blood thinners and medication. They're like, you need to go home. Do, don't stay here. We can do the surgery, but you're gonna be here for months. And we're like, Nope, we're outta here. And, uh, we went, flew back. But from May to September again, I, she couldn't walk and I was her primary caretaker. And that, that is definitely, I would say for me, that was about being true to my masculinity and true to what I believe my. Responsibilities are and who I am as a person. I, I, I would tell you, I think that has a lot to do with where we are now. I mean, she cooks for me, she cooks for us almost every night, and that means a lot to me. You know, I see. I'll send her recipe suggestions, like, Hey, this looks really good. And so she can't eat red meat, right?'cause she only has one kidney and the colorectal stuff. And I'm like, let's try this, let's try that. And she's like, okay, sure. I'll make that, let's see how it goes. And then my job, I, I always tell her. You can leave the kitchen a complete disaster. That is my job to, to clean that mess up. You went to the effort of making this wonderful, amazing, incredible dinner. I will take the responsibility of cleaning up, putting everything away, rearranging. That's my gig and that's the balance y'all have found, and it works for you. Yeah. And I do, I have to admit to the fact that I do, when she starts putting things in the dishwasher, I'm like, I mean, I appreciate that. She goes like, I know, I know you're gonna rearrange it. Well, Alan Alder made that quote in his book. What I, if I understood you, what I have, this look on my face was the title of the book. And it's basically just an empathetic communication book. And one of the things in there that always strikes a chord is the second most common fight in marriage is how to load the dishwasher. Well, Kevin, uh, thanks so much, uh, for coming on and sharing all this about, about 12 step at, uh, some point. I'm probably gonna heckle you to see if we can get, uh, like one of the 12 step skills that you'd recommend for just anybody, and I'll, I'll put that up with this just so people can have some more structure on what they're trying to do and maybe have you come back on and talk about it at some point. But it's been really good hearing you talk about the work, man. I always love how you do. And I like how having you in the community, I'm really glad we got to share you with the viewers today. I thank you. I appreciate the opportunity, and that's our conversation with Kevin. We're so lucky he was willing to come on and share his story as an insight with us. Sorry again about the video going out about the 14th mark, but we had the technical issue with Kevin off in the mountains. At least we could still hear the conversation. I'm glad it still worked out. There's only a few things we need to clarify and make sure that are lined up really well. So 12 Step isn't just something that. Like Kevin and other people in 12 Step talk about being good. There's actually really good data behind it. Talking about how community and the structures provided by 12 Step really do help quite a few people with their recovery and maintain their abstinence from a substance, and that data keeps getting renewed. I. The second thing I'd like to check a little bit is on how masculinity shows up at 12 step. Things like accountability and transparency improves men engagement in mental health and recovery. That's also really well documented. It's one of those things that there just aren't a lot of places outside of religious organizations that are doing that, so it's a place we can get that. The next one is we, we talked a lot about, uh, different kinds of support. And of course we wanna involve our family and our loved ones and any major changes we're making. But it's important to remember that family and close loved ones cannot provide you everything you need. And generally speaking, what I, I like to say that we require is we need community. We need our family, whether that's chosen family or birth family. And we generally need some kind of medical engagement, whether that's therapy, medications, et cetera. And so if you're making a major change in your life, particularly around recovery, make sure that you get all three. You know, whether it's 12 Step or some other peer organization, whether it's um, therapy or coaching or uh, medication. Hopefully you're getting as many of those as you can to make this really hard change to your life. I. The last thing we wanna kind of clarify a little bit is that family can't do everything for you, right? We, we always wanna involve our close family and close friends in our changes that we're making. When they're really monumental, however, they're not gonna be able to help with everything. You need to spread out the support a little bit. That's why these communities are really fantastic, whether it's 12 Step or something else, and why things like therapy and medication are also really helpful when making those major changes. And there's really good data behind. The more support and avenues of support you have, the more likely you are to maintain a change that you're trying to go for. So those are kind of the three main fact check points that I wanted to just clarify and get in there a little bit. If this helped you, if this helped you understand 12 step, if this helped you, uh, explore it for a journey for you or just helped you understand loved one's journey through it, please. Share it around. Find somebody else that needs this. We really wanna get the word out. Also, remember that this was an hour long conversation with an expert. It's not going to give you everything you need on the topic. If you're gonna make a major change like this, please remember, this does not replace therapy. Your story is unique and so is the needs for your care. Make sure that you're getting the right care and right resources for you. I'll see you next week when we talk to an expert around the differences between blue collar and white collar and what they can learn from each other. I'm really excited to share it with you. I can't wait to see you there.