#2: On veteran mental health and breaking stigmas | 2 Docs and a Grunt

As Diana O Sees It: Compelling Conversations Recorded: Sunday, June 16, 2024. 2 Docs and a Grunt Diana O: I wanted to thank you guys for everything that you've done for veterans and for our country, because some of the stuff that's been happening on our streets has been really disturbing to me. I'm in New York City right now and I'm a couple blocks away from the World War I Memorial that was vandalized a few weeks ago. So, that just, that really deeply disturbed me. I wanted to say thank you to you guys. Luis Fonseca: Yeah, yeah, definitely. Thank you for the support, Diana. Absolutely. Doc Berry: We appreciate it. Anything we can do. Luis Fonseca (00:42) Well, first and foremost, Diana, good morning and thank you so much for inviting us. My name is Luis Fonseca. I served on active duty in the United States Navy as a US Navy Hospital corpsman for 22 years of my life right out of high school. I joined the United States Navy back in 1999. During my time on active duty, I served in nine deployments, five of 'em being combat tours, boots on ground, and one of those tours I was involved in the Battle by Nasiriyah, which infamously became known as Ambush Alley, and for my actions that day, I was awarded the Navy Cross. So yeah, that's a little bit about me. What's been going on in the last eight months? Oh wow. What has not been going on is probably the better question. Right? Finishing up one trade program after retiring from the Navy, I didn't think I wanted to go into medicine, so I went to HVAC school then welding school and electrical school. When we first met Diana, I'd already completed HVAC school, and I was in the middle of welding school. And so I completed that and then I also completed my electrical trade. Diana O: Wow. Congratulations. Luis Fonseca: Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. So that's new. We have a fairly recent high school graduate now in the house. Our daughter graduated two years early from high school at 16. So yeah, so she's right. So she's rocking it. Diana O: Proud dad. Happy Father's Day to you all. Luis Fonseca: Happy Father's Day, gentlemen. A hundred percent proud dad of all my kids, all of 'em. What else has been going on? Just trying to bring more light to the foundation and trying to save some more lives while we do that as well. And then actually next month, I'll be starting school. Because I just can't get enough of school, even though I hate school. I really, really do it with passion. I actually start my journey into my clinical psychology degree next month. So I'll start at the bachelor level just because I didn't have enough credits to suffice, but I'll knock that out fairly quickly and then move on to master's and then hopefully my doctorate. So yeah, fairly new stuff going on. A lot of stuff. Diana O: Wow. You're going to be a force to contend with. Nate Emery Yeah! Diana O: That'll be awesome. Luis Fonseca: Fix HVAC units and humans. Diana O: It's amazing. Oh wow. Yeah, for somebody who didn't like high school, here you are. Yeah, it's like, oh, that's awesome. Thank you. Well, thank you. Luis. Who goes next? Usually Nate Emery: I go next. Diana O: Alright, go for it. Nate, Nate Emery: (03:31) Again, thanks for having us on. My name's Nate Emery. I did 22 years in the Marine Corps. Two of my deployments I can tell you about are combat related. I was in Desert Storm in the infantry, and I was in Mogadishu Somalia for Operation Restore Hope. And after my 22 years in the Marine Corps, I did 12 years enlisted and then 10 years as an officer. So I retired as a captain. And after that I went into DOD contracting for a few years and then I went over and worked directly for Secretary of the Navy and did that for about eight years and talked about some relationship stuff you want to cover in there. There's some crazy stuff. And over the past 13 months, it's kind of like my second act in life, I guess, or maybe it'd be the third act, I'm not sure. But for people in there who know the Old Testament, it’s kind of my Exodus 14. I got pushed out of what I was doing, because I needed to be. And I've been reinventing myself, getting closer to God over the last year, and using this time that I've been living on my 401k to formulate a nonprofit that I want to start that deals with veterans and first responders, but also includes a Christian component to it if they're open to it. And so a lot of stuff in the past year, how we've been doing. I've been in my own head a lot. You do good, you get a lot of traction for a little while and you take three months or three steps back for a little bit and then one of your buddies will text you or whatever, and these guys keep me on task and remind me and get me spun back up again and moving in the right direction. But that's what I've been doing. I don't know if I've mentioned this before to you, but it'll be new to your viewers. I'm a single dad. I've been single for six years now, maybe seven, six years. And I've raised 12 kids plus a bunch of foster kids, but the last six years I've had four, raised four of 'em on my own. So that's been eye opening when you realize how much workload another person carries that you're not even aware of. Diana O: Well, congratulations. Nate Emery: Well, I don't dunno how well I'm doing. We'll see how that goes. Thank you. Diana O: I don't think there's a perfection badge for this. Nate Emery: If it is, it's getting glass. It's just for looks. Nobody's got it yet. Diana O: Awesome. Thanks Nate. All right. Dr. Berry, last. Doc Berry: (06:29) Hi, I am Berry. Thanks for inviting us along to this. Real happy to be on the receiving end of one of these for the first time. I'm also known as Doc Barry. I'm a psychologist and psychoanalyst and I practice in New York State. I specialize in working with veterans and first responders. It's what I seem to have been put on this earth to do according to folks like these. And I've never seen combat, never seen any heavy situations. I have no idea why these folks feel comfortable enough to tell me what goes on in the bush or on a fire scene or on a med call in great detail. But I'm honored because what they are doing is tantamount to them giving me a piece of their soul. And I do everything I can to help them recover from post-traumatic stress and whatever else, and help them redefine themselves. Because oftentimes guys and gals who get out of the service or after a career as a first responder, virtually any denomination, they will often say, I have no idea who I am anymore. And so it's my job to help them find who they are to 2.0, so to speak. I have recently been giving two presentations, in addition to working with these guys, which is—and I'll say it now and out in the open and for all to hear—is the greatest team I've ever been part of. No joke, it’s the greatest team by far and away. And I'm honored to be here. Never thought in a million years like Luis was saying, he never thought he'd be in a room full of educated, accomplished people. Well, I never thought I'd be doing this, especially with men of this caliber and many others. So anyway, what I've been trying to do is to get the word out about post-traumatic stress disorder without coming across like a psychologist, which is to say I do two talks: one is the “Old Chief” and the other is the “Old Veteran.” The Old Chief is geared toward first responders, and the Old Vet is kind of self-explanatory. And as I was putting this together, I thought… now as Nate especially, and Luis will tell you, I can never do anything the right way or the normal way, I’ve got to do it my way, When I'm putting this stuff together, I thought, any idiot and in a suit and tie who's going for tenure can get up in front of a group of people and read off a list of completely uninteresting, tedious pedantic and ultimately dehumanizing DSM five terms that are at the end of the day, technically slick, will get you tenure and et cetera, et cetera, but are categorically about as interesting as a five pound bag of fertilizer. So I thought, okay, how do I do this? I'm going to take… you ain't heard nothing yet, lady, believe me. So I thought, why not take all the symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder and instead of outlining or saying what they're, why not tell a story about all of them? And what I'm doing is when I do this in front of vets or first responders, I am holding a gigantic mirror up to them, and they feel comfortable receiving the message from me because I've been told many times over, they feel like I'm one of them. And I am in some damn fine company. And, I was taught about the concept of triage from a fellow that I worship to this day called man. And my hero in that was Hawkeye Pierce, the character played by Alan Alda. Now I realized that this is a construct; that it's not real. A lot of it's Hollywood, but it sunk its teeth into me all those years ago and still has me in its grasp. And Hawkeye said in an episode, it's triage. He said, the people who get seen first are the ones who are bleeding the most buckets. Now, I am no surgeon, I'm no corpsman, but I do work with heavy psychological trauma, and these guys should be, these guys and gals should be seen first. No question. That's no question. I stand by that one. And why should they be seen first? Because folks, in case, well… Diana, you were just saying a little bit ago, it's not safe out on the streets anymore. And we like to think of first responders as the thin red line, the blue line, the thin yellow, et cetera, et cetera. In the military it’s the thin green line. And guess what folks? Those thin lines are getting thinner and thinner by the day. And I can't solve these political reasons for the sort of the social; that's above my pay grade. And then it turns into a pissing contest. All I can do is focus on my little sphere of it, which is the mental health end of it. And lastly, I'll tell you… I am going to be 61 this year due to circumstances beyond my control. And I come from a generation where… When we were kids, we were surrounded by veterans. World War II was enormous in my household. When I was a kid growing up, my dad graduated from my high school in ‘45. He served stateside. And Happy Father's Day to us all by the way! Dad was discharged as a tech sergeant, and he spent his entire career as quartermaster, and he swore only because he could type faster than anybody. That was my father for you. And my grandfather served in heavy, heavy combat in Bavaria. He was captain, army captain. He received a bronze star with the Vier valor. The neighbors were veterans, uncles coming after our grandparents were veterans. So I was just surrounded by them. And I didn't know it at the time because when you're a little kid and you're being programmed, you never know how this shit works, right? But what I was doing was I was being programmed later on in my life to work with these guys. Getting back to the talk that I try to give. By the time I get done, (and it's no exaggeration), most if not all of them at one point or another in the audience are in tears. And I have to do it that way. I have to reach them. I have to send a message that I'm trying to understand them. I care about them, because they are bleeding the most buckets, because they need to be seen first, and they need to be restored to the level that they once were. When I was a kid growing up… We've heard on many occasions the tedious cliche, “well, I'd take a bullet for that guy.” And that's all it is, it’s a cliche. However, right now in this interview, whatever we call it, you and I are in the presence of two men who have been shot at on more than one occasion. To me, they are the country's finest. They're walking pieces of history and national treasures. And we as a country, have to restore the honor to them and the deference to them for being willing to take it that far. And that's the end of that speech. I've said too much already. Sorry guys. Diana O: No, that was awesome. Thank you, doc. And I loved how you talked about the restoration of the human to how they were when they were kids. What do you think are some great things that are happening for veterans today? Luis Fonseca: (14:57) Very great question, Diana, especially because I actually just got off the phone with a gentleman last night speaking about this. I personally believe what's going on right now with veterans is a lot of us are just learning to open our freaking mouths. A lot of us are kind of just tired of seeing our brothers and sisters die, because we just don't have the balls to get out of our house, basically. And a lot of vets are kind of fed up with the whole, “woe is me, I'm a veteran. Oh, I did this, I did that. Boo hoo me.” And a lot of us are saying: “you know what, we need to stop that shit and get the fuck out of your house. Because we're out here. You talk about missing the brotherhood, the sisterhood. Well, all it takes is you opening that door and taking two steps out of your house. And you'll see!” We don't ask for much. So it's like the old cliche saying goes, you lead a horse to water, but you can't force it to drink. The organizations are out there, the support is out there. Just about everything and anything you can think of for veterans. I want to say in the last eight months, I dove so much into true non-profit organizations for veterans. And I've come to realize that whatever cup of tea that you want to help your mental health to support it, I guarantee I can find you an organization out there that's a hundred percent free to you. Whether it's: Do you want to learn how to fly fish? Do you want to learn how to make pottery, glass flowing? Do you want to go to school? You have no more money from the va? There's lots of organizations and scholarships out there for veterans. And I think just people coming out of the woodwork and just saying, you know what? We're done playing the sobbing game. We're not pitiful. We're not worthless. We're not these men and women that went and did great things regardless of whether you stepped foot on the battlefield or not. Just signing your name on that line to say, whenever this country needs me, I'm here for it. People don't understand what it's like to have to wake up to go to work every day. And then knowing that, let's say your child's birthday's coming up and now you're fighting with your other colleagues to say, “Hey, can someone swap duties with me so I can be home for my child's birthday?” And I was like, “Hey, dude, it sucks, man. That's military life!” And it's those little sacrifices that some people just don't even realize that we have to make on a daily basis. And so to me, regardless of whether you step foot on a combat field or not, doesn't matter to me. If you're a veteran, you are a veteran, and we're here to support you and take care of you. And I think within the last, not maybe eight months, but within the last six months, I've really been seeing this trend of change, of just veterans coming out and saying, that's it. No more. We’ve got to stop this. And the way we've been trying to do it for the last, let's say, 15 years doesn't work. Us crying about it sitting in our bedrooms doesn't work. So yeah, I think that's probably one of the biggest things I've seen transpiring as far as veterans and the veteran community. Especially, I think I saw on this last post, one of the things I do at the National Warrior Foundation is we actually go out and try to find veterans and or service members that are actively in the process of committing suicide. And this last post, I think the post before that, I posted something about this to me speaks words and it talked about a political agenda and then a person that was, I'm actively looking to commit suicide. So the political agenda post got like 300 something likes, views, comment shares everything. The one where we're looking for a veteran, four people interacted with it. And I said, so this to me, volumes of what is really on your priority list as a human being. I think it was a few days later, we posted that we're looking for another veteran, and within 24 hours it was over a hundred shares. And I was like, see, that's how we do it. That's how we save lives. We put all this political bullshit aside and start just taking care of human beings, because 99% of us are great human beings. And we need to stop letting the 1% screw up our nation. I'm sorry, I got on a rant on that one. So yes, so that's what I've been seeing. Diana O: It's interesting that a lot of the help is coming from nonprofits. Luis Fonseca: Well, yeah, absolutely. And a lot of the help. One thing that me and this gentleman, Albert, his name's Albert, her last name is Hero, Albert Hero. Diana O: It's appropriate. Luis Fonseca: I know, right? He's a navy veteran as well himself. But anyways, that's one thing that Albert and I were talking about. We are very much appreciative of the Dr. Barry's in the world, the psychiatrists in the world, but at the end of the day, what we've been saying is, what's keeping me alive isn't the doctors, isn't any medication, it's me opening my mouth and sharing stories with my brothers and sisters. So it's really not, the professional help is great, but it's like having diabetes, right? Once a doctor diagnoses it with you and gives you the tools to treat your type one diabetes every day, it's up to you to do use it, right? Use not the EpiPen, but the insulin shots or whatever. That's how I'm trying to take an approach with my mental health. I've already been diagnosed with this. I have a lot of freaking tools in my bag. And I think the one biggest tool that I didn't use for a long time, or I wouldn't say I didn't use, but maybe I wasn't as open and as transparent as I am now, was with my mental health. And now that I am, man, my life has just changed dramatically for the better. I still have bad days. I still have shitty days. I still have days that I wish I wasn't here. I still have days where the drink is a lot better than dealing with the issue or going to find some drugs somewhere is better than dealing with the issues. But then I remember that I would much rather deal with the issues in a sober state of mind and in a clear state of mind with my brothers and sisters alongside with me than just going back into that dark place that almost took me out of this world. Diana O: That's really powerful. I just keep thinking about what Nate shared earlier about the isolation being in your head. I work with some people through my coaching business and they're in long-term recovery, and they talk about that a lot like being in your head, the inner critic, and the isolation sometimes. I mean, luckily they go to a lot of support groups, but so they also, like you Luis, it's part of their DNA. They go to meetings every week, but it's so easy to fall into the isolation trap and how do you reach the veteran who's at home, who's feeling hopeless, and how do you find them and reach them to say, Hey, don't be alone. Join us. Nate Emery: (22:17) That's a hard thing because we tend to, and I don't know if it's the times we live in or if people have always been this way, but we tend to look at things always from one aspect, from one point of view. And certainly there have been times in my life, and I've known lots of people who are in this position where they deal with anxiety, depression, PTSD, suicidal thoughts and stuff. And some of it is because of their inaction or just their self-isolation. But then there's those that are out there that no matter they've got what Dr. Barry could go into more detail about this, but they're in a clinical depression where it doesn't matter what they do. It doesn't matter how hard they want to pull themselves up by their bootstraps, there's something else going on. They can't kickstart themselves. So I've been, I recently started—a couple months ago—going to a veteran support group, and it goes on Fridays. So it's people that are retired. And so it's an older crowd. At 52, I'm the youngest guy there. Quite often, we got guys there in their eighties. And what I'm noticing is occasionally there'll be be post-Cold War vets, post 9/11 vets there occasionally, but the Cold War veterans back to World War II, those vets are still sitting around holding onto stuff. It's still bottled up in a lot of 'em. I think it's the stigma from their generation “of handle your shit. You can deal with it on your own.” And then usually they cope in negative ways. And some of 'em are just now starting to want to start talking in that group because it's not necessarily a PTSD group; it's just a veteran support group. Veterans, you can see each other and you can tell who's bottling up a bunch of hurt by the way they appear. So I'm seeing that in the older generation and my generation, the post Cold War on through 9/11 or after 9/11, I'm seeing people that are just starting to learn how to talk and speak about things. I didn't seek help until 2009, and it's been… still is… this long journey for me of learning all the things that I could have done, should have done better, stuff like that. And then the post 9/11 veterans, I think, are the ones that are—in their own interest—doing the best to help themselves, because, I think, they've grown up with more time and learning that it's okay to say things. It's okay to speak. There's still some stigmas there. And more than the stigmas, I think there's a lot of feelings of self shame and self doubt that everybody's always going to have trouble. When you go to church or you go to some social event, and somebody says, how are you doing? Well, you know that that's a cursory question. Right? They're just looking for, Hey, doing great, good to see you. It's not the time that people are expecting to go, well, let me tell you what's going on. I've been sinking in this hole for the last seven years now and nobody knows it. So what you said is how do you help those vets that are isolating? Because it’s one thing to be isolated, but it's another thing to be isolating. And I look at it as anybody with negative mental health is in some type of a hole, and they're all different depths, and some people have been in the holes for so long that their hands are up looking for help, and no one can see 'em. Unless somebody goes and looks down in their hole and takes an interest, they're not going to realize that person is begging for help. And usually all it takes is for someone to notice a look on somebody's face, the fact that somebody's not showing up anymore or they're not hearing from 'em as often and just ask them, “Hey man, how you doing?” And then if they give you that cursory, “I'm doing great. I'm all right.” I'm going one degree deep. “No man, how are you really doing? I'm concerned about you. I'm worried about you.” And then usually that's enough to get people to at least give you a glimpse and give you the opportunity to listen and start helping 'em out. But I noticed, I live in northern Virginia, so I live in this area where politics kind of permeate everything. And up here, the politicians all believe that they're doing everything that they can for vets, despite a lot of veterans benefits and programs are slowly starting to devolve and reduce. Like here in Virginia, the state of Virginia just rescinded free college for a hundred percent disabled veterans' children for their children. And there was no talk about it happening in advance. It just showed up in the Virginia legislature, and it got voted in. And it's like out of nowhere. So those things are, now that the wars aren't in the spotlight anymore, veterans aren't in the spotlight anymore, now this stuff's starting to go by the wayside. And it's the nonprofits that are picking up all the slack. If you want to know how well veterans are doing, it's almost, almost indirect relationships. The better vets are doing, the less the nonprofits have to do. And the fact that there seems to be more and more veterans nonprofits growing, it's kind of what I've been telling Doc Barry in the mental health community for a long time. I think we're starting to see this bow wave of what happens after the war is over. And finally people have a chance to go home and live in the real world with everybody else. And now they're reflecting and starting to deal with their issues and themselves. It's a mixed bag. Diana O: So you are thinking about starting your own nonprofit. What would your nonprofit look like? Nate Emery: (28:36) It evolved over time in my head, what I wanted to start doing. And I don't know if that's God working on me or if that's me just getting some clarity. I just knew that from the time I was 18 years old, my job was to help others. I mean, most people would say no as a defense of the country that once you get out there and you're doing defense of the country or you're doing offense, it's all about those that are around you, all the other service members. And I realized that even as a father, my whole life has been helping others. What I was missing, a big chunk of me was, I was no longer helping anybody. I was just a cog in a machine, working as a contractor or working in DOD. And so I started working on that front, and about that time we started doing the Two Docs and a Grunt webcast with these two gentlemen, with Luis and Doc Berry. And I was like, okay, we've got this. We're doing a good thing. But there's still a group of people that I'm aware of because of my church, that there's people that they've got a spiritual hole of some type. And if you can't fill that spiritual hole in your soul along with fixing yourself in the ways that you can, there's always going to be some type of a wound there. And since my background is I'm Christian now—(I've been Christian since I got baptized in 2012)— I realized I wanted to do something to help people repair that spiritual side of themselves as well. And when I searched, I could only find one veterans nonprofit in the entire country that also takes care of the spiritual side on top of the mental health. So, that's where I want to go. I want to build a facility, where I can get other leaders and experts who are great at what they do to come in and teach classes and courses or vets and first responders that are dealing with trauma in their lives. And maybe on top of that, having some residential classes where maybe you need to learn how to take care of yourself again for four weeks. Hey, here's how you get a daily routine started again, that has healthy habits. And we're not just going to tell you how to eat better. You're going to practice learning how to eat better by cooking for each other and doing it, so then when you go home, you've already lived it and have a start. So that's what I want to do. I've got a long list of courses and ideas and different areas I want to do, whether it's home gardening, mental health, DNA ministries that are based around some of the things like Luis has, whether it's around welding, car repair pack, or other believers can talk to them and mentor them, but it gives them the space to talk about their spiritual beliefs as well. Diana O: Well, I hope this dream comes true for you, Nate. I think it sounds like a wonder. Nate Emery: I hope so too, because I'm going to sell my house to do it. Luis Fonseca: Oh, we're going to make sure it happens. Nate Emery: If it doesn't work out. Yeah, I'm starting from scratch. Diana O: Well, it sounds like a wonderful transition for veterans who are maybe transitioning to a civilian role.I haven't asked you guys specifically, but this transition from military to civilian—I've heard—is always very difficult, because when you're in combat, you guys are together and you have each other's back, and then you're released into the civilian world and then you're on your own. And that's a horrible transition. Nate Emery: (32:16) You can kind of break everybody into almost two schools of thought. There's the people that have been preparing their whole career to leave the military. They already know what they want to do when they get out, and they've got their sights set on something. And then there's people like me who didn't want to leave the military, wasn't planning on getting out, and then all of a sudden found myself in the situation in life where I'm like, the best thing I could do right now is to get out of the military: retire. Well, I haven't had all the time to think about all the different things I might want to be when I grow up. And you find suddenly some of us find ourselves in a spot where we don't know what to do with ourselves anymore. We're like, okay, my purpose? And that can be difficult. It doesn't seem to matter whether you're an officer enlisted. I've known colonels that get out of the Marine Corps and they get this high vice president job in a contracting place somewhere, but then they struggle because they're like, what am I doing? This is not what I was born to do. This isn't what I've done for the last 40, 50 years. Diana O: Wanted to get to doc. Doc. What do you think is working well and what do you think could be better in terms of serving the veterans and mental health? Doc Berry: (33:39) Well, just to riff off what these guys have already said. The central theme of what you have just heard from these two is disclosure, which means you open your mouth. Okay? I didn't invent this, but I swear it works. And these guys have heard me say it many times, which is why they're falling asleep right now. But you open your mouth, and the pain comes out. I’ll say it again. You open your mouth and the pain comes out. And the prior generation of vets, the guys from World War I, World War II, they never talked about it. And that's just the way they did business back then. But when you're not talking about that level of agony, you're not doing yourself any services. Okay? I cannot tell you how many times I have run into somebody who has seen combat. And by the way, this is starting to happen with the Vietnam guys as well. They're opening up to me, and they were part of–on the cusp of that: “Should we talk about it or should we not?” And what I've seen categorically is when they open up their mouth, they're so surprised at the end when they actually verbalize that, they feel some relief. And that just makes my point, for me. Only agony, the emotional pressure, the shitty memories, the sleep loss, the death, the whole thing, and the emotional pressure, the cognitive pressure when it finally comes out. And what happens is after a while, the anxiety, the depression, the fill in the blank with your favorite symptom decreases to where they can actually start thinking again and perhaps even feeling again. Case in point. Here's another story, these guys have heard me tell many times. I started my career as a diagnostician in a state run Supermax out in Kansas, which means my job was to check an inmate's rap sheet, interview 'em for an hour to an hour and a half, check the psychometric testing, type up a report, suggest program recommendations, and send him on his way, which has very little to do with mental health and everything to do with “wham bam, thank you, ma'am classification the trip to McDonald's through a drive through.” That's it. So, this one Vietnam guy comes in—a combat vet—and I checked his rap sheet and everything about this guy was alcohol related. Effectively, he came back to the world and he drank his way out of his own life. Married. He finally was able to tell me three times his wife wouldn't speak to him, his kids wouldn't speak to him, and it was all booze. This guy from the date of discharge forward was fighting monsters in his head that he couldn't see or put words to now, and it landed him in federal prison. Now, so one of my questions for the combat guys is, “who do you miss the most?” And usually they'll tell me about their best friend, their brother, sometimes their sister in combat who was cut in half by machine gunfire or some god awful thing or obliterated. One guy looked at a terrible expression on his face years ago, and he says, “Hey Doc, have you ever heard of the pink mist?” And I said, “no, but I think you're about to tell me.” And he said, “it's when blood vaporizes. It’s pink mist.” And I said, “that's the nightmare that wakes you up?” And he goes, “Every fucking night.” So anyway, bottom line, this guy came to me and I said to him, “who do you miss the most?” And I'm expecting him to say about the loss of a brother or sister, but what he gave me was a priceless clinical nugget, and I'm passing it on to you today. The color search to his face, the veins were sticking out of his forehead and his neck burst into tears, and he half shouted. “Doc,” he says, “I miss me. I used to be a nice guy. I miss me. I used to be a nice guy.” And, it's one of those moments where you take that simple and unbelievably eloquent sentence, and you let it sink in, you let it process it. And you take that idea and apply it to every vet or first responder you worked with from that day forward. And what he was telling me was he went into the service as person A and he came out the other end of the service as person B. This poor bastard had no idea who he was anymore. And what a lot of people don't realize with post-traumatic stress from combat, it's more than anxiety, depression, nightmares. The central nervous system is affected, which means the chemistry and physiology of the brain changes. This guy, and Nate and Luis—I would venture to say—and the others, you go into the service with brain A and you come out with brain B. And it's not because of normal maturing and development. It's from the relentless effect of adrenaline blasts, non-existent sleep for days or even weeks, shitty food, chaos. And your central nervous system pays. And when you think about that, when you think about a changed brain, right? Is it any blessed wonder that these guys say to me, “I have no idea who I am anymore.” And, to raise the stakes on that idea even further, I was giving a two minute version of the old vet talk to a local Vietnam vets group. And I told that story, and one of the non vets who… there wasn't much left of him, let's put it this way… I got done saying my thing, and I got a nice round of applause and handshakes and bear hugs. A couple of 'em were in tears. And one guy stood up and he says, “doc, he says, listen, I got back to the world and my mom asked me, ‘why aren't you the same person you were when you went in?’” Wow! Just wow! When you think of that! And so, what was I saying a few minutes ago? The idea is to, among other things, get these guys, these gals to open up and talk. Let the pain out. Talk about who they were, if they can tolerate what they've seen and the effect on all of that, on the person that they are today and who they wish to be. And, it often takes me years with these guys to get the layers to peel back. And I'll give you one other symptom because this is PTSDs doc. I can do this all day long. Listen, these guys let me hang out with the cool kids. I'm just some far out old fart, grossly overeducated, weird. I'm the nerd who hangs out with the varsity players. I'm the emotional waterboy. Call me Gungadin, if you will. So anyway, it's emotional numbing. And let me tell you about emotional numbing. It's pretty much what it sounds like. When you see the old vet or the old chief or whoever at a funeral, and he or she is in the dress blues, and somebody is being lowered into the ground, the old vet or the old chief stands there like a goddamn statue. Expressionless. Mechanical. And that right there, I can't make it any clearer than that. That is emotional numbing. Could we take this to another level? Yes, we can. They're not feeling anything. They're not. And here's another, an even heavier statement about what's going on. I've run into a couple of guys, and they lower their parents into the ground and they feel nothing. And one guy told me that he put his kid in the ground. His kid! You understand what I'm saying to you today? And he actually said to me, this is going to sound cold, but I'm so grateful for all the combat that I saw. So when I buried my boy, I wouldn't have to feel anything. That right there, folks, is emotional numbing. And that also, among everything else, takes away a sense of being emotionally related to the wives, to the husbands, to the kids. And is it any wonder at the end of these god awful tours of combat or years of service as a first responder, these poor bastards wind up alone. And when you see in the obituary that great sentence, that patriotic flag waving sentence that says: A lifetime of service. Boy, that really pumps my nads and gets the testosterone going, makes me want to re -enlist. But the darker side of it is what I'm emphasizing. Lifetime of service often turns into a lifetime of trauma. And getting back to your original question, what's stepping forward is we gotta get these guys to open up and they are slowly, thank God, able to do that. But we've got a long way to go, because the stigma of opening your mouth is still there. The way veterans and first responders are trained to do their job so well is to never say anything about themselves and be watchful of everybody else around them. It's essential for mission completion. I get it. I totally get it. But there's an enormous price to pay because at the end of these tours, the end of these experiences, we have to ask them, get them to a point, get them to a place where they can do just the opposite and open their mouths, and finally say something and finally say, “I'm not okay with the message that it's okay that you're not okay.” Number one. Number two. When we get them to that point, what we are saying to them with all the love in our hearts is that you are from, you know, the last hair on your head to your longest toenail and everything in between your body, your brain, your soul. You were acting perfectly normally to an unbelievably abnormal set of circumstances, a level of crazy that defies description. And my brother, my sister, you are not weak. You are not crazy. You're just in pain. So let's do something about that. And I can't do it all by myself. I need you to tell me what's going on. Diana O: Wow! To me that sounds really hopeful. Because… if the solution is opening up and talking. We just need to clone you, Doc, and have thousands of Doc Berries around America talking to veterans, or in Nate's and Luis's. Doc Berry You wouldn't be the first to say that, believe me. Nate Emery I was just picturing in my head, this army of Santa Claus looking therapists. Diana O It's so funny. The first guy I interviewed looks like you guys too. He's got a big white beard. So fun. So I'm curious, Luis, what do you think this new psychology degree is going to do for you? Luis Fonseca (45:57) Honestly, I don't think it's gonna do anything for me. I'm hoping it does well for whoever I come into across in my life that could use some help like I've gotten. I am you know, no knock on any of my psychology for psychologist friends and psychology doctor friends out there, but not many of them look like me, all tattooed up, you know. That's kind of... I think it... as you can tell, it's still hard for me to think positively all the time about myself. But I think I could just bring a different perspective. I can bring a different... to have knowledge is one thing, to walk it and to experience it and then to fight your way out of your own darkness with the help of great family and friends, loved ones. I think to be able to bring that to the table, not necessarily like, you know, we'll hear my story so that way you can help yourself. No, it's more like, dude, I get it, man. Like there's nothing that you can tell me that I probably haven't tried and or done myself in the most negative ways to combat mental health, to everything from trying out all the positive things to combat this. So amongst these four walls between you and I, if there's anyone that I would hope you could really feel trustworthy enough to say, all right, here it is, would be someone that lived that life too, that lived that. There's a reason why I watch a lot of people in recovery that do podcasts that are convicted felons that did 20, 25 years hard time and now I've found a life of sobriety and recovery. There's a reason why I gravitate to the ones that lack of a better term lived a really fucked up life because that's who I relate to, I don't relate to the ones that that grew up had a you know an average, you know a home situation, you know, we're you know did decently in school and then went off to med school or or psych school and now there seem like I am sorry I can't relate to you. You know, to me, your life that you lived, although you have the education just like a dentist, right? A dentist that treats a root canal doesn't need to have a root canal in order to treat it. But I think a dentist that has had a root canal done before and when your patient's like that one hurt a little bit, you know, they're not just going to sit there like, okay, whatever. I just gave you numbing pain like, you know, five minutes ago. They're going to be like, okay, let me give you a little bit more. And so I just think that's a little bit of the difference that hopefully I could bring with this new pursuit. And if anything, just to, just as well, I mean, for the selfish parts too, would be just to understand myself a little bit better and my kids too, you know, to try to bridge that gap between us. Although I try very hard to do it nowadays, I've also realized I'm a man that likes to understand the whys and how we come about to these conclusions. And so with that, unfortunately means having to go to school a lot sometimes. So, yeah, so I think if anything, my two main goals or one big goal with this whole pursuit of this degree is just to try to give someone a little bit of comfort in their darkest times to know that there is recovery, that there is hope, that if, you know, a high school dropout that never thought he would amount to be anything in life can be here in front of you today, then you definitely have the power to do and become whatever you want in this life. And is it easy? Absolutely not. By no means. If life was easy, then we would all be living happy and carefree, right? But it's not. And then, like I said, the other part would just be to try to hopefully better understand my children and their grandchildren to break some of these generational cycles that have just continued on throughout our family trees. You know, no fault of anyone else's own, but I do feel that if you recognize that there's a generational trauma within your family lineage, then now it's your responsibility to do something about it, not just put that link on once again, right? So. Diana O: Thank you, Luis. The reason I asked you that was because I've always thought about going back to school and getting a psychology degree. And thank you for inspiring me to maybe follow in your footsteps. Luis Fonseca: Hey, do it, do it, do it. You know what I mean? Especially in today's day and age, I think the big stigma about us working the first 30 years really hard to maybe enjoy the last 20, right? Because our life expectancy was in the 60s, early 70s. Now when we're living to 80, 90 years old, very healthy as well. I mean, you have, Diana, so much time and so much great energy to give to this world. Why not? Why not? I mean... Diana O: Yeah, I think once you have that degree also, it's like you have more access to helping people. People will seek you out. Luis Fonseca Absolutely. And if I can take one thing off of Doc Berry, I didn't want to say this, but you're right. It gives you credibility, right? And Doc Berry shared a story with me that one of his professors shared with him when he was starting off his either scholastic or psychological career was like, do you know what the P in PhD stands for? And Doc was like, I'm not sure. And the guy was like, and you can correct me Doc if I'm saying it wrong, but basically it was like the P stands for power. And I know it sounds very, very brunt, very egotistical, but it does, right? It opens a lot of doors that regardless of how good of a dude I think that I am and how great things I've accomplished, having sometimes those initials behind your name allows you access to some rooms that would otherwise be a lot harder to get access into. So yeah, there's a little bit of selfishness in there as well. It would be just to try to gain access into some of those spaces to try to help out our brothers and sisters. Diana O: Yeah, that's awesome. Doc Berry (52:24) What's going to make Luis successful is knowing him as I do. He'll never be Dr. Fonseca. He'll be Doc Fonseca to his Navy shipmates or Luis. And between that and the ink, and by the way, Luis, I don't know, your head was turned, speaking of ink, okay. Speaking of ink, you know, it certainly helps with credibility. But yeah, the guy I was talking about, he served on my first doctoral committee. And he asked me one day, what's the P in PhD stand for and I said philosophy and he goes not he goes yes but it also stands for power and what Luis is saying is yeah you it opens doors it sends a very clear message that you've gone the extra mile that you've gone deeper you've gone wider and that's when you're in a position where excuse me they almost by definition have to take you more seriously, and you know for myself, that's certainly what happened. You get treated differently when you can call yourself doc. Diana O: I like the word “anti-fragile.” You guys are not fragile. Nate Emery: (53:41) Think of the alternative. What would a life-time of comfort and ease look like at the end of your life? What comes out of that? Not a lot. Diana O: A worm! Like a noodle? Nate Emery: There’s no resiliency born out of comfort and ease. Luis Fonseca: (54:01) Absolutely. I think that's why, you know, in the Navy, I'm sure it was, I think it's an actual old African sailing proverb, to be honest with you, but it states basically, you know, smooth seas never made for a skilled sailor. You know, and I take that approach about anything in life nowadays is without that adversity, without that, you hitting bottom every now and then, you don't know what it's like to get back up and be resilient. Diana O: Luis, what is your advice to parents out there? Luis Fonseca: (54:31) You know, one thing that I like to share with my kids and I know for some, there's gonna be parents out there who are gonna gasp at this, like, my gosh, how, you know. I tell my kids all the time this, within the four walls of our house, you're 100 % the most special person in this world. No one else is better than you. No one else gets more love than you from me. No one else gets more attention from you. You're the most special person, absolutely. But as soon as you open my house door and you walk out, you're a nobody. Remember that. I tell them, because that's how the world's going to treat you. Regardless of what accomplishments, regardless of what awards, regardless of how much fame you think you have. When I was telling my kids this, I told them, at that time, I think Dwayne The Rock Johnson had the most Instagram or ex -followers, Twitter followers or whatever. Something like 700 million followers he had at that time. I said, you wanna know what's ironic about that is you kids look at this guy and think, my goodness, such an amazing, well known person. I said, there's almost eight billion people in this world. What is 700 million to eight billion? I said, less than 1%. I said, even someone like him, that a lot of people think he's well known and world famous and my, whatever, less than 1 % of the population know who this man is. I said, that's how unspecial you are to the world. But to me and your mom, you're the most special person. And I try to remind them of that balance, right? Don't get overzealous of who you think you might be, because there's always someone that is going to be bigger than you. There’s always going to be someone that's going to be better than you. There's always going to be someone that's going to make more money than you. There's always going to be someone that has more fame, more glory, more accolades, more this. But you have to be content with who you are. You have to be proud and happy of who you are as a person because that's what matters at the end of the day, which falls in line with this whole, you know, I'm a big believer in this whole not having participation trophies, right? Like you can't, you can't, I'm glad that you showed up. Absolutely. 100%. But the way the world works is, you know, you can show up at a company every day on time, but if you're not helping that company make progress, they'll let you go. You know, same in life. You can show up all day every day and that's great, but if you're not making progress, then it's probably time for you to walk away from whatever it is that you're doing and go on to another adventure. Another thing I like to stress to my kids a lot is I want you to grow up comfortable with failure. A lot of kids today are so scared of failing because they make it seem like failure is such a one of the worst things in life when, in actuality, failure is probably 98% of your life. I mean, how many times did not necessarily the light bulb, but the filament within the light bulb have to get reinvented over and over and over and over again before we've come to this conclusion? How many plane crashes happened before finally we got one in the air? Failures are probably our biggest way to develop and grow ourselves, especially when we're down there at that place in our life where we think it's rock bottom. And I tell my kids, it's at those moments that you use all of those failures to really build a solid foundation to grow yourself back up. And anyone that picks themselves back up time and time again after failure is going to be the people that change the world and provide the biggest influence in the world. And so I tell them that like, success you're going to get it. I'll ensure you'll be successful. That will, we'll build the roadmap for that. But within that roadmap, I don't want you to be scared of failing. I'm not going to be there all the time. Your friends are going to be there all the time. Your colleagues aren't going to be there all the time. Your significant other, right? Whatever is not gonna be there for you all the time. So you need to be comfortable with failing and knowing that you can get back up from that failure. So I think those are the two biggest things that I always try to instill into my kids is to always remain humble of who you are, where we come from, you know, as we progress in life. And if you get, you know, I tell them, if you get all the riches in the world, by all means, I'll be so proud of you. But stay humble and also don't be afraid to fail. Don't be afraid to go through life with failures, because most of us in this world have more failures in our resume than we have successes. But that's what also makes those successes so much sweeter, so much better. Diana, I'm about to celebrate six years this July sobriety. And yeah, and that's my biggest thing that I brag about so much, because for 17 years I failed at keeping that thing in control, right? And now for six years, you know? So that's why I say I feel failure’s a big part of our life. Diana O That’s so huge. Send me your sobriety date so I can send you a message on that day. Luis Fonseca Yes ma 'am, will do. Diana O I love that. That your kids feel that their love to the moon and back within the four walls of your home. I think that's so beautiful. And I really hope that parents listening to this can maybe share that with their children. But I also love this idea of the no participation trophy and the humility that comes along with that. It's just, I think a lot of problems today are a lot of kids are used to those trophies and then the real world hits them and they just go from here, they go from lofty heights down to nothing and it's very traumatizing. Luis Fonseca Right, right, absolutely. Diana O Yeah, or their parents do everything for them and then they don't know how to do anything for themselves. Luis Fonseca Yes. My God. It's like common sense: where did it go? Diana O I want to say thank you for your time. If there's anything I haven't asked that you would like to say, please feel free to say it now. And I want to give you guys your day back. Doc Berry (01:01:00) What we've been saying from a completely different angle is what we've been talking about here is open the mouth, let the paint come out, in other words, disclosure. And disclosure breeds disclosure. If one eye one guy opens his mouth and lets out the pain that gives courage to the next guy and the next and the next when we started two docs and a grunt the response with all the stuff we have been able to upload and the dozens of podcasts we haven't, because we can't find anybody to do the editing. But the stuff we have uploaded, we are getting messages, emails. “Doc, you don't know who I am. We've never met before. I was on the verge of doing myself in last week and a buddy of mine said, you got to go see, you gotta check these three guys out. I watched you guys last night. My jaw was on the ground and you guys turned me around. So we know that disclosure is breeding disclosure. We know this is taking a metaphorical piano off the backs of those suffering. And the greatest benediction we, I think, from my angle that the webcast has given us is they just about all of them say the same thing at the end: “Can I come back and do this again?” When they're initially sitting down scared shitless going hummina, hummina, hummina, hummina. And they say, but you know, first five, 10 minutes, it's a little rough, but then the ideas and the conversations start to flow and they want to come back. They want to do it again. And they're enthusiastic now. Disclosure, greeting more disclosure, big white elephant in the room gets a hell of a lot smaller, a lot faster, the more people are talking about it. Diana O In the show notes, I’ll put up a link to your Two Docs and a Grunt. You guys have a YouTube channel. I noticed you have a Linktree. There’s a link there where people can contact you. Do you guys take donations? Luis Fonseca (01:03:03) Two Docs and a Grunt was established by us three as a separate entity from National Warrior Foundation. National Warrior Foundation is a 501c3. We’ve been in operation a little bit over two years now. Earlier this year, we had a board meeting and so we’re bringing 2 Docs and Grunt under the umbrella of National Warrior Foundation. I’m actually in the process of rewriting the bylaws to reflect that. So, yes, we can officially take donations. I just request that you do it through National Warrior Foundation. We’re all working out of our own pockets, and that’s okay with us. It all goes strictly back to the foundation to support and try to save veterans and/or produce more content, so that we can keep spreading the message. So, yes man we can, Diana O Awesome. Well, thank you so much! Luis Fonseca Thank you. Diana O Anything else, Nate and Doc? Nate Emery Thanks for having us on. Hope we get to see you at the next Renaissance Weekend and maybe not Charleston this year. Diana O I hope to see you guys maybe, you know, if you swing through New York City or Newport, Rhode Island? Stay well and see you soon. Luis Fonseca Alright. Bye bye everyone Nate Emery Bye Doc Berry See you guys later.