The VetsConnection Podcast
Join host Scott McLean, a veteran and also a passionate advocate for veterans' well-being. Each week Scott will bring you an episode that will feature insightful conversations with representatives from non-profit organizations dedicated to supporting veterans, as well as experts discussing programs within the Veterans Affairs (V.A.) aimed at assisting veterans with their needs. From discussing innovative therapies to highlighting community resources, this podcast sheds light on the myriad of ways veterans can find support and healing thru nonprofit organizations and also to connect nonprofits with each other in hopes of creating a network that will be beneficial to all.
The VetsConnection Podcast
Ep. 70 - Talking With Tim Roberto - Inside “Stomping Out The Stigma” And A 100-Mile Tribute Walk
We sit down with Marine veteran and counselor Tim Roberto to trace how pain became purpose and why Stomping Out The Stigma offers ten free, confidential therapy sessions to first responders and veterans. We follow his 100-mile Surfside walk, the moments that changed minds, and the simple systems that save lives.
• origins of long-term recovery and stigma
• Marines, AWOL, addiction and depression
• first 20-mile walk and organic momentum
• why confidentiality beats fear of HR and EAP
• ten free sessions with licensed therapists
• kitchen table culture in firehouses
• Surfside tribute: 98 lives, 100 miles
• expansion to Georgia, North Carolina and New Jersey
• small costs like 35 dollar copays change outcomes
• mentorship, vulnerability and speaking up
• how to reach SOTS and get help
If this episode touched you in any way, shape, or form, and you know somebody or you are somebody, please reach out to Tim. Do it. Don’t white knuckle it. If you know somebody or you are somebody, reach out. And it’s free. First name only. No HR. Nothing. We don’t report to any agency.
Like, Subscribe and Share. If you have comments or suggestions email us at: vetsconnectionpodcast@gmail.com. You can also find the video of this podcast on our YouTube Channel - Vetsconnection Podcast
Welcome to the podcast. I'm Scott McLean. My guest today is well, he's a second time guest. Uh I had him on uh maybe about a year and a half ago, maybe, uh, with just the audio podcast before I started doing video, which I was forced to do. Not really. Um but yeah, my guest is Tim Roberto, uh founder of Stomping Out the Stigma. Uh Tim is going to tell you what Stomping Out the Stigma does because I don't want to screw it up. Like I don't ever want to miss anything with the guests. I learned that along the way. So Tim's gonna tell you all about Stomping Out the Stigma, and we also are gonna talk about the long walk. The long walk. So, how are you doing today, Tim? I'm blessed, Scott. I'm blessed. Thank you for having me on. It's always a pleasure, my friend. Always good to see you too. Me and Tim became friends as soon as we met. Uh, we met at the Mission United. Uh Johnny Schre introduced us and we hit it off. You know, us people in recovery, we seem to bond.
Tim Roberto:It's like instant. You know, it's instant, man. Like, you know, military to militar veteran to veteran and cop to cop, you know. Yeah. It's just alcoholic to alcoholic, drinking addicts, you know. It's we're you know how to get it. Yeah. And this is kind of like our second podcast already. We already had one when I got here.
Scott McLean:Yeah.
Speaker 1:You know, we that's right. We caught up and talked for about 45 minutes.
Scott McLean:The pre-interview, interview, but that's more of a discussion with me and two. So again, you know, welcome to the podcast. So let's get right into it. Uh tell us uh you're the founder of Stomping Out the Stigma. Uh give us the story behind that.
Speaker 1:Well, um, you know, as a guy that's in long-term recovery um through mental health and substance use disorder, um, you know, I paid a high price for many years. Um and um the highest price I I think at that time in my life was when I got, you know, discharged from the Marine Corps after two and a half years. Um that was like devastating to me, you know. And um I never fully recovered from that because, you know, I have that background where my family was really aggressive. I'm one of five boys, like my dad was from Italy, you know, just a no-nonsense kind of guy. Uh it's all co- I I get all that. That's kind of cool, you know. I learned a lot from that, but I'm still just a little kid at five years old, needs a kiss and a hug, and says, I'll see you tomorrow morning, pal. You know, and that was, you know, that was tough to get. So I think I treated myself accordingly as I got older. And of course, you know, being in an aggressive household, I was walking on eggshells as early as I can remember. You know, dad's what's he gonna come home like? That kind of stuff. So I never really was able to get that bond and that camaraderie with men, I think. You know, my brothers were we're kids. You know, we're all just wrestling, punching each other and calling each other's names, you know. It wasn't that um so um It wasn't the Brady bunch. That's for sure. It was the Roberto bunch. A hundred percent. Behind the scenes times ten. Yeah, it was it was very dysfunctional. So um, you know, so that was the first thing I really bonded with with, you know, the people, the men that I really bond bonded with, and they were just as nuts as me. But we were all in a controlled state of intenseness, you know. It was just awesome, man. I kicked ass in boot camp and I kicked ass from but you know, just that training and all the toys and all the equipment, like just uh man, I loved it, but always training for war. You know, it's a Marine, right? We're always training for war, we're always training for combat because right, we get deployed like that. But you know, I I never knew like until now, of course, you know, and through some through the relief of the mental health and addiction. I didn't know back, but I know now, you know, the greatest battle I was training for was the with the war in my head. And that was brutal. And um, you know, and that stigma, you're a marine, suck it up. But I get all that too, but man, I'm still just a guy. I'm still a human behind the uniform, I'm still a human. I have this wiring to me. Um, but you know, I just couldn't get it out. Hey, I need help. So I went AWOL over and over. You you know, you go kick some ass out in the field, you come back, you see oh would be like, hey, great job, guys, don't get arrested, I get arrested. There's always the MPs, you know, right outside of Camp Lejeune there. And that was uh just devastating to me. And then of course, you know, it really fueled the addiction more and my depression, and just uh, you know, I struggled, just struggled, man. I I couldn't live life on life's terms. I had a really difficult time doing that. Um I had great coping skills. I had phenomenal coping skills. I mean, gosh, you could drop me off in the Sahara Desert, you know, and I would still cop. Might take me a little longer, but but I could cop. I just had no coping skills, man. I just couldn't cope. I I I I just didn't know how to live life on life's terms. So uh so in my recovery, you know, uh uh becoming up on 19 years and on April 15th. Nice. And uh yeah, I'm very fortunate. My nickname in the community is Tax Day Tim. Good one. Dude, dude, I was like, I don't know, I've been going the same way.
Scott McLean:That sounds familiar. That date sounds familiar.
Speaker 1:Isn't it crazy? Yeah, that's great. But you must pay your taxes because you laugh because I get to speak a lot, you know what I mean? And I it's for me, I found that it's like a great intro. It's like a great lead-in. Hey, I'm my name's Tim, recovered alcoholic. I'm totally powerless over drugs as well. My sobriety date's April 15, 2007. I'm also known as Tax Day Tim. And if you know what I'm talking about, you laugh like you did. But and then the people that are just like crickets. They look I don't get it. Yeah. So it's a great leading because I say you don't pay your taxes. And you do.
Scott McLean:Well, we do on the last day. Yeah, 100%. Oh, whatever it is, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and so um 15 years, you know, when you suffer quietly, when you suffer in silence, you know, uh because of stigma. Um, you know, I was using from 11 years old to 44 homeless right here in Deerfield Beach. This fella I was in the Marine Corps with in Camp Bejeon, uh, he was from Jersey too. I grew up in Jersey, and when when I got out before him, uh when he got out, he became a Newark police officer. I'm like Charlie, he didn't have enough. He's like, it's just the way it is, too. And I understood that. Became a Newark police officer, and uh after six years in Newark, you know, it's like a Afghanistan really. Um the uh uh physician, the agency doctor put him on colanopin. And in one year, talk about having the itch, man, the bug, in one year he was to the needle. Wow. He lost his job. Yeah. And that that's made him spiral like it did when the Marine Corps cut me. And um anyway, he came to Florida and uh I called him one day. I was so desperate, man. I was homeless. He's like, I was waiting for this day. You know, it's like it's like the great pimp, man. It's like the great illusion. I hear it all the time as an addictions counselor now. I hear it all the time. I can't believe they knew. Yeah, and I hear I am saying the same thing. I was like, really, Charlie? You knew he's like, Timmy, you couldn't even talk when you called me half the time. I'm like, oh my God, because we didn't think we think nobody knows, but it's crazy. Yeah. So uh he got me into this place that he went to, um, and I ended up staying there for almost nine years. And I started out, I got a little scholarship, had a couple hundred bucks in my pocket. Uh started cleaning toilet bowls, picking up butts, garbage around the property, blah, blah, blah. That led into painting apartments there. I just kept working my way up, went back to school, etc. And you know, my recovery and my journey in this field has been incredible to me. You don't really appreciate it unless you start from the bottom again. Correct. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I started I was in treatment. I got divorced in treatment. Uh I signed my house over in treatment. The state took my kids away from me in treatment. And I had nothing to use. I had to sit with that. And that was brutal, man. That was the final blow. Like, I don't even know, I don't even know if that's the right way. Because, you know, people ask me now, wow, it's so long. Like, what do you think happened? I don't even have to think. I'll tell you what happened. They're like, what happened? I was like, my pain outgrew my fear. That's what it was. When all that was coming, it was my pain. I was so broken, Scott, man. So lonely. Oh man, it still gets me emotional after all these years, you know, just living so lonely. It's like the worst boulder you can carry, man. It's uh so my pain outgrew my fear, and then uh, you know, as I got better at living life on life's terms, not Tim's terms, you know, I was able to teach other people like you know, if you're making if you're really in a leading a fear-based life, you're making fear-based decisions. And if you're making fear-based decisions, you're only creating more fear. So, aka the drain. Yeah. Oh, I just couldn't get it. The death spiral. Yeah. So um, you know, I just met beautiful people, uh, I met amazing people like yourself, the frontliners. Man, I always wanted to be a frontliner. I had a service heart from a little kid, you know. Um so in my 15th year, I said to my wife, I said, you know, something's going on, man. I'm like feeling something like a movement. Oh, okay. Well, you know, you've been talking to God for a long time. Maybe just wait and see. And one day I heard take it back to where you got sober. I really wanted to do something from this 15th year. That's a privilege denied so many. Especially amongst the vets, you know, and our deaths, and our death by suicide rate's horrible. Um, so I heard one day, take it back where you got sober. I live in Boyton Beach, Florida, and I got sober in Deerfield Beach, Florida. So I just googled it on my phone. I'm like, 20 miles. Oh, that's odd. Just let it go. You know, and a few more days pass, maybe a week or something passed. And I went, that's what I'm gonna do. God, I'm gonna show you how grateful I am. I'm gonna go on a pilgrimage. It's just gonna be me and you, and I'm gonna give you praise all the way down. I'm gonna take it back. I got sober. My wife's like, that's incredible. She's like, You're gonna be able to do that? I said, Well, so fine.
Scott McLean:We'll see if we'll find out.
Speaker 1:So, you know, I started walking like five miles initially, training a little bit. Oh, because I have a broken femur bone from my late 20s and my knees all kind of torn up from the accident. Um So I started realizing, man, around that six, seven mile, man, my feet started getting those blisters again. I was like, whew, man. Anyway, one thing led to another. Started getting phone calls, you know, like, hey, what's this walk about? I said, Oh, it's about mental health, it's about alcoholism, it's about drug addiction. I was really into that human trafficking space back then because of all the counseling I had to give these poor women, it really affected me, you know what I mean? Like, it really affected me because my I was so close with my mom. You know, my mom was like my rescuer. Of course I'd be close to her when, you know, but but she was a beautiful woman to put up with five m boys, you know. Um, so um and then I one day, you know, it just kept morphing, man. It's such a trip. And one day it was like, yo, bro, you're a marine. And I had a lot of friends in uniform still, you know. And so and then I just switched and went into first responders. I said, what a great way to pay back to the core. What a great way to pay back to the men, you know, that I just disappeared on. Thank God it wasn't we weren't in in uh in in theater anywhere. So, you know, oh my lord. Um, so what a great way to pay back. And then, you know, I started marinating, and then all of a sudden I'm getting phone calls. People are like, hey, I'm hearing about this. I sent them my wife, I can't believe what's going on here. God is really on the roof. She's like, This is crazy. I was like, I don't even know what I'm gonna call it. Like, what am I gonna call it? Yeah. And uh, you know, I just talking to all the people like me, you, my Johnny Shrey, Johnny Shrey, all my first responder friends, a lot of them were in uniform. And they're like, Well, you know, dude, it's such a stigma. Didn't you suffer with it from when you were in the Marine Corps? I was like, oh, stigma, yeah.
Scott McLean:The stigma of alcoholism, drug addiction, mental health.
Speaker 1:Mental health. Hey, I'm not doing well, you know. Yeah. So uh that that's the that was the beginning. Um, I called it stomping out the stigma. I raised really good money the first time because first responders in Palm Beach County, they they have one of the highest suicide rates out of any other county in Florida. And be even prior to coming up with the name, one of a lot of my friends were all talking about it one day at lunch. I'm like, well, what are we doing about it? You know the deal. They all just looked at each other. So I just started doing something about it.
Scott McLean:So you organized the walk, the first walk. Correct. And that was 20 miles from Boyton Beach to Del to Deerfield. Yep. Right? Yep. And you planned it out and you coordinated it. You wanted a movement, you got a movement, right? More than what you kind of expected for, uh expected to get. Yep. Yep. And there's a great story that you told the first time you came on about the gentleman that started walking with you and talking with you, and he walked with you for a number of miles, I think.
Speaker 1:A lot.
Scott McLean:A lot did that. They would just pick up and start watching.
Speaker 1:Just pick up. Cops would jump out of their cars, they had their buddy, you know, in the in the unmarked, blacked-out windows, but at the you know, obviously somebody was driving him away because a cop would jump out of the passenger seat, and the car would take off, and so they walk down, you know.
Scott McLean:So you you completed that. It was quite an accomplishment. It was a great movement. You had participation from different fire stations along the way. They would meet you and greet you. And the way that you did it, I think, was uh you would walk a certain distance and then you know, you're not gonna sleep on the street. You don't have a fucking tent with you. You know, you're not gonna and so you would get picked up, go home in the evening, get dropped off the same spot the next morning, and then continue your walk. Is that how that went?
Speaker 1:The first walk I banged it all out in one day. Oh, okay. Yeah, man, it was brutal, but it was worth it. Okay. Because I knew I was on to something, you know what I mean? Like I knew I knew it started so organically that it was meant to be. There wasn't like any pre-planning, manipulating and all that knot. You know what I mean? I do. I do know you. You know what I mean? Yeah. I just made that commitment. Like I'm just gonna walk. I'm gonna yeah, and I'm gonna do something about it.
Scott McLean:I don't care about logistics. I'm gonna stop here or I'm gonna walk all the way down. Correct. Just walking.
Speaker 1:Correct. And I heard one day, you know, because it took me about nine hours, you know, between the rest, rubbing out your feet, changing socks, you know, some Gatorades or whatever. It took me about nine hours. Um, I heard, you know, one day, Tim, this is this is great, but I want you to bring awareness to it. You can have eight to nine-hour walk to bring awareness to the mental health needs. So that was another uh thing that came into play. So I would stop at all the station houses and tell them what I was doing, why I was doing it, and if I could help just that one guy uh avoid going through what I went through, it would all be worth it. I do 60 miles, you know? Well, well we're getting there.
Scott McLean:We're getting there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, we are. But I just started seeing the power and camaraderie and commitment and somebody being vulnerable, a male, you know, uh an older fella, a marine, uh a server, um, you know, a guy who tells it like it is respectfully, you know, that I I found the power in the vulnerability, and in that power, in that in that ability to get in that space, because it was completely something I couldn't normally do. But to be in there, that's when all the magic happens. That's all the secret sauce is in there, you know? Yeah. And it would inspire other guys to talk because you're doing these walks, it's really intimate. Sometimes it's just you and another guy next to you, you know. And um just it was just incredible. I had a dinner the same night, and it happened to be right across from a fire station. All the guys came over and got food, and I had people speak, like mental health advocates, you know. I had some a fire guy speak who who went through the ringer. Yeah. And I met him. He says I saved his life. I'm just Tim. You know, I was I was one of his uh counselors, and I think he's got I don't know, ten or eleven years now. So he came and spoke because I think it's really important when you have a guy that was a first responder, flight medic, you know, and the flight medics are coming, it's not very nice.
Scott McLean:Nothing good happens on a flight. A medical medical flight.
Speaker 1:Body parts like it's gross.
Scott McLean:Yeah, you're not a taxi.
Speaker 1:Correct. Yeah. Yeah. And it really broke this guy down over time. Like it's just like anything else. I mean, over time. Like we're not designed to go through this stuff over and over and over. And then on top of that, it's zero to a hundred, zero to a hundred, zero to a hundred, two in the morning, you're in a deep sleep, you're in your REM, and all of a sudden, boom, the tone goes off.
Scott McLean:It's like or you get a call in the middle of a quiet night and you're a you're a you're a you know law enforcement. Yeah. And you go to a scene and it's not what you expected. Correct. You know, it's intense. Shit hits the fan.
Speaker 1:But that surge of adrenaline over and over man, it takes a special guy, but even behind the badge or the weapon or the or the or the firefighters map, you know, you're still a human being. And you're that's the condition as of right now, I don't think will ever go away. Does everybody go down the tube? No. But I think it comes out maybe in some different ways.
Scott McLean:The human psyche is a fragile thing.
Speaker 1:It really is, man. I don't think it's anything somebody can ever get used to. Like, how do you get used to that?
Scott McLean:You adjust.
Speaker 1:I had a fella just the other day, um, you know, because we've expanded Georgia, North Carolina, New Jersey now. Nice. So a guy up in Georgia, he was the first one of the first guys we made contact with up there, and he he he went through a rough call, man. Four month-old, ejected, out of a vehicle. So um, you know, it was tough like trying to keep her going to the hospital and the in the you know, and there's there'd been a bigger county up in Georgia, it took him like twenty minutes to get to the hospital. It was a lot on him.
Scott McLean:I have a similar story. It was one of my things I probably never told you. I'm not gonna tell it now, I'll tell you afterwards. I had two Oh geez. Two different bases. Yeah, yeah. That that crept up on me over the years. Uh so I I I can I I know what that guy was going through.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's deep, man. He texts me and he's a he's just I don't know, man. There's something about when you're in that state, that space, you know, in a way it's really it's unfortunate, but at the same time, there's like this beauty in it too. Like it really brought this guy, and he's an Afghanistan bat combat bet too. Like he gets out and then he goes right into the fire fire service. But even in all that pain and the the way he wrote this thing to me, he goes, I just have to write it. I can't share it right now, I just have to write it out.
Scott McLean:And it was really beautiful, like you know, in the journaling is another good therapeutic model, you know.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so um so yeah, you know, it raised a lot of money. Um, and what what stomping out the stigma started was it was uh it was g creating another space to where somebody like me or maybe like you have experienced or your listeners experienced, you know, you just can't get through that window, you know, to say, hey look, I'm not doing well. You know, if you're a police officer, you know, you you do that, and maybe there's a possibility, you know, they're gonna take your weapon away from you.
Scott McLean:That is that's that is the number one uh uh thing for law enforcement. You you take my weapon and you put me on light duty. And if you're a street cop or if you're out in the field, like I was on anti-terrorism, anti smuggling, you you don't want to come off the field. Yeah. You know, because of the stigma, the fucking stigma. Because you think you think that everybody's talking about you, everyone's laughing at you, everyone thinks, oh, he fuck, you know, he fucked up, he's crazy, or whatever. Like your mind really and none of us want that. So I'm not admitting that. I'll suffer through it. I'll come to work and put on a good face and be a hard worker, but then I'm cracked on the inside.
Speaker 1:That's just like, you know, I don't know, man, it's like chopping off a cop's you know what, you know, and take their weapon away.
Scott McLean:Like without a weapon, what tell a fireman they have to stay in the station. And then they watch their guys go out on a ladder.
Speaker 1:Yeah. It's bad. It's bad. It's bad. So stomping out the stigma just created a another space. Um, like, you know, like say for the firehouses, you know, if if those kitchen tables could talk.
Scott McLean:That's the thing in the fire stations, yeah. It's the kitchen table. Yeah.
Speaker 1:But what that table holds and the stories that it holds, you know, I mean, boy, if they could talk, you know. Um, but they don't. So um well, excuse me. I mean, they do around a table. Yeah. You know, you know, and figuratively. Outside of that station, though. Nothing leaves the station. That's it. And then you go home after a bad call, like you're supposed to act like nothing happened.
Scott McLean:Or you go to your next call and you have to act like you gotta do your job. Correct. That's the thing about law enforcement. I can speak personally for that. Like you you go to these horrific incidents and then you gotta go back to work. Like you're not like you didn't get to go home. Like, this isn't an office job, but like take take a couple of days off. Like you process this horrible scene, and then it's done, paperwork's done, filed. You go back out on the road. Like that's that's not normal. No. You don't even have a time to think it through. Like and we're our our own therapists. Like you're in a bubble. Like we talk to each other, fire stations, they talk in that at the around the table or in the station. It's a bad bubble to be in. Oh, yeah. When a fellow officer or fireman or paramedic or whatever, when they're your therapist, when we talk just to talk, because we want to talk about it. But you get that feedback, they're like, Yeah, yeah, there's never a disagreement. Yeah. No one's ever gonna look at you on the job and say, Hey, uh, that's not really fucking normal. Like we feed off each other.
Speaker 1:Correct, correct. And I think everybody goes down with it. You know what I mean? Like, like nobody's on the outside looking in and like Yeah.
Scott McLean:So stomping out the stigma, what does it offer for first responders and veterans also?
Speaker 1:It's um, you know, for the veterans, it's uh it's a place where you don't have to be part of the system. And for first responders, I don't report to any HR, EAP, no insurance, and I do no, you know, nothing like that. So you don't ask for insurance, it's all free.
Scott McLean:All free, ten sessions. That's important. Let me repeat that. Ten sessions free. Correct. Autonomous. First first name only. Yes, that's it. And nobody has to know about it. It's not going back to your department, it's not going back to your first sergeant or any of that.
Speaker 1:And that's why it keeps growing. It tells me there's a serious problem still, even though it's 2026 and a lot of things have changed, you know. But this is one thing I think there is some change, but it's a s it's a slow churn, you know, like and they're still we're still losing more first responders to death by suicide nationally than in the line of duty. So I just look at the stats. I look at this my own pain, you know. As a friend of mine, he says he turned his pain into power. You know, I'm mine's grace and gratitude.
Scott McLean:Um your voice. It's my voice say with my foundation. Now, this isn't a this is my cheap plug in a serious conversation. But that's what one man with mic foundation does. It's about your voice. Correct. It's about being heard, it's about speaking up, correct, and being able to do that with dignity and not a stigma. Fuck the stigma. Like your voice, your story is your biggest uh power, it's your biggest strength. Correct. And when you share that story as you are living proof, uh when you share your story and you affect just one person, you can't get stronger than that. When you go and speak, which you do, and you're speaking to a room of whether it's five, fifty, or five hundred, right? You have the power to move that entire room with your story. It usually does. It does. It absolutely does. And that's I always go back to Johnny Schre, his third shout out this podcast. I love that. I was with him this morning, as I told you. I think I I'm all about the Johnny Schre brand, by the way. Yeah, yeah, it's a wonderful man. It's being vulnerable, like showing other people, other men, other women that you can be vulnerable. The stigma is not gonna shut me up. No, you know, my story is gonna get told. It's hard. And I've said this a hundred times on this podcast with the one man with my foundation. I tell him, you guys, people like us, we don't retell our story. We relive our story. And I saw you reliving that. You get emotional, but you lift a weight every time you tell that. Oh, yeah. You know, somebody out there is gonna watch this and listen to this, and they're gonna connect with you. I would love that. That's a guarantee. I would love that. Whether they connect physically or through the or just you touch them and you spark something inside of them. Like I think a lot of these podcasts, you do your own podcast. I just give it give it a plug.
Speaker 1:It's called the reset uh recovers uh recover recovery-centered podcast.
Scott McLean:Right. And it's based on recovery, right?
Speaker 1:All recovery, mental health, first responders, veterans. I would bet a year. Let's give Johnny a fourth plug. Johnny Schre was even on that. Yeah. Yeah.
Scott McLean:No, he's a great, he's a great case. He's all over the place. He is, yeah. Um and I it's almost it's almost 100%. Nothing's 100%, but I would say this probably 100% that somebody listened to one of your podcasts and said, huh.
Speaker 1:Oh, 100%. Huh. Oh, yeah, I hear I I get I get calls or messages.
Scott McLean:So the voice, the story is what's really important in these things. In the stigma. That's how you beat the stigma. Don't let it own you, you own it.
Speaker 1:You know, if you look at a family that never never talked about anything, you know, just sweep it on the road. In a matter of no time, everybody's walking on eggshells. And then you become that member of the Good and Fine Club. Because even when you had something, you knew to keep it quiet. And what we say in this house stays in this house. And then you go outside, and it's not what you're reading as a little kid in the books. You know, that's not well, that's not what's going on in my house. Well, why not why the heck am I being told that what's said here stay? It just shuts me down. So I guess you know, my feelings and my thoughts don't matter. And we're you guys like me and you, we're busting that down. You know, every you know, life is precious, and I I do a lot of things in group with people, you know, with mental health and addiction and and um substance use disorder, and and I always ask them initially, you know, sometimes depending on the day, I'll say, Who thinks life is precious? And then they all, oh, I do, I do. And then the ones that don't, I know they're thinking it. But that's okay. And then I bust them. That's not my style, but uh, you know, sometimes you gotta do whatever you can, right? Alcohol kills alcoholics, drugs kill drug addicts, mental health kills mental people struggling with mental health. So I read this thing and it ends the last couple of sentences are uh always share your thoughts because life is so precious, something to that effect. I said, so if you think I asked you when I who thinks life is precious, you all raised your hand, and then you can't deny that your thoughts aren't precious, and you need to start telling people your thoughts. Because how do you know it's not exactly what somebody else needed to hear? And I get it all the time, you know, to look. Oh, wow, man, that was deep. You know, but it's it's the simple things that I believe have the most empowerment. Anybody who's struggling, like our poor vets, frustrated, struggling, nightmares, all all kinds of stuff, you know, smells like we need to be there for them, and we need to, you know, even if you don't say anything, because there's so many vets that don't feel heard, you know what I mean? And and and and so many of them were the kids that were never heard. You know, because this stuff is everywhere, man. It's from Park Bench to Park Avenue and everything in between. So And it's never too late.
Scott McLean:Never, it's never too late. It's never too late. You might be 40, 50, 60, 70.
Speaker 1:I was 44. Yeah. You know, for me to be sober and happy, not just sober, happy. We started off sober. Correct. Correct. We had to learn to get happy. I I couldn't agree more, and that's a different kind of hard. Whole different thing. Oh man. That's like the ultimate, though, because if you can succeed at that, it'll be the greatest thing you ever succeed at.
Scott McLean:As you know, the further down the road you go with it, the more proud you get of it. And the more and pride, I always say, never helps, it only hurts. But in this case, it's a different kind of pride. You're proud of your sobriety. When you speak up out of pride, that always gets you in trouble. Yeah. Yeah. But when you're proud of your sobriety, it makes you just that much more uh uh resistant to it. Oh, yeah. It's always just an arm's length away. 100% whether it's a package or it's a bottle. You know, but when you're proud of your sobriety, the further way you and I'm 35 years this past Thanksgiving. But I'm still not done, right?
Speaker 1:Oh yeah. I couldn't agree with you more, man. I think that's the most patient fucker I know. Yeah. That's it'll wait and wait. It might even come back at when you're 70 or something, you know. God forbid it's something tragic h I don't I don't know, man.
Scott McLean:I've just Well, then there's the complacency too. And I uh you know, we could get into the whole sobriety thing, but I had a uh a friend that was sober for I don't know, like 20 years, maybe 18, but then he goes on vacation. He's like, I it's the old story, it's right out of the blue book. I could I could have one. I can have one. The big blue book, right? Uh um I can have one. Yep. Just talked to him recently. He's like, I'm re-evaluating. But at least he's reevaluating. He didn't go like he used to. But evidently something happened, right? To make you go, maybe I don't need that again. But now he's starting all over again. Ugh.
Speaker 1:No thanks, man. I just that's the It just doesn't have me pimped out like that. Like it doesn't seduce me like it used to, you know. It's like the obsession, all the work I've done, it's like removed the obsession. Yeah. You know, and so I'm around it all the time. I go into these sh shitty hotels to pull guys out, you know, and it's like God bless you, buddy. Yeah. Yeah, I'm still I'm still doing that kind of stuff, too. But you should always do that, right?
Scott McLean:It's that's what's going to keep you humble, too.
Speaker 1:My wife, when she first met me, dangerous also. She used to think I was nuts. Yeah, it's dangerous. She's like this. I don't know about you, but I from my experience, a lot of alkies are like drug addicts or great, you know, extra spice people. Yeah, yeah. We always get like these nice, quiet little nice women, they're really polite, you know what I mean? Nurturers. We look for nurturers. Oh, yeah. But they it's true, like they like that bad boy stuff too. Like, and when I first met my wife, I'd be like, look, I'm going into this room. If I don't come out in five minutes, call the cops. And she would look at me like, Yeah. You know what I mean? First time I ever did it, I come back, it's like, oh my God, what are you doing? You are you nuts? I said, I'm not nuts. I think I just I'm not afraid to interrupt something that could kill somebody. Exactly. And she was like, Whoa, oh wow, like okay. Yeah. And that's what I'm doing. I'm just interrupting a a process, you know what I mean? And and it's driven by a phenomenon of craving, right? It's a thought. So if I can snip that process and coming up to a door unannounced and knocking on it.
Scott McLean:It's dangerous, yeah.
Speaker 1:It's a little dangerous, but it snips that process. Yeah. And they're like, who is it? You know, or whatever. And if I don't hear anything, yo, it's Tim, man. Yeah. I'm outside. Open this thing up. We ain't doing this. And they open up the door, oh my God, too. Yeah.
Scott McLean:Yeah. But um, it's just how but it's never it's not like one of those physical things. It's like you're gonna you're there to help them, you're there to support them. And they they usually know that.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah, because if I'm going there, I got it through the grapevine. Or some of them even called out, even though they even called, like, I don't know what to expect behind the door. Kind of like when you were a police officer, you know, like sometimes these domestics are the worst. Oh, yeah, absolutely. You know, they got I've been on more than a few of those. And they got the potential to be the most deadliest. Volatile.
Scott McLean:Always volatile, always volatile. There's no such thing as a routine call. Like you hear this in the movies and the TV. Ah, it's just a routine call. There's no such thing. No, no such thing. Yeah, no, nobody has it like that. Watch some bad shit happen in front of routine calls. Yeah, no kidding. You know, and this is things that cops live on the edge, whether you're in the military and your security police or military police, uh, or you're a firefighter or any of it, you know, everything anytime that phone rings or you get a call, yeah, it's not routine.
Speaker 1:You're still serving a community. Yeah. And whether you're in the military or not, people will be people. Yeah, yeah. So whether you're cruising down Orchard Lane or you're on some some base somewhere, you know.
Scott McLean:That's right. That's right. So if somebody wanted to get in touch with, and I still want to talk about your last this recent walk that you did. I know we're on a kind of a schedule for you, but um if someone wants to reach out to you, how would they do that?
Speaker 1:Um, geez, man, you can uh SOTS S O T S Inc24 at gmail.com. I N C Inc.
Scott McLean:S O T S I N C dot com.com.
Speaker 1:And that stands for stomping out the stigma Inc24 at gmail.com. Okay. Um I'm all over social media, but you can contact through the website. Um yeah. Open 247. 247, man. You know. Nature of the beast. Correct. And if you're getting to me, you're you're in a you're in a space that took you either years to get into, or you just can't take it anymore. Yeah. And this is my last call, and if they don't answer, I'm done. And I would hate to be the last guy because about because I made it about me.
Scott McLean:Oh, you missed that call. You turned your phone off. I want to go to bed tonight, I want to sleep tonight. That's a patient wife, also. But she understands.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but it's you know, it's gosh, man. It's uh I I get calls, but it's not like it used to be. Yeah. You know, and I've kind of put that in that boundary in place too, you know. You have to, as yeah, because who takes care of you, right? Correct. And it's practicing self-care. And I'm 63, and I'm about 50% of men at my age that have to get up three or four times a night to go to the bathroom. I ain't some young buck anymore hitting the rack at 11 o'clock and sleeping straight through, you know, at six, ready to go. I go to bed.
Scott McLean:You guys in your forties and fifties right now. Listen to this man.
Speaker 1:I go to bed tired and I wake up tired. But I got a lot of heart and I got a lot of grant uh a lot of gratitude, and I'm I still have that marine. I'm a ground pounder. I am a ground pounder. I'm not an intellect, I'm none of that stuff.
Scott McLean:Right. So speaking of that, your latest walk was about uh 100 miles. A hundred miles. And that was about what, a month ago now?
Speaker 1:Uh I started, I left Tequesta, Florida on December 4th, and I got down to Surfside Memorial on December 12th. Hundred miles. 100 miles, and it was epic. Ah, well epic. Yeah. You know, we started in Tequesta, pipes and drums. Next year, you have to, you have to.
Scott McLean:I'm not telling you what to do. I love you, buddy. I love you.
Speaker 1:You're telling me what to do.
Scott McLean:You have to get a document, like, get this documented, like documentary style, like real deal.
Speaker 1:Like you yeah, as it continues to grow and morph, I'm getting to that point because up until even this year, I'm like, I can't spend that because that can just help another guy. I'm not spending because I got a full-time job. Right. I'm like, I can't stroke. Nah, I'm not doing 500. Nope. Unless it was to like a chili cook-off for the Leos, uh chill, you know, fire firefighters, you know, something like that. I gave out three scholarships last year to a local high school that they but they had to be part of the scholarship was you're either your parents were first responders, you're going to an academy, because this high school I gave, it was Wellington uh high school. Okay. Yeah. They were they have like a fire academy, you know, or you were going into the field um like as a psychologist or clinically into that space, first responder space, veteran space, and then you had some other requirements, GPA, you know, average, blah, blah, blah. I was initially only going to do one. But as I started reading, I said to my wife, I said, How can you say no to that? So I ended up doing three. Can't say no. Yeah. But the gratitude, and actually one of the kids that won his dad was a Leo, Palm Beach County Leo, and he came up to me after. He's like, What you're doing is amazing. Yeah. I said unique, I tell you that. And I guess I'm a humble guy, man. I'm just I don't want to uh, you know, what I always say what we're doing. Yeah. You know, it's not about me. I made it about me, and I drank my ass off and smoked a ton of crack when it was about me. And I just don't just don't want to live like that.
Scott McLean:So I go through that too, right? I'm not this is not a topper story. That's that's a bad thing in podcasting, but I can absolutely relate to that because the things that I do or I've done or accomplishments in my life, I'm always giving someone else credit. But someone said to me one day, but you're the one that's walking in the shoes. You're the one that actually did it. We just suggested or we recommended. Yeah. But they were the ones that motivated you, right? But we are the ones that it's hard to do. We're the ones that put the shoes on and make these things happen.
Speaker 1:I I get my fill like putting my money where my mouth is. Yes. That's where I get my fill, you know. We had a hero's dinner this you know, we have them every year, and I had a couple comments like, hey, you should be more involved with the with the MC and I already I already did what needed to be done. And that was a hundred miles, and talked to countless men and women, countless, on an intimate level, even walking out of one station house by a fella telling me I've never told anybody this, to asking another guy, wow, that was really deep, man. Can I ask you a question? He's like, Yeah. And he and at first he's like, Really? Like, yeah. I thought I overstepped my pal. It's like, really? It's like, oh man. And I uh and he said, Yeah, of course. But I said, Man, what made you get so vulnerable like that? That's that word again. And he said it again, really? I'm like, oh man, double dipped here with the old man stuff. I said, Yeah, just want to and you know, he he's like, dude, you're a marine that struggled in your mental health and bitostigma. You're 60 miles, or I forget what it was, 60, 70 miles, and you still got 30 miles to go, and you're doing it for us. Yeah, I felt comfortable with you. Yeah. Yeah. So all these moments, these intimate moments, it makes me stronger and it convicts me even more. Makes you more humble. Makes me more humble.
Scott McLean:Just when you think you can't be humbled enough, yeah, something happens in this space that we kind of work in, right? Working with veterans of force responders. Yeah, something comes out of nowhere. And if you're paying attention and you have self-awareness, which is very important in what we do, you will get humbled more than you think. Humbled in a good way, not humbled in a like if the cocky, oh, you got humbled. No, like you saved somebody's life. Yeah. You literally saved somebody's life. I think so. How do you how do you how do you like to go, hey, look at me, right?
Speaker 1:No. I just say thank you, God. You know, thank you, God, for the ability to still do what I do, you know. And I got down to Surfside nine days later.
Scott McLean:Now, to the audience that's not familiar with Surfside because there's listen is all over the uh all over the country. Uh Surfside is the incident of the collapsed condominium in South Florida, Surfside, Florida. Correct. Four years now? Five? Four or five. Yeah, it's like in that like so it was it was horrible for the people that live down here. It was horrible. Horrible, right? Um but just like any tragedy. So when you decide what say cause for lack of a better word, that you're going to uh donate your your your walking to the the how did you come up with surfside? Like what was the significance of surfside to this particular year, this particular hundred mile journey? What was it? What triggered that?
Speaker 1:Well, I wanted to do something that would hit home, you know, and bring a lot of attention and create a lot of conversation to the needs of the mental health of our first responders, you know, and we need to start talking about it more. However, I can do that. So I had nine days to talk about it. They recovered 98 uh souls out of there. Yes. Um so from Tequesta, Florida to Miami, surfside Miami, Florida, we rat routed it through the um, you know, the ab these all these other first responders who were phenomenal in logistics, like just crazy good. Um we did the 98 miles, and a couple times to get the ninety-eight, we had to do a little, you know, a little detour. Sure. So it was like a hundred miles. Yeah, yeah. But the theme of it was ninety-eight lives, ninety-eight miles. Because not only did they recover ninety-eight souls, you know, the horrific uh trauma mental health that that caused on all the first responders and the Leos and the veterans. Because that's not a one day and done thing. That's a continuous Well, I had a guy walk with me in my last station stop in Miami before I got the surfside, and those guys were off the chains, man. They were so pumped, they're pulling ladders off their trucks and carrying them walking with me. The whole pack of us. Like it was insane. Like I just kept hearing the Rocky song, you know. Yeah. Yeah. Came over a bridge. Miami Dade Fire Rescue had both of their fireboats out there blowing the hoses. Like, oh, the sirens are going, and it was so deep. But when we got down to the memorial, because there's a memorial down there now, and um one of the fellas that spoke because we had the the pipes were there, yeah, honor guard was there, and we did a ceremony, and man, this guy sure tore it up. Yeah, because he's like, Thank you for doing this. Yeah. I'm like, where's he going? Where's he going with this? He's like, I was on that pile for two months. And you see that little building over there? I had countless meetings. A battalion chief. You can't get any rougher. Those guys are rough. Yeah. Good men, you know what I mean? I've had countless uh meetings in that building, and I haven't been back since. I couldn't come back until you started rolling through, and we started getting word of you coming down, and we're like, what this guy's doing, you know, he had his own words to it, and it was just everybody, you know, everybody started doing the old, you know. Rubbing the eyes. Rubbing the eyes. Yeah, yeah. So I've had in the last four years, I've had all these moments, you know. I just can't turn back. Like I can't turn back, you know. Actually, we're gonna go five times now with Johnny Schre because uh we had a combat marine in North Carolina. I don't know, I don't even know how I don't even want to know how to act, he got my number. But he contacted me. That's all that matters. It's all that matters. Combat vet um he was uh golf, right? Yeah, golf. And uh I said, why don't you start out with a mentor first? Because he was really paranoid about you know, therapists, maybe his experience with the VA, no disrespect to the VA. He's right. Um, you know, he just I said, Look, I know a really great marine season, um just a real deal. And I'll have I'll have him reach out, you know, he can be a mentor just to get you going, get you used to talking, you know, about what's going on instead of holding it in him because you'll never win. Um and unfortunately, you know, if we hold it too long, maybe s other things happen. And so I think I reached out to Johnny. Said, yo, I need you. Sots, Sots, I need you, man. Johnny was on it like white on rice. Sort of mentoring the guy, you know, and that's the beautiful thing. So it keeps growing. Uh this year's dinner was in incredible. Uh we even had a state legislator, state representative call in during the dinner. She's very pro pro first responder. And uh, we had some heavy hitters. We were talking about them before. You know, and um it just keeps doing itself.
Scott McLean:So let me ask you this. It's you said you had somebody up uh in in another state or a couple of states. Are they doing what you're doing?
Speaker 1:No, we help them. You helped them. Like they found so we've helped in Georgia. Georgia's kind of kind of do the same thing like a walk for a cause or just helping veterans.
Scott McLean:Uh first responders. Oh, okay.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So we've established ourselves in Georgia. It's kind of spreading.
Scott McLean:So I I I had interviewed a uh a golf, a veteran golf nonprofit in Oklahoma. And what these guys do, there's five of them, and they they find spots and they go they don't, they're not all together. They're friends, they were veteran, the veterans together, they all were stationed together. And they go to different locations around the country, golf courses, and they will do a fundraiser for your foundation, and they do a hundred holes. Wow. Yeah. Like in a hundred holes is from and they don't stop until they finish the hundred holes. And it's from break at dawn to you know sometimes at night. So I had asked them, I said, that's it's a lot of walking. That's a lot of and and he said, That's right. And then we're not young guys anymore. And I said, Have you ever thought that get a younger person involved and say, okay, you're gonna if you want to be part of this, so then like Johnny can take a step back and somebody fills his spot and you get those young, fresh legs to keep and they're young, so you keep it moving, right? Have you ever thought of well of two things that come to mind? And and again, this is just me. Yeah, yeah. Uh, eventually there's gonna come a time where Tim's not gonna be able to do a hundred miles, and you're not gonna go every year like next year doing 200. That's not a thing that you're okay.
Speaker 1:No, hey, listen, if that's if you're gonna keep going, like I'm just yeah, that's when I got to Miami just a couple, you know, in December, people are like, oh my god, how you knew you feel? Dude, man, I was looking at my phone walking, how far the first key was from Miami. It was like another hundred and I could have kept going. You gotta walk to the keys? I could have kept going though. Like something happens, you know what I mean? Like I get you, yeah. It's just you get in that zone because psychologically, like, okay, I walked 100 in December, but uh like you said, I'm 63, man. Yeah. Broken femur in my late 20s, knee all screwed up. Like, I gotta compensate for that too. So I started I started training like in August. So August, September. Yes, you did.
Scott McLean:I saw you all you would see me. Yeah, yeah, I see you post, yeah.
Speaker 1:But it's the psychological thing too, right? 15 miles by yourself, you know, Florida in August, Florida in September, Florida, October, October, and getting pounded out there, you know, and you gotta sit down again, and then you know, I could just call my wife right now, she could pick me up. Yeah. You know, you gotta battle all that psychologically. You know, I never had a beard in my life at 63 until four years ago. Because when I was training for the 20 miler, 20 miler, I one day I got I was so frustrated. I mean, I was getting my ass kicked, you know, someone was killing me. I was sitting down like every five minutes. What did you get yourself into? This yeah, yeah, yeah. And I was just like, what this. So I beg God, man, that night before I went to bed, man. I thought here I go again. It's so emotional, all these turning points. Where we're at now, you know? Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:But I was just like, God, please help me, man. Stop struggling. And I shaved my whole life the next morning.
Scott McLean:Yeah. That's beautiful.
Speaker 1:I was just about to shave again, and I just heard this don't shave.
Scott McLean:It's like in hockey, the playoff beard. Like all hockey players, in the playoffs, they don't shave.
Speaker 1:Correct, dude. And then every day I was like, well, because I haven't had hair on my face my whole life. Uh she's how can you not notice it?
unknown:Right.
Speaker 1:And it just kept me focused. Keep going, Timmy. Keep going. And then I don't know, it fills in a little more. My wife's like, I really like it. It fits you, yeah. I'm like, all right. And then other people, because people have known me for years. Yeah. And now I got this scrub. Yeah, you played off beard.
Scott McLean:And it's just been part of the movement ever since. So have you ever number one thought of eventually maybe finding somebody that can pick up pass the torch, right, to somebody else. It's still in it's it still starts, you know. Um or and starting that in another s another uh state. Like, hey, this is what we do, this is all we need, this is what we request, and this is has that ever come to like a conversation?
Speaker 1:You know, I feel like the guy that you know grew up on the farm struck gold or oil, I should say, maybe. You know what I mean? Like because the formula will work all over the country. Yeah, there's no doubt. It just I don't know, it was on my heart one day. I'm like the guy who was digging a fence pole host. You're like Jed Clampin. Yeah, there you go. Mr. Bunny, next thing you know, the oil's black gold, buddy. You hit some Texas tea. Yeah. And dude, I am so open to everything. Like, if this could ever be a tunnel, the towers, I would say, thank you, God. And then hopefully I would hear back, good job, past the baton. And I'd be down with that, Scott. Like, yeah. Obviously, it would have to be the right guy. So that's and that's a yeah, there's a vetting thing that has to go through that. You know. Yeah. Black gold in Texas T, but yeah. And uh did I think it'd be like this for four years down the road? No. I even paid you know, I have a I have a and I've got like culturally competent therapists now. I I didn't have that initially. I had really good therapists, trauma, uh you know, people therapists that that that's you know, yeah uh that were in that space, certified. Like it was all that. I'm not saying that it was didn't work. It worked, obviously. But it spread so much now. I got people that are culturally competent. I have this one woman up in Orlando, she's up in the on the Mount Dora fire, fire, uh, uh fire rescue. She's a licensed mental health counselor, and she's still on one of the rescues. Wow. Still goes on call, she's still part of the struck gold up there, like gold, license. She's a beast, and she's a huge advocate. And I even pay for things like the $35 copay that one of a first responder up there was getting baker acted. Yeah. Because they were just so off their medication, so over, you know, but they couldn't afford it. Uh who the hell am I to ask? What the why can't you afford 35 bucks? I it's not my place, yeah. It's not my place. And I trust her. Yeah. I've been working with her for a couple of years. I said, sure, what do they need? $35. So you're telling me we can get somebody back on the beam again. $35 twice a month? She was still going so they can get their medication, get their about no brainer. Did it for a year. I said, and then you know, every once in a while, because I really don't want to know anything unless there's obviously I need to. Don't want to know anything. She would say, Hey, you know, it's been about five months. Just wanted to let you know, thank you so much. That person's doing so good. They're actually working again. From Baker Act.
Scott McLean:35 bucks.
Speaker 1:35 bucks every two weeks. That's it. You damn right are gonna keep walking.
Scott McLean:Yeah. Yeah. Um, so but that that has that's one of those things, like again, one man, one mic. I want people all over the veterans all over the country to teach other veterans how to podcast. Like you grow a cr a coaching tree. You know what I mean? Yeah. Like I think the formula that you have with starts is is that's a no-brainer. It's natural progression.
Speaker 1:It really is, as they say. Scott, it's so natural because you brought up the thing like, well, what happens if you can't walk one day like that?
Scott McLean:There's some lunatic out there that will walk a hundred just for you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you and you know what this you lunatic stinking. Have at it. Well, that too. But I'm gonna take a shot riding a bike from here uh to um Ocala. O'Cala has a beautiful, from what I understand, the center of town, a big first responders, uh, statue, uh, you know, like this really, really nice. So what a phenomenal feat, man. Uh it's about 375 miles biking, you know. I could probably bang out 30, 40 a day.
Scott McLean:I have a great friend from South Philly. He's uh he worked with me in customs and board of protection, then he was an air marshal, but he's an army veteran. And uh I if I tell him about that, well, you you got an ally up there, buddy, for real.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I would need that, man. Yeah, yeah.
Scott McLean:You got an ally. He's that guy that was, yep, whatever you need me to do.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because when you do these walks, like safety obviously is paramount too, you know. Yeah. I'm using the roads all the cars are using. Um thank God I take a lot of sidewalks and thank God for the escorts. Yeah. You know, if it's not if it's not uh the fire department's PD, you know, yeah uh helping me out. But if they get really deep, sometimes there's like a ton of people. Guys walk down the street with ladders and grabbing them off their truck. Oh, it was insane. Trucks going by, cops going by, woo-woo, uh, you know, they're on the other side.
Scott McLean:It's motivating. That's what keeps you moving. It was incredible. Yeah, that's what keeps you moving. Incredible. Yeah. So once again, uh Stomping Out the Stigma offers free counseling, 10 sessions, autonomous, away from your job, away from whatever you're doing, uh, and they it's all confidential.
Speaker 1:Uh if somebody calls in, yeah, I say, you know, usually right, hey, I heard about you. I heard about you went to your website, one of my buddies, and uh I said, that's fantastic. From now on, we're first name only. Roger that. Okay, copy. Um I'm just gonna ask you a two questions, um, but you answer them on your terms, not mine. Uh, because I have to have a little info so I can hook you up who I think would be the appropriate therapist for you. Yes. Are you cool with that? Yeah, man. All right. So we don't need the details. Just tell me a little bit about what's going on. But but it's not rocket science. You know what I mean? Right. You can gather without details when those when those kind of calls come in. Yeah. Number one, he's tapped out or she's tapped out. Before you even say anything.
Scott McLean:That's recovery jogging. We were talking about this before. Explain to the people that aren't addicts and and and alcoholics.
Speaker 1:Tapped out means You're biting your fingernails. That's it. You know, so if you're calling me or you're hooking up with like you're already you're already there. It's unmanageable. Yeah. So we already know that. So anyway, he has a couple of questions. First name only. Um, and I love it like that because I raise my own money. I don't have to answer to anybody. No EAP, no HR, no insurance company, no certain none of that nonsense. And the only person I answer to is the person who calls in.
Scott McLean:And these therapists offer their time.
Speaker 1:I pay them.
Scott McLean:You pay them, but they're professional.
Speaker 1:Oh, they're all licensed.
Scott McLean:Yeah, they're all licensed.
Speaker 1:I wouldn't deal with anybody that doesn't have a license. I have to know them. I I think the one that I use I have at least five years, but my couple of my go-tos, mo ten, twelve, thirteen years. Wow. I have an agency, a couple agencies that are just first responders only. Like, it's been amazing, man. It's been amazing. I had um I had one of the guys write me a letter of his experience with stopping out the stigma. And he came, nobody knew, except me. And you know, and he came from Georgia down to the dinner in Fort Lauderdale. This uh Jane, it was on January 17th of this year, 2026. And I was just like, look, people, I just want to let you know how thankful I am. And all the people that we've helped, how thankful and grateful they are. I actually I wanted you to experience where your money's going for this dinner tonight. So I have a letter for you from somebody that we wrote we uh helped in Georgia. I read the letter, you know, you could tell everybody's like and I said, he happens to be sitting right over there. I said, Kyle, would you stand up? He came, he drove. Wow, he loves what we're doing. Yeah. And he's very grateful. And the guy that hooked me up with him, he's like, Timmy, he was he was on the edge. I don't if you if we didn't, if you and I didn't meet, I don't think EBRM.
Scott McLean:We all have that one person or that one facility. And again, number six, Johnny Shre tells me when I asked him, because he was in it, he was a heavy hitter. Shrek. Yeah, how you know, and he said it's because of this guy with this facility. Yep. You know? Yeah. And I have a uh senior master sergeant back at Mather Air Force Base, it doesn't exist anymore in Sacramento, who came and talked to me. And he's like, This is what you need to do. When they were ready to kick me out. This guy came out of nowhere, who everybody thought was an asshole. I always liked them. And he said, This is what you need to do, you need to go self-ID. You need to go self-ID because this is what they're planning, and you don't deserve that. And that guy changed my life. Uh changed my life. We all have that one guy. You're I got one guy. That guy's one guy.
Speaker 1:That's why I'm always after that one guy. Yeah. Because I know the power of that one guy's.
Scott McLean:Or a woman. I don't want to, you know, put that. There's women that that have stepped up uh just as much.
Speaker 1:We've helped. You'd be amazed. Well, maybe you wouldn't, but maybe some of your audience would be amazed how many women we've helped. Yeah. And they're hum you know, they're human beings too. Yeah.
Scott McLean:It's different for women though. A hundred percent for women.
Speaker 1:It's just different. They're designed differently. Yeah. They think differently, they feel differently. And everything there's everything different about a woman.
Scott McLean:Yeah, yeah. And if you you know, I always have this uh you know, I never realized it until, you know, probably recently in my life. Um I'm 62 now, and uh, that my mom was she was suffering from depression. Like we never talked about that. She never mentioned it. She kept a lot to herself, she slept a lot, never put it together. So when I did, and like you, my mom was huge, biggest influence on me. Yeah. Um tough as nails, her favorite two words were tough shit. Right? That's the right. You grew up in that same, I grew up in that same kind of tough shit. Uh single mom. But I just always like I I I really, really have extra empathy for for women that that are going through things like this. Just like me. I just think of my mom, and I'm like, and no one was helping her. Like she terrible, right? She white knuckled right through it with three boys. You know, five, you know, there was five in your family. Yeah. And I just it just extra empathy comes out of me for that.
Speaker 1:It's like, oh Jesus. That's how that's why when I mentioned you know how the lane I was in, you know, for mental health, alcoholism, I was doing human trafficking. Because as a guy as a counselor to have That's another episode right there, buddy. And to have here are these women that are 18, 19, 20 in your group, you know, you're you're meeting them and then you get that out of the way, get them to feel safe, and then you start talking a little more, take it down a couple levels, it's like Yeah, heavy.
Speaker 2:That's not even a word, yeah. It's deep. Yeah.
Speaker 1:It's very, very wounding, very dilapidating, kind of like.
Scott McLean:Yeah. So if you're a woman out there, uh you know, I know we mentioned, you know, guys and he, but that's the environment that we came up in. These are the people we worked with. There were very few women uh that you served with or that I served with, as far as like canine, or it's a very small percentage, right? But we don't need to we're not leaving out women for any other reason other than our lived experiences. No, you're my sisters. We're men, yeah. Exactly.
Speaker 1:They're my sisters, man. They're sisters I never had.
Scott McLean:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:And I always wanted one. Right? I don't care if you think they're gonna be able to do it.
Scott McLean:I don't know if you agree with my my brother always said, there was three of us. He said, I'm glad we don't have a sister because her life would have been miserable with the three of us. I don't know if five boys and one sister really works.
Speaker 1:I just I'm just that curious guy, you know. Like, what would she look what would she have looked like? Yeah, yeah, yeah. What would she be doing right now? Like would she have a kid? Like, what would she be like? Yeah. Would she play piano? I don't know.
Scott McLean:She definitely wouldn't have had a boyfriend for a long time with five brothers. That would have been a pretty tough screening process to get through. That's the key right there. Yeah. Well Tim, man, I I'm sure we're we're leaving something on the table, but you are a recurring guest. Thank you, man. I'm honored. Don't be surprised if four or five months from now you're back on and we have a lot more to talk about. Yeah. Uh just in this conversation, we left some stuff on the table. Yeah. But that's as you know, as a podcaster, fellow podcaster. Yeah. That's good content. Right? We have more content to talk about in another time. It's always enlightening. My friend, thank you for coming on again. I appreciate your time. I know you're a busy guy, and uh I appreciate the drive down here to Boca. Uh and yeah, yeah. And so it's S-T-O-T-S-I-N-C.com stots.
Speaker 1:S-O-S. S okay, yeah. S Oh, now you got me doing it. S-O-T-S.
Scott McLean:Yes, stats. I N C. S O Barn S recovering addicts. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Trying to figure out an acronym. What the hell? Like a beavis and butthead moment, you know? Uh uh. Yeah. S-O-T-S-Inc INC. INC.com. 24. 24. At gmail.com.
Scott McLean:All right. All right.
Speaker 1:If this Or you can go to the website, sotsink.org.org.
Scott McLean:Okay. So if this episode uh if this episode touched you in any way, shape, or form, and you know somebody or you are somebody and you don't necessarily have to be in the South Florida area, as we found out. Correct. Uh please reach out to Tim. I I don't usually do this, but I 100% vouch for him. Uh do it. Don't white knockle it. Like Tim said. Don't chew your fingernails off. If you know somebody or you are somebody, reach out. That's what it's for. And it's free. It's free. That's big.
Speaker 1:First name only. We don't have to answer anybody except you.
Scott McLean:No HR. Nope. Nothing.
Speaker 1:No, we don't report that any agents.
Scott McLean:Separate entity. So and uh, well, Tim, we built another bridge today, and I always appreciate your time. I appreciate you. Tim is as genuine off the camera as he is on the camera. I can tell you that.
Speaker 1:Awesome.
Scott McLean:A lot of respect. A lot of respect. Thank you. And if you like this, share it. If you didn't like it, well, thanks for watching and listening. This has to be over an hour right now. I think we went beyond our.
Speaker 1:I think we did.
Scott McLean:Tim's gonna be late for his next point. Yeah. But that's cool. And as I always say, uh, you will see me and hear me next week.
