Security Halt!
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Through powerful interviews and candid discussions, Security Halt! Podcast highlights vital resources, celebrates success stories, and offers actionable tools to navigate mental health, career transitions, and personal growth.
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Security Halt!
Military Exposure, Clean Living & Plant Medicine: Chris CT Thompson on Healing from the Inside Out
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Could what you put on your skin and in your body be silently sabotaging your health?
In this eye-opening episode of Security Halt!, host Deny Caballero welcomes Chris “CT” Thompson, a veteran turned wellness warrior, to discuss the hidden dangers of endocrine disruptors, the life-changing power of clean ingredients, and the rising role of plant medicine in veteran healing.
CT shares his raw personal journey—from battling post-service health issues to discovering how everyday toxins were disrupting his body and mind. Now, he's on a mission to educate others on the importance of reading labels, cleaning up your environment, and embracing alternative therapies that work.
🌿 From Ayahuasca to Ibogaine, Chris dives deep into the world of plant medicine—offering valuable insights on preparation, integration, and the responsible use of these powerful healing tools.
If you're a veteran, health advocate, or someone searching for real solutions outside the traditional VA system, this episode will challenge you to rethink your health and reclaim your well-being.
🎯 Topics Covered:
The truth about chemical exposure and endocrine disruption
CT’s personal health battles post-military service
How clean ingredients changed his life
Plant medicine: myths, risks, and healing potential for veterans
Why self-advocacy and education are vital for long-term wellness
🎧 Listen now and take the first step toward informed, empowered healing.
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Produced by Security Halt Media
Securepodcast is proudly sponsored by Titan's Arms. Head on to the episode description and check out Titan's Arms today. Chris CT Thompson. Welcome man. How you doing Good man. Thanks for having me on. Absolutely. You're at the forefront of two battles that you know a lot of us aren't aware of Endocrine disruption and advocating for medicinal plant medicine, things like ayahuasca. It's very popular right now within our community, but a lot of us run towards it without really understanding the importance of having proper protocols and really understanding what it is, what it means, to go after these sacred medicines. But before we dive into all that, man, I want to dive into your journey. Had you found yourself founding a company that is advocating for simple ingredients in the things that we put on our bodies? Because I wasn't aware of endocrine disruption until I was on the other side of my career, dealing with a long list of health issues? Yeah, and at the very top of that list was endocrine disruption.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I would say both of those things are all tied together. You know, once I got out of the Army and I worked as a contractor for another special operations unit for several years and then at the end of that, well, I kind of, you know, my son was born and I was supposed to be deployed at the time but I was able to stay back for the birth. But once I came back from that deployment, that was that, you know, I walked away from that life kind of abruptly and what had been my entire adult life, um, you know, everything that I'd known was training for, you know, deploying and doing and then just totally leaving. All of that is when I think most everything caught up to me and like, at that point it was, you know, seven deployments. I was broken emotionally, physically, and had done no self-care. So, um, yeah, it was a super, super dark time in my life and a lot of the things that we know with, like there's a name for it now operator syndrome, but at the time that wasn't, there weren't and just other any kind of resource for support there weren't. I wasn't a guy that they were familiar with, like, with just the amount of deployments and high op tempo and and things like, things like that. It was just, and so I was a foreign, seeing somebody and what I had experienced and was going through and just trying to work through I think a lot of the answers at that time were I really did think that, okay, if this is coming from a doctor and it comes in like a pill bottle from a doctor, then this has to be the answer. And it wasn't for me at all and in fact it made things worse.
Speaker 2:And so really, what I did, you know and this is over 10 years ago now where I really just started taking charge of my own health. I wasn't so conscious of it at the time, but I was recognizing like, hey, here are the things that I'm like being told to do and you know, and it's not working. So I've got to find something else that will. And what that looked like. You know, my wife says I really don't have any hobbies, but I would say this is my one hobby and that is I'm just really interested and fascinated about health and just what we can do to be the best version of ourselves. And so I started just doing a ton of reading, and I still do today. It's like one of I guess my only hobby, you know, and research, yeah, and just learning, and at that time it wasn't just veterans and what they had gone through and what they had done to heal themselves. I was just looking at people in general because I do feel like that, although we have different experiences across the board, we still can connect on similar emotions, whether it's grief or sadness or I mean even on the positive side, joy and gratitude and all those things. And so I just spent a lot of time researching and really learning about all the things health related and there's so many different aspects to it and I love all of it.
Speaker 2:But one of the things that I learned was cancer is one of the leading causes of death in the special operations community and I had lost a teammate to cancer while he was on active duty. I've got another teammate you know, former teammate who's battling a second round of cancer and it's just it's been so rampant within the SOF community and I really wanted to understand why that was and, like, with all the things that I had piled up already, like, is this something that I may be facing and what can I do to prevent it? And so one of the things that I learned is that you know chemical exposure, chemical stress, is one of the causes leading into diseases like cancer and you know where that comes from. You know in the soft community is and really just the military community in general is deploying to places that there's just pollution in the air that you're breathing in, the whole burn pit thing where all of your trash and all that stuff is being burned right outside the fire base and then you're breathing that stuff in to one of the fire bases I was at. You know we're getting water from a river right next to the fire base and you know it turns out had high fecal content and guys were getting really sick and we're trying to figure it out and medics are adding more chemicals and stuff to try and counteract that. And then the fecal content so high at a certain point you know, like it's really not, there's other harm being caused by the amount of stuff that's being put into the water trying to treat it.
Speaker 2:And, yeah, you know to even stateside. You know all the shoot houses. You know who knows how many rounds have been fired inside some of these shoot houses, then explosive breaching inside those houses and that stuff's getting into the air You're breathing, it in, it's getting absorbed through the skin. There's a lot of things that have been put in place to make those kinds of situations better Ventilation and that kind of thing.
Speaker 2:But but yeah, you know, and I went through a school where, even while I was on active duty, where you know we had to sign some documentation and we're made aware of potential for high lead content based off what we're doing shooting and being in the shoot houses and all that, and at the time like it really sat in my brain. But you know, at the end of that school, I mean, a few days later, I was back down range and so like there were like greater threats in my life at that time. But but you know, once I was out of those situations, it was really recognizing that it's like, okay, I can't change what I've been exposed to in the past, but I can change what I'm putting on my body going forward, because ultimately, the stuff that you're putting on your body in some form is getting absorbed through the skin, in some form is getting absorbed through the skin. And so me and my wife first started doing a lot of this stuff ourselves, with no intention of ever selling anything to anybody. And you know, initially we started looking for products that had better ingredients on the market, and you know this was now it's gotten better, but back then there wasn't, wasn't much out there, and even still today there's there's very few companies that are doing what we're doing in terms of how clean the ingredients are, in terms of being organic, all natural and even naturally scented. There's some brands out there that are doing a lot of natural base ingredients, but they're still using synthetic fragrances, which ties back into what you were saying earlier, which is one of the main things that messes with our hormones. You know their endocrine disruptors, and so, yeah, I really started out a lot of that with just focusing on our own health and what we could do to to improve it.
Speaker 2:And and in that aspect it came in okay, what are the products we're using every single day? And and I do believe this that you know, regardless of what product it is, you know if it's something that you're using on a daily basis, like you really do owe it to yourself to find something that has the best ingredients, the cleanest product that you can find, because, essentially, like this is like a paper cut every single day that, and it's not just you know, the soft community is not just affected by this problem of chemical stress. You know this is a you know problem and there's so many studies that back this up. Almost three years ago actually, where I forget the number of people that it was, I think it was over 2000 that were a part of the study that represented the American population, so they had old, young, different ethnic groups and that kind of thing, and male, female, all of that, just a population, a study group that represented the US population, and what they found was that from this group it was over 80% had detectable levels of glyphosate in their urine, which glyphosate is the active ingredient in Roundup, which is linked to cancer.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and so we're all exposed to this and really at this point it's not so much about just eliminating, you know, trying to get to a place where you're having zero harmful chemicals coming into your space. Really it's doing the best you can to make steps towards reducing it, because it's everywhere in our food and you know just grooming products that we use on a daily basis. So some are easier to move towards eliminating all that. But yeah, really how that all started was just trying to get back to the best version of myself, and we can for this idea that the more the healthier we get, the more we focus and hyper-focus on performance.
Speaker 1:When it comes to the type of lifting, we do the ratio and we buy every sort of biopic feedback device we can get our hands on, but a lot of people really don't focus on the things that you're putting on your body or consuming.
Speaker 1:And it's. It's like I've seen guys like dump thousands of dollars like the best performance training, the best home gym, and then they're going to the store buying their ax body wash, yeah, yeah, lathering that on, spraying that stuff all over themselves. And, uh, and it's. It's often and we have to give credit to the innovators within our lives for majority of guys that are married, it's our wives are are finally sounding the alarm bell of saying like, hey, I should probably get rid of all this stuff and throw it away. Like it's, um, yeah, it's crazy that we don't have enough people yelling or screaming about what you're putting on your body, what you're spraying all over your body, because if you look at the ingredients, none of these things and like literally none of them have like a normal, simple, one ingredient name. It's all these advanced chemical compounds and we're just slathering them on.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, and you need some kind of like science degree to be able to try and interpret what's listed in the ingredients.
Speaker 2:Another interesting thing about the ingredients list is if it has the word fragrance, that can be a whole list of other ingredients that are hidden behind that one word.
Speaker 2:And the FDA does not require companies to list out what they're putting in fragrance, which is wild.
Speaker 2:Even when we were having a lot of our packaging and stuff done and cause we list out every single thing that goes into it, and the folks that were doing the packaging and everything they even said like, hey, you're listing out what you sent your stuff with. You know you're not required to do that and you know the industry standard is just to put the word fragrance and then hide everything underneath that, with the idea being that it's some kind of. This is people's trade secret, you know, and therefore they're allowed to hide who knows what underneath that word. And but the reality is like anybody can take some product and there's companies that can replicate those same scent profiles even if they have no idea what it is. So you're not really protecting much of a trade secret and so, yeah, it's crazy that people you know still can do that because that's where, again, a lot of where the endocrine disrupting you know chemicals are coming from is what's hidden underneath that word and fragrance.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's, it's all about smoke and mirrors. It's. It's about even like.
Speaker 1:There's a lot of companies that are pivoting into the space of healthier products and they market and build themselves as being a healthier alternative to soaps like old spice and, and you know, dove, which is just insane. The amount of chemicals are put into those bars and they're marketed as at the healthier option, one of them being the Native brand. If you flip over the packaging, everything about what they're doing gives you the feeling that this is a cleaner, healthier alternative. But you look at the back and it's the same thing Fragrance, what chemicals are being put in there? And it's. They're not naturally occurring and it's just. It's the same version.
Speaker 1:A cleaner package is a slim. It's all about marketing. It's a sleek ploy to make it look like it's not one of the other alternatives that's just as harmful. So the consumer has to be a little more spun up. We have to be more educated. We have to understand that maybe lavender isn't the greatest thing for us. Maybe artificially created lavender fragrance isn't the greatest thing for you, because it's going to directly inhibit your own ability to produce testosterone. It's going to inhibit your ability to continue living a healthier life.
Speaker 1:But we get addicted to these scents because they smell good, they smell clean, whereas in reality it's like you don't need the fragrance you don't need. You can get naturally occurring stuff, which is. When you look at the stuff that you guys are creating, it has the appeal. It's not a blob that's just made of beef tallow. There is some consumer appeal to it. Going into this space, how did you find yourself being able to compete and being able to put out a product that's both ethical in nature, being able to give somebody a cleaner, healthy alternative, but then also be able to say to yourself, like I got to make, I got to make ends meet, I got to be able to bring something that's wanted.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's a really good question. I would say there's two parts to that is. One is the in the beginning. You know, because I think I guess when I started you know you can do things so much cheaper. You know, going outside of the country to like China or wherever it really went against my values to do something like that. And I was really struggling because really looking at scaling and you know, still being so small and like how am I going to do this? Because I can't keep printing stuff out on my home printer and like trying to put it on a box myself. And and you know I was really struggling trying to find help within the U S to still make all this happen and and and be able to grow the business.
Speaker 2:And someone told me in the beginning cause I was, I was really like starting to question like hey, either I can continue to grow this, but I may really like starting to question like hey, either I can continue to grow this but I may have to like go outside the country to do it and go against my values, or or or just stop. You know I was kind of starting, you know, feeling like I was running up against that and someone told me. They're like hey, your values are going to be tested always. It doesn't matter what aspect you're in in business, whether you're just starting out or you've got a huge successful company. Your values are going to continually be tested. And so you have to make the choice of what do you. Do you really stand by those, or is this something that you don't really value? And so in my mind, that kind of solidified things for me it's like okay, I'm not going to go against my values and just hope that things work out.
Speaker 2:And not long after that, when I was kind of felt like I was hitting this roadblock, ended up finding some really good help within the US and was able to. I mean people that have very similar values. Yeah, there's one company that we work with. I mean it's just so heavily into the natural aspect that like if you were to send them something with synthetic fragrances, they would open it outside the building but then to understand, like the scent profile or whatever, and then immediately throw it away, but they won't even bring it into their own facility. And so I would say you know, it's just, and so things really worked out in that sense. Out in that sense I would say values, really sticking by my values, and ultimately that's what's going to keep you happy. It doesn't matter if you're in entrepreneurship or not. Like if you're working for someone else and it's a good values match, you're going to be much happier versus being in a place that you're. You know the company or what you're doing goes against those values and this episode is brought to you by Titan Sarms.
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Speaker 2:And so I'm really thankful that I was told that, and you know, sometimes you just need to hear things for them to stick, you know, to solidify for me anyways, and so sticking with values. And then the other part I really don't know, you know, like you know, I think that and this is a part I really don't know, you know, like you know, I think, and this is a part of my values as well is that I have a belief that businesses, especially in the future I think it's starting to happen now, little by little, but I think, especially in the future, businesses are going to be judged by authenticity, how they treat their employees, not only how they treat their customers, but how they treat their employees, honesty, and so I've just tried to live by that as much as possible, and my hope is that if I'm doing what I believe is right in all aspects of my life to include in business, then I hope that will translate into other people being interested in it. And and so you know I can't say that. You know there's a part of me that I don't know like, because I think business is just so complex.
Speaker 2:I think business is just so complex and in terms of I think there's many paths to get to one end state and, uh, but regardless of which path, as long as I'm just trying to do what I believe is right along, whichever one I choose, then my hope and prayers that that that leads to continued success and just trying to do right for others and that's really it. Man, I can't say that there's, and just trying to make a better product. I would say those are the things, that there's some things that differentiate us and ultimately that comes down to cleaner ingredients across the board. But I would say those are the things that my hope is that is why people purchase and how we're able to compete.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's hard to try to change the culture, to be more understanding of like and be better educated about what they're putting on their body. It's not something that I was aware of for a long time until like, like I said, it was my wife to make the changes for us. I mean, from getting rid of the Glade plugins, getting rid of the everything, everything, I think, for us it came down to like no-transcript involved in my journey. You know these things are are affecting us just by simply breathing them in. Like. That's. That's the crazy part. Like thought about that.
Speaker 1:We grew up with all this stuff being sprayed around us and now it's like okay, so if I can get rid of this, this and this will have an effect. Will it help reduce the amount of disruption in my system? And the truth is is yes, it will. It's a, it's a positive. Go through your own home, be smart, remove the stuff. And every day there's more and more information. We just now bought a standalone water system because the amount of phthalates that are in our public water, the amount of things that you're consuming and you think we grew up thinking that, oh, it's yeah, water from the tap, it's safe. We drink from the hose Now it's like. But we think about our combat experience and our water bottles that would sit out in pallets, yeah, for days in the hot sun, and how much exposure because that stuff leaches and all those chemicals go right into the water yeah, the microplastics and all that yeah affects fertility and yeah all kinds of things.
Speaker 2:What kind of water system are you using?
Speaker 1:I forget the name. I'll actually I'll put it in the episode description is a standalone. It's supposed to be the best, one of the best rated ones out there. So you just fill it up and it filters and then we transfer that put it in the fridge. I always thought I'm like, oh, the fridge has got a filter, Of course that's good enough.
Speaker 2:My wife's like, no, that's not good enough yeah, yeah, we just switched over to a standalone system as well. Yeah, because there's just even up here at work I mean, I don't drink the water up here at work because not long after I moved in, the city sent in a letter saying there's like high lead content in the water and it may not be safe to drink.
Speaker 1:You know, it's like yeah I'm fix it, but you should know, yeah, yeah, that's wild man Dude. Oh my God, man it's. It's. It's crazy, like, yeah, and I think about all the things we did, and you brought up a good point the exposures we have in the military. It's like you go to schools like Sephardic, go to school like SIFSIC or SOTIC, whatever whichever acronym they're using this time and they're constantly briefing you on washing your hands, washing your uniforms Don't go to chow until you've switched out your uniform but then nothing gets done after that. There's no, for a vast majority of guys, they don't do continued blood testing. I know if you do, you do have certain blood tests at certain parts and if you have too high of blood content you get pulled. But for the rest of your career, nobody's, it's, it's not mandatory. We're not checking these things across the board, not at soft, not in the conventional army, and I think it's time. One thing that.
Speaker 1:The other thing that you brought up is the rate of cancer within our guys. Yeah, it's going through the roof, I think. Within my own friend group, five and guys are not they're getting diagnosed. This is the ones that really freaked me out. Guys were getting screened. They knew they had cancer and they didn't find out. They weren't told about it until they were retiring. That's the crazy part.
Speaker 1:So now we, we, we have a situation where even our medical system is so fucking ridiculous that they can't let us know, or forever. Not for everybody, of course. This is, uh, just two individuals that I know. Yeah, they were found to have cancer, weren't notified, so they were on their the way out, retiring. So we, we have to be educated, we have to be able to advocate for ourselves in every aspect. That's just when it comes to blood work and screening ourselves, but on the back side because, like you know, when we get out, that's when we comes to blood work and screening ourselves, but on the backside because, like you know, when we get out, that's when we start to struggle. That's when we start to go through things. And in your own journey, what were some of the things that you struggled with when you finally made your way out of the service?
Speaker 2:Yeah, there's a lot, you know, as I mentioned, most of the things with operator syndrome. You know I would eventually be diagnosed with TBI post-traumatic stress, a lot of anger issues, hypervigilance, a lot of trouble sleeping, a lot of cognitive function issues and then a whole lot of I mean the typical physical issues. And then, you know, really tried to I don't know, you know self-medicate, you know, became dependent on alcohol and which did not make my situation any better. And yeah, actually I am three days away from four years with not a single drop of alcohol right now, which has been amazing. But, yeah, suicidal ideation is a super, super dark time in my life and the surprising thing to me was how well I felt like I hit it from a lot of the people that I interacted with, you know, because I mean, I'm still involved in the veteran nonprofit space and initially I was pretty involved in the veteran nonprofit space and initially was was pretty involved in the veteran nonprofit space after, you know, contracting and all that, and so I was interacting with a lot of veterans and and when I finally really I guess the things that made the most difference in my life, you know, and was just sharing some about that, there were people that were that I'd known throughout this entire timeframe, you know over was just sharing some about that.
Speaker 2:There were people that were that I'd known throughout this entire timeframe, you know over the course of like eight years or something, you know like my darkest time in my life, and they're like, well, why would you need that treatment? You know like that's not something you would need, like they had no idea that how bad it was. I mean, my, my wife for sure knew and I'm super thankful for her because she's put up with, you know, all the deploy, supportive and just really trying to, you know, supportive of whatever I wanted to look into to, to work on myself, and even when it meant going against, you know, western medicine and that kind of thing. And yeah, I'm just I'm really thankful for her because I don't know where I would be, you know, without her support.
Speaker 2:But yeah, there are a lot of things that I was dealing with and just trying to work through them, like and I don't recommend this like quietly suffering and yeah, I can even man, I haven't thought about some of this stuff in so long man. Man, I haven't thought about some of this stuff in so long man, but I can even remember going to the VA and seeing a mental health professional and it's like the clinic that we have here is super small and at that time, you know the mental health people are on this like one back corner of the VA. I remember like coming out of there and seeing someone I knew and just feeling like so ashamed that they might think that I need help, or you know that I was in. Uh, I hope guys feel more comfortable or at least feel more willing to to reach out for help.
Speaker 2:Um, but back then, for me anyways, I felt like that, um, I, I was the only one and yeah, and I felt a lot of shame with with that and and therefore, I mean, and it totally delayed my healing is what it did, and versus just like I'm just going to put myself out there and really start reaching out for help instead of just trying to do everything on my own. You know cause I feel like there's if, the if. The end goal is the mountain top. There's all kinds of ways you can get there. You can walk up the mountain, you can drive up it, you can get in a helicopter, you can fly to the top and up the mountain, you can drive up it, you can get in a helicopter, you can fly to the top and get there quick. Or, and it's just, it may take you a long time and you're going to get beat up and cut up and everything else along the way.
Speaker 1:That's not the preferred method, yeah yeah, but it's important to understand that everybody has their own journey Everybody, that's true and it's not about necessarily doing everything that worked for me or worked for Chris, but being willing, being willing to listen, being willing to be receptive, and then making a choice to try something. To try something, to try something and I've been there. Making that choice to do something other than what you've been doing is hard. Sometimes, suffering becomes your default mode and you're stuck in that idea. You're stuck in that survival mode and you just have to take one step forward in an opposite direction. Just be willing to try something. Just have to take one step forward in an opposite direction. Just be willing to try something. Be willing to try talk therapy, be willing to go and seek help at an inpatient treatment center, be willing to stop drinking, be open to putting down the bottle.
Speaker 1:I now know that the hardest thing somebody that's addicted to alcohol will ever do is actually walk away from it. Addicted to alcohol will ever do is actually walk away from it. Yeah, and I am. I'm also sober. I am lucky that it didn't become an addiction, but it was becoming a place of comfort, that a place where you're just drunk and numb was becoming very comfortable. Yeah, and after losing more friends, we just lost another one this summer to alcohol.
Speaker 1:I am telling you guys, if you're listening and you're suffering, I don't want you to take and just blindly follow me. I don't, that's not what I'm advocating for. What I am asking you is, if you're listening to this and you find yourself seeking comfort in alcohol, take a pause. Maybe take a pause hall, take a pause. Maybe take a pause, maybe ask for help if you realize that it's too much and be willing to explore sobriety. Just make the decision on your own accord, be willing to talk to somebody and, if anything, just do a 30, 30 day challenge. Go out there, get back in the gym, don't drink sober October, but do it in the summertime. Whatever you need to do, just try something. Try something to get better. You know we were talking earlier, before we started recording, and how summertime can sometimes correlate with a lot of suicides, can correlate with a lot of people feeling down and depressed.
Speaker 1:In my own journey I have explored this with a lot of people and I believe it has to do with the amount of loss we have with summertime and if you're out there struggling, just be willing to talk, man, like being willing to connect with your support group, being willing to connect with your brothers, your sisters. Don't suffer silently. Be willing to re-engage and reconnect because, like we don't recover on our own, we don't get better on our own. Some of the worst things we've been involved with if you're a military veteran, you can remember some of the worst times that you've been in. There was always somebody to your left or right to help you get out of there. You had your platoon, you had your team, you had your ODA, like you're always there with somebody. So please reach out, be willing to go through this journey and ask for help. When you've decided to explore Ibogaine, what was the final thing that said that it gave you that strength to say, okay, I'm going to reach out for this, I'm going to explore this, yeah.
Speaker 2:So you know, I mentioned earlier about doing all of this research. You know, continued research on what people had done to heal themselves, to get better. This was before COVID, this might have been 2019. I read a blog about a woman who she was not a veteran but she had, I believe, a lot of sexual trauma, sexual abuse, that she was dealing with. I read an art, you know, a blog that she had written about how maybe she went down to Peru and did ayahuasca and how she found a lot of profound healing from that trauma and at that time I'd never heard of, you know, in that case, ayahuasca. And so it caused me to really start reading a lot on just psychedelic-assisted therapy. And you know, I had read about ayahuasca, psilocybindma, you know, ketamine, all these different um psychedelics that people had used um to heal and um, and you know, there I got slated to go to Peru for ayahuasca and I guess that would have been the end of 2020 when I was accepted to go down to Peru, and so now it's January of 2021.
Speaker 2:And I'm like a few days out from going down to Peru, I have my negative COVID test, like that whole bit before you fly, it's a wild time and so I'm just a few days out from flying and then the whole country of Peru shuts down because, like of a COVID, you know spike or something. You know how things were like, you know. So like going up and down in terms of restrictions. So then the guy that had set me up with that, you know, I told him I was like hey man, like let me know, like the next thing that me up with that, you know, I told him I was like, hey man, like let me know, like the next thing that comes up, and, uh, you know, told him some of my availability, you know, for the next couple of months. And, um, you know, he reached out maybe two months later or something, and was talking to me about an opportunity to do Ibogaine. And I was like what the hell is that? You know, I've done so much research on all these other psychedelics but I've never heard of Ibogaine and at that time there was little to no information on it, very little. And now there's quite a bit more and definitely right now it's in the news, it's in a lot of media and things and within the government as well in terms of legislative stuff, which is great. I would get connected with vets, veterans Exploring Treatment Solutions. I applied to be a grant recipient and a few weeks later I was approved as a grant recipient, but really what led up to that was just I had done a lot of things at this point.
Speaker 2:So now this is like eight years into this whole, what was a lot of suffering and this really dark time, and some days, a lot of days, it was just surviving the day, and so I think I'd really gotten to a point of I was really willing to try anything to get better and so and this was a thing that you know I grew up, like you know, had never taken any kind of psychedelic or anything like that, and you know, my upbringing upbringing was like alcohol is OK, you know, but any kind of drug, you know, is the worst thing ever Like you'll go crazy, you know what you know.
Speaker 2:Whatever thing ever Like you'll go crazy, you know what you know. Whatever I was even the guy. A few years prior to that, I heard about another guy that I was in group at the same time with, and I heard him talking about using CBD, which has no psychoactive effects, to help with headaches and TBI related symptoms, and I was like what a piece of shit. Junkie you know, like that's that was my view on, like these kinds of things and fucking drug addict.
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Speaker 2:My mindset at that time was so limited to again like thinking that it has to come in this pill bottle from a doctor, yep, and what I learned was that a lot of what I was doing before was trying to treat symptoms versus the root cause. And so, you know, before going down to Mexico to do Ibogaine, some of the things that I learned was that you know some people had died doing Ibogaine, and I know now that you know a lot of those cases. There weren't proper medical protocols in place and some of them were people so far gone with heroin that it was either they continue doing heroin and they're going to die soon, or they can give this a shot with Ibogaine and maybe they'll live, or either way they're close to death regardless. So, and so really, for me to do something that was so outside of you know my character and what I believed in, and I thought I might die. I was like there's like 50-50 chance I'll die doing this, like I'm going to go to some random place in Mexico and hopefully I'll be okay, and I mean, you really have to be at a point to where I wouldn't say I was at the end of my rope, I wasn't willing to give up hope.
Speaker 2:But I was pretty close to that and you know, there's even yeah, I mean just a lot of anger stuff getting out of control in the home and you know, and my wife kind of pleading, like you know, like hey, you have to, you have to get better, like something has to change, you know, and and really this became something that I was really hanging on to, the the next thing that I was going to try, you know, because I guess this has happened multiple times, where I was trying different things going up to, like Cleveland clinic and different things within the VA and outside of the VA, and so this became, you know, almost like a last hope in a way.
Speaker 2:And yes, it's really interesting to think about my mindset at the time, because even when I was staying in San Diego before the next day going over to Mexico, like I made a point to get a hotel room that faced the water, you know, because, like spending a little extra money on that, because I was like, okay, this could be it, so I might as well like get the nice hotel, you know, but what I found out was was transformative for me and, and with proper screening, medical protocols in place it can be very safe and and yeah, it became life-changing for me in in so many ways yeah, it's, um, it's not an easy button, it's not a magic wand, but, uh, in my own experience with 5meo, it it's a radical reset in reprioritizing your life, like I thought I had done all the healing I needed and this was going to be like the last little tiny thing I needed, and it was.
Speaker 1:It's not, it's a journey. It was an absolute journey for me and it was so profound and. But I don't want anybody to think that it should be the end, all be all and the only thing you do, because the reality is you, you have to have, you have to have an intention, you have to have a plan of action and you have to have something on the back side.
Speaker 1:So that you can hang on to what you experience and be the best version of yourself, and I will tell you the moment that you steer away, the way that I equated it for me and my experience. It felt like the best aspect of me was finally shifted into alignment with my life, and you will notice in how fast it gets away from you when you stop working and you stop following your plan of action. You have to have like something to fall back on. You don't want to just come back home and think that it's it did all the work for you, right Like, and for you. When you got back home with this home, after this journey, after this experience, how did you ensure, or what did you put into place to make sure you continued having the best effect for as long as possible?
Speaker 2:if I can just get down to Mexico and do Ibogaine or 5-MeO, if I can just get down to Peru and do ayahuasca, then this will solve all of my problems. It can be a catalyst for profound positive change but, like you said, it's not a magic pill. So, for me, what I think led to the greatest success and what I think are key elements for someone else having similar and long-term effects is, in short, it comes down to preparation integration. I believe that VETS is the gold standard in terms right now of anybody, for civilians or veterans, in terms of preparation integration. So, to start, I worked with a coach who and she just happened to have lots of experience with veterans as well as I mean, she's a licensed, you know, psych and PhD type, and as well as having a great understanding of the medicine itself. And so, and for me, like you know, having never done something like this before, you really don't know what you need to do to prepare. And so having this coach, who you know I would meet with and she would talk me through the things that I needed to do to prepare, and so having this coach who you know I would meet with and she would talk me through the things that I knew needed to do to prepare, um, um, you know, setting intentions and um, and there's with Ibogaine, there's some things medical wise and certain things you need to do leading up to, uh, the treatment. But so just helping out with a lot of that and I think that played a huge, huge role in the value that I got out of it the preparation and then on the backside, having the coaching as well for integration, and Vets offers all kinds of different integration offerings. I mean for grant recipients. They can pick and choose, you know some of what they want to go through, because some of it may be applicable to one guy and not for another.
Speaker 2:But I started taking advantage of everything that I could. And I think you know people will say that preparation, integration, is arguably more important than the actual treatment itself. And I think there's a lot of truth to that, because when you come out of the treatment for me anyways, I felt like I had a choice Before, like I wanted to quit drinking but I couldn't and I knew it was not doing me any good, but I just couldn't stop. When I came back, I had the choice. Then I was like, okay, well, I don't want to drink anymore. So I don't feel like doing it. I'm not going to, and I just didn't feel like maybe a lot of things that were, like I mentioned before, root cause that I was dealing with were taken care of into where I felt like I just didn't need it anymore. But if you come back, you have the choice Do you want to go back into some of the old things that you were doing or back into the same environment that was maybe causing a lot of issues? You have that choice and if you do, then things are going to start back over again and maybe not to the same degree. I think as a whole, you'll probably still be better off.
Speaker 2:But really it's kind of when the work begins, in my opinion, is when you go back from treatment, and I did. I felt so good that like it's emotional for me because of how significant this, this moment, was in my life, but because I I was thinking about thinking back to like I probably hadn't been back a day back at home, and I said, like you know, I feel so good, I'm gonna do whatever it takes to maintain this, and I started. I got extremely serious about my sleep hygiene because sleep was an issue for me for so long. I don't even know how I managed to function for, you know, almost a decade, with my sleep being just so messed up and that affects hormones and all this stuff, and and I was like, okay, I'm gonna get real serious about this, in terms of not watching TV, you know, right up until sleep. I'm not scrolling on my phone right before bed and, like you know, just really having a downshift and sticking to a time that I'm going to sleep and waking up, you know, consistent throughout the week.
Speaker 2:And with alcohol, I never set a like a timeframe of like, okay, I'm going to make it to the end of the week with no alcohol, or I'm going to do a month. I just that was just day by day. It was like I feel like I don't need it today, you know, so I'm not going to drink. And then that turned into a month, you know, which then turned into a year and now almost four years. But but for me that was such, it was a needed thing that I I needed to implement cutting out alcohol and and a lot of other things. You know, I'm in still a lot of this, still to this day.
Speaker 2:I have maintained this throughout, um, which is, um, I cut out watching the news and, yes, I, I think I'm like at least 15% happier, you know and a lot of social media stuff. Like I've really cut back social media use and then really used it for something positive, to where the stuff that shows up in my feed now is stuff that is only lifting me up or it's things that I'm learning and to make me a better version of myself, versus, like, seeing all kinds of political stuff. Or, you know, like I mean you can see more things that would, things that can bring you up. You know, if you have like things set up to in your social media to view it that way, listened to, I've totally changed and it's crazy to think like I was listening to some really dark stuff. You know, whether it was music or, yeah, mainly music.
Speaker 2:But even I really don't watch a whole lot of TV anymore. Or, you know, I mean this is not for everybody. I kind of went pretty extreme on it. I feel like, but movies, don't watch many movies at all anymore, and but I, you know, even with music, you know, I'm sure you've heard people say this or experienced yourself where, like a song gets stuck in your head and if there's this chorus that's playing over and over in your head, you know it's almost like this programming that you're putting into yourself, and if that's not something positive, then you're just taking steps towards, in my opinion, a dark path, and it's just contributing to bringing yourself down.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the importance of changing out that continuous playlist you had. You associate things like music to where you were. So like one of the biggest things that I took from from therapy was what, what music are you listening to? Your playlist, my gym playlist, okay, but at any other moment in time, was that playlist used for anything else? I'm like, yeah, pre-mission and during mission, it's like okay, you're amping yourself up to be in the same environment that you're actively going to therapy to talk about.
Speaker 1:So if you're listening to the same music that's connected to the worst day of your life. You might need to re, you know, understand that maybe somewhere down the line you can remove that connotation, that linkage, but for the time being, maybe listen to something else. Look, I love my heavy metal. I've worked through a lot of things. The same, the same music I listen to now no longer gives me that hyped up sense of alertness, that sense of like oh, I'm about to go, I'm getting ready to kid up, get on a CH-47, to go on a mission. I don't have that connection anymore.
Speaker 1:But there was a period in time where I had to change that music playlist. I had to change those things because it's important to reframe. Don't listen to the same thing, don't watch the same movies if you haven't dealt with the situations, if you haven't gone and get help, otherwise you're amping yourself up, you're getting back in that mentality, you're putting yourself back in fight or flight and nobody tells you this. You have to experience it when you go through and talk to a provider, talk to a mental health care worker, talk to somebody that can help you understand and unravel these things, like it's an important part of being able to heal and get back to that better part of your life being able to say like, hey, I don't need this anymore. Maybe I don't need Haybreed, maybe I don't need Pantera to amp me up. I can go to the gym, just be in the gym and have a great workout with a different music track, with a different you know rap group, and it's no longer trying to feel yourself or put yourself in that same mindset.
Speaker 1:I know a lot of people hang on to that and you know, if that's, you maybe think about that, maybe feel like there's a better way. We don't have to get ourselves and put ourselves back in that mindset. If you're about to go into a combat zone, you can just be amped up and excited to go back to the gym. Right, yeah, that's it man. Yeah, dude, it's been awesome being able to sit down and have this conversation with you. Brother, I can't thank you enough for being here, for being vulnerable, to share this. If people want to check your website out and see what you're up to and maybe contribute and get some better, cleaner, healthier alternatives to soap and body products, where can they go?
Speaker 2:Cleanercom, which is K L E N.
Speaker 1:Rcom and you have an awesome tagline. By the way, if you break it down for us, you have some awesome. Uh, your, your graphics are insane, but your tagline's awesome, so where did you come for that?
Speaker 2:Yeah. So Spare no Arrows really is about kind of like, what we've been talking about is about health, and you know there's a quote that I like is with health, we have a thousand wishes. Without it, we only have one, and that's to get our health back. So with health we can get the most out of life, and that's what I want to do. You know, we all have a limited amount of time here and I want to make the most of it.
Speaker 2:I don't want to hold back, and bearing no arrows would be just going for it. Don't hold back, and you know there's a lot of people around the same concept, that kind of have this idea of I'm going to work until 65 and then my life will start and then I can start doing the things that I want. And to me that is the example of sparing arrows. You're holding back and I don't want to do that. I want to be the best version of myself and get the most out of life today and not wait until some point down the road when it's too late road when it's too late.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely, man. That is a great, honorable, friggin motto to share with the rest of the world, not just the soft community, but everybody. Spare no arrows, get after it, man. Life's too short, like it's, uh it's, we're not getting out of this alive. It comes to an end for everybody. So, while we're here, spare no arrows, chris, thank you so much for being here. Brother, again, absolute pleasure. I cannot wait to have you back on.
Speaker 1:And if you guys are looking for some new soaps and body products, head on over to cleanercom. I'll make it easy for you. If you're listening to this episode right now on Spotify, we have this awesome feature where you can text us directly. The first 10 people that text us through this episode, you will get some free products. I will send it out to you personally. You're not going to get to choose what I send you, but I will send you some free, cleaner products First 10 people text us through the Spotify text us feature. Let's make this happen, chris, thank you for being here.
Speaker 1:Everybody tune in. Thank, thank you for being here. Everybody tuning in. Thank you so much for supporting the show. Please continue to share it. Please continue to like it, subscribe it, leave us a comment, leave us a rating in Spotify. I greatly appreciate it because, man, there are tons and tons of podcasts and shows out there that you can consume, but you're choosing to listen to this. I don't take that lightly. I greatly appreciate you all and we'll see you all next time. Till then, take care. Securepodcast is proudly sponsored by Titan's Arms. Head to the episode description and check out Titan's Arms today.
