Blurry Creatures - EP: 343 The Redemption of a Wounded Heart with Blake Cook

Episode Date: July 22, 2025

This week on Blurry Creatures, we welcome Blake Cook—Purple Heart–receiving Army Infantry veteran and former Fayetteville Police SWAT officer—to explore his extraordinary path through trauma, r...edemption, and the paranormal. Blake shares his harrowing experience surviving a near-fatal IED blast in Afghanistan, his struggle with mental health and near-suicide, and the divine intervention that led to his spiritual awakening. He also recounts chilling paranormal encounters from his childhood in West Virginia and his time in law enforcement, offering a unique perspective on the blurred lines between the natural and supernatural realms. This episode delves into the complexities of faith, duty, and the unseen forces that shape our lives. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript
Discussion (0)
Starting point is 00:00:01 Listen, Luke, we know that we live in a world where everything is fake, fake food, fake clouds, fake news, everything's fake. And you know what? You get tired of it. And you're just like, if I want to buy a shirt or something nice, can I just, please give me something real. Quinn's is an amazing company that does high quality everyday essentials. So we're moving in. We're in spring here. Moving into summer. Maybe you need to refresh that wardrobe so you're ready for the summer, t-shirts, shorts. These are everyday essentials made from premium materials. Here's a chance to refresh. your wardrobe for the summer at the price that's 50 to 60% less than similar brands. And we always ask, how do they do this, Nate? And it's because they work directly with ethical factories, cut out middlemen.
Starting point is 00:00:42 So you're paying for the quality, not the brand markup. And everything is designed to last and look good, baby. Well, if you want stuff that's the real deal, go to quince.com. Like we have got a whole fleet of new T-shirts this last time, man, because I'm ready for the spring and summer. I got 100% ring-spung cotton shirts. I got a couple flown-it shirts of light and area to wear around, work in the yard, or wear to the studio.
Starting point is 00:01:00 If you're like me and you want to get some new threads for the summer, refresh your wardrobe at Quinn's. Go to quins.com slash blurry for free shipping and 365 day returns. Now available in Canada. You're in America's hat. You want the goods. You can get it now. Go to Q-U-I-N-C-E dot com slash blurry for free shipping and 365-day returns. Quins.com slash blurry. Luke so often, people email us and they have this story. They're out in their woods and they're looking in the bushes and they go, what's that? And when you are pouring your dog food and your dog's bowl,
Starting point is 00:01:39 that's the last thing you want to say. What is that? What is the stuff coming out of this bag? You know, I don't think a lot of us think about maybe what we feed our dogs. And that's why we partner with rough greens. Most of us would love to have our dogs, you know, live as long as possible. I mean, I just lost my dog in December. And I would have loved more time with Carl.
Starting point is 00:01:58 And one of the things you can do to get more time with your dog is to feed them better. Dog owners don't usually realize that live nutrients, that their dog needs to thrive or missing from the food. You just talked about. What is that, right? And that's where Rough Green comes in. It's America's number one dog supplement that you sprinkle on top of their food. It's packed with prebiotics, enzymes, omega oils, and 20 live vitamins and mineral support digestion, energy, and overall health from the inside out. It's all natural made in the USA. And thousands of dogs are feeling younger, more energetic and healthier than they have in years. That's why we love it. I'm giving it to our two dogs. You know, I've got older
Starting point is 00:02:28 dogs, Nate, as I said. And so, you know, since they've been getting rough greens with their food, I've noticed they have more energy. Their joints hurt less. They're older. I mean, they were talking 12 and 13 years old. And Rough Green's really made a difference in their energy levels and the pep in their step. So if you want to do what we did, you can get a free jumpstart trial bag for your dog today. Just cover the shipping.
Starting point is 00:02:47 Go to Rough Greens.com and use discount code blurry. That's RUFFF Greens.com discount code blurry. Rough Greens makes any dog food better. The history of our earth is so different from what we can imagine. Joy to journey. The Smithsonian, if they found out about a large skeleton somewhere, was to go get it. I'm going to assume at least one person is right, because if one person's right to bust the paradigm, it all goes back to the fallen church.
Starting point is 00:03:24 And the problem with the modern day church, they have a very truncated view of the supernatural. This backdrop that's just pregnant with all kinds of meaning associated with this Mount Herman event. And this guy did. effects from the kingdom. That's a big deal. All right. Again. Trying to get Dan to count in like Wayne's World camera guy, but he's one of these days. All right, welcome back to Blurry Creatures. Today's guest is Blake Cook. Blake, welcome to the blurry basement. Wow, thanks for having me here. You just made it into the 80s. He slipped into 1989, but hey, I made it. You made it.
Starting point is 00:04:22 You're a Purple Heart winner and former SWAT team leader. I just a true man all around, you know. True badass. and us over here, we're the dummies on Blair Creatures basement, but we're going to ask some questions today. Get into your story, and we're going to give you a license to get as weird as possible. I know some of these podcasts episodes are a little bit more. You keep things a little more professional, but you can get as weird as you want here. I'm weird, man, so I'm here for it.
Starting point is 00:04:47 All right, and the way we start that is ask you the question. What are your thoughts on Bigfoot, and then we can go where you want to go? My thoughts on Bigfoot's real. He's just smarter than us. I know how to dodge. technology. But any stories? Any run-ins?
Starting point is 00:05:06 No. No, there's a guy where I live. So I grew up in Southern West Virginia in Appalachian Mountains. And there's a Mr. Stover, who is a legend, pioneer, mountaineer kind of guy, lives in the woods. He's walked, he walked like 10 hours one time to the state capitol to get roads paved. Like, he's about it. He lives in the woods. And he swears up and down.
Starting point is 00:05:31 that he has seen Bigfoot multiple times. And I believe him. Yeah. He's just one of those guys that just doesn't lie. I've never experienced anything, but I believe he's real. Well, there's a lot of places in West Virginia. I believe in aliens, too. I don't care what people say.
Starting point is 00:05:51 John Denver saw Bigfoot. Probably. Bigfoot, I think, avoids the country roads. Oh, wow. Yeah, country roads is not really even about West Virginia. It's not even about West Virginia. Yeah. But we like the stories with, you know, gentlemen in uniform that have had these paranormal experiences on the ground. And I think that, you know, you do enough weird stuff. You're in action for long enough. You're going to have some stories to tell. And on our podcast, we're always sort of looking for the more paranormal, strange, strange stuff. But you have a long career. And I'm sure you've had some encounters and some moments that you were like, that's more than just human evil going on here, I'm assuming. Yeah, so I have, I've had one really weird encounter on duty.
Starting point is 00:06:35 Sticks with me forever. I'll never forget it. My wife made me stripped down naked outside. What even let me wear my clothing inside? Because I was like, it was weird to... It's quite the move. Yeah, so... It could be normal.
Starting point is 00:06:50 Could be. I got to get naked before you come inside. I didn't know how to take that. Not saying no to that, yeah. You're like, well, right. But then she hit me with a bunch of sage and... choked me to death and it wasn't what I thought it was going to be. Yeah, it sounds a big letdown.
Starting point is 00:07:04 Yeah. Like, tick check. Tick check. No, but I mean, I'll tell you about that one if you want to hear it. Yeah. It's a good one. Let's start with that. Yeah, that sounds good.
Starting point is 00:07:13 Yeah, so this is back when I was a patrol officer before I went up to the gang unit. And I used to, we used to love the third shift, which was, it was like 6 p.m. and ended at like three. it was the weird hours you know you had the the car X but then
Starting point is 00:07:31 and some shoplifters but then after nine you know when the sun goes down the goons come out to play and you're really running and gunning
Starting point is 00:07:39 but there was an apartment complex where the caller on the first floor called 911 for a physical disturbance for the floor above
Starting point is 00:07:49 and said they could hear a man and woman yelling a man was yelling in a really deep voice that he's going to kill her and he's taking over her soul and and I'm like, okay, cool, this is normal domestic.
Starting point is 00:08:04 Husband's drunk, right, came home, wearing out his old lady. And she's not going to call for help. So we're on her way. We get there and I knock on the door and I hear this deep voice. I was like, Fayetteville police, Fayetteville police open up. And it's like, it's like, it's like, get the F out of here. We don't want you here.
Starting point is 00:08:30 And I was like, oh, well, sorry, we're here. I'm like, you need to open up, my friend. And then I hear, Ah, help. So we took a step back, kicked the door in. As soon as the door came open, there was a female that was standing right in front of the door. So we grabbed her, pulled her back,
Starting point is 00:08:46 gave her back to the third officer, and then myself, and the secondary officer cleared the whole structure. The place was trashed. I mean, Like massive sectional couches flipped. All the glass was broken. All the dishes and drawers were out.
Starting point is 00:09:06 I mean, anything that was in that house was completely destroyed. And then we went in her bathroom and she had a big massive, probably six by six. She had like a double sink. So it was a massive one big mirror. It was completely broken except for this one section that I forgot the verse that was on it. but she'd actually cut herself. Well, somebody cut her, and then wrote across with a verse on this piece of glass.
Starting point is 00:09:35 In blood? In blood. So now I'm going to windows. I'm like, man, this dude's in here, or he's jumped out, right? So we clear it, we clear it, nothing, nothing. So go back out, and I'm all right, let me talk with her. And as I'm talking to her, I'm getting her information. She's cut real bad.
Starting point is 00:09:52 EMS comes. They wrap her up, and I'm asking her, hey, man, what happened? who's in the apartment with you and she's like nobody's in the apartment with me I'm like look I get you're trying to protect your man here
Starting point is 00:10:04 I'm like but like this is this is an issue and so I'm trying to pry information out which is I'm just thinking it's just a battered wife who doesn't want their husband going to jail and and she looks up at me
Starting point is 00:10:20 and it goes I was like oh I was like okay, I was like, that sounds identical to the voice that I heard. Yeah. I'm like, let's go ahead, click, click. You're going in handcuffs for a minute until we can figure this out. So we're like, all right, maybe she's super schizo, right?
Starting point is 00:10:40 Maybe she's schizophrenic. She's sitting there speaking perfect Latin. Don't have no idea what she's saying, but perfect Latin, like fluent. And we're like, all right, she got to go to the hospital. Right. And my sergeant comes in. Again, I'm a rookie. Right.
Starting point is 00:10:54 I'm the rookiest guy out there. My sergeant's like, all right, cook, take her down to the hospital. I'm like, give me to put her in my car after she's, because I believe that people get possessed. Y'all might not believe that. So you thought that at the time? Oh, yeah, I was like, at first I thought she was schizo until she started speaking perfect Latin.
Starting point is 00:11:16 Yeah. And then I was like cross, Bible verse, perfect Latin. What is, this is weird. You need to go to hospital. So you're telling your chief and your crew that, I'm telling my supervisor on. seen that and he's like, you're an idiot. Okay. Oh. She's schizo. Uh, take her to the hospital. I was like, yeah, okay, cool, Roger that. So get her in the, get her in the car and she's just
Starting point is 00:11:39 sitting there like, she's still yelling perfect light and have no idea what she's saying. We make a turn. The hospital's mile and a half way, Max. We turn on an all-American freeway. And again, I hear her do this deep laugh. She's like, ho-ho-ho. Um, What are you going to do, Samuel? And Samuel's my first name. But Samuel's not on my badge. It's not on my shirt. It's not on paper.
Starting point is 00:12:07 Anything that I did paperwork-wise was Blake. Yeah, really? There's only one person that calls me Sam and Samuel, and that's my grandfather. All my court documents, everything, there's nothing in that vehicle or on my computer screen that said that my name was Samuel. Wow. I hit my lights, my blue lights and sirens, and I turned my interior lights on, pulled up my camera, made her camera massive on my computer screen.
Starting point is 00:12:36 Dude, I probably did, I probably did 105 to the hospital. Got to the hospital, pulled her out, took her inside, and said, hey, she's y'all's, I'm out. And that's it. I'm not doing this. Do people like that ever break out of their cuffs? Some, I've never, I've, there are some people that have, like, the, um, the weird joint things where they can pretty much,
Starting point is 00:12:57 pull their thumb all the way over. But nobody like that. It's actually really hard to get out of handcuffs if you put them on properly. Yeah, unless you're a magician. Well, they say that demonic people,
Starting point is 00:13:07 possessed people can have like superhuman strength, throw like 10 dudes off of them and they just kind of go berserk. I believe it. I mean, I'm a, I'm a big believer in spirits, demonic spirits of,
Starting point is 00:13:18 I'm gonna get chill bumps. I don't really talk about it because people think you're weird. Yeah. But I've experienced it my whole life. So this is your law, I love we started with that. Let's start at the beginning though because I think like your story like I mean your story is your testimony right and you've have this wild story that's very supernatural
Starting point is 00:13:39 the sense of God coming to get you and I think that old set sort of set the stage for these other crazy things that we can talk about but because you have a wild story and of yourself I mean you're from West Virginia that's where we started we kind of jumped ahead to law enforcement but there's a long story before before that and after that for you born and raised in western Virginia. Southern West Virginia, Coal Mine Town Sports were everything. You either got 4.0s
Starting point is 00:14:05 and went off to med school or an attorney or a dentist or you got an athletic scholarship or you went to the coal mines. That was your three options. I wasn't super smart. I didn't want to go to the coal mines. I decided to get really good at sports
Starting point is 00:14:20 and I got really, really, really good at football and was able to get a scholarship played in college. I have the most after-catch yards to this date for the state of West Virginia. A lot of yak, baby. Yeah, a lot of yak yards. I was just super fast, man.
Starting point is 00:14:36 I ran a 4.48-40. That's fast for a white guy. Yeah, I was 5-11, and I was pushing about a 195, so I was a good slot receiver. I catch the bubble screen and just run through people. Didn't really have a lot of moves, so I just kind of hoped to your strength. Like Edelman.
Starting point is 00:14:53 Yeah. So, you know, I went to college, and, It kind of built like a rugby player too. I wish I would love to have played rugby. I like physical contact. That would have been fun. Or hockey. But I went to college, man, and it just didn't last.
Starting point is 00:15:08 Parted my way right out. And then my mom, being the sweet lady, she was at, she was like, all right, move in with me. We'll go to a community college. And, you know, we'll work your way back up to getting your football scholarship. And I was like, yeah, you know, her thought was, I have him in a community college in Beckley, West Virginia, and there's nowhere to party. And I'm like, uh, we'll see about that.
Starting point is 00:15:30 So, uh, I felt out of community college because, uh, every day at 1 o'clock, Applebee's have happy hour. Hmm. So I was partying every day at Applebee's with a bunch of rednecks and moms with their kids and in baby cares and at the bar, like people smoking. Like, it was, uh, you know, my mom would call me and I'd go outside and like, oh, yeah, I just stepped out of it. the class.
Starting point is 00:15:54 You got a break. There's always a party at Applebee's. Always, man. Two for 20, too. Come on. Wow. And so, you know, I broke her heart. She found out six months later that I never even attended a course.
Starting point is 00:16:08 And that's my reoccurring dream. That I don't go to class. Partying at Applebee? No, that I don't go to class. It's a good dream. Yeah. You're like, it's karaoke. I wish it was partying at Applebee.
Starting point is 00:16:19 It's karaoke. It's wild. They're playing my song. That's it. It's, I have one class. have to graduate and I don't go the whole time. That's like the worst dream ever. I didn't go to any of my classes. So then you decide I'm going to go to the military? No, it's not how I decided at all. I was like, all right, cool. I'm not at college. My mom, maybe I just need a year. Maybe I just need a year
Starting point is 00:16:39 to find myself. I took a year and got really good at Call of Duty, Modern Warfare. I was on like top, I was on a top 500 team in the world. Wow. Yeah, I played, I started playing at seven at night and I wouldn't go to bed till six in the morning and I'd sleep until four work out get back on call of duty so finally after about a couple months after this my mom's like she comes in she's like hey you're kind of a loser right now so like you need to get a job it's like oh she's like if you don't get a job and she swear she never said this but she did and uh or you got to go I'm like where am I going to go you know she's just got this uh she's been dating this guy for couple years. He started living with us and he's my stead dad now. I love him, but he like
Starting point is 00:17:27 would try to motivate me to go to work with him. I'm not going to work with you, dude. I'm going to call me. I'm riding this out. And so ultimately now my mom calls me and she's like, hey, you got a job. I'm coming home. Like, you need to go get a job. I'm serious or you're leaving. So it went up to like Hibbitt Sporting Goods, man. I was wearing a white t-shirt with cut off sleeves, some gym shorts and some sandals. Look like I just woke up out of bed. I go in there and I'm like, hey man, are y'all hiring? The guys said, oh yeah, we are, but just not you. I was like, mm.
Starting point is 00:17:59 I was like, all right, well, I tried. So I go outside and when I went outside, that's when I met up with an Army recruiter, asked me if everything was all right. And I was like, I just need a job. And man, it's a light bulb for him. He was like, you need a job? Son, United States Army's hiring.
Starting point is 00:18:15 I was like, really? I'm like, yeah, I can do that. Get inside, he tells me it's like Call of Duty. gets me all worked. I'm like, dude, I'm like, I'm top, I'm like on a top 500 team in the world, man. If I'm good at Call of Duty, I'll be good at this. He's like, oh, dude, just like Collierty, all the gear.
Starting point is 00:18:32 I'm like, sign me up, dude. I'm like, I don't know what job. He's like, the infantry, man. It's like Call of Duty and we need people. I was like, I don't even know what that is, but put me down. And so I get home, and I'm playing video games, playing Call of Duty. and my mom's like, you got a job?
Starting point is 00:18:52 I'm like, yeah. She's like, oh man, I'm so proud of you. She's like, what is it? I'm like, come here. I'm like, watch this game. She's watching it. I'm like, it's like that. She goes, were you working at GameStop?
Starting point is 00:19:04 I'm like, no, mom, signed up for the military. Dude, she starts crying. She's like, oh my God, I killed my baby. He signed up for the military. I wasn't really going to make you leave. Can you get out of it? And I'm like, I don't think you can just get out of your contract. I was like, mom, I had to sign a bunch of paperwork.
Starting point is 00:19:24 I went to this building called MEPs. I did all the things today. I'm like, I'm in it. And she's like, you know, ultimately she ended up, it was the best thing that ever happened to me. Truly, I was, you know, I went down for that year that I was taking a break to find myself. I hung out with some guys who were losers and were into things that they shouldn't. Like I was running moonshine is a real thing. I was running moonshine for some doctors and stuff where I live that were delivering it to judges and a lot of corruption stuff. And then that got in the woods. Huh? Would you make it in the woods?
Starting point is 00:20:01 No, there was a doctor who had an actual facility. Like he had like a really nice. It was a distillery. Yeah, it wasn't in the bushes. He had an overhang and I mean, it was, he had full wheelers. I mean, it was like, it was like Dukes of Hazard. It was crazy. It was insane. And he would pay us. to go out and deliver a couple bucks to deliver these jars and he would give them to give them some to us apple pie moonshine was the best and uh just got the flavor down yeah dude it was the best get little apples in it cut them things up you're hammered and uh but then that led into hey man if you're running some moonshine can you run some pills you know and it led into some weird things i did that a couple of times I was like, this isn't right. I got to do something with my life. Like, ended up breaking away from those friends. I got to do the opposite. I got to stop these guys.
Starting point is 00:20:53 I was like, this is weird. At the time, I didn't know any better. I was 18, you know, 19 years old. And I didn't think anything of it. I really know about drug problems and stuff like that. And so I was like, man, this is weird. So I isolated myself from everybody and just worked out and played, that's when I got really good at Call of Duty because I was like,
Starting point is 00:21:14 I'm just going to play video games. everybody wants to hang out with either wants to smoke weed either wants to do do drugs or wants to just go get hammered and now I'm now I got people handing me little bags of pills and it's just like that's not where I want to be like that's I didn't know anything about it but I knew it wasn't right right and and you can get really locked in on those small towns in West Virginia where people don't have ambition you know and it's they don't have jobs so everybody there sells drugs drugs.
Starting point is 00:21:45 Yeah. There's no way out. There's no way out. There's no way out. The only way out for me at that time, the only way out for me at that time was join the military. Was it like Call of Duty? Absolutely not. Absolutely not.
Starting point is 00:21:57 Nope, because in Collie duty, I didn't poop into a barrel and have to stir it with diesel fuel and watch it melt away. That was not in Colliery duty. Wow. They did not tell me about that. He did not. That should be in the extended edition of Collie duty. You're like, who was...
Starting point is 00:22:14 So I went to basic. I didn't have anything in my contract. I didn't have anything cool. Get there. All these people were like, oh, man, we're going to RAS. I was RIP at the time. Rap, I think it was RIP.
Starting point is 00:22:25 What's that? It's Ranger Selection. Okay. And I got Airborne in my contract. I got all the, I got selection for the Q course for SF. And I'm like, I didn't get any of that.
Starting point is 00:22:37 I'm like, I didn't, people are getting sign on, like 20,000 signing bonuses. And everybody in my, um, in my barracks in my company had a minimum of a $15,000 signing bonus. I had nothing, not even a dollar.
Starting point is 00:22:51 They got you on Call of Duty. Yeah, he got me a head. He said call on duty, man. I was locked in. And so halfway through Basic, you start getting your orders of where you're going. And they were like, all right, uh, cook, Korea.
Starting point is 00:23:05 I was like, Korea. I'm like, what's in Korea? I'm not going to Korea. Like, uh-uh. I eat steak and bacon. potatoes. I'm not going to survive over there, dude. What am I going to eat? I don't eat Korean food. I'm like, this sucks. I'm like, how do I get out of this? I'm like, I'm already homesick. I don't want to go all over to, because that's a minimum of like a year or two that you got to be out there.
Starting point is 00:23:28 And I, you know, once I join, I've decided like, hey, man, like, if I'm going to join, like, I want to go fight. I want to go, I want to go to Afghanistan. And I'm not going to Afghanistan with Korea. Like Korea, yeah. That's a party thing. You got a Seoul Korea. and everybody parties. It's not what I've signed up to. So I went to my recruiter and I'm like, hey man, I'm like, what do I got?
Starting point is 00:23:50 I'm not my recruiter. Excuse me, my drill instructor. And I'm like, hey, what I got to do to get out of this? Like, he goes, hey man, like, we offer, you've gotten, see the max that you can get on your PT scores are 300. And I've gotten 300 on all my PT scores.
Starting point is 00:24:04 He's like, if you get another 300 on this next one coming up in two weeks, I'll give you an airborne contract. We have one to give out and I'll give it to you. And I was like, oh, my gosh, this is awesome. So I was really excited. And then about two days before that PT test, I came down with the flu.
Starting point is 00:24:22 And, you know, I just had all the dehydration, the throwing up, the diarrhea issues. Like, I was really bad off. And I was like, my man, I got to be able to do this. Like, I can't go to Korea. So the night before the PT test, I was still feeling, I was feeling better, but really dehydrated and tired. And my bunkmate pulls out. out, he opens up his, lifts his bed up, unzips it, digs all the way in there, pulls out a
Starting point is 00:24:48 five-hour energy shot that he had somehow smuggled in. He was a, hey man, I sell it to you, it was like a hundred bucks or something. I was like, done, done, let me get that in the morning. So I take the, I take it, I wake up the next morning. I'm, all night long, I'm holding it, putting it down in my shorts, you know, I'm like, I don't want to lose it. Yeah. So I get up, I chug it the next morning, put it in my shorts, because it has the, the lining halfway through the run. I tossed it out while nobody's looking. And I got 300 on PT tests, and my drone instructor held his word and gave me an airborne
Starting point is 00:25:23 contract, which that means I don't go to Cree anymore. It means I go to either Washington, or not Washington, excuse me, Italy or Fort Bragg. And I went to Fort Bragg. And I was at Fort Bragg for about 11 months, nine months. And we're doing a lot of training. We had a couple of appointments come up. We trained for him. They'd get canceled.
Starting point is 00:25:45 That was when the P.O.W. was missing. So everybody was trying to find him and sending help to areas where they thought he might be. Did he do the deserted? Yeah, he was a deser. I remember that. Bo something, yeah. Berg-Gall. Birdgall.
Starting point is 00:26:02 Yeah, Burd Gaw. Yeah, he actually studied the Quran. I mean, he did the whole thing. He left. He left on his own wheel. He got captured, like a dummy. But, um, so. So I went in for a haircut.
Starting point is 00:26:15 I was like, I'm tired of going to these little Korean ladies. They give me these high and tights. I want like a normal haircut. So I went into this place called Fredericks for a haircut. And I sat down in this chair. And it's really, really, really pretty. Girl started cutting my hair. And it was my wife.
Starting point is 00:26:34 I didn't know it at the time. So we got to talk in and I was like, man, she's super cool. and then the next day they're like, all right, guys, we got to go for another 30 day training. So we left for 30 more days down to Georgia, to DeLanaga to training the mountains. And when I got back, I was going to go see that girl again, get a haircut.
Starting point is 00:26:54 So I went to go get a haircut and walk in and she's in there, and we're talking. She's cutting my hair. She's trying to set me up with a girl next to her. She's like, hey, we're going out tonight. If you and your friends want to come out with us, come on. you know I'll bring out this girl and you can hang out with her and I was like oh sweet so I get we get her house that night and she's like oh I'm sorry Courtney couldn't make it she had to cancel I was sorry no worries we'll all go out so we all went out and then we started talking and then uh you know at the end of the night we were at this bar called patties and we're all still together and then my team leader at the time texted us and was like hey um I'm out here, guys.
Starting point is 00:27:40 Come on. I'm picking y'all up. So we're leaving. I'm getting in the car, and I feel somebody come up and tap me on my back shoulder, and it was my wife. She's like, hey, can you just hang out a little longer? I'd just like to talk to you.
Starting point is 00:27:52 And everybody in the car is like, get in. Don't do it. I'm like, oh, see, good boy. You know, shut the van door. And we went back out inside and just kind of set out of a table and hung out. And got married four. 41 days later. Wow.
Starting point is 00:28:10 Yeah, we've been married 13 years. Yeah. That's amazing. She had a three-year-old son at the time. He's 17 now, but I've raised him since he was three. In my eyes, he's mine. You know,
Starting point is 00:28:24 and we have a massive relationship, and his father isn't present, so we have a really good bond. And, yeah, so it's been, it's been, it was great. After we got married, we got married. We met the week after Thanksgiving, then got married January 4th of 2012. So super, super quick. But what was even crazier is after we got married, a deployment came down for the end of February.
Starting point is 00:28:56 So I was like, wow, this is. Army wife right away. Yeah, right away. Yeah. So I left for deployment at the end of February and went to Ghazi Providence, Afghanistan. It was pretty cool at first. There wasn't the big army Well, we were the big army
Starting point is 00:29:11 This was 2012, yep So I was in the 82nd, First Brigade 1,504 Red Devils And our little company Got there before anybody else did We were there with the Polish So it was pretty cool
Starting point is 00:29:25 I got to experience A kind of an unregulated deployment Like where there wasn't like Sergeant Majors and stuff around Making you do like stupid stuff And things like that And it was cool It was, the deployment was fun.
Starting point is 00:29:40 And then May 24th of 2012, we were doing a QRF operation, some third group, special forces guys. Third group or first group. What's QRF? Quick reaction force. Okay. So there's always a team that's on QRF that's ready to go. Everything's in the truck.
Starting point is 00:30:01 So if there's like a terrorist or an insurgency or like, no kind of guys. Yeah, like if there's somebody in a heavy firefight, right? And they need help where we run to the trucks, start our stuff on. The guns and everything are already prepped. You just got to slap the ammo in. Rocket, send it. Like, you know, if you go to the gym, you're in uniform.
Starting point is 00:30:21 You're not in PT clothes. You're ready to go. You're like on call. You're ready to go. Like, it's needed. Sometimes it feels like when you get that phone bill, it's like the crash site document. You can't read it. There's a bunch of numbers, random fees, vague language.
Starting point is 00:30:35 Stuff's blacked out. You're like, what am I actually paying for? I don't know about you, but I like keeping my money where I. I can see it. I like to be simple. I like to be easy. I'm going to be thrown away money on big wireless carriers. You too can say goodbye to overpaying for wireless. Get a simple bill. That's where Mitt Mobile comes in. So stop overpaying for wireless just because that's how it's always been. That's what you do. Mint Mobile offers premium wireless service for a fraction of what the big carriers charge. And you get to keep your phone number. Get to keep your coverage, most importantly. And it runs on the nation's largest 5G network. So the question becomes, why has everyone been acting like this has to be expensive? It doesn't have. to be. Dr. Judd Burton's out there dialing up Blurray every day, giving us the scoop on what's going on in the academic world and the ancient world on MintMobil. Loud and clear on the job sites, way out in the middle of nowhere, Texas. And if you want to save money, just like the illustrious Dr. Judd-Burton, switch to MintMobile. If you like your money, say where it is. Metmobles
Starting point is 00:31:28 for you. Shop plans at mintmobile.com slash blurry. That's mintmobile.com slash blurry. Up front payment of $45 for a three-month, $5.5.5 plan required equivalent to $15 a month. New customer offer for first three months only, then full-priced plan options available, taxes and fees extra, cement mobile for details. You said this place was steps from the water. We just haven't found the steps yet. How much did we save? Enough to get lost.
Starting point is 00:31:56 Or you could book a stay with Hilton. Welcome to your oceanfront room. Just steps from the water. The Hilton sale is on now. Book on Hilton.com or the Hilton app and save up to 20% to get the stay you expected. When you want savings, not surprises. It matters where you stay.
Starting point is 00:32:13 Hilton, for the stay. When you need to build up your team to handle the growing chaos at work, use Indeed-sponsored jobs. It gives your job post the boost it needs to be seen and helps reach people with the right skills, certifications, and more. Spend less time searching and more time actually interviewing candidates who check all your boxes.
Starting point is 00:32:33 Listeners of this shelf will get a $75-sponsored job credit at Indeed.com slash. podcast. That's Indeed.com slash podcast. Terms and conditions apply. Need a hiring hero? This is a job for Indeed sponsored jobs. So these boys were out on their operational outposts, which is away from the main fob, which was a forward operating base. And they got into a tick with some Taliban forces. They were actually target practicing and were getting ambushed. And they were on full wheelers and stuff. and they were pretty bogged down. So the fastest way to them was a side road that was a black.
Starting point is 00:33:13 So black means that it hasn't been cleared for IEDs in two weeks. That was the first route there. So we're driving. We pull off a highway one. We hit this dirt road and about 100 yards after hitting the dirt road. I was a gunner. I took my headset off. We had headsets.
Starting point is 00:33:31 We were listening to like some Katie Perry's song. and as one does oh man it was it was moving starship was the name of that song so we took the headphones off I went to holler at somebody and as I took my headphone off
Starting point is 00:33:46 I saw it I didn't hear it but I saw like a massive bright light like imagine if these things were like a million looms in front of you right now they heat everything and then I saw like pieces of dirt
Starting point is 00:34:00 and rock and pieces of the truck in like a real slow motion feature kind of going up. It was like everything just slowed down tremendously. Then it did that for about a couple seconds and then boom, I came down and I hit the 240 with my face. So immediately this is a great example. I can use it with this. So I'm in the gunner's turret, right? It's a circle. And I got the machine gun, the 240. The blast comes up. Boom. The pressure throws me back, breaks my back plate in half. Then I come forward and break the whole right side of my face on the gun.
Starting point is 00:34:40 Like I have zero filling on this side of my face still to this day. They broke all this. And they put me on a gurney. So what happens you drive over an IED? Is that? Yeah. So are you in a Humvee or truck? No, we're in wraps.
Starting point is 00:34:56 Okay. One of the larger vehicles. So the truck in front of us, it was self-detain. It was remote detonated because it was blown up right in between the two trucks. And EOD that went out later on the next day after I was already flown out to Boggham, estimated it to be about a 500-pound IED. I mean how much C-I-ED? I woke up like 10 minutes later.
Starting point is 00:35:21 Is that C-4? Is that like 500 pounds? Does that mean 500 pounds is like C-4? Yeah. Yeah. Wow. And probably multiple, multiple, probably 500-100. Did they remote?
Starting point is 00:35:31 Let me ask us, like, because I don't know anything about. Cell phone. Do they remotely? Yeah, they were watching us. They're trying to get your truck on top of it, or they're trying to hit both trucks of the in between? Probably trying to hit both trucks at the same time. So I wake up 10 minutes later,
Starting point is 00:35:41 there's a lot of chatter on the radio. Somebody said that, so the talk, which is the command post, that has the big balloon up, that's seeing everything. They're reporting large heavy presence of possible Taliban fighters moving to our location. This is after you getting blown up.
Starting point is 00:35:59 Yeah, I'm strapped on a board. they can't get a helo in to land to get me out. Are you the only injury or are there multiple casualties there? I'm the only massive injury. There are people that have injuries, but I was the only one that went unconscious for 10 minutes. Because you're on top. And there were some people that got on the bird with us,
Starting point is 00:36:19 but I was only one strapped to a board. And so they can't land a helo because of these possible people come in. The sky was already, it was a no-fly zone for some reason. I don't know why. So they ended up sending out two Apaches to fly around, secure landing zone for the Black Hawk. And I woke up as I'm being loaded on the Black Hawk.
Starting point is 00:36:45 And I tell you what's funny about this is one of my old game partners, right, Kelton Glorfield. I didn't know this until I met him. He was the medic, or not the medic, but he was the, a gunner on the ship that picked me up. Oh, wow. I didn't know that. I didn't know him at the time.
Starting point is 00:37:05 He was my partner in the gang unit. So later in the story, you end up being partners. Eight, seven years later. For the guy that came to rescue. Yeah. That's wild. And so, you know, I'm on the bird, and we were talking about Blackbeard, right? Why I love Blackbeard so much.
Starting point is 00:37:18 So I look up and every Hilo, every Black Hawk, the crew has a flag that they want to fly, whether it's their favorite college team and their state flag, whatever. This, Hilo is just. happen to have a black beard flag. So a pirate flag? Pirate flag. Oh, just for, yeah. So we were talking about this pre-roll.
Starting point is 00:37:36 Yeah. You got a black beard tattoo. I got several. I mean, I got this one. I got a whole black beard chest piece on my leg. I literally have black beard tattooed on my leg. Does that happen after this point?
Starting point is 00:37:47 Yeah. Yeah. So I'll see the flag and then I'm like really dizzy from my brain injury. And so I ended up passing out. And I woke up in Boggham Air Force Base. Actually, I woke up. excuse me, I woke up at our forward operating base because they couldn't find me to Boggham
Starting point is 00:38:04 because of the sky was in no-fly zone. So I'm laid in Boggham for about a day, maybe a day and a half. What kind of injuries do you have at this point? Do you know? No, I had some nerve damage, had a traumatic brain injury for sure. I was thrown up. I just was like, my body was super weak,
Starting point is 00:38:24 my legs were really weak. Didn't know because I couldn't really see a doctor. I'm at just a medic tent is all I'm in. They're trying to get me to bogg him to the hospital, and they couldn't because of the no-fly zone. So while we're dealing with this, somebody comes in and says, hey, man, you need to call your wife.
Starting point is 00:38:47 And I'm like, yeah, yeah, I'd like to talk to her. And they're like, well, it could be a little headache at first. I'm like, well, why is that? Well, apparently, and I found, this later on from her is the family readiness group, which is like the wives of people who are there, called my family, my wife, and told them that there was an accident and I was possibly deceased. Oh, man. And so for a little while, that's the phone call that they got. Jeez. And so, ultimately, I was able to give them a call shortly after. Confirm that was actually alive. I'm not dead.
Starting point is 00:39:28 Not dead. So my mom had a freak out moment. So I remember laying there for a whole day, I'm just laying there staring at the ceiling. Just watching multiple dead Afghan civilians come in. I'm watching multiple dead. I literally watched a surgery on an Afghan police force guy came in, was shot head to toe. They're like trying to save handbloods everywhere. I'm just like laying there.
Starting point is 00:39:59 I can't do it. I can't really move. I'm strapped to a board. Have like this other kids. It's just kind of setting with me. And then they come over and they start, you start hearing the sirens. Which means they're incoming, incoming, incoming, incoming. Incoming.
Starting point is 00:40:16 Which means we're getting mortared. So we're just getting mortared all day. And so I'm laying there strapped to this board with an injury. And all I have is just people's, I got just a line of bulletproof vests. Everybody's just placing bulletproof vests on top of all. me in case our tent got hit with a mortar. Yeah. I'm like, yo, can I get out of here?
Starting point is 00:40:33 Like, this is, let's fly me out. So finally they got its clearance. They flew me out to Boggham, Bargham Air Force Base, which is like a little mini U.S. town at that point. And I stayed there for about a month and a half, two months. And I wasn't feeling great at the time. And I was like, you know, I'm good. Like, I want to go back.
Starting point is 00:40:55 lied on all my tests, said I was good, went back. I ended up coming home and just went and just everything, by the time we got back home from deployment, so I finished it out for a couple months, and then by the time I got home from deployment, my brain injury was really bad. My nerves, my brain and my nerves in my body wasn't really communicating very well.
Starting point is 00:41:18 So I just had a massive list of injuries. And so they sent me to the Warrior Transition Battalion so I had three medical appointments every day speech memory and physical therapy for almost like two years well for a year and a half and then after I did this whole so Walmack Army Medical Center did
Starting point is 00:41:38 they started a traumatic brain injury pipeline there was six of us I think two of the guys killed themselves one guy one guy just dropped out and three of us actually excuse me finish the pipeline it was a really extensive
Starting point is 00:41:54 pipeline. It was a lot of puzzles and like they would time you unloading magazines and it was really stressful and so they released me. Let me ask us what the symptoms. Let me ask us what the symptom we say of traumatic brain injury. What are the symptoms of that? Are you getting like, are you just in a brain fog? Are you not being able to coordination or is it? Start starting really bad memory loss, um, irritated, um, depression. Yeah. Just all these, all these symptoms. And, So they release me from this pipeline, and they give me to send me back to my unit. And as soon as I get to my unit, they're like, hey, go rig up your rucksack. We're doing a combat jump tonight.
Starting point is 00:42:39 I'm like, guys, I have eight months until I'm out. I don't want to jump. I just did this for a year and a half. Yeah. And you want me to go jump. They're like, it's fine. It's a nighttime jump. We're going to jump, and then we're going to ruck 12 miles back.
Starting point is 00:42:54 This is a break? Yeah, I was like, well, I'm like, you don't have, there's, I don't even know why we're discussing this. You don't have an option. So I was like, all right, well, whatever. So I went and packed my ruck up. I went home and told her, I'm like, I got to jump. She's like, what? I'm like, yeah, like, I got to jump.
Starting point is 00:43:11 Sorry. And did the jump that night. It was a smooth jump out. Couldn't really see much. And right before I hit the ground, instead of hitting the ground, I smacked a, landing on the I landed on the hood of a Humvee and smack my head off the glass. Oh, gosh. So I woke up, I don't know, I don't know how long I was out.
Starting point is 00:43:31 It didn't feel long, but I woke up, had a massive headache, nauseous thrown up. I was like, oh, man, not again. So I packed my shoot up, get all my stuff. I dropped my shoot off and I go link up with my platoon. And I'm like, hey, it'll go away. Like, you don't need a fuss about this. So I'm laying there in a prone position, and my squad leader is next to me. just like throwing up and he's like his name was uh um boca garcia i love that dude he's
Starting point is 00:44:00 he's a yo s a you okay i'm like no man i hit i hit a humvee on my way down i'm like but i don't want to make a big deal out of it he goes are you throwing up i'm like yeah he goes nah dude he goes no i say go the medical tent i don't care he's like you're going to get help because he'd been doing this for 20 i mean he was he was there for desert storm pentamall i mean he's jumped in all of them he was like you got to take care of yourself so i went to the mechal tent and then boom man back next day back in the pipeline so get released from that right so i do that for a couple months i actually i did that until uh yeah about about about about four months i finally get cleared and then about a week later i'm driving it's pouring down rain and uh this soldier was in this
Starting point is 00:44:48 brand new rx Subaru he stops in the middle of the road and turns his flashes on and I man, I smacked him at 60 miles an hour. Airbag didn't come out. I had an old Jeep wrangler. Airbag didn't come out. So automatically smack my head again for the third time. Three brain injuries in two and a half years. Off the steering wheel.
Starting point is 00:45:09 They couldn't get up with my wife because they're asking me for my wife's number and I gave them my cell phone number. So nobody can get up with her. Finally, one of my really good friends was, got, had her number and called her. And I went back into the pipeline for the third. time and stay there until I got out. And then I medically retired. I didn't medically retire out because I wanted to do federal law enforcement job.
Starting point is 00:45:33 I walked in one day, still two weeks before my ETS, which is the day, the ETS is when you get out of the arm, it's your date when you, when you're released. I forgot what it stands for. Something time of service. I don't know. Don't hold me to that. But I walk in one day and they're like, hey, like two weeks before I'm supposed to ETS, they're like, hey, here's your D.D.
Starting point is 00:45:52 214, see you later. I'm like, what? Like, I still have two weeks left here. They're like, no, no, you don't. You're out. I was like, all right, cool. I have no plan. Right.
Starting point is 00:46:04 I don't know what to do now. So I'm driving home and I see this armored vehicle with Fable Police Emergency Response Team doing 100 miles an hour down Bragg Boulevard. I was like, man, I want to do that. That's what I want to do. And signed up for the Fable Police Department and was very fortunate enough to be selected to do that.
Starting point is 00:46:25 And I did, I was on patrol for about a year. And they had trialts for the emergency response team, which is how I met Brandon. I met Brandon shortly after the academy. We worked kind of the same area together. And he just kind of like took me under his wing. He's such a good dude. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:46:44 I love that man. I shout out to Brandon. Yeah, shout out to Brandon. Love you, dude. But, you know, he kind of helped me, like, get prepared. for the ER team was like really motivated me to do it. I mean it was an honor to like when you saw those SWAT guys walking around with the with the with the tab on their shoulder that said Fable Police and then you had the
Starting point is 00:47:00 long tab that said Burnsey response team like man when them dude showed up like you felt you felt at peace because you're going to live because because SWAT's here and so I got a waiver because you're supposed to be on the department for two years and I got a waiver to to go try out and a lot of people fail multiple times and I was very fortunate enough to pass and get selected first go-round and, you know, so I did that most of my whole career.
Starting point is 00:47:35 SWAT. Yeah, SWAT. So we're a part-time team full-time status. Yeah. So we still had daily jobs, but almost every day was some type of operation. So if there was a call-out, a barricade, hostage rescue,
Starting point is 00:47:49 active shooter, search warrant. I mean, it's Fayetteville. It's, we have like 30,000 registered game members for one of the highest
Starting point is 00:47:57 crime, crime cities in North Carolina. It's a city that never sleeps with violence. When the sun goes down, man, the goons come out to play. It's,
Starting point is 00:48:04 it's dangerous. It's a dangerous city. And so we were always doing something SWAT related, but I still had other obligations to my normal job. But any time something came out, we were always,
Starting point is 00:48:16 we went, man. We had two phones. When the bat phone went off, we took it and we ran with it. So I did that and then later on a position with the gang unit popped open. And I was a man, I really want to do that. I'm fascinated with the cartel. I'm fascinated with gangs and all this. And so I did it.
Starting point is 00:48:36 I chied out. Man, it was one of two people that got selected and funnest job I've ever had, man. I grew up massive, massive long beard down to here, hair down to here. Got my hands tattooed. Yeah. I was loving it, man. We were like a bunch of cowboys. We made a difference in that city.
Starting point is 00:48:54 So what's evil look like from like when you started your career until you ended it? Evil is evil, man. Evil doesn't change. I think evil's been the same murderers, rapists, people who really aggravate me or people who sell drugs to addicts that are family members to somebody else. To them, they're accustomed. to you know my dad's a real bad drug addict and I struggled with that for a long time I tried to save him several times last phone conversation I ever had with him in 20 23 is straight up told me like you're you're a piece of you're a piece of crap you couldn't even save me
Starting point is 00:49:31 so you can't even save yourself wow and uh it's the last conversation I ever had with my father and uh and it was really the my dad's addiction was the downfall to my personal life and the downfall to my career because once I found out that he was that bad on drugs, I became obsessed with putting drug dealers in federal prison. Obsessed. I had no compassion for you, your family. Like, you got treated like crap by me. Like when you went handcuffs, I don't care if you were dying of thirst. You're going to die of thirst. You ain't get no water because I, you know, at first I I try to have compassion, but they would say, man, I don't care about the people we sell to. And I'm like, in the back of my head, I'm like, man, I'm about to punch you.
Starting point is 00:50:17 Like, my dad's an addict. And so that was hard because I let emotions get involved. So I was acting out at work, you know, and I don't want to get into the police chief. I did that on the Sean Ryan show. And I don't want to get into that. There was a bunch of leadership issues, too, that just were not good. They wanted to suspend me for a week for telling a guy that I was going to effing kill. him and I was I have a scar you can probably see it from over there but that's this scar here and
Starting point is 00:50:51 here is for me holding that dude's front sight posts of his gun that he was trying to kill me with and uh and they said it would have sounded bad on CNN because of George Floyd so I was like all right I'm out man like went to the bathroom cried went and went and saw a uh a doctor and got put on um leave and medically retired out couldn't do it no more but man I had a I had a blast in L.E. Like I said it and I'll say it again like you want to make a difference in your city. Yeah. Crimes high in your city.
Starting point is 00:51:23 Man, go get you about six to ten good good dudes. Yeah. Put them in plain clothes. Tell them to lawfully go do things, right? There's no gray line. Yeah. Black or white.
Starting point is 00:51:34 Operate in the law, right? This is America. We have the Constitution. People are protected. Yeah. They're veterans. What you fought for? Like, we're not breaking people's rights.
Starting point is 00:51:44 Drug dealers. and people who are crime and evil. Evil doesn't change. Evil's, it might be in different forms whether it's murders or rapes or robberies or anything like that. Just people who are careless of life.
Starting point is 00:52:01 Like the people who scared me the most were non-traditional gang members. So you have traditional, non-traditional. Traditional gang members are ones that are established nationwide, same gang, multiple cities, like eight-traceous. Crips, Hoover Crips, those are all different sets in different states.
Starting point is 00:52:21 You know, they can be sex money murder. Issaid Maa Pairo, which is Little Wains, who he's established wish. They're throughout different parts of, they're everywhere, right? Non-traditional gangs are, we start a gang right here. Yeah. You know, blurry creature street boys. It's a tough gang right now. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:52:42 And, but those are the gangs that are unorganized. They have no leader. Yeah. They were the first ones to shoot. Do you think there's a spiritual component to that? I think so. Yeah. I had a spiritual component to that in the LE.
Starting point is 00:52:54 I think I'd have been a much better police officer. I think I had more success as a police officer if I would have walked with Jesus. So talk about that. What's your faith journey? Like you have these multiple head injuries, you know, where these bad things continue to happen. I'll tell you this, man. I'll tell you my downfall. 2018
Starting point is 00:53:16 Black Friday me and my brother went to visit my dad and my dad's always you ask my wife my dad was always like don't drink drinks bad my dad took us to church every Sunday he brought so many people to God and we went to visit him on this Friday and that was the first time I ever saw my dad hi and he couldn't even talk to us
Starting point is 00:53:40 my brother spoke his peace to him my dad got rage he was on cocaine rage demonic look in his eyes and he took off running downstairs and I was like let's go that's where he keeps his gun so first thing I did is I ran out the house
Starting point is 00:54:00 jumped the fence opening up my driver door my truck got my gun and I'm like I'm not getting shot like we're going to do this and we can do it we get in my truck and my dad my dad comes outside and you know I didn't see his hands I just backed out of the driveway
Starting point is 00:54:12 it man it felt like 100, but it was probably 30, 40 miles an hour, and it was still fast for backing up. And they just spent that thing around, and we got out of there. And, you know, I drank myself into a coma that night, and I was so mad at God. I'm like, how do you let a man of faith, a man that's brought so many people to Jesus? How do you just allow him to get addicted to drugs? Like, Jesus, you perform miracles. You brought back Lazarus from the dead.
Starting point is 00:54:44 and like you can't just like heal this dude like you know and it's so that was my and we were living in this house I thought I bring this up too rented this house called 311 Fairfield and Fayetteville and the moment this is the same year uh we went we moved into the house that summer that that house I when I never physically seen anything but I spiritually felt the president of something bad. That house was very weird, man. Our son said that he saw something in his bedroom. And we was like, we're not talking about it.
Starting point is 00:55:24 Not talking about it. We have nowhere else to go. It was a house in a really nice neighborhood that in Fayetteville, which is rare. Yeah. And we lived in that house for how many years, two, three? Couple years. And during that time, that was, I found out that my dad was addicted in December or Black Friday. November, we moved in in like July.
Starting point is 00:55:48 And then while we lived, we lived there for about two years. And during that two years was the worst I've ever been in my life. Spiritually, mentally, physically, we were partying and drinking. I was, our marriage was crumbling. I mean, we almost got a divorce. Just because I was so focused on attacking drug dealers at work. When I came home, I wasn't physically present or mentally present. I was on my phone talking about,
Starting point is 00:56:14 trash dumps and trash pulls like how are we getting this guy just didn't care about then we were constantly we could never ever be on the same page and it was something in that home because once we bought a house and moved out when we drove away from that house you could feel a sign of like that we've never felt before we lived in this other house for six months before i medically retired and it was just a happy house we we got a long great you said the address so if you live there now like It might be haunted. I might want to do, I want to have an exorcist come over.
Starting point is 00:56:47 Yeah, dude. So like, I mean, we would find the garage door that the door that goes into the garage. That thing would just open on its own. No matter if it was locked. We would lock that thing, dude. Like, deadbolt lock it.
Starting point is 00:56:59 They would open itself up. And she, we would find that thing open in the middle of the night. And it was weird because it was down the long hall. And it bypassed the living room, the kitchen. It was just a dark room. Yeah. And, uh,
Starting point is 00:57:12 when I would be gone working late nights. Because of the gang unit, man, I'm in the problem. I might go into work. And I might be in Washington, D.C., following somebody. Yeah. And she'd call me and be like, Blake, something's in the attic. There's somebody up there slamming something. And I'm like, nobody's in the attic, Nicole.
Starting point is 00:57:31 Like, we don't have somebody that lives in the attic. And I'd be honest with, I didn't have the balls to go up there to look either. I went about whoever can be up there. You're chasing gags. Like, I don't go up there to see that. No, man, you live in rent-free up there if you're up on her attic. But it was just. just a really bad two years of our marriage and just how we felt both, how we both just felt.
Starting point is 00:57:53 I tipped a suicide in that house. A New Year's Eve of 2018, after I found out my dad, she had just had a surgery, so she was out, put her in the bed. She literally just picked her up that day, took her and put her in the bed. It was New Year's Eve. and she was asleep. Our son was at his grandfather's house. I drank two bottles of Jack Daniel's honey and made a suicide video
Starting point is 00:58:25 from my family and told him that nobody will ever understand the pain that I'm in. And went to, I'm shining the video, I'm shining to the bottle of whiskey. There's my duty service weapons in there. and I'm crying. I got this big biker beard, this long hair,
Starting point is 00:58:45 and put the phone down, put the gun up, put it to my head, went to pull the trigger. And two things happened. I had a female German Shepherd at the time. She jumped up and ran straight over to me. But I also heard like this demonic kind of laugh. and I was like, he shouldn't have done that because he did that, it angered me.
Starting point is 00:59:17 Because I was like, what are you about to do? You're letting the devil win. The devil won. He's laughing at you right now. And she was like on top of me. Your dog was. Yeah, moving my arm. So I put the gun down and just continued to drink until I pass out.
Starting point is 00:59:34 But there was something in that home in that two years, that was, it was wild. Is that voice similar to? Yeah. To the one that you heard in that lady? Yeah, that, I'm getting chills. When that, yeah, a demon man, it's a, that's just a, I don't know how to describe it,
Starting point is 00:59:53 but it's just, it's a very demonic, uh, it's a very demonic voice. It's a very eerie voice that will, stops you in your track when you hear it. Sure. I mean, I could have been drunk. Who knows? I doubt it. I mean, you hadn't.
Starting point is 01:00:09 But there was definitely evil in that, in that long. Yeah, let me just say this, though. Like, you know, anybody who's been drunk, you don't, you don't get, you don't get goosebumps. No. From the time you were hammered. And I've had, we've had so many experiences with, you know, I don't know what it is about me. But, man, since my childhood, it's always been, I've always seen, not seen, but. I've seen and been around like spirits.
Starting point is 01:00:42 It's almost like they find me. Even as a kid in our house we grew up in. When I was a baby, my mom, my brother was in the bathtub. He's older. My mom was doing her hair in the bathroom next to my brother. And this little baby walked by the room, the door to the bathroom in the hallway,
Starting point is 01:01:03 going to my room. And she thought it was me, so she automatically ran out and then went to my crib to see if it was me. And she said I was in there sleeping. And that house was weird. We didn't have like anything bad, but TV would change, doors would open, cabinets would slam in the middle of the night. We just got used to it. We had nowhere else.
Starting point is 01:01:25 Nothing bad. It's just haunted. We had nowhere else to live. Yeah. Like that was it. So it was like we just, you know, to be honest with you, like I slept with my mom until I was a teenager and I was terrified. Yeah. And my brother was completely different than me.
Starting point is 01:01:39 He wasn't terrified. He lived in the basement. He didn't care. No issues. My friends with the darkness down there. Yeah. I want to get to some of the other, I know you have some good paranormal stories,
Starting point is 01:01:47 but like, you know, you decide not to go through with suicide. When does, what happens, I mean, how does, what happens next in the sense? How do you find your faith?
Starting point is 01:01:58 Yeah. The next morning, I woke up and went to work, got some, one of my really good buddies, stopped me in the hallway helped me go get some help got some help and man I didn't find faith for a while
Starting point is 01:02:12 after that um we'll fast forward to our medical retire moved to the beach um got really into partying one of my really good friends owns a bar there so we were we play this game called lyres dice it's an old part game I play lyrs all time yeah and uh man we just
Starting point is 01:02:30 we'd we play that and we would take a shot before the game during the game Luser pours first shot, take a shot after the game. We'd go through two bottles of Skyblood Orange, Vaca, like it was nothing. And again, alcohol was killing my marriage. And she couldn't keep up, nor does she want to keep up. So ultimately, it was just straight up, hey, like, you either get help or you stop this, or we're going to have to go.
Starting point is 01:02:58 So I started a training company, and I was training local teams and just get her off my back and I was still drinking, but it was worse because then I was secretly drinking in my garage. And then, you know, and once I tore my Achilles tendon, playing basketball, my son, went through that, stopped drinking because they didn't want to get fat, like, sat around because there's, I mean, you turn it, that was a 12, that was a 12-month recovery. Yeah. Like, I couldn't run and do anything until 11 months. And then I got serious about training, and then I got a phone call from my aunt during a training event was like, hey, your dad's dying.
Starting point is 01:03:38 He's rotting away in his room and his house. So I went to school with his probation officer, called his probation officer, set up all this stuff, got him. The probation officer went there. The chief police went there and I was like arrest him. He's got drugs. There was drugs everywhere, paraphernalia. They wouldn't do anything with it.
Starting point is 01:03:55 A real corrupt small town. But the probation officer ended up arresting him on all that. and I gave him the option, either go to jail or go to the hospital. And he went to the hospital and then literally got transferred to Roanoke Hospital. And three days later,
Starting point is 01:04:12 had an open heart surgery for a valve. His valve was so, so bad from shooting heroin that it had vegetation on it. So they had to replace the valve. He had a 10% chance to live. Made a full recovery. I spent, man,
Starting point is 01:04:25 $6,000, cleaning his house, stripping carpet. His house Think about this. He's got a 3,000 square foot house, 3,500, I think. Imagine all the houses I've been in. It's the most disgusting house I've ever been in my life.
Starting point is 01:04:40 Because you were... You're busting drug dealers. The dog had withdrawals from dope and was having diarrhea all over the house. Oh my gosh. It was bad. The dog ended up dying two weeks later from... Like drug withdrawals?
Starting point is 01:04:54 Yeah, drug withdrawals. And so it spent all this money getting my dad help. My cousin showed up, Josh Lombo, you know, love him, showed up, got on his hands and knees, scrubbing things with me. And ultimately, my stepmom still stayed in contact with him and, you know, they ended up lying, getting domestic violence protection order out on me. Once he got out of the hospital, she lied and said that I was laying down the street with a sniper rifle and pointed it at her. and I'm like, guys, I'm, again, it's a little corrupt town with no good, nothing. I'm like, I have video proof that I'm home right now in North Carolina. Like, I have cameras.
Starting point is 01:05:40 I have eight cameras in my house, inside and out. Like, I'm protected, and they still issued it. And I had to pay my dad's wife and write an apology letter to my dad's drug dealer. That was part of the bargain for her to drop the DVPO. And after that, man, it was, I was like, there ain't no God. There ain't nothing. I went down a, you talk about a raging drinking binge, man, I went full sin. And then May 24th, the day I got blown up of 2023.
Starting point is 01:06:20 I went to a parking lot and in Wilmington and roll the windows down and put my head on the steering wheel. and said, God, please don't send me to hell. Please don't send me to hell. Please don't send me to hell. I can't do this anymore. And at that point, I fully surrendered. Give me one second. I fully surrendered to him.
Starting point is 01:06:43 And I went to grab the gun. And when I went to grab the gun, my phone rang that was next to my gun. And I realized, I didn't have him saved at the time, but I didn't realize. I realized at the time it was Kyle, Kyle Morgan, the guy that I trained with now. from Blueberry. He called me up. He's my best friend. And now, and he calls me up.
Starting point is 01:07:03 It's who we do the podcast with and everything. And he calls me up. And he's like, hey, man, sorry I missed you call yesterday. I'm like, man, you're calling at the right time. And he's like, I have an opening for my course this weekend. You wouldn't come take it. So I did. And it gave me a little hope, a little motivation.
Starting point is 01:07:19 Because you're going to kill yourself. Yeah, I was about to kill myself. Yeah. Didn't, you know, I believe at that time I fully surrendered. Yeah. and that's what Jesus was waiting for me to do this whole time. Went for us all, right? Yeah.
Starting point is 01:07:34 Fully surrendered him. And I took the course and at the end of the course, you know, as I'm there, Kyle was like, hey, man, need your help, help instruct him. So I started helping him. And then pretty much after that, started working with blueberrying. And, you know, there's three obvious. There's Kyle me and Stephen. Kyle's a former special missions guy
Starting point is 01:07:56 former law enforcement and then Stevens former Highway Patrol and SWAT guy and he left Highway Patrol to go full-time ministry with his dad and so we're in ministry now you know when we travel to these places like first thing we say is
Starting point is 01:08:12 hey man we're going to talk about Jesus we're going to pray if you don't like it sorry and the last event that we did was full of a down in Texas it was a full of it was a room full of 15 in SWAT dudes full time. And at the end of this,
Starting point is 01:08:29 all these guys were crying, talking about Jesus. That's the question I was going to ask you. Is like, do you feel like, I mean, obviously a lot of military law enforcement get into help people, but it seems like there's a lot of demons that they're attached to the lure
Starting point is 01:08:43 to get into some of these. The thing with, the thing with L.E. is nobody calls us to give us a hug. Nobody calls us, tell us we're doing it. them good. Nobody calls us to tell us,
Starting point is 01:08:56 hey man, I won the lottery today or hey man, my daughter's getting married. You know, people are calling us at their worst moment. Ten hours a day, 12 hours a day, every call is somebody's worst moment. Somebody's raped. Somebody's murdered. Somebody's kids
Starting point is 01:09:11 been abducted. Somebody just got robbed. Some 13-year-old gang members shot four times in the face because he's wearing a 50-cent bandana that isn't the same color as the other kid. Like, when you're in L.E., it's hard. It's hard to say, Jesus, this is all, yeah, because it's, like, violent every day.
Starting point is 01:09:33 It's just darkness. It's dark. It's pure dark. And then you got to go home and smile to your family. Yeah. You got to go home and act like you had a great day. My first call ever was a 12-year-old kid that hung himself. That's horrible, yeah.
Starting point is 01:09:46 And I had to tell the mom. Jeez. Like, you know, suicide is dark, man. I've seen some gnarly suicides. But it seems like you were drawn to it as well. What do you think was in you before you gave your life to Christ? Was there some place? I think I just wanted to help people, man.
Starting point is 01:10:04 Yeah. I don't think I was drawn to the darkness. I've always wanted to protect somebody. I just wanted to be a protector. I just wanted to, I wanted to be the one who showed up that brought the others home. I want to be the guy that people called when things went bad. I want to be the one that has to take that shot. I want to be the one that has to rescue those kids.
Starting point is 01:10:25 I want to be the one that makes a positive impact on somebody's worst day. When do you think that started in you? Man, I don't know. I thought about this question. I don't know. I've just, I've always been like that. I've always wanted to protect my cousins, my brother. I've always wanted to just protect my mom.
Starting point is 01:10:46 And I think a lot of it comes from, too, I think from my childhood. I remember in my early days, early memories of my mom. and dad being together. My dad was really aggressive, terrifying my mom. And I always wanted to protect her, but I couldn't because I was young. And I think in that moment where I saw two or three of those incidents, one in particular, my mom was holding us at the door or bags were packed. We're going to, she said, I'm going to my mom and dads. My dad is standing on the stairwell and he's just punching the wall. And my mom was terrified. And I just wanted to protect her. And, um, And I couldn't.
Starting point is 01:11:24 So now, so after, you know, growing up, I was always into working out and learning survival things. I just wanted to be a protector because of that one incident changed my life. What do you think, you know, having done the military tour been blown up and how to do all, you know, head injury and all the, and then getting out and then going into law enforcement? Like, why do you think guys, I mean, this is really, it's 98% dudes, right? Like, why do they have such a hard time with compartmentalize? I would say compartmentalizing. I mean, I have, you know, you tried to, you thought about it in your life at least twice. And, you know, what do you think that does to you to a person?
Starting point is 01:12:07 Because I know that we have a massive, and this is something that Zach Bell, a good friend of ours, veteran with a sign, has been on the show before he champions all the time is that there's this veteran suicide. You know, it's like one a minute. I think the problem in this community is one, we attack each other. two there's a there's a stigma that being follower of jesus isn't cool we're breaking that stigma yeah i mean i have 142 000 followers on instagram and everything i post is about jesus yeah and i'm going to honor jesus to the day i die now have i always believed in jesus yeah i have but have i walked with jesus no not until recently now i tell you where it really dug deep for me
Starting point is 01:12:50 is I started in the book of John and I watched The Chosen. The Chosen changed my life. The Chosen showed me the expectations of what Jesus wants. It not only showed me the expectations, but it showed me how much he loves you. The scene and the Chosen
Starting point is 01:13:07 where Mary gets drunk and goes back to the tent and can't even look at him and he says, I already forgive you. That's love, man. And there's nobody talking about that in L.E. and in the military. There's nobody preaching about Jesus is love.
Starting point is 01:13:23 Everybody's scared to talk about it. Hey man, if you think you're more bad to me, cool. I don't care. I'm going to talk to you about Jesus. I think that's the biggest problem. I think that's why the military and elite community is so dark.
Starting point is 01:13:38 It's because all Jesus wants is your faith. You got to surrender. You talked about surrendering completely. I think like, you know, I think a lot of people will compartmentalize things like that. Like you said, you go home and then you've got to put on a smile,
Starting point is 01:13:51 but you've seen the darks of the dark, you've seen the worst of the worst, right? Then you've got to flip this switch, but you don't have anywhere to put that, right? One of the greatest things that I've ever heard said was by BB3, Stephen, our third guy, is he said he heard it somewhere. If guys will stop talking to themselves
Starting point is 01:14:09 and start talking to Jesus, that's when you don't have to keep that inside of you anymore. When you talk to yourself, you keep it in your soul. When you speak to Jesus about it, you give it to him. Yeah. You have to carry that. Do you think that a lot of guys, younger guys,
Starting point is 01:14:31 that are kind of drawn towards the military and things are kind of running from a demon? Well, if I do something good, maybe that darker voice will go away. No, I think it's just, you know, I think a lot of guys just... Like a lot of hard, a lot of hard stories. It is.
Starting point is 01:14:47 I think a lot of guys are good. until they join those jobs. I think they're good in the sense if they want to be a protector, they want to protect people, they want to be the one. But once they get to that job, they don't understand
Starting point is 01:15:01 the true darkness that comes with that. Like you, man, a part of my soul, every time I went to one of those just, I went to a call one time where it was a murder-suicide, wife was leaving him. He kicked in the apartment door
Starting point is 01:15:19 killed her, killed his kid, put him on a couch, set next to him, put a shotgun in between his legs, and blew his head off, and he set it up as a family portrait. Jeez. So sick, man. It's evil, bro, yeah. So when you start taking those calls, it's really hard to find the good.
Starting point is 01:15:40 Do a lot of those guys look for answers after they go to those calls? I think they do, but I think they're scared to ask the questions for the answer. what's like total darkness um like how do you see it now do you see it as as more than just human evil like there's hierarchy satan's there ah yeah yeah for sure i think i think the moment that you and again if i'm not bashing people who drink i'm just saying if you got issues don't drink i think the issue with veteran suicide and law enforcement suicide you know 183 law enforcement officers took their life um 2023 and um then you compare that to 131 who died in a line of duty so 183 killed themselves 131 died in a line of duty while we having more that kill themselves
Starting point is 01:16:33 that in a line duty deaths it's because of this it's because we see things and we think that if we speak it into existence of seeking help that it's a weakness yeah so by holding in the dark things and then you allow yourself to get drunk. Drugness allows the devil to control you and tell you that suicide is the answer. You're worthless, you're this, you're that. And I think a lot of these issues come from people getting drunk and allowing the devil to take over.
Starting point is 01:17:09 I think when you drink and you get drunk, I think you open a portal that allows the devil to enter and communicate with you. They're called spirits, right? Yeah. I mean, liquor is called spirits, it was interesting. I really believe that if we could stop these veterans and stuff that are having hard times. I mean, if you go back and you look, I guarantee you that 80% of the people that take their lives are intoxicated. Drinking.
Starting point is 01:17:35 Drinking. Both times, for me, it was alcohol. When you say, like, you've had spiritual experiences or spirits, you've been counter-spiriture, you're sort of your intoxicated. entire life. Is that perspective look different now on the other side of surrendering to Jesus? Yeah, I'm not scared. Yeah. Because if you have Jesus in your heart, the devil's too scared to mess with you. Yeah, the Holy Spirit. Yeah. Do you believe there's the same spirit kind of falling in your whole life? And then you finally had to have a showdown with it? I don't know. That's a great question. I feel like I've always been around some sort of spirit.
Starting point is 01:18:19 And, but since I've... Because you're like a cat. Just keep coming back. So since I've fully surrendered, I haven't had any issues with this. Like, we stayed at this house in Alaska. We went out and trained in Haines, Alaska. And this house that we stayed in was beautiful. It was like from 1800s.
Starting point is 01:18:42 And I'll tell you how bad spirits and stuff freaked me out. The first thing I did when I went to that room is I took out the rocking chair. And I took out the mirrors. And I put them in the other room. Because I'm like, I'm not waking up to a rocking chair rocking. And I'm not raking up to a figure in the mirror. I'm like, so I've always like, even like multiple people just, I've just had experiences. And I think it's, I think when you really have Jesus in your heart and it's a part of your daily life.
Starting point is 01:19:12 Yeah. I think it, I think the devil knows that he doesn't have a chance. He goes after the ones who are, who, who, are lost. He goes after the one sheet that left the 99 and he tries to get to them first before Jesus, but people need to understand that Jesus does not stop looking for you. What about I do? Can I read something to y'all? Yeah. Yeah, I can hand me on my phone. This is something that I wrote. And this is something that, you know, any L.E. guys or military guys that are listening to this or anybody who feels lost, I wrote to us one night. It says the love
Starting point is 01:19:47 that leaves the 99. Before Jesus says the words in Luke 157, he tells a story that surprises us. A shepherd has 100 sheep and one goes missing. Most people would say, oh well, it's just one. I have the 99, but not this shepherd. He doesn't stay put, he doesn't give up. He leaves the 99 in the field and goes after the one that's lost. He climbs heels, searches through dark places, pushes through thorny bushes until he finds it. That's the kind of love Jesus is showing us. It's not cold, it's not distance, not about rules, but close, fierce, and determined. Maybe you feel like that one sheet. Maybe you've one or too far or two of shame to come back.
Starting point is 01:20:25 But listen, God's not waiting for you to fix yourself. He's already coming for you. He sees what others don't, and he knows what your heart's missing from his family. He doesn't count the crowd. He counts hearts, and he counts yours. God's love isn't just for the world in general. It's for you personally, fully and completely. That's the love that leaves the 99, and it's.
Starting point is 01:20:50 coming for you. I think if we can preach things like that to the L.E. military community, I don't think Satan would have a chance. Yeah. I don't think he would have a chance. I don't think him. I don't think his team of demons. I don't, I think, I think Satan is a coward. Yeah. When it comes to, if you have Jesus in your soul and God, he is a coward. He is scared. It's incredible. And your story is incredible. I think sometimes, you know, Luke and I have like sort of a micro view into someone's life or some bizarre story, some encounter, something weird, but it's like your story makes me think that there's this battle for everyone's life, of all the crazy ways you could have died, you could have gone, and you stay alive.
Starting point is 01:21:36 You know, God keeps like, at some point, this whole story is going to redeem itself and it's going to win a lot of people over because you're, because you went through hell and back again to get where you are. But I think the supernatural part is just maybe angels keeping you alive at that moment. You're like, I'm ready to go or I'm done. And there's just this thing that keeps you going. And I think suicide when it comes down to it, it's a very supernatural thing. It's what the devil wants the most is to kill people before they have a chance to have their story turn around. Or be redeemed. Yeah. I think that's a beautiful part about your story. And sometimes we just look for the weird and the, you know, five minutes of work.
Starting point is 01:22:15 weird, but it's like a whole lifetime of a supernatural dog fight to keep you going. I think the devil gets so angry because when one person repents and says, I'm sorry, God, I'm here, I'm here for you. The whole heavens cheers. They play music. They're excited. And the devil is, he knows that he has no power over that person anymore. And I think what I hear in your story, what I think is profound is that like God has a God of purpose. Yeah. Right? And when you reach a point where you want to take your own life, you want to end that,
Starting point is 01:22:50 it's because you, you've convinced yourself that you have no purpose. Yeah. And I think the truth of the, that Jesus is trying to say is that you, not only have you have a purpose, but I have, I have plans. I have, I have dreams for, for all of us, right? And I think that's the big lie is that not only is the enemy in the darkness saying you're worthless and your failure and you should just end this all because you have purpose but Jesus saying not on that now you're worth everything I think the biggest thing is um
Starting point is 01:23:18 is the difference in me now is is just having faith and watching the chosen because just you know when he asks his disciples have you have no faith they've seen him do all these things and I think the biggest scene for me that was like is when um I forgot the the Roman soldier comes in He's like, you don't need to come to my house. I know you can do it from here. And Jesus was just so moved by that dude's faith. And that's the journey I'm on now is I have faith that he can do anything. And it's on his timing, not mine.
Starting point is 01:24:05 Yeah. I love that. Yeah. And you have this epic haunted house story, I suppose. On a school. On a school. But then I really want to tell you about the. All right.
Starting point is 01:24:15 Let's get. Let's get to this. The yellow house. Because that, this one I really wanted to show you because I have pictures, man. And so we'll start off with this. We just graduated high school. This is Pommel Junior High. It was around for 1930s to, right when the county started consolidating schools up until
Starting point is 01:24:37 like 2000. My dad worked there, my whole childhood, right? So from 89 to when it shut down in 99. So as kids, he would stay there. So if you look up, right, start at the middle door and go straight up and then go, you have the little half window, full window. So right under high, like right under the H&H, that was my dad's room. Right?
Starting point is 01:25:04 So I think it was room 307. We would run that whole school all the time. So tail has it that in 1930. A little girl, she was 12 years old, 11 or 12, was killed in that school when it first opened. And it wasn't put out in the paper because they just built this brand new school. They want to make a big deal out of it, whatever.
Starting point is 01:25:31 Then there was, legend has it, that in 1991 on Halloween, of course. The janitor was shoving coal into the furnace and some kids jumped out and scared him. And he had a heart attack. and those kids panicked and they put him in the furnace
Starting point is 01:25:48 because they didn't want to get they wouldn't go to jail. So that's where we start getting to these, now these two images, right? So as a kid, around 93, 94, 95, my dad would stay late
Starting point is 01:26:02 in grade papers. Well, what would we do? We'd go to the gym, shoot me and my brother go to the gym, shoot basketball. Remember those things that you, I was hoping you guys had one in here, that you used to sit on
Starting point is 01:26:12 in gym class on your knees and you would roll yourself. Rollerboards. Yeah. So we'd take those in the hallway, man. But we would always hear this man whistling. And you would hear like a mop bucket being pushed. And then you would hear like this little girl giggling.
Starting point is 01:26:32 And we just thought maybe our minds are taking over. Right. We're just kids. And we'd see it hear it all the time. Janelle's fast forward to the summer of 2008. The school had been shut down for eight years. as people would break into it. So the window at the bottom floor
Starting point is 01:26:48 right on the back of that staircase. Yep, right there. That window in the corner. That was the arts and craft room. That's the room that these pictures ran. Telling you right now. I'm telling you. Telling you.
Starting point is 01:27:01 Stuff's falling on. Stuff's falling, dude. Do we say a prayer? Come on, Jesus. But the Cubs Scouts and the Boy Scouts still use that bottom floor right there. They still used it for a little bit.
Starting point is 01:27:16 The gym was still an active gym at this time, but all the other doors were locked to the school. And so we broke into it. I can say that. That's one does. Because that would be a felony, and we're past a statute of limitations, so they can't do anything.
Starting point is 01:27:36 A little B&E, now, wait, all right. A little B&E action. And with a group of friends, there was about six, about seven of us. So we go up to the second floor and the two girls that we were with, they were kind of hippie-ish into like the witchcraft thing. So they brought a Ouija board.
Starting point is 01:28:02 That idea. That idea. Yeah. They put this Ouija board down. They put this candle down. And they're sitting there and, you know, the girl's name was Ashen. she was messing with it, asking it questions. And I was like, well, ask it if it remembers me.
Starting point is 01:28:19 I don't know if she's doing it or not, right? So she's messing with it. And this is yes. And I'm like, all right, let me ask a question that nobody in this group knows. I'm like, okay, well, if you know me, you must know me because of my dad. And I was like, what room number was my dad's room? And they had no idea. And it was, that thing went to 307.
Starting point is 01:28:40 I'm like I'm like looking at my cousin Lombo I'm like Did y'all did you tell her Like did you tell him the story behind all he's like No dude I promise So she starts She starts messing with it
Starting point is 01:28:54 Right And this thing says goes to L Goes to O Goes back to O Goes to K Spells out look We're like what And we look over
Starting point is 01:29:05 And about from here to that middle camera Was a little girl set in cross leg hands on her cheeks like this she was wearing she had like white undergarments she had a blue dress on right and she had
Starting point is 01:29:21 a blue bow and she had white leggings with black shoes on everybody gets up takes off running Ouija board gets knocked over Pandel gets knocked over everybody takes off running I take off running
Starting point is 01:29:35 I'm like slowest man dies right I'm like, I'm out. I'm saving. I'm saving myself. I'm getting out of here. So we all went outside and everybody's crying.
Starting point is 01:29:47 Everybody's freaking out. But then people are like, oh, my cell phone, my purse, my bag. I'm like, well, we can't, what are we going to call the police and ask to go back in? Is the candle catching the board on fire? Or we can burn in the building down. So me and my cousin's like, all right, we'll go back in and check it out. Everybody else stays, everybody else stay here.
Starting point is 01:30:07 So we go back into the school. And man, we are like, because we're moving an inch at a time, right? Back to back, no flashlight. He's a bigger dude, too. So we make it up to the second floor. And no lie, man. Ouija board was right back where it was at when we left.
Starting point is 01:30:29 Candle was upright. I watched that candle fall. I watched the candle fall. I watched the wax hit the floor. I watched it. I saw it. But everything was upright and in position as if it was perfect. So we grabbed the Ouija board.
Starting point is 01:30:45 We blow the candle out. We get everybody's stuff. And my cousin's like, you know, we used to love ghost hunting, man. We used to love it. Yeah. He's like, oh, dude, let's pull the app out on the phone. I had a first Gen 1 iPhone. And in the iPhone, well, it might have been, no, yeah, yeah.
Starting point is 01:31:03 I think that's when it came out. It might have been the summer of 09. but the Gen 1 iPhone came out and you know you could get these apps like like the paper toss and they had this one that was like Ghostfinder app and it was a it was a radar on like a Navy ship and it would do the whole like ding ding right and it would show you spirits around you it would be a red for demonic yellow for like a neutral and then a green for a good spirit but you could also communicate with it through the app and the apps and the apps would you would say something and then the app would give you one word back.
Starting point is 01:31:39 Sounds terrifying. So we go to this art. Again, bad idea. Bad idea. So we go to this arts and craft room after this. Now we're like, we're full-fledged straight up, ghost hunting right now. After we saw this, we're like, oh, this is our time. This is our time. So we're sitting in this arts and craft room. We're sitting just out a table, a normal square table. He's sitting across from me. We got the app and he's like, all right, let's, we're waiting. We're like, oh, I'm holding the Ouija board, right? Bad idea. Right.
Starting point is 01:32:09 Right. Yeah. I'm like, hey, if there's any spirits here, please make yourself known. This thing starts ticking. And it shows us too green at first. And we're like, oh, okay, cool. This is good spirits. We're talking to it.
Starting point is 01:32:26 It goes around a couple more times and then both of them turn to red. We're like, well, if you're an evil spirit, if you're a spirit in here at all, like, prove to us. or this app is stupid and you guys aren't even really here. And this is waste of our time. And my cousin is messing with some yarn because it's an arts and craft room for Boy Scouts. And he's twirling in his fingers. And this app says, string.
Starting point is 01:32:50 I'm like, my cousin goes, all right, I'm out. I'm done. He goes, best way is through the cafeteria. We'll go out the big windows. Food. We're like, oh, no. So I'm like, all right, I'm out. So I see in the corner where the dot is.
Starting point is 01:33:09 I took my phone and I went, click, and I had one on top on me, started turning around and I just clicked it. So that's the one in the corner. That shadowy figure is who I believe is the janitor. So you can see kind of the arm resting on the table as if he's leaning on the table, like kind of setting on. It's so creepy, dude.
Starting point is 01:33:29 I believe that's the janitor. and if you go to the other picture behind me so the bottom left of this that's my head the thing directly in the middle of this screen I believe is that little girl you can kind of see off to the left
Starting point is 01:33:47 of her head where that looks like hair so I didn't see these pictures until the next day so very blurry so it's on brand yeah very blurry but there's no one behind you in this picture right I know. There's only two people here, me and my cousin.
Starting point is 01:34:02 And my cousin is setting directly across from me the opposite way at the table. So we get up and we run out. We get out to the main parking lot. Pull up the picture of the school for me, please. So we're out in the parking lot. And as I'm leaving, me and my cousin look around. We're looking at the school. And there's a, we're going to get chills.
Starting point is 01:34:24 There's a dark figure standing in my dad's classroom, staring at us outside the window. I've never been back in that school. School's actually torn down now. It's gone. But I never went back inside that school. Pineville Junior High School. Jeez. So the next morning I wake up,
Starting point is 01:34:43 and I'm like, man, I got something's wrong with my neck. It's kind of bubbly. I'm like, man, my mom looks at it. It's a burn. I believe that the burn is either that little girl, my neck or that was just her being close to me and I got a burn down my neckline like that. Yeah, there's a picture if you're listening. There's a picture of your neck with burn marks on across the, almost across the entire back of your neck. Yeah. So now I have a cross tattooed
Starting point is 01:35:12 in that same spot. Junior high was bad, but that's real bad. Yeah, that's, uh, so moral the story, dude, don't bring any Ouija boards into haunted school. So to confirm what we saw, there was only one other person that's ever actually saw the little girl. And my dad said, go speak to Charlie Keaton. Charlie Keaton was a teacher there. And he told everybody that he saw this little girl walk past his room one night when he was grade in papers late. He's the only person that's ever saw anything in this school.
Starting point is 01:35:43 So I go to Charlie and I say, hey, Mr. Keaton, can you describe that little girl? And he described her exactly what I saw. And he goes, he goes, did you? He goes, did you see her? I said, yeah, we took a Ouija board in there and you saw her. That's when he started telling me like, yeah, this little girl was actually, they believe was raped. Because he started doing research on it. And she was actually stuffed in a closet, but then they found her based on the odor.
Starting point is 01:36:16 But they never proved who did it. So, I mean, because again, there's no, like, forensics back then. Right. Yeah. Or, yeah. The witnesses or nothings. It's like 1932. too. So that's, that school terrifies me, man. Well, it's gone now, right?
Starting point is 01:36:33 Yeah. It's gone. I won't even go back to where it's even torn down. And then I'll tell you a story later on in life. Me and her are looking for houses. We've been married a year and a half. We're in Fayetteville looking for houses. We got, we're looking at all these rental houses. We're trying to get out at an apartment complex. and I was in the process of being hired at the Fable Police Department. So we're looking at houses. We've got like six rental keys.
Starting point is 01:37:03 We didn't like any of them. So we drive by this one house that just has a standard four rent sign in the front of it. It's this two-story, slimmer, bright yellow house. We're like, ah, it's ugly, but we're desperate. Right? So something drew us to it. So we pull in. So I go up, it's got the realtor lock on it, pull the hand,
Starting point is 01:37:24 to push it. It's locked. So I'm looking through the windows. We're talking mid-July. We're talking North Carolina, 80% humidity. Swell, terrain. 100% temperatures. It is hot. So I'm like, she's like, can you see inside of it?
Starting point is 01:37:40 I'm like, yeah, I can only see through this. I was like, come up here, I'll lift you up. So she comes walking up the steps. I grab her, I'll lift her up. She's not touching the door. I'm not touching the door. The door goes, ah. I'm like, that's weird. I just pulled the handle.
Starting point is 01:37:55 It's locked. I just try to get it open. Nothing. Walk in. Dude, it feels like it's 60 degrees in this house. I'm like, man,
Starting point is 01:38:05 the AC bill here has got to be expensive. They got this thing on cold. It's freezing in here. I mean, literally it was super cold. We're like walking around and the whole time, man,
Starting point is 01:38:17 feel like something's on top of, like holding on to your back. I'm like, man, we're talking about it. We're like, man, this house feels weird.
Starting point is 01:38:25 I don't know about this. She's like, well, let me just, let me just see the upstairs. Let's just see what the upstairs looks like. We go to go to upstairs. She takes about three to four steps and stops and goes, and I just grab her.
Starting point is 01:38:45 I just grab her. I didn't ask, I didn't say anything. I grabbed her by the waist, picked her up and ran outside, shut the door, got in the car. I was like, what was that? She goes, Blake. something stopped me physically from going upstairs and all I saw was red like blood.
Starting point is 01:39:05 I was like, what? She's like, yeah, something stopped me from going upstairs. So I became a cop, right? Obviously, the first thing I did in my database is I went, I looked up the house. Four rent, not haunted. That's probably what's something to sign, right? And there was a lot of domestics in that house. nothing that showed like a murder
Starting point is 01:39:28 but doesn't mean that it didn't happen because a lot of calls will come out as a domestic and then end up being a homicide. But a lot of the husband, drunk, beating the wife, beating the kids. So what I believed happened is there was actually a homicide in that house. And I think something stopped her from, you know,
Starting point is 01:39:49 her dad took his life when she was six and we believed that maybe her dad or her grandfather stopped her from going upstairs to something evil. Pretty gnarly. That was gnarly, bro. That's wild.
Starting point is 01:40:03 Don't rent a house in Fayetteville. Yeah, don't rent a house in Fayetteville. Fayville for renthouses are wild, man. Well, there seems to be some sort of lingering spirit, and we talk about that a lot, and I think some of these circles, people don't like those stories because they sort of have to expand their understanding
Starting point is 01:40:18 of the afterlife and other things, but... I don't know if it's because I've just been open to it as a kid. Yeah. Like I believe that they're there. I've experienced it at a younger age. Yeah. I don't know if I've, and again, I didn't really have the Holy Spirit inside of me in those
Starting point is 01:40:34 moments. And I felt like it was a opportunity, maybe a portal for these demons to show themselves to me, attack me mentally, physically. Yeah. You know, I think a lot of that was self-doing by not having the Holy Spirit in my heart. and I believe in them. You know, I believe in a lot of weird things. I believe in aliens.
Starting point is 01:41:00 That's not weird for our show. Yeah, I mean, I saw a UFO. I've seen one. Okay. With my dad, stopped out of train in Pima, West Virginia. Me and my dad and my brother, we were in a, is one-seer pickup truck. I'm in the middle. My brother's over here.
Starting point is 01:41:15 My dad's driving. We're stopped at a train in front of the house. A car in front of us, us, and a car behind us, we look up. up and there is like, man, I don't know, 70 yards above us. There is this massive circle with green lights, bright green lights. And before we blinked, that thing was gone. Wow. The people got out the car in front of us and behind us and asked us if we saw the same thing.
Starting point is 01:41:44 We said yes. My dad looked at me and my brother and said, shut up. Don't talk about it. We're going home. We go home. What year was this? man this is i was probably eight so you're looking at 97 yeah so my dad goes home my brother was a big drawer so he had the the big white posters yeah he gives each of us a poster in himself
Starting point is 01:42:06 jr going that room like going that room i'm going in this room draw what you saw to detail we put them all together they were all the exact same thing so that's only how big you think that thing was that thing was huge man that thing was huge i mean i mean I mean, as a kid, it looked like some freaking thing off Star Wars. That big. But it was huge. And it was gone. Did it have like one piece of metal?
Starting point is 01:42:33 Yeah, it was just one big piece, one big circle. Like a disc? Yeah. And it was gone so fast that you could see the green trail. I'll never forget that. People can, there are people out there who don't believe it. It caught me crazy. I could really care less.
Starting point is 01:42:48 Were they actually lights or were they? I don't know. I don't know. It was bright green. Interesting. It was bright green. Quite the blurry life, Blake Cook. And it was gnarly, man.
Starting point is 01:42:59 As a kid. Like bigger than a car? You're talking like football field big. I'm talking 75 yards by 75 yards. So it's a big. I mean, it was huge. It was over top of us about maybe 75 to 100 yards up. And I just remember looking at it.
Starting point is 01:43:16 And it was so bright that you had to squint your eyes. And it was 10 o'clock in night. We just got food from Pinnacle Drive-in. Okay. Shout out Pinnacle Drive. How many lights? Like all around it? Yeah.
Starting point is 01:43:27 It was just a bright green. And then you could see that it was a dish shape. And then before you did anything, it was gone. Yeah. Like it was a blink, like fast as a blink, and it was a green trail. And my dad was like, nobody talk about it. Pinnacle driving's still going on? Is that still happening?
Starting point is 01:43:44 Yeah, dude. All right. Yeah. Shout out. Shout out. So the people get out of the- That's hot dogs in the world. The people get out of the car in front of you.
Starting point is 01:43:51 And they asked us, what, did y'all see that? And we said, yeah. You're at a train stop. We're at a train. No, yeah. There was a train going by. Oh, okay. And it's just loud.
Starting point is 01:43:59 You can't hear anything. Yeah. And my dad is talking to these other people. They're saying that they heard, that they saw it. They described the same thing. And it was like, holy cow. Like, this is gnarly. Yeah.
Starting point is 01:44:12 To see that. Like, you know, I believe in it. I believe that our government has. You get the blurry grab bag at the end here. The lights is always. fascinating to me why they have lights on these. It wasn't like I saw individual bulbs. It was just, it was really green.
Starting point is 01:44:28 It was almost like maybe that's the choice of light for them. Maybe they had them turned on to see what's going on. What's going on below? No, lights is, I don't know. It's very common, you know, and it's sort of just advanced tech with like these old, just this old school, like lighting around it. I mean, and I think that part of the, the lighting part of it kind of makes people feel like they can't believe it because they're like,
Starting point is 01:44:55 well, I would an advanced species have these little lights, you know, on their craft, but they do. I'll never be able to explain it. It doesn't matter how much ammo I save up and whatever gun I buy. We're never going to be able to defend ourselves from aliens. They have laser guns. If I can get my hand on one of their laser guns, game over for them. Just like revert back to Call of Duty. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I think the whole thing with aliens and on our shows, it's like the spiritual and the physical kind of come together. I think so, yeah.
Starting point is 01:45:23 And that's the hardest part about it because as Christians, we sort of have trained ourselves sort of subconsciously that spirits are just floating out there. Heaven is like this see-through place. It's not actually a tangible society, empire, whatever word do you want to use. But then we see these little like,
Starting point is 01:45:41 you know, because you obviously see like a ghost in an old junior high. That's more like a spirit. Yeah. Then you see a craft and go, okay, there's some kind of assembly lines somewhere built these things. Was it, is it, is it,
Starting point is 01:45:58 was it a government aircraft? I don't know. I just know that it was, it was a massive disc shape with the brightest lights I've ever seen and it was gone. I've seen a lot of military. Look at this old school train
Starting point is 01:46:16 that they still use down here. Yeah. It's like, guys in a one-seater truck. They're going to do. A bunch of peasants. Yeah, right. Well, Blake. Dude,
Starting point is 01:46:24 thanks, man. Thanks, man. It's crazy. Do you talk to our folks, because I know you've, you've a podcast, you mentioned that, and also you're doing training
Starting point is 01:46:33 and actually try to pitch you on, let me ride along and do some training with you at some point. Yeah, man, we love to have you guys out at some training. Oh, that's so fun. Yeah, we train private citizens in L.E. An active shooter response and... What's the company?
Starting point is 01:46:46 BlueBerry and Solutions. Okay. BlueBelU Bering Solutions. and it's just we're able to train people, giving them the confidence and the skill. We implement tactics of hostage rescue and put them into active shooter response. And really, it's to build confidence in those
Starting point is 01:47:03 to be the one to bring the others home. That's the biggest thing. And we do it by implementing our faith. I love that. That's what you're saying. Because at the end of the day, you can be a protector. You can go and, you can go.
Starting point is 01:47:17 and have the skill set all day long, but if, but if, but if, but if you're not doing the same training with your faith in Jesus, then who's gonna save you? Yeah, gotta break out spiritual sweat too. Yeah.
Starting point is 01:47:32 And, uh, we do a fellowship every Friday night, 8.30 Eastern on our Patreon. Um, you know, there's two tiers. There's a $5 tier and then there's a $20 tier, $5 tier allows you to do the fellowship. We're consistent with it every Friday night. It's awesome.
Starting point is 01:47:47 We're up to like, 45 people now. Let's go. We alternate between me, Stephen and Kyle, on who leads it. I lead it this Friday night, so I'm pretty stoked.
Starting point is 01:47:59 It's my birthday, so I get to lead it. Well, happy birthday in advance. Yeah, appreciate that. And what's really cool is, again,
Starting point is 01:48:05 we have our own podcast called the Black and Blue podcast, and, you know, it's a way for us to express ourselves outside of the tactical community. We get to talk about
Starting point is 01:48:14 just daily lives and daily struggles and our faith, the mental health and when we goof off and it's a way for people to, because everybody's always, you know, and they see our pictures online, they see pictures like this and they think that's our full lifestyle. That's, you know, work is no longer who I am. You know, I'm a, I'm a family man, I'm a husband, I'm a father, I'm a son, I'm a, I'm a Christian, and I'm a trainer last. And that's what we want people to see is, is, is you got to find an outlet and our outlet is
Starting point is 01:48:45 our faith. That's awesome. That's such a powerful testimony, Blake. I think like, I mean, our testimony is a story that God's given us, right? And God is in the business of redemption. And I think that's such a powerful story. The things you went through, and we've talked about this
Starting point is 01:49:01 just you and I before as well. I think it's, that's your weapon, right? And you're using that, which is really cool, is that you come from a weapon, a place where you were, you had weapons of war and you were protector, but God's giving you the weapon of your testimony. And you're using, using that for the kingdom. People say it all the time. Hey man, you're you're writing your story. I'll correct them. I'm not writing nothing. I'm a character in the story and the author is Jesus.
Starting point is 01:49:27 Well, I think, you know, you started helping citizens and people and now you're helping out the people that are helping out the people. Yeah. And so I think that's cool. That's always been your desire since the beginnings to help people, but it's like you needed someone to kind of reach down in your career and say, don't do that, you know? There's a better, there's a better, there's a better way. And I think that's cool because I think a lot of times people retire and get the heck out of there, move to some cabin and out in the middle of nowhere and be like, I don't want to be around people, I don't want to talk to people, but to be able to give it back to people is awesome.
Starting point is 01:49:57 And what's the website they can find you at? So you can find us at blueberry.com, Blake Cook Actual on Instagram. All right. Just started a photography page for landscape photography, so appreciate the support on that. Okay. It's a broken mask. So I really love, that's my outlet man, truly is capturing moments that people wouldn't even know that existed and turning them into something that is healing. Love that idea.
Starting point is 01:50:25 Yeah, so it's awesome. Thanks, bro. Thanks for being here, man. If you guys would allow, I'd like to close us out in a prayer. Let's do it. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely.
Starting point is 01:50:35 You're having me, Father God. Thank you, Lord for allowing me to be here. Thank you, Jesus for my brothers to my right. Thank you, Lord, for creating this platform. allowing us to give you the honor and the glory and the love. Thank you for your son Jesus. Thank you for his sacrifice. Thank you for his willingness to forgive us for our sins and understand that we're human and continue to love us as long as we just give him our faith.
Starting point is 01:51:02 Lord, I ask that you continue to bless this podcast. I ask you continue to bless those who need to hear the message. God asks that this message just gets to one person and helps them out. and just continue to bless those, Lord, who don't know you yet, but want to know you. God, please, Jesus, don't ever stop running after the one. The 99 will be okay, but the one needs you. Thank you for your love and your glory and your son, and we do this in his name. Amen.
Starting point is 01:51:33 Thanks, bro. Yeah. Thanks.

There aren't comments yet for this episode. Click on any sentence in the transcript to leave a comment.