Surviving a Traumatic Brain Injury: Mental Health, Healing & Identity

Welcome back to the ACT OUT podcast! In this episode, host Adam Tomlin sits down with Nicholas Ruchlewicz, a traumatic brain injury survivor, mental health advocate, and self-proclaimed nerd, for an honest and deeply personal conversation about trauma, healing, and what it means to keep rebuilding yourself after life changes in an instant. What starts as a conversation about Nicholas’s advocacy work quickly becomes a powerful look at survival, vulnerability, and the invisible weight of recovery.

Nicholas shares the story of his life-changing motorcycle crash in 2016, including the traumatic brain injury, brain bleed, and long road through physical and cognitive rehabilitation. Adam and Nicholas talk about the emotional toll of recovery, the frightening reality of being alone with your thoughts after trauma, and why men with traumatic brain injuries face such serious mental health risks. Nicholas also opens up about how therapy helped him long before his accident—and why that foundation may have saved his life after it.

The conversation also dives into anger as a secondary emotion, the stigma men face around vulnerability, and the ways trauma can intensify underlying struggles like ADHD, emotional regulation, and self-worth. Nicholas explains how he learned to slow down, recognize his triggers, and build new habits through speech therapy, cognitive behavioral work, and daily accountability. Along the way, Adam and Nicholas explore something unexpected but incredibly meaningful: how gaming, music, and community became part of Nicholas’s healing and helped him feel less alone.

If you’ve ever wondered what recovery after a traumatic brain injury really looks like, how therapy can reshape the way you handle pain, or why vulnerability is one of the strongest things a person can practice, this episode will stay with you.

Learn more about Nicholas Ruchlewicz here.

Tune in every Thursday for episodes that inspire, challenge, and entertain. Whether you’re here for laughs, lived wisdom, or action steps, the ACT OUT podcast is your space to rethink growth, embrace self-awareness, and act out your passions.

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Transcript

Meet Nick Ruckle — TBI Survivor, Mental Health Advocate & Project Manager

SPEAKER_02 0:00

Welcome to the Act Out Podcast. I'm your host, Adam Tomlin. Today's guest is Nick Rutuliches. He is a TBI survivor and also a mental health advocate. Let's roll the tape. Hey, Nicholas, how are you, man? I'm all right, Adam. How are you, sir? I am doing well, man. I uh I really appreciate you coming on today. I was doing like a little bit of uh background research on you, and uh I believe you're uh on Instagram uh NPR nerd, right?

SPEAKER_01 0:28

Yep, NPR nerd. It's it's just my initials. I don't listen to NPR often. I like to talk a lot.

SPEAKER_02 0:36

I thought that you were the like National Public Radio, and I was like, oh my goodness, yes, absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 0:41

But I'll take donations, uh, but no.

SPEAKER_02 0:46

Well, uh, can you uh kind of tell the audience um a little bit of uh little bit of background uh about you? What do you currently do?

SPEAKER_01 0:55

Uh well for my um my job, I'm a I give the gift of low expectations. I'm a project manager for a technology company, but I have my passion projects, which is why I mean we were able to connect is um I do a lot of advocacy for trauma and mental health support. I'm a male traumatic brain injury survivor, and I do a lot of different presentations or different webinars or anything on you know the impact trauma can have, you know, from anxiety, depression. And I speak a lot about you know some of the issues men face with the you know stigma that is attached to our emotions. So and you know, you can see behind me, I my I'm a big gamer, I'm a big nerd, my nerds treat credit pretty high, but that's you know, my my uh big pass the the you know nice thing about this platform is to be able to speak very clearly with about my vulnerabilities and where we are and you know where I am after

The Motorcycle Crash That Changed Everything

SPEAKER_01 1:58

everything.

SPEAKER_02 1:59

Jimon, kind of getting a little bit of uh like background uh into your uh to your injury. Uh how old were you whenever uh whenever happened?

SPEAKER_01 2:07

I mean it was this recorded on February uh and uh 23rd, so it was almost 10 years ago. Oh, wow. 315, 2016, the IDES of March and brain injury awareness month. So I'd got a double jeopardy. So I was I was involved in a single vehicle motorcycle crash, and I separated my pelvic circle, I broke my sacroiliac, I crushed my left orbital, I had a massive concussion, right side brain bleed, subdomahematoma.

SPEAKER_02 2:35

Oh man. So just the fact that you're even here is is saying a lot.

SPEAKER_01 2:41

Yeah, it was, you know, the good thing is, I mean, doesn't really need to know what happened, doesn't really matter. Um body lied there for roughly about four hours. Um I had I just had a really rough separation and and divorce the year before, so I was still in my mom's and the my dogs were acting up. Mom's like, where what's where's Nicholas at? My brother didn't know. So they'd played telephone tag with different people, and then they came to the the unit where because I just bought a bike uh, you know, uh, and I just was starting to ride it uh after the snow. I wanted to make sure that I didn't ruin the new paint job. So uh that's where my body was in a nice secure location, and uh I said about four hours later than the EMT came and took me right to right into the trauma unit over in Northern Virginia, Fairfax. Yeah, so that's ten years.

SPEAKER_02 3:33

Do you have much what was your last memory of that day?

SPEAKER_01 3:38

Um I have I remember um I remember riding my motorcycle. I mean, I had no memory of anything. I mean, I I rode it, you know, every day for a couple uh you know, probably about you know 10 days or so before the incident. Um again, we just had snow. I mean, in this area, sometimes we get snow in weird times, and we had snow like the first week in March, just a little bit, but all the salt and everything else on the ground, I didn't want to ruin my new paint job, so I just rode around the facility. It was a big facility. Again, I had a um I had a big storage unit uh in a it was a garage style. And uh yeah. So just a little bit of trauma, I would say.

SPEAKER_02 4:23

Well, uh you had uh mentioned that you were also a uh mental health advocate. Was your uh what was the injury tied to the uh to the like mental health uh issues or are they separate?

SPEAKER_01 4:38

No, they I mean they're separate, but they are combining in the two. Trauma is a very um isolating and dehabilitating, you know, thing to anybody. I always say that trauma wasn't the hardest thing I went through, it was my separation, divorce, because you know, you're surrounded by anger and hate and people that want to take you know something and my my separation and my divorce, it was really tough. You know, at least in my trauma, people wanted to help me and you know help me heal and help support me. So that was a very different, different mentality. So before my trauma, I was in, I I had I had therapy. I went to therapy every every day, not every day, you know, every every week, at least once a week, if not every other week. And it was something that I used for myself. My previous relationship, a lot of things were tough, but I wanted to figure out how to help out my spouse, and then I found out through that how to help myself, and I worked really hard to get where I was. And um yeah, I mean, it was some I mean, it was it's been almost 16 years, actually a little over 16 years since I uh I started going to therapy, and you know, I saw a therapist, like I said, and and we saw each other. And again, I found out how do I help someone, how do I help someone, and then I found out how to help myself. You know, we did something called cognitive behavioral therapy, where she asked me difficult questions and and I challenged myself. And I guess since I want to be a teacher's pet and always try to do well, I try to really answer and be as honest as I could. In doing so, again, I learned a lot about myself through it. And I know I do believe very strongly, if I didn't have that, you know, foundation, I don't know if I'd still be here or what capacity I would. So again, I saw a therapist, I separated, and you know, I was driving to see her, you know, blah, blah, blah. Then my trauma happened. So I didn't see her for about a month uh because I was in the hospital. I saw her once, and then literally the following week, she uh suffered a heart attack and had to stop practicing. Oh wow. So yeah, I had something that was just such a powerful part of where I was, who I was, for almost six years, and the rug was pulled out from under me. And I mean that was terrifying, you know. And I do say to myself, I was like, she, you know, she taught me a lot. She taught me how to be where I am, so I know that I'll be able to be okay. But I made sure I immediately would try to go find another therapist,

Why Male TBI Survivors Are Twice as Likely to Die by Suicide

SPEAKER_01 7:16

you know. Male traumatic brain injuries are much more common than we realize, and male traumatic brain injury survivors are twice as likely to die by suicide. It's a very big deal. Than a typical male, correct. I mean, especially white males are very high right now on the on that, you know, those issues and and traumatic brain injuries because our brains are, you know, obviously they control everything. So right side, brain, left side, negligence. So, but your right side of your brain, so left side, a lot of that is your recognition of words, the way uh you can speak, um, some different analytical thought. Your right side is your problem solving, uh, the way you you see your vision, um, and again, left side negligence, uh, your compulsory, you know, some of your actions and a lot of your emotions. So just a lot of uh a lot of little things that went on. So I was, you know, so that's before my um, you know, trauma where I knew a lot about mental health, and then you know, through my trauma, you know, I was able to, you know, there's a program I'm part of now, Trauma Survivors Network, and it wasn't active when my trauma happened. So my family didn't really have a good resource. My now wife, um, my girlfriend, now my wife, um, she um had uh been around people with brain injuries and and major concussions, so she understood certain things. My mother was terrified of like that I would be something completely different than I was, didn't have that support. And I was actually never in a coma. I was never technically unconscious, I was just not cognizant. So there's not many pictures of me. My father deleted them all, there's only one holding a comic book, but you can see my eyes are totally glassed out. But even though I have no memory, I would respond to different things. Or my girlfriend would be like, We're gonna go out to dinner and just get me to eat my food or something like that. So I would do so again, I have no memory of that event. I just have these ideas of visions, but it's not real vision, it's just that was my brain trying to con you know make sense of things. And then, you know, I woke up, I always say I woke up when I became more lucid and understanding certain things, and you know, it was very crushing and very, you know, you feel alone. I mean, every brain injury is different, and they call it the invisible injury. So it was uh you know complete darkness. I don't know if you remember I was thinking of the never-ending story of the nothing. It's always that darkness is out there, the nothing exists, and it is terrifying, and it's something that you know I never want people to feel alone in their journey. So that obviously is a huge deal with mental health and this, you know, this path. And one of the things I've learned, so trauma survivors wasn't active, but in the rehabilitation hospital, the acute rehab, there was something called peer mentoring. So former patients can speak to current patients about where they are. And I heard someone speak, and their story was I had to be removed, uh, I couldn't stay long because I was in a lot of pain, which I called discomfort. But they said a story about having a brain aneurysm and not understanding what numbers were anymore and letters, and they were a math professor, and I'm like, how can I be this selfish? Just I can't relax, I can't calm down. I have nothing compared to that. They had to relearn everything, so maybe there was something else there, and I so I wanted to make sure there was hope for others, and I learned, you know, through my journey, why not me? If anybody can do it, why not me?

SPEAKER_00 11:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:16

So I I really went in all, you know, I don't don't do anything small in my life. So I went all in, and you know, through that advocacy and through that, I've I've done some really I mean, talking to you, talking to this platform is great to be able to reach new people from around the globe.

SPEAKER_02 11:34

So yeah, I'll definitely that was a lot of information and and stuff, so I will put this well no, I had there's just like I have like 145 questions that I'm trying to remember from things that you that you said. Uh the first thing that uh that really struck me with what you were talking about was your initial reason for going to therapy, uh, you know, pre pre-entry. And it was it the reason why it resonated with me is because it very much reminded me of me. And you had said that you went to try to basically find things out to or uh figure out how to help your spouse do things, right? Like it wasn't even to it wasn't even for you didn't go to therapy for you, it was for your spouse. And uh for me, I didn't go to therapy for myself at first. It was for my son. I knew that there were uh patterns that were uh that I were that I was going to repeat, and I was completely helpless stopping them, even though I could see them. So I was like, you know what, I'm screwed up beyond repair, but hopefully Camden's not. And it took me it probably took me about probably six months before I like really started to feel like I was like, hey, you know what? Like I'm I'm getting somewhere and I feel like I'm starting to do this for me. Do you remember if there was like a um if there even was a light bulb moment, or was it more of a progression for you from uh wanting to go to therapy for your uh spouse versus going for yourself?

SPEAKER_01 13:00

I think it morphed into going for myself. Um, because I learned more about myself, um, asking myself those tough questions and you know, just trying to figure out to go. And, you know, I'm a very literal person, like I'll find inspiration, different things, and I I love dark uh music, but I remember some of the music I listened to, and it really helped open my eyes to some of the struggles I was in, and and that allowed me to you know speak about it. I mean, I had my old uh dog, my champ, I would walk him and just basically talk to him about everything going on and where I was, and he was so critical for me to do it and maybe realize when you speak out loud, I mean, there's something that's proven that when we hear ourselves speak a problem, our brain hears it and we can start trying to troubleshoot and resolve it. That's why a lot of times, if you talk in the car, a lot of times, if you notice, sometimes your best conversation will be in the car because you're focusing on the road, you're focusing on the environment, so it looked gives your brain the chance to unload and just you know focus on there, but also kind of be a little vulnerable when you're speaking because you're you're not trying to put on this guarded look. So, you know, that was a again, I've I found a lot of neat little ways to, you know, better myself through, you know, my experience and and that yeah, that being alone or being feeling not worthy or not valued um was tough. And one of the things that can help show people that they're not alone is music because some people write about things that are so you know hard and they put it in a lyrics. It's just like art. People in different ways can can do something to inspire someone. So that pain and that stuff people feel, there was something out there, so I knew that I wasn't alone in this, even though it felt very, you know, like overwhelming that I'm I'm alone in this. You never are. One of the things my trauma taught me was that I wasn't invisible as I I thought I was, but I'm definitely not.

SPEAKER_02 15:17

So whenever your uh injury happened, had your uh therapist already stopped practicing? No, no, okay.

SPEAKER_01 15:27

Literally, I saw her once after my trauma. So I I got out of the hospital, I was in a wheelchair, uh, still because I know they shaved my head because my I said that movie face house full of crap because they pulled my face down to me do my uh yeah, but anyhow, so I still had my still stitches in my face, this and that. I saw saw her, and literally the week later she had a heart attack. So it was like, I mean, it was a beyond gut punch,

Losing Your Therapist After Trauma — and Finding the Courage to Start Over

SPEAKER_01 15:55

and and you know, trying to find a new therapist when you're already struggling and already low is terribly hard. And you know, it's this was fortunately way before pandemic because it's even harder now. But so I made sure I reached out to a bunch of different you know therapists on uh from a website, and I reached out to like five, two of them didn't respond to me. Two of them said uh they're not seeing anybody, and and then one of them said, I can see you, but I only do workday hours. And I said to myself, I was like, listen, my mental health is the most important thing for me right now because I knew how scary it was to be alone with my thoughts, and I knew how hopeless it felt, and I didn't want to do that, so I saw I went to see her, and literally almost uh 10 years later, I'm still seeing her, and she helps keep me accountable when I'm ready to not be accountable and for myself and to be honest, and that's that's really important, and sometimes we all need that someone to help us be a little bit more, you know, have expectations of ourselves, and because we might make excuses, but sometimes if you let it and be vulnerable to a therapist, to someone, that'll allow yourself to be able to push through that you know, pain or whatever you're going through.

SPEAKER_02 17:26

Oh, you're you're preaching to the converted friend. I've definitely recently converted, I've been in therapy. I do uh internal family systems therapy. I've been practicing it for three years, I think, in uh May. So uh yeah, it's uh definitely been a uh definitely been a transition. One thing and or another thing that you had said that I like completely blew my mind, the statistics about men who have a traumatic brain injury are how many times more likely to die by the time. Well uh can kind of why do you think that's the case? Like what what are the mechanisms behind that?

SPEAKER_01 18:02

Um, well, uh our brains and our minds can be the scariest things we ever go through. Everybody, many people can say that. You say that you're like, my wife will say, you know, are you being mean to my husband? Remind me, you know, stop. And it's something that we are very we're taught to do that, like men especially. And when you feel like you have no control over anything, when people have to help clean you, have to, you know, help you get dressed, help you do your basic tasks, that's pretty humiliating. And that's just you know this. And I fortunately, you know, I was able to heal and I I was compelled through it, but being alone with our thoughts and being trapped, I always say I was never in a coma, but I have this 12 days of darkness that nothing's nothing existed, but it's there and it's always there. And I try not to talk about it, I try not to think about it because it's that very chilling fear that it's out there and what it could have been and everything else. And sometimes it it feels comforting, and other and but it's also scary as can be just to not think about being in control of myself. Yeah, I think there's a lot of people. The biggest lie in the world is control. Sorry. Control is the biggest lie in the world. I had to learn that through years, but the only thing we can control I did learn is our own actions. So it's our response. It's our response.

SPEAKER_02 19:30

Yeah, no, I um I absolutely agree. I I think it's there is a certain power and the humility that you that you had to kind of like go forward and even still like being being willing to be vulnerable and being opening yourself up again. I think that shows an incredible amount of strength.

SPEAKER_01 19:51

Thank you.

SPEAKER_02 19:52

If I can brag on you for a little bit.

SPEAKER_01 19:54

I appreciate it, Adam. I mean, you know, Brene Brown said you can't be uh brave if you're not you know vulnerable, you can't be courageous. And yeah, we'll it might come up and but I I remember meeting the writer um of Batman, uh Tom King. I worked with patience and I I do a lot of again. I'll talk to anybody and I said about someone that you know what would someone say they they like Batman. What would Batman say? Uh and he picks up a comic book and he writes down, it's okay to be scared, everyone's scared. Now's a chance to be brave, Batman. And Tom King actually used to work with uh soldiers with PTSD. And he's actually gonna be another comic convention soon in Washington, D.C. And I'm actually gonna see him again, and I'm gonna bring that story up and say, you know, I bring that little piece of wisdom I found, and again, that's a different creative aspect we can do, and and we give someone this power to inspire us through you know, through vulnerabilities for them willing to ask themselves different things. So again, that's a little distraction. Like I said, I've sometimes it's a little bit like a goldfish. And and actually with the TB, with the traumatic brain injury, TBI, a lot of the what we find as well, a lot of underlying conditions people might have had have been exacerbated. Um so I was very high function, ADHD, neurodivergent, whatever you want to call it. But after my brain injury, my T TBI, it became very extreme. Um, again, right side is you know, I was very compulsive. You know, that's what it is. It's a hard time, you know, losing focus. And that's very much what ADHD is. Well, now you have a brain injury, a uh brain bleed and hematoma. What's gonna happen now? So it I believe, and there is a lot of studies, that it does greatly amplify certain things that have been underlined. And it's just something that I've you know, it's now part of my I learn, I learn it, I respect where it is, and I try to allow myself to, you know, someone really special told me, you know, count to three. You know, it's a it's a brain injury awareness. Just count to three. Give your space to count to three. And the space between stimulus and response is where the power lies. That was by Victor Frankel from A Man's uh Journey about, you know, just understanding giving yourself that time will allow yourself to have control over that.

SPEAKER_02 22:32

Uh I have such a strong case of ADHD that I call it AD4K. Uh but um it seems like you uh you may have me uh you have me beat. Um and the thing is, even after I was originally diagnosed, I did not do any research into it. Didn't I just like uh well I guess it just like affects my concentration and that's it. But I think the biggest misconception I had uh was that it only affected like kind of work-related things. But I would say that for me at least, that the biggest uh probably the biggest thing that I struggle with are the strong emotions that's attached to ADHD. And so with that brain injury, I can imagine that that's even more exacerbated.

SPEAKER_01 23:17

Yeah, you know, so one of the things that I was again very fortunate to learn through CBD and my therapy, you know, I learned I people would say I get very angry, I'm very angry. And I, you know, I say men are um allowed no emotions but anger, and women are allowed every emotion but anger. It's really messed up because we're all allowed everything. But I learned through my therapy and CBD, CBD, not CBD, sorry, cognitive behavioral therapy, C, you know, B T. Wow. That's okay. But I learned, yeah. I learned that No, it's true. I learned that anger is a secondary emotion. So understanding what your trigger is to lead you to be anger, and mine is frustrating and belittlement. I would get very frustrated growing up where you know people I would not feel I'd feel inferior to things, and you know, obviously that's belittlement. I thought it was smarter than me, you're a dumb kid, you didn't go to school, blah, blah, blah. So that was it. And knowing that is what triggers my anger. And when I am like that situation now, I try to slow down and try to break it down. So when I see myself in a situation where I start feeling frustrated, feeling belittled, I have to count to three, realize it's just right now, it's not forever. And I actually try to reinvent the wheel where if I'm starting to get frustrated, I'll slow down and I'll explain what I'm doing to someone or explain it to someone. And if I'm feeling belittled, I will do what I can to try to lift lift up others. And that's my way of kind of controlling the anger. And I, you know, I worked a lot, you know, we do something called speech language pathology, speech therapy in trauma or after a brain injury, and you know, I had to work a lot on being compulsive, being angry. So I don't allow myself even that little bit of anger, which is wrong, but I respect where it is, and I try to say, why am I angry? What is making me this way? And anger only comes out in three ways it's yelling, it's physical, or it's crying. And you know what? So I'm a big dude that cries a lot sometimes. Oh well, that's just called being a person again. I'm willing to take that on.

SPEAKER_02 25:45

Uh I think uh you said a lot there, but one of the big things was that counting to three, you need to remind yourself that this feeling isn't forever. I think that uh definitely with me, whenever I'm feeling a very strong emotion, I think it I think I feel it so intensely that my brain assumes that I'm going to be in that state forever. It's very easy to make bad decisions based off of that, based off of that belief. So wish I would have done the count to three thing uh much earlier.

SPEAKER_01 26:18

It's you know, it's neat the different stuff that I've learned, you know, through my trauma, through my uh injury recovery, speaking to other survivors. You know, we learn a lot and learn those little techniques. Like one of the I learned something, it's called uh you know, really hard all the time when someone asks me, oh, you're doing great, or how are you doing? You're like, I'm miserable. I can't feel anything, I can't see. I had to relearn how to use my eyes, you name it. I couldn't do any of this crap. And it would get me frustrated. But now I learned something called stop and deflect from my speech therapist, where you know, like, you know, I'm I'm having a bit of a rough day, but you know, the weather's pretty nice outside or can you believe it snowed? You know, briefly. So you're acknowledging certain things, but now you're deflecting away from whatever topic. And people want to be seen and they want to feel sometimes that you're doing, but when you say no, I don't want to talk about it, they get offensive, like, man, this guy is this guy's a jerk. This guy's being an ass. Like, that's what he is. Like, no, it's just my response. So now I try to do things differently. I'm like, you know, I'm okay, but I'll immediately just try to change the subject or something you can do. Like, I'm I was talking to my office literally today, and I was I was saying that I was weeping like a like a kid this weekend, like a like a baby when the US won gold. Like it was so emotional for me to see, and I mean 46 years to the day, and also the uh I'm a Flyers fan. Uh the former flyer that was uh they had his jersey out there because he was killed by a drunk driver. And they the players did that, and for me, that was something. It's something I've been able to do is just say, like, you know, there's so much stuff out there that's awful. Let me just concentrate on what can be good and just try to reflect on that and where we are together.

SPEAKER_02 28:16

That seems like a much better way of what I do. I just do the politician thing where it's like, hey, you asked the question you want it, I'm gonna answer the question that I want to answer, okay? I won't say I don't do that.

SPEAKER_01 28:28

It's it's it's funny because there's the business, Nicholas, who is very just this is how it is, how it is. And there's the the person, a mentor, this and that, and I'm very, let's break it down and do it. And and I actually try to look at myself in the third person when I'm handling a situation, I try to say, Do I like how I'm doing this? Do I like how my interactions are? Because I had to really concentrate on my responses because of my brain injury, because I don't necessarily know what I didn't know what I was saying, but at times there was things I didn't know what I was doing or my actions. So I had to sometimes slow down and say try to look at myself about how am I handling the situation. So it's exhausting to kind of put your mind through that loop, but when you do it over and over again, it just becomes second nature and you just you just start doing

Relearning to Think — Speech Therapy, Anger & the Road to Recovery

SPEAKER_01 29:21

it.

SPEAKER_02 29:22

You had uh you you had mentioned that you had to say a speech language pathologist. Um what what are some of the different things that you had to uh to to work on uh rehabbing uh after the injury?

SPEAKER_01 29:35

I had to learn to, I mean, I lost the ability to problem solve, and that's like my greatest strength in the world. Like I can figure anything out, but I I lost it. So I had to work on, you know, different just you know, actions or different like worksheets, quizzes where I had to put myself in a situation like I I always say, I wish I had the first assignment I ever got in the hospital, because she said, you know, I'm your speech therapist, we're gonna see what deficits you do. We have a construction schedule, we have to put the people in. And I just started arguing with her and arguing. I said, This is the stupidest thing in the world because I literally I handled this for a living. I would never do it like this. And I got so angry at her, and and that's why some people that have brain injuries, anger is a very common thing. And she's all right, you just I just want you to just follow the rules with it. And then I just got so upset, like, why are you treating me like this? I just you know, I can't walk. That's all it was. I couldn't focus on what was going on behind here, and I realized that maybe there was something more to it. So I did make sure I I can't be compulsory, I can't just answer stuff. I had to slow down, try to recognize what I'm trying to grasp at. I worked on a lot of distraction therapy, you know, trying to focus, because again, right side, a lot of that's your cognition, you're being able to start bringing yourself to the present instead of being, you know, totally just you know compulsory and going after something, just trying to say to myself, what am I trying to do? What am I just remind myself what my focus is? So again, a lot of that sounds like ADHD, you know, intendancies, stuff like that. So it's a lot greater when you have a you know a brain injury and also to understand your emotions because when I start getting angry, what is my triggering thing? And like what do I realize I'm angry? Do I realize what I'm doing? That was the hardest thing in speech therapy. Do I realize how I'm acting in my actions? Because it gets compulsory. You start doing things again, anger, frustration, emotions, you know, train of thoughts, everything, it would kind of get caught up. So pushing myself to slow down. And also, you know, it's nice because I worked, I was in an acute rehab facility, so I had occupational therapy too, and and you know, they handled a lot of you know, brain injury as well, the the specialty with it. So, you know, all the sides communicated about the actions we were doing to making sure that it was, you know, not only did I have to go to occupational therapy in the in the in the grocery store to learn how to like stand or or pick things up, but also you know, recognize what I'm trying to do, what I'm trying to work on. What am I trying to gather, not just get distracted. So again, it's basic, I want to say simple. Simple is not a fair word, but it it's very very humiliating when you have to slow down to make sure that I forget what's literally in front of me. And it's it's something that it still terrifies me today, not having that ability to problem solve, not that ability to have control over my actions.

SPEAKER_02 32:52

You were um earlier talking about uh some of the triggers for your anger, and not like one of them like feeling like frustrated or belittling. Like, of course those are going to be exacerbated with a situation like that. It seems like just a cocktail for you know just a terrible situation. Yep. Yep. I think we're starting to get somewhere trying to uh figure out why there's uh that correlation between uh between uh self-harm and uh suicidal ideations and uh and traumatic brain injury. Do you know if it's uh I'm I I don't know if there would be any statistics there, but like what about neurodivergent people with traumatic brain injuries? Is there more likely to uh that that I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 33:35

Um like I said, I do believe that, and it is different studies have shown, and I'm not a medical doctor, and I don't have I can't give medical advice, but I have uh seen other presentations where um bra after brain injury, a lot of the underlying events, you know, personality quirks or different neurodivergencies, uh again, they are exacerbated. So when they're in that situation, who knows what they're going through and where it is.

SPEAKER_02 34:03

Did it take you uh a while to like to feel to feel like yourself again?

SPEAKER_01 34:14

Um and that's I mean, I I say that to be dismissive. It's not you know, I healed very well. I healed very well, and I also I worked I worked really hard to heal as well. And I'm still doing it every day because you know the world's still spinning, so I'm still trying. And that's that's one of the things I think that is my greatest strength that I didn't accept the way things are. I I say to people, I said in a webinar, and some people from my friends from Costa Rica and stuff from the band reached out to me and said, you know, you said just do the next right thing. That's why I tell myself, just sometimes just do the next right thing because the next step's a little easier from there. So I constantly just try to push the envelope, push myself to make things a little bit better before I, you know, then I found them. And it's something that I I do try hard to do, and I do try to remember to be kind and you know compassionate and caring because many people didn't want whatever situation happened to them. Doesn't matter what happened to them, it just did. So trying to give them the grace and the dignity that you would what I would want, I want to do that for them because we're all we all deserve dignity, we all deserve grace. And trying to, you know, my therapist taught me you can only offer three things to people compassion, acceptance, and forgiveness. So I try to look at it, I always try to look like are are the three levels full? Like I try to be very forgiving, I try to just try to make sure I have a balanced approach to everything. And you know what? If someone, you know, if I made a jerk, maybe I ran into a a jerk that day. But what I say, if you ran into a jerk all day, maybe you're the jerk. And I would use different colored language. But yes, that's uh yeah. So if uh yep, if you run into all day, maybe you know you're the problem. And and being humble enough, I don't know if I'm humble, but to understand that I I make mistakes. And again, that's the hardest thing with many younger males, especially. I mean, I was 35 when my trauma happened, you know. Um, but many males can't make mistakes. Many males, uh you know, especially in this horrible toxic environment, they they look down on things like that. So when you start talking about feelings and stuff, I've been called a lot of different uh derogatory names because I'm an emotional guy. And I was before my acts, my my crash too, but it it's still now.

SPEAKER_02 36:56

You know, it's a bit unfortunate that uh we both have ADHD because I can't remember where we were uh at whenever the whenever this first series of catastrophes happened.

SPEAKER_01 37:07

I think we were just talking about um, you know, I think and then we started having a conversation about males and um you know ideations and things being exacerbated from it. And I mentioned I I don't really have any other medical training. I don't have no medical training or anything, I just know what works for me. And I know, and I think that when I explained everything that was going on in your side, it made sense to you why someone would feel that way when everything seems to be working against you, and then we talked about anger as a secondary emotion and being uh hum, you know, being you know, belittled and everything else getting you angry. And of course that makes sense if you feel you're always angry because you're relearning everything. So that I think kind of got us there.

SPEAKER_02 37:55

Yeah, that was an amazing little recap. I uh I'm I'm very impressed, man.

How Tabletop Gaming Helped Rebuild a Brain

SPEAKER_02 38:02

So one of the things that uh that really interested me about your story was you using uh games as part of your uh as part of your recovery. Whenever we were talking about you saying that uh, you know, you felt like your greatest superpower, the the problem solving was uh was gone for a little bit uh for a little bit, and you know, kind of working on it. I can imagine the games is something that you can use to strengthen that.

SPEAKER_01 38:27

Yeah, I mean, like I said, my nerd street cred's pretty high. I did a lot of uh role-playing games, and uh, but it was interesting. So I before my, you know, it it kind of goes to my you know, before my trauma when I was going through this horrible separation and divorce, I needed to find out, like I didn't want to be at home playing. I always joke, I'm a World of Warcraft survivor. I got my like you know 10-year chip. But I don't, you know, I didn't want to be at home playing video games. I wanted to push myself to get out, get out. So I went out to see, you know, to different game stores to play games. This is tabletop games, role-playing games, board games, dice games, blah, blah, blah. Just to push myself to not stay in. Because I felt if I'm just in, just talking to someone on online, I will avoid reality and I'll say, This is fine for my bubble. So I push myself to get out of my comfort zone to meet new people, and I met some amazing people. I also met other people I don't really care for as much, but I met some amazing people, and then my trauma happened, which sucked. And but it was really cool because some of these people that I only knew from the other side of a table, they visited me at the hospital. They visited me to see how it's going. Uh, they're still friends with me today. But when I left the hospital, I you know, again, I was in a wheelchair, I was not weight bearing for 12 weeks, couldn't walk, couldn't do a lot, but lights and noises were very overwhelming with the brain injury. So it was again a new environment. You're going in there. I've been in the store a dozen times, but when you're in here in a wheelchair and trying to just get through, everything feels different. So I push myself to that. When you brain injury, uh right side is understanding analytical and creative thought. It's trying to go between it, it's it's those parts of your brain going between the two of them. Um, so what a perfect way to do it than a role-playing game where you got to be pretending you're a character in one thing and then doing math rocks the next one to figure out your actions. So I used my games to help me with my recovery. I also would like I have I had left side negligence, so I only picked up pieces with my left side, left hand to kind of get I still I had problems seeing, I mean, looking at smaller devices stuff because I had to really learn how to use my eyes in space and stuff like that. So, you know, I pushed myself for that, and through the games, I was in a very welcome and inclusive environment. I mean, it's one of the things I volunteer with uh Paiso Organized Play from Pathfinder, but they have a very inclusive, they and they uh promote inclusivity, and it's really important because I know what it felt like as someone who didn't know what end what end was up, you know, didn't understand a lot, you know, and to be comfortable in an environment like that was really powerful. It was that in music that really helped me heal and be where I am today because I was willing to try to try to do something different, to try to push myself beyond my comfort zone.

SPEAKER_02 41:42

Man, that is that's I think that's actually my problem. I uh man, my comfort zone is really freaking comfortable. It's the it's the darndest thing. And uh and then another thing that you mentioned is uh like meeting some folks and you made so you you met some great folks and then you've met some you know, not great folks uh doing that. I think that's where a lot of people have have trouble. At first getting out of their comfort zone in the in the first place. I mean, that is incredibly hard. But then afterwards there's the you know, you get out of the comfort zone, but then you end up uh not not finding your tribe right away. And uh, you know, not being able to get that immediate success can be, you know, can can be really disheartening for folks. How long did it take you to kind of find uh, you know, like it I'm sure, you know, obviously your community's kind of grown, but like, how long did it take you to be able to find uh you know at least a couple of folk?

SPEAKER_01 42:33

I and honestly, so I'm a very I always joke at work. There's two people out there, people that like me or don't, but there's never an in-between at work. I mean, I met some people that I really enjoyed right away, and other people, like I said, that didn't. And you know, I've told I've spoken to people about sometimes the people in our lives that we want will reflect some of the best qualities we like in in others. So, and I try to add that to myself. So when I am able to see people that I have certain tendencies that I really like, I will gravitate towards them. It's actually uh my a good friend of mine, another gamer, he's a psychologist, and he he said, you know, when you have a uh behavior, someone you don't like, and they teach you to, you know, don't tell that person that's awful, stop doing it. Obviously, if it's bad, stop doing it. But uh compliment on people that you really do like, what their habits are, and the other people will try to make those habits match. And I was like, okay, yeah, I make sense. So I and I would tend to gravitate towards people, and I'd be very excited towards certain people, their actions or stuff, and then they in turn everybody wants to feel included, so they might change a little. And and through this, you know, organization, I was able to grow more and more and meet more people and and more game stores. And I do a lot of cool stuff with the organization. And I mean, hell, I started this little. Little Toys for Todd Sting at a local store. And this past uh year, we uh we were in what is it uh 16, 17 stores across the country all playing the same game at the same time to generate toys and I mean thousands and thousands of dollars raised for kids in the holidays. So again, it's because I was willing to step outside and do, and also when you're advocating for others and trying to help others, people will maybe want to be around you because you know, help's a gift we freely give. So understanding that when you're helping others be creative and be comfortable, you're showing them that they're safe. And when people are safe, they can be their better selves. So it's very important for me to feel safe as someone who, again, you know, rough marriage, abuse, whatever you case you want to call it, there's a lot of things that I could have very much gone right into protect mode and do that. But I pushed myself to say, why not? Because I didn't want to be that nervous, scared, adult male that didn't want to leave his house because of my brain injury. I didn't want to be stuck sitting there thinking about all that would hurt me or all that I couldn't do. So there's a there's a handful of stuff I couldn't do, sure. And there if I started listening now the stuff that I have problems with, it would become greater and greater. What I can say now is what I I've been able to gain from it, which far outpasses you what I lost. You know, things still feel differently on my side. I still get sometimes get a little anxious, but I went to Congress uh four years ago. I interviewed uh friends with a band, a major Italian band, and I've traveled to Europe to see them. I met friends from around the globe because I was willing to take this mantle and challenge myself to do it. It's you're right, people want to be comfortable and they should always be safe. But finding other interests where is important. I mean, especially in this horrible divide we have right now in this country. But that's the nice thing about like going to a concert, there's a lot of people there that are going there for the same thing. So when you go to a game store, people are there for the same thing. So trying to come together on those joys will be good. Again, I never drank, I never did, and I'm not opposed to people that do it as long as you're safe. But that wasn't my that wasn't my hangout. And you know, when I do games, it's it's my poker night, it's my you know, it's my you know, going to the bar with my friends, it's me playing games at a table with other people. It's just that's how I was able to do it. And through this organization, I've been able to talk to tons of people from around the globe and see them and and play games with them and help advocate for others because you know there is a very large, there's a they call them gamers, there's a large community of gamers, tabletop gamers, that are LGBTQ, and you know, I learned a lot from them. They taught me how to be a better person, but it was through that, through mentoring and others, that I can just treat everybody as a person, and just it it's amazing what happens when you do that because it makes everything a lot easier when you just treat them like a person.

SPEAKER_02 47:29

Isn't that amazing? I just treat somebody like a human being and good things happen. Yep. It's uh one thing that you that you said that uh kind of struck me is like the best way of converting someone from you know on one political side to another, so to speak, is to humanize a member of the uh you know of that other side. Because you know, humans are very much the in-group-out group thing. And if you can show somebody that uh that not everybody in in and out group is this horrible, awful person, it can it can kind of soften some uh it can kind of soften opinions sometimes.

SPEAKER_01 48:07

Yeah, it's it's important, especially now, like I said, we're going through, and I I try to do everything I can to you know help others because I want them to feel seen. And I've said this before on other podcasts, and I said, listen, I'm a I'm a straight white male, guys. I will keep on fighting and I will do it. You know, if I can do it, I will do it. And that's why I mean I mean I I go out, I have business cards that I made that you know have a little bit of my my Linktree and other stuff. And I talked to my you know state, my United States Senator, and he emailed me and thanked me for my work I'm doing. And I'm talking to my house delegate uh and the Virginia House delegate, trying to work with her on potentially working on a bill to help with some mental health uh barriers. So I'm doing it because I'm like, screw it. I want to make it better. I want to build a better boat, and I'll do it by saying, why not me? I might as well, why not me? If I don't like something, I better do something to change it to make it

Breaking Down Mental Health Barriers — Insurance, Access & Advocacy

SPEAKER_01 49:06

a little bit better. What are some of the barriers that you see to uh access to mental health care? I mean, that's a huge one. So uh I mean insurance is the number one because it's very expensive. And every time there's a this is where I'll have to every time there's a trauma in our a major thing in our country, people say some sides especially say, oh, it's a mental health problem issue. Well, how are you going to fix it? Because you put too much stigma on it. There's also in Virginia, and I don't know the the rule exactly, but in Virginia, like when you go to therapy, your therapist has to tell the insurance how long do they think you'll need to be in therapy? How many sessions? How long are you gonna breed in this world? Then maybe things are gonna change. That is total crap. I mean, it you're growing, you you're trying to do it, but they put those things in there and they put the financial barriers and everything else there. I mean, I I have good, I mean my when my trauma happened, I had the best insurance. I don't have good insurance right now, but I still go to therapy because when I tried to cut back on it, I started getting fearful of what I was, you know, where I was going, where my brain was going towards. So I made sure it was important. So I now use that's how I first uh reached out to my uh state house delegate before I moved, um, about the hell, the one year I spent uh you know, my year of my trauma, I spent roughly sixteen thousand dollars, fifteen thousand dollars. I mean, my hospital spent eight hundred and seventy-five thousand. Um my insurance did. Um but um but then the year after 2019 when my company went to a cheaper insurance, I spent $27,000 because of mental health care. Oh, you know what, it's not covered. And here's someone says, Oh, well, we have therapists, and I said, You're exactly right, you're a therapist. Let me send a different babysitter to your house. Yeah, I got a different uh dog sitter. Oh, it's okay. And that immediately gets them to shut up because especially when you had someone, you know, I had this terrible, rough situation I have, and I I lost my therapist for six years. I lost her because of illness, and I didn't know what I was gonna do. And then now you're telling me that after my brain injury, my trauma, and everything else, that I should just go to someone else because my insurance feels that that's better for them. Screw that. I'm not doing that, and I will tell them to their face, and I have on recording told them how horrible they are for doing that. So, me going to my goal is going to the Capitol, I want us to be able to have access that I believe personally that all insurance should honor um other uh propriet, you know, um therapists, and it shouldn't just be this closed network thing. Sure, a higher deductible for it, but it should be counting towards something. It shouldn't just be uh, oh well, no, I want to do this. It's it's wrong. It's wrong at a moral level. When people don't go, they do stupid things, either hurt themselves or hurt others. And when we can just clear the path ahead of us to allow us to have those mistakes in a safe place, be able to talk to people in a like-minded way that could help you work on those problems. Because the problem is with uh there's a lot of problems I can go on this with social media, but long ago when you used to have a something you thought of or did, a lot of times you talk to a doctor, you talk to you would talk to someone about something you're thinking. Now you just go online. I promise there's millions of people out there that think the same thing. But it doesn't mean they're right. That just means they're people, and they could be you know providing wrong information that gets the again this this cloud closed-minded view of the world. And that's why I took the handle. You know, my my therapist said, What gifts did you get from your trauma? What gifts did you do? And you know, I gained a lot from it. I I have people in my life I could never imagine, you know, not going. Some therapists that came my life and I would not want to be here now. I mean, you know, I proposed on my right after my 36th birthday, uh, 30th birthday, it was amazing. And my many of my hospital therapists were there, and they were also at my wedding. So these people that are now in my life because of my trauma, I would never take away. That's why I say I have a gift of perspective. I see things very differently, and I'm allowing myself to see all the bad because when you see the bad, there's also good through it. So trying to focus on that better things. I would say, there's worse crap in the world. A lot of things are going awful right now, so I can only control certain things, and my perspective is a way I can control my reactions, is just looking at that gift in front of me.

SPEAKER_02 54:18

Now, you may have said that uh problem solving was your uh was your superpower, but I'm actually gonna push back on that a little bit because Okay. What I am amazed at with your story is how you were able to use kind of like uh to setbacks or hurdles, problems for you become these big motivations to make bigger changes. I think that is a superpower in and of itself, man.

SPEAKER_01 54:49

Thanks, dude. I mean, I so through my advocacy and through talking, so March is brain injury awareness month, and I reached out. You know Amelia Clark from Game of Thrones? Yeah, yeah. She had had multiple brain surgeries, she had brain aneurysms, and and in the first season of it, she's had uh quite a bit of brain surgeries, but she actually started a foundation, her and her uh with her mother, saying you. Well, I found them. A friend of mine did another person that interviewed Christina, another brain injured survivor. He did the profile on him, and I wrote to them, and they did uh make me an advocate for it. So I again this now recognized international organization, Rhea, my story, but they in in England is where she's from, they were working with another university in England, and they did a case study with my wife and I about brain injury survivors and their spouses and how it affects. So through my trauma, through all this hardship, I've been able to do so many cool things. And and what did my I made my uh very wonderful older British gentleman and I had him laughing because I say I'm not afraid to fail, but I can't make a mistake. Because I'm gonna fail anyhow, so I might as well do it. So I'm always gonna fail, but I can't make a mistake. That's how my thing works. So when I push myself, when again, I just I I assume I'm not gonna do well, I might as well do it. So I do it. I'm I don't worry, like I said, my my nerve street creds high. What do we learn through fear? Well, Green Lantern told us that you know the one way to stop fear is through willpower. So pushing myself when I'm afraid of something, that's when I say, not today, I'm gonna do it. Now, obviously, not talking about anything's gonna get me hurt or anything else, but I am willing to take on a task because I might as well try it. Because guess what? If I don't do it, well, at least I tried. So I am not afraid to fail. I am afraid to make a mistake.

SPEAKER_02 56:58

I I took making a mistake as like a I it would send me into fight or flight. Like I it was it was like an existential thing for me for a very, very long time. And I to this day I am still trying to learn that making a mistake is not the end of the world. It's I think that's something with uh with ADHD and kind of like uh very like black or white thinking. That's uh well at least for me. I I I was big into the all or nothing thing.

SPEAKER_01 57:24

I I can understand, and you know, like I I talk to patients all the time, and I I always say I can't give medical advice everyone, but I can only promise one thing that the sun will rise tomorrow and allow yourself to have a bad day because we can we will never be in this point of time in space ever again. It's not possible. So allow yourself the grace to have a mistake and to have a bad day because when you go to sleep, you wake up the next day, the sun will be it'll rise. The sun will always rise. So allowing yourself that for me, it's nice because it takes this weight of everything else and just throws it away. It it gives me this sense of weightlessness to say, okay, it's not that bad because tomorrow is a new day. Screw it.

SPEAKER_02 58:19

It's it it's so amazing at what a uh mind shift change can can do for your can do for your life. Um it's something that like it would be great to uh be able to do this without having years and years of therapy, you know?

SPEAKER_01 58:34

I get the cliff notes version. As I say, I'm not just use me as a cliff note. 16 years therapy, I can let's go. What are our one lines? Come on, we'll get through them all real fast.

SPEAKER_02 58:43

So all all this wisdom you're spewing out, it's not even you, it's your it's your therapist, huh?

Be Your Own Narrator — Practical Tools for Healing and Moving Forward

SPEAKER_01 58:48

It's it's I'm really grateful that I have a really I'm very good at speaking and and understanding things, and also trying to take what I learned and again just try to make it a little bit better. I don't believe in a lot of things, but I do believe in trying the butterfly effect, trying to do something better, you know, because when you do it the next day will be better. Adam, when we get to do this, we find ourselves, you know, even if it's a short recording or a long one, we can help each other and grow and learn from it. And that's what the important part of this journey is. Nothing's ever written, and I'm we're writing it all as we go, and trying to be in front of it. I I'll tell patients, be your own narrator, tell your own story, don't let anybody else tell it for you. So that's that's important advice across the world. Be your own narrator through whatever journey you're going, because that's in the end of the day, you are the one that can, when you stand in front of it, you you can help direct all the what people feel.

SPEAKER_02 59:50

That is really good advice. I'm gonna steal that and uh take it, I'll take it as my own. But I think I think that there is a such a power in being able to reclaim that kind of that that author of my own story. Why do you think it's so easy for folks to kind of lose that uh or not even have that sense in the first place?

SPEAKER_01 1:00:12

Because we are we are taught to any mistake is uh is uh is awful, and we are trying to prevent ourselves from you know being that, you know. I mean, our bodies are we try to protect ourselves no matter what, in danger or anything else. We feel a threat, we're gonna do it. So anything criticism is is very effective. But I mean I've been criticized a lot in my life, and I'm not saying it doesn't affect me because it's still I'll still think of things that happened to me 25 years ago, and immediately just middle of the night, like, why the hell do I think that? Like, doesn't matter at all. That's what our brain does. But what I try to do is I try to use a better voice in it. I don't do a great job at it. I can give great advice, hard for me to follow it, but I try to remember certain things that I can control, and I also laugh at it a lot because when you laugh at something, you take things have less power over you and you make a laugh. It's actually uh I don't know the term, but there is psychological studies that if you get someone to like laugh a little bit, they will be able to hear bad news, bad as it is, or they'll be able to hear worse news if they've laughed a little bit. So I will say like a little whip or a joke, and then I will tell them something that's wrong at work, like a client, like, oh yeah, but and then I will but I'll finish it off with a good here's my resolution. So they call it the sandwich technique. You have a little bit of uh the top bread, which is a little joke, get them in, meat of the issue, which sucks, but now here's your resolution for it. So I do the same thing all the time, just in my work, and just again trying to learn more about the human condition as I'm going. What can I do to make a little better and just try to just go, go, go?

SPEAKER_02 1:02:02

Yeah, I think uh one of the uh one of the biggest impacts therapy has had on me is uh that inner critic uh that I, you know, that everyone has uh I think that for a uh prior to therapy, that inner critic I assumed was the author of my story. And it was only with therapy that I'm not gonna say that I don't hear that voice. I mean that still have a very strong inner critic, but it doesn't feel like me anymore. That's just a part of me. And I think that has been one of the biggest, uh, you know, biggest benefit like biggest benefits of uh biggest benefits of going to therapy. Sometimes words are hard.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:47

Yeah, I I understand that words can be very hard, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:50

But yeah, um, so what would you say to uh to someone who is struggling to to find uh to to find a therapist or to even no let me say that someone that is struggling to get out the door that is kind of in their comfort zone, what is like what what's one thing that they can do to kind of make it easier to take that next step?

SPEAKER_01 1:03:14

Um talk uh if you have a pet, talk to your pet um because they're the best therapist, um, because they don't say anything. See how you feel. Uh uh there's you know you can do uh a journaling, write it down, read it out loud, see how you feel after you start speaking about your problems. And you know, therapy is not therapy is not about just a bitch fest to do this. It's also allowing yourself to see what mistakes did I do and how do I feel, how did I handle myself in a situation? So for me, it's it's trying to problem solve whatever's out there. I want to help someone, I help someone, then I realized how to help myself through that helping someone. And it's you know, hearing ourselves talk. I mean, like I said, I could be the kindest person, someone next to me, but I will talk nasty myself all the time. But that's the important thing about when you speak out loud, you write it down or anything, but it allows you to, it has less grip over us. It's just how the mind works. That's one thing control anxiety is write it down because you know where it is. Your brain will know, nope, I wrote that down somewhere. It is right there. It helps take it away. Doesn't mean it solves it, but it helps take it away. I mean, I learned a lot of analogies along the way. One of the things I my therapist told me is, you know, depression is being in the tall grass and lying, a lion charging at you. Anxiety is being in the tall grass, knowing there's a lion out there. That's it's like, okay, I can see that. And it's that lion charging. Yeah, I'd love to take that lion on, but when I know it's out there, like, oh gosh. And you know, I would say, you know, fearing the past, a lot of that's depression. Fearing the future is the anxiety, and trying to stay in the present is you know, is the most important. That's where the joy is. And I do don't do a good job myself, but I don't really worry about the past as much. I fear the future. So I try to navigate it and just go through it all like the Kool-Aid man. Just, oh yeah, and just bust it down the walls where I can and just try to yeah, my way through and fake it till I make it where I can. When you fake that smile, when you just force yourself to laugh, you will feel better. It's when we smile, like I said to someone, no matter how hard it is out there and how bad it is, there's always someone that wants to help you. And sometimes that's really important no matter how low we can get. There's people out there that want to help. And you know what? When I was in a wheelchair, people didn't want to open the door for me and crap like that, and I would get frustrated. But There was so many people that you know made sure I was okay. And that made it so if I focus on that person that didn't open that door all day, I you know, I would be the one. I've met a jerk all day. But if I focused on everybody was, I was the one creating that uh self-fulfilling prophecy of everything. Because if I'm just talking about the person that sucked earlier in the day all the time, people don't want to be around me. They're like, wow, all you do is just so just try to let it go. Just let it go, and just try to focus on what you can control is your next step, your next action.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:35

Where could folks find you if they want to if they want to find out more about uh Nicholas Rush? Ruklevic. Oh, it was way off. Ruklevic.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:46

I would I would say, you know, just listen to NPR, but that's Nicholas Peter Ruklevic is is where the initials came from. I was at a job site once. Someone's like, who's a fan of national public radio? I was like, oh, it's actually my initials, but I never thought of like that. So it became that as my but I I have a simple little link tree, uh gifts of perspective, uh, you know, link tree gift of perspective. I have uh, you know, email, gifts of perspective, a Gmail. I just try to, I want to try to help people where I can find this. You know, I have important I have links of the different stuff I've done, my webinars, um, my different interviews with musicians or podcasts, whatever, but I also have resources for people that have been affected by now. My trauma is different than everybody else. Mine was a physical like trauma unit, but then there's also other resources I have on my little link tree for people to find when they might need some hope to anything, and just to find the community that's out there. Because I will tell everyone, I've seen my own self. When I've seen someone in as a trauma support group, so we have support, Trauma Survivors Network, started in Fairfax, Virginia. Now is literally around the globe because of Canada and Australia, and there's like 240 trauma centers across the globe that we're in. And when you know, I again I speak to patients as a as a volunteer with the organization and the hospital, but it's also a safe place for people to talk to us. And I've seen people's growth when they first come in being terrified of I mean, that they're here. And all of a sudden, five months, six months in, them talking to us and being able to stand up clearly with confidence in it, because that's what this story is about. It's our own story, not letting anything else control it's important. And when you get in there in those uncomfortable places to make yourself feel comfortable, that's the important part. So long story short, Link Tree get to perspective, that's all my different stuff. And you found me on MPR Nerd at on Instagram, and yeah, so that's about it.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:55

Nicholas, so thank you so much for your time, man. Uh, this was a this was a blast, man.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:00

It's thank you, Adam. I know that we tell you what, we I will gladly uh you know, every time you want to reach out, we'll we'll be able to talk again, especially since I know now that you know we're the part of the country you're in. If I if I do go to uh Richmond, I will definitely let you know of any anything we can do. Again, my goal is to help normalize the what people don't feel is normal. I want to help do, I want to help normalize whatever someone's going through to say, you know, it might not be normal to the you, but it's now normal to this person too. Because trauma affects, again, I speak a lot about trauma. Trauma is the number one cause of death between one and forty-five. Technically, one in 17 is just guns, but one in 45 is trauma, and it affects a lot more people than we know. And I say that because that also means that if you just think of that one major statistic, well, I think mental health is affects a lot of people too. And the one thing we can all go through right now, that we can all many of us can speak through that weren't uh COVID babies, um, the one thing the world at once, the entire world was going through something during COVID. Everybody was going through something. We know. So now that allows us to have a little bit of empathy for each other, to maybe figure out what struggles are they going through and understand that sometimes people are just trying to do their best with whatever they got.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:31

Yeah, man, and uh, I would uh I would love to uh to hang out, man. I I don't know how good I'd be at board games, but I'll I'll I'll definitely give it a try.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:40

All good, Adam. I appreciate it. I mean, again, like you said, this has been a neat community when I've started this podcast, and you guys helped create a really neat environment because you never know where this might inspire someone. You know, again, that's the goal. I always say if I helped one person, I guess it was worth it. And I I know I've helped a lot of people, and that's why I keep pushing myself to help more because it helps me be valid. Again, I'm almost 10 years to the day. I'm almost 10 years in one month of my trauma. I shouldn't be here, I should be gone. But look what I've been able to do from that. I've lived more than my uh 10 years, and maybe we'll have done in multiple lifetimes, and I'm gonna keep pushing forward. And that is my promise to you and everybody that I will I will keep pushing forward, and and I'm glad to have you on my team.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:30

I I don't doubt that for a second, man. I guarantee you're gonna keep pushing forward, man. That's uh that that's been kind of the the theme of your uh of your life. I mean, that's uh something else, man. It's really incredible.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:43

Thank you. I appreciate it, man. Thank you for for everything again. And that's a cool thing. Like, if if we were near each other, we could be friends, like hang out. Like it's that's a nice thing because again, we're able to take this topic that doesn't feel comfortable and you know, have fun with it, and also show others that hey, you know, you're a safe place. And people know that it's a safe place. That's why I've spoken about trauma. A lot of people reach out to me about how trauma affected them. And it's because I was willing to take on that, yeah, this sucked. Look what I went through. And people will tell us, oh my gosh, I went to something similar or something different. And we all might say different stories about what led us here, but you know, recovery, uh, rehabilitation, mental health, it's all all very similar healing, and the journey is still the journey we're going through.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:35

Nicholas, thank you so much for acting out with me.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:38

I appreciate thank you very much, Adam. I appreciate it.