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Hi everybody, this is Trista and Bob. Welcome back to the Almost Famous OG podcast. I'm really excited. We have one of the DS, Joe Vaughn Q. Did I just hear you laugh? Cue? No, maybe that was you, Bob jovonn Q Charles. He is one of the DS. And if you don't recognize the name, and if you saw the show, he's the one that was following me. Let's let's say that following me out of.
He was following you, Pepper and you.
Basically he's like, you don't belong here, You're done, get out of here.
Yep, exactly. So I'm really excited to talk to him.
Uh.
This is kind of the first time that I've had interaction with any of the DS after the show, and.
I am a little bit nervous.
I mean, obviously, you know, you know, they're good people. Yeah, I would imagine it would.
Be under ranking experience for you. How's it going.
It's good so Q. This is my co host for our Almost Famous OG podcast. This is Bob Guinea. He was actually on the Bachelorette with me. Uh, sir, when I was the Bachelorette. Do you even know what the bachelorette is?
By the way, I know that's really a good question because I was going to say, yeah, then I was the Bachelor after but you don't know the Bachelerette or the Bachelor.
But it is kind of funny you had two.
I mean, you've had several people from the Bachelor franchise on the show as you've been affiliated with it, just in general.
Obviously, Trista's the toughest.
Yeah, I know, Trista, Tristan the G.
That's true.
She is right, She's a real G.
But no, you're you're you're totally right, do I do?
We We have had a lot of the uh, the Bachelor, Bachelorettes and all that stuff on the show. So it's been it's been. It's been good to see how y'all respond.
Yeah, that's a that's a good that's a good word.
It's a lot.
Yeah, I like those words. Okay, so welcome. I would I would love to hear because they don't really do enough of this. I feel like on the show. Your background and how you became part of.
The show, well back twenty two years in the military.
I just retired in twenty twenty one, right as all the cast and everyone knows I'm a former Navy seal.
So I did that most of my career.
Okay, I've deployed seven times in my career out of twenty two years.
Great time. You know, got all my things into So I'm I'm all good, right And from where my background, I will say.
From where I come from. Originally, I'm originally from Washington, d C. That's where my my home home status. But I kind of I kind of reaped both. I'm from Washington, d C. But I finished high school in North Carolina, so everything. I joined the Navy in June ninety nine from Charlotte, which.
Is where I'm at right now.
And you inst directly this is all coming up because my son is actually considering applying. He kind of wants to be a Navy seal que so I might be calling you, so did you enlist? I know there's a few different ways that you can become part of the military in the United States. Did you enlist?
I did? I did. I came in I mean straight row right when I was in the military.
So one of the reasons I came I joined the military is because I had kids in high school. So that's the whole of where I come from, right, you know, I was my I didn't I didn't have my mom growing up.
I was raised with my grandparents.
My mom was a drug ACDT Oh wow, she was in and out of prison a lot.
So I never knew who my dad was.
So my grandmother took that responsibility and my aunts and uncles, they all kind of played that role. Is raising me, I guess you would say. So took me from DC to North Carolina. Still have my issues again, had my kids in high school as a teenage dad then, and my grandmother was like, Okay, you're going into the military.
This is how it's going on.
You're going in the military so you can help take care with kids and get out of this craziness.
Right.
So it was a good idea, I think today in hindsight. You know, she was very sick as well, diabetic ampuchief from the knee.
Down write me down.
So she was the one who initially pushed me into the military, which I had never wanted to do. I was just not one of the things. I wanted to go play football. I was a football star and all that stuff.
But it worked.
Out you know, if I couldn't be a pro athlete or a collegiate athlete, being in Navy Seal truly is the next best thing. Now not really the next best thing, it's really the thing because I have done so much right I could be especially I mean I can be a pro athlete or even a collegian athlete. But collegian athletes, pro athletes, they couldn't do what Navy sills do, you know what I'm saying. So it's one of those things
where I have respect for them. I have respect for anybody that's a professional in any industry that they're doing right.
I have complete respect.
But when I look at what I've done and what the Seal teams have done as a whole across the world, you know, it takes the right person.
To be this, to do this.
You know, when I in my class, we want to graduated fifteen men, but we had two hundred and seventy starts. You know what I'm saying, Wow, this is the normal of when people feel this is reality. It's hard, it's a year long training.
They just as much.
As we're we gave it to you on the show, Imagine what we get on in realistic life of the.
Training pipe I can't even imagine.
They don't they don't shake your hand until you graduate. You know, you're not cool at all, and gradually and then when you get to a series like you start all over again.
So those are some of the things.
Is how I got involved in the Seal teams is how it all started to me.
You know, to be honest with.
You, that's incredible. I love that.
But my father was a marine. I have incredible respect for anyone who serves a country. And especially when Trista said, you know that her son wants to be a Navy Seal, I was going to pipe in and say, I think every single guy in the world would tell you if.
They could do anything.
You know, in my mind, like I tell trist of this all the time, I watch a movie and I walk away going, I need to get I think I can still do it. I think, you know, there's first of all, there's no way, there's no way I could do. But yeah, just a tremendous amount of respect and admiration and appreciation for what you've done with your career and and and you know, for what the Navy Seal Teams have done.
You know, for our country. I mean, it's a it's amazing.
Having someone on this show, like like like Trista, who obviously you know is coming into this at a later stage in.
Her preparation for seal them.
I just got see that's why I couldn't make it on.
The show or an ABC.
I just started sweating. So when you have someone like Trista on there, and people like like Stephen Baldwin and everyone that's on the show, even Cam Newton, I mean, I'm sure you you see things in them that you know they're they're they have the fortitude, and they have the courage, they want to be there, and they're putting themselves in this situation.
But I mean, what was someone.
Like, for example, like for Trista, when you would kind of like size her up and you'd see she has tenacity and she has grit, But what was her what was her shortcoming if there was one that would have possibly stopped her, one that could have possibly stopped her from becoming a seal?
How is that?
I love you, Bob.
I'll just there you go.
Hey, you pushed that on to me now, so you want me to be bad?
Yes, sir, Yes, sir, I'll answer it, I'll be the bad guy.
Okay, I like I like it, Thanks a lot, thanks a lot.
Yeah, Oh my gosh, oh man.
So, uh all right, how do I tiptoe into this this?
You know what? Let me.
I'll help a little bit. So I have to tell a funny story. And I don't know if you remember this, Q, so hopefully you do. But I walked up to uh where we were going to jump off the bridge, and I got to the top, like, you know, you climb up this really steep hill by yourself. You know, Golden's not there to carry my pack. I didn't have my pack, but but you know, no one's there to help me. So I climb up this hill and I get to the top and Q is way there, And do you
remember what you said to me? And what I said back?
I don't really remember you a breaka.
Oh my god, you're gonna laugh. Hopefully you're gonna giggle. So you you were like, why are you Why are you so out of breath? What took you so long? And I was like, I'm fifty one years old, I'm out of breath, I'm out of shape, and I have asthma, And you were like yep, and you walked away. Okay, yeah, it sounds about right.
You definitely gave me everything I needed to hear.
I was like, oh yeah, I got nothing.
I got nothing on that I can.
Perfect. I was like, well, if I'm being honest, like I'm totally out of shape and I'm fifty one. You know, it was really it was a funny moment and a moment that I feel like, hopefully, you know, at least to yourself, you're finding like a little humor because I can't even imagine. But let's go back to Bob's question, So what do you think is my weakness?
All right, all right for all the people watching this and don't yeah, at the end.
Of this, no, no, I mean I'll probably you know, say, yep, he's He's totally right. But I am curious to see, like what you what you thought of it, like as someone who sees all these celebrities come through it. And you know, I'm small, I'm older, you know, I don't I'm not a professional athlete, I'm not an Olympic star. You know, I'm sure you have certain judgments that you have to make because you guys are judging us essentially.
So yeah, i'd love to know like what I can work on just from my own personal perspective, what I could utilize from your experience, and how I can myself.
Well, I will initially say, like for the for the general right, for everyone who comes on the show, Yeah, one, typically everyone is not physically in condition in some kind of way. Like me, I, even at forty four years old, I hold my conditioning to the utmost highest standard for me, right, I want to a one hundred year old man is still a beast in this world, and I will always
carry and be that way. And I think for the broad spectrum of it all, everyone comes in not really physically ready for that, and then there's others who are even not even close to that, they're even worse. And then mentally, people are assuming the celebrities that come on the show, assuming that.
There will be a little bit of a lull where you.
Get to go and relax and you can kind of you know, have a little chill time where you know, maybe a hotel, maybe your cell phone back, you get to kind of relax. Yeah, all we strip all that away and let all that gum. We treat you like you are really on a deployment, because we want youry to get a full understanding of what we had to go through for the years of seven eight nine months.
Depending on if you was a seal, you're gone for seven eight If you're a marine, you could be gone for an entire year and say yes, SBS the same thing. So's we want people to understand that, you know, you're isolated in this in these positions, and you're mentally you have to be in the game, you have to be
all in on what you're doing. And I think a lot of the celebrities come in not really understanding that's how it's going to be because as you know now that's this reality show was not like any other reality show ever, and we've really, you know, kicked the crap out of you. So I would say for you personally physic the physical aspect of it was huge for you, right, and then you win it. Right, you have asthma, you have all those things, your age and all that stuff.
But it's something that because you're a family person, right, it's not something that you're really common to or normal to in your normal daily life, your routine because you're a mom or a wife do all these different things. So you're going to come into with that weakness, right, and then the mental as of it is another thing. Uh, there's a lot of fear in you on this thing. So you know, I can't remember you.
First of all, you're answering this brilliantly. I mean, I'm just blown away.
I'm like, God, God, he's doing great.
I've seen a lot.
And I was also instructed before I got out the navy, you know, so I kind of I got the chance to see what it's like on the instructor's side for kids who's trying to come in and beat me like your son. Trust I got to see now because at first I wasn't always in the instructor role, so I didn't get the chance to look at her from the other side.
But when I did, it.
Was like whoa, whoa, Is that what I look like when I went through.
Crying and throwing up? And like then it's so funny side, But generally that's what it is.
You know.
The mindset of the thing is you're going through hell the entire time, right, it's the worst thing.
It's a lot of fears that you've never done this before.
You got people yelling at you, you know, and and if you're not mentally prepared for the especially us the verbal abuse that we're giving you, right, and it's.
Ye own verbal abuse.
There's a purpose behind it because we're meant to break you down and see if you can still push through all that, if you can not hear it, if you can shut it out, and still even when you fail a task, can you tell yourself to pick yourself up.
It's all right to keep moving on, even though I'm in your.
Ass the entire time and telling you you're not, telling you you're not this is not for you, telling you you're weak, telling you you're a failure to the rest of the team, the rest of your your classmates and whoever, and see how you can manage that. You know, all that hell, And I'm like, okay, that's the whole. So I think a lot of that stuff. Everyone that comes on the show, they have they struggle with all those aspects of what I just said.
So you have you have your struggles with that as well. And the physical part.
I think you've probably been a little bit more physical condition, you would have been able to probably push through some more of the things that we were giving you.
That's what I was saying.
Yeah, oh, tot and I'll tell you kind of a background. They approached me I think about three months before, and I was I was basically signed up. I was going through the like medical clearance, and they weren't going to clear me medically because I have had a I had back surgery, I had a lumbar fusion, and at one point the doctor was like, well, I just don't know if you could handle being pushed off a boat, and I was like, being pushed off a boat, Holy crap.
So basically I had to get my doctors involved and ended up obviously getting cleared. But during that time, I'm super superstitious, and I didn't work out when I was waiting, so I lost like at least a month of training that would really have helped.
Three months tholand months would have definitely put you in a better bracket physically to handle a lot of the stuff that we was doing with Especially when you start running with fact all that stuff, it weighs on you, like your lower back starts to hurt and be painful,
so uncomfortable your neck from this. People don't realize how miserable you completely are when you add weight to your body and you're always wearing this weight and you're always doing this certain thing and you're always running here and you can give They don't realize the they don't realize it. But it's good. It's good to see what, yeah, you.
Do because your only respect too, I'm sure trust that.
I mean not that, I mean, I know you have friends who have trained in their Navy seals and things that are retired now as well. I will say this, you know, watching the show, I mean I got literally emotional watching the show because you know, I know a lot of the people that were on this season and I was just watching how you guys are. I mean, but I also feel like, you know, you guys have been there and done it, and you clearly still keep yourself in spectacular condition.
Everyone looked like they're in such great shape.
But it's funny, you know when you went into the I think it's called the mirror room, and you kind of would be you know, and it was like the one time on the show where we'd see you guys actually you know, as the DS is sort of not ever letting the guard down, because that was one thing Denise Richard's commented on too. She had said she kind of had thought, you know, we'll go to a lounge or something. She's like, where's the lounge? You know, where's
craft services. But you'd kind of get to know these people, which I thought, Man, you guys aren't just great at what you've trained your whole life to do. You're really good at getting us as a viewer to like, you know, you kind of got to the heart and soul of what made these people give this thing a shot in the first place, and why they're there, why they're not just in their cushy lifestyles, and and I was just watching it thinking, man, they've got to be feeling for this.
Person, you know. But so I have to ask, like, you know, in your role, were there ever.
Moments where you were like, oh man, we got to back off of this person, or was it because of your training, because you know what you've gone through, they're like, okay, we got to step it up on this person in that moment where we're all at home going hump the brakes,
you know, give her, give her a minute. Was there ever like that moment where where you, guys, it's not like you smell blood in the water, but you see this person and you're like, okay, we got to push harder now or where are you in those moments?
Yes or no?
To anskwer that out of the bet. Yeah, you'll see that and you want to push. And you'll see that and you're like, oh, let me laying up a little bit on this person. We want to we want to challenge you period, hands down. We want to give you full bore challenge. One thousand percent. What is like one
hundred percent right? One hundred percent of the time. Well, you'll you'll get to a point where you see someone say, like a like a Denise right herself when on the scene saw me pulling her number, Yeah about her back right and this and if she sees this, Denise, I have nothing more respect for you.
Girl.
Don't ever know everything. This is personal?
Okay, Yeah, sometimes celebrities will take some of that stuff personal.
I mean, I get it, we took it.
I didn't like my instructors when I went through I hated them, But when we graduated.
I understood why.
They did that to me, why they was in my faith, why they made me feel so like I shouldn't be there.
I understood it at the end.
Yeah, it was and all that stuff, but it was so funny and I still even when I would meet them, even when I was in a stale team, I still looked at them as the instructor. I will still call them almost instructor, but the same level. But I will still want to say that because they gave me so much. Yeah, so when I have those things go on show, you know, like with Denise for example, that was part of me that I wanted to push and force her back in because I felt she could do more, but she was willing.
To just yeah it go.
But I'm like, you can do more, but you're giving me something here that I can't. I can't continue with right because if I allow you to complain about the back of your back is sore, because that's really what it was.
Back is sowred.
It's not that you hurt. You're not about to break your back. Everyone's back for everyone's back is tired, everyone's needs hurting, all that stuff. But allow you to keep doing this and then put you back in. Then the other what the other celebrity is gonna think, Okay, maybe I can just can I see the medic you know, my.
Kneehir a little bit? Can I get a little pause? No, you don't get that.
In reality, we don't get off. You know, once you started going to the medic and instructors looking at you, they're writing your name down, they're gonna get you out of here. For we don't need that, we don't need somebody's trying to dodge what we're doing. We're not going to kill you. We are going to extremely challenge you. So it's the point where I was not going to just let her go back in at that point. So I was like, you know what, she's been out long enough.
You know, the girls and everyone else have been dealing with everything that's going on with the surfer merchant.
Exercise man that one.
Yeah, yeah, give her a chance. But I just couldn't give her the extra chance again because it already happened. I think in the pool in the beginning, I think.
Yeah yeah, and I think she can yeah.
Yeah, I think something happened here. And I was like, we can't keep doing this now. So and remember we run the show. It's that producers and all that stuff. So we create the tactics and all the obstacles we create that.
We don't want the celebrities thinking they can go and.
Talk to you know, Paul's time out. Can I go and talk to whoever over here go with us.
Yeah, that's if I may interrupt that.
That's what I think makes the show so different is you know, everybody kind of kind of like what Denisa said, And I mean, you know, I think everyone would probably go into it thinking, oh, you know, if we've done one of these shows in the past, we can kind of pull aside excuse me, you know, and you're by yourself time, right, and you know they know what they're doing when they do that, and especially when everyone else is all linked together and basically being you know, the
experience of drowning essentially, and it's like, and she's up there having a little chat. You know, I get it. I think you're right. I'd be I'd be bitter if I'm still down there just swallowing gallons of seawater.
Get here, So I totally get that.
Yeah, right, Yeah.
And it's terrible.
We went through that, and I'm telling you that, and we go through what is even the surface a little worse. You know, you got some waves coming in, so now it was like smashing you down on your face, and it's even harder because you truly feel like you can't breathe. You're uncomfortable mouth. You can't be your eyes the sand and saw it's like lingering here.
So you get up. When I have you set up, you just still can't do it. You just Tristan miserable, right, you know.
Actually I'll let you explain how you felt going through that piece of it.
Oh my, well, okay. So what people don't is, and obviously, being from reality television, I know that so much ends up on the cutting room floor, like there's just not enough time to show everybody everything, and there's sixteen different people, so you want to show like you know, everyone's stories and like the whole process. So what people did not see is we got down to the beach and it looks like we immediately went into the immersion the linked
arms activity, but that's not true. We were we were doing sprints with our boots on on the on sand, you know, which is really hard to do if you've never gone running in the sand. It's not an excuse, it's just really hard. So we're doing sprints and then I think the next thing was we had to grab the like giant logs and the sand bags and take them to the beach, and so we were doing that like back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. And those laws how much did those logs weigh?
Yeah, yeah, we kind of get this.
We kind of tried to get what we use in bud so for people on this bus that's for basic underwater demolition sealed training. Those laws can weigh in between twenty two fifty to three hundred and three ten somewhere right in there. It just appends and you got it.
I am so blown away by that, really, holy crap, no kidding. I had a hard time so so. And then the sandbags, how much do those weigh or did those weigh on the beach?
Yeah, we just kind of put in a bunch of sand and those maybe gotten up to like fifty pounds something like that.
Okay, Well the hence for the reason why I could not lift it over my head. I was literally like I can't.
I know you want me to, but I can't.
So you're just as dry weight is just north of fifty pounds on a normal day anywhere her full body weight, you know.
I remember actually I remember her oh holding it overhead.
That was a good Yeah, I remember the sand was poor.
I could not And I will say like thanks to all the ds at that moment, I remember locking eyes with I think Foxy and Billy because I literally couldn't push it up. It was sitting on my head and at least both of them. I'm sure you saw me too, but they like just looked past me. They were like, get it above your head, and I'm like, I can't, and they just looked past me. Thank God, and gave me some grace in that moment. But I will say, so you don't see you know half of what we
did on the beach, and I was exhausted. I will say, Q. My biggest fear going into this well, one of them was open water. I'm really fearful of open water. And I kind of shocked myself because in the Beehive well, first in the boat to helicopter jump, I wasn't even thinking about the fact that we were going to be in the water maybe at some point and then oh and when we jumped from the boat, sorry, go back to that, or we got pushed from the boat and
we had to swim. I was being weighed down by my clothes and I'm normally an okay swimmer, but I was not even thinking about my fear. Same thing at the beehive, like I stayed, I was treading water. I think I passed that one. I think. But I literally went to the side like seconds before you guys called like, everyone go to the side. So I was proud of myself in that moment. And then the beach, I really
was not thinking about how cold I was. I wasn't thinking about like the fact that we were drowning and you're going to laugh at this little part. So during the surfer version, when we're linked up, you guys said, you know, put your legs back and you know, rock whatever, rock whatever. I don't know what your exact instructions were, but I got confused. I don't know if anyone saw me. I haven't even said this to anyone yet, but I did a full on like somersault on my back like a back roll.
I think I did see me. I think I did. I think I do. Recall that happening.
Yeah, I literally was like.
What are they talking about? So I just went I rolled on backwards and then I had to reconnect.
You broke the link, you broke the chain, and I was like, oh, yeah, breaking my chain?
I did I did, I did it?
Yep, I did it.
So anyway, Yes, it was. It's so much harder than people think. Sorry, Ryan's waving at me, so much harder than people think because you don't see like half even like three quarters of what we do. So it was and it's intimidating. You know, you guys are intimidating. And I know you're supposed to be. You're supposed to be breaking us down to make us better, and and I totally get that. At one point, also at the end of the exercise, I stopped Rudy because I was about
to pass out. Like, I was like, I am really dizzy. I feel like I'm going to faint. And he was like, okay, do you want to give me your arm band? Same situation like with you and Denise, and and I was like, no, I don't want to leave yet, and he was like, well, you can't go see a medic, so it's either give me your arm band or you keep going. And I'm like, okay, fine, I'll keep going. And then yeah, yeah, finished.
Before you finished, just because you made that decision, right, you made that conscious decision. That is what we that's what we want, we want, we're looking for, right, you know, With all respect to her, she couldn't make that decision right in the heat of it. Yeah, rest in that chaos, she was thinking about, you know, I just need this break. Well, guess what, if you finish, you'll get it. You'll get a chance to go see medic late, either at the end of the night or morning. We're not going to
kill you and your back is going to break. So when you said that to Rudy, you made a conscious decision to go further, right, to push further, really dig deeper of who you are in your true character, right and see who you really are. And you show that with that, And then I got on you as we kept going. But that was what we're talking about. That's what people in general lose. They don't understand you do have the forty two to keep going. You do have
your own power to keep going. People lose that idea and they don't realize they can go, they can push themselves further.
Than what their initials.
Yea, yeah, I love that.
Well, you you get like caught up in the fear and the pain and the like mental you know, the devil on your shoulder, like I said in the in the trailer, like you listen to that devil A whole lot easier when you're in pain and you're super scared and you're getting yelled at, and you're tired, and you're exhausted and you're sick and you know all of these things. So yeah, but you know, obviously, mind over matter it is a thing. It's a thing, a thing.
You know. Most people don't know.
When I went through Hell Week, it put me in the hospital because I was really yeah, well, you know, hell We goes from Sunday night to Friday morning. So that's when Hell We starts Sunday Friday morning, and you only get roughly three or four hours of sleep if I can recall throughout the entire week, wo Hire week, and that first nap it's like a two hour nap you get on Tuesday, right, Tuesday and Wednesday, and the next one you get on Wednesay, Tuesday, Wednesday, and honestly,
you don't get to sleep. You can't sleep.
One.
If you're in a tent ten that's outside, it's still doing the middle of working day. So you hear people walking around going to work, you hear you know, cars driving by you.
You're not sleeping.
You're in your wealth, right, You're in your wedd uniform and you want to cut the cot is not comfortable right now, dead heat of the day, so you're not sleeping for this tour. You're resting, but your body is like trying to heal, so you're shaking. Your body is just constantly shaking its form of than the state of healing you can't control. So on Thursday we did medical checks.
On Thursday, we do medical checks where they got to make sure you know, nothing's going to happen to you, right, because there's a point of the training where it can become a hazard. Now there there is a point to that though it has to be that intense. Our training has to be this intense. Sometimes you'll see politicians or try to make our program somewhat easier, our selection program.
We're like na and you'll see a lot of Navy seals who have power step up and say, no, we're not making our selection program lighter, just because y'all fear that people get hurt. You know, all this high as this happens, and every so often, you know, if someone made me lose their life.
In our training pipeline.
But again, when you're thinking about terror, terrorism around the world, and I'm keeping America Safe, I would select your program has to be this intense and it has to be that hard, right for this, you volunteer. You want to be that man, You want to be that silent professional. You want to have a stake in protecting people. You got to know what you're dealing with. So yeah, on Thursday,
I'll have this pain. When the medical checks was checking all of us out, We're in the underwear, shoulder to shoulder, and they come by and just ask, hey, hey, you haven't any kind of pain anywhere. What's going on with you? Blah blah, And it got to me and I was like, well, I got a little abdominal pain. Don't know what it is, just a little abdominal pain. I think I need some
peptobismo or something just to help me get through. Because we're in the afternoon on Thursday, and the training in hell we end Saturday Friday morning, excuse me, around eight nine ish, so I'm always there, right, I'm right to finish line. I could see it, you know, Thursday afternoon, I only know I got a few more hours to go. Well, you know, a whole and the doctor has me sitting on the ground. He's like, lay down, lay down. He presses on my stomach and it was just terrible pain
just by him pushing on my stomach. And it was like, you're going to the hospital. You're done, And I was like, I was freaking out.
Oh whoa wait, I only got a couple more hours and I'm done.
Whoa.
I just need some medicine and I can keep moving. I'm not totally now.
I mean, I'm freaking out with this guy now right because I know I'm about to lose my dream, this dream of being.
Is about to go.
My one time opportunity to have this chance to be this thing, this this huge thing that I really wanted to be, for my family, for my friends, to see where I come from, to see that I can.
Achieve this thing, this big thing.
I couldn't, right, So I started to cry. Oh man, And then I couldn't. There was no instructor staffs around because I wanted to talk to them so I could let him know I'm not I'm not quitting all this thing and that, and uh, nobody was around, and I got I got eventually put in the ambulance and sent to the hospital and they said my kidneys were shutting down. Eventually, Oh Wow, it was so my muscle was breaking down eternally,
poisoning myself. And yeah, in an aspect that couldn't flush it out because you know, you're you're not eating that much. Your body is as is at its extreme exertion, right, you're doing all kinds with a boat in your head. You're carrying those logs like crazy. Yeah, it was just intense. So as my muscle breaking that was poisoning me. So I get in the hospital.
I'm trying. Oh, it was the worst. It was the worst stress. It was the worst.
So that is awful? Is it rab though? Did you have that?
That's what it was?
My husband has had that. He yeah, it is not good, not good. Like you can die, yes, yes, right, yeah, you can die from it. That's really scary. Well I'm glad you pushed through.
How did you get back into the mix?
Overnight?
And I finally got an instructor on a call on the phone because I was not they got me hooked up to this.
I mean, my fingers is all covered up. I mean I was jacked up.
So I finally got somebody on the phone and it was an instruct that I said, Hey, I did not quit. I did not ring the bell, just to medic the hot. The doctor threw me in the ambulance and said I had to get there.
I'm done. He's like, is this quarrels.
I was like, quarrels, don't worry about it. Just heal and we'll do with you, you know, just get back.
He said that. I kind of felt a little relief.
Oh my gosh.
Yeah, when I come back, if I come back soon enough, I'll still be in the sting with my class.
So yeah, I passed.
I went to sleep, and I woke up the next day and they came and picked me up. I'm in a wheelchair, couldn't walk. My feet was so swollen. Every my knees, every every joint in your body ankles, knees, elbows, wrists, face, neck, back, completely huge, I mean huge.
Wow. Yeah, because your kidneys aren't functioning. It's like, yeah, oh my gosh. Yeah.
So I'm in a wheelchair rolling through the barracks. My class is already secured from hell week.
So I'm rolling through and.
I'm trying to push through, and I'm looking in the doors and they put all the mattresses off the bunk beds on the floor because you got to stay there one night, and they don't want you falling off your bed. And I'm looking at my guys and they're just shaking, just uncontrollably. Just they're going through what I kind of went through the night before. So we stayed there, you know,
throughout the weekend, medical checks and all that stuff. And then money comes and talk to the instructors and they said, because of what I did up to that point and how I carried myself on the point, they allowed me to stay with my class.
So it's awesome.
That's awesome.
That's amazing.
Yeah right there, Yeah.
Big grace, big grace.
And then I eventually waited as the honograd of my class, you know, so I graduated as the honor man of my class.
That's amazing, amazing, congratulations, that's awesome. What did you learn in your time training that I feel like would be your best advice for future people who want to do the show, Like, how do you how do you get how do you get through those struggles? How do you get over those fears? How do you get past the devil on your shoulder that's telling you you shouldn't be there?
Purpose? Purpose, Purpose is number one.
I found When I went through the program, I found who who I am meant to be, and not only the purpose of just being a seal, because being a seal is one thing, but what does it really include, right, helping others. That's how I summed it up. So my purpose was really to give and be a servant to other people, whether I'm going over in the Iraqis and Syria to take out bad guys so families can walk in their their markets and feel safe with their children
and not worry about something happening to them. So I had my sense of purpose now and I knew now that I can move forward and crush life because I understood what I'm meant to do, which is serve other people.
And if I kept that advice service to others, whether.
I'm giving you my advice, well, I'm giving you mentorship, where I'm giving you physical fitness programs and training, helping you in some kind of way to better your life. I felt, this is me who I meant to be, And it was the hardest thing. Not the hardest thing, It was the most inspiring thing for me to understanding my purpose and doing that program, I understood who I'm
meant to be. And serve else is really what it is and I and now that I'm out, you know, I still do the same thing, you know, with my keynotes, with my team building events, my leadership coaching events. I do for corporations who want to know what it takes
to be a leader, a true leader. I understand, this is this is me, this is who I'm supposed to be, and even on the show for every bit of me, so you can really have a true experience of what it's like to go through in hopes of you'll see that for yourself, how you can push through something and
maybe you'll find another purpose. Right Because a lot of people come on the show, they are kind of past their their MVP prime, like a Cam Newton, you know, he's not the MVP and a NFL anymore, but he may is looking for another step, another season of his life. And we're hoping that when people find that, not saying that he doesn't already have it, but we're helping.
With no totally. So I think that's why we all I would say there's a little bit of that sprinkled into every single person who was there. I feel like for me for sure, that was like one hundred percent. My kids are about to be into empty nesters. And I don't know if I explained this in the mirror room with you, but my kids are going to be
leaving me. And I've poured my life into my family life and kind of being there, you know, the household manager and their caretaker and everything else, and I kind of wanted to get back to like who I am and and find that purpose. So I feel like I would I would honestly say I would guess one hundred percent of us were there. That was a little bit of our reason, you.
Know, Yeah, I would say as a oh, yeah, I think that's got to be yes, yes, yes.
Right for every season. Yeah, yeah, I think everyone comes on.
That's that's the number one thing to trying to find about who they are now since we're changing our season of life, our profession, your your kids are growing up now, they're about to leave the home.
You know, there's about to be a whole new life of you, your new season.
So we're trying to hope that we get people to understand that this is the goal and nature of the beast of it. And some people will say they'll leave early because they feel they achieved that at some point, but we want to see people like just challenge themselves and push themselves and just see, hey man, you got more in you, You got more in you, You got more in you.
You can go for everyone we've talked to.
Everyone we talked to has kind of echoed what Trista said when she was first able to tell us where she you know, what she was doing, because it was it was a deadlock, secret man.
I was trying to get it out of her.
But it was really interesting to me because everybody has said, this isn't a competition show. You're competing with yourself. It's all what's going on in here? And I mean, you are made for this ce Like, honestly, God, watching it at home, I know I could never do the things that you have done in your life, just from a physical perspective and a mental perspective. But it's like I relate to you somehow and so and I feel like
I do with all the DS's, you know. I think that was part of me being emotional, was like I was like, oh my god, these guys they get it. They know you know, you guys seem to know what we all think of you as well, Like we hold you up here. But you also want us to know that you're human beings and you're like relating to everybody in the room. And I mean, it's it's remarkable because I can imagine, you know, I've met Golden Tate and
Cam Newton a few times in different settings. And but you know, especially if you were a fan, let's say, of Cam or whatever, and now you have to break them down. That can't be an easy role to be in either.
I wouldn't imagine.
No, no, no, no, man. And I've known Cam, know the person.
But you know, I've watched him when he came in the league as a rookie, you know, so I just playing his golden tape. You know, his team put my team out of the playoffs many times when he played, this team put me out of and I was like, I couldn't stand the Seahawks for years, and I was like, yeah, and he was on that team, he was playing, he was doing.
So no, you're you're right, and it's it's very hard.
And that is the thing what you said was, we want people to still see us as we.
Are, just knowing human beings as well.
You know, we had the same challenges to become who we are. We had to identify we can be further, we can be better. And the number one thing you got to you gotta find your purpose. You got to be inspired by something first though, you know, to be willing to walk through that fire, you got to be inspired.
I was inspired with my grandmother.
I wanted to make a proud so the Navy Seal graduating first black man that graduate top of his class in any Navy Seal training pipeline to.
Accolade, you know, to get that to achieve that.
For me, it was like I got to get this from my grandmother so she I can show her a victim of the circumstance.
Right, I want to atalysts.
But others who struggle in life as a child, who didn't have the best growth, you know, the best you know, raising, there's a word for you know what I'm trying to say.
Yeah, upbringing?
Yeah, upbringing, And you can be yeah.
More if you want it.
But you got to be aspired by something and then you'll find your purpose as you're working through that inspiration and you'll find it and you'll become everything that you need to be so you can help others do the same thing. And that's what I want to do. I want to help others be the same thing, do the same thing.
I love it.
I love it.
I can listen to you talk all day. Can we do a three hours of this podcast? I have a question. I got a question for you, cue, so I'll let you off the hook. For this season that's airing right now, but with the previous seasons, has there been someone that stands out to you as someone who you're just like, Okay, this person for season two and three, I mean, this person went next level. This person went above and beyond, you know, and and like they stood out more than
you leave it. Like like on day one, I'm sure we're all guilty of I even said a trust the day one, I'm like, here's who's gonna end up at the end here, you know, y'all, I'm sure you go through it too. Was there someone that you were like, Okay, this person went above and beyond more than I could possibly have imagine from the from the couple of seasons that you've been on so far.
And you don't have to count this one if you don't want.
To, uh on see uh yeah, I can't really safe for this one. Yeah, we don't want to give something away, right, But season two for me, it was Jojo Siwa Jo.
Yes. I mean when she was freaking carying, was it she carrying Tom Sandoval or Nick or yes? I was like, what the hell she's carrying a man?
Wow?
Her physical yes, her physical her physical strength and endurance was pretty impressive for her age. You know, she never really trained for something like this when we found out later, I mean she did some training, but nothing on this level. And coming from a child the star to this because she was also trying to find more of her purpose, right, you know, from being the child face to now an adult face and how to make the addition and what I really want to do, who I want to be
and all that kind of stuff. So I think Jojo Siwah was the most impressive, and I want to say to the other ds as well, she was the one that everyone was like, I'll be.
Down, yeah, no kidding.
Yeah, that's awesome.
Okay. So I reached out to my season of Celebrity Recruits or whatever you want to call us, and I said, I'm not going to reach out to Instagram. I actually want to know if you guys have any questions for Q because I'm talking to him today. So I have a couple of questions from the from the staff or no, from the recruits, and before we get there, one last thing from me and then we'll end with these questions
unless you have something else, Bob. But okay, So they cast you, you know, to be part of the DS. Did they know about your laugh before they casted you? Or because you guys if I don't know that anyone watching this season knows that his laugh and I want you to do it for us, like you have to give us a little example. But when he would laugh, it was like literally, you're hearing sorry the devil like you when he when he laughs for you, Bob, You're gonna be like, yep, that's evil. I'm sorry, c but
it's true. So can you okay, So first, can you laugh for us? Show us? Give me a little like memory. I'm gonna, you know, close my eyes and listen, and you gotta saying them there and then and then tell me if they knew about it before or if they they how that all transpired and how the laugh like developed if.
You will, Uh, how the last transpired? Really? I developed it? Active duty? Okay, active duty? Uh? When we would do crazy stuff and I was training in the still teams. Yeah, we we you know, we we're crazy. I'm not gonna lie. You gotta be crazy to do this job. In some kind of way.
You will find near death near death experiences like funny, and you gotta like I made the laugh evil. And then we had these little times where everybody be doing these little laughs and we laugh at each other, and then we'd just be just laughing for no reason after everything.
The stuff that we would do together in the unit and a small little group.
So that's how kind of created itself and it and then I started doing it. The is No, it's almost almost like my normal laugh. Now everyone says it's evil.
I mean it doesn't.
He's not. He's not doing it likes as much as you did. Oh, you have to do it just so Bob can hear it. So if they don't show it on this season, everyone will know what I'm talking about, that I'm not crazy. Come on, cue, put yourself in that place, you know when we're standing on parade and you're like saying you're gonna get punished, Like, come on, act like me and Boba in the parade. I'm great.
Ready, let me get it, let me get my mind, because it's okay, and it comes out as an instructor. It really like, it's perfect when it comes out as my when I'm being an instructor.
So so I'm.
Like, I'll say something to somebody so it'd be like for you and Bob, I'll be like, okay, So you think you guys are going to chill through this pro man, Yes, sir, sir, yes, sir.
Wait listen, you have to listen to his laugh, Bob.
It's pretty good, I will say.
I'd be like, okay, all right. So you think you guys owe me later for this? You guys lollygag throughout this course. You guys didn't respect the course. You guys gonna owe me, and you guys gonna pay for this later. Trust me, you ain't gonna like at the end of it, like.
Literally, can't you see?
Like he has like horns coming.
Out of I'm taking my armband off right now.
I'm giving you the evilness of what's coming to you. Think of the evilness that's going to come.
It's just like you're stirring the cauldron. You're like here it comes.
Yep, exactly right, sureing the cauldron. Oh my gosh. Okay, so I got this question from Marion and all of us were thinking it. So I'm sure, but and you hopefully you'll laugh at this and the way you know, I feel like you have a pretty good sense of humor. I feel like all the ds have a pretty good sense of humor, which is which I would love to know, like be on the fly on the wall and see what you guys actually talk about after the show. But okay,
so this is Marian's question, does he feel guilty? Honestly? Afterwards, when swimming while perched on a swim noodle in the pool challenge while some while some were nearly drowning while splashing water on our faces.
Somebody, somebody would ask me that same question.
Hysterical, Oh my gosh.
I was like, I got I need one, I need the new but I had to pass it off to somebody else if y'all are really drunk.
So that's why I'm like sitting.
So the purpose of the noodle was so you could save some people. No, I'm just kidding.
Partly so I can say that people I need to be well rested, need to be well.
Feel if it need be then I'll pass it all, but for the most part, it's for my for my comfort.
He's already gone through this, I know, I know.
The beehive in buzzs, behiving buzzs. We're in this gignomous pool and your class.
Is pretty pretty still big.
You got about one hundred people still in your class. I can't remember if we were all hundred in there or it was like fifty. And they got one instructor in the center on a on a noodle and you got that four or five instructures swimming around smashing everybody together.
Yeah, that's a big group of us, and it creates panic.
It creates that fear, It creates that that feeling fear, fearing other, that fear of death right because you're choking, you don't know if you're going to survive. People panted like crazy. So that's that's the scenario of what it's really like. It's no joke. The beehive is now joke at all. But that was good question.
Yeah, I loved that question. I was like, Mary, and you're on it. And during Beehive in your training, did they have scuba divers like underneath in case people drown, because they did for.
Us, No, no, I don't recall that.
No, yeah, no, yeah, I mean that's the swimmers.
That's why we had more instructors swimming around like what we did it. For us, it was just Rudy. And then you have Billy and Foxy on the top because they can really see and their idea not their idea, they're also job for Billy and Foxy was to identify who was really struggling and then get Rudy to go over and try to help them.
But we didn't.
Oh yeah, because Rudy was in the water, true, right, Okay, and then Golden asked, ask who voted him to be the Hammer and the punisher.
Too?
The other the ds did? They said they did? They did?
They said, uh, based off because I'm the Seal, right, the Seal is like a big title everyone knows. And I was like, oh, yeah, you know this is my this is my thing, right, I'm all this this is my second nature, my second home.
I'm all I'm comfortable here.
So yeah, I love that part of it. So this is this is probably who I'm going to be from then on.
That's well, and that leads me to my next question, which is and maybe we'll end on this unless you have anything, Bob. But Christy asked, ask him, after being as accomplished as he is, first Black Buds graduate to graduate top of his class, what goals do you have for your future?
Mmmm?
Good, serious question, Good, serious question, Christy. That's that's there's a lot that I want to want to be accomplished. Right, We kind of talked a little bit about it, right. I want to, as I said, I want to be a beast until the day I die, not just physically. I want to impact millions of lives through my keynotes.
Through my book that I'm writing. And that book is called why Not The Reason I Call Me? So it's like when you grab.
My book and you read the title of it, it's going to make you ask yourself already, why not me?
Why not you be? You know on the Bachelorette?
You know, why not you be the Navy seal, the doctor or the pilot or whatever top you know, profession that it is that you want to be Because I think everyone has the ability to get there. Now, everyone comes from a different background, so it's gonna be a little harder for those someming than others.
Right, But.
People to understand and know that you have the ability to change your circumstance is the key thing that I really want to push. I want to be the lead dog on that thing, and I hope to God, right, I pray a lot that I can be that catalyst to get maybe suicideally right, Yeah, that was one accolade of my life. Then graduating talking my class. But what I do after that, I've got my bachelor's degree, right, I started learning how to do public speaking.
I've been a personally trainer, so all these.
Things lead into go from the Steel teams taught me many things about how I can achieve these things, but now I got.
To take that with it at the same time.
So my life is really geared to that service thing that I want to be able to say I served millions of people. So when I'm done on this earth, my time is done, I really hope to have impacted millions of people.
That's my goal.
That's amazing, and you can do it every week right now, I'll tell you that.
I know.
I was just gonna say, you're impacting people like me who never ever ever would have thought that they would be part of this show. I mean when they first asked me, I was like, hell, no, don't you want
my husband? And then, you know, and then thought more about it and thought that I that I could actually really challenge myself and get back to who I was before my family, you know, not taking away from that, because it really is my greatest joy in my life, but I just wanted to challenge myself and make my kids proud, make my husband proud, make myself proud. And so you you definitely affected one in a positive way. Even though you're yelling like crazy at me when I
was running to the jeep. Yeah, in that laugh, but you weren't. You weren't saying anything that I wasn't already saying in my head. Obviously. I think that that's what a lot of us are going through. You know, you're saying exactly what we're thinking. And when you said it, I was like, I kind of want to prove him wrong. You know, he's saying all these things.
Yeah, yeah, that's the nature of that whole thing, to see you want to hear me.
You might get pissed off and you ain't gonna like me or whatever, but.
You say, you know what, I'm gonna prove this dude to get him f Q I'm going to push him.
I'm gonna make it. That's all were looking for. That's really what we want. Yeah, that's awesome.
Well, thank you for letting me be part of it. Thank for being Thanks for being part of it. Now you've got Bob wanting to sign up for the show.
Well, I didn't say that. I didn't say that, but I will tell you I listened to you talk.
It's like listen to Dan campbell Man, my Detroit Lions coach. I want to run through a brick wall for the guy. So yeah, I get fired up by this kind of stuff. And I was such a I was very proud of my friend Trista and uh, you know, we we had a chance to interview a couple other people from the show, and it's been one of those things where I was like so proud of her.
I got emotional watching it, you know, I really did.
And it's and uh, I think it's a lot of those factors coming into play, but it's definitely one of those things where you're just watching people go through a fraction of what I know you've gone through through to get where you've been. And you know, they always say you you know you can't let the dog out in the backyard if you don't have a backyard.
And we got to thank our servicemen and women for that every day.
So you know, thank you for that, and and thank you for for showing us a little bit a little taste of you know what that is because I can I magnify it in my head about a billion times and know what it really is.
So it's crazy.
Appreciate that, honestly appreciate that. Uh thanks a lot with that bomb. And that's really what we want to do.
Man.
And when you say you're coach from Detroit, I like that guy. He has he has the mindset of what we're talking about all the time. And you know, just to be honest with you now, I don't even like you because I gotta pay you next week.
Yeah, your commander, ye.
Me and you are. I'm about to get your number after this.
We can be buddies after. We'll be buddies after.
But we aren't going to be buddies that day. I can tell you that right now.
But.
After the game will be cool.
Thank you.
I'm a big I'm a big fan of your team too, and I love your coach man, he's I like that whole mindset too. He's kind of he's kind of tapped into that. And you know, I think both those guys, those guys should be candidates of the Coach of the Year for sure.
So wait, I'm sorry, back up, who is your team?
Qing?
The Commanders got it because Ryan used to play for the Panthers.
Oh did it?
Oh?
I didn't know that.
Didn't he play for the Ravens too? I thought he played for the Ravens.
Yeah, he got I think he got drafted by the Ravens and then got traded to the Panthers and then he played for nine seconds.
So I will say this so about her husband real quick.
And I love this. When we were both on the Bachelorette vying for Trista's love, she chose the right guy.
I promise you.
They were making a big deal out of me. Haven't played college football. I played Michigan State, and they're like, you know, oh, well, Bob played colle and the Producers and Ryan was like my bunk, you know.
And so I had like talked to him a little bit about stuff, and.
I'm like, and I was getting so angry because it was like, in every conversation they try to make me talk about it. I'm like, I'm not talking about it. I was a backup quarterback. This dude, this dude played for the Baltimore Ravens. But I was like, I was losing my mind over it because no one was talking about he was Ryan the firefighter.
I'm like, no, he's not.
Oh my god, yeah, so the firefighter.
He's not just a firefighter, damnit.
Yeah. I got myself worked out more than once because I just adore the guy.
But yeah, it's uh, it's really great.
It's been really great talk with you. Thank you for giving us your time and for being on the show with us, and thanks for giving us such great television to watch too, because I've been loving the show and very excited for this week's episode, and man, it's just been a it's been this whole thing has been like an unbelievable, mind blown experience. When I found out Tristan was on there and then to see her kicking ass made me really happy.
So hey, sometimes, thank you both for having me on here. I appreciate it and look to do more. You know, I'm trying to get further out there, so hopefully, you know, I'll get have opportunities to continue to speak this kind of word to people.
So I enjoyed that. Well awesome, awesome girl. You did a great time.
Thank you, thank you. I appreciate it, we appreciate your time. And you know, keep watching Special Forces World's Toughest Test on Fox on Wednesdays and then it will stream on Hulu the next day. Thanks everybody for listening.
Thank you everybody. Thanks you, thanks a lot.
Thank you.