243 MIKE MILLER

Chuck LaFLange (00:01.969)
Hello everybody, watchers, listeners, supporters of all kinds. Welcome to another episode of the Weekend Rumble on the Ash to Awesome podcast. I'm your host, Chuck  in Krabi Thailand. This time, also in Krabi Thailand, is my guest for this weekend, Mike Miller. How you doing today, Mike?

mike miller (00:16.771)
I'm good, Chuck. Mixed feelings, I guess. Generally in my life, pretty good, but we've both lost someone that we know and we had sort of touched base on that beforehand, so yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (00:31.761)
Yeah, it's a big hit. It's a big hit, you know. And for anybody that's not been paying attention, Devin McGuire from Revolution Recovery in Surrey, BC. I mean, he's a... Jeez, I made a few posts on him, and I don't know if I could make enough. I mean, the guy was an institution unto himself in the recovery world, right? Many, many people. You guys go back, way back, right? Recently in an episode...

mike miller (00:57.23)
Yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (00:59.921)
I was discussing with somebody about, I couldn't remember, which one of you answered the phone when the other person called in. If I got the history right, 20 years ago or whatever. Okay, okay, okay. And that would have been close to 20 years ago or right around there by now. I think he was about a year behind you getting into the game, right?

mike miller (01:07.92)
I answered the call when he called treatment, yeah.

mike miller (01:16.431)
Yeah, I think it was what 18 or 19 years ago, probably something like that. Yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (01:21.777)
Yeah, yeah, right. So yeah, Devin, I mean, wow, right? And of course, what was crazy is you were just landing in Vancouver when that news hit, right? Which of course, I had no idea about that. So did you get a chance to talk to any of the recovery community out there about that? Or is that still too fresh and too busy?

mike miller (01:35.758)
Yeah.

mike miller (01:42.927)
A little bit like well, no, so Yeah Yeah, let me know where to start with it. So yeah, we go we go way back So he was a client of mine and you know, I can say that because he said it quite, you know blatantly and he's Said it on this podcast. Generally. I wouldn't do that stuff, but It's quite historic as well. And then you know watching him sort of embrace recovery

Chuck LaFLange (01:58.577)
Yep.

mike miller (02:11.822)
grow his own personal recovery and then, you know, get involved in helping other people. and he did have a massive heart and he was just like quite a, a charming and charismatic guy. So, you know, he drew people to him pretty well and. You know, he didn't do it for financial reward as, as I think he said on this podcast, I know you've, you've said it before. It wasn't his sort of thing that drove him to do it. He just wanted to help people.

Chuck LaFLange (02:34.065)
Yep.

mike miller (02:39.374)
Yeah, so watching him sort of like blossom into this like, you know, figure in recovery was a pretty amazing transformation. And, you know, over the past couple of decades, just, yeah, really seeing him solidify himself in the community and build up a lot of people around him that he had helped. And, you know, it was just quite a thing to witness. And then, yeah, I had to fly back to Canada for, you know, I'd...

My grandmother passed away and I had a passport sort of thing. I had to go back for an emergency.

mike miller (03:19.725)
can't remember what's the word I'm looking for. It had to facilitate like an emergency passport renewal and.

Chuck LaFLange (03:21.617)
Yeah.

mike miller (03:27.981)
So I get there and of course I don't have a Canadian SIM card. So when I land, my phone is basically dead. And then I connected to the wifi at Vancouver airport and all of a sudden, yeah, I got a bunch of messages and saw posts and notifications and stuff about Devon. And yeah, it was, it's quite surreal. I mean, today I was talking to my wife about it and saying how surreal it was. And when I was there, I was able to contact, it's weird, like,

I hesitate to get too active with stuff when people pass away because I don't want to be a guy who makes it about him when someone else passes away. And I think that, you know, there are, I'll just name it, there are people that do that, right? And I think it can encroach on other people's privacy and on their grieving. And, you know, I had my own sort of like,

Chuck LaFLange (04:11.825)
Yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (04:18.705)
Of course there is, yeah.

mike miller (04:26.317)
process to go through with it. But what I did is I talked to some of my close friends who are also mutual friends with Devin. Again, we've both been part of that recovery community for a couple of decades. So I connected with them and we, you know, had some, some sadness and had some laughs and, you know, sort of memorialized some of the good times with them and stuff. And yeah, it's, and then, you know, you're always like, because it's a very

Chuck LaFLange (04:33.105)
Yep.

mike miller (04:53.869)
private thing and I'm not in the family and you know, so like you're left kind of like not sort of knowing what's going on and Yeah, it's it's it's tough man, I just I feel for his family I feel for The people that I know that work at Revolution Recovery. I feel for the people that he's mentored and he's helped get clean They look up to him the people on his ball team like he's just a big part of the community a lot of ways and I feel bad for a lot of people

and yeah, it's sad, man. It's tragic. and I'll miss them, you know, like that's, that's a lot of wine. And I know that there's people out there hurting and I feel for them too.

Chuck LaFLange (05:30.737)
Yeah. Yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (05:36.497)
Yeah, right. It's the people closest to him. And I don't think she would mind. Lisa has taken a break from the show this weekend because they were really, really close. And she's processing that grief as well right now. So he was a big part of things with Lisa's family. And that's another story to be told. But I mean, and.

mike miller (05:48.301)
Yeah. Yeah.

mike miller (05:55.694)
Yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (05:56.849)
As you well know, Devin was one of the first sponsors of the show for me. You know, right? He's got a lot to do with he's how Lisa and I met, you know, it was in Indian people, you know, when you say something that's sorry for your loss, it's like, okay, thank you. But it's not it's not about me. It's like, how many people are just deeply impacted by this guy, right? And I'll just just kind of switch gears on it. One of the things that Devin did that I would aspire to.

mike miller (06:00.365)
Yeah. Yeah.

mike miller (06:14.381)
Yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (06:26.545)
just in life. Whoever you were, he made you feel great about whoever you were. Right? He just had this thing. I remember when I got my denture, we got on to record and he says, there he is with that bright fucking smile. And he just made me feel so good about it. Right? But that's just who he was as a person. Right? And in the short time that I knew him, you know, so yeah, he's a great guy. Great guy. Yeah.

mike miller (06:31.63)
Yeah. Yeah.

mike miller (06:42.094)
Yeah.

mike miller (06:45.839)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, yeah, that's a thing like charismatic, charming, but like also not like not phony in it. Like, like, you know, this is just who he was. He was like really attracted people to him because he's an easy guy to be around. He's an easy guy to laugh with. Like I've had a lot of laughs with him. And actually, when we hung out, most of the time we were laughing.

Chuck LaFLange (07:00.753)
No!

Chuck LaFLange (07:14.065)
Yep.

mike miller (07:15.695)
Like, you know, that was just sort of the nature of it, even though we deal with, you know, some heartbreaking shit between us. Like we're both in the field of helping people and that, you know, sometimes you get these amazing, awe -inspiring stories out of that. And sometimes it's, you know, heartbreaking. And yet somehow connecting on that, we would still manage to always like have a good time and laugh. And yeah, it's just sad. And I know like,

Yeah, I feel bad for Lisa. And I guess this is one of the things that happens is, and we forget this, I think, right? Because I forgot that I was the guy who answered the phone when Devin called treatment until he said that, right? And so like for me, it was just a moment a day at work and then, you know, but for him, it was like that moment that he reached out for help and someone picked up that phone and Leo, so like.

Chuck LaFLange (08:01.297)
yeah.

mike miller (08:13.936)
What that did is it, without like any sort of fucking blowing my horn or something, because it was just my job, but no, but you know what I mean? So it was an important moment for him. And in that relationship to me, I became important to him in that, just like the guy who answered the phone for me when I called treatment was very important and is still important to my life. And as someone that I've become friends with and is like someone I've.

Chuck LaFLange (08:21.745)
I don't think you have to qualify it, but I think, yeah, go ahead. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

mike miller (08:42.096)
you know, now been friends with for over 20 years, who I hold in very high regard. And I'm very grateful that he answered that call. And so, you know, Devon.

Chuck LaFLange (08:49.073)
I think that's another mutual acquaintance of ours, is it not? Right? OK. OK. OK. I thought it was somebody over to my old sponsor there, TWC. Right? I thought it was. OK. OK. that's what that was. OK. OK. All right. It's all right. All right.

mike miller (08:52.047)
It is not.

mike miller (08:59.632)
No, no, no, no, I answered the call for him too. They're all my clients. They're all my clients. No, he's actually runs an AI company in London. Now he's sort of semi -retired, but that was his business.

Chuck LaFLange (09:18.641)
okay, okay, okay. Okay, yeah.

mike miller (09:24.56)
No, but that was an important moment for me. And so, yeah, that bonded Devin and I together, but I had forgotten about it. And for him, you know, like he doesn't forget about it. Just like, I don't forget about the guy that answered for me. And there's a lot of people out there that Devin was that guy for. That like, you know, like someone like Lisa. Yeah. Like, you know, Lisa's like, you said important with Lisa's family. He was that guy to her in a lot of ways. And he was that guy to a lot of people. And he's probably just like, you know.

Chuck LaFLange (09:39.313)
Fuck could you count them right? Yeah? Yeah, right, you know Yeah

mike miller (09:54.415)
going through his day, not necessarily knowing the impact that he's had far and wide in those little moments of being that guy in many different instances, whether it was answering the phone or opening the door, giving someone a bed or giving someone a ride or like whatever it was, just the stuff that he always did, right? So yeah, that's the impact that he's had, I think that.

Chuck LaFLange (10:05.873)
right?

Chuck LaFLange (10:13.521)
on countless, countless people. You really couldn't put a number to it, right? And I think if you're going to take something from this conversation, I mean, that's it, right? You never know how you're going to affect somebody's life, right? So keep those interactions positive and, you know, right? So yeah, yeah, sad to bits them. Anyway, anyway, that does bring us.

mike miller (10:16.143)
Yeah. No.

mike miller (10:25.903)
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah.

mike miller (10:32.815)
Yeah, me too.

Chuck LaFLange (10:37.361)
segues nicely. I don't want to use ordnance. And there's something I do want to talk about. It's something that we've touched on in the show before, Mike, with you. And that's the grief in EMDR and some protocols around that too. We did talk about it.

It was in the middle of a lot of things in that particular episode. It's something that I wanted to circle back to. I think it's relevant to a lot of our listeners. A lot of our listeners are parents who've lost the battle with their kids, right? And maybe some potential there to help with that. So if you could maybe touch base on how that works and what that's about.

mike miller (11:05.487)
Yeah.

mike miller (11:14.895)
Yeah, well, I think, like, one of the things about grief is it's pretty unpredictable and a lot of people think they're doing it wrong somehow or don't, you know, like, it's like, how do you know how it's going to affect each individual person, right? Like,

And so when someone comes to me and says, you know, and this has happened fairly recently, I had a couple of different people in my care that had lost people that were significant, and they both had two very different reactions, but what they wanted to do was get past some of the sort of like what I always call like that gut punch that goes with the loss.

Now we're not trying to circumvent grief by using EMDR and just for anyone out there who doesn't know what we're talking about when we say EMDR, EMDR stands for eye movement desensitization and reprocessing. It's a type of psychotherapy that is called the gentlest form of trauma treatment. It utilizes eye movements and other forms of bilateral stimulation, stimulating both hemispheres of your brain. And...

What it does is it desensitizes the disturbance levels around certain memories. That's the D in EMDR. And the reprocessing is it allows us to have different beliefs and understandings about ourselves in relation to these memories. And here's an example. It's an example I always use. I'm eight years old and I'm playing...

soccer or football for our European friends. And I score a goal and I look over on the sidelines and my dad isn't there. And I start to form a belief about myself with that memory that is I'm not important. So with EMDR, we would process that using the eye movements and other modalities. And that would desensitize the pain that I feel about that memory.

mike miller (13:26.222)
And then I would at the end of the process, I would also have a different understanding that like, just because he wasn't there doesn't mean I'm not important. It just means that he was at work to give me a roof over my head, et cetera. Right? Like, so I get a different belief about myself attached to that memory, the reprocessing part. When it comes to grief, we tend to have obviously disturbance in our bodies.

when it comes, like when I think about someone that I've lost, like I do feel that kind of gut punch feeling. However that shows up in your body, I just talk about it as the gut punch, like that real sort of disturbance level that we get. And then we'll probably have a belief about that ourselves in relation, like a lot of times, you know, like if I've lost someone, I might think like, it's my fault or I should have, if only I'd done something different, you know, if I had, you know, we do that bargaining sort of.

Chuck LaFLange (14:00.913)
course. Yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (14:19.473)
That's probably the most common belief, right? Yeah, yeah, right. Yeah.

mike miller (14:22.638)
Yeah, I could have done more or whatever the belief might be, you know, and that might relate to like, I'm a failure, I'm not good enough or whatever, if you boil it right down to it. And so when we use EMDR to process it, we're not trying to make sad memories of grief, happy memories. We're not trying, we're not erasing memories. And so,

Chuck LaFLange (14:44.785)
Mm -hmm.

mike miller (14:49.325)
What we want to do is we want to get rid of that gut punch feeling, that disturbance, so that I can actually access more adaptive understandings about my relationship to that person and about myself. So what that would mean is a lot of times when I've lost someone, when I think about them, all I think about is the loss, right?

Chuck LaFLange (15:14.545)
Yes. Yeah.

mike miller (15:17.486)
So like for me, if I use an example, like when my grandmother passed away, and this is when I was actively using drugs, for a long time after that, anytime I thought about my grandmother, I would be overwhelmed with like sadness and despair, and all I could think about was the loss. If I process that with EMDR, at that point, I...

I often liken it to like, there's like a log jam in my brain that, and that's, there's like a river and the log that's, that's clogging up that river is just the loss. So that's the one thing I think about every time I think about my grandma, I just think about the loss. When I process it with EMDR, it's like that log jam starts to move. And now all of a sudden, even during the process of EMDR in the session, I might.

Chuck LaFLange (15:52.433)
Yeah.

mike miller (16:13.614)
start to think about like the good memories I had with my grandmother. Like it becomes less of a blockage to some of the rest of my relationship with her because I get so stuck in the loss itself that I am not able to access other things and EMDR can help us get through that. And then, you know, that belief that I would have had is like, maybe I should have done something different. Maybe that belief becomes, well, I did the best I could, or it's not my fault, or I'm good enough, or whatever it is that we're sort of targeting with that. If that makes sense, I know.

People who aren't familiar with EMDR might not follow that exactly, but yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (16:41.969)
It does, yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (16:48.657)
Well, I think I'll interject with my very, and I'll keep this very brief because I don't want to get too far off topic. But for myself, my experience with you is something I've been very open with, but I had a very traumatic memory that my first EMDR session with you, that was horribly traumatic and it kept me back through a lot. It was one of the worst things I've ever been through. After our first session, it was like,

I can talk about this in a matter of fact way. It no longer brings up this massive emotional response. I remember that day writing it down. I was completely, it was a breakdown for me. I'm just giving it a name. I could have called it anything, but whatever. By the end of that session, when I hear you talk about EMDR to grief, I think relief.

and how fucking awesome it would be to just not awesome how freeing it would be to just be able to shift that focus to the good stuff with that person and not be held back by that lost memory i guess right so yeah go ahead

mike miller (17:51.82)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I think, I mean, if we know, I think you're bang on. And I think if we think about it in sort of a cultural context, like in some cultures, when people pass away, like they don't grieve, they celebrate and they move on because that's just how they've been sort of like socialized to that process their whole lives, right? Us in the West, you and I are both Canadian.

Chuck LaFLange (18:19.217)
Yeah.

mike miller (18:21.899)
And I would say it's probably similar for a lot of cultures in the West is that it is a grief thing. It's like I've lost that person and now I'm very sad about it and you know, it can be quite disturbing to me. And I think that if we can get to the point where we lose the disturbance, we can still be appropriately sad about it. Like we, you know, as we would be like, I've lost this person and that's sad, but I don't feel like you said this.

overwhelming emotional response where like I can't even put a name to it. So then what happens is like I can't even talk about that person. I can't even remember them because any thought of it, I'm just overwhelmed with grief. If we can get relief from that. So it's like, I don't have to avoid it. You know what I mean? I, the other thing is that, you know, when it comes to any sort of traumatic symptoms, a lot of times it comes with intrusive thoughts, nightmares, flashbacks, that kind of stuff. So,

I might be having intrusive thoughts about the loss of this person and EMDR is really effective for getting relief from those what we call criteria and A symptoms of PTSD. Not saying that people that have lost someone have PTSD necessarily, but I'm just saying nightmares, flashbacks and intrusive thoughts are part of that. And EMDR is really good for now I can choose to think about the person. And when I think about them, I don't get overwhelmed. And I don't just have to think about the grief. I can actually think about.

all the reasons of why I'm grieving them, because how awesome they were in my life and the moments that they were there for and the important good stuff, like I can access that now without feeling overwhelmed by it. And I think, yeah, our goal isn't to erase memories or make them happy. It's just to take that sort of like power out of it so that now I can kind of have the power and I can choose to think about them and remember them in the way that I want to.

Chuck LaFLange (20:04.945)
Yes, yeah, right.

mike miller (20:15.755)
without, you know, cause a lot of the times with grief, I don't have a choice. You know what I mean? Like I'm not choosing how I'm going through this process. It's, it's just happening to me. I will say this too, with grief is that some people wouldn't need to EMDR on something like this, like grief is a process. It takes time. And some people feel very disturbed by it in the beginning. And then that lessons over time and you know, they just go through the process. Yeah. But some people get stuck in it.

Chuck LaFLange (20:40.561)
which is natural, right? Yeah.

mike miller (20:44.267)
Right. And, you know, I can, you know, I had a client who had lost their spouse. They were married for 40 something years and couldn't get past it. Like they couldn't like, you know, for whatever reason, and I'm not going to go into it too much, but they couldn't get past it. And EMDR brought them relief from that and they were still sad, but they weren't stuck anymore. Right. And so, yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (21:11.249)
crippled crippled by it's right now yeah

mike miller (21:14.315)
And so that's the difference. And that's how it can be used in grief. And that can be done fairly quickly. Some people realize that they're stuck pretty quickly and other people, you know, it's just, there's a natural process. And here's the thing about grief. It sucks. Like you can't predict it. You don't know how you're going to go through it. Some, you know, I can beat myself up. Like I'm crying too much. I can beat myself up. I'm not crying enough. I can, you know, like, like we try to make meaning of how we're doing it. And, and.

Chuck LaFLange (21:30.385)
Yep. Yep. Yep.

mike miller (21:43.338)
of how we're supposed to be doing it. So it's a really tricky one, grief. I wouldn't say that I'm any kind of a grief expert, but I would say that, yeah, when it comes to specific EMDR protocols with that, or EMDR outcomes with it, is we can get people unstuck a lot of the time as a goal.

Chuck LaFLange (22:04.593)
Yeah.

mike miller (22:05.961)
and get them relief from any of the sort of guilty or feelings that might go along with it if they have a belief of like, you know, I should have done something different. And I had that, I had survivor guilt. A friend of mine got murdered when I went to film school and I was supposed to be with him on that day. And all I could think about was, if I had gone there with him, it would have turned out differently. Yeah, which is, you know, kind of crazy because there's a good chance I probably would have ended up shot along with him.

There's no way to know that. No, absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. But that stuck around with me for like years and years and years and years. And I did do some EMDR on that and that changed, you know, it lessened over the years, but it was still there. This kind of, and now I just go like, yeah, like I wouldn't have had any control of that. It wasn't my fault. You know, I stayed home for a specific reason. And, you know, he ran into a guy who was a psychopath, but like, you know, that's.

Chuck LaFLange (22:34.801)
rational isn't a part of the process, right? Like it's just not. It's just not. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (22:43.953)
Okay.

Chuck LaFLange (23:04.817)
Yeah, that's how that happens, right?

mike miller (23:06.759)
Yeah, sometimes it's tragic, but it wasn't my fault. And for a long time I hung onto this, it's my fault. And EMDR got me some relief from that as a client, and I've seen people get relief from it as a therapist.

Chuck LaFLange (23:08.817)
Yeah, it is. It is.

Chuck LaFLange (23:16.785)
Of course, right. I think, circle back to something you said there, it is important to recognize that it is a natural process and that it does suck, you know, to kind of wrap this portion of the episode up here. It is a natural process. It does suck. You are going to experience some horrible days and moments. And for me, it happens. And it doesn't matter who it is when I lose somebody.

I can be, and I'm sure it's like this for many people, I'm not unique in that, but I can work all day, everything's fine, I go to class, and this has happened a lot with Devin, right? I go to class, I'm fine, and then I'm sitting here and boom, out of nowhere, two minutes of sobbing, and then.

mike miller (24:00.041)
Out of the blue. Yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (24:04.017)
And then your day goes back to normal, and you're like, what the fuck was that? And that might happen for the next month. And that's OK. There's no time limit. There's no minimum time on it either. But it just fucking is what it is. So not everybody's going to need some sort of external therapy for that. And I think it's important that you said that. So thank you. Yeah.

mike miller (24:07.465)
Yeah.

mike miller (24:11.113)
Yeah.

mike miller (24:14.793)
Yeah, Mike.

mike miller (24:25.576)
Yeah. Yeah. And I think you're bang on, like it might happen for a month. It might happen longer. It might happen less frequently and less intensely over time. But this is the thing is all of us who knew Devin are all going through our own grief process. and I think, and it does suck in some people will possibly try to, you know, do a workaround or short circuit that through some type of self -soothing behavior. you know, that's how I dealt with grief when I was younger is I would just medicated, you know,

Chuck LaFLange (24:39.313)
Yes.

Chuck LaFLange (24:54.705)
Of course, of course.

mike miller (24:55.624)
and, and after I stopped using drugs, the way I'd medicated would be with other sort of behaviors or some, you know, like food or you're like, whatever it was, you know what I mean? and you can't outrun it. Like it's like, you can kick the can down the road a bit, but like the only way to kind of go through it is to go through it, which again, sucks. It's not a fun thing. but if anyone gets stuck in it, then, then maybe looking into some EMDR down the road. Isn't the worst idea. That's for sure.

Chuck LaFLange (25:25.617)
Of course, right. And for anybody that wants to know more about EMDR specifically, we've done quite a few episodes on trauma therapy now. HWApodcast .com slash trauma brings you to, of course, your bio page on our website and all the episodes that you've done with us. So check them out, guys. There's a lot of really great stuff in those episodes. I know because I still pull content out of them routinely. Something else I want to talk about in this episode, Mike, is the...

The trauma that families go through and of course, you know, we brought on a new sponsor as you know, FAR Canada, who's they're all about helping the families and I'll take a moment to plug them right now. FAR Canada, they offer a few different programs. There's a peer -to -peer support for families, which I think is just fantastic. So they'll have...

example a mother who's gone through their child being in addiction or might still be suffering an addiction. But they've kind of gone through the process and the program, the process.

with the peer -to -peer process and they go back and they do some training so they can go back and help their peers and on and on it goes, right, which is just in anything you're doing, peers are always a great resource, right? So they are looking for volunteers as well. It's quite the process to become a volunteer. It's not just anybody can jump in and do that. There's a lengthy training that goes along it, but if it's something that you're interested in, most certainly look them up. We also had a chance to talk with Sydney.

A couple weeks ago, she's coming back on again soon. So is, so is Ange, the one of the co -founders. Sydney is an amazing reason. She's, she's great. I don't know if you had a chance to check out that episode with her, Mike, but she's amazing.

Chuck LaFLange (27:14.225)
You would love so much of what she has to say. And I know you haven't. It's OK. I love saying that to people because I know they're going to say, I have it because or I don't know. But anyway, yeah, she is fantastic, right? Yeah, yeah, she really is. Yeah, so and she answers the phone kind of during business hours. It's not specifically during business hours. And she's in Eastern Canada, so you have to keep that in mind. But.

mike miller (27:18.15)
Yeah, put me on the spot a bit, but yeah, no, I haven't. And I, yeah, I don't doubt that at all. Yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (27:37.809)
as kind of a support for people that are waiting to get into the peer -to -peer support program. So they've got that going on. And then in the background, advocacy to the government for societal change, for policy change. They are working hard, really hard, right, to do those things. So check them out at FARCanada .org, guys. And of course, there'll be a lot more of them coming up. That said...

One of the things that I find myself, and as you know, the show has very much focused on families and loved ones in general. One of the things that I find myself focusing on as I get messages from people, and of course, having known you now, having got to experience the Yatra experience, if you want to call it that, and I've said this before, I am not a trauma -informed individual. I am...

closer to that than I was a long time ago with a long way to go yet. But having a better understanding of what trauma really is now than I ever have before, when I get the messages from family members, and I'm not sure what to do, I say, well, how about I look after you right now?

How would you address the trauma that you have as a result of all of the insanity and chaos and uncertainty and wondering if your kid is gonna, if you're gonna get that phone call, like how hard that is on you. Like I know how hard trauma was on me. And so when I'm talking to a mother, it's like, maybe you address this so that your decision -making isn't being affected by that.

right, by the trauma and by, you know, and you know, so it's more than your lizard brain addressing some of the things that you need to address, which are huge. I wanted to talk to you about that in this episode as well. Maybe just give your initial thoughts on it. We'll go from there, Mike, right?

mike miller (29:17.636)
Hmm.

mike miller (29:31.428)
Yeah, I mean, I've worked with families. I've worked in family programs in different rehabs that I've worked in. Obviously I've worked with families, like as a family group, I've worked with family members aside from the person who's using or doing whatever it is. Yeah, it's, I mean, one of the things that I've heard from some family members is, you know, we might say, you know, like,

Like you said, have you thought about getting some help for yourself? And they go, no, no, it's his problem. It's like, no, no, you have a problem like this. You have a family member who's who's in active addiction or whatever it is. Like it affects the whole family system. It's pretty hard for it not to do that. And it's hard for it not to be traumatic. And, you know, we have a saying, you know, we're in Thailand. So a lot of our clients come internationally and I'll say, you know, you were just on a plane.

When you're on the plane and the flight attendant, they do the announcement at the beginning and they say, here's where the exits are and here's how the life vest works and all of that. And I always say, what do they say about that air mask? And what they say is put it on yourself first because you can't help anyone else if you don't put it on yourself. And so with a family member, I would say that would be a crucial.

Chuck LaFLange (30:44.913)
Yes. Yeah.

mike miller (30:56.226)
like you can't necessarily be there to support someone if you're not taking care of yourself. Easy for me to say and sometimes harder for family members to hear because...

Chuck LaFLange (31:05.265)
Well, I'll speak to that. Even Lisa, who's Dr. Lisa, my normal weekend co -host, who has all of that medical knowledge, all of the lived experience, all of the common sense, maybe it's not fair to say that, but everything in the world telling her that yes, you do need, she's still, when you bring this up,

kind of defends the, but we need to look after the family member. Like my brother, that's the important part. And she still low key does that. You know what I mean? So yeah, anybody. It's easy for us to sit here and say that. And even her, she defaults to kind of defending that, no, we need to look after him first. So.

mike miller (31:38.721)
Yeah. Yep.

Yeah. Yeah.

mike miller (31:50.976)
Well, and I would say you pointed out, so one thing I'd say when you say, I'm not really trauma -informed, like I would say you probably know a lot more than the general population does based on your experience, based on the fact you've done treatment, based on the fact that there's been lots of conversations that you've had with people that treat trauma. I would say you know quite a bit. And you demonstrated that by saying that lizard brain stuff, right? Like when a family member is in active addiction,

Chuck LaFLange (32:16.081)
Yeah.

mike miller (32:20.)
I go into survival mode because I am constantly scanning my environment for threat. Like, is this person in danger? Are they going to be okay? Like I remember when I went into treatment the last time, the place that I was at, you know, and this is pretty everyone having cell phones and all, you know, pre social media, pre computer, everything connected. Like you, they, you were on restrictions for like 35 days. There's a 12 step place. So when you're done a step five,

about 35 days in, then you were allowed to access the phone, possibly have visitors, things like that. But until that point, like there was none of that stuff. So I hadn't talked to anyone. They used to tell, they told me when I showed up, they said, bring stamps with you, because that's how you're going to communicate with people. And that's what I did is I was like writing letters, which was quite the trip because I hadn't done that in a long time. I haven't done it since either, by the way, but.

Chuck LaFLange (33:12.369)
You just dated yourself.

mike miller (33:20.129)
but my mom came after I got off restrictions and she took me out for lunch and she said, this is the first time in 10 years I can sleep at night. And it, like, it was so impactful to me that, you know, here I am over 20 years later talking about it. But when I put that in the context of trauma, it's like, why wouldn't she have been sleeping at night? Right. It's because her nervous system was so aroused because she was constantly facing the threat that she was going to lose her kid.

Right? So she's constantly faced with symptoms like anxiety, right? She's got adrenaline, she's got cortisol. Her amygdala is running the show at that point. This is like a stress response that my mother is in constantly. And here I am out doing drugs and thinking like out of sight, out of mind, like I'm not affecting anyone if they can't see it, you know, like that. Of course, it's a good rationalization to keep doing what we're doing without realizing the harm that we're doing to other people. And I don't say that with any judgment. I mean, that's...

Chuck LaFLange (33:49.553)
Yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (33:53.041)
Yep.

Chuck LaFLange (34:06.769)
Yeah. I think that's a lie we, most of us, tell ourselves, right? You know, yeah. Absolutely. 100%. It's reality. Yeah, yeah, right? Yeah, yeah.

mike miller (34:19.071)
You know, that's how denial works, right? Yeah. But.

My mom can't make the best decisions when her amygdala is running the show and she's in a stress response. She needs to get her stress response alleviated. She needs to get her nervous system regulated. She needs to get out of the fight or flight sympathetic nervous system activation and get into the parasympathetic nervous system activation, the relaxation response. And how she can do that is through desensitizing.

triggers that she has using EMDR. She can use mindfulness practices, breath work, yoga, Tai Chi, Kung Fu, like that kind of stuff, get access to her body, anything she can use to kind of like regulate her nervous system, putting her face in a bowl of water, which like I'm out there doing drugs and selling drugs and all this stuff. You tell my mother, like it might be beneficial to you to do some breathing exercises. And she is going to be like, no, I'm mobilizing myself to go figure out where my kid is. And you know what I mean? Like it's hard.

Chuck LaFLange (35:21.073)
Of course, of course, yeah, right, yeah. So it's easy for us to say, hey, but fuck, man, you know? Yeah, that's the real thing, you know? Yeah.

mike miller (35:22.145)
Yeah, of course, right? Because she is in, yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. It's a very big, it's a very big ask to say like park that fear and work on this. Because if you work on this, guess what? That fear, when you're in the parasympathetic nervous system response and your amygdala isn't hyper activated like that, you can be back in your cortex and you can actually do better thinking and make better decisions. And you can see things not based on fear.

Chuck LaFLange (35:50.321)
to help the person that you're so concerned about helping, right? It's all counterintuitive when you're in it, but so necessary, right? Yeah.

mike miller (35:52.064)
Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. And

Yeah, well, of course, because when you're in a, so say if you're the drug addict, you know, if we can use that as the term that we're going to use, you're in survival mode and you're doing things that go against your values and that you know are terrible. Like I knew lots of times this is a terrible decision, but I am going to do it anyway, because it's facilitating my addiction because my brain is interpreting the need for that massive dopamine smash as a survival thing. So this is like, I'm doing that.

Chuck LaFLange (36:03.345)
Yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (36:16.081)
yeah.

mike miller (36:27.744)
You know, even if I know it's not a good idea. Well, my mother's going through the same thing, right? Which is like, she's going like, he's calling me and he's asking for money. And I know I shouldn't give money. He's just going to spend it on drugs. But like her anxiety is so ramped up that how does she alleviate her anxiety? Sends me the money because she's like, now I know he's going to be like, in a such, she's not out doing something else to get the money, blah, blah, blah. Like she's in survival mode. You know, and you can call it enabling or whatever you want to call it, but.

Chuck LaFLange (36:28.113)
Yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (36:43.985)
Gives you a little bit of money. Right, yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (36:56.497)
But I think that works the other way too, though. Does it turn you off to empathy? You know what I mean? You go into the survival mode, so you get cold, you get disconnected, and all those things. Because yeah, I mean, what better survival mechanism than to disconnect yourself from that situation? But either way, the decision making is being affected in a big way by trauma. So yeah.

mike miller (37:04.031)
Yeah. Sure. Yeah. Yeah.

mike miller (37:13.599)
Sure. Well, yeah, dissociation, right? So I think different.

mike miller (37:20.415)
Yeah. Yeah. Well, literally, like we could probably set my mother up at that time into like, like a, functional MRI and measure her brain activity. And it's not going to be the most active where her logic centers are in her brain. It's going to be the most action where her. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's, it's a parallel process, right?

Chuck LaFLange (37:39.793)
It's not going to look that much different than yours at that time as far as frontal lobe activity goes, right? You know? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

mike miller (37:49.951)
And me being out there and addiction is traumatizing to me and her living with that is traumatizing to her. Now, here's one of the things about trauma therapy is that it's really hard to do trauma therapy with someone who's actively being traumatized. Right? Like, because one of the outcomes you want for trauma treatment is for someone to feel safe in their body in a relaxed muscle body. You can't, you can't.

Chuck LaFLange (38:08.113)
Yes. Yes.

mike miller (38:19.902)
have PTSD like symptoms if you're in a relaxed body, because PTSD is the opposite of that, right? Hyper activated and everything. So, you know, it's like going, like if I went to Gaza right now and said, hey, let's do some EMDR with someone while they're waiting for like their door to get kicked in or bombs to fall or whatever, like they're just going to be like, dude, like I just need some water and food. Like we'll deal with that. Like when the threat is gone. So, so when someone's in the middle of it, them.

Chuck LaFLange (38:25.585)
Yes. Yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (38:40.625)
Yeah.

Thank you very much.

mike miller (38:47.326)
thinking about getting help is a very hard thing to do for themselves because their focus is external and on the person who could possibly be facing death on the street or whatever it is. But also like if they're constantly being traumatized, it's very hard. So then what we would want to do is give them some tools to be able to regulate, to get into their cortex so that they can make better decisions, which might just include like seeking out some kind of support, whether that's like, you know, a peer support network or.

you know, or a far or, you know, whatever, like, you know, yeah. Like someone that can advocate or some sort of resources or something out there, because one of the things that family members go through a lot, and I hear this all the time, is like, I felt like I was the only one that understood this. My friends, you know, if your friends haven't been through it, they, as a parent, they don't understand. They might tell you, you just need to cut them loose or her loose or whatever, you know what I mean? Like, and they don't get it and you feel.

Chuck LaFLange (39:17.777)
an Al -Anon or whatever, something somewhere, right? Whatever's far, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

mike miller (39:45.822)
like you're not being heard, you're not being understood. And like, I can't put them loose because guess what? That's like really anxiety provoking for me and it's not going to be helpful and blah, blah, blah, all that shit. Yeah. So if I can.

Chuck LaFLange (39:55.217)
Of course, right? Yeah, yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (40:01.2)
Yes. Yes.

mike miller (40:01.63)
calm down and regulate my nervous system, get access back into my prefrontal cortex where I can actually go like, well, what is it that would actually be helpful right now? So I'm not running on instinctive survival mode. I'm actually in like, what's actually the best thing to do? I can't hear that when I'm in survival mode. You know, like I can't.

Chuck LaFLange (40:20.145)
Absolutely. No, no. I've actually, I've got two mothers right now that I talk to almost daily. Both of them have adult children in jail. And it's like, I don't know what I'm going to do when he gets out. And it's like, right now, they are, they are in both cases, right? Yeah, yeah. And it's, and my advice to them or my recommendation to them was maybe now is the time, maybe right now is the time.

mike miller (40:36.542)
Yeah, I was gonna say, are they happy they're there? Yeah, most mothers are, yeah, yeah. What a relief.

Chuck LaFLange (40:50.033)
to take this opportunity and start looking at your trauma. Because when that person, I think verbatim, it's not verbatim, but when she gets out of jail, you're going to want to be in the best possible place to be making good decisions. And so now's a really good time for you to maybe start addressing those things before that happens. So if you're lucky enough to be on a break from it, maybe now's the time. Because I can't imagine what release day is like.

mike miller (41:04.062)
Yeah. Yeah.

mike miller (41:08.638)
Yeah. Yeah.

mike miller (41:16.446)
I would

Yeah, I would consider that to be very good advice. I mean, the more resourced you are, the better, right? And so how can I make sure that I'm resourced is by being calm. If that's such a huge resource to not be acting on this massive anxiety, terror, whatever it is, and to be like, okay, you're getting out today.

Chuck LaFLange (41:18.801)
you know, for so many moms, right?

Chuck LaFLange (41:27.953)
Yeah, of course.

Chuck LaFLange (41:33.969)
Yeah.

mike miller (41:46.334)
What do we need to do to make sure that you're safe? What do we need to do to make sure that I'm safe? Instead of just living in panic, right? That's not probably gonna be super helpful. And I don't mean it's that person's job to fix their kid or something like that, but it's definitely gotta be their job to make sure, you need to be okay no matter what happens. So like.

Chuck LaFLange (41:54.865)
Yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (41:58.353)
No.

Chuck LaFLange (42:09.489)
whatever direction you're going to go with this, right? Yeah, right? And at least you know that if you're addressing these things, the odds of you making better choices for you, whatever those choices are, not to judge whatever route somebody takes, but that they're being made from the real you and not from trauma you, right? Because I know firsthand, you're not making good choices when you're in survival mode. You're just not, right? Like, you know, yeah.

mike miller (42:12.03)
Yeah.

mike miller (42:20.414)
Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Well.

mike miller (42:31.775)
when my trauma responses meet your trauma responses, neither one of us is gonna be communicating the way we want and making great decisions. And we're probably gonna be triggering the shit out of each other. And then our responses are gonna be super exaggerated and amplified and not in incredibly healthy ways most of the time. That would be my supposition. So yeah, I think what you're saying to them is good advice. But again, let's not fool ourselves.

easy for us to say sitting here. I would say, you know, like, I've been the kid, but I've never been the parent. I don't give advice in my job. That's not the advice of a therapist or a counselor, or that's not the job is to give advice. And so, you know, I,

Chuck LaFLange (43:06.129)
Yeah. No.

mike miller (43:20.094)
I would hesitate to tell a parent exactly what they should do in response to their kid. Because, yeah, well, if they make it this, yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (43:28.305)
I just don't. I cannot do it anymore. Right? No, no. There was a time when I did, but part of being a little more informed. It's understanding that not my place. Right? You know? Right? Yeah.

mike miller (43:37.726)
Yeah.

Yeah, well, for me, I know if I tell you to do something and you act on it and it goes bad, like you get the consequences of my decision and I'm not willing to live with that. I would say.

Chuck LaFLange (43:49.041)
You said that to me probably a year ago now, or close to a year ago now, when we very first started talking, and every single time somebody asks me for advice, that conversation runs through my head. And it probably will for the rest of my life, right? Where it's just like, no, careful what you say here, man, because, you know, right? No.

mike miller (43:53.766)
Yeah. June 5th.

mike miller (44:00.798)
Yeah. Yeah.

It's.

Yeah, it's, it's hard to do because when you do have certain information that other people don't have, it's, it's a trap you can fall into to be like, you should just do this. You should just do that. Right. Because it's coming from a more informed place than possibly the other person is sitting in. But maybe my job is just to inform them about stuff and not advise them about stuff. you know, as far as like what actions to take, because, you know, if I was to be like, tough love, you just got to.

Chuck LaFLange (44:19.217)
Yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (44:29.905)
Yeah.

mike miller (44:36.126)
kick him out of the house and then he goes out and he overdoses on fentanyl. And that mother comes back to me and goes, you know, like, you told me to kick him out and that's, and it went fucking horribly wrong, pardon my language. Like, I don't want to be responsible for that. Like, I just don't. I've never been in that position to have to make that decision with my kids. So I'm not going to tell someone else how to do it. But what I would recommend is not what action you would take.

Chuck LaFLange (44:40.753)
Fuck.

Chuck LaFLange (44:48.785)
Yeah.

Yeah.

mike miller (45:05.694)
with the kid, but you know what might be more helpful for you would be to start learning some of these tools for regulation of your nervous system so that you can be back in your prefrontal cortex and you can make the best decisions. Seeking out whatever kind of resources you need to seek out. I think that that's a key thing is for each person. It's like put the air mask on yourself, right?

Chuck LaFLange (45:28.337)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, right. It's such a cliche thing whenever somebody says that, but it's true. It's still, it's, it's a test of time. It's, it's a very real, you know, it's, you know, this is, huh. Yeah, right. And recovery is full of them. Recovery is full of them, right. To say the least. True story, true story. dear. Yeah. Lots of that. Lots of that. Lots of that.

mike miller (45:35.774)
Yeah. Yeah. Well, cliches are cliches for a reason, right? So.

mike miller (45:43.838)
it's full of something.

Hope and wonder.

mike miller (45:55.934)
I'm joking, I love recovery. I couldn't be more grateful that we are two men sitting here clean today, I'll tell you that.

Chuck LaFLange (45:58.065)
Yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (46:04.401)
No shit, eh? No shit, right? And you know, as hard as life can be today, and it can be, it can be really fucking hard, the thing that I remind myself of every single day, my worst day today is a hell of a lot better than my best day two years ago, right? Like way better, right? You know?

mike miller (46:05.662)
Yeah.

mike miller (46:21.758)
Yeah. I like that you adapt. I used to hear when I would like attend 12 set meetings out here, people say my worst day clean is better than my best day using. And I would be like, that's either you sucked at using, or that's just total bullshit. Like I like that you said my worst day today is better than my best day two years ago, not ever using, you know, like we use drugs for a long time because they actually worked for quite a while.

Chuck LaFLange (46:38.673)
You

Chuck LaFLange (46:46.225)
Yeah, yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (46:50.609)
I had some fucking, I got war stories from my first 15 years that, you know, I was doing quite well, right? You know, right? But.

mike miller (46:59.358)
Well, I mean, it's funny, like I had some pretty good consequences from the very first time I ever used a substance. But like, even though there were consequences to it, it still met my needs when I was doing it. You know, like I felt relief from like the social anxieties and the insecurities and all that shit. Yeah, you know, so like it worked in that way until the consequences, like at that point, the consequences were not outweighing the benefits.

Chuck LaFLange (47:14.065)
Yeah. Yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (47:19.665)
All those things. Yeah.

mike miller (47:27.806)
Like the benefits were like quite profound and the consequences were like, man, whatever, you know, but eventually the consequences are way it, but yeah, I think that.

no matter how bad it is today, 100 % I can always make it worse by adding some dope to it. Like that, I just know that to be true, right? And you know, my track record shows that. You know, I've constantly made things worse by adding drugs to the situation. So.

Chuck LaFLange (47:46.961)
Yeah, there you go. All right. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.

Yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (47:58.961)
It's literally never worked out well for me. Well, not in the last five years or so of active anyway. But yeah, yeah, yeah. Jeez, eh? Yeah, I guess we're coming up on your 21 years, eh? Right away, a couple weeks from now. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Congratulations on that, yeah. Yeah, yeah.

mike miller (48:06.652)
Yeah.

mike miller (48:14.78)
Yeah, yeah it is. It's funny we were having a conversation, well actually we were having a conversation before this conversation about like celebrating clean time and stuff like that and how you gotta avoid the trap of falling into some kind of ego stroking like, that makes me better than someone or I know more than you or you should listen to me because I have more clean time or I don't know as much as you because I don't have enough clean time and blah blah blah. I'll tell you this like.

Chuck LaFLange (48:34.801)
Cough cough cough

mike miller (48:41.948)
The only reason I'm clean is because it's better than when I was using. I have a life too good to risk right now for something. And I'm not in as much pain as I used to be due to all the therapy that I've done that like, it doesn't seem like I need to soothe myself compulsively with any, you know, drastic measures. You know, I still do like to soothe myself from time to time and maybe I go grab some ice cream or something or whatever it might be if I'm, if I'm.

bored or stressed out, maybe I like binge something on TV or something, you know, it's a bit different the way that I do it today. but yeah, I'm, I'm grateful that that clean time's coming up. I'm grateful that I have it. I do know that it doesn't make me better or smarter or, you know, more recovered or whatever than anyone else. I know this in my first little while of recovery, I was much more diligent about working a program of recovery than I am.

today in some ways. And part of it was fear driven. And part of it was like, you know, I had to build a really strong foundation out of concrete. And nowadays like, you know, that foundation's there. So I'm kind of building the walls out of whatever, you know, materials I can find nearby. But it's not, I'm, you know, I'm a bit more, yeah, I'm a bit more removed from that pain of desperation, that, that pain induced willingness to do stuff. Like it's, I'm, you know, life isn't crumbling around me. So I don't work as diligently at it.

Chuck LaFLange (49:41.425)
Yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (49:55.761)
Lots of bamboo here.

mike miller (50:09.821)
So, you know, I know that there are people with like, you know, 21 days clean that are like day to day putting in a lot more time to their recovery than necessarily I am as far as like specific recovery focused activities. But that I think that part of that is because it's, it's the level of care stuff, right? Like I don't need acute care today. I need maintenance and, you know, I'm.

Chuck LaFLange (50:23.6)
Yes.

Chuck LaFLange (50:35.153)
I'll set, yeah.

mike miller (50:36.669)
Yeah, anyway, we were talking about how you can fall into that trap and it can become an ego stroke thing. And lots of people like, look at me, I got this clean time. And I'm of two minds, cause like, I know that's real, but I also know like, I'm not, I don't want to give up that time. Like that's a, that's an important day for me. And my life only gets better if I put those days back to back in my experience, you know, I mean, I'm not saying that's true of everyone, but for me, absolutely, I got to stack those days back to back for life to get good.

Chuck LaFLange (50:52.945)
No. No.

Chuck LaFLange (51:02.033)
Yeah, 100%, right. Yeah. So an interesting thing that happened here. There's a few things that throughout the show, and I'll just point them out now because it's funny to me. And you've been kind of a key study, if you will, for a couple of them. Well, no, no, it's just observations, right? Anytime you say anything, not you specifically, anytime anybody says anything that isn't a glowing thing for a 12 -step.

mike miller (51:16.861)
good.

Chuck LaFLange (51:31.121)
It has to be qualified with, but I'm not bashing Carl Stem. So every time anybody, and you're the same way, I mean, our first episode was full of that. So that's a funny thing. The.

mike miller (51:31.229)
Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

mike miller (51:40.581)
I've done it a million times, yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (51:46.577)
No, I haven't listened to that episode. Or I'm sure you will, right? No, I haven't listened to that episode or whatever, or I had a chance to. That's a universal truth for every single person that comes on this show, the same qualifying of it. And even just now with the clean time. I am proud of my clean time, but I'm not doing this, this, and this with it. I'm proud of my clean time. So I'm guilty of that, very guilty of that. Guilty is not the right word.

mike miller (51:46.589)
I'll do it forever too. Yeah.

mike miller (51:57.019)
Yep. Yep.

Chuck LaFLange (52:14.609)
I do that as well. Maybe that's a better way to put it, right? So it's just funny that because you're kind of like on all three of these things, you're kind of the guy that does, you know what I mean? Like, you know, it's just an interesting observation to me. Yeah.

mike miller (52:22.389)
yeah. Yeah, well, and that's, I'd actually know and I think, well, here's one of the things about recovery is like, you got to be responsible in the messages that you send so that you don't turn people away from the help that's available. And you don't want to you don't want to shit on someone for doing certain things. So if there's someone there who's like,

Chuck LaFLange (52:40.817)
Yes.

mike miller (52:47.099)
I've been waiting for that 60 day key tag because it's massively monumental to me. And you're telling me like, you know, people can celebrate clean time just because of egos or whatever. Like, no, people don't do it just because that. And I am, there's a part of me that's proud of my clean time, but there's a bigger part of me who's just grateful for it, right? Like, I'm proud of it because it's probably the hardest thing I've ever achieved.

Chuck LaFLange (53:05.585)
Yeah. Ooh, I like that. Yeah. Yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (53:13.425)
Yeah.

mike miller (53:14.299)
you know, like to turn your life around and pull yourself out of addiction is not an easy thing or everyone would do it. But you know, I'm just grateful that I had the support to do that. I don't think that makes me, I mean, fuck, if I can do it, like probably anybody could do it given the right resources. Like that's the thing is having the right resources, the right time and everything. But I'm grateful for it.

Chuck LaFLange (53:33.809)
Absolutely. I posted a Theo Vaughan quote. I don't know if you saw that one. I relapsed at a one -year -old birthday party. If I can do it, if he can do it, fuck anybody can. Right? So.

mike miller (53:41.627)
I did see that actually, yeah.

Yeah. but so, so I like, I qualify stuff because, you know, and I've been honest about on this podcast, I'm honest with people in my life. There's stuff in 12 step programs that I really like and see as valuable. And then there's stuff that I see as, not super helpful and probably detrimental to some people in some ways. Now, one of the reasons that I qualify it when I say that, but I'm not shitting on it or whatever is because.

A lot of people rely on 12 step stuff to help change their lives. And I don't want them to say like, well, Mike said it was shit. And so I'm not going to do it anymore. you know, and I think that that's part of it is I really don't want to deter someone from getting the kind of help that they want to get. as for not listening to podcasts, like, you know, whatever I'm busy.

Chuck LaFLange (54:21.009)
Of course, of course. Yeah, yes, yeah. Yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (54:32.593)
Of course not.

Whatever. I totally get it. I totally get it. And I know if there's an episode I really want you to listen to, I'll send it to you. And I know you'll get to it when you get to it. But yeah, yeah, no.

mike miller (54:43.546)
Yeah, absolutely, I will. And I've done that. And I mean, here's the other truth to that, right? Is like, you're a prolific content creator, and I cannot consume as much content as you create. Yeah, I got other shit going on. And that's not to downplay what you're doing. It's just like, you know, I got to prioritize some stuff at times.

Chuck LaFLange (54:59.953)
My mother has literally said this exact same thing to me. Of course, of course I do.

mike miller (55:12.538)
I mean, but this is one thing too, if I didn't value what you're doing and didn't believe in what you're doing and the spirit with which you do it, like we wouldn't be involved with you as an organization, you know, so I'm grateful for what you do too. But yeah, I think that people will continually, I know I will, I will always qualify stuff about recovery programs, even, you know, ones that I've never participated in, I will.

Chuck LaFLange (55:22.961)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

mike miller (55:41.082)
probably say, yeah, you know, there's probably some good stuff in there as well as stuff that I don't really see eye to eye with. But at the end of the day, if anyone's listening to this and they're wondering, you know, how to change their life or whatever, like I honest to God, don't care how someone changes their life. I don't care how they improve the quality of their life. I just hope they do it if that's what they need to do. However, they find that if they find it in places where I would never,

Chuck LaFLange (55:46.993)
Yep. Yep.

Chuck LaFLange (56:05.329)
Yeah, 100%.

mike miller (56:10.777)
darken the doorway of myself doesn't matter. It's not about me. It's about you. Do what you need to do. You know, and have your opinions on it. Yeah. Absolutely. 100%.

Chuck LaFLange (56:14.673)
Yeah. Nope.

Whatever is helping you improve your life is exactly the right way for you. Right? It is my attitude, you know? And there's one thing this podcast has taught me is don't black and white any of this shit, right? Because it's just, you know, everybody's way is their own way. And I don't really care whatever is working for you to make your life better, right? You know? You know? Yeah.

mike miller (56:29.273)
Yeah. Yeah.

mike miller (56:35.673)
Yeah, well, and I'll say this as an organization, like I designed Yatra's treatment program to be what I think I needed when I got clean, like would have been beneficial for me because, you know, I went through a bunch of years of maybe not the healthiest behavior, not the healthiest coping mechanisms because of my trauma and nobody was addressing it. No one was even naming it. You know, and then, then I started like,

Chuck LaFLange (56:44.017)
Yeah.

mike miller (56:56.953)
getting some therapy and getting some help and getting more informed about trauma and everything. And I'm like, okay, so if I'm going to design a program, I want it to be like what I think would have been beneficial to me. That doesn't mean it would be the one that everyone needs to do or they would be, you know, they're doing it wrong or something like that. There are people whose level of care that they need is higher than we provide. We don't do detoxes. We don't.

Chuck LaFLange (57:23.121)
Yeah.

mike miller (57:24.665)
do psychiatric care in a lot of ways. You know, so like, there's, there's, for every single model of recovery program on every single level of care that there is, there's someone who will benefit from it and not everyone benefits from everything and they don't need to. And that's okay, because that just means that the more diverse the programs and services there are, the more that there'll be something that'll fit for somebody out there. And I just encourage people like find it wherever it is.

Now the tragedy of all of that is that even though there's lots of diverse services, there just aren't enough. There aren't enough services. There's too many financial barriers. If I could change anything, it would be that people could get help with no barriers. When you want help, it's just available. That's what I would wish I could do. Yeah, yeah. Good evidence -based treatment on that. Yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (58:00.721)
No. Nope.

Chuck LaFLange (58:11.337)
Treatment on demand. Treatment on demand, right? It's one of the goals that we've talked about with it at FAR as well, right? It has to be one of the goals, right? Because, well, I mean, there's a whole episode to be done on, you know, fuck, right? You know, it's just, yeah. Yeah, it's something Lisa and I have talked quite a bit about as well. It's that window, grab it while the iron's hot, all the things, you know? So, yeah.

mike miller (58:23.897)
Yeah. Well, the window can be very small, right?

mike miller (58:36.345)
Well, I mean, there's two variations of the window. There's the window of willingness where the person is like, okay, I want help. And then it's like, we got to be ready to get it to him at that moment. But there's the other thing is that if they can't get it, the contaminated drug supply might mean that that person's not around for another window. Right? So like this. Yeah. I mean, without.

Chuck LaFLange (58:59.729)
And we can't lose sight of that. We can't.

mike miller (59:04.025)
being like melodramatic or over dramatic about it. That's just the truth is that like the way that it's like a super dangerous time to be using. And I have.

Chuck LaFLange (59:12.977)
I think in BC alone where you're from, I think last year it was three people a day or four people a day. Yeah, I think it was for 2023. I just looked at it today, so I think that's what it was. But yeah.

mike miller (59:18.837)
it's gotta be at least that. I'm not up on the stats, but I'll tell you this. Me...

Yeah, that sounds at least right. I mean, for me personally, I've known four people confirmed in the last three weeks. And that's, that's just me. You know what I mean? And I'm not like,

Chuck LaFLange (59:37.041)
Right? And you're 20 years removed from collecting people that are in that life. Right? Or 21 years removed. Right? I've tried to explain that to people who are not maybe aware, but the way that I can't believe that they aren't. But for me, I'm 19 months, and it's well over 19 people. Right? Well over 19 people. Right? You know? Yep.

mike miller (59:43.449)
Exactly. Yeah. Yeah.

mike miller (01:00:01.239)
Yeah, well, that's I'm proud of you for the 19 months. I'm grateful for the 19 months. And also like, there is also a sense, I don't know if you experienced it, but I sense sometimes like a bit of a survivor guilt thing where it's like, how come I got to get out of it and that person didn't and it's, you know, like, and yeah, and it's, and it's shit because it's shit. Don't feel guilty about.

Chuck LaFLange (01:00:16.945)
100 percent. Yep.

Chuck LaFLange (01:00:22.257)
All the time. All the time. I still wrestle with that quite a bit. Yep. Yep.

mike miller (01:00:28.855)
fucking being clean because you know, like you had to do what you had to do for you. And it would be terrible if we had to feel guilty about probably one of the, if not the best decision we ever made in our lives. But I just wish everyone could come with us. And you know, this again speaks to why that window is really small is because it's just such a dangerous time to be using.

Chuck LaFLange (01:00:38.289)
Of course, right? Of course, yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (01:00:49.521)
It is. It is. It's why, arguably, I mean, there was a time when, okay, you're clean, get rid of all those people off your list, get rid of all, you know what I mean? Like, people, places, things, you need to separate yourself, and arguably, there could be a case made to say that I should have done that a long time ago. My friends list, my messenger list is full of people that are still in it, and every single time they reach out.

It's funny because we're getting the end of the... Go ahead. Yeah. No, no.

mike miller (01:01:17.399)
Yeah, I think one thing that works to your benefit, sorry to interrupt you. I was gonna say, I think one thing that works to your benefit is that you are literally incapable of physically connecting with those people. You are geographically separated by the, as far as you possibly could be on the planet, right? Yeah, so it leaves you out of, yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (01:01:32.337)
Absolutely. That has not been lost on me, right? So yeah, that's not been lost on me. When I have hard days here, you know, maybe those thoughts get a little intrusive and it's like, you can't act on me, so you're good, right? So they do come and go. I wouldn't, I'd be dishonest if I said they didn't. They come and go with a frequent passing now though, right? You know, they don't stick around the way they used to, but yeah, most certainly. So.

mike miller (01:01:50.647)
Yeah, me too.

mike miller (01:01:55.863)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, they have less, I mean, my experience and I get them too, you know, like when I was younger, the second drug I ever tried was cannabis, right? So, you know, now it's legal here in Thailand and didn't used to be like, you know, it used to be like, you're going to prison for a really long time. And now it's like every second shop is a weed shop, which is people in Vancouver are like, yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (01:02:14.449)
Yeah. It's crazy, right? I know, when I'm in the jungle, I smell it. Right? Like, fuck.

mike miller (01:02:23.99)
People in Vancouver are like, yeah, it's normal, because it's been legal there for a while, but here it's a bit different. But I think like every once in a while, my brain, that little part of me that likes to soothe myself goes, I just had a big meal, gonna sit down and watch the movie or something, like, you know, it would be good, maybe some of that, you know? But it doesn't have any power to make me act on it today, like it used to. Like before, it was like, if I thought that, I did it.

Chuck LaFLange (01:02:43.793)
yeah. Yeah.

mike miller (01:02:51.35)
You know what I mean? Like think, do, you know, and now it doesn't do that. And I don't think that it's weird. Like I think some people in recovery to admit thinking like that from time to time would be seen as like not doing a recovery, right. Or something. And to me, I think doing recovery, right. Is it being like, here's the actual truth of what my situation is and I'm not ashamed of it. And you know, we're not, we're not the thought police over here. we have automatic negative thinking, which is why we use cognitive behavioral therapy. you know, I just.

Chuck LaFLange (01:02:51.825)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (01:03:08.625)
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (01:03:17.521)
Yeah, so.

mike miller (01:03:19.606)
you get triggered by stuff, you know, like, and I don't mean triggered, like, my God, I want to go do it. But it's like, thoughts get triggered, feelings get triggered by all kinds of stuff. Yeah. Yeah. So we kind of went like on a weird like off of what we were talking about just into the conversation, but it's all connected. It's all recovery stuff.

Chuck LaFLange (01:03:25.617)
Of course they do. Of course they do, right? Yeah. You wouldn't be human if you didn't, right? So, yeah, yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (01:03:36.369)
I think that's the way it happens, right? I often say, Mike, the best episodes I have with Lisa are the ones where we don't have an agenda, and they turn out to be great, right? So this last, you know, whatever portion of the show, that's what it's been. We will use that to segue into the final segment of the show, and that's the Daily Gratitudes. So what you got for us, Ben?

mike miller (01:03:43.062)
Yeah. Yeah.

mike miller (01:03:54.936)
So.

Well, I, you know, again, I'm grateful for my clean time, your clean time and the clean time of everyone who's got some right now as we sit and, you know, reflect back on like the fact that I've lost some people in the past little while. So I'm grateful that there are people doing the kind of work like Devin was doing, helping people. I'm grateful that there are places advocating for families like FAR.

Chuck LaFLange (01:04:22.033)
Yeah.

mike miller (01:04:28.407)
I'm glad that there are people who without being able to access any resources just are able to find the wherewithal and internal resources to kind of make the changes they need to like that there are people doing this. And then off of the sort of recovery.

viewpoint is I was able to be on a beach in Thailand today, witnessing a friend of mine that I've been friends with since I'm 14 years old. So over 40, no, about 40 years, sharing vows with her husband. And I got to take some awesome photos of that and witness that with my wife.

Chuck LaFLange (01:05:07.089)
Aww.

That's wonderful.

mike miller (01:05:15.031)
and then go and have a cool dinner. And yeah, it was just, so yeah, I'm grateful, grateful, obviously for that friendship and grateful to be able to witness that and, you know, just the joys of life and friendship and, you know, meaningful relationships. So yeah, it was just a cool, cool evening.

Chuck LaFLange (01:05:33.297)
That's amazing. I'm going to have to remember to congratulate her on that. I myself am grateful that you were able to step in to this one because it was kind of last minute tonight, as it often is with me.

mike miller (01:05:49.815)
as evidenced by the tangent.

Chuck LaFLange (01:05:58.961)
Devin's memory, I guess, right? You know, sit and think about that. Yeah. My mom and I have been talking. It was my birthday like nine days ago or something now. So...

mike miller (01:06:00.569)
Yeah.

Chuck LaFLange (01:06:12.657)
Mom and I had like an hour and a half conversation and I just love those, right? Because they don't happen very often. She's very busy, I'm very busy, and we live on a 12 hour time difference. So, right? It's like, you know, it's hard to do that, right? So, I'm feeling a lot of gratitude. And with a special shout out actually to Chantel from Trap House Testimonies. I'm like, her and I have talked.

daily now for the last couple weeks and just had some real raw conversations and I just love her. She's a big part of my recovery community so yeah very thankful for her. I'm also grateful to every single person who continues to like, comment, share, do all the things down at the bottom. Guys keep doing those things please you are helping us grow faster than ever these days and it means a lot to me.

mike miller (01:06:38.649)
sense. Yeah, beautiful.

Chuck LaFLange (01:06:53.425)
Every time you do one of these things, you're getting me a little bit closer to living my best life. My best life is to continue making a humble living, spreading the message, and the message is this. If you're in active addiction right now, today could be that day. Today could be the day that you start a lifelong journey. Reach out to a friend, reach out to a family member, call them to detox, go to a meeting, pray, go to church. I don't give a shit. Do whatever it is you gotta do to get that journey started, because it is so much better than the alternative. If you have a loved one who's suffering an addiction right now, just take the time to listen to our conversation. If you just take one more minute out of your day and text that person, let them know.

them know they are loved, use the words, that little glimmer of hope just might be the thing that brings them back.

mike miller (01:07:26.169)
You are loved.

mike miller (01:07:32.761)
Happy bleeding.

Chuck LaFLange (01:07:32.977)
There we go.