The Rich Roll Podcast - How Adam Sud Lost 100 Pounds, Kicked Adderall, Reversed His Diabetes & Found A Life

Episode Date: September 10, 2015

I love the everyman stories. Adam Sud isn't famous. He's not a world-class performer. And he's not schilling a book. He's just an average dude living a pretty normal life. But look deeper and you'll find a rather extraordinary story. The story of a guy who completely lost himself in the bleak darkness of drug and food addiction. Hopelessly hooked since high school on the superman rush provided by Adderall, Adam spent most of his twenties isolating and high — up all night playing video games and binging on fast food. The heavier he got, the more he isolated, until he stopped caring altogether. Life shrank to a cycle of getting high, finding more Adderall, and repressing his increased depression and anger with more and more fast food — a lifestyle that left him over 300lbs with Type-2 diabetes on a crash course with an early grave. Out of cash, unemployable and alienated from friends and family, Adam finally faced a choice: live on the street or reach out for help. After extended stays in rehab and sober living facilities Adam found sobriety, peace of mind and a new lease on life. Oh yeah — he also lost over 100 pounds, reversed his diabetes and repaired his physical health wholesale. How? By adopting an active, plant-based lifestyle. Today, Adam lives a conscious, purpose-driven life devoted to helping others achieve and maintain a holistic, healthy lifestyle. Not surprisingly, this is a conversation about drug addiction, sobriety and nutrition. But it's also a conversation about cross-addiction, low self-esteem and an important issue rarely discussed — body dysmorphia and eating disorders in men. I'm inspired by Adam's tale of everyman redemption and I think you will be too. I sincerely hope you enjoy the exchange. Peace + Plants, Rich

When I reversed my type 2 diabetes, it was when I saw the weight coming off that I felt self-worth for the first time and I felt like there was somebody worth saving and I had enough self-confidence to say, alright, you know what, I'm going to drop the ego with my therapist and say I don't know what to do. The way that I know how to live my life clearly isn't working as far as an emotional individual. Maybe I should just do what they're saying I should do and see what happens. That's Adam Sood, and this is the Rich Roll Podcast. The Rich Roll Podcast. Hey, what's up, everybody? How you guys doing? I'm Rich Roll Podcast. What's the aim? The aim is to help all of us simply unlock and unleash our best, most authentic selves. So thank you so much for tuning into the show. Thanks for subscribing to the show on iTunes.

Thanks for checking out my weekly newsletter and subscribing to that, for giving us a review on iTunes, and for always making sure to use the Amazon banner ad at richroll.com for all your Amazon purchases. Thank you so much. So one of the things that I think kind of makes this show unique that distinguishes it from a lot of the other interview shows out there

is that every once in a while, I bring on somebody who I think could barely be characterized as an everyman. You know, I had Josh Lajani on a couple of times. You remember him. You know, the story of somebody who is basically, you know, not a superhero, not some kind of world-class high performer, but just like an everyday average person having a human experience who has faced and overcome some specific obstacles on the journey towards becoming more fully expressed.

And so today is one of those guys. Adam Sood, again, he's not a world-ranked athlete. He's not a renowned expert in any particular field. He doesn't have a book coming out. He's just a guy. He's a dude. He's a human like everyone out there listening. But it just so happens that this human

has a pretty amazing story. And I'm really looking forward to sharing it with you guys today. More on Adam in a minute, but first. All right, Adam Su, today's Everyman guest. So I don't want to give away too much about this conversation and this guest, but I will say this. Adam is a really good guy. He's a very grounded guy.

He's a young guy, but not too long ago, he was also a guy who was pushing over 300 pounds crash course with an early grave. But he turned it around. He got sober. He lost the weight. He became an athlete. He became a holistic lifestyle coach and a whole number of additional things. His life has blossomed. So how did he do it? Well, you're just going to have to listen in to the story.

And it's a pretty compelling story. He is quite a dynamic young man. But it's also a story that I hope you can emotionally tap into and perhaps relate to a little bit more intimately than some of the other guests simply because Adam isn't some superhero or world-class performer or somebody with a massive social media following or anything like that. Again, he's just an average guy who came up against some pretty severe obstacles in his life and found the wherewithal to get to the other side. And I think that in and of itself is just a really compelling, interesting, emotionally charged story that I'm excited to share with you guys today. This is a conversation about drug addiction and sobriety, of course, but it's also about cross addiction, food addiction, eating disorders. And in particular, what's unique about eating disorders in men, which is something that doesn't get talked about all that much.

It's about low self-esteem, body image, self-image, body dysmorphia. And we have an interesting discussion about masculinity among many other things. So without further ado, let's step into the world of Adam Sood and find out what this guy's all about, shall we? Enjoy. We're in my office right now. There's a fan overhead. Like I've tried everything to try to figure out how to turn off the fans in here that kind of make a relentless buzzing noise that makes me crazy. It's no problem.

Just telling the audience, like, bear with us. I'm sorry about that. But anyway, man, you got a really cool story, and I'm looking forward to kind of getting into it. There's so many inflection points, points of commonality between your story is different than mine, but it's also very similar. And, uh, it's pretty cool, man, what you've been able to, what you've been able to, uh, you know, do with your life. Thank you very much. I appreciate it. Kudos on, uh, on making the turnaround. Thank you. You know, so, well, let's take it back. So you have a, uh, you grew up, did you grow up out here? No, I grew up in Austin, Texas. I was born in Houston, um, and lived in Houston until I was about, uh, 14. And then grew up in Austin, Texas. I was born in Houston and lived in Houston until I was

about 14. And then we moved to Austin, Texas. And yeah, I'm like a seventh generation Texan. Oh, wow. How long have you been out in California then? Three years. Yeah. You like it out here? I do. I like the weather, but you know, I'm a Texas boy at heart. So I miss, I miss the breakfast tacos, not breakfast burritos. And have you found any good ones here? There's some good stuff out here.

Yeah. Where do you like to eat in Santa Monica? Where do you like to eat? Well, you know, I found that since I became vegan that I make about 95% of my meals myself at home. Right, right. But when I do go out, you know, I like to just go to whole foods and get something really good. So does that have anything to do with the fact that your dad was a founding investor in whole foods markets? Uh, no. Uh, well maybe,

you know, cause I grew up with it in my home, you know, um, but, uh, how did that happen? Let's take it back there. Like, so, so your dad is one of the original OGs, right? He is. Like got involved in Whole Foods in the very beginning. That's right. Was he a friend of John Mackey's or how did that come about? They grew up together on the same street. Oh, wow.

And played high school basketball together and then went to school together. And yeah, went through the whole thing. So John was kind of like a hippie farmer guy, right? Yeah. Like back in the day. Absolutely. And he's still a sort of rebel hippie at heart, I believe. Well, he's quite the capitalist too.

Yeah, and he's not ashamed of it and he shouldn't be, I don't think. He wrote that great book, Conscious Capitalism, which is, I read it and I really like it. He wrote that great book, Conscious Capitalism, which is, you know, I read it and I really like it. Well, it's quite amazing how Whole Foods has really transformed, you know, how we think about food. Absolutely. In many, many, many interesting ways. And, you know, mostly for the good. I just got back from Pennsylvania. I spoke at this event called called summer vegetarian summer

fest and they bring in all these speakers and um i had heard i heard a talk by this guy gary francione do you know who i don't he's a professor of law at uh at ruckers and he's sort of a lifelong he's probably the most hardcore animal rights, you know, activist advocate that I've ever come across in my experience. And he is so strident and intense. Like his whole position is, he comes from an abolitionist point of view, right? Like, like either, like if you draw an analogy between using animals as chattel with human slavery, like there is no middle ground, right? That's right. Either you adhere to this idea that animals are property and therefore it's appropriate for us to be able to exploit them or you don't.

Exactly. There's no third option. or you don't. There's no third option. And from his point of view, and I'd never really heard this articulated before, but he was really like calling to the mat like PETA and the Humane Society and Whole Foods, because in his opinion, he feels that this trend towards kind of grass-fed, sustainably raised animals is actually a move backwards in terms of the animal rights movement, because it's making people feel more comfortable and better about eating animals for food, right? So we're lulled into this idea. And Whole Foods, if you really think of it in that context, like if you see it through Gary's point of view, and you go to Whole Foods Market, and you

see these pictures of these farmers, and you see pictures of cows that look like they're living, you know, fulfilling lives, I guess, then you feel less guilty about choosing to purchase that and eat that, right? Yeah. And, you know, honestly, for a long time, I felt the same way. You know, I brought up the point that if Whole Foods is this conscious company, and I truly believe that it is, why is it okay with selling meat products? And the fact is that it's because its customers ask for it. And so in order to do so, in order to fulfill what the customers want, they're going to do it in the most humane and sustainable way possible. But I agree with you. They're also participating in cultivating that demand, though, right? True. So they're in partnership with that. But what was really interesting about what he was saying is how

these organizations, you know, we think of PETA as being, you know, one of the most hardcore animal rights groups, right? But even they will sort of, you know, commend the Whole Foods markets or other organizations for making incremental progress. Okay, well, this is great. So you're now advocating cage free, for example, right? But then that just makes you feel better about buying eggs as opposed to Gary's point of view, which is you shouldn't do it at all. So you're lulled into this sense that exploiting animals isn't so bad. You know what I mean? I'm not saying that, I've just been thinking about this because I just heard his speech, but I thought it was an interesting point of view. It is. And, you know, I heard an amazing statistic recently when

I was at the Engine 2 immersion in Arizona with Rip Esselstyn and we watched this film and, you know, I can't remember the name of it, but they were talking about, they talked to this farmer who has converted his cattle to grass fed and everything. And he's in Montana. And he said, so, you know, what do you think about the, you know, in South America where they're raising cattle and in order to do that, they're clearing X amount of rainforest in order to create grazelands for these cattle. And the statement that the farmer makes is that, well, if the country can't sustain that kind of product, then they shouldn't be raising cows. And then he replies by saying, well, did you know that if we want to convert all of our cattle in the United States to grass fed, we would have to cover the entire United States, all of Canada, have all of Central America and half of South America with grass grazing lands. That includes all the cities, all the mountains.

Right. You know, everything. And so our country can't sustain it as well. Right, right. Well, that movie is called Cowspiracy. Cowspiracy. That's it. That's it.

And I have a producer credit on that movie because I've helped them kind of market that movie a little bit. And Kip and Keegan are friends. And what they've done with that film is quite extraordinary. There's some pretty exciting things coming up with that film. So everybody's going to see it soon. There's some tough stuff to watch at the end too. Yeah. I mean, I think when you hear that title, you think it's a movie that's about animal exploitation. Like, you're sort of girding yourself to see animals suffering, but it's not that. It's really just the perspective of how we raise food via industrialized animal agriculture and the deleterious impact that that's having on our environment. It's really an environmental film.

It's nothing like, I don't know if you've seen Earthlings, but I could get through half of that movie without it becoming way too much. That's a very, very difficult movie to watch. And I think people see Cowspiracy and they think it's going to be that, but it's not that at all. But anyway, we digress. So your dad gets involved in Whole Foods Market at the inception. That's pretty amazing. Yeah. It's something I'm really proud of. And he currently is the executive in charge of business growth and development for Whole Foods. So he's located back in Austin. So what does that mean?

He's in charge of the real estate, developing the new stores. And, I mean, the company has done really well since he's, you know, really become hands-on with the company. Um, at first he was, uh, taking over his dad's, his father's business. Um, his father passed away from cancer when he was 25. And, uh, so he went home and ran the family business. And then at a certain point, I think it was right before I started high school, uh, John said, you know, we really need you to come here. And he came and joined us in that position. Right. And how old were you at that? I was 15. Okay. So you kind of grew up in a household where healthy food was surrounding you.

Yeah. The idea have healthy living. Absolutely. And my dad is a marathoner. And, you know, he from a very young age, I think even maybe too young, became very critical of, you know, the way I chose to eat and live. And it wasn't until later that I understood it was because of the fact that he lost his father at a very young age to what could have been a preventable disease. And he gets very scared of losing people who are close to him as a result of preventable disease. Right. So anybody who he's close with that he truly loves, if they're becoming unhealthy, it scares him and he becomes hypercritical. Right. becoming unhealthy, it scares him and he becomes hypercritical. Right. Instead of just being able to open up to them and say, you know, I'm scared about what you're doing. And this, you know, I don't want to lose you. So that sort of thing. So but back when you're 15, so you're just not buying it. Like you're just Yeah, what are you doing? Like you're on high school. And you know,

I'm 15 years old in high school at a very competitive football high school. And I didn't really fit in with the football crowd. But so I was, you know, I was kind of like your average rebellious teenager. And, you know, your parents saying you have to eat this way and this is the way in the house. So when you as soon as you left the house, you're like, yeah, going to McDonald's. Exactly. Yeah. In the house, it was certain foods. I never, we never had the, you know, a lot of the Oreos and all that stuff ever since I was little.

Um, I would always go over to my friend's houses and play so that I can get, you know, the, the snacks and whatnot. So yeah. Do I think that that played into it? Um, a bit. Yeah. Into my, uh, sort of as a rebellious rebellious way of saying, you know, whatever. Right.

I can do whatever I want type of thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That certainly played into it. Yeah, screw off, old man. Exactly. That kind of thing, yeah. But he must know what's going on, right? Oh, absolutely.

So this is causing like a strain in your relationship with your parents. You know, especially later on after college because I was always really fit in high school. But you didn't play football, but did you play sports? Well, I mean, my brother was on varsity tennis, so I used to play tennis with him as a way to, you know, help him train. And that's my twin brother. You're twins, right? My twin, yeah.

But I did drama, and I was always really interested in arts, and so I did drama and art classes. But I was always really fit in arts, and so I did drama and art classes. But I was always really fit, and, you know, so it wasn't really that big of an issue when I was in the house. And as long as you didn't see it outside of the house, I guess it wasn't too big of a problem. Right, out of sight, out of mind. Yeah. Okay, so pretty typical high school experience for the most part. Absolutely. Right? You go off to college, and somewhere along the lines, the beautiful, wondrous effects of Adderall start to enter your life.

Oh, yeah. Absolutely. Right? So let's talk about that. Absolutely. I fell in love with that stuff. Yeah. You know, it was like my senior year in high school, actually.

When, you know, I started taking Adderall in high school, but I didn't know until my senior year when someone said, you just take a bunch of that. You can just stay up all night and study and get all your work done. And I did that. And from then on, I was just addicted to that feeling of being superhuman, of never having to take a break and always being at 110%. And I loved it. I love that, too. I never took Adderall, but you're making me want some right now.

And the thing is, I was prescribed it for attention deficit disorder, and it's an over-prescribed medication. And then when you get to college, it's all over the schools. Students are using it like crazy, right? It's like the super drug. So initially, you get diagnosed with ADHD at some point along the line. Yeah. By what what happens like your parents take you to a shrink or. That's right. Yeah. I mean, I had, you know, I was kind of an angry kid growing up and, you know, used to fight the school structured lifestyle. structured lifestyle. And so they took me to go talk to somebody and this therapist or psychiatrist suggested that I take at first Ritalin and then it became Adderall. And that

was sort of the beginning of it. Although, you know, at first, of course, I, you know, refused to take the medication because I was just sort of this rebellious. Yeah, exactly. Like, actually, this stuff's really good. Yeah, exactly. You know, if I could take a drug that would allow me to just be super hyper-focused and be hyper-productive, like, I'm in. Yeah, exactly. So I hear these stories about, like, you hear Dave Asprey, you know, the bulletproof diet guy.

He talks about ProVigil and how it makes him like a superhuman person and you can, like, crank out his work. Like, that's very, very dangerous for me to hear that because my first impulse is like I got to get some of that. Exactly. I could use some of that. Think how much more productive I could be. And as somebody in recovery like yourself, like those messages are, you know, scary stuff. Exactly.

are, you know, scary stuff. Exactly. And, you know, it was fine all the way through college. But at some point, I guess maybe my last year of college, it had taken its toll on my metabolism to the point to where it basically wasn't there. It didn't work unless I was on a lot of the medication. Well, you developed a tolerance. Exactly. So when you get to college,

I mean, how is this? How do you get it? Like, are you still going to the student union, like health center or something like that? Or are people just selling it in the dorm? It's both. I was seeing a doctor in Georgia to get the medication and then I would buy it from people as well because I was taking, you know, the stuff, the amount that I would get from the doctor was never enough. Right. And so I'd have to buy some extra on the side. And it got to a point to where I was doing, when I got out of college, I was doing an obscene amount. I mean, the doctors would prescribe you an average prescription, I guess, is anywhere from 20 to 60 milligrams a day. By the end of my addiction, I was doing 450. So every single day, every single day. How expensive is it? It's really expensive. Uh, especially subsidizing all of this, unfortunately, uh, uh, with, uh, my whole food stock. Ah, I gotcha. Yeah. So, um, all right. So

walk me through like that first experience of when, when it really hit you like, wow, Adderall is something awesome. Was it a slow process of just realizing like, oh, this is like a secret weapon? Or did it kind of hit you one day like you stayed up all night and cranked out a paper or something like that? This is how I'm going to make my way in the world. Exactly. I got all my work done. I never had to take a break. And then afterwards, all I wanted to do was just stay up and be fixated on something just, and so I got onto video games and started playing those like crazy all night long. And I still had energy at the end of it because I could just take some-

So you didn't have a crash? No, just take some more. Just keep taking it. Yeah. And how, so were you sleeping at all? I would go on average two, two and a half days without sleep. And then I would crash and then wake up, you know, 15, 16 hours later. Do you have like a hangover? Yeah. And you get, you know, you get really, really hungry afterwards. And unfortunately, at the end, I was still hungry on it and addicted to fast food.

Right. Well, we're going to get into all of that in a minute, but I'm just like, I'm like super interested in just Adderall and the impact of that and how that kind of began to change your brain chemistry. Yeah. I mean, it, it, it affects you in, in every single aspect in the same way that meth does because Adderall is an amphetamine. That's exactly what it is. It's just legal amphetamine. And luckily, because I wasn't snorting it, I was just swallowing it. I was ingesting it. I didn't do a lot of the damage to my brain that a lot of addicts do. But, you know, it makes... Have that, I mean, did they give it to you in like a time lapse and then you chew it up?

So you override the... There's two kinds. There's two kinds. There's instant release, and there's the extended release. And I always ask for the instant release. Instant release. Exactly. Of course you did, right? Yeah, exactly. They tried to get me on the extended release a few times.

I said, no, it doesn't work on me. But of course it does. Right. Well, that's like a... I mean, anybody who is tuned in at all to somebody who potentially is an addict, that would be a red flag right there. Right. Absolutely. Anybody who's asking for the instant. Oh, and I was doctor shopping like crazy, which is where you have more than one doctor prescribing the same medication without them

knowing about each other. And it's completely illegal. It's totally a felony. Right. Um, do they have systems where they can monitor that kind of thing or they do? But you know, the thing was, I wasn't doing so I wasn't I was always uh just having two doctors at one time to where it wasn't so many different pharmacies and so many different so you wouldn't get completely exactly and I also wasn't filing it under insurance um which is really how they catch you right because insurance won't fill a prescription if it's within a month of the previous one uh-huh so I I say, oh, I don't have insurance, paying out of pocket, and then it was just up to the pharmacy.

Right. So the message in that is this is how crafty you get when you become an addict. Oh, my goodness. You become unbelievably resourceful at learning how to game a system. Incredibly. I mean, whatever, you know, even if it came down to,

oh, my goodness, I'm out today. I need some. I would craft and scheme and call and do whatever is necessary. And I would get it if I needed it. You always get it. Yeah. You always get it. It doesn't matter if you have to spend your entire day, like, figuring out how it's going to happen. Because that's the only thing that's important.

Yeah. It overrides everything. It makes your world about that big, you know, which I'm making a symbol saying very, very small. Because it just literally revolves around, do I have any, how much do I have left? When does that mean I need to get more? How am I going to get more? And then when all of that is figured out, anything that's left over, any energy that's left over for social activities or work, you may spare some energy for that, but it's not important. So I became this recluse of a person who just sort of hid in my apartment. Yeah, you become, you think that it's the solution that's allowing you to be successful. Like you

attribute all of these miraculous benefits to it, but you're completely myopic to the fact that your life starts to just become smaller and smaller and smaller and smaller. You think that you're controlling your life by taking it when it's completely controlling you. Right, right, right. When I was in rehab, I went to a rehab where there were a lot of professional diversion groups would send their people. So there were a lot of doctors and there were a lot of pilots. But it was so interesting to hear the stories from the doctors, particularly anesthesiologists, because they have so much access, right, to, like, drugs like fentanyl and sufentanil, which I'm told have a very similar kind of effect

in terms of, like, allowing you to be really productive. Okay. And just the incredible links to which they would go to kind of like steal it out of the hospital, but do it in a way where no one would notice and then using their own script pads and spreading it across. They knew where every single pharmacy was in like a hundred mile radius and they would drive out of town and go way to a different town, to a you know, the amount of energy that would go into it is extraordinary. Yeah. And I think that's something that, you know, if you're a normal person, you're like, what? Like, I don't understand, you know, but when you're an addict, you're right. Of course. Yeah. Yeah. That's just part of it. Exactly. What? Of course. Yeah. So. All right. So. So at some point,, you have to realize like, this is not, not good. I'm sure that realization came somewhat before say it in my head, but I could never say it out loud. And there were nights where I'd be up and I'd be feeling miserable.

And I'd know that it's because I'm almost out and I'd be worried about it. And I'd say to myself, man, I'm an addict. And I asked myself to say it out loud. And I just could not get my lips to make the movement and actually say it. I couldn't do it. But I just could not get my lips to make the movement and actually say it. I couldn't do it. And, uh, but you know, I just denied the help. I denied asking for it and I knew it was there. My dad, you know, everybody must've known. Cause if you're not sleeping and you're, you must be kind of looking a little strung out and like beady eyed and stuff.

Yeah. You know, and, and, and everybody had sort of made their attempt to reach out. Uh, you know, and everybody had sort of made their attempt to reach out. You know, my sister, my mother, my father, friends. They say, you know, if you think you're fooling somebody, you're kidding yourself. And how would you respond to that? Oh, I'd make up, oh, it's, you know, because I have OCD and you're seeing the tics are just part of my OCD. Because I would get, you know, like tics where things would bother me and I have to like touch my, my hair, move it off my ears all the time. And, um, and they'd say, you know, we can tell, you know, you're always futzing with something and, uh, and say, well, that's because I actually have OCD and I'm seeing somebody about it.

So don't worry about it. You know, just get everybody off your back. Yeah. Just get everyone off my back, make up whatever I have to make up in order to just get off the subject. How long, how long into, uh, you taking it before people started to notice? I think it was the last five years of it. So, uh, this was after college. Um, I guess I was about 25. Yeah. Um, so you had a pretty long career of using this stuff. Oh my gosh. Yeah. Yeah. I was a, I was a hardcore addict for probably 10 years. But when you were in high school, it was just starting, right? Yeah, it was just for fun.

It was just, you know, on weekends at parties, you know, I could hand it out, you know, get people to come to parties and whatnot, be invited to parties. So it wasn't just for studying. Oh, no. It was recreational just as much wasn't just for studying. Oh, no. It was recreational just as much as it was for studying. Absolutely. And you didn't venture off of Adderall and get into other drugs? I mean, Adderall was the drug of choice. I mean, of course, I smoked marijuana in high school.

And there were a couple occasions when I did ecstasy because I went to some raves with some friends. But none of those really they didn't do it for me. It wasn't the same. I guess I was sort of seeking a substance that would allow me to have attributes that I was lacking. And that was being that type A personality. I never learned how to do that on my own.

And this drug did it for me. Right. Did you ever try cocaine? Yeah. It doesn't last long enough. Right. Did it have a similar kind of effect? Oh, yeah.

It's very similar. Right. But it just wears off too soon. That's the bottom line. I relate, man. I was always too, you know, I'm older than you. So, so prescription meds weren't, they just weren't really around when I was in college. You know, I probably would have been right there with you, but I had like a super healthy fear of, of cocaine because I knew myself well enough to know that if I tried that, that that would be the end of me, right? So I just

stuck with booze. But had I taken that leap and gotten into cocaine, I think it would have accelerated the whole process. Probably, yeah. And I'm sure I would have loved Adderall. Oh, well, be glad you didn't try it. Yeah, maybe I dodged a bullet there. But what's also interesting is kind of, well, there's a couple observations. You know, at some point, there is a cross addiction with food, right? Absolutely. So you come off of, you know, this protracted high, and then you have this intense hunger. And you're also kind of, meanwhile, sort of, you know, at a young age, you're rebelling through, you know, eating fast food and stuff like that.

of, you know, at a young age, you're rebelling through, you know, eating fast food and stuff like that. So then when that intense hunger kicks in, the pangs after the drug is starting to wear off, and then you're on this roller coaster, right, of up and down and sort of binging on fast food, which kind of, my impression is that, you know, you sort of develop this eating disorder at the same time that you're developing this Adderall addiction. I became an emotional eater, 100%. You know, when I would come off of the drug, I would feel miserable. And, you know, it was an instant, you know, source of instant gratification, you know, go to McDonald's, get two cheeseburgers and come back and just watch TV. And, you know, almost became like a hoarder. I had, you know, this garbage around my couch, which was just fast food wrappers. Um, it's because I didn't really

give a, I didn't give a crap about anything else. You know, uh, let my hygiene go. I let my health go. I gained, you know, a whole bunch of weight, especially by the end. And, um, right. So you're, I'm, I'm looking at you right now. You're a skinny, fit guy. But I know because I'm also looking at a before picture of you that you are at 1.300 pounds. Yeah. Right? Yeah. Which is hard to imagine looking at you right now. You don't resemble your former self at all. So a lot of these eating issues, and this is what I want to get into, kind of stem from this sort of lack of self-esteem or kind of body images, body image dysmorphia that you had.

And it's an interesting subject. I just got an email the other day from a guy who's a professional triathlete. I'd met him like last year and he sent an interesting email and he said, you know, one thing you haven't talked about on the podcast is eating disorders in men, particularly male athletes. It's something it's kind of a shadowy subject that I think exists. You know, I think there's a lot of athletes out there, male athletes that do struggle with an eating disorder. disorder. But unlike it is with women, it's kind of a, you know, it's still, I think, kind of a shameful thing, right? I think there's a lot of men that are that are suffering quietly from this. And it's different if you're a guy, like to say, I'm anorexic, or I'm bulimic, or I have this body dysmorphia. And I'm obsessed with, you know, what I'm eating as a result of trying to control my life and the kind of disorder that that blossoms out of that. So I'm interested in kind of getting into that, you know,

how that developed in you when you became aware of it and kind of what your, you know, daily practices around food were at that time. You know, I think I've always had, I've always struggled with self-image and with some kind of low uh, some kind of, uh, low self-esteem when it comes to body image. Um, and, uh, I think that what happened was, um, my relationship with my twin brother, you know, we would sort of qualify each other's lifestyles by doing the same thing. So if he was, you know, eating unhealthy and then I could do it. It's fine. Were you guys wearing the same clothes every day? We were.

Were you? Yeah. Until what age? Well, we wore different colors when we were little, when we were real little. Some people could tell you are. Are you an identical twin? Yeah. My brother wore blue, and I wore red until— You're wearing red right now.

I'm wearing red right now. So you still do it. I still do it. Is he wearing a blue shirt today? You know, he might be. I doubt it, though. But, yeah, until, you know, middle school. Then it didn't, you know, it was all about trying to differentiate ourselves from each other, trying to find our own identity.

And that was an interesting struggle that, you know, he would find an activity that he really liked. And of course, I really liked it too, but he would get mad because I was doing it. Right. That's my thing. Yeah. Find your own thing. Exactly. Find out who you are. This is who I am. Right. So he's playing tennis. And what else is he doing? In high school, he, well, basically, he just, he was all about tennis. And he had, we were both really into cars. And he had the fastest car in high school so what was he driving it was a uh a 97 mustang cobra with a kenny brown c4 racing package on it no high school kid should have a car like that it was

pushing 600 horsepower wow so it was pretty sick he had nitrous on it and everything oh my god it's like right out of like Friday Night Lights. It is, you know. And not only that, it's, you know, Texas high school. Right. So, yeah. And so we used to drag race and stuff like that. Uh-huh.

But. Did you have a fast car too? No. No. I mean, I liked cars and I'm still obsessed with cars. But for some reason, he always got the better car. So is that making you resentful as a young person? It was.

How are you differentiating yourself? It was, because all of our closest friends, we were all about cars. And I was Bobby's brother. Bobby, who had the fast car, I was his brother. It would be different if he was like your older brother, like he was, uh, you know, Matthew McConaughey in Dazed and Confused. Right. Exactly. Brother, but, but you're the same age. Exactly. You look exactly alike. So, you know, I never had, I never got to really do any of the racing. Um, but it was fine. You know, I did, um, I did drama and I competed, uh, nationally in, and I competed nationally in drama and prose and things like that.

And it was pretty cool. But we were both really, really interested in art as far as computer animation and film. And we both got, it was weird, we were kind of recruited by Savannah College of Art and Design. They came to our high school and they went to our electronic media class, which is our computer animation course. And our professor sort of pulled us aside and had us show this representative our portfolios. And they said, oh, this is exactly what we're looking for. And they offered us the biggest scholarship that they can offer to the school. And so we both accepted and we went there originally for computer art until we found out what that meant as a career path, just sort of sitting in a room, staring at a screen,

creating problems for yourself and, you know, thinking that you're going to be in charge of a Disney film is, you know, it's not going to happen. But we've, both of us have been big fans of film ever since we were little. Right. And so we changed our major to film. And we both of us have been big fans of film ever since we were little. Right. And so we changed our major to to film. And I remember the first time that I rolled on my short film, it was on Super 16 millimeter on an old Arri camera. And I just fell in love with being behind the camera.

And I think that a lot of that passion was was fueled byderall as well because I became obsessed with camera work and with photography and not just the art but understanding the technology. I could now stay up all night long reading the manuals and it would be pleasurable because I was on Adderall. Right, right. And I could show up and know more than everyone else. And I got really high on that, that feeling of being the person who knew more than everyone else

about a certain subject. With Adderall, though, does the memory fade? Is it that thing where you can cram for a test and know it the next day, but then a week later you can't remember any of it? No. next day but then like a week later you can't remember any of it no um i've actually uh for ever since i was little had an amazing uh amount of recall um the only time that it would get difficult is if you're on like day three of staying up and you're trying to actually be effective right at that point at some point it's not gonna happen wheels are still just not gonna

happen wagon right all right so so you're so basically your brother becomes your filmmaking At that point, it's just not going to happen. The wheels are still going to fall off the wagon. All right. So basically your brother becomes your filmmaking partner. I mean, I know you guys have a film company today and you guys work together. Yeah. We used to work together a lot more. Now he just runs the whole thing himself back in Texas. Oh, he doesn't live here?

No. Uh-huh. himself back in Texas. Oh, he doesn't live here. No. But yeah, we did. You know, we got our first, our first break on a film with Luke and Owen Wilson and Will Ferrell and them called the Wendell Baker story. I know the film. Well, do you really have a little bit of history with that film? Really? Well, not really tangentially. So I wrote and directed a short film called Down Dog that was like a satire on yoga. And this was in like we finished it in 2005. And it did really well in the festival circuit. So we traveled all these festivals.

And we were at the Maui Film Festival where they premiered the movie. That's right. So Julie and I hung out with Luke and Andrew a little bit. Yeah. Which was interesting. And I see Andrew a little bit. Yeah. Which was interesting. And I see Andrew around Santa Monica. Yeah. For people that don't know, he's the other Wilson brother.

And he's got beautiful long hair and he kind of has a beard. He looks sort of like what Jared Leto looked like before he cut his hair. Like he had this hippie vibe to him. Right. He's a handsome guy. And that was kind of like he's always been overshadowed by his brothers, but this was kind of more his movie than the other movies that they had

worked on together. So we were there when they screened it for the first time and spent a little time with those. Owen was there too, so got to hang out with him. Yeah, they're actually really great guys. I remember this was my first thing. I was still in college, and it was interesting because my mom runs into Luke at

Whole Foods in Austin. This is when they're there scouting locations and whatnot, or even this might've been even before that. And my mom is never one to shy away from an opportunity or just to talk to somebody. And so she walks up to Luke Wilson. She says, this is her famous line. She walks up and she goes, you know, does anyone ever say that you look like Luke Wilson? And she totally knows it's him. Yeah. And she asked him, you know, are you guys making a movie? Because I have two sons who are in film school and they would love to work on it.

Luke says, well, our producer is right over here. Why don't you talk to him? And he comes up to her and they start talking. And he says, well, you know what? I'll tell you what. If you can get me a meeting with the CEO of Whole Foods, I'll give your kids a job on the film. And she says, well, all right, just give me one second. That's easy. Why did he want a meeting though?

He's just a, he was a big fan of Whole Foods. His name is Dave Buschel and a super healthy guy, big fan of Whole Foods. Needless to say, we got the job. And it was great because Luke and Andrew, they were amazing. They sort of took us under their wing and allowed us to experience the filmmaking process and still have that air of magic about it. Because a lot of times when you show up on set and you're working on set, the magic gets killed because you see all the bureaucracy behind. But they just did, this was independently financed. They just did their own thing.

They just did their own thing. And so Luke and I actually still, we still stay in touch. And I saw him recently and yeah, they're great guys. Yeah, that's cool. Well, that's a cool way to kind of kick off your, that's a pretty sexy, fun way to expose yourself to the industry. Was that all shot in Austin? It was. And it was a lot of fun.

It was during a summer in Texas. Most of it was shot outside, which meant it was a really hot shoot. But, yeah, it was great. Andby and i continued to work in film i worked for a company called action figure um back in austin we did music videos for the flaming lips and uh southwest airlines commercials and things like that and it was pretty fun um but at the same time i was still sort of nurturing this addiction right uh that was taking you know the first seat and yeah and uh my everything what's your brother doing because he must know like i'm you know i'm trying to work with my brother and he's strung out all the time well you know uh

my brother is uh you know he unfortunately i used to i was a pretty shitty brother at the time. And, uh, cause he's prescribed Adderall as well, but he doesn't abuse it. And, uh, I would, you know, do whatever I needed to, to get it from him. And so I think you're pimping his stash. Exactly. And, and, uh, you know, I just thought of this right now, but, um, when I said earlier that we would sort of qualify each other's lifestyle, I'm not sure if there's a little bit of him that said, you know what, I'll make this seem okay for him, and I won't, and I'll sort of take backseat with our career as well. And he just sort of started living the same lifestyle that I was,

where I would stay up all night, and then I wouldn't eat really well. And if that's the case, if, if I sort of got him into that unhealthy, uh, lifestyle, then, you know, I feel really bad about it. But, uh, you know, uh, so there was some level of like sort of extended codependency in the sense that he's not only allowing you to continue to live your life this way, but he's, he's, He's not only allowing you to continue to live your life this way, but he's on some level kind of dipping his toe in it to make you feel more okay about doing it. Because, you know, our father at the same time was seeing our lifestyle habits getting really bad and is, like I said, a very critical person. And I would take any kind of criticism about behavior as a criticism about who I was as a person. I wasn't able to separate the two and I was people can't. Right.

But, uh, you know, it was, it, it wasn't on him that I couldn't do that. I was just unable to see that this was how he was trying to say that I love you and I'm worried about you. I took it as him saying, I don't approve of who you are as a person. And so I used to get really depressed. And, you know, so my brother and I would sort of make it okay by allowing each other to feel like this is our, hey, this is the way we live our lives. So, you know, I do it too. Interesting. All right. So, so depression is happening. Your weight is escalating. This fast food addiction is really kicking in. How long does it take before, you know, you swell up to, you know, 280 to 300 range. And, you know, by that point, I barely saw anybody else. I didn't hang out with any of my friends. I didn't like who I was. I didn't like the way I looked. And so...

You're starting to be like a shut-in. Yeah, absolutely. And of course, that's, you know, fostering the depression, I would imagine. Yeah, absolutely. And then are you getting medication for the depression also? Yeah, they put me on several different things that I would not really take. I wasn't taking them seriously. I would take them every now and then.

Right. But of course, like, I mean, anybody could see like, well, he's depressed because he's stuck in this cycle that he can't break out of. So another medication is not solving the problem. Exactly. I've said that so many times. I said, you know, when your lifestyle is making you sick and unhappy, you don't need a new pill. You don't need a new product.

You need a new lifestyle. And, you know, it wasn't for lack of my, you know, anyone reaching out. My dad called me a few times and said, you know, Adam, what's going on with you? You're gaining all this weight. You're unhappy. You're not working. You know, I can see that, you know, your money's going away and you have nothing to show for it. You know, he brought up the possibility, thought I might have a gambling addiction.

And he said, you know, if the money's disappearing so quickly. Right. Adderall. Exactly. And he said, you know, uh, you know, I know that you have an addiction to Adderall, you know, do you want, you want help? Do you need help? Don't be ashamed of it. Um, and it was because he had reached out so many times and I wasn't ready that those times that he would ask, but I, it was because of that, that when I was ready, when I did wake up that morning, he was the person I called. Um, and it was just because I looked down the line, you know, five, six months and, uh, I saw myself living on the street and, uh, I grew up, uh, pretty comfortable and I, I don't have the skills to survive on the street and I was really scared. And so I called my dad and said, okay, I need help. Uh, so was this after like, you know,

a couple of day binge? I mean, did anything, what do you think it was that suddenly gave you that moment of clarity? Uh, it, it really was the fact that I knew that in about six months I was going to have no money. Uh huh. And, uh So it was really the fear of suddenly being out of money and not being able to get Adderall. I mean, you would have been forced to have to steal it or break it. Exactly, steal it. And I wouldn't have been able to pay rent. I would have been out on the street.

You could have thought, I mean, a good act would have been like, I've got six months left. I'll worry about that then. Yeah, well, luckily I didn't do that so the elevator's going down and you had at least enough you know uh wherewithal to understand that you know this this train was about to crash yeah and i was i was really sick and i was really really depressed i i just, I just, I, I hated life at that time. And I guess I, you know, it's a, it's a cliched saying, but I got sick and tired of being sick and tired all the time. So walk me through like a typical day, uh, you know, in that when you were really

in the grips of the addiction. Um, okay. So I would get up if I had slept the night before, I'd probably get up around noon, uh, and go straight to Torchy's Tacos and get, you know, like six breakfast tacos. Come back, pop some Adderall, start, you know, either doing some pointless online research, sort of self-educating, just to get into the throes of it. And then I'd probably get on, you know, an online role-playing game like World of Warcraft or something like that, which I'd be familiar with. Is this this idea that you're being productive and you're not really? It's a false sense of productivity because I'm researching all this stuff, so that must mean I'm a productive person.

Right. You're not really doing anything. Right. I would do that for five hours and I'd be like, all right, yeah, I learned all this new stuff about all this new technology. So I'm OK. I'm at least I'm up to date with where the industry is. But you're not employed. I'm not employed. Exactly. But I know. But, you know, and I had this arrogance. Oh, but I know more than anybody. You know, it's like, well, in theory, no practice behind it. Well, in theory, no practice behind it.

Yeah, it's that weird thing that addicts have where deep down you know you're the biggest turd on the planet. Yeah. But you're more arrogant than anybody else and feeling superior to everybody. I had this insane superiority complex. I was incredibly arrogant and I had no self-confidence. It's the weirdest combination. It's like how do you even fathom that you could entertain those two ideas simultaneously, but that is the condition of being an addict. Exactly.

And so, you know, I would do that, and I'd play video games and then take a break, go get fast food, come back, play video games, order a pizza, watch a movie, and by a pizza, I mean a large Papa John's pizza with like the side of the chicken strips and all that stuff. The whole deal. The whole deal. And, uh, you know, I never went to the grocery store except to buy like sugary cereals, like, um, Lucky Charms or Fruity Pebbles. Um, and I would eat those at night. You know, it was basically just, it was nothing but drug use. It was all substance abuse because eating like that is a substance abuse. Yeah, salt, sugar, fat, and Adderall.

Yeah, exactly. That's exactly what it was. Nothing real. I wasn't eating anything real. Oh, my goodness. I used to drink like nine regular sodas a day. And yeah, I had this belief that I was in control of my life. And so that would be it.

And then staying up super late, right? Yeah. Oh, yeah. I mean, especially when I first got a refill. I mean, it's supposed to last you a month. It would only last me about six days. But for three days at a time, just nonstop, my problems did not matter anymore. I remember when I would go to the pharmacy

and get it filled i'd be like all right game on game on yeah exactly no more problems right so all right so you so you wake up this morning on this one morning yeah discuss it with yourself you call your dad yeah and uh i said you know i need help and he knew exactly what i meant and he said you know don't worry I'll take care of it. And we went and we met with this therapist who recommended a place called Sierra Tucson. And we called them and I talked to them and wanted to know all about what they do and whether it would fit in. And, you know, the whole time. Only the addict is like interviewing the rehab.

You know what I mean? Exactly. Um, and you know, my dad is at the whole time he's, you know, saying how, um, uh, you know, this take, this as an opportunity to sort of not only change your, uh, your lifestyle around drugs, but your lifestyle around, uh, food and, and to get, cause he's always sort of, it's, it's funny because, uh, you know, I used to hate him, uh, for trying to impose his beliefs on food on me. And, uh, um, it's amazing cause I used to give him so much. I used to direct all my anger towards him. It was all his fault. And, uh, he took a lot of shit for a long time. And he just took it. And when the moment came when I finally asked him for help, without second thought, you know, was there to offer all the support I needed.

And I remember it was actually a year before I asked for help that he sent me to the first immersion that Rip Esselstyn did for the Engine 2. Oh, wow. Rip Esselstyn did for the engine too. And it's sad and funny at the same time because, you know, I went and I accepted because I didn't want to upset my father. And I went and I was using at the immersion. But at the same time, I was also really learning a lot because I had this addiction to learn all I could and know more than everybody. And so I learned everything that I could from these sessions. And what was amazing is because of that, when the time came for me to save my own life, I had all that knowledge.

Yeah, you knew what to do. I mean, that's like somebody going to an AA meeting drunk, you know, on some level, even though they're not there yet and they're not ready, like, you know, that message is seeping in. Exactly. When they are ready, you know, it, that message is seeping in when they are ready, you know, it can, it can go to work. Was that the one, was that one in Austin? It was.

Yeah. Um, and you know, I stuck to it for like two weeks and then it just sort of went back to my own ways. But when you're using drugs, it's like, you know, all bets are off on anything else, you know, in your life sort of being organized. I went, I went to Sierra Tucson and, uh, this was in, um, September of 2012. Um, and I walked into, into what they call MAS, which is where you spend the first, at least 24 hours of your stay in rehab. They have to medically assess you. Uh, and if you do have to detox, that's where you detox so that you're separate from Uh, and if you do have to detox, that's where you detox so that you're separate from everyone else and that you're in a safe, controlled environment.

Um, and if you're not detoxing, you still have to stay there because they're running all these medical tests and they have to get them back. Um, and so you sit in this sort of dormitory area and watching movies and you can't go outside and you can't, they bring you your food and I'm bored out of my mind, but you know, I had to do all these, um, physicals and stuff, which were really embarrassing for me because, you know, I did not like the way I looked physically and, you know, they have to do, you know, the full body physical and do they rifle through your bags when you arrive? Oh yeah. Yeah. And you got to take off all your clothes in front of them, make sure you're not, you know, stashing stuff. And, uh, um, I showed up at a couple, two quick stories.

So I showed up at rehab and it was the same thing. Like I showed up drunk and they're going through all my stuff. Oh, yeah, everybody shows up for rehab on their drug. Yeah, and I'm indignant. I'm like, why would I do that? Who do you think I am? And then they're like, just go into your room over there, right? So I go into my little dorm room that's like right off this sort of like bay of cubicles

where the nurses are and then yeah you know i pass out i wake up the next day and i'm like okay so what's the program you know like what are we doing and they're like just go back to your room you know like no one would tell me what was going on i'm like you know i was like what's happening you know i don't understand they're like just go back room. Like, so then a nurse would come in and do the same thing. They're like, because they're so used to dealing with incorrigible people that are coming off drugs. Absolutely. They've heard it all. Like, they're just like, they have no tolerance for, you know, any BS whatsoever.

And they're trying to avoid getting to the point of an escalated situation. Right, right. They're just like cutting it off. But I remember when I got to that point where I was like, okay, I'm going to rehab. And I was in that position of like, okay, I'm going to interview all these rehabs and find the right fit. And I really wanted to go to Sierra Tucson because it looked really nice. And I was like, it was warm and sunny. And, and I was working with an addictionologist. And he's like, yeah, it's good and everything. But he had a relationship with Springbrook, which is now hazleton up in oregon and that's where he wanted me to go and he's like look they already have a bed there this is where i went yeah but like sierra tucson i don't know it looks pretty good like let's call them he's like why don't you just go up there but i remember like that's what i that's kind of like where i wanted to go to rehab as if i was going on vacation exactly so ridiculous but that's not ridiculous because a lot of addicts use rehab as if I was going on vacation. Exactly. It's so ridiculous. But that's not ridiculous because a lot of addicts use rehab as just a vacation from their addiction and then they just

go right back on it. I was just going to go for a spin dry and get back to my life, get people off my back or what have you. I mean, I knew I had a problem and I knew it was an opportunity, but on some level also I was like, what's the least amount of work that'll be the most pleasurable and the least painful. And you don't have to accept complete responsibility. Yeah, exactly. But what was ironic, so I didn't go to Sierra Tucson, but what's ironic and interesting is that I recently spoke at this event called Revitalize. It was kind of like a wellness summit that's put on by MindBodyGreen, the website.

And it was kind of a curated weekend where they bring in kind of wellness leaders and they do like a TED Talk kind of weekend. It's not open to the public. It's just kind of like, you know, a whole bunch of thought leaders. And the morning before, one of the mornings that I was there, I got up early and I went on a run and I was kind of exploring around. It was in Tucson, right? And I run down this road and I see the entrance to Sierra Tucson. I was like, oh, my God, it's right here. It was like literally across the street from the place where I was staying.

Yeah, there's that. It's called Miraval. Yeah. It's the resort right there. And I was like, wow. Like it just hit home so heavy that, you know, this arc of my life. Like, you know, I was I thought at one point like you know, I was, I thought at one point, like, that's where I was going to go to rehab. And here I am, like a speaker at this, where I'm talking about wellness

at this event, like the full circle of it was just so like profound because it was just right there. Yeah. It was crazy. So yeah, I ran right by the entrance. I didn't go in, but there were people. They wouldn't have let you in either. Yeah, they wouldn't have let me in. It was all, and you can't see any of the buildings from the road. It's all very secluded. Right. So, all right. So you't have let you in either. Yeah, they wouldn't have let me in. It was all, and you can't see any of the buildings from the road. It's all very secluded. Right. All right, so you ship yourself off to Sierra Tucson. Yeah, and day two, I get a call from the doctor.

Needs to come and meet with me. Doesn't want to let me know what it is we're going to talk about. First of all, how is the detox off Adderall? It's not bad. You don't go into any kind of medical conditions or sweats or anything like that. They don't put you on like Thorazine? No, or Suboxone or anything like that. You just get tired because your body is accustomed to having all this amphetamine pumping through it.

Now it doesn't. Yeah, your adrenals must be just cooked. Yeah, exactly. And so I get this call from the doctor and I go into his office and he sits me down and he goes, you know, you know, you have high blood sugar. I said, no. It was interesting because a year before that I was living in Israel and I got really sick and I went in and they did a blood test on me and everything came back fine. But my blood sugar was at like 300. And he says, you're diabetic.

And this is, you know, type 2 diabetes is a lifestyle disease. You don't get it unless you give it to yourself. And so here's the numbers. Here's the situation. I could not deny it. I could deny my addiction all I wanted, and I kind of was. I even was able to talk them into prescribing me Adderall in low doses. While you were in?

While I was in CRG. Yeah. That's crafty. Because I just said, well, I'm here really on mood for depression. I take Adderall. I've used it recreationally, but I just prescribed it. And so they gave me like- I can't believe they bought that.

I know. Believe me. You should have seen what my sister did during family week when she found out she went crazy. But and this was the first time that I had to take responsibility and accept my part in my destructive lifestyle habits. Here's the blood sugar numbers. Here's your weight. You can't deny it. You've done this to yourself.

And I got pretty upset about it. And I remember being very scared hearing the list of things that can happen to you as a result of diabetes, losing your eyesight, losing your hearing, losing fingers, feet, legs, things like that. I mean, diabetes is a pretty awful disease. It kind of screws you in every single way possible. I mean, risk of infection, recovering from injury, recovering from surgery goes way up. It's this weird thing, though, because so many people now have it. Like it's this weird thing though that because so many people now have it yeah you know like it's commonplace yeah it's like oh you got the diabetes you know like you and everybody else

so just take this take metformin medication don't worry about it everyone else has it yeah by 2030 50 of americans are going to be diabetic it's crazy pre-diabetic it's crazy crazy and uh so of course they prescribed me the medication and of course i took it um and but the thing was that uh i went and i remember i made a phone call to my dad and he said he goes okay so uh you know um he wanted me to believe that you know that this this is just not to freak out about it uh that i understand that it's hard for me to accept this, but I was accepting it, but realized that I know that this is reversible. He wanted me to remember the fact that I knew that this was a fact that is reversible. And that I also not only knew that, but I knew what to do

in order to do that. And that the fact remains that I have it. So let's not focus on that. Let's focus on what I can do to change that situation. It's weird that the thing that pierced your denial was the health, you know, less than the Adderall addiction. Like you're still struggling with a little bit of denial over that, but you were able to hear that, you know, you were going to have to change your lifestyle habits around food. For some reason, it really, it really hurt hearing that because, you know, it was, I don't know, I knew that I had done it to myself and this was sort of, uh, I don't know. Addiction is a very emotional disease. Whereas type two diabetes is very, it's a very scientific intellectual diagnosis where it's like, this is why you are type two

diabetic. Your blood sugar number is over this amount. It's over 125. Yeah. They can't say, you're a 9.2 on the addiction scale. Exactly. Here's your blood test that proves it. Exactly. And so for me, I'm very, someone who had taken medication, taken drugs to sort of cover up having to understand what emotions were and having to deal with emotions, I would pop a pill. So emotions sort of, you know, just sort of, I didn't understand them and I didn't like them. But if it was in intellectual form, then I could completely accept it. And because I could accept it, it hit me. And I said, all right, I'm a type two diabetic. That means I'm responsible. And then somebody, I can't remember who it was that told me, they said, you know what the best part

of being responsible for your situation in life, if you're the problem, you get to be the solution. If it's somebody else or something else that's causing your situation, then it, you can't do anything about it until they, or whatever it is decides to allow you to do so. Um, and so I remember I walked myself from the doctor's office over to the personal trainer's office. Normally you got to put your name on this list and then hopefully within that week, she'll get back to you, letting you know, they're going to schedule you. So probably by the second week that you're there, you get to start training with her. And I went over to her and I said, uh, you, the personal trainer, she said, yes. He said, listen, I'm really scared right now.

I just got diagnosed as a type two diabetic today. I need to start working with you and I need to start working with you tomorrow. Please, can we do this? And she said, yeah, let's do it. And, you know, in rehab, you don't have a lot of control over what you eat. They give you the food and you eat the food. How was the food there? It was OK. But what I tried to eat as healthy as possible, but I hadn't really gone 100% hardcore

on the diet part. But it was the fact that I'd taken a step forward in changing my lifestyle habits and saying that I need to change and I'm doing the exercise. And I did lose some weight during rehab, but the real work started after rehab and sober living, you know, rehab is a place for you to accept and learn about the problem that you have. It's sort of like preparation for the real road to recovery. Um, and so when I got into sober living, uh, and this is a, this is like a big passion of mine now is I noticed that sober living that I was in stock their house with refined sugars, processed foods, hydrogenated fats. I mean, it was everything from Oreos to microwavable pizzas. And I said, you know, you're required to offer, to have food for me to eat.

And I can't eat any of this. I'm a type two diabetic. And they said, well, I had, they had an assistant manager that just started when I got there and his name was Luke Ch two diabetic. And they said, well, I had, they had an assistant manager that just started when I got there and his name was Luke Chittick. And he said, all right, I agree. What can I do for you? You write me a list and I'll get it for you. And we'll set aside a space in the refrigerator for you. And cause he's very health conscious and he wanted, he sort of saw this as an opportunity for, I think for himself to to prove to the management as well that this is what should be happening. Right. And so I wrote a list.

And at the time, it was egg whites, any leafy green vegetables that were available, and some fruit. And he got that for me. And I ate that for every meal, every day, for 10 months. ate that for every meal, every day for 10 months. Um, and I reversed my type two diabetes in about six months. And after that, because the majority of my diet was plants, I, I chalked it up to, well, this must be the majority of the reason and, uh, became a complete vegan within a year. And since then, since that day, a year later, I lost over a hundred pounds, went off of my sleeping medications, went off of my mood stabilizers. They thought I was bipolar. Went off of my met Foreman and was just a completely different person. I was, I struggled so much in therapy.

I went to IOP every day. And for people who don't know, that's intensive outpatient therapy. And you go about four to five days a week for about five hours doing group therapy. And I would fight it every single day because I didn't, I didn't have any self-worth. I didn't feel like I was worth saving, but I had a plan and a goal and a purpose in life. And that was reverse my type two diabetes and drugs didn't fit into that. And so that kept me sober while I was still fighting therapy. But it was when I reversed my type two diabetes, it was when I saw the weight coming off

that I felt self-worth for the first time. And I felt like there was somebody worth saving. And I had enough self-confidence to say, all right, you know what? I'm going to drop the ego with my therapist and say, I don't know what to do. The way that I know how to live my life clearly isn't working as far as an emotional individual. Maybe I should just do what they're saying I should do and see what happens. And then from that point on, the real recovery began as far as my emotional recovery. You surrendered. Yeah, exactly.

You have to get to that point where you're really ready to let go of your idea of what's best for you. Exactly. So it's interesting. So that moment didn't really occur for you, at least on the recovery tip while you were in rehab. No, it didn't at all. So did you do the 28 days or what was your? I did 37 days.

37 days. Okay. So, you know, look, for people that don't know when you're in rehab, I mean, look, first of all, like Sierra Tucson, as cushy as it is, it's still a mental institution. Yeah. It's still a mental institution. Like your best thinking got you sent to a mental institution where people are, you know, full time focusing on changing the way that you think and behave. Right. Because the way you're thinking and behaving landed you there in the first place. And basically it's all day therapy, pretty much group sessions, individual sessions, working your steps and, you know, just on and on and on. Yeah.

Until you go to sleep at night. But that's not that wasn't really you didn't have any kind of surrender epiphany while you The only surrender I had there was surrendering my lifestyle habits as far as my physical health. That's interesting. My emotional health came much later. And I think it was because I needed it to be intellectual. I needed it to be A plus B equals C. So when I got out of rehab, I knew that if I ate the right foods, if I exercised, I would lose the weight and I would reverse my type two diabetes. And that's what I made my day about every single day. But you know, you recognize, of course, that the solution to your Adderall addiction is not through diet, right? Like you're like intense focus on trying to control your diet and your lifestyle is not

going to resolve, you know, sort of your addiction problem. Absolutely not. And the thing is, I had to go to meetings as part of living in the house. You have to go to five meetings a week. Did you go to sober living out here? Yeah. I went to Transcend Sober Living in Santa Monica. They have five houses, I think, in West LA. The one I went to at the time was located on the beach in Santa Monica, right next to the Lowe's Hotel. That's not bad. It's not bad. And, you know, I would walk myself to the gym every day. walk myself to the gym every day. Uh, and, uh, that was immediately after getting back from IOP. And, you know, what was great was, uh, the manager there, Phil Hamburger, he made it very clear to me. He said, you know, you're going to get really angry. Um, and you're going to need someone to be angry at, uh, because you're going to want to get angry at the world and that can blow up on you.

Uh, and if you need, because you've been, you're off Adderall, first of all, like, are you having trouble mentally focusing? Absolutely. It's gotta be hard. You're not, I mean, I know that people that are coming off that, like they can't read a book, they can't focus on anything. And I had a, I was basically incapable of experiencing pleasure, being happy with doing anything. I remember.

Like everything's just blah. Yeah. Right. Absolutely. That goes on for a long time. It does. And, you know, I remember sitting in Sober Living and they would have every weekend was pizza weekend. And this was during the football season.

And needless to say, I'm a football fan. And I remember watching all the guys eating the pizza and drinking the sodas, watching the football game, and me sitting there with my kale salad, crying because I couldn't have the pizza and I couldn't have the soda, and then realizing, man, my addiction is much more than just Adderall. You're still playing the victim. Absolutely. And I played the victim for a while to the point to where when they finally confronted

me about my addiction to stimulants because I stole some from the med cabinet and you get drug tested and they're like, bro. While you were in sober living yeah so so all right so now i'm getting a clearer picture of what's going on here so it really like the tail is wagging the dog a little bit here because you go for your adderall addiction but you're kind of having none of that yeah you get fixated on on resolving your your the type 2 diabetes thing rings your bell yeah and that becomes your entire, but you're really overlooking the larger problem. Like what I always say to people is, okay, you have type two diabetes. We need to address that. Or, you know, you're smoking two

packs a day or whatever other habit you're doing. Like we can get to that, but like, we've got to focus on the biggest issue first, which is your drug addiction. Like once we can at least get a handle on that, then we can start to address these other things. It's interesting. It happened in a reverse way. It did. You're relapsing basically while you're in sober living. So you're still not getting it. I wasn't getting it. And it wasn't until, you know, I finally saw a different person in the mirror physically than I was when I got there. And it was someone that I was actually proud of to look at. Um, you know, this goes back to my, my issues with self image, um, that I realized that I accepted the fact that I didn't know what I was doing in terms of my health. And I took someone else's advice. This was Rip Esselstyn's

advice. This is what he taught me. Um, uh, and I implemented that into my life and just accepted and surrendered to it. And as a result, my life- Rip was your higher power. He was, he absolutely was. And my life got better as a result of it. But at the same time, I'm still a very angry person. I'm a very entitled person and I'm having a lot of trouble dealing with my therapist

and dealing with my IOP, maybe I need to take the same approach that I did with my physical health towards my emotional health. Yeah. Well, your best friend had been taken away from you and you're still not really leaning into any of the tools that I'm sure they tried to teach you in rehab. So of course, your emotions are, I mean, you're like King Baby. Exactly. Yeah, exactly. That's a good, that's a good term. Tell people what King Baby is. Yeah. You know how they define that? No. So King Baby is like a term that, that characterizes a lot of addicts and alcoholics, which basically means that you think the whole world revolves around you. You're incredibly

entitled, but you have like, you take zero responsibility for any of your actions and you have no empathy for anybody else. And that's exactly who I was. It's all about you. That's exactly who I was. It's a hundred percent who I was. Um, and, uh, so I'd say by about, you know, month, month three, uh, is when I, I started to say, you know, this needs to change as well. And so by the time... Maybe I should look at this. Maybe I should look at this in the same fashion. Underlying fact that I'm a drug addict.

Exactly. And so they took me, you know, they said, listen, if you want to continue going to IOP, they're not going to let you continue if they see another failed drug test. You can go get another doctor somewhere else, but you can't come to IOP anymore. If you want to go find a doctor to prescribe you Adderall, go right ahead. I'm surprised they didn't boot you out of sober living. You can't be using and being in sober living. That's right.

That was the other thing. They said you get one with this manager. He would allow you to mess up once, and then that was it. It was sort of your warning because relapses, they say relapses happen in recovery, and especially early on in recovery, he allowed you to see the fact that, yeah, you made a mistake. This is part of it, but it's not going to be part of this sober living anymore for you. You can either now choose to accept your problems and commit to recovery, or you can continue doing what you're doing and you will get caught. And when that happens,

you're gone and you're on your own. And if you think you have the tools to survive on your own, then good luck. And I knew I didn't. Right. But meanwhile, you're going to meetings too, right? Yeah. You have to go to five meetings a week. Right. And are you like not identifying? Like, are you saying, no, these people are not like me? And I used to say that a lot. Um, um, but it became easier. And the thing is, again, I never really, uh, truly identified with, with AA. Um, uh, you know, I didn't, I didn't do the steps, but I, I, I identified with the Buddhist recovery, smart recovery. Um, and I did that for a while. And I still go to AA meetings with friends and support other people. And I still like to go to AA meetings to feel

connected to the sober community and connected to people who share the same disease that I have and to hear their stories. But I've still never done step one. Really? Interesting. Yeah, I know. I get that a lot. I get that a lot. Listen, I don't have any judgment on, you know, what, I'm not somebody who's, who, who believes that the 12 steps are the only way to get sober. Um, I know there that that's, what's worked for me. And I know that's what works for many, many people that I know, but you know, I reserve judgment on people's other paths. Yeah, of course. Yeah.

The thing is that, you know, for me it was, I got more out of the spiritual teachings and the Buddhist teachings. And, you know, I was an angry person at the time. And so I didn't allow myself to connect to AA because of the whole God thing. And that was part of my arrogance is that I was like... That's a common thing, though. You know, that's very, very common for people that are new. Like, they just can't wrap their head around that. And then they just, you know, it's like talk to the hand and they're out the door. One thing I did allow myself to do, though, was that while I don't consider myself, you know, a member of AA, I would go and I would say, you know what?

I don't understand the whole God thing, but I'm going to listen to everything else they say because everything else they say makes sense. But if you just remove the word God and just say higher power, and that can be anything, like you're using RIP as your higher power in a health context. So use the people in the room who collectively understand how to get and stay sober better than you do and just say, well, these people know better. So I'm going to, you know, surrender to this collective wisdom. And to be honest, I've been very tempted to start the steps lately, like so much more so than ever before. All right. Well, we can talk after the podcast. We can talk after the podcast.

Are you still angry? No. I mean, I'm, I'm much more, I'm a completely different person. You know, I, I've, everything about my life has completely changed my relationship with my father. And what's interesting is that the qualities in him that I used to hate the most are the ones I want most in myself today. And it's, you know, he's, you know, my brother and I are still extremely close and we always will be. But he is living a completely different lifestyle than I live. He doesn't eat. But he is living a completely different lifestyle than I live.

He doesn't eat. He doesn't have the same awareness of food and consciousness of what he puts into his body that I do. And so it makes me uncomfortable being around it. And I'm sure it makes him uncomfortable being around me. And so there's that. But as far as being identical twins, we're always going to be incredibly close. It's a weird thing when that's the gift of sobriety in some respects. Like when you're somebody who goes to that extreme, that it brings you to your knees literally, then the world opens up to you to then make an incredibly

profound change in your life. So that's why people say I'm a grateful alcoholic or whatever, because they have this profound moment in which suddenly they decide they're going to live their life completely differently. Whereas somebody who is not an addict or an alcoholic can kind of be on a slow burn with unhealthy habits their whole life and never reach that point where it's enough of a crisis to do something about it, or it doesn't cause enough pain. And so you can just kind of perpetuate it. Yeah. And, and, but what's interesting is that today the person I feel like it can be myself the most with is my father. And that was never, never the case. And,

you know, he's, he's, he's now you're way more preachy than he ever was. That's true. He's nearing, I'd say he's nearing the end of his, his marathon career. Um, he was supposed to run New York this year, but, uh, the friends that he runs with didn't qualify. Um, and so he deferred till next year. And I said, you know, dad, if, if this is going to be your last, let me be, let it be my first and I'll run it with you. Um, and so i really think that that that moment when we cross the finish line together next year that's going to be that'll put the seal on my recovery for me that you know that i've come full circle in my relationship with my father um so in the parlance of of recovery i mean did you make an amends to your dad or how did you bridge that gap?

Absolutely. You know, I don't waste any opportunity to tell him how grateful I am for everything that he's, you know, been able to offer me. You know, I wasn't working for Whole Foods when they did the engine to immersion. be only open to Whole Foods employees because they were using it as a way to change the idea of what healthcare is and what, how companies should look at providing healthcare for their employees. Um, but he said, you know, if you, if you really want to go, I can get you in. And so I went and, uh, you know, he was, he was never shy, um, uh, about making himself, he was never shy, um, uh, about making himself, making his, his, uh, his, uh, opinion known to me that it, while it, it scared him and he was critical in the way he did it. I knew at heart what he was talking about, but my, my addiction and my arrogance sort of would backfire. Um,

but, uh, so what's the, so what's the lesson? You know, uh, I, I, I remember I made an apology to him about eight months into my recovery. And I, you know, I said, dad, I want to apologize to you for never understanding the way you chose to show your love for me. And that was by him being critical of the way I was living my life. That's how he was able to say, you know, I love you and I'm scared, please change. Um, so, you know, the lesson I guess is, you know, you're, if, if you're in a relationship with somebody, uh, if you're, especially, you know, if you're a son of a, of a critical father, I'm going to use this example, cause this is the example that I know from my life experience. Um,

you know, your opinion and your view of this situation is only half the story. And you got to think of the fact that, you know, your ego wants you to believe that you're OK. And so it's going to it's going to help you or it's going to want you to attack back at that criticism. Make it seem like, oh, it's because they don't like me. Well, screw them. I'm fine. That's what I was doing. Um, you know, I never thought to think of the fact that, you know, I was my, I was the age that I was when I was at my worst was the age when my dad lost his father. And it never occurred to me to think of that. Never occurred to me to think about that because it wasn't about anybody else but me. So how old were you when you went to rehab? I was 29 when I went to rehab. But when my

dad really started to reach out, I was 25. And that's when he lost his father. And it never occurred to me to think about that. When when when it was all happening. I was just like, Oh, well, you know, he's just an asshole. And he doesn't like me and so um yeah i mean when you're look look when you're when you're addicted like you can't see outside yourself at all you know and so the the thing that you always hear is somebody who's in the throes of the disease is like well you know leave me alone this is my life and i'm not hurting anybody these are decisions i'm making for myself like get off my back You're completely unable to understand, let alone empathize with the fact that your behavior has impacts on everybody around you. Everybody else.

And you also don't fully appreciate that they even understand what's going on. Like, the denial extends to this idea that they don't even really know that you're doing it. Like, you'll just tell yourself, like, well, they don't really know what I going on. Like you, the denial extends to this idea that they don't even really know that you're doing it. Like you'll just tell yourself like, well, they don't, they don't really know what I'm doing, you know, even though they can, it's obvious to anybody. Yeah. I mean, I'm sure they didn't know to the extent, you know, what I was doing as far as the doctor shopping and all that stuff. But they knew that I was an addict to the full definition of that word. Um, and word. And they were scared. But, you know, I'm sure at the same time they didn't want to press too hard

that I would run away from them and then that would be it, you know. And, you know, they asked me, you know, were you ever suicidal? And the fact is I was never suicidal. This goes to my relationship with my twin brother. We're so close that I know that if I was ever to ever hurt myself, it would probably cause him to do the same. Um, but at the same time, I didn't care if I died the next day, you know, um, if, if I got hit by a car and died, I'd be fine. Um, so you were so like bereft of any sense of self-confidence or self-assuredness that that even the idea that

you know your life could be improved by getting sober didn't really resonate it was only when you began to see results as a result of changing your your your dietary and lifestyle habits that that seed was planted that maybe your life is worth something. Exactly. And, you know, I think that. And you needed that in order to even be interested in, you know, saving yourself from. Yeah, I needed to like I needed to have some some kind of, you know, worth some. I needed to have to like myself just a little bit to want to put in the effort that's necessary to make that change. And that's there. It is incredibly difficult. Um, and I also believe that the diet that I put myself on allowed me to regulate my emotions better. It allowed me to,

you know, deal with anger, uh, better than I was before. Cause my energy was just up and down. It was sugar spikes and sugar crashes and, you know, Right. Usually it's the reverse. Like you get clean and sober from drugs and alcohol and then it's not until much later and you're kind of immersed in the steps when you start to connect, you know, how your other behavior patterns, how you use them to modulate your emotional state. And of course, you know, whether it's smoking or food or gambling or pornography or whatever it is, shopping, you know, usually it's something, right? Because you strip away your best friend, the drug, and your addict is looking for something else, right?

So where are they going to, you know, plant their roots? And so it's very common that food then becomes a big problem. So you go to A meetings and it's donuts and coffee and cigarettes. You know, sugar is like a huge problem with people in recovery because they're looking for anything that can take them out of the moment. That's going to make them feel different. That's going to alter their consciousness in even the smallest amounts of ways. So, you know, food is an obvious thing, but I think it takes most people quite a long time before they really appreciate, oh, my God, I'm eating to repress my emotions. Or, oh, wow, you know, I didn't notice that, like, you know, because we just, it's so habitual, right?

Like, oh, I feel depressed. I'm going to go, you know, suddenly I'm at the drive-thru. But you don't really solve that equation and understand or appreciate why you're taking those actions. And not only that, a lot of people get put on medications where they tell them, oh, you're probably going to get an appetite and gain weight on this medication. That's normal. That's almost an excuse to just eat whatever. And there were a lot of friends that I made in sober living that ended up gaining a lot of weight in sober living, which is common. And then going on more medication as a result of gaining the weight, uh, secondary, you know, health issues coming up,

whether it be sleep apnea or, uh, type two diabetes or hypertension. Um, and you know, the whole point of recovery is not to go on more medications is to get you stripped down to your authentic self. I think that that's the search for your authentic self is the essence of recovery. And it was surprising to me, and it's still surprising to me today that nutrition is not mandatory in most recovery. And you go into the sober living house, most sober living houses in this in this city, and you look at the way they stock their pantries, and it's just like, boy, are you kidding me? Yeah, but it shouldn't surprise you. I mean, it's overlooked everywhere. Like I just, I just went, uh, to the Olympic training center and I gave a talk to the USA, uh, national junior swim team, like the fastest kids that are 18 and under. And I was around some of the, you know, all kinds of Olympic athletes, all these people that are

training there in Colorado Springs, this whole place is just about refining excellence, right? Right. Athletes from all across America come there to, like, be their best. And you go to the cafeteria, and it's just abominable. Really? Like, all you can drink soda, you know, soft-serve ice cream up the hill. You know, just everything's greasy. It's, like, insane, right?

Like, these are the cream of the crop of our talent. And then, you know, look, wherever you look, go to any hospital, it's the same thing. So why should it be any different in rehab? Like this is our blind spot, right? Exactly. This is part of the holistic equation to being well and being healthy. And this has to change. I agree. I mean, you look at the dynamic that this country has in its relationship to food. You have kids who come from nothing who are going to public schools, getting fed processed foods and then eating fast food after school, becoming type two diabetic. And the kids who come from everything who are in the wealthiest percentage of the country starving themselves to fit in. So you have kids who have every opportunity being too skinny and starving themselves to death and kids who have absolutely zero opportunity and come from nothing being too fat. That's our relationship to food in this country. I mean, how messed up is that? Well, there's a lot of

privileged kids that are fat too. There are. They're just playing video games all day. Exactly. Ordering pizzas and what have you. So it's across the board and certainly socioeconomically, it's a huge problem because of farm subsidies and how cheap fast food is and processed food is. Exactly. And it just becomes the easiest option. I just had this guy, Steven Ritz, on the podcast, the most recent episode that I put up. And he's an elementary school teacher in the Bronx, which is an urban food desert. Like, there couldn't be any place worse.

I just listened to this podcast. Yeah, like giant towers where people live in subsidized housing and not even real grocery stores, just bodegas where all it is is like malt liquor and chips. these kids are super unhealthy and you know the attendance is abysmal and nobody graduates from high school and like what he's done by you know growing food in his classrooms and and transforming block after block after block in his community into like urban gardens is literally transforming his community like one student at a time and it's inspiring you know but it it took such a strong personality i mean that guy's a force of nature, you know, to like make that happen. And so, you know, you can't clone Steven Ritz and put a guy like that in every town. So it needs to be addressed, you know, at a systemic level, at the highest levels of government and

legislature. I agree. When, you know, when the legislature and the media is bought and paid for by big pharma and big food, like you're dealing with a behemoth that you're trying to turn around the Titanic, and it's a very, very difficult thing. So, you know, I think it's going to change through changing consumer demand, you know, one person at a time through podcasts and grassroots movements and, you know, stories like yourself, like your story that help people realize, you know, stories like yourself, like your story that help people realize, you know, what's really going on and, you know, empowering people to, you know, rethink

this equation because we're just in this matrix, you know, we just, oh, you know, chocolate milk is the ultimate recovery drink. We just bought, we just take at face value whatever we're told through whatever marketing message and we just buy into it because we're busy and we don't want to think about it or we don't have time to read the research and what have you. So here we are in this predicament of the worst healthcare crisis known to humanity.

And unless we make some significant changes, it's not going to get any better. I mean, look at school lunch. I mean, it's incredible. You know, I've said Engine 2 and I've said Rip at school lunch. It's crazy. Incredible. You know, um, one of the, you know, I, I've said engine two and I've said Rip Esselstyn, uh, a few times. Um, and, uh, you know, he's, I consider him a mentor of mine and, you know, I'm, I'm honored to call him a friend. And you mentioned earlier about being able to come full circle. Um, and, uh, you know,

for me, that happened when he asked me to come and speak at his immersion recently and I got how did that happen to me did you know him well I knew him through my dad and you know I attended his immersion and so I sent him an email

saying you know that I've completely reversed my type 2 diabetes I've become a vegan I've gone off all 7 of my medications and I've completely reversed my type 2 diabetes. I've become a vegan. I've gone off all seven of my medications. I've become a holistic lifestyle coach. Can I just come and meet with you? I want to talk about how do I make a career for myself in this industry. And so we came, and he hadn't seen me in like two years. And he didn't even recognize me when he saw me.

I had to tell him it's Adam's son, and know, two years. And he didn't even recognize me when he saw me. I had to tell him it's Adam's son. He just went crazy. And he asked me to come and speak at his recent immersion in Arizona. And he wanted me to talk about addiction and addiction recovery. And, you know, he didn't want me to hold back. And, you know, I thought how, how interesting is that, that I get to come back to his immersion where I was using the last time I was there. Did you say that? Oh, I told him. I was here in the audience a couple years ago, and I was high as a kite.

It was funny because when we met, he goes, so when you came to my immersion, were you an addict then? I said, Rip, I was using it, your immersion. And he goes, just make sure and say that when you speak to them. at your immersion. And he goes, just make sure and say that when you speak to them. And, uh, it was interesting because, um, uh, Dick Beardsley spoke at that immersion that I went to the first one. And he talked about his struggle with, uh, addiction. And I remember being so moved by what he said that he was almost the first person I walked up to and said, I'm an addict. Oh, wow. And, uh, he has an incredible story. He does. And, uh, I didn't again, I, you know, I chickened out. Um, but, uh, it was, it was quite a thing for me to be able to come back to an engine to immersion and

speak about my, my journey with, uh, recovery, um, where I was using and where I, where I almost, I think I realized for the first time that I needed to change after hearing his story, but I still wasn't ready to admit it to anyone else. And so that was pretty incredible. How'd it go? You know, I'm a pretty modest person. I don't like to, you know, brag. You could toot your horn a little bit. But, you know, I had a whole lot of people coming up to me at the end of it saying that

they thought that I was the highlight of the immersion and giving me hugs. And it was amazing how many people came up to recovering addict, and having to look now at recovering your lifestyle and your connection with food is that you've done it with one substance. We just have to do it with another. And think of addiction not as a negative thing. You know, I was an amazing drug addict. I was very, very good at getting my drug and living that lifestyle. I just needed to make sure that my new addiction is productive, not destructive. And then my new addiction is, is vegan. And it's all about being healthy. And it's all about creating, uh, health in the body, reversing disease, preventing disease,

uh, moving forward, uh, healing my body and spirit in order to become a better person today than I was the day before. And, uh, what can I do today in order to keep that going forward? I think that it's also important to be aware of that addictive beast that's inside of you. Oh, absolutely. Because it can latch on to... You can have an eating disorder as a plant-based... Oh, absolutely. You can eat a whole food plant-based diet and have an eating disorder and be an addict.

Yeah. You know what I mean? Absolutely. Because your addict can go, oh, this is my new thing. And you can be sort of, what's that term where you're overly obsessed with healthy eating? It's called, I forget it right now. It escapes me. Anyway, I'll think of it in a minute.

But the point being that you could fixate on that, like, as you said, you know, basically, you're saying I'm transferring my addiction, but also, you know, it's about like, being balanced in your life, right? Right, it is. But at first, I had to make it more of like, I need to focus every single day in the same way I would focus on my destructive addiction, I need to now make it focused on my recovery, be a sort of, and I use the term addicted. Yeah. I use the term addiction, addicted to it. I need to be addicted. What I'm saying is I need it to be the primary motivation for my daily actions, uh, to be, to, to allow myself to recover. So that's what I did. And that's, you know, it, it's, you know, it took me a good while

before I started to actually enjoy what I eat. Now I love it. But, you know, I'm- It's important to admit that. Yeah. Like a lot of people say, oh, you know, I don't understand like why people think it's so hard. You know, you have to weather a little bit of-

You do. You have to weather some discomfort. You have to go to food rehab. You really do. You really do. I read- You gotta get to a little bit. You do. You have to weather some discomfort. You have to go to food rehab. You really do. You really do. I read. You got to get to the other side. How long was it before your obsessive craving for Adderall went away?

It was five months. Easy. Five months, right? So how long before those obsessive cravings for McDonald's cheeseburgers and Papa John's pizza went away? Probably a year, which is crazy because that was stronger than my Adderall addiction. Yeah, and the difference is with drugs and alcohol, you draw a line in the sand and you don't go there. But food, you have to eat every day. You do, and the destructive foods are on every corner.

And it's interesting because I read Doug Lyle's book, The Pleasure Trap, and that, in another situation, allowed me to understand intellectually

what was happening to me emotionally in regards to food and changing the way I eat. And he was actually at the Emergent in Arizona and he and I had lunch together

and I just sat there and I was like, I gotta tell you, and this is really surreal right now because your book was so instrumental in changing my understanding of what was happening to me when I'm changing the way I eat, why it tastes so bad right now and why I want those other things so badly. And instead of having to struggle with the emotions that were involved with that, just understand that this is why it's happening and this is what's happening and I don't need to understand where the emotions are coming from,

but just know that that's the situation and deal with it. Right. It's a great book. But for people that are listening who are unfamiliar with the book, just lay out the thesis. Okay, so the thesis, he talks about the dopamine response to supernormal stimuli, something like refined sugars or hydrogenated fats. He makes the statement that there's no species of animal that is not designed to love what it eats, what it's designed to eat. When you eat the foods you're designed to eat before you've tried any supernormal stimuli, your dopamine response in your brain registers a level of pleasure that's in the normal range. And every species on this planet is motivated by

three main motivators, pleasure seeking, sex and food, pain avoidance, and energy conservation. And so when you eat foods that are what you're designed to eat, and you get that pleasure response, and you get the calories, your brain and your body are saying, this is good. This is what we need to do. Then when you go and you try something that is a super normal stimuli, a refined sugar, let's say an Oreo cookie, the dopamine response that happens is much higher. It's very, very high. It's a super normal stimuli. And the other thing that happens is that you're also getting a lot of calories and you're not expelling a lot of energy to get them. And because your brain

cannot distinguish the fact that this is a chemical-based substance, that this is artificial, this does not exist in nature, your brain sees a lot of pleasure, a lot of calories. This is good. This is right. This is what we're supposed to be doing. So you become habituated over the course of continuing those behaviors to where what once was a super normal stimuli is now just registering a dopamine response in the normal range. And then you end up getting a diagnosis because you've been going so long. You get diagnosed with type 2 diabetes or you just become overweight and unhappy and depressed. And someone tells you, well, you need to go back to starting to eat what you're designed to eat. You need to start eating fruits and vegetables, whole grains.

And you do that. What happens is because what was once normal is no longer than normal, it registers a low pleasure response. And it's also not calorie dense as, say, an Oreo. So when you're doing the right thing, your brain and your body are telling you that it's the wrong thing. And you just have to weather that for about a month. Yeah, you have to recalibrate. You do. It's like you got to reboot the operating system. Exactly. And it takes time. And so, you know, as long as I understood

that, okay, I know why I don't like this food, but I'm accepting the fact that I'm supposed to enjoy this and that I will start to enjoy it. And it will become, you know, normal for me to eat these things. And that I understand why I don't enjoy going to this right now. I'm just going to weather it until it gets to that point. I didn't, and I didn't worry about the fact that it was making me angry because I knew why I was getting angry. I didn't have to understand what the anger was about because a lot of times a bunch of issues and a bunch of emotions from past stuff comes up

when you're in a very heightened emotional situation. I didn't want to have to worry about where that was coming from. I can deal with that in therapy later, but when I'm eating, I'm just going to deal with the fact that I just need to eat these foods, get it over with, and move on to the next meal. It's just like with recovery with my drug addiction. You know, I don't have to worry about being sober for the rest of my life. I have to worry about being sober today. So when I woke up, I had to worry about eating the right things today. And that's what I did. Yeah. I mean, it's pretty powerful to kind of leverage the tools of sobriety and apply them to food. And of course there is that differentiation in that, you know,

it's, you can't just avoid food altogether, like you need to do with drugs and alcohol, right, eat it. But, but still, there's so many powerful tools that you can use. And one of the most powerful is staying in the now like being in the moment, like the one the annoying one day at a time thing is so true. Like, you know, if you start to think, Oh, my God, I'm going to have cake like my whole life. Like I'm going to kill myself. Like what life isn't worth living. Like, you don't have to think about that. You don't have to worry about that. What do you eat? What's your next meal? Exactly. Just focus on like making the right choice for your next meal. Yeah. And you know, people say, you know, I remember when I first, uh, became

vegan and people would say, you know, Adam, you're going to live like this for the rest of your life? And I said, yeah. You know, I haven't had a cheeseburger in three years, and I don't care. I don't miss it. You know? I mean, it's not a part of my life anymore. That's just a fact. And I've accepted that reality as my life. Cheeseburgers don't work into my day. That means today I'm not going to have one, you know? So is it a problem? No. I, you know, there's this really superficial saying that, you know, nothing tastes better than being skinny. But I, you know, I, I changed it to, you know, nothing, nothing tastes better than being happy and healthy with who you are. And that's how I feel every single day. I, you know, for the first time, I think it was a month ago, I had a dream where I saw myself the way I am today,

and I've never in my life liked the way I looked physically until now, and now I know that my subconscious is accepting it, so I'm becoming a completely different person than I've ever been in my entire life. I'm happier than I've ever been. I'm healthier than I've ever been. life. I'm happier than I've ever been. I'm healthier than I've ever been. I'm more content with who I am and the lifestyle that I lead and the impact that it has on other people. Being an example to members of my family, to people that I love, that I don't like to go out and preach to them when they're eating something that I don't agree with and say, oh, you shouldn't eat that. But I know

that if they ever reach a point to where they need to make a change, all they have to do is come to me and ask, and I will gladly help them to, to accept those things. So that's, you know, it's, it's, it's really amazing because I, I truly hated my life, uh, about three years ago. I was, I was fed up with it. And now I, you know, while I'm upset that I wasted my 20s as an addict, I, you know, I said to my dad, you know, people come up to me and they say, you know, are you upset that you wasted your 20s? Are you upset that you lost, you know, the later part of your 20s to being, you know, overweight and an addict? I said, you know, well, an addict that said, you know,

well, that was necessary for me to become who I am today. And today I'm younger than I was five years ago. Yeah. So not regret the past or wish to change it because that you had to burn in the fire. Absolutely. To become the person that you are today. And there's so much power in owning your story, you know, and then, and know, and then telling it, you know. You are going beyond the kale, right? It's like you repaired your health through this lifestyle shift, and now you're sharing that message in service to other people. And that's super inspiring, Matt. Yeah. It's really cool.

Thank you. Yeah, it's great. I mean, when you were, you know, shipping yourself off to Sierra Tucson, I mean, what did you think you were going to be doing with your life? I had no idea. I really didn't know. I just knew that this was that I needed to do this for 30 days to make people think that I was taking my life seriously. And then I could go back home and get my drug. That's literally what my plan was. And is there a specific moment where that shifted or was that a gradual? And is there a specific moment where that shifted or was that a gradual? It was a gradual thing because, like I said, I continued to to lie and steal drugs from sober living when I first got in.

You know, and I don't remember the exact day that I said, you know, everything has to change today. But at some point it did. you know, everything has to change today, but at some point it did. Um, and I know that I wouldn't have been able to accept it had I not accepted that, that the type two diabetes diagnosis and said to myself that I'm going to change this one thing because it proved to me that accepting your, your, your, uh, place in life, accepting your responsibility, accepting the fact that I am the, the cause of my problems is what allowed me to change everything in my life. And, you know, today I, you know, I surround myself with an amazing group of people. I go back now and I teach nutrition as a tool in recovery to transcend sober living to the Canyon IOP where I was a patient. to Transcend Sober Living, to the Canyon IOP where I was a patient. And I go to this amazing gym called Dethrone Base Camp or Base Camp Fitness. They changed the name, Base Camp Fitness in Santa

Monica. And the trainers there, when I walked in, I told them my story, of course, because I'm pretty proud of it. And they went know, they went crazy. And, you know, they made me feel so good about myself. And, you know, they, Nigel is the studio manager there, and Nick and Ian, and everyone there, they said, well, dude, print up flyers, like, promote yourself here at the gym, you know, come in and bring your, the guys that you work with at Sober Living, we'll do a class specifically for them. And it just seems like everybody that I've been able to meet since I accepted my reality and decided to change it has been more than willing to just say,

yeah, let me help you in whatever way possible. Rip came back into my life as a mentor and has allowed me to come and speak to people and help change their lives. I'm speaking in Austin the weekend of August 8th and 22nd, uh, at Whole Foods market stores in Austin to the, uh, 28 day challengers for the engine too. Um, I've, you know, it's, it's just been a, it's been a crazy road. And, you know, my dad, like I said, my dad, who never gave up on me, is now my best friend, which is an amazing thing to say. And it's just, it's, I, you know, I know that people wouldn't say that nutrition is a true form of recovery, but I really believe that it is my AA. a true, uh, form of recovery, but I really believe that it is my AA. Um, and, uh, it, I, you know, I owe my life to the fact that I was finally able to say that I need to do this. And, uh,

yeah, it started with, with accepting that you had a problem, surrendering to it and asking for help. Yeah. And I think a stumbling block for a lot of people is that surrender. They're like, that means defeat. That means giving up. And look at how empowered you are now. And look at how big and full and exciting your life has become by overcoming that hurdle. And having the willingness to throw your hands up and say, I don't know, help me. Right. Which is very difficult for everybody it's more difficult for addicts and it's even more difficult for male addicts I think you know this idea I agree it's an

assault to your masculinity or yourself a sense of you know self-domain or what have you you know we're not taught when we're young that you know we're supposed to know the answers to everything. And to raise your hand and say, I don't know, is to be weak. And to surrender is the very definition of weakness. And yet, I have come to learn, and clearly it's been your experience, that that is the path to strength. Absolutely. Yeah, it's been quite a ride.

And I have to say, I wrote to you on Facebook that one day, just out of whim, you know, I read your book, Finding Ultra. And I said, you know what, why not just give it a shot, just find his Facebook page and send him a message. And then when you wrote me back that night, I like literally flipped out. And like, I called my therapist, who's like one of your biggest fans, and said that, you know, I'm going to be on the Rich Roll podcast. like one of your biggest fans and said that, you know, I'm going to be on the Rich Roll podcast. And, you know, it's just for me, it's just another example of I guess that what I'm doing is the right thing for me to keep doing. And then I'm on the right path when I have people like you and people like Rip and my dad and John Mackey saying that, you know, what you're doing is worthwhile. Yeah. So it means a lot. You know, as I said in Finding Ultra, when you're on the right path, the universe will conspire to support you. And you're certainly on the right path. And the universe is conspiring to support you.

It is amazing because as someone who's very, you know, scientific minded and sometimes doesn't go in for all that stuff, it's amazing how true that statement is. And especially for me over the last few years, you know, for some reason, somehow I've just found myself being put in the path of people that are allowing me to continue to move forward. It's unbelievable. It's all energy, man. It is. You're vibrating on the right frequency. It is. Stuff just shows up. Yeah. Just people believe this because it's 100% true. Spiritual equation that defies all logic and rationality. But time and time again in my life, that's been proven to be the case.

Yeah. And it's cool, man. No, I think, look, your story is super inspiring. I was excited to meet you and hear about it. And I think, you know, what kind of differentiates this podcast from some of the other ones out there is, you know, I love the, I love the stories of, of transformation. Like I love the, you know, normal guys, you know, it's like, look, it's fun to go get people that everybody know, like, you know, Dean Karnazes or what have you. But like, for me, these are the most special conversations. Thank you very much. Because you're just an average guy and, and you decided to make

a change. And if you can do it, I think that's really powerful for everybody who's out there listening to understand that transformation is not reserved for some kind of special person out there. It is something that is accessible to all of us. That doesn't mean it's not hard work. That doesn't mean that you're not going to have to take a hard look at yourself and get to that point of acceptance and ultimately surrender. But if you can get there, you know, if you have the willingness to do the work, that incredible, inherent, like, potential energy to completely shift your life is within your grasp. Yeah. And you're a living example of that.

Thank you very much. That's beautiful. I appreciate it. Yeah, man. Thank you very much. That's beautiful. I appreciate it. Yeah, man.

So we'll shut it down here in a second, but I would like to kind of close it with, you know, maybe some helpful tips or tools that you could relate to somebody. You know, this is kind of how I close the podcast down regularly. Like, you know, if somebody's listening right now, maybe they're quietly suffering in an addiction. They haven't had the courage to either admit it to themselves or to somebody else in their life. Or, you know, they're just suffering from, you know, food addiction or just being depressed and feeling stuck in their life. Like they're ordering the Papa John pizza and playing video games. And, you know, they're tuned into this podcast because on some level they want to change but they're just they can't get to that first base that first step um well you know for me it was uh you know uh i had to unfortunately i had to get to the point to where i was a type 2 diabetic

before i accepted my issues pain is the ultimate motivator exactly it takes what it takes right you know as hard as it i remember it being impossible for me to admit it to somebody that I was struggling and that I was an addict and that, you know, I was, I wasn't happy. I know, I truly believe that if, that when I finally did, when I finally did call it, everything in my life changed. So if anybody is, is out there and they're struggling with just being depressed with, I wouldn't say even if you, you know, there's a, there, there's a difference between eating disorder and disordered eating. Um, and a lot of people suffer from disordered eating, whether it be because they eat emotionally or they just don't know how to eat properly. Um, you know, reach out to, to, to somebody and don't be ashamed of your situation in life because, you know, I was as close to, you know, my life was very close to ending.

I was really unhealthy and really unhappy, and I just didn't care if I lived or died. And the thing is that, you know, when you finally accept your place in life is that that's the point when you can change it. So don't be ashamed of it because it's going to make you who you are going to become. And there's something to be said for someone who can accept the situation that they're in and then put themselves through that test of fire every single day. Be comfortable with being uncomfortable on a daily basis to become something they've never been before. And it's the hardest thing you'll ever do in your life, but it's the hardest thing you'll ever do in your life, but it's the greatest thing you'll ever do in your life.

And give it a shot. You know, you can call me if you want. My phone number is 512-731-0245. Give me a call and I will... You better watch out, man. I think your phone might ring a few times. That'll be great. Give me a call and I will talk to you about it because it is my life's goal right now is to help people who, if you were feeling, if you're feeling close to how awful I was feeling, if

you're feeling worse than I was feeling, then I want to talk to you and I want to help you make that first step. You talk about finding your life's purpose a lot. And I didn't, you know, for a long time, I felt like, what's the purpose in bettering myself when my life has no purpose? Now, I truly know that my purpose in life, I've made it about spreading the message of how plant-based diet in addiction recovery has a place, that it should be taught, that it should be the third leg of that stool. It should be, uh, your therapy. It should be your, uh, recovery, whether it be smart recovery or AA or whatever. And then there should be nutrition should be mind, body, spirit. And, um, my purpose is to make that the new commonplace. And, uh, because for me,

it's completely transformed my life. And, you know, they say give it back. And that's what I want my life to be about every single day. That's a beautiful thing, man. Thank you. Yeah, listen, there's nothing to be ashamed about. You know, shame is really the thing that keeps your life small and keeps you isolated and keeps you in pain.

And you don't have to live that way. And trust me, there are people out there who have done worse and who understand your pain. If you're out there suffering, um, there are people like Adam who will take your phone call. I will, you know, and, uh, and there, there is hope because if you could go from somebody who truly had so little self-worth that, that self-worth that 32 days in rehab couldn't even penetrate your consciousness about your Adderall addiction to where you are now, that arc is so massive and dramatic, let alone going from 300 pounds to what do you weigh now? 170. 170. Yeah, that's unbelievable. 170.

170. Yeah, that's unbelievable. Then, you know, hang your hat on Adam's experience and understand that if he was capable of doing it, that that possibility exists for you as well. Thank you very much. I appreciate that. So thanks for your time today. Thank you. All right.

Well, everybody's got his phone number. Yeah. I don't know if we need anything else. There's not that much about you on the Internet. There isn't. I poked around. Yeah. You got to start writing. You don't know if we need anything else. There's not that much about you on the internet. I poked around. You've got to blog more, man. I'm in the process of writing a book. It's slow going. I'm just sort of journaling,

chronologuing my recovery path. That's sort of bringing back new memories. I'm writing them down as I go. Rip is offering to help me as well, which is amazing. I'm happy to be of whatever assistance I can to that process for you. For sure.

And you're on Instagram, though, right? I am on Instagram. AdamSud82, right? Yes. All right. Is that it? That's it. That's the only place.

That's the only place. I mean, you can find me on Facebook. You're on Facebook, too. Yeah. But I haven't really created the social media identity of the recovery type thing yet. Well, there's task number one for you. There's task number one. Yeah.

All right. Well, thanks so much, man. It's a total pleasure. Thank you. It's an honor for me to be here. You're an inspiration, man. So keep doing what you're doing, all right? Appreciate it.

All right, Adam. Peace. Plants. Plants. all right appreciate it all right adam peace plants all right i hope you guys enjoyed that i really like that kid i'm really looking forward to seeing what he does next and where he's going with his life so hope you dug it as well make sure you check out the show notes for the episode at richworld.com i got links to interesting articles and information about the stuff and the people that we discuss.

So don't miss that. I put a lot of work into that. For all your plant power needs, go to richroll.com. We got meditation programs. We got nutrition products. We got signed books. We got garments. We have plant power tech teas.

We have sticker packs, temporary tattoos, limited edition art prints, basically all kinds of cool stuff to help you take your health and your life to the next level at richroll.com. Keep sending your questions for future Q&A podcasts to info at richroll.com, of course. Check out my online courses at mindbodygreen.com, The Ultimate Guide to Plant-Based Nutrition and the Art of Living with Purpose. Just go to mindbodygreen.com, click on Video Courses. You can find out everything you need to know there. And thanks, you guys. Thanks for supporting the show. Thanks for telling your friends.

Thanks for sharing it on social media, for using the Amazon banner ad, for giving us a review on iTunes, all that good stuff. I appreciate you guys tremendously. I just can't tell you how much this show means to me. And it touches my heart to know that it is affecting other people out there as well I get all your emails I read

them I can't always respond to all of them but know that I'm feeling very deeply connected to you guys and very grateful to be on this journey with you so thank you see you in a couple days make it great and I'll talk to you guys soon peace plants Thank you.