Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 2882: Hormones, Peptides & Body Transformation with Phil Vella CEO of Vita Bella Health

Episode Date: June 18, 2026

In this episode Phil Vella, founder of Vita Bella, returns to break down the wild west of the gray market peptide industry. He shares new data showing 70 percent of research peptides now fail purity and contamination testing, why so many random people are running peptide side hustles out of their garages, and the real risks of injection site infections and improperly dosed products. They cover why hormone optimization should always come before peptides, the most popular peptides Vita Bella prescribes, the science behind PDE5 inhibitors for both performance and longevity, and the regulatory battle between big pharma and compounding pharmacies over GLP medications. Phil also opens up about a brutal stretch of his life that included losing his father, a double spinal fusion injury, and nine people from his childhood neighborhood dying by suicide within about a year, and how that period reshaped his understanding of money, purpose, and fatherhood. Vita Bella / MP Hormones: https://mphormones.com Code: MINDPUMP365 for a free 10 minute consultation plus raffle entry. Three free memberships and ten free essential labs will be given away this month. Raffle entry: https://calendly.com/vb-consultations/complimentary-consults?month=2026-05 SPONSORS Troscriptions: https://troscriptions.com/MINDPUMP Code: MINDPUMP for 10% off your first order. Medical grade supplements including methylene blue and Calm. MAPS Anabolic Relaunch: https://mapsanabolic.com Code: ANABOLIC for 50% off through the end of the month. Includes updated female blueprints, updated FAQ and phase overview videos, masterclass videos on the barbell squat, bench press, overhead press, barbell good morning and behind the neck press, and three days of live coaching with one of the Mind Pump coaches. LINKS Mind Pump Store: https://mindpumpstore.com Maps Fitness Products: https://mapsfitnessproducts.com Instagram: @mindpumpmedia 0:00 - Intro 3:07 - Phil Vella returns to talk peptide industry quality and regulation 5:04 - 70 percent of research peptides now fail purity testing 7:26 - Everyday people running peptide side hustles out of their homes 10:39 - Contamination, infection, and dosing risks from research peptides 13:12 - The difference between FDA regulated compounding pharmacies and the gray market 16:23 - Why hormones must be dialed in before starting peptides 19:12 - Testosterone for women and the most prescribed hormones at Vita Bella 22:04 - Recent changes to peptide regulation and the FDA review process 33:06 - Blood Pump and PDE5 inhibitors for performance, pumps, and longevity 38:22 - The Glow and Clo peptide stacks for recovery and skin health 43:15 - Metformin and glutathione as part of a longevity stack 51:11 - Phil's double spinal fusion injury and recovery 52:46 - Losing his father and nine people from his neighborhood to suicide in one year 58:11 - Moving to Bali and rebuilding his sense of purpose 1:00:38 - The Bell Curve of Happiness and why money stops buying happiness 1:09:04 - The membership model behind Vita Bella and future plans for the company

If you want to pump your body and expand your mind, there's only one place to go. Mind Pump. Mind Pump with your hosts. Sal DeStefano, Adam Schaefer, and Justin Andrews. You just found the most downloaded fitness, health, and entertainment podcast. This is Mind Pump. Today's episode, we have an industry insider into the peptide and hormone industry, Phil Vela. And he breaks it down, you guys.

Listen, this industry is crazy. there's the above regulation side and the below regulation side, the gray market side, and we have the data, we have the tests, and it's not good, you guys, it's crazy. Phil breaks it down and tells us more in today's episode. So if you're interested in hormone therapy and peptide therapy, you're not going to want to miss this episode. By the way, if you go to mp hormones.com, we have medical professionals there that'll talk with you. You get a free 10-minute consultation, and you can ask them questions. Is hormone therapy right for me?

What about peptides? Does this peptide work better than that peptide? They'll be able to help you out. And if you decide to work with them, well, now you're working with medical professionals. And if they prescribe you peptides, it's through FDA-regulated compound pharmacies. By the way, if you go to nphorhormones.com and use the code, Mind Pump, 365, you'll get the 10-minute consultation. Plus, you'll get a raffle entry.

three people this month are going to get a free membership there with our sponsor and 10 will get free essential labs that'll be given away. So if you're thinking, look, is hormone therapy right for me and maybe I want some peptides? I want to take things to a next level. Go to mphormons.com. Now, this episode is brought to you by our sponsor, Troscriptions. Now, troscriptions provides medical grade supplements.

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I'm talking right now, hit pause, head on over to mindpump store.com. That's it. Enjoy the rest of the show. Phil, welcome back to the show, man. Thanks for having me. Last time you were on. We were dating. Yeah, we were talking.

We weren't in a relationship yet. About just the peptide space, a little bit of how Viala Bella operates. And we were so impressed. We are now partners. We work with you. And now we've been working with you long enough to we're hearing reviews and the people just comment positively on the service.

Just the service and the quickness of delivery. I had an experience with you guys. I got on the phone with the medical professional. They set my order up. And my stuff was at my house in two days. Yeah. In California. Yeah.

Which is great. So you guys are doing a phenomenal job. Don't spread that rumor too fast. That's three and four days. But, no, it's been great. Like the MP hormone forum, And the feedback that we get, mind pump hormone for them, sorry, the feedback that we've gotten from you guys and your patients has been absolutely incredible, like what they've came back and

told us. And it's also been great feedback even when it's not incredible, right? Every little slip up allows us to improve and I actually get excited when we get it wrong because it just gives us an opportunity to fix it and get better. If we don't know things are broken, we can't fix them. Well, great job. Off air, we were talking about these. studies that are coming out on these kind of because the gray market for peptides is huge.

These are, they're labeled as research chemicals. And a lot of people are going in that direction for their GLP or for other peptides. And this is a completely different category of, I guess you would call it regulation or non-regulation. So you can go online, buy it, you don't need a doctor, whatever. And you were communicating to us some data, and I looked it up and I confirmed it. Let's talk about that a little bit. What they're finding in what these people are injecting into their bodies.

Yeah. So when we came on in February or I think it was January, there was a great report in New York Post. 40% of the research peptides didn't pass the tests when they were sent in. 40%. 40%. Last month, 70%. It's gotten worse. It's gotten worse over time.

Why has it gotten worse? Because your hairdresser. Shear volume of people doing it. It's every person selling research peptides. They don't know. where they're coming from. They're labeling them themselves. You can't even figure out which bottle you've got, right? They're sitting at home, sitting in their garage, labeling peptides. And even the bigger companies, the biggest research, this is crazy statistic, but it'll make

sense to those deep in business, is the research peptide space, the people who were getting the best deals at one time had to find new suppliers. Why? Because everyone else came online and was offering those companies, those manufacturers, more money. So if you were getting your peptides at X price, they got so much more volume, you became insignificant. The OGs, like a lot of the OG players that we've seen in this space,

super OGs that have been around for five, 10 years in the research before it was cool, right? They had to find new suppliers because they couldn't deal with their current suppliers. They lost their price parodies, they lost the level of importance because so many new players came online. No loyalty.

No loyalty. How easy is it for someone to go online and find a quote unquote supplier? Bro, super easy. It's so easy that, and I was talking to him off air, that this has been happening to me where I'm at, you know, family gatherings, barbecues of friends. And these are car dealers, real estate agents, hairdressers, not a fitness fanatic people.

And the conversations that I'm having on these people, and it's them starting it, not me. I'm not talking, I'm not running around talking about peptides. They're telling me about their peptide business that they have started. And it's literally buying from China at these like ridiculously low prices.

Buy in bulk or something. Yeah, buy in bulk, non-labeled bottles get shipped over to them, them wrapping their brand that they started, and then pedaling them to all their family friends and they're, you know, 10xing the price. And they're making thousands of dollars on the side, hustling all this.

And the big, you know, craze right now is the RETA. Because I think some people who have heard that, oh, man, in GLP1 and GLP2s, you could lose muscle. And so, oh, Reda's supposed to stop that from happening. And so there's a slang in RETA before it's even. I'm going to get back to research peptides, but this is the single most insane topic is RETA stops you from losing muscle. Yeah.

The Eli, the guy who spent $2 billion, right? Eli Lilly creating this drug cannot make the fucking claim. No. Phase 3 trial came out. 14 pounds average muscle lost. But you're a social media influencer. You know exactly that you don't lose muscle. And it's the most aggressive of all three of them.

It's the most aggressive. 29% average weight loss on the highest doses. Like, who needs to lose a third of their body? It also, because of the third receptor that it attaches to, elevates heart rate, which the other ones don't necessarily. to that extent. They all can cause a little bit of rise and resting heart rate,

but RETA seems to have the strongest effect. And so some side effects are like insomnia and stuff like that. One out of five people suffering from distensia, which is the burning of the skin sensation above 12 milligrams. One out of five. Oh, wow.

Yeah, 19%. 19%. Wow, that's big. 19. And RETA is not, it's just in phase three trials. It's not even FDA approved. And you've got Tresepatide,

which is already super strong. I don't understand why people are jumping on Because of the myth that it's the social media stuff. It's the myth that you won't lose muscle. Yeah. That was the big scare from semi-glutide and Treseppatide was, oh, man, these people, they lost 50 pounds, but they also lost 20 pounds of muscle. This new GLP3 keeps you from losing muscle. And so that's, this is what they're communicating.

I'm just saying they're listening, right, as if I don't know what's going on. And I'm, oh, wow, interesting. Tell me more. Yeah. And then asking question, how much you're getting for? What are these people doing? How do you, like, all just. random people that are because it's become so popular and mainstream and people so many people

are losing weight from the glps that you've got these people that are wanting it and then when they go do it a little bit they're a homeworker they try and do it the legitimate way they find out it's not cheap and then they find out oh i've got a friend who says they can get it for half price or a fraction of that and they're pedaling to all these people just no no subscription no prescription no blood work being done no idea how to dose it correctly don't need to even know if it's legitimately 40% true or pure or not. It is wild. Those things a mega issue. I mean, people are taking drugs. And when you go to any of these research sites or your hairdresser, for that matter, who's telling you what dose you're taking? What about titration? Who's guiding you

through any of this stuff? I mean, we got a person that bought epitalion off a research site. She goes, I'm just, she came to Vita Bell. She's like, I've got this like brain fog. I can't get rid of. I go, what are you taking? She goes, I've been on Epitallion for five months. What? Five months? Five months? No, I think you're supposed to limit that to like 20 or 30 days.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, two to three weeks. And she's been on for five months. Holy cow. Because who's telling, who's telling, you know, Sarah in Tennessee and was a mom, what the dosing schedule is? The scary part to me, because the 40% fail, most of it has to do with improper labeling and dosing. Dosing can be dangerous. Yeah.

To an extent, improper labeling can be as well because if you have some issues, taking some peptides, it might not be a good idea. But the one that really scared me, because when you brought it up, I went and researched and looked it up. 15% had bacterial contaminant. Yeah. So one to two out of 10 samples had bacteria, which, you know, that could be devastating of a problem. Are you getting any reports from people who are,

having adverse effects from research chemicals? We've got, we're doing a men's health, uh, interview on this. We've got 28 patients, which are going to participate because you've got to get their consents and, and what have you.

Oh. Um, of, of research, uh, problems, or research peptide problems. What kind of things are we, are they,

are, are we, you've got, uh, injection, uh, injection, uh, injection sites where, you know, you get, I don't know if it's gangren.

I don't know what it's called, but where you can have, like flesh eating. Oh. So where you have to get like a golf ball or baseball size. removal at the injection site. And that's twofold, right? You can also get bacteria from improper. You know, you don't dirty needles.

You don't use your alcohol soaps. We have that. You've got distension. You've got cardiomyopathy from people taking mega doses of the GHRHs and the GHRPs. You've got, you know, the brain fog from people. I mean, I don't know how you do five months of epitalion. But, yeah, I mean, you've got so many different problems that arise from research. And by the way, I'm not even knocking.

Like, if you find the most amazing research peptide company in the world and everything's perfect, good for you. But at the end of the day, who's helping you, who's guiding you? Yeah. Right. People aren't, it's hard to navigate. It's a second job. Like, this is a second job. You got to research.

You got to do all of these things and figure it out on your own. Why? And there's no way to confirm, like, what you got. Like, there's no testing kit or something like that. Who wants to pay to test every single one of their. Well, especially the person that's trying to save money. that's not the person that pays for that. Yeah.

I mean, the best call out ever. Yeah, no, the person who's trying to save a buck is not going to go through the extra step to test their stuff and spend X amount of dollars on that.

So talk about, or else you would just go to the real source. Now talk about the, what's the difference? What do the regulations look like if I go through like Vita Bella? Like you guys are going through FDA regulated compound pharmacies.

Yeah. What does that look like in terms of determining, you know, purity and dosing and all stuff? What's the difference? oversight. So you think about it basic. There's no oversight. There's no guaranteed testing. It's not made in a sterile facility. Like you look at these things. Everything's under hood, right? For those people that are brainiacs out, it's under hood. The guy's going in hazmat suits, right? You're getting air purified through multiple gates to get into your sterile lab and produce any of these products. One that helps out. And by the way, even in FDA licensed pharmacies, you get back to, Yeah. It's impossible to be 100%.

Yeah. And so guess what? You throw away the damn lot. We had a mega problem on your page. I was very forthcoming in the MP, in the Mind Pump Hormones, Facebook page. And because we had a delay in TB 500 and BPC 157. And I was very forthcoming. I said, guys, I'm really apologized for the delay of what's coming.

The batch that came out was not at the level of the standards that we wanted. And I didn't realize it was going to be this long to reproduce a new batch. batch, but I gave people credits. I gave people everything because the quality matters, like quality over speed. And people like, I need it today. I get it. Yeah, but that should make people happy, though. I'd way rather hear that my stuff isn't on his way because the guy who's stopping it is like,

hey, there was contaminant. So we threw it out completely. And now we have to redo everything. And so versus you could have sold it to me that way. And we could have, by the way. Right. We could have sold it. But we wouldn't.

Yeah. Now, do the raw materials. because I know we do testing, it goes through FDA regulated compound pharmacy. In other words, if the compound pharmacy fails, they could lose their status

and they can't. So it's like very high standards. But are the raw materials coming from overseas? Absolutely. Okay, they always do. I don't care what anybody says. Like, oh, peptides come from China.

And so does every damn shoe from a brand that costs $8,000 to $10. So does your clothes. By the way, you know, you can take a junk phone or you can take the Apple iPhone. They both come from China. But the quality is very, very different. It goes through stringent testing. You've got powders that go through PCCA in Houston,

which is a certifier of certain powders. There's so much more governance. And save money on Timu and Ali Baba for lawn chairs and shirts. Like, like, you're injecting it under your skin, immediate access to your heart, your blood supply, your brain health, your liver health, your kidney function, like saving any other areas in your life. And what are the cost differences? Maybe $50 $50, $75, what are you really saving to guarantee the success of you? And then also,

what are you doing with your hormones on top of it? Like dialing hormones before peptides. I mean, that's a big deal. Yeah, cover that for a second because you have like first order and second order things you want to focus on. How helpful are peptides if my hormones are all messed up? You know, Mike Israel said it best,

or you talked a ton about peptides on his latest, on his latest podcast that he did. And it's like taking peptides before, dialing in your hormones is like watering and fertilizing grass before you seed it. There's no grass. Like there's some grass left over from last season and some things are going to happen. But seed and build the foundation. Hormones are so important to be just the foundation of who you are.

You jump on, people jump on your Zepitheat, like I'm still blow it again because your estrogen's out of whack. Like there's just so many things. And then you jump on, you know, you talked about Reddit and it's so strong. What happens when you jump on these peptides? You lose muscle. If you're 50-year-old male, 50-year-old female, you lose six pounds of muscle. You guys are all trainers.

How hard is it for a 50, 60-year-old person to gain back six pounds of muscle? Yeah, difficult. That's what you minimize. And so hormones are the single greatest thing to dial in first. I think people don't understand how important they are. They are truly the foundation. And it's what takes you, it's what catapults you,

it's where you are. Peptides are not going to give you all this muscle. People like, yeah, I'm jumping on C.JC. Test some more. Great. Nothing will replace anabolic. Nothing. There's nothing.

Maybe throw on HGH, right? Talk to Phil. But, yeah, I mean, nothing will replace anabolic. Testosterone's your base to build muscle and maintain muscle long term. Peptides are absolutely going to help, but they're like bolt-ons to the car. What are the hormones that you guys work with? Obviously testosterone. You guys also work with progestones.

thyroid, because I know women's regulating their hormones through therapy often involves more than just testosterone. Yeah, yeah. With guys can get away sometimes. I'll give you both sides. So on the male side, you've got testosterone, you've got all the esters, you've got Cipionate, and Anthonyapropinate. We've even got tri-blend where you mix them all together and take one shot with all three of them.

Yeah. Yeah. So I've heard that that's like, oh, doesn't make that big difference. And I've heard other people say it makes a big difference. Like, what do you think? Mega fan. Really? Mega fan.

Because what happens is you're changing the half. Half-lifes and the release cycles in the body. You're talking, you know, you got propionate, two days. You've got Sipionate, roughly seven-day or an anthonyate, seven days, sippian eight, 10-day, half-life release cycles, and then you take them on Mondays, you know, split your dose, whatever you're taking for the week, split it on Mondays and Thursdays. You'll get a lot bigger boost.

You want, you know, I want to get bigger legs. I don't know why I can't get them. I'm doing eating enough. I don't know, but I take whatever leg days, I'm taking that. But, yeah, that's a great. And then when you go into the, you know, if injury and recovery side, Exanglone known as Anavar, you've got nandrolone, which is DECA. These are great for injury, recovery, people who experience massive weight loss.

And then from a women's side, testosterone, the single greatest prescription that we give women for day and night on top of estrogen, progesterone and everything else. But so many companies out there like Winona, like the largest female hormone dialing in company in the nation right now, they don't even offer testosterone. How do you dial in a complete hormone package with the dialing in testosterone? It's game-changing. We prescribe crazy statistic more testosterone to women than men. Really?

Really? Is that because more of them come back with it being low? It's because of your followers of how many came to us, by the way. No, it's the average woman that we're testing right now above the age of 40. Oh, paramedopause, menopause. Blow your mind. Get ready for it. Single digits.

Yeah. Single. Single digits. It's like no testosterone. Yeah, five, seven. Yeah. And dialed in's like 60 to 70. Yeah.

So you're talking almost a, if you're at six, it's a thousand percent increase, libido, energy, tiredness, muscle, muscle, just confidence. These women start walking, me, careful with their husbands. How are they using, how do they administer the testosterone? Is it injection or with women, do they also do cream? Are there other options? You do all of them, right? But I prefer injection.

Cream can get messy, especially if you have kids around. People don't think about this. Cross. You can. You can. Crazy. Like, like, you put your cream on and then you touch your son, your daughter. 100%.

It absolutely. Where do we know that was petting their dog? And the dog was, yeah. The dog was losing hair on the top of their head because they would, they would pet their dog. I don't think about that. Oh, yeah. I get my dog jacked now. I'm going to go home in the night.

Here, listen, this is a new cream. But, but they are available in other words, because some people are afraid of the, because there's a difference between insulin needle that you use with the peptide, tiny, but intramuscular needles is much larger. Some people are less super like a lot of people use insulin needles to inject testosterone. How does that work? So is it just, is it, is it, I mean, how do you get the oil through that? It's a swear people are patient. And if you're going to low dose, like women, an average woman's dose like 2.5 to 5, right? They sit there for 20, 30 seconds. They pull in the insulin needle because they don't want to inject a big needle, 25 gauge. And so you just go and try it. And then you just push it

into the skin enough to where you're inside of the muscle and you put, your tiny little injection. Is that how a majority of them are doing it? Yeah. Okay. We've got a lot of women that are using insulin needles to inject it. Now, again, it's annoying a little bit, right? You got to wait 20, 30 seconds.

No one's patient. Patients are not patient. Yeah. And yeah, but yeah, they absolutely do. And it's great. But the creams are also available. Yeah, creams are available. And same thing with estrogen, right?

You've got your patches, progesterine. You've got your pills, troke. You got all sorts of options. We all, if it's available, we offer probably 98% of anything that's available in the marketplace. Speaking of which, recently, a bunch of peptides became available again. There was a minute there where we couldn't offer BPC-157. We couldn't offer the thymusin ones.

There was a lot of them that we could have MOTC was off the limits. Recently they took them, they said, okay, you guys can offer these. What happened? Yeah, so RFK announced in February that he was going to be working on this. In April, he announced that they're taking them off the category two, substance list. So in 2020, 2003, October, 19 peptides were placed on

the Category 2 substance list, which just means that compounding pharmacies shouldn't be able to compound them. He undid that lockout from 2020 this year. They're going to go to the FDA review board in July, and they're going to go to the FDA review

board in January to determine if those should be able to be compounded. Okay. And what is the status on the GLP? like terseptide. I know there's, it's obviously, it's,

terseptide is the name of the peptide. Yeah. But then you have the brand names of them. Mangaro Zepone. Yeah. So are, how's that working?

Because I know that these companies, these pharma companies, I believe don't want compound pharmacies to offer them because it's like, you got Advil, you don't want people selling ibuprofen, same compound,

but you want to be able to sell your expensive version of it. How is that looking moving forward? The pharmacy, the pharmaceutical companies are getting extremely, extremely smart on this. So they're trying to reclassify GLP ones as biologics.

They just filed. I heard this. So what is that? So you need two different licenses. You've got a compounding license and a biologics license. Biologics license is harder to get and require. And it's not as a large of a, like Tesla Morland is a biologic. Okay.

HCG is a biologic. Is that because they are naturally occurring in the body? It's insane how they even want to classify it. I was just going to say it. Because there's appetite doesn't exist in my body. Correct. Yeah, and it's an adjusted, and it's just an adjusted amino chain. But, yeah, they're getting smarter and they're trying to figure out a way to mitigate

and prevent compounding pharmacies from doing these. And I'll be frank, a company spends $2 billion to make a drug. Sure. They deserve to have rights. You deserve to make up some of your money. I'm not saying, but I think that there needs to be a lot of flexibility for others to do it in the ways that they don't, right? They have a pen.

They have this. They have guaranteed dough. You can't go lower than the smallest dose. There's certain reasons that should make compounding available. They're making it harder. But today, all of these compounds are still readily available and can be sold at much less prices than. What's your opinion on moving forward? Do you think they're going to succeed?

I think on RETA, it's going to be close. It's just a matter of, right, you've got RFK at the helm. And you've removed a lot of the bad actors. from the FDA. Like before, I would say it's a money thing and that would be guaranteed. Today, I'm not, I'm not so sure. What's the difference in price between the brand name and the generic, you know, a violet terseptide versus, you know, the brand name?

$1,500 for a brand name pen. And if you get it in, you know, starting doses for treseptitide on compound is maybe $149. Whoa. That's a massive. Yeah. That's about 10%. Eight to 10x. That's a massive difference.

And so keeping that available for people is very helpful, my opinion. But again, you're battling pretty many. We're not going to win against Big Pharma. That's only what? Chispetite only runs about $149, $150,000? Yeah, starting dose on Vita Bell is $149 for Chorzepit. Which is for a full month. By the way.

Which is, because normally it's like four or 500 bucks. Yeah. Other compound, other companies that are offering it, you know, with FDA regulated compound firms are like two or three times more. Am I correct? Yeah. Okay, so you guys are just still the best. We're actually going to be lowering prices.

Really? Yeah, we're going to be announcing some lowering of many different peptides. I promised everybody, when I first came on the show, I promised everybody in the Mind Pump Forum that as soon as I get better prices, I'm going to lower them for everybody else. So our volume has increased immensely this year. We grew pretty significantly. We just renegotiated some new prices.

They're not finalized yet. but as soon as those prices come live, like IGF1, we're going to lower, we'll lower Tessamorland, we're going to lower a number of, and we're already very well-priced, but how do you make it more accessible? Wow.

Like, how do you get more? And again, we talked about this last time you're on the show, but a lot of this is because your business model is different than these other companies. You have a, Vitabella has a membership model, which is a basic membership,

where you get your hormone or B-12, depending on the person. And then that's allowing, because you have a consistent revenue. That's allowing you to charge so much less. Yeah. It's operating. Well, it's testosterone is not that expensive.

No. Right. Beetswell's not that expensive. It's just the markup on the industries a lot. We include it in the membership fee. You know, we include your doctors as it's in the membership fees. We include wholesale price labs in the membership fees. But yeah, it allows for me to manage the OPEX long term. And there's a value there.

Most people are paying 100 bucks a month for their testosterone. In Colomaphne. $120 for in clomapheneer. I think it's 189 at Maximus or some of these other places. What gave you the idea for that model? I come from software.

Software as a service, right? Microsoft had ELAs and all these things. So I tried to make like healthcare as a service and try to figure out what's the umbrella to offer people consistency and also what would people not want to come off? Like if people are on testosterone, they're not going to come off testosterone.

No, you're going to stay on it. Right? in Colomaphene, you're going to want to stay on it. So I figured what can we include and what can we build the most amount of value for in the membership so that people are actually, one, excited. We get people that complain about it who wants another membership, right? But the membership value, right, is you get 24-7 support. You get all of these things.

That portal that you guys have is really, you guys do a phenomenal job. I send a message and somebody returns, you know, my message answers my question. I would argue just the access to the medical professional is worth that. that's what's interesting to me. I think that in itself is incredibly valuable. Here's what I found out from your specific listeners. Is the one thing that made Vita Bella unique? And I didn't even think about this before the show is you get to actually pick your provider.

What company online? Do you get to pick the individual? They can go look through all of the profiles. Oh, I didn't know that. Pick the individual that you actually want to be seen by or be treated by. Is that the person that they always get to work with then? You get to pick the person that you want to work with every time. You want to pick a new person.

You just click down, pick a new person that you want to see. I don't recommend that guys, please. But yeah, you want to stay consistent. But if you're unhappy with your provider or you know, you want to try someone different that specializes in something else, you can pick them. And then if you want to message them, what company allows you to message direct to your physical provider? They don't. They don't. I can't message my doctor.

I can't message anybody anywhere else in the industry. So it's very, we have a really educated audience. And so I think they really appreciate that ability to be like, I want to talk to somebody who really knows their stuff that I can ask questions and challenge. Not just a salesperson. You guys have an amazing audience. I mean, you guys come in and they're like, listen, here's what I got questions about. Here's, I know everything about this. But, you know, let me tell you about your drugs.

Let me tell you about how you're going to prescribe me. But they're really good. I mean, we get a few Karens here and there. But for the most part, you guys have some of the most. amazing listeners. Oh, that's awesome. Appreciate that. How last time I talked to you, you guys were not offering service to California because of the,

just how difficult it can be. You guys now offer service to California. What was that like? Because I know, when I asked you when you were on the, you're like, I don't even know if I want to do that. To your credit, man. What did you, like, what, what did you have to do to make it happen? How many bodies do you have to bury?

We buried three to four bodies. We had to launch an entirely separate. separate company, Vita Bella of California. Okay. For regulations. We had to get a brand new pharmacy, which shafts me, by the way, because I don't have volume and some of these things. So we had to raise a little bit more of the membership for California, 179 for California. All of the peptides are available, testosterone, estrogen, all of those products are still available.

There's a few products that aren't available here, blood pump and some other things. but it was a it was a fucking nightmare to do business in the state of California. I did not want to do business, but, you know, for those listening, these guys were so adamant

and be doing business in this damn state. Yeah, dude. Jesus. Well, we knew we had a large listener base in California, and so that would be a massive miss. And I think nobody is taking care of California really well.

I think most people in California have to play all these games where they're shipping it to some other address to another address to get to them. And so the fact that you're able, to do that and do it above. We did it legally. We made it perfect.

We got the medical licenses, the DEA's. I'm impressed, dude. We had to do it all. You figured it out because the last time I had an experience with getting, you know, the legit way here in California, I had to set up a mailbox in Florida. Yeah. It would get mailed to Florida so they could forward it here to me. So I'm waiting two, three weeks for stuff to get here.

And this is a company that I'm working with. and that's the best that they could do. So that's off to you, man. It was a nightmare. I mean. So do you have to have like physical location in California to make that happen? I don't. No, I didn't need that specifically.

I've got all of the other. We're not going to go too deep in these specifics. No, no. But we are legal in the state of California. We are shipping the state of California. We have pharmacies licensed here. I have providers, DEAs, medical licenses. Everything is solid in the state of California.

And we are servicing. thousand customers. Now that California has done like that, because I know there's some other states that you weren't in before either. Does that make the other ones easier? Are they all individually as difficult? Let me help you guys out.

So Katrina was on me so hard to push really deep to get all these states lined up and the forum and everybody else. We went from like 30 states to 46 states in two months. Great job. Yeah. Great job, dude. Yeah.

Yeah. It was the biggest undertaking, the most expensive cost of the company since our founding, California, specifically, ate all of the other states combined. That's crazy. Yeah. It was difficult. But, yeah. We're there. Thank you, man. I appreciate it. All right. What's this blood pump? You brought this up a couple times. What is blood pump? You message me personally and you're like, dude, you get the craziest pumps when you work out, which right away, I'm like, okay. Adam didn't share it with you. Is it the Tinafadil or whatever? Did they send it to you? Yeah, he sent it over to me.

But why don't you bring it over here? Because if I give it to you, you, it'll take all of it. No, no, no. And I haven't used it yet. What is, what is it? Is it a PDE5 inhibitor? It is a dual PDE5 inhibitor. It is the most amazing product for when you're working out visibly.

You visibly see change. So it's the Dadaulafil and Vardinifil. For those of you unfamiliar with Vardinifil, I don't know what that is. So, to Danofil, scialis? Yeah.

Correct. Yeah. And I'll walk you through how this works. This is super cool science. Okay. Vardanophil is five to ten times

stronger vasodilation than Viagra. Okay. Okay. In low doses, it shouldn't activate the hammer unless you're a pervert in the gym. Right?

Right. It shouldn't act activate the hammer. Just walking around with a sword. We can't give it to Justin. My hammers. Yeah. It's always activated. But it's,

it's predictable. It's, it's predictable. It's, So within, you take it, I call up the world's best and first pre-workout pill. You take it 30, 45 minutes before you work out. It dilates the hell out of your, but you visibly, you don't need a pump cover anymore, you know, because for those of us that got the security problems, right?

You just got to have the pump cover for the first six or seven lifts. And then now you don't need, you walk in like you've been at the gym. I mean, I take it to go to dinner because, you know, a half narcissist. But, yeah, it's literally visibly you look. different. And the cool part is you're getting like a three to 400% nitricks oxide push inside of your muscles. Wow. It's healthy for you. Yeah. 38% reduction in cardiac event heart attack and stroke. They're, they're recommending because it's reduced stroke, reduced heart attack. There seems to be reduction in, in degeneration of the brain. They're recommending now men take low dose PD5 inhibitors all the time. All the time. Yeah.

Which is wild. This is turning out to be like this miracle. So I have it at home and Katrina's like, Phil wants you to try this. And I tell Phil I've only worked out twice in the last month. I said, I said, that's not very good. I said, I looked at it.

I said, I looked at it. Oh, well, this is something we could use outside of working out. Yeah, right. So I would know what dose I needed for that since that's more interesting to me. You haven't tried to get like that? No, I haven't. Well, I just literally like the last night or the night before because she brought it up because Phil's coming on.

He's like, he wants to know how that is. I said, honey, I've worked out twice in last month. So I grab it. I'm like, well, let me read it and I'll figure out what it is, right? So I look at it, I'm like, oh, this is boner pills. I'm like, this is, why is he asking me why? I didn't take this for working out. Well, increased blood flow.

But I didn't know what the vanaphyl or whatever. The other, the other. So why do you have them together? It's very important for anybody that are going to try these drugs on their own. It's excessively important is verdenafil is such a strong vasodilator. And it's fast, right? So four hours later, your blood supply is going to restrict. So that's where the azalephil comes in, the Cialis portion of it, is that way it's slowly, because that's a 24-hour, 36-hour.

So it'll slow it down so you don't just get this massive blood pressure increase in your body. It is very important that, by the way, they're mixed together with Vita Bella. But if anybody's ever thinking about taking Vardinephil on their own, you know, in these doses on a daily basis, we'd probably recommend, including some sort of low-dose Cialis with that as well, just so you have a slower contraction. So does my dosing change if I want the Cialis effect more than I care about the workout pump from it? Or should I not take it? Why don't we just give you 100 milligram Viagra? I mean, that's what I thought you were giving me when I first looked at it because I know I know what the Tenephodil or whatever is. Talk Katrina, clear the weekend calendar.

I mean, that's it, dude. I mean, that was the first day you came to my mind when I looked at it. I said, I know, because I've had the TROCy version of the Tenefodils before. And I know those work. Yeah. I know I keep saying it wrong. What's interesting about PD5 inhibitors is they have lots of health. health benefits, longevity benefits.

They improve athletic performance, especially at altitude. This is where you might need it if you're training at altitude, but even high endurance sports. Bodybuilders use it because they like the pump. It's got mild aromatase inhibiting activity, so it seems to raise testosterone in some men. It's interesting. I've been reading the longevity studies on this stuff, and I'm like, you know what? We're like five years away from them just saying you guys should, good for prostate

enlargement. They're recommending it. So it's wild. It's very interesting. It's, it's, it's, it's been fantastic. And it, it, what makes you look good and is actually healthy for you at the same time outside of exercise and sure some of the other things we don't want to do? This is an easy one. Do you, do you ever have, uh, for people who do want to use something like that or just to Delafel for, uh, for sexual performance? Do you recommend they use like oxytocin trokeys PD1 4. Do you recommend any of that stuff? We have all of them, right? We've got to Delafelifel Phil. Sledanophil, you've got PT-141, you've got oxytose,

you've got trokies. I got all three of them inside of them together. I mean, we've got all sorts of different. When it comes to the sexual arousal, sexual environment, I mean, that's the world is your oyster. Speaking of stacks, tell me about the clow peptide stack. Is that very interesting to me? What you guys stacked in there was just BPC-157, TB-500, GHKCU, and KPV.

So it's like remarkable recovery and like skin health stack, I would say. Yeah, it's everything all in one from recovery, hair, inflammation, all of it. And it includes, here's the cool part is, for those of you that want to be on any of these products, you get all of them at the standard dose in the same vial for the same price. Four bottles, call it $249 a piece, or you get a, one at 204 with the exact same ingredients that are in four. Oh, that's cool. That's a massive savings.

And only one injection instead of having you. And one injection. Yeah, but you got BPC and TB 500 for recovery. You've got GHKCU, which is like the most Google product of the year, which is great for skin, rejuvenation, anti-aging and everything there. And then KPV, which is great for inflammation. I mean, if you're thinking about the glow, which everybody knows about the glow stack, just upgrade to clow.

Absolutely fascinating. Yeah, so. So what is the difference between the glow and the clow? Just add KPV, right? Okay, that's basically the difference. Because you have heard other people talk. I've heard other people talk about the gals. So my wife has that experience with the stack.

And great reduction in pain. Sometimes she gets chronic pain. She'll have some issues. Huge reduction in pain after about two weeks and then skin. She notices improvements. The glow up. Yeah, which is pretty awesome. I, and this is rare for me,

because I've used everything. But you guys introduced me to a new peptide that I've never used, which is 5amino 1 MQ. Comes in capsule form. Yeah. Amazing. Yeah.

Like I feel... What is that? So it increases NAD in the cell. So it reduces... So you're a precursor to NAD? No, it blocks one of the enzymes that breaks down NAD. And it's in capsule form, which is cool,

so it's not injectable. And I notice energy from that, like big time. I take 50 or 100. milligrams in the morning. And it's like, I feel great all day long. I never had used anything like that before. Do you have experience with it?

Yeah, I take it all the time. You do. I take five amino one MQ. You've got four main ones, right? For mitochondria repair, you got NAD plus SS31, 5 amino 1 MQ, and MOTC. I call them the four horsemen. Would you take NAD and the five amino together?

You would take both? I would. I haven't done both together. I personally take both. I take both. And then if I'm going to go to MOTC, I always take SS31 before jumping on Mutsi. Well, you do like a month of one and then a month with the other one?

Yeah. My experience with NAD is interesting. Like when we're normal, healthy training, diet, everything like that, I don't feel that much of it. If I'm off, got sick, recover it. Holy shit, I know it's the difference. Yeah. And so I normally tell, because I've heard that from people too. They're like, oh, I tried any idea.

I didn't feel anything from it. It's like, oh, you know what? Try taking it when you're coming off being sick or you're down and out. that's when I feel a huge difference. I could knock out, put you down on the floor passed out with a high dose NAD. If I took an I am and I just gave you an I am, you will feel, you will come immediately, feel like, I didn't feel anything. Go up another 25 meters.

See where you're at. Yeah. NAD is probably the only drug class that we have where you can immediately feel something in your chest, 15, 20 seconds. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But the 5 Amino 1MQ, I feel great. It's a 5 Amino 1MQ. was a great product. I mean, it's very understated, and I think it's very under-talked.

It's marketed as a fat loss peptides. So people will use it for, I didn't get it for that. But that's also marketed as something like that. Is that a popular one? Do you guys use, do a lot of people request that? It's getting a lot more popular, right? It all comes down to social media. What everybody wants to use for click-based. Now it's going to get popular because we're talking. Yeah, just say watch now. And it's a pill. And it's a lot more popular. So it's a lot more popular. are becoming, right? There's a lot of people that don't want to do injections, and so it becomes more popular of an option for those.

You guys also will work with metformin. Yes. For some people. Methormin's the single number one anti-aging drug in the world, and I think it's the number two prescribed drug in the United States. Okay. So explain metformin a little bit. Yeah, metformin helps with glucose insulin, right, resistance and glucose,

and it's typically used for those diabetes. Yeah. But a low dose for an average person. A low dose for an average person. I give you crazy, interesting study is Northwestern Mutual, big insurance company, like they kind of go, they don't care about what the labs say or anything else. They're going to look at what prescriptions you're on and what the lifespan is. And those who are on metformin would live like, don't quote me on this, like three to five years longer than those who didn't.

Because of the insulin sensitivity effects. Listen, sugar's the killer. Yeah. Sugar is what kills us. It's what ages us. It's what kills us. And if you can manage sugar intake, glucose, insulin, you typically are going to live a lot better life.

So that's part of the longevity stack. What else is in the longevity stack? So they have... NAD, MOTC, glutathione. Yeah. Let's talk about glutathion a little bit. Because glutathion master antioxidant. Yeah.

Glutothion, for me, shines in a couple different places. One, I'm starting to get sick. Glutothione makes a big difference. two, I'm not recommending this, but if I'm going to go out and I'm going to drink some alcohol, glutathione is miraculous. The mother of all details. It is miraculous because it's an antioxidant.

It gets depleted in the liver. I mean, I'd say that's another one that falls in that category. When I, again, NADA glutathione, when you're feeling good or normal, I feel like I can't really notice it. I'm coming off of a hangover, sick, not feel good. Boy, those two things, NAD and glutathione, you feel a difference. Yeah. For sure.

Doesn't feel good. The gluteothion can feel a little bit. Like you're injecting. You burn a little bit. It hurts a little bit. I only do it in the glue. You guys do the shoulders and thighs are the true champions. I'm not.

I'm like, I'll just do the glute. Yeah. I'm not putting it. Anybody who injects in their thigh to me that they deserve a trophy, an award behind them. Like, I'm the guy. I'm a good guy that injects the thigh. That's a laugh. What is the most popular?

Is it BPC now? Is that one still the most popular? BPC is real popular. Um, MOTC has become a lot more popular, um, just because of the social media side. But glutathion staples, NAD plus staples, the single most popular and absolute number one ordered drug in the entire company is Tessamorland. Really? Yeah.

It's because it's got aesthetic effects. Yeah. People see the shrink the waistline. He eats, you know, visceral fat. It also is a growth hormone, releasing hormone. And so you're getting a two for in one. So it's, it's. By the way, I didn't know about this probably until like last week and I came on the show.

And we were coming here. And I'm like, what is our top product? It blew my mind. Are you able to prescribe HCHH? We are for injury and recovery specifically. So I built the company originally on injury and recovery, right? When I had double spinal fusion. So that was part of the protocol.

So if you have a V-HGH isn't even a controlled substance. You don't even need a DEA to prescribe it. What? It's crazy. It's not. People don't know. that. Why can't I go buy it at the store? So you need a prescription, but not a DEA. So testosterone need a DEA. HGH, you don't need a DEA. It's not on the list of control. It's not a controlled

substance. I had no idea. Yeah, it's not. I thought it was. No one has any clue about it. By the way, like the biggest stigma of all medication for body is not a controlled substance. That's wild. You can't prescribe it for anti-aging, even though it's great for anti-aging, but you can't prescribe it for that. So you actually need a clinical need, and it's determined by the providers. Same thing with Oxangeloan, right? Everybody wants to be on Anavar, you know, but you actually need a need. And if you have a, if you have the right need and protocol. You have the right need.

Because I was going to say, it's, it's hard for me to justify Tesla Morland if I were to have access to HGH. I feel like HGH is the king when it comes to that. Well, not everybody's got your budget. It's way more expensive. Is it a lot more expensive? Oh, yeah. Oh, the HCH is way more expensive.

Because I thought Tesla can get kind of expensive too. Tesla is the brand name drug of Griffith. If you go to like CVS or something, it's probably like 10 grand. You know, it's two, three hundred bucks at Vita Bella. If you look at HGH, you know, depending on how many kits you're looking at, it could be anywhere between 8 to 20 grand at CVS. But they're like 500. I think I don't quote me.

I don't know our price list rate of it. Thousands of dollars. Yeah. If you did like four vials a month for like a good recovery, probably two grand. Okay. Yeah, I thought they were close. I thought they were much closer because I know your prices on Tesla is a lot. cheaper then.

Yeah, because transcends Tessimorland was way expensive. Like a thousand dollars. Yeah. Yeah. And I was like, that's like HCHH prices. That's how that way I looked at it. I was like, why would I?

It would make sense at that level. Yeah, yeah. That's kind of how I looked at it. It was like, why get the Tessimorland? You mentioned your double spinal fusion? Yeah. When did that happen? Did you talk about the last time you're on?

Like, how did you do that? He briefly mentioned it. I had double spinal fuse. It's how it kind of came up with the idea with Vita Bella, but I had double spinal fusion and they told me it was going to be. It was an effue to the doctors, don't you remember? Well, I know that, but how did you hurt your, how did you, how did that happen? You know, when you go to the gym and, uh, you put 500 pounds on a squat rack and, you know, in the mirror, you want to be the guy when you come up and you get that bounce at the top.

You know, you want that bounce when you come up? Did you do it squatting? I did. Oh, Phil. And I shot the disc two centimeters into the spinal cord. Oh. And, uh, I was on, I don't know. Did you fold like a lawn chair or what?

Did you know? No, I didn't even know. Oh, wow. You actually got to rewrack it at least. Yeah, I rewracked and I was like, ooh, that was like a pinch. I didn't feel anything. And then I literally had a friend go, what's wrong with your left arm? And I was like, what's wrong?

I was like, wow. And he goes, it's significantly smaller than you're right right now. And I was like, what happened? And so then I'm like, well, I'm in a lot of spinal pain. Then I got worse and worse. Next thing, you know, I'm like 100 oxy cotton. I've got a spinal epidural going on. And then I went to a spinal doctor.

And he goes, we're to do a. emergency surgery tomorrow morning at 5 a.m. Otherwise, you're not going to get your left arm back. Your biceps going to be gone forever. So I got about 80% of the bicep back. Wow. What was it like coming off the oxy? I'm not like a painkiller guy.

Oh, wow. Really? More of a go fast kind of. I'm kidding. I'm not a painkiller guy. So I hated like feeling the lethargicness of any of that. So you like reluctantly took them in the first place. The minute.

They were like tick-tack. Anybody who's got spinal pain. It's the worst. pain. Like dental and spinal, the two worst pains in the world. But I, the day I had surgery,

I never took another painkiller. Wow. Like literally came out of surgery, full spinal, like all the amnesia, all of the anesthesia, all of the anesthesia came off. And I never touched the pain.

So 500 pounds, a lot of weight, dude, because you're not a massive guy. Yeah. Were you, like, what were you lifting back then?

I was, I was a big boy at one point. What were you weighing? A 265? No, you were 265? No. I've got pictures. Come on, guys.

265? What do you wait right now? 210. Yeah, because you're, I mean, you're pretty jack guy. Yeah. But 265 is ridiculous. My neck was 22 inches. You were a hoss.

Yeah. A little bowling ball, bro. That's a big ball. Now you were not natural at 265. Were you competing? Why are you calling me out? That, come on. I don't think I need you.

I was not competing. I was just an idiot. That was it. I was just an idiot. in the gym just pushing really hard and I was I was pushing some gear at the time. What year is this? I was seeing four or five years ago. You were two CC5 that just that long ago.

How hard? What was it like to lose all that muscle? Did that mess with you? Yes and no. I think I felt a lot better. I got to be honest. I had so much more energy and then half of my day wasn't consumed prepping food and just eating.

Like you don't realize how much you're actually full-time jobs. Eating all day long. Like you come out of the gym, you're eating. You're like, oh, I got to get a meal. And I'm like, I'm not even doing anything with this. I'm not prepping for anything. What are you doing?

Like, I'm acting like I'm going to go to the NFL combine and I'm going home to my daughter. Yeah. Wow. I want to see that picture, dude. 265, Phil. That's got to look crazy. That's got to look crazy.

Just texted to me because I'll look. Yeah, I'll send you some pictures. These things are huge. I was a big guy. Wow. Wow. All right. Can we get to.

some hard stuff, because I asked you off air if we could, if I could ask you a little bit about. Sure. Because I had heard, you had discussed this with, with Katrina. Yeah. And you had some really, like, hard stuff happened to you in a very short period of time. Yeah.

And it's part of what got you to leave tech. Yeah. And that's part of your story as to what got you to move in this direction. That plus your injury moved you in a completely different direction. Yeah. So take us back. this was when was this 2018 2019

really 2019 is when like I went through like some just you couldn't make it up like I just I thought like I was on candid camera and God was holding the camcorder quite frankly like it was uh I went through like the death of my father um and I had

almost I grew up with like 13 kids a bunch of friends family did you guys all live together we didn't live together but we lived in the same neighborhood in Chicago, it's a tight community. And for whatever reason, nine of them killed themselves that year and in very unique ways.

It sounds like surreal to talk about, but like nine. That's a lot of people that you know. And eventually my brain thought that we were being off like in my head, you're like this is like a systematic takeout. but and you just gets to you and I don't know why but yeah I had nine different individuals in my life take their lives after losing my dad lost custody of my daughter like any bad thing that could

possibly walked away from my career at Cisco um and any bad thing that could possibly happen me happen I'll give you the story because I think this is a crazy thing is I went to uh I didn't know what to do By the way, this is a crazy statistic. If you know somebody that's killed themselves, you're six times more likely to kill yourself. If you know two people that killed themselves at six times six, you're 36 times more likely. And if you're part of the family, it's like...

Yeah, and if you're part of the family, and so you just have, you know, so many people that... And I think it unlocks. Like when someone kills themselves, you mentally believe like it's okay at that point it's like a psychotic thought goes through your head you're like well do they know something that I don't like it is the easy rod out and the good thing is that the four remaining humans had children so of the nine none had kids well four of us have children and I think that that's probably why you know because we get a bigger purpose than ourselves of the bigger purpose to live for but it was a crazy year and I at the end you're in the middle of this all going on I decided to go to Bali Bali Indonesia and was it just to get away to I'm gonna call somebody out but I call the ex-girlfriend and I was like hey this is what's going on in my life and she said go watch the

movie eat pray love and I was like that's a weird thing and so I just go watch the movie and I call her back and I'm like Bali she goes yeah she goes I found a lot of peace there and so I ended up going to Bali and I went there for one week. I came back just under six months later. I spent six months in Bali. Did you know anybody there? I didn't, but I knew everybody by the time it was over. I had no idea of how it was just an amazing place, peaceful.

It's like the highest happiness rate in the world or number two. Is that true? I don't hold me, but I think it's, I think it's, It's like how they go to heaven is service service to others. Okay. And so the service is amazing. The people are amazing. The energy just communicating with people who are genuinely happy,

lifted me up really good. But yeah, I went through a crazy year. That's, it's, we talked to Adam, you know, off before the show. And I think that it was really hard to have empathy during that period when people like, dude, you don't understand my life's difficult. Tell me more. Tell me how difficult you're, life is. And I didn't think my life was difficult. I still don't think my life, even going through all

of that. I just think God had a plan. I don't know what that plan was. I just know that there is a plan and a purpose for all of these things happening. Was there something in common that was happening in the neighborhood or in the family that caused this kind of like, they lived all over the country. Some of them extremely highly successful. So this is wild. So you guys all grew up together in a neighborhood, the nine of you. And then this all happened as they were adults and moved and lived in different places. Yeah. That's crazy. Yeah. The statistical odds is impossible. Yeah. For that to happen to you is. It was great. Like it, it's so crazy. I mean. And all within it within a year, you're saying too. Yeah. A year, year and a half. Yeah. It was it. And there's nothing that you can point.

Was it was this, were we COVID? What are we doing? No. Before. Right before. Right. Right before COVID. Right before COVID. So this is before that. Yeah. And there's not like a thing that you can point to that. No, I've been through mentally. I was like, well, you know, and that's why I post a lot about like suicide because men specifically, like, we're in a lone wolf society today.

Men are pack animals and we don't want to talk about problems. It takes more, it takes more courage. to talk to another man than it does to stay quiet. Of course, of course. And by the way, it's like that, you know,

I need, what is it, eight minutes, six minutes, seven minutes, you know, just give me seven minutes. Like, if you get that guy

that goes, hey, you got, you got five minutes. I got it. Like, just talk. Like,

everybody, we magnify problems in our own head to a level that most people would look at you and laugh, right? And because we,

we marinate, And as you marinate, you give it more power, you give it more guilt, you give it more everything, and it becomes something big. But if you just talk about it to somebody else, since that's like the big lesson that I've taken away is when people are going through stuff or they seem off. I'm like, hey, are you okay? Do you have a strong network of men now around you? I've got a pretty good strong network of men. It's crazy. Like my circle blew up and then I'm like, this is too many people.

I got to shrink it back down again. Like, yeah, I've got a good. I've got a really good circle of good men around me. And I like it small. Like I like a tight little, you know, three, four dudes that I could call it anytime. And, you know, just to talk. When you left to Bali, was that also this, did you, was that you pieced out Cisco? Peased out Cisco.

And that was, you said, hey, I'm out. Yeah. And two weeks later. And then two weeks later, you were in Bali. Two weeks later, I was in Bali. And when you do this at this time, you have no idea what you're, you're going to do after this. I know you cashed out so you're okay. So it's not like you're like, I need to figure out how to feed myself. So you're financially stable. But what am I going to do

with the rest of my life or what do I want to do? Is that what you're asking yourself when you're out in Bali? I mean, it's, it's insane for you to wake up like after two decades of just running things, five, six billion dollar division, four thousand employees. And then I wake up the next day and I'm like, who am I? Yeah. Like, what's my purpose? What's next? And it did help with being like a parent. I can say like as a dad, like we're providers, we're protectors. It helped out like get real present. Yeah. How old's your daughter when you leave when you leave to Bali? Four and a half years ago. Okay. Yeah. Was that and then that was when you also lost custody at the time? Yeah, I lost custody and my daughter temporarily due to some nonsense. Now I have full custody.

but we're still we're shared now but for a period of time i had full custody but yeah i lost i if it could go wrong it went wrong and uh i think it's that that's where the character building came out like i think that until you're at the absolute bottom you don't build the right foundation like that's that's the lesson for for being at the absolute bottom mental i had money so thank God I had money at the time because then that would just be another problem. But that also goes back to money doesn't buy any sort of happiness at all. Like it's the like the true wealth is health, family, friends. Did you piece that together before all this unfolded?

Hell no. No, it was completely. What did that switch happen? I always love hearing that story for people that have had tremendous financial success. At some point, most people, if they're not, they're still chasing. So either find two categories of people that have made success financially. Either the goalposts just moved even further and they need the yacht or the whatever. Or they had this massive realization of, oh, shit, this doesn't make me any happier.

I had a number. I had a number. And I'm in the middle of writing a book about this called The Bell Curve of Happiness right now. Oh, cool. Right now. And it's, we think that when we get more money, something's going to change like, dude, if I just had the next million,

I'm going to change. Nothing's going to change. Surprise. Nothing's going to change. You could argue it gets worse and more stressful. And the main reason why I think it gets worse is because you get the next million

and then literally you're like, fuck, nothing changed. It's like chasing the Olympic medal. You do it your whole life. You get the Olympic medal. You're still the same person. You're a happy person. You go through depression.

You can become a happier person. Yeah. Michael Phillips. He launched a depression app about this. And it was like I was chasing and chasing and chasing and money was my God and North Star for a long time. And then one day I realized like it, my daughter helped me realize it.

Like for children, a lot of us buy things, experiences. All they want is our time. That's all they want is the time you spend with them is going to be so much more significant than anything you bought them. And that was like a defining. Like I was just like, hey, we'll go here. And she goes, Daddy, let's just go to the park. I'm like, shit, it doesn't require any money.

And then what else do you want in life? Like, what else is necessary? After crazy comment, but like after the mentor that I had, after $10 million, there's nothing to buy. Yeah. That is of, and we guys are in California, so it's different.

You guys got expensive homes. But after $10 million, what are you doing? Like, they're just gluttony at that point. The data shows even far less than that. Like once you meet your needs and you get a little extra, beyond that,

there's zero. 250. It's like the bell curve of happiness happens to like 240, 250. Like after that, nothing. You think something's going to change. It's different depending on what part of the country you live.

But like $250,000, you get like a significant. And billionaires and heavy 100 millionaires is even way more depressed. Well, that number used to be 75 to 80. And the only thing that's changed is time. That was 20 years ago when they did that study, it was 75. The only inflation's happened.

And so 250 is the new 75 of 30 years ago. But it's to your point, it's once your basic needs are met, you have a roof over your head, you can eat comfortably food, you have one or two cars. You know, I read this really fascinating study, and there's other studies that support it. The study was to look on the best ROI for the use of money to produce happiness. Because if you ask somebody, why do you want to make money?

Why do you want to make more? At the very bottom of it, it's to make me happier. Like they might say, I want to buy this, that, and it's like, well, why, why? It's become happier. So they actually did the study, what's the best return on investment when you use your money for happiness? and they looked at buying things. What happens when you buy something? When you buy something, you get a spike in happiness that quickly drops.

And if you buy that same thing again, you get zero happiness. And if you buy other things like it, you get diminishing returns. So it's a terrible return on investment. The second one was on experiences. And experiences had a longer happiness curve. But that also dropped. And if you repeat that at the same experience, you know, first time you go to Hawaii, amazing, you go there over and over again.

You don't get that same spike. Now, if you use your money, to voluntarily help someone else or to donate voluntarily. So it's got to be voluntary. So taxes don't count. We're being forced doesn't count. But when you use it to give to help somebody, you get the spike of happiness that repeats

every time you think about that time, you use that money. So for the rest of your life, for as long as a study ran, every time a person thought about, man, that time I gave so-and-so $1,000 or that time I bought groceries for so-and-so, that you'll get that same exact spike in happiness.

So from an ROI standpoint, using your money for other people is the best way to get happy. That's fascinating. Which is so countered of what people think. So opposite. How many of us just go and buy stuff for ourselves? It makes us happy for days. And then you feel like an asshole after you're like,

what the fuck did I just buy? I didn't even need this. Yeah. Yeah, no, it's, I think giving, you know, it's biblical. Yeah. Giving's biblical, right? 50x back, right? If you give.

And now I struggle with tithing. my whole life. And the more I leaned in, the better life became. Isn't it amazing? Do you, you talk about being a father a lot. Do you want more kids? I'm not against it. I mean, God's will. I want daughters. I have more fun. I didn't know I wanted a daughter until I got a daughter. And yeah, I wouldn't mind having more kids. I just, uh, how old your daughter now? She's 11. Okay, so she's going to become a teenager soon. I can inherit more kids. Yeah, that's true. She can become. a teenager soon.

She is. How do you feel about, you know, her starting to date, all that stuff? Are you like, you know, very overprotective? Ish. Yeah. Ish. Yeah. Ask me in three more years.

I talk to my daughter like she's an adult. I do. She's 11. She's growing up with her dad, right? So I'm like, there's no baby talking since she's been like five. She's like, what? I'm like, pick it up. Let's go.

But I was talking to her the other day. It's so funny. this up. I was talking to her the other day and I said, I want you to get like excessively heartbroken young, like just crushed, soul crushed. And she goes, Daddy, why would you wish that upon me? I was like, because you don't want it to happen later in life. Like, just have it 15 years old. Your whole world collapse. I can be there for you. I can, that's not a bad point. I can, I can help you with, I don't want it to happen in college when you're at some dorm or somewhere else and you collapse. Because you got to figure of the story we just talked about. I'm like, the mental state of mind is so

critical and immelible at that point. So I'm like, happen young so you realize this is what the real world's like. Not a helicopter dad or mom. Like, this is real world shit. Like, you're going to get heartbroken. Shit's going to happen. You're going to make connections. They're not always going to work out. Just have it happen young. She goes, this is not a great conversation. I'll see you later. You just walk out of the room. Do you bring her to work with you? I've brought her to work for a long, a long period of time. So you had COVID going on and everything else. You came to every bit. business meeting. She came everywhere. And she actually understands Vita Bella. Like, she understands products. And she knows, she's like, yeah, she much really hurt my arm. It's like a seven-year-old.

Dad says BPC 157 will help you. I'm like, we don't do the seven-year-olds here, honey. Yeah. I do, I do bring her to work. That's awesome. Any plans in the future, because the way that you've structured, I have to ask this, the way that you've structured Vita Bella with the membership makes it a prime company to be able to sell at some point. Whereas other companies would be very difficult to sell. Is any plans in the future to have it maybe sell it and to get it? Yeah. So the goal is in the next 36 months to take Vita Bella to a place that I couldn't imagine.

And then probably in the right investor or the right company to take it over and move on. I've got a number of different ventures and things that I'm working on. I've got some fun things that are coming up. And I think probably 36 months move it over. But it's very important that we don't sacrifice the mission. Yeah. Like it's scary. Like so many people turn over a company and they don't take patient care seriously.

Customer success drops, customer service drops. So it would have to be the right situation. I mean, I think about it all the time. That's kind of like the mental goal. In the end, who knows what happens. Yeah. Yeah. Was the membership idea primarily to exit or was it more to protect you of the uncertainty

of the peptide space? Because that's how I looked at it. I thought that was brilliant because of that. The membership was built to manage OPEX. The membership was built to manage OPEX because if I can offer a great product, because here's what happens is people forget to put in orders. They forget to do this. They forget to do that.

And then they just fall off. And so this also holds a level of accountability. like one of the big pieces of having a membership is you should use it right the law of good intentions is the gym right they buy the membership to the gym then they'll go to the gym and after a certain time either you're going to go to the gym or you're going to cancel it so it forces you to think about these things but yeah it was accountability invest in yourself long term make sure you see your doctors if you're paying for it you're going to probably see your practitioner yeah but yeah I mean, and then obviously all valuations is built on on your,

all valuation is going to be built on your predictable recurring revenue. Yeah, yeah. And the membership offers the predictable. Because I really thought it was brilliant from a protection standpoint. I bring up the analogy all the time that the peptide space reminds me so much of the cannabis space and the volatility of it. You know, whoever we have in office who's deciding the laws, you know what I'm saying? And it could be pro you, could be very, you know what I'm saying? And each state to state is different.

And so all the stuff that you already know about, that's such a headache. But the one thing that we're so beyond that with testosterone and like we know the benefits of that. That's not going away. And so I thought, oh, this is so smart. Like even if peptides are getting regulated and shut down and this is good, this is not good, the consistency of that, I feel like that, I mean, that won't go away. We have so many other products outside of peptides.

Like people think that like peptide, like there's rapamycin, there's anti-aging products, skincare products, sexual wellness products, energy products, detox products, vitamins, like basic Mick injections. People don't, people undervalue. Was that Mick injection? Mick injection, like bio boost. Yeah, aminos, inocetol, coline. Oh, okay.

Yeah, things that help with your liver, metabolism. Sure. All of these things are overlooked now because of the peptides. Yeah, and they shouldn't be. There's still some really, really good products and hidden things out there that protect the space. If we lost peptides tomorrow, yeah, it'd be an impact to the business,

but not as big as an impact. I mean, female hormones is monstrous. Yeah. Male hormones is monstrous. Yeah. Everybody seems to have an injury for Anavar and, yeah, injuring yourself every three days. I don't understand.

You want another prescription? He's like, yeah, I'd rip my other rotator, my knee. I'm like, oh, my God. Do you know what percentage of people that are on the membership that also partake in peptides and everything else? Yeah, you're probably have like a 60% penetration. 60% that are at least ordering one peptide. Okay. Yeah.

So you've got 40% are hormones, skin care. Yeah, and then about 60% are penetrated on peptides. Are we going to see you at the World Peptide Congress again? I will be at World Peptide. You are? Okay. I'll be speaking of it. I know you will. It'll be heckling.

Yeah. All right. We're going to mess with Sal. So all of us is due on stage. Well, very good. Well, Phyllis, this has been great, man. Thank you, brother. It's been awesome.

Again, we get great reviews from our, from the people that we send your way. So the service was the most important. That's number one. So I'm so happy and relieved that it worked out that way. That was the big thing was that we wanted our people taking care of. And I, for the first time, feel that way. I feel like they're not being pressured and sold on stuff that they're. they don't want or need.

I feel like they get to meet with a medical professional who will go through every bit of their blood work in detail with them, meet with them quarterly like that, follow up on them. And then, of course, they get their stuff really quick. No, it's been an incredible experience. And the feedback has been awesome working with you guys. So thank you. Thanks for coming on again, man.

Thank you, brother. Appreciate your boys having us. You got it. All right. Thank you for listening to Mind Pump. If your goal is to build and shape your body, dramatically improve your health. and energy and maximize your overall performance, check out our discounted

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