Sober Motivation: Sharing Sobriety Stories - John's Journey: From a First Drink at 12 to a Life Changed by Alcohol.

Episode Date: October 18, 2024

In this compelling episode of the Sober Motivation Podcast, John Buckley candidly shares his harrowing yet inspiring journey through alcoholism and his ultimate path to sobriety. Growing up in an Irish immigrant household with a father battling alcohol addiction, John reflects on his early encounters with drinking and the profound impact it had on his identity, education, and relationships. From dealing with high-stress environments on Wall Street to personal crises, including his father's death and his own terrifying health scare. Through immense challenges and with significant resilience, John has successfully reclaimed his life, offering hope and practical advice to those battling similar struggles. Links:  Sober Motivation Community 2 week trial: https://sobermotivation.mn.co 1:1 Sobriety Mentorship Info: https://www.sobermotivationmedia.com/1-1-mentorship SoberLink: https://www.soberlink.com/recover John on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jbuckofficial/ 00:00 Introduction and Guest Welcome 00:29 John's Childhood and Family Background 01:39 Early Experiences with Alcohol 13:11 College Years and Identity Struggles 19:58 Career in Sales and Drinking Culture 24:15 Family Struggles and Father's Decline 32:39 The Illusion of Control 33:49 Life in Manhattan 35:19 Meeting Debbie 36:31 Fatherhood and Escalation 38:47 COVID and the Downward Spiral 41:07 Hitting Rock Bottom 44:03 The Turning Point 51:13 A New Beginning 53:16 Reflections and Advice

Welcome back to season three of the Suburmotivation podcast. Join me, Brad, each week as my guests and I share incredible and powerful sobriety stories. We are here to show sobriety as possible, one story at a time. Let's go. How's it going, everyone? Brad here. Welcome back to another episode. A few mentions before we get into this episode is, first off, the subramotivation community. If you've been thinking about joining a community but are kind of on the fence, look, this is the push that you need.

you need some support on this journey with other people that have been through it, trying to do it alone because of all the different fears and everything we're afraid of that could go wrong from joining a community is preventing us from getting to the next level. If you're looking for a community that's extremely supportive, flexible, and we'll meet you exactly where you are, be sure to come and check out some of the meetings I host, and we have other hosts as well on the Subur Motivation Platform, a bunch of different meetings throughout the week and also a very supportive and active chat feed where you can connect and make friends with other people. Two-week free trial. I'll drop the link to that down in the show notes below. Another thing that I want to mention here too, the space is

very limited, but I'm offering one-on-one mentorship. And I'll drop the link for the information for that. We could jump on a call. It doesn't cost you anything to jump on a call and just connect and see if we would be compatible to work together with you and your goals that you would like to achieve on your alcohol-free or sobriety journey, so I'll drop that link down in the show notes below and let me know if you have any questions with it. In this compelling episode of the podcast, John Candleby shares his harrowing yet inspiring journey through alcoholism and his ultimate path to sobriety. Growing up in an Irish immigrant household with a father battling alcohol addiction,

John reflects on his early encounters with drinking and the profound impact it had on his identity, education, and relationships. from dealing with high-stress environments on Wall Street to personal crisis, including his father's death and his own terrifying health care. Through immense challenges and with significant resilience, John has successfully reclaimed his life, offering hope and practical advice to those battling similar struggles. And this is John's story on the Subur Motivation podcast. I've taken the device everywhere with me.

It's gone on camping trips, holiday vacations, even Iceland. It was really useful for when I wanted to travel. I wanted to be able to visit friends and really be able to. to live my life. These quotes are from Soberlink users who have found peace of mind while enjoying vacations, even in early alcohol recovery, when traveling can feel scary. Maybe you're nervous about being away from your support system or your loved ones are concerned about a possible relapse. That's where Soberlink comes in. Here's how Soberlink keeps you accountable. You'll test at scheduled times each day two to three times a day, facial recognition confirms your identity, tamper sensors

detect any attempts to cheat the system, and instant easy-to-read results are sent directly to your loved ones, giving them peace of mind while you're enjoying your time away. Soberlink isn't just about proving you're sober. It's about building confidence in your recovery, even when you're miles apart. Soberlink, proof of sobriety at your fingertips wherever life takes you. Visit soberlink.com to sign up and receive $50 off your device today. Now let's get to this episode. Welcome back to another episode of the sober motivation podcast. Today we've got John with us. John, how are you? What is going on? How you doing? I'm good. man. Thanks for reaching out. Be willing to jump on here and share your story with everybody.

Absolutely. It's an honor to be honest with you. The things that you're doing over there to impact the sober community and reach out to people that are looking for hope is so important. So it's an absolute honor for me to be honored. Thanks for having me. Yeah, 100%. So what was it like for you growing up? I mean, the funny thing is I look back on my childhood pretty fondly. I was born in Ireland and I grew up in a very typical Irish immigrant household. We immigrated here when I was a baby, so no accent. So it was a warm childhood surrounded by extended family. But the thing is with a lot of the Irish community, right, is we are drinkers. And I grew up around drinking quite a bit. And once again, my childhood was

fun, but it did, I feel like, set the stage a little bit for what was to come later down the road, right? My dad was an alcoholic. He drank when I was younger, but he was sober for. for over a decade from when I was, I think, three to probably like 12, 13 years old. So I didn't, and my mom wasn't a drinker. So I didn't grow up necessarily in a drinking household, but was aware as I got old like my dad didn't drink where I saw all the family members did. So it was like. Yeah.

Well, you threw me off there a little bit, being from Ireland with the accent there, but it makes sense though. He came when you were younger. It is interesting, right? I've had people that still live in Ireland as part of the show. And definitely that drinking culture for things. I mean, what are some of your earliest memories as a child? I mean, were you into sports?

How did school and stuff go for you? Yeah, so always into sports. I was always an athlete. Average at best, but I love playing. I played ice hockey and football my whole life. And I still played ice hockey up until about a year ago. I shattered my hand in a game. But, yeah, surrounded by sports was always fun.

And academics was very important to me. I was lucky enough that I grew up in a house with my, my aunt, Eileen, God bless her. She was like my North Star, but she was always very educational focused. And the rule was like, we could go get a hockey stick or we could go get a new football or a jersey or what, but we had to stop by the bookstore as well. So I grew up reading. I still, you can see behind me, this is just this year.

Like, this is this year's books. I am like a constant reader. It's an escape. And now in sobriety, it's been much more, right? I'm reading probably five times the amount of books now than I did when I was. was actively drinking, right? But yeah, my childhood was, my childhood was good. I grew up in a typical household. And my parents, they were great parents. They worked hard. My old man, which will be a common theme throughout this podcast. My dad was a very hard worker. He was a

teamster. He worked the midnight shifts. So I didn't see him necessarily a ton throughout the weeks. The quality time that we did have together was important, right? I grew up in a very typical Irish Catholic household, JFK pictures on the wall, the Pope on the other side, like that kind of thing, right. But then as I got older, right, and I started hitting adolescence. My dad, I remember the day like it was yesterday. He once again worked midnight shifts and it was four o'clock in the morning. I heard a loud bang downstairs. I walked outside. I was like 12, 13 at the time. My mom came out the hallway where we figured we were getting broken into. And it was my dad who had at that day relapsed and came home and fell into China cabinet, exploding China

everywhere, glass everywhere. He's on the floor. And at that, I can pinpoint. that as like a very pivotal point in my life, right? Because everything did change at that moment. For me, my little sister who was affected as well. And our house was really never the same. So I can look back on that one day and just be like, wow, like that was a very pivotal point in my life where everything did change. And he really never slowed down from that day. And it really did put us on a different trajectory in the household. So I think about that day a ton as I go back through my story. And then I think it wasn't like a rocket ship to where he wound up, but like it was a slow progression.

And then my mom and my sister around that time took a trip to Ireland. It wasn't weird for my mom and my sister to go to Ireland or me and my dad to go to Ireland, what have you because we had a lot of family there. But this one particular trip, he got loaded. And I guess I was trying to be a man like him. And I said, well, I can drink like you. I think I was 12, 13 at the time. And he made me, I would never forget it, a Gatorade and vodka, pint glass with a little ice in it.

And he goes, if you're a man, knock yourself out. And I remember drinking that. And I remember laying in my bed after drinking that. And the whole room was just a helicopter. And I loved it. Like, it was like, wow, okay, I can get behind this. And as a 12-year-old, 13-year-old, That was a weird feeling, right?

So that kind of set the stage moving forward for me because I started from then. And then not that I was like from that point on, I was drinking every night. But that really was like the jumping point for what would become a lot worse later on in life. Yeah. Thanks for sharing that too. It's always so interesting to me. I don't know if it is to anybody else. But I'm really interested by the stories that people share when they have their first experience with drinking.

Right. because you hear a couple different over the amount of stories that I've heard here and just working with people for probably 13 or 14 years, 13 years. And some people love it. And other people hate it. And it doesn't, you know what I mean? Because you feel like I'm just picturing that too, right? The room spinning.

A lot of us have probably been there, right? And you can't stop. You can't stop. Yeah. And then you have this thing where you enjoyed the escape maybe in a sense. Mm-hmm. And you have all the stuff. stuff going on at home too. But you know, what happens, I think, when we're younger is, I mean,

we can't put all these pieces of this puzzle together. I know I sure couldn't. When I went to my first party and had my first drink, I was with you, man. I was like, this is the great, I finally, for once, to keep this story rather brief, because I've shared it many times here before, but I finally for once felt like part of the world, like people accepted me. They were interested in me in everything else that I had worried about not being good enough. And it all made sense to me in that moment, man. And then when I look back, I think ever since I had that first drink, something in my subconscious was working. And I would get glimpses of it every now and then that I was going to have to quit this Sunday. And I would just, I would shut that voice down so

fast because I was like, I can't give this up. This is just, this is my way in. This is my way into the crowd. A hundred percent. And I think I always say like it became part of my identity. like John Buckley, the drinker, the party guy, like that was always my reputation on the football team. Like I had the fake ID. I could buy beer. I always found a way to get to the party. I always found a way to get booze for everybody else. And then from high school into college, like that reputation and the people that I surrounded myself with were other drinkers.

Right. And once you're surrounded, right, I'm sure we'll talk about this in depth. and it's been a huge part of my awakening, but your circle that you keep, right? If everybody in your circle that you love is a drinker, well, then you're not really doing much wrong, are you, right? Because everybody is, your circle is doing it. Well, he's doing it, and he's captain of the football team,

and this guy's doing it, and he's starting his own law firm and down the road or whatever, right? So the circle that you're keeping is not showing you that you're any different. It's actually showing you that you belong. And fast forward, right, 20 years later, when it was time to give it up, I was like, I don't know who I am without it, right? Because I've grown up with it. I had my first rank, like I said, at 12. So you're still a baby if you think back. You think back on 12 year old, like, you're still a baby at that point. Like, I grew up drinking now. And I don't know who John Buckley is without having that ability to go out and have a beer. So it became who I was. Yeah, which is right even before you shared that, after you shared a little bit, I wrote down, I write notes on my notepad as we go.

Everyone's doing it. And I think that's the thing, right, is we hear as a common trend in a lot of stories is once we surround ourselves with that, then that's the mindset that we have going into it, right? At the time, you don't know any better necessarily because that's what we've surrounded ourselves with and it's really easy to buy into that narrative of let me look around who I hang out with and the world, the small world that I live in and it's the way I'm going about it doesn't look any different really than a lot of other people. But when I look back at my story and in how the

drinking progressed and the reasons why I was drinking, I think that varied from my peers. Like how much I drank or how frequent I drank or all that stuff. That looked fairly common across the board, right? College, of course. We're hitting Thursdays. We're going on Friday. We're doing all that. But when I look back, I don't know this to be exact because I'm not going to go around and ask people, but I really believe that the reason why I drank was different than my peers. And I was really hard to, I never wanted it to end. Of course, it ended and I went to bed in everything. But in my mind and in my heart, I didn't want it to end because I was worried about that I was. That I was. I was going to have to start to face myself again in what I think. Yeah, yeah, 100%. Like, in that, I feel that and I agree with that. And I resonate with that because part of it was, listen, a lot of my friends did have, like, tough dads, right? Tough upbringing. He's in, like, my old man was we, from being a kid, like, we didn't get along very well. Like, I loved them and I know he loved me. Like, I know that part, right? But interaction, the two of us really couldn't

be in the same room as I got older for, I had more than a couple of minutes and it would just blow up because we were so, so different. And like I had mentioned that my, he worked night shift. He never took a day off. The guy worked 70 hours a week. He was a working animal. And then the one thing about my dad, you can put it on his tombstone, hardest worker I've ever seen in my entire life. And that's, he took that to the grave, right? But from a father's son standpoint, all of a sudden, I had something in common with my dad. for the first time he wasn't a sports guy he wasn't an american guy he held on to like his traditions of the past uh so what did we have in common we were both drinkers and finally at one

point in time right like the lack of attention that i was been craving for my old man well at least we had that thing in common right now this is all coming out like as i retrospectively right when you think about it at the time i was just being what i thought guys should be, which is a football player, hockey player, tough guy, drinker. That's just what guys do. And then it starts bleeding over to that mindset is, well, I'm a drinker, but I don't miss work. I never called in sick. Like, if you go out with the boys, you wake up like a man. That was my spiel, right? As long as I get up and go to work, well, I don't have a problem. And as long as I do X, I can keep doing Y, regressed me through my entire adulthood, to be honest with you.

Like, it's the ability to continue. If you looked at my life on paper, when I had to give it up, I owned a successful business. I had married the girl in my dreams. I had two small, beautiful kids who were healthy. Like, outside looking at, I, I had. I had it all together. And it was because, like, if I have X, well, then I can't be Y, right? If I have all of this great stuff going on, then I can't really have that much of a problem.

And those two things do not go hand in hand. And we all come to the point where we realize that. Yeah, 100%. Of course we do. And I think it's a spot a lot of people get to where, yeah, I mean, I think a lot of people say the excuses of, well, I'm not, like so and so and I haven't lost everything yet, but it won't get there. I don't want to get too far forward on that.

We'll get there because I've got a few thoughts on that too. Going back to college though, and you're mentioning, you bringing up this identity piece, right? And looking at your entire drinking career in a sense about never really truly knowing who you are without the drink and that becoming an anchoring your life. And as you go into college,

my guess is too, it probably just really just picked up steam there. college was an absolute mess. My college years, so like my high school stuff, I loved high school. I was one of the, like I loved being in high school. I had a great group of friends. I was playing football. I was playing. I really enjoyed it. College now, what is my identity? Who am I? Like, and it's, I was the party guy, right? So I fall back on what you know, right? So I started partying and trying to just fit in with other people that were partying. I, like, I left one school after first semester, snapped my ankle in a fuck. And I was. hit my face. You can't see it through the camera. Busted my face open. I had stitches on my face, broken ankle, and I was drunk trying to fight a friend of mine who at the time was a golden gloves boxer, pro tip, don't fight the golden gloves boxer guy, right? And so I decided to leave school and went home. And home at that point had escalated into an absolute dumpster fire because my dad was 24-7 on the sauce. So the home situation was right.

off. Now, back at home with his dad who is, I mean, a hundred miles an hour drinking and is not happy that I'm back home, right? So now me and him aren't getting along. So I do that for a little while. And then I go away again to school, get my stuff together, decide to go to Delaware, one of my best friends. We go down there for a year. Same basic thing. We had a blast. It was a lot of fun, met some great people, but I was there to party. And luckily or unluckily, school always came easy for me. I'm like, for whatever reason, you could put the test in front of me. I can take a test on a couple minutes notice and do fine. So I realized I could show up, get the syllabus, you know, mark the things that I needed to mark down and take care of the

bare minimum and show up for the finals or show up for the test, take them and get a B or C-plus or a B. In my mind, who cares, right? I could pass the test, and I could get through it that way. And I want to waste the time that was. So I had a girlfriend at home at the time, and I decided, once again, I'm wasting my time. I'm going to go home. And I dropped out of college at that point and came back home. So, like, now here's me at 20.

I'm a college dropout. Like, for somebody who loved academics, I'm a college dropout. And I wound up going to work. And I got a good gig. As a stockbroker, I got my Series 7. because I had the gifts of the gab, I could sell. So I was working in a boiler room, which you've seen the Wolf of Wall Street? Yeah, yeah.

So I worked in a boiler room that was run by two former Stratton-Okman brokers. So same thing that you saw in the movie, the microphone, and the morning meetings, and let's go. And like people doing Coke in the bathroom at lunchtime. Thankfully, I never got involved in that stuff because I knew for a fact I was going to love it way too much. So I never touched it, thank God. But I remember going home in that lifestyle, right? So the athlete, drinker, football parties, that fun stuff that I loved.

Now I find my people again. Go as hard as you possibly can all the time. Now, most of these guys are hyped up on Coke and whatever, right? But like the bell rings at four, the market closes. Bang, we're at the bar. We're doing martinis. We're having liquid lunches. It's just part of the lifestyle.

So now I find my people again, these party animals who are making money and they live the lifestyle, they got the good suits and the nice shoes and the fancy watches. And well, they're successful, right? Brad, they're successful now. So who am I to say that this party lifestyle isn't the way to become successful like these guys? So I find my stride a little bit. And I watch, if you remember the movie Mr. and Mrs. Smith with Brad Pitt and Angelina

Gillian. So in that movie, every day, he drove. drives this really sick Cadillac home. And he gets out and he's got the good. It's Brad Pitt. He looks like a million bucks. He's got his cool suit on. And he comes home and he shakes up a martini.

And I was like, whew, all right, we're going to do martini. So every night I came home and made, I got myself a little martini bar and made myself a martini. Because that's what successful people do, right?

And the movies, boiler room, Wolf of Wall Street wasn't out yet. But like all of those movies, Wall Street, Like these guys were all drinkers. So my idols at that point were party animals that were successful because this is what I was ingesting. Right.

So not only did we talk about a circle, so we'll swing back to that, but also what are you feeding yourself? And at that time, I'm feeding myself that successful people are party animals that work on Wall Street. And I want to be part of that. Yeah. Well, that, yeah, I mean, just from the movies and stuff there, too, I can picture that. So, yeah, I mean, and that's what you're idolizing in a sense, right? What you're looking for. If I want to get here, then I've got to be willing to do all this other stuff.

I mean, correct me if I'm wrong here, but it would have probably been, it would have probably, I don't know the right word for it, but it would have been a bit strange if you were like, I don't drink in that situation. I mean, 100%. Especially then, like, I don't drink is like almost like a, what's wrong? is there something wrong with you? And I didn't have the backbone. Then looking back, I thought I was on top of the world, but looking back, I didn't have the backbone to say, no, just not my thing.

Whereas, listen, I mean, even just recently, I've gotten even better at just being like, I don't drink. I said it for the first time, maybe over a year ago for the first time saying, no, I don't drink. And I'm like, who said that? Who? Was that me? Did I just say that out loud? Like, I don't drink?

Like, I didn't make a funny joke about it. I didn't make a little quip about it. I just said, no, I don't drink. Thanks. And on to the next one, I was like, wow. Like, that's interesting. Yeah. So how long do you stay doing this job for?

So from there, like the market crashed, right? And 2007, 2008, Lehman Brothers went out, Bear Stearns went out of business. I was on the trading floor when all that happened. It was like straight out of a movie. Everybody just stopped and it was like, whoa, like, this is scary, right? I got sued for just over a quarter million dollars. I was 21 years old.

I got sued for over a quarter million dollars for unlawful options trading in somebody's account, completely false. And I was having panic attacks at night. So now I'm like, I'm 21, 22 years old. I'm having panic attacks. So I'm just wolfing vodka at night, right? Go through that scenario. I get, it gets thrown out that literally like, I did nothing.

I was a junior broker. It wasn't even in my name. The guy was just looking to make some money back on his losses, right? But from there, it was sales job. after sales job, which once again, like the sales environment lends itself to a drinking environment. And if you're not on the team, right? If you're not on team happy hour, well, then you're missing FaceTime with the VP of sales. You're missing FaceTime with your manager. You're not bonding with the crew, right? So from that point on, it was a career in sales, which was a career in drinking.

Yeah. Yeah, you hear that a lot of people. I had somebody else put it like all the deals go down at the table, tight deal like at the bar. Yeah, and anything, I too, I think a lot of those work cultures too, it's that stuff where you get where you get to know people. I mean, is it the most productive? No, obviously looking back, we know that now. But I think at the time, it worked. Like it worked to do it. I mean, there was bad things that came of it, keeping this thing going. Throughout all this time, so I mean, you're in your early 20s. have you ever had a thought yet of hey like drinking's a problem or I should cut back I should quit or anything well I mean this goes for my whole 20s right like anytime I grew up like a good kid right like I wasn't a

bad kid I didn't have bad behavior like I never I was never in trouble growing up I always had the same kind of mentality I'm now I'm a positive person and I'm like a happy person but in my 20s I started getting in trouble right so like I said busted up my face broke my egg and ankle. Another scenario, I put my hand through a window. You can still see this card here. Got into a fight, got a couple stitches here. All of a sudden, I started getting picked up open container tickets. I have to go to court. And then that happened a couple times. I got put in the back of a cop car for my mouth. When I was getting an open container ticket, I was trying to be funny because I had a group of people around me. Cop didn't like it. It threw me in the back of a car.

And I'm sitting in the back of a cop car going, dude, is this you? This has got to be as close to rock bottom as you can get. And boy, I was not even close to, not even remotely close to rock bottom at that point. But I started seeing a pattern that every time something bad happened to me, there was alcohol involved 100% of the time. The crazy part about it is I pride myself on being a logical person. But this disease, this sickness has a very funny way of,

of taking logic and throwing it out the window. And I just put it up to, well, that cop was being a jerk. Or, hey, listen, so one-off, it happens every once in a while. It's not like I heard somebody. It's not like I drove my car drunk. It's not like I got a DUI. It's not. So all of those things, you can rationalize it as, ah, it happened.

We'll get over. It will move on. I continued to drink, but always found myself as considered like a heavy drinker, but never convinced myself that I was an alcoholic. And once again, I think that has a lot to do with the circle I kept. Even though I may have been the hardest drinker in that circle, I was still in like ski trips, right? What are ski trips? It's like you ski between drinking, right?

Like a couple beers in the morning, a couple beers in the backpack, a couple beers at aoprace ski that back at the chalet. We were going on ski trips all the time. Summer trips. What are summer trips? Fishing and drinking on the back. boat, water skiing and drinking, sitting on the beach and drinking. I did nothing without drinking involved. But neither really did my friends. Yeah. Right. So it was a catch 22 that my 20s, I did get in

trouble a few times for drinking. I remember showing up to court and I was in a suit and I'm waiting to go in front of a judge. And I'm like, like, what? A gut check moment. What am I doing? And you know what I did? Like after I left court, I went to the bar. And I had a beer. And all the while that this is going on, and I'm figuring out who I am, right, as a 20-year-old man, I've realized that, like, at 20, you think, like, you're really, as a man, you're, like, you're trying to figure yourself out. And I'm trying to figure out who I am, but also balance this alcohol thing.

And I'd be remiss to say, at the same time, my dad is going through a complete downward spiral in his life. And so my early 20s, we moved out of the house. We had to move him with my grandparents because my dad was like ransacking that he was getting drunk. And he pushed an air conditioner out of a window at me. He chased me around the house with a baseball bat around the car. I had to get my girlfriend at the time to come get me and my sister and get out of the house. It was a very tumultuous time in my house. And I was trying to protect my mom and my sister.

But at the same time, try to get him help, right? And that was a series of events where he was like in and out. He went to jail. Like he chose to go to jail. He got in trouble for drinking, but it was like driving while impaired. The option was like a one month jail sentence or like six months probation. And he was like in court. He's like, no, I'll go to jail.

I'm not going to stop drinking. So I'm not going to. And I was like, who picks jail? Do you know what I mean? So like I was dealing with him and he was taking up a lot of my time. I was getting him in and out of rehabs and detention centers. and the jail. And it was like this big,

constant issue. And I remember one time my sister called me up. And she's like, hey, John, you got to get down to the rehab center. Like, they're kicking him out. And I was like,

all right. So I get down. He was smoking in the rehab center. Wouldn't stop. They kept asking him to. And I remember going in and I'm like, sitting down with the counselor. I'm like in a high school,

like, go to meet the principal for my kid, but it's my dad. And like, being like, what happened? And they say, you were smoking and whatever,

you won't stop. And I look at him and he goes, what's the matter? Are you mad because I'm getting out of here? And I'm like, no, dude, I'm not mad because you're getting out of here. I'm mad because you're an ao. And I was like, but you know what I did? I picked him up from rehab because he got kicked out. And I went to Applebee's and I sat in front of him and ordered four Brutus drinks.

And I just stared at him while I was drinking my beer. And he's, I'll take one. I'm like, no, you're not taking one. Like, you're an alcoholic. I'm not. Like, this is my, this is your problem, not mine. And I was drinking away. So I'm dealing with him and then all of a sudden he got sick.

And the doctor, I still get, it's a very real, like he, he left the house. We moved back home. He was living in an apartment around the block. And all of a sudden, he wasn't looking good. And he lost his job. He tried to fight his boss. The boss smelled alcohol on his breath, sent him down for testing, and they fired him. He was in this job 25 years.

super close to retirement, and they fired him. And thankfully, like, we fought it, and he was allowed to keep his pension. But that was like, now he didn't have that structure. So he went on an absolute downward spiral, and he started looking very sick. Stomach was distended. He couldn't eat. So we finally had an intervention, and we got him to go down to the doctor, to the hospital, to the emergency room.

And the doctor said, hey, like, you got six months to live. Your liver is giving out. You have six months left. And to me, my dad, your dad's your hero, right? And I was like, for drinking, you know, for, for, like, you know, after all we went through, I'm going to lose them to this stuff. Like, it broke my heart. So we brought him back home.

My mom's a saint. She brought him back home. And she nursed him and nursed them. And we got him into all like the proper doctor care. And the doctor turned around about six, nine months later. And he said, I don't know what the heck is going on, but you're a miracle. Like, you're going to make this thing. Like, you're actually going to survive.

And he heard that we, I went to work that day. I came home. He was drunk. He, I guess he heard the good news and thought, instead of saying like, sweep, like a newfound life, he started drinking again. So the long part of the story is he left the house again. Siri, like, he stayed with a cousin of mine, caused a lot of issues with my family, a couple DUIs.

He was homeless for a little while, and eventually he settled down in Florida with this girlfriend that was just milking him for all of his money because at this point, he was, like, wet-brained. We got the phone call that from the nurse, and she was like, hey, I just want to let you know. We have your dad here in the intensive care you. unit, he's going to pass away within the week. And I was like, listen, at this point I had it, I did. I had it up to ear with him dealing with this for my entire adult life.

And I said, look, like, we've gotten these phone calls before. The guy survives all of them. And I said, how serious is it? She goes, if he makes it five days, I'd be shocked. I think if you want to say goodbye, you should hop on a plane. So that's what we did. We flew down to Florida. And my dad and myself are way of saying hello.

if we were passing out, I would be driving home when he went to work. We'd give each other the finger out the car window as we were driving by each other. It was, I don't know, like, it was just the way that me and him communicated. Yeah. So when I showed up to the hospital, he couldn't talk. He was tubes everywhere, and he just gave me the finger. And that was, I gave it back to him. And that was the last communication that me and my dad had.

we were in hospice for the next week or so, and he passed away. And he passed away, Brad, with me sitting at the foot of his bed with a 30-pack next to me. Like, I was just going beer after beer watching him die of liver cirrhosis, but it still didn't, like, none of it said in to me, like, that could be me. this was at I was 29 so I watched him pass away of this disease and I watched him ruin his own life for 20 years and I watched him

relapse I watched the whole scenario the sobriety to relapse to end and out of rehab to lose your job lose your car lose your family lose your house to lose your life and I watched that to my superhero

and it still didn't stop me. Like, that's how powerful this is. You can watch it, eat your superhero alive and kill them. And you still justify doing it. Yeah. So true. And I think it even goes back to what you mentioned before, how insidious it is in a sense to where it'll get you all confused and mixed up.

Because I think it's humans. And thank you so much for sharing that, man. And it's a story that too many people have experience with doing the podcast and just knowing other people and seeing these stories. It's just one that too many people have experience with. And I feel like it's one we don't talk about enough, when the sense of addiction and a sense of how devastating it is. I think alcohol has been one of those things that's, I think it's getting better. But I think it's been one of those things that's been really protected over the years. It's been really protected because of the money that it's.

generates for the companies who are involved with it. And I think that it's, and it's, maybe more of a slower burn for people and stuff like that. And then I think too, when a lot of, and I'm only guessing here, just some my conversations and stuff with people, I think that a lot of the times when people pass from it, it isn't always necessarily directly related to cirrhosis. It could be heart attack. It could be heart failure. It could be so many other things that it's just, it's just left at that. There's not much more digging that takes place. But I really think there's a a lot of people, a lot more than we ever will realize, that have been impacted by this. But it's that thing you mentioned too, man, about where you're sitting at the end of the

bed there drinking, right? Doing your best, I believe, at the time of trying to process all of this and the feelings and your superhero mentioning that, but doing the drinking as well. And I think that's the thing. And for a lot of people's lives, is that we just continue this thing going. We can see it. But I think as humans, we do such a great job in our brains do to, protect us and convince us. That's them. That's what's going on there. That's what's going on over

there. That'll never be my story. Not me. That'll never happen to me. Yeah. Yeah, 100%. And hindsight, hindsight's always 20-20, right? But if that doesn't stop you, what does? Right. And that's the craziest part about this disease is everybody has their own thing that stops him or not, right? I always say, you stop one way or another. Right? Like, you stop it or it stops you. It does come to a point, right, that it does stop. And I totally agree with you. A lot of people that have the issue, maybe they do die of a heart attack or they die of cancer or they die of kidney failure or what have you, right?

Like, it's not necessarily, oh, he died of alcoholic liver cirrhosis. They die of something. But it's 100% because of lifestyle. And it's allowed and it's in society and it's accepted and it's not given the marketing that it should be, which is this. is poison and this ruins families and lives. Yeah, for sure. So after all of this, I mean, how do you move forward with things like 28, 29 with your life there? Yeah, so complete lifestyle change, right? So I made a move at that point. I moved into Manhattan. I didn't change a thing.

I got a good gig of Manhattan. I was always an achiever, right? So I was always like a number one or a top five sales guy in whatever company I was at. Like a team lead, like always like happy hour, let's go, presidents club, all that. And I was in Manhattan. So there ain't nothing else to do but party, right? So I was running around. I was partying.

I was, honestly, I was having a blast. But I spent like most Sundays at a bar by myself, miserable, right? Like the most lonely I've ever been. and I look back at the font times. I was living a very, a lifestyle that really couldn't have been kept up with, right? Like, I was not missing work, but I was definitely not performing the way I should have been performing, even though I was still achieving, right?

Like, everything on paper looked good, but I know internally, like, I am hurting. This is catching up to me. But it didn't slow me down. Once again, the justification, right? No, dude, like, you have an apartment in Manhattan. You're running around. I'm going on different dates every night. to the best restaurants in New York City.

I'm rocking and rolling sales-wise. I'm making great money. Like, life is good on paper. But I know, like, behind the scenes, it's when you pull back the curtain, I'm fighting through this, right? And then I met Debbie. I met the girl in my dreams.

And I'd like to say things started to change, but it didn't, it may have slowed down a little bit because she was never a drinker. But it just made me get almost like a little bit more crafty on when and how I drank. Like, I would know, like, if I was going to talk to her at 8 o'clock at night, like, maybe I would call a beer or whatever, but I wouldn't get shellacked until, like,

maybe after I spoke to her and then I would down a bottle of wine. Or we would go out to dinner, and I would always have a plan, like, all, let me get to the bar earlier than dinner, a couple beers at the bar. Well, then she'd show up and I'd just be having one beer. She would know I drank maybe four beers before dinner, and then I would get a martini or order a box. And I would be like, yeah, why don't you just have a glass of Chardonnay?

And she'd order it, I think, to probably make me feel good at the time. But, you know, she never was a drinker. So, you know, she moved in. We moved in. We got an apartment together. And I always went out for like football Sundays or whatever. But it was very status quo. I guess at that point, I was a heavy drinker, but I was doing all the other right stuff.

And then we found out she was pregnant. Like, we found out she was pregnant a month after we moved in together. So all of a sudden, I think the drinking started to ramp up a little bit. And it was because I went from my new life, single running around Manhattan having the time of my life to, oh, my God, I'm going to be a dad. And I don't think it had the impact. Some people are like, you're going to be a dad. And all of a sudden, like, I tightened up. And I saw that little baby and I'll never, I'd never drink again.

That wasn't me. It was the exact opposite. Like the day that we were, the hospital was in our neighborhood in New York City. So we were scheduled to walk in at 3 p.m. to the hospital to have our daughter. And my wife wanted to get her nails done. So I was like, yeah, I'll walk you down to get your nails done in the morning. And it just happened to be across the street from my favorite Irish pub. So I went in and I was like, Jerry.

I was like, I'm having a kid today, blah, blah, blah. So what does Jerry do? Put the bottle of Jameson in front of it, right, to celebrate having a kid. Fast forward three hours later, I am stumbling into the hospital. And I'm sure my wife is like, oh my God, what am I going to do? Right? What is happening? Right?

Because my support, her support system, me is drunk. And I remember feeling very down on myself and being like, dude, you couldn't hold it together for the birth of your kid. Luckily or unluckily, like the kid didn't come for another 18. hours. So by the time she did come, I was sober and tired, right? But I was sober at least. So I didn't remember everything about the birth of my kid. But I just remember being down on myself going into that. Didn't slow me down. I bought a business. So now I have a kid. I'm running a successful business. I'm not really drinking Monday through Thursday for the most part because I'm traveling for business a lot, driving. The good part about for whatever reason, I never drove drunk ever. If I had a drink to

me, I threw the keys away. I never drove drunk ever. So I had a successful business. I was only drinking on the weekends, literally Friday at 4 o'clock until passed out Sunday. We had a second kid. We moved to a nice apartment. Like, things were good and then COVID hit. And I think 2020 was the jumping point where I didn't have the structure of having to commute. I owned my own business, but my employees were working from home. So now I was left to like my own regard every single day. And that's the rocket ship that took off. Yeah. Wow. So things happen quick there. Throughout this too, though, is Debbie mentioning anything to you about the drinking? Now we're in that stage, right? We're in the, look, I'm doing sober October's. I'm doing dry January,

right? I'm doing the 30-day fitness challenge. And so we're having these talks. Do you have to be like it revolved around, everything revolved around the next bar we were going to or like going out to eat or cracking wine? So yeah, she's, you know, she's chatting with me about it. But like nothing to the point where I'm worried about her leaving. I didn't get the idea that she was drawing a line in the sand and saying, hey, either you do this or I'm gone. And I don't know good, better, and different if that was a help. There was a lot of my family members are, they could write a book on the enablement. My mom, God bless her soul, she literally would give me like a lecture. I do not want you drinking anymore. I got you a six-pack of your favorite beer in the fridge. It was always

enabled. So I can't put it on anybody. It was my own fault. But those conversations started getting more frequent. And then when COVID hit, I was going to, I called it going to lunch. Like I was like, hey, I'm going to head out. I'm going to go grab lunch. I'm going to go grab the laptop and I'm going to whatever. And every day, it was like I started drinking at like noon instead of happy hour. So now I'm drinking at noon.

And now I'm running a company remotely. No one can see that I'm drinking. And those conversations are getting more and more. Then we have a second kid. So now a lot of the stress is on. her, right, because I'm blitzed and 24-7 at this point. And she's really taking the reins of the family, right? So as a man, right, as a protector and a provider, I'm not doing my job anymore. So we fast forward, because I know we're coming up on time, but we fast forward. So I'm drinking now.

I'm hiding white claws in the back of the fridge. I'm getting the kids on the bus and opening up a white claw at 8 a.m. Then I'm getting to the point where I'm waking up at 6 a.m. every day and immediately throwing up, like, running to the bathroom, kids out of the way, throwing up every single morning. And then I have an episode where I hallucinate. I get my daughter out of bed at 2 a.m. Get her completely ready for school. Get her backpack on and start walking her down the stairs. And my wife is at the bottom of the stairs. And she just basically says, Rourke, my daughter, she goes, Rourke, daddy's just sleepwalking or whatever. He's a little confused. Go back up to bed. And she was like, hey, buddy, it's game time. This is not good. I go to a doctor,

like first thing in the morning, they Uber me to a doctor. The doctors look, your ammonia levels are like, the ammonia levels are in your brain are causing you to hallucinate. Your body's not processing anymore. Like, you're in bad shape. And I was like, okay, understood. I'll make sure to get the Gatorade's in me. And not really paying attention. I Ubered right to the bar from the doctor's office because I couldn't stop.

Like I was like, and I choked a beer down and I just remember being like, all right, dude, that's it. You're dead. Like, you're dying. Your life is not going to be the same. You're going to wind up dying just like your dad in front of your kids. And I couldn't do anything to stop it. And I was crying every night. I literally could not picture a world without drinking.

I could not physically stop. My wife was begging me to go to rehab. I couldn't do that because I owned a successful business, right? And I couldn't let the business fall apart. Until one day, I had a business meeting gone bad. February 14th, which is Valentine's Day. And I had a business deal gone bad. It wasn't that bad of a deal, but I made it mountain out of a molehill.

We were supposed to go to dinner for Valentine's Day. and I must have drank about 10 old fashions at the bar at lunch, called my wife up and I'm like, hey, I'm not making dinner. I'm wrecked. I'm taking an Uber home. She's like, no problem. She's the sweetest person on the planet. No problem.

Sent the kids to my neighbor's house and met me with food when I got home. And I cried my eyes out and I said, hey, I'm done. I'm done drinking. I'm at my rock bottom. I just ruined Valentine's Day again. My kids are now at the neighbor's house because my wife doesn't feel safe with me. I'm about to lose everything. And I promised her I was done.

And 12 hours later, at noon the next day, I was standing in front of the bar. I don't remember walking to the bar. I don't remember the decision to go to the bar, put my shoes on. I don't remember any of that, but I remember standing in front of my bar. And I looked up at the bar and I looked at my phone. I had a picture of my daughter on my phone. And I looked at the bar and I looked at my phone and I said, take a lap. And if you want to go in and drink, the bar is going to be there after you take a lap.

So I walked around the block and I stood outside the bar. And I looked at my phone and my daughter and I took another lap. So I was at two laps. I did that 14 times. I took 14 laps that day. And on the 14th lap, I, went home. And I went into bed with a bunch of Gatorin. And I know it probably sounds a little hokey, but I heard a voice. And I was laying face down and anybody that's gone through this knows

how vicious you feel at that exact point, right? I've never been sicker. And I can only say it was a voice of an angel or God or whatever spirit, the higher power you believe in. But the voice just said, Johnny, you're done. This is it. You're done. And I just said, you're right. And I sat in that bed, face down, cricket legs, throwing up, sweating, crying. The next 72 hours was a living hell. But I was saved. And by the grace of God, I avoided the imminent death that was 100% happening. And life has never been better. Wow, man. Great job, dude.

Thanks for sharing that. Yeah, it's just incredible listening to that, right? Okay, because I'm thinking a million different things right now from what you just shared there. One of the things I'm thinking about, too, is when you get to the end there, right? Some people are going to get this and some aren't. You want nothing more than to quit, but you can't quit. You can't see it.

You can't put it down. You can't picture life anyway other than that. way of life. And I mean, you've been doing this. It's been different over the years, but since 12 years old, alcohol has been involved in your life in one way or another. This is how you've been connecting with people, whether it be at work or friends or socially. This is how you've been dealing with your feelings. This is how you've been dealing or not dealing with it. Because I mean, alcohol right? Yeah. Yeah. Provide that. How you cope, right? It was my only coping mechanism. Yeah. Great day, drink.

Really bad day? Drink. Okay day. Let's make it better. Raining out, great day for the bar. Sonia out, great day to sit outside. It was just drink. Yeah.

And it's interesting there too because a lot of people from the outside world, they're like, oh, you're having a bad day, so it makes sense to drink. But, man, I was with you. When I got into the cycle, it didn't matter about the day or the feeling or anything. It was just that was the way I was out. operating in living my life. And then I'll never forget that too. Getting to that spot, man, it gets emotional, right? It's even before I quit, right, that emotion started to come out when I felt like I had truly lost control. Because up until that point in my life, I knew it was a

problem. Like, I was well aware that this is a problem. But it was a problem that I could turn off the tap at any time. It was like a, it was just like a sink tap. Oh, the sinks on. Yeah, that's a problem. But I could just turn it off and we're good. What I didn't fully understand I couldn't just turn it off. It wasn't that straightforward, simple, because when I went to try, it was a ton of resistance. I did not. I tried everything, man. Like, I did no wine, just beer.

No booze, just wine. Tequila because it's healthy. Only on Sundays. The 30-day challenges. Literally, I tried every single different way that you could swing it. to make it work and the amount of time and effort that you have to put into trying to moderate when you know you can't. It's like this mental gymnastics thing that you're even like your inner self is saying,

dude, you can't do this. There's no reason for you to do this moderation thing. It ain't going to work. And you're just like, no, I'm going to hold out to a little bit. If I just, if this just the tequila on Sundays does it like, it'll work. I can just do that. And then you get to the point where you're like, this is not working. This is futile, you know?

Oh, for sure. So at the end there, so, I mean, yeah, you turn this thing around. And it's really interesting, too. I mean, we go back. I've heard this story before in a sense, not exactly yours, but other people shared something. And I don't know if there's anything you can relate to it on this. But growing up, they, not that they didn't want to be like their father, but they didn't want to be drinking like their father. Anything, I will, you know what I mean?

Like, they'll say it out loud, right? I'll never do that. And then it's like towards the end of your journey, maybe that it's not maybe exactly like it. But there's some similarities, I think, there to how you were going about it too. Absolutely. But even in his death, like it was still like my thing that I had in common with them. And I have to point to a lot of my drinking was because of my relationship with him, right?

The craziest part too that I want to bring up, like my wife and I were very much like on the same page, like we're pretty inseparable. And she made plans to leave. the next day. Like, she was, she hit her, that was it. That was her, we weren't fighting. There was no fight. That's how you know it's done, right? When there's no fighting. She promised herself that she was going to either ask me to move out or move out herself with the kids February 15th. Wow. And she saw that I was sober that day and the next day. So she stayed the next day. And then the next day, so you stayed another day.

And then now from that point on, and I'd like to talk about from that point on, because it's, oh, my God. Like, I can't begin to tell you, I am beaming on a daily basis about how good my life is. It is almost hard to put into words. Like, I mean, I hold my little, you know, I flip my little coin around in my hand all day long. I got to the point I felt like a looney tune I was walking like I would right next to the Hudson River

New York City right next to me right like the big skyline like I live right next to the city so it's a pretty inspirational walk in the morning like a year ago two years ago what have you I was walking down the river and I literally said out loud Hallelujah like

Hallelujah I am saved and I know it sounds hokey or whatever but like I can't help put that I am chosen to be here. I am so viciously lucky that I got a second chance. From that day forward, I sold my company. I've lost, as of today, my goal is 80. As of today, I've lost 77 pounds. My liver enzymes are back to normal. My kidney function is back to normal. My blood pressure, and I walk around at stroke level blood pressure.

Like, my blood pressure is back to normal. My relationship with everyone around me is so good and so real. My time with my kids is so quality. I'm tearing up. Like, it's hard to believe, because I don't, how many people are probably told me when I was in the midst of it, like, that life is just, but. My life has been unbelievable sense. Every day is a blessing, and I feel every bit of it. I do more.

My hobbies are better. My relationships with my friends are better. My circle has changed, which that's something that people need to be aware of, that your circle will change, right? Like, it will change. There's no doubt. And you've got to be prepared for that because some of that growing has a little pain with it.

Yeah. But life is good. Yeah. No, that's beautiful. And the thing with the circles, I mean, it will change. And I think for a lot of us, too, it needs to change. Whether we want it to or not, we have to realize that this is my story, your story. They're not one-offs.

The people we're hanging out with is really a reflection about where we're headed. And that includes drinking. And it can include a lot of other areas of our life. You listed off a ton of great stuff there, dude, that you've accomplished. in. You guys might not be able to see it if you listen to the audio, but John's just grinning ear to ear over here with just joy about all this, man. And I mean, even though we're miles and miles apart here through a computer screen, I can feel it. No doubt for everything. I'm wondering, too, though, a lot of that other stuff was what I picked up on anyway was how

things are going outside of your being. How do you feel differently about yourself between your ears and maybe in your heart with sobriety. So the clarity, I think, is the first of foremost. Like, life didn't get easier whatsoever. I don't think life gets easier because you get soap. I think how you deal with life and how you take on the hurdles and obstacles that life gives you, that gets better. because you realize I can get through this.

There's a solution that I can find that I can attack with a clear head and I can overcome. The anxiety that I had every morning knowing that I wasn't being the person that I had the potential to be, that crushed my soul. It rips you apart when you know that you're being the person that I had the potential to be. part when you know that you're built and you're put on this planet to impact and you're not doing it because of a substance, that dwells on you. That messes with your head. And it gives you a massive anxiety. And then the medication for massive anxiety is more of the thing that caused the anxiety, right?

And then that's the spiral. I'm a better person. I'm a better human. But I'm better to myself. I've never given myself grace for anything. But now I'm actually in tune with like how I feel. I've never been a feelings guy. I've always been just whatever.

We're going to barrel through it. Now like you start feeling things and you're like, what is that? That's a feeling? Oh, okay. Like I've never felt that before. I've never felt feelings. This is how people walk around with like emotion. Like real genuine emotion.

I never felt that before. So yeah, it really changes as a person. Yeah, man. Great reflection there on. You know, and I love that, man. I love that approach for it too. Because a lot of people ask, I mean, like, everybody asks, does it get easier? And I'm torn between the two, right?

Does sobriety get easier? Or do we just develop the tools on how to deal with life on life's terms just to keep it simple? And I think we do. I think life gets easier in the sense. Like you mentioned earlier, right? 100% of the things that went sideways in your life were because of drinking, I'm with you too. Like when I look back at my life and everything I'm ashamed of or embarrassed of or was ashamed of or was embarrassed of, it was drinking, man. It wasn't actually me.

It was drinking. So I think when you remove all those extra stress and anxiety causing situations that are like just we don't have control over, you remove that stuff. You start to put some tools on your belt that can help you building new relationships. Emotional sobriety can help you with connecting with other people. It helps you in that direction. And for some people, leaning into faith a little bit more, community. Once you start doing all these things, it's like, you know, my goodness, of course it's going to get better because now I'm working on the solution.

And I'm removing all that other stuff that I was welcoming into my life. And it's so interesting looking back to. And I think you talked about it, right? It was like the cop was just an a hole and everything. That's how I lived my life, man. Every time I got in trouble for something or something didn't go my way, I always blamed it on somebody else. It's the way I was raised. It was the wrong place, wrong time. Dude, it was me. I was the common denominator of every six hundred percent. Yeah, and that's

the crazy part, right? Like, you can justify anything when you're drinking. You can absolutely justify anything. And that kind of brings you like, right, once you get into that mindset, right, where you can now all of a sudden, you're like, how do I make this known for other people, right? Because a lot of people ask me, the craziest part is once you start saying that you're sober, people start coming out like that you wouldn't even believe. Friends of friends, family members, people that were like, hey, how did you do it? Or any tips or whatever, right? Because the way I got to listen, I've been in AA meetings my whole life with my dad.

I was like, I tried outpatient. I tried AA meetings. I tried the craziest part. What worked for me was like a couple things. Social media, which is wild, right? Like, you're a podcast. Following people that have what I wanted, all of a sudden, I'm like, oh, wait, there's guys that have what I want. And they're all sober too.

Interesting, right? And then a buddy of mine, Andy, he decided to give it up and just broadcasted it. And I'm like, wow, like, that takes, I'm not there yet. Like, that takes a lot of nerve to just tell the whole world that you're sober. And then all of a sudden, I grabbed my phone one day and I'm like, screw it, let's do it. All right. Hey guys, it's John. And I started J Buck official on Instagram because I realized it was the people that I was watching on Instagram that gave me the motive. Like if they can do it, I should be able to do it. If these guys are proud enough to say it out loud, right? If your

if your mind can cheat and conceive it and your heart believes it and you believe it enough to speak it out, then you can accomplish anything. And then I've realized like, I'm sure you had that epiphany, I would be wasting the most valuable lesson I ever got by not trying to put it out there to help others. Yeah. And so I started a men's group to help men find their tribe locally and to try to younger guys, to try to get them on the right road. And I don't preach sobriety.

I just preach doing the right thing. And through action, through showing what I do, all of a sudden, there's a couple more waters on the table. at the meeting. So I put out videos every single day, sometimes about sales, sometimes about business, sometimes about life, a lot of times about sobriety. And the feedback is nonstop. Hey, this really helped. And it's almost, it starts becoming a snowball. And like you said, like what you're doing, but you probably have a backlog of people that want to speak with you because people need to hear this. Yeah. And if you help one person, if you help one person,

not ruin a marriage that was supposed to make it or one person not wind up in a hospital bed. Man, what a life that is. Isn't that a success? What a success that is. Yeah, it is, man. It really is.

And I mean, that's the mission and the vision for the podcast. Podcasting when I first got into it, right? Oh, yeah, it's not much work. It is a lot of work. But I enjoy nothing more than sitting down with people to hear their story and just to see what it's like, man.

and let other people out there know that truly no matter where you're at, there's a way out of this thing. Like, your life doesn't have to revolve around alcohol. Nothing's going to change with alcohol. Nothing's going to change, right? It's not going to ever bring value to your life. And the sooner that you can get away from it, and just by saying enough is enough, you don't have to wait for all this stuff to happen or madness to come down. Like, just get ahead of this thing and do yourself a favor and avoid this stuff. Yeah, but that's what it's all about, man. And it's been, for me personally, it's been a wild journey, man. And I'm glad to see that you're out there putting stuff together for other people. I have this sort of thing of each one, teach one,

sort of this, uh, the sentence, right? About just help people out. And I'm not the sobriety preachy guy either. I just share my experiences and the experience of others and where people land, they land. And if you don't stay sober, then you didn't do it right or you're not a success. Because like your story and so many others, you truly never know when that moment. is going to come. You didn't have a plan for February 15th. The day I got sober, I didn't have a plan. I just said, you know what? I feel like shit. My life is going absolutely nowhere. Maybe there's a little bit more in the tank. I put my socks on, put my pants on, did a little bit of laundry in the sink. And I went about my day. And I was sober that day. And I was woke up the next day,

and I was like, yo, let's be sober today. And let's go to a support group. And then here we are years later. And that's why I always tell people, just because you don't, think it's going to play out for you. You never know when it's going to. So just stay in the game. 100%. Listen, I'm sure, like a lot of your guests and the people you speak to, 100 day ones, right? 100 day one, you know what? I'm just going to give it up. I'm going to give it up for 30 days. I'm going to do a challenge. I'm going to do whatever. And then finally, one day, it's, and once again, I pray that you don't have to get to the point where you're like, you're hallucinating and you have ammonia in your brain and your doctor's telling your kidneys are shutting down. But, you know,

I hope that everybody gets to the point where you're like, okay, I'm done with this. You know what I mean? This is not giving me anything back, especially if there's no control of it. When you get to that out of control stage, that's a scary place to be, especially when you're cognizant of it. When you realize that you're out of control, that's scary because that's like literally being on a roller coaster that you can't get off of. I could not not go to the bar.

Like I would wake up most days towards the end and be like, I'm not drinking today. and by noon I was sitting at the bar. And I have a billion stories that I could tell. This podcast could be six hours long with all the war stories. But what worked for me, one day at a time, one single day at a time, and I think that's the key for me. Scheduling, like in the beginning, I scheduled, wake up here, go to bed here, and I had literally every minute of the day, chock full. Because I knew if I had a little bit of wiggle room, I'm not going to let my brain say. send me where I know he was going to send me.

Yeah. But man, what a blessing. Yeah. Well, wrapping up here, man, if somebody's listened to this episode and they're struggling to get or stay sober, what would you say to him? Great question. A, the strongest thing that you can do, which may go against everything that you feel internally, especially if you're a guy and you're taught like you deal with your problems by just

gritting and bearing them, is asking for it. for help. Ask somebody for help. Family, friends, professionals that are very good at what they do. Ask for help. Get over the stigma of asking for help. Because once you do, help will arrive. Help will arrive. Audit your circle. Take a look at who are you surrounding yourself with. The five people that you spend the most time with, show me your circle. I'll show you your future. Surround yourself with people that have what you want. And don't be afraid to ask for help. That's the key to the starting. And if I can give anything from there, life is unbelievably better when you finally come into your own. The only regret I have is not doing it sooner.

If I had this level of clarity in my 20s through my 30s, I have no doubt. I'd be taking this podcast from a private jet. No doubt. Love that, man. Yeah. Well, thanks for sharing. And thanks again so much for sharing your story with us. Thank you for, Brad.

Thank you for the platform. Thank you for having me. If anybody's trying to get in touch, I always say, the easiest way is my Instagram. It's at J. Buck. My name is John Buckley. So J. Buck is my nickname. at J-Buck official. My DMs are always open.

So please feel free. When I say ask for help, I will respond to you every time. Beautiful, man. Thank you. Well, there it is, everyone. Another incredible episode. Thanks so much, John, for jumping on

and be willing to share your story with all of us. I'll drop John's Instagram handle, link down to the show notes below if you want to reach out to them and just say thank you. We're jumping on here on the podcast and sharing a story.

If you haven't left a review yet on Apple or Spotify, jump over there right after listening to this. Drop a written review on Apple, five stars on Spotify, and I'll see you on the next one.