Episode 8: Behind the Mic

This week, John mixes things up to talk about why Keep Comin' exists, what actually happens between hitting record and hitting publish, the patterns he's noticed after months of interviews, and what it's like being a crack head.

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SPEAKER_01 0:00

February 2003. That's when my life changed. My name is John Knowles, and this is Keep Comin', a podcast about recovery from substance abuse. In the 12-step rooms, you get to share your story or you sit and listen. That's the format, and it works. But there's something missing. The conversation. The questions no one gets to ask. This is that conversation. We've got a different type of episode this week. We don't have a guest, and we'll be doing something a little different, maybe pulling back the curtain a bit on how we create this podcast and the purpose and reason behind it. So far, we've had nine episodes, which means nine guests. I wasn't quite sure what would happen when I released the first episode. That was a bit of a pilot, a proof of concept, just to see if A, I was interested in doing more, if any feedback came back that said it wasn't particularly good. And so far I love doing this, and the feedback, in particular from people who aren't in recovery, has been wonderful feedback. Finding guests on this podcast you could think of similar to someone who started a new job, maybe an insurance salesperson. You reach out to your friends and family first. And so, of course, having been in recovery since 2003, I have a lot of people in my network, so those are the people I've reached out to first. I think what will be the next level up for me in this is getting strangers to want to do the podcast and see how I build a rapport with them and have them open up and share with me the personal details of their journey, experience, and life. Anyone is welcome to do this podcast as long as they have a passion about recovery. They don't need to have successful long-term recovery, quite frankly. They can be a struggling person who's desperately trying to get sober and passionate about getting sober as long as they care about it. Conversely, someone can be sober for a really long time and not be particularly passionate about it anymore. And so they would be to me a less interesting guest to have than the struggling alcoholic or addict that is passionate about it but has yet to find long-term recovery. With that being said, anyone who's listening to the podcast that knows someone or they themselves would like to be a guest on the podcast, I more than welcome you to reach out to me. You can text my virtual phone number at 401-307-1629 and just say hi. Let me know your thoughts on the podcast, any ideas, suggestions, or that you'd like to be a guest. One of the most important things to me is for people that are guests to feel comfortable and natural. I don't send them a list of questions up front. I want them to be a little bit thinking on the fly. As a result of that, I edit the heck out of these episodes. So I tell them up front, I'm going to take out all the long pauses, the ums, and the ahs. I just want you to focus on giving genuine answers, heartfelt answers, and don't worry about how you sound now. I'll make you sound good, even though you already do, but taking out all the pauses and crutch type words. Generally, the episodes flow naturally and the conversation unfolds like you would have a conversation in person with someone. I do have a set of questions I want to make sure that I hit on most of them, and so I reference a question sheet throughout the episode to make sure that I hit on the key points that I think would be important and interesting for listeners, like the sober date, the last drink they had, a number of things that you've probably, as a listener, have heard either the same questions asked each week, or at least information that is consistent across every single episode. It's important to me also to get a diverse group of people on the podcast. I'm trying to alternate week to week, male-female. I also want to get different age groups, different substance use, different backgrounds, and I think I've done a fairly good job at that. This is where things are going to get challenging because the longer I do this, the deeper I'm going to have to reach into my network and also rely on referrals, quite frankly, for people to do the podcast that I've never met before. Common themes that show up across a lot of the different stories is this sense of feeling a little bit different. Not left out per se always, but just we addicts and alcoholics tend to feel like we're on the outside looking in a bit. Now, I don't claim that non-alcoholics and addicts don't feel the same way. I what I do believe is that alcoholics and addicts are wired to respond to that in a different manner, in a more destructive manner. For example, I don't think when I was a freshman and sophomore in high school and feeling as worthless and made fun of and such low self-esteem that I was the only one feeling that way. But I did react to those feelings and seek out a solution to that. Now I didn't know I was actively seeking out a solution. I almost didn't even know that there was a solution. But to me, alcohol turned out to be the solution to that problem for me. Another common theme is the gratitude for almost developing the substance use problem to begin with, because it led us to recovery, which essentially, across all the stories, myself included, is one of the greatest things that ever happened to us, if not the greatest thing to happen to us. So for me, developing an addiction to cocaine and crack cocaine brought me to my knees so fast, and I'm grateful for that because I might otherwise still be drinking destructively, but not quite badly enough that I realized that the problem was worth trying to fix. Also, a sense of humor seems to be a very common theme. People talking about really deeply impactful moments in their life, whether it be getting shot, abused. There's a sense of finding humor in some of these darkest moments in our lives. Now, that is also a coping mechanism to some extent, but it's also through therapy, AA meetings, NA meetings, whatever it might be, finding a way out of that and seeing it from a different perspective, which is one of the best things about recovery is we switch our perspective. And for me, that happened uh in a phone call I made to a recovery center when I realized I needed help. And and I and you've heard me say this on the podcast, I didn't want a roommate when I went to rehab. I thought, oh, I've got health insurance, I can pay for rehab, give me my own room. And that's just not how it works. And the guy on the phone's, to my retort, when I said, Hey, what if that roommate turns out to be someone I don't like or I hate, and all the person on the phone says, What if that person turns out to be a lifelong friend? And for me, I had never thought about that possible outcome. I only thought about the first one, which was this is gonna suck. And this guy on the phone just said, Maybe it won't suck. And that's all it was. That was a defining moment. It just turned my perspective on its head and said, maybe think about this in a bit of a different way. So I've got some friends and family and listeners that ask me questions sometimes, and I want to address some of those just for fun here. In terms of when I realized that I wanted to do this podcast, I think I've been thinking of it for a number of years. And quite frankly, a employment change in February of this year freed up some both physical time and also mental capacity for me to focus on some different things. And so when I had that time, I was a little inspired and motivated. I finally just sat down and did that one pilot episode with Stephen C early on. And uh, he was gracious enough to be my first victim, so to speak. And once I did that and I did the editing process and built out a story and just felt something in doing that that uh just kind of gave me no surprise here. As an addict, it gave me a little bit of a rush or a big rush. And every episode I release, I get that same feeling. And so, yep, I'm here I am again chasing a feeling and chasing something. It's a better outcome than drugs or alcohol. But it's a very similar physical experience I have each episode I release. Another question is what is it about recovery meetings that made me want to double-click into that and have this show be a bit of a format like that, but the opportunity to ask questions. And during meetings when people are sharing, they're talking about some amazing things, some really deep things, interesting things, and you don't have this opportunity to raise your hand and say, hey, I'd like to know more about that. And you have that opportunity after the meeting, if that person's available or they have the time, or you form friendship or relationship with them to learn more about their story. But I just always found myself wanting to be able to say, hey, if if I could hit a pause button and have a conversation with this person myself, here are some of the things I'd want to know based on what they've said so far. So that is pretty much the format of this podcast and what has driven me to want to be able to do this. Another question, is there another podcast that led me or inspired me to want to do this? And I'll be honest, I've never really been much of a podcast listener until the last year or two, but I don't listen to too many podcasts. It's generally clips on YouTube, and I don't know a lot about it. So I didn't really have an inspiration for this other than, hey, I think this could be a format that could work. Why is the podcast generally between 30 minutes and 55 minutes or so? I don't actually have a set time limit, although I think the sweet spot for podcasts and maintaining people's attention is in the 35 to 45 minute range. But if a guest has a story that requires more time, last week we had Heather Jay on. That's one of the longer ones. Heather Jay talked about some very personal things as it relates to sexual abuse. I want to let that story unfold. I want to have time to be taken to absorb that, for that to come across. So it really depends on the depth of the conversation. That's not to imply just because an episode is short, there's not depth there. I want to be clear. But also I reserve people for 90 minutes. So sometimes the first 15 minutes are working through technical glitches and issues, or just building up rapport or catching up with someone that I haven't talked to in a really long time. And sometimes you might notice that an episode ends rather abruptly. And that's that's organic. That is, we run out of time. And and despite the fact I could talk to some people all night long, the episode does have to end, and I have to let people move on with their days and their nights. And I haven't found a solution for that. I don't know if I plan on finding one, nor do I think it's actually a problem. It it they will just end sometimes. And I don't sit here and try and craft the perfect narrative and arc. I strive for that organically, but sometimes things just end and and I end it as quickly as it sounds like I've ended it. Not to be rude, but just we've got to move on with our days. What happens after I hit stop on the recording after interviewing a guest? My personality is one where I want to instantly get in to editing that episode. But generally these things are done at night after people's work days, so that ends at, you know, maybe 8.30 at night. If I start editing at 8.31, I'm not going to bed until one or two in the morning because it's just so addictive for me, is editing the conversation. So generally what I do is I sleep on it, I go to bed, and then the next morning, and I'm an early riser, I wake up at 5.30, I just start editing that episode. I strive to get the episode released the next day by end of day. And that editing process can take me six to eight hours. That's how meticulously I edit these things. Many people ask, well, can't AI take out all those pauses and all of those ums and ahs? And the answer is yes, but I haven't found it to do it in a balanced and smooth enough way that I'm satisfied. So it doesn't pace it, it doesn't it sometimes cuts out like a soft S. Someone might say the word sweet, and it just AI takes it, so you just hear wheat, and it just isn't effective enough for me to make it worth letting AI control the pace and removing pauses. One of the questions that I used to ask was something along the lines of, what's one of the most ridiculous things you've done under the influence? Tell us a crazy story. And that never really landed with people as much as I thought it might. I thought people might have something cued up or teed up or just some story they always told friends how crazy or ridiculous these things are. And I stopped asking it because it just didn't seem to really convey much of a message, quite frankly. It's more sharing ridiculousness. And again, that can be fun and entertaining, but it just doesn't seem to have clicked with people. And so I stopped asking that. It maybe inherently comes out through part of the conversation anyhow, but I specifically said I'm not going to ask that question anymore. One of the coolest moments I've had so far was actually episode one. And a friend of mine who I sent the podcast to who was listening, he called me up and he said, Oh my God, Stephen C is me. That's me. I'm him. And this is a person that's not doesn't have an alcohol problem, or at least not one that they've conveyed to me. But I found that just it really had an impact on me that that this person, this friend of mine, listened to the very first episode, and the first thing he thought was to call me and tell me how much he could relate to the very first guest I had on the podcast. And one of the bigger questions I get, as I've gently referenced it throughout all the podcast episodes, and haven't fully been interviewed myself and told my story is, hey John, what's it like being a crackhead? And it took a long time for me to be able to, and you can sense it when I still say it, oh, I abuse cocaine and crack. It it's still hard to call myself a crackhead. Now, that's obviously a bit of a derogatory term, crack user or whatever it might be, but the humbling point of this is that crackheads are the the punchline of a joke. What are you on? Crack? Do a crackhead? That was that took so long for me to not get offended by whenever anyone ever used that statement or slogan. And so it's freeing to be able to say, yeah, I'm a filthy crackhead or recovering filthy crackhead. But what's it like to be a crackhead? It's pretty terrible and it's as pathetic as you think it is. Now it's not quite like the vision I had when I learned my mother was an alcoholic at the age of twelve. I didn't know what that meant. And so as a late bloomer, both physically and emotionally, I thought that meant she pushed around a shopping cart in downtown Providence through alleyways. I I truly didn't know that it meant anything else than that. That was my vision of an alcoholic, was a homeless person. And I think there's probably a lot of people that think about a crackhead and say, oh, well, that's a guy who who, you know, sleeps in a dumpster and has burnt lips all the time, and you know, Dave Chappelle had a character that that was, you know, kind of a a stereotypical crackhead. The people that I was smoking crack with were all prep school white, wealthy upbringing type folks. So A, that helped me feel like, hey, this is a bit more normal. I'm smoking crack with other people that went to private schools and worked and had friends and you know, were attractive for all accounts. They didn't they didn't have missing teeth, and you know, a lot of the things that you would expect uh if you have limited knowledge of what addiction is, you would expect, you know, a toothless crackhead type thing. And my experience, and I'm sure those exist out there, but my experience was was not that. But the you know, the moment you take a hit of crack, you instantly turn into someone who's obsessing about the next hit of crack, which crack is a very short-lived high. It's minutes. And so a few minutes after you take your first hit, you're already planning on taking your next hit. And each subsequent hit gets you less and less high. And within a half hour, it's essentially not even getting you high anymore, yet you're still taking a hit every five to ten minutes, maybe more, maybe a little bit less, if you have self-control. But you get into this pathetic cycle of constantly taking a hit of crack, knowing full well it's not really doing anything, but you just have this hope that this one will be different. Also, the behavior of most people once they get high on crack is one of paranoia. They don't want anyone they know, other than those getting high with them in that moment, to know that they're smoking crack. It's a very shameful drug, and the behavior on it is also very shameful. So each person, their crackhead personality unfolds. Mine was one of, let's, I'm gonna hunker down and I'm gonna cook up the next batch of crack for everyone. I was a chef, if you will. And so I just kind of focused on heads down, let me just, you know, make sure that the pile uh is there and everyone knows their allotted amount, and other people they want to play cards, maybe, they want to obsessively play cards, others are looking out the window all the time. I mean, it's just a real potpourri of nonsense. And there's nothing remotely cool about it. I went to a very dark place, not necessarily depressed and and want to kill people, but any sign of who I was prior to getting high was just gone. Different than drinking, you know, you get drink, you embellish your your maybe your fun party personality, smoke some weed, you mellow out and listen to some tunes, but you smoke crack and it's just like game changer. Your personality completely changes. And so I often wonder why was crack the thing that really got me, that really just brought me into full-blown addiction. And I think part of it was because it genuinely just turned my brain off and gave me a single purpose, which was to focus on crack and getting high and nothing else mattered. My insecurities went away, my concerns went away. I genuinely focused on nothing other than that. And so while I may not have been down in an alley pushing a shopping cart and homeless living in an urban area, I exhibited the behaviors that one would expect. I wouldn't show up, I would delay my arrival time. I mean, if I'm high and be getting high for hours, I'm not going to return home to my partner high as a kite. That'll be very obvious. So I need to do whatever I need to do to either continue getting high and blow that person off, or come down and get to a calm enough state where I'm not blatantly geeking out from coming down from a five-hour crack binge. That could look like, oh, uh, you know, send a text. Actually, text messages weren't really quite what they are now. Call, call my partner and say, hey, uh, I'll be home in a half hour. Meanwhile, I'm high as a kite, and I continue the party. Maybe I found a way to get more drugs, and then I call them and say, Oh, I got a flat tire, uh, or traffic's really bad. I mean, I remember telling my partner that I was in Providence traffic for two hours, and it was just obviously nonsense. I was getting high and coming up with as many reasons as I could to not come home. I once showed up to meeting the crack dealer with a roll of nickels, and I think it's $5 maybe a roll of nickels, you know, that you put into one of those little tubes. And at that point he said, Man, you've got a problem. So the crack dealer, me buying $5 worth of crack with a roll of nickel, with a roll of nickels, telling me I've got a drug problem. That was close to the end of my using. It was probably in the last month or so that I did that. Pawning off the Godfather DVD box set for $10 to buy crack. I had one dealer that would let me buy stuff on credit card for him or his family, like PlayStations or gifts for his kids, and he would give me a one-to-one. I'd buy a $200 PlayStation and he'd give me $200 worth of crack. So I was essentially buying crack on credit card. I think it's fair to say that I was smoking crack about 40 hours a week, because sometimes it would just be 24 hours straight. Other times it'd be a couple of days, and maybe I'd have a three to five hour binge. But a lot of the times once I started, I was not stopping. And so how did I have the money for that? Well, I had a job, but I was a freelancer and I was expected or I was supposed to pay quarterly taxes, estimated taxes. Well, I didn't do any of that. So I spent all my money on drugs. I managed to keep paying for my health insurance, which was a miracle because it allowed me to go to rehab, and I was paying my rent. But other than that, I wasn't paying down credit card debt, I wasn't paying taxes, I wasn't contributing to retirement, I wasn't doing anything. So I was spending, I would say, about $40,000 a year on crack for a couple of years. What's it like to be a crackhead? It's pretty terrible. In a future episode, I will have someone interview me as a guest on my own podcast. I'll tell my full story and get into a lot of the details about how I got to that point and my full story. But I wanted to just give a little bit of insights into the world of being a crackhead and what that means. I've got a guest interview tomorrow night, so early next week, I'll have that edited and that episode released. That'll be Jason H. And I think you'll really like his story. I appreciate you listening to this podcast without a guest, and we'll talk to you next week.

SPEAKER_00 22:33

Keep moving, ain't no looking back. Choose your weapons, lay them with no regret. Got the side of your story, is bumping over back. JD cat, just try to move you back to the check. You planted a seed, they don't wait for a treat.

unknown 22:47

Snuck your foot in the door, they don't wait for the key.