Hello, Hi, How are you?
I'm okay?
How are you?
What's your name?
Can I give my real name?
No? Want to give me a fake name? I'm gonna I'm gonna give you and I'm gonna I'm just gonna give you a fake name. I'm gonna give you one. I'm gonna call you Annie.
Amy.
Come on, bro, I don't sound like a Amy, all right?
You know what you get the fake name you get, and you don't get upset.
Amy.
How old are you? Amy?
I'm twenty three?
Well, what's going on? Amy? How can I how can I get you today? What's happening?
Man? Honestly, that's such a loaded question with everything that's gone on in like the past year and a half of my life. But basically, long story short, right before my senior year of college started, one of my best friends was like murdered the first week of school us.
And it's just the craziest, like his most mind warping time honestly in my life, and I thinking back on it now, I'm just like I can't even believe it's been that long, and it's like this the way that I've had to accept like that I'll never get closure on some things has been just way too much for me to handle.
You know, what sorts of things are you trying to accept that you'll never get closure on.
Basically, just with everything that happened to her, it was like a lot of blurred lines and just like things that don't add up from like the person that murdered her, and like he never technically got charged with a murder just because of the way laws work in my state. So it's just like, although he is behind bars for what he did, it's still no one was responsible with her life. And I'll never really know like what really like in a way killed her, Like what really happened with it? You know?
Can I ask you what happened? Do you want to talk about what happened?
Yeah? I can. I can kind of go into it. So basically, there's this huge thing in my school that I went to in college, I went just background. I went to a big ten college, really big school, big party school. It's really known for that, and it's really like great college in general, but it definitely has a culture around drinking and partying in Greek life is like the biggest thing ever. So it definitely prompts a lot of crazy shit to happen there. But this was like
way more than I ever could understand. But there's this thing that everyone like goes to you on Tuesdays. It's called two dollars Tuesdays. And it was the first one of the year, like we had all just moved back down. It was the week before school started, called welcome week, and this is our senior year. And me and my friend had met each other when we were in high school, but we never really met each other for real and
started becoming friends until freshman year of college. She was my best friend throughout like all three years of college, one of my closest friends. And that night she was a year younger than me, so she wasn't twenty one yet. I was twenty one at the time. Me and two other friends had gone to the two dollars Tuesday thing. She was at another friend's house and they were all just like kind of pregaming to go out later, but Avery was just gonna do something else. But basically Avery
ended up getting god name. She ended up getting just like more drunk than she intended. And she was supposed to leave and come to my house, and I was supposed to go pick her up. But since I was drunk. I was like, I'll walk to you, because we were only like ten minute walk away from each other. But by the time I said that, her friend was like, no,
I'll just drive her over to you. But Avery was still thinking that I was coming to walk and get her, so she was being reluctant to go with her friend, although me and her friend had already worked this whole thing out that she was going to get dropped off in my house, but she didn't have her phone, her keys, or anything, so she didn't want to leave because she
couldn't find them. And then she ended up getting in the car, but was convinced that our other friend was taking her to the wrong house because I had just moved to a different house this year and she'd only been there like once or twice, so she was like unfamiliar with the area I was in, And so she got out of the car without any of her stuff, like a block away from my house, by this gas station, and then I was on the phone with the friend that led her out of the car, basically not thinking
anything of it because she was being aggressive and they were both very drunk, so she was like, she'll make it to Laurence. She's literally right down the street. But like I was waiting out of my porch for her, and she never showed up. So I was just like, what the fuck, Like, where's my friend? And then my sober friend, my roommate at the time, came home and I was like, yo, I don't know where my friend is.
We need to go look for her, like I'm scared, Like she doesn't have any of her stuff on her, you know. So then we drive around, we don't see her at all. We drive around where she lives, which is like ten minutes walk away from me, drive around my neighborhood, don't sear, drive around where she came from, wasn't there, And so then I was just I mean, I was intoxicated too. So then I called my other best friend. So it was me, my best friend that was missing at the time, and my other best friends
who were like a trio. My other part of the trio was in Florida. So I FaceTime her while I'm drunk, and I'm like, yo, I don't know where our friend is. Like I don't know what to do because she doesn't have her phone on her, no one knows where she is. She could be with maybe one of her friends, like you know that she ran into, or maybe someone that else she knew in the area, like no one knew. So then basically I ended up just going to sleep that night and I was like, I don't know what
to do. There's no way I can track this girl. I don't know where she is, and I was feeling ill about it, but like really truly, there's nothing that I could do. And everyone was like, she's okay, Like she's probably just with like her kind of man at the time, friends or something along the lines of that.
But then the next day we woke up still heard nothing from her, which was rare because she was always the type to wake up early and text us that like she was up or whatever, send us something funny from the night before, like just some humorous shit, like she was funny, and we were just didn't hear from her, and we were like, this is so like just so fucking weird. So then me and my friend were like, okay, we need to like call our other friend, the roommate that let her out of the car, and we do,
and then we called the police. She's not in the hospital, she's not anywhere. And so then We're just like, this is so messed up up. And then like all of a sudden, I'm on the phone with my best friend and she was on the phone with our friend's stepmom at the time, and the police had came to their door and said that they had found their daughter dead. And then we just started flipping out. We're like, how did like how and what and where and like how
did any of this happen? And basically we didn't even find out that, like the person that did this to
her wasn't arrested for like two months later. This guy that just like murdered our friend was just out there and we had like no idea what it happened really truly, and then we had to wait like an entire year until like this past June to even go to trials for it and everything, and we still never even got full closure because he didn't have to go up on the stands because he didn't have to like choose to incriminate himself.
So you don't even know, you don't even know what happened. You're like, who is this guy? How they like this was this just was she was talking drunk along the streets and this guy just was randomly from the streets like kidnapped her.
Yeah, that's like in the nutshell basically what happened. I mean, the trial pieced it more together for us and gave us like an idea of the timeline. Like we saw footage of her in her parking garage, like alone, she was talking to some people. But I think the conclusion of her like being in the parking garage and not being able to get up to her apartments because she didn't have her keys, and like when you have an elevator in the parking garage, like you can't go up
to a floor unless you have the fob. She never had her fob. So there's footage of her in the elevator like trying to go up and down but it won't let her out on her floor. And then there's like footage of her going in and out of the garage like trying to talk to people.
But is there like is there footage of her and the sky?
Yeah?
How did she meet this guy?
There's there's no footage of her actually meeting him. It's hearsay of like what he said how they met, which was they met like five blocks away from my house, which was legitimately on campus at this university, So that just shows you everything about safety at colleges. He was just lurking at two to five am on a random Tuesday night, like nobody's business, and he said that that night he was looking to get drunk and fuck some bitches.
So then he picks up my friend while she's overly intoxicated, alone and drunk. And the technical cause of her death was speentanel. So what we won't do like ever know is because the autopsy doesn't reveal how the sentinel was ingested. They didn't find any like points on her skin or anything like that, like either she took a pill of some sort or like bad drugs, but like well just or like the thing is is like I know she would never do that, so it's like very difficult for
me to ever think that would happen. And he also raped her two times, three times more maybe I don't know, but Jesus, yeah, it's just like I don't ever think that she would willingly do that. But like people originally when this happened, people thought that like she did this to herself, like they thought that she took bad drugs and killed herself. But I knew that it was never true the whole time.
I'm sorry to hear about all this. This is a wild, wild, wild thing, especially you know, being you know, in contact with her the night that it all happened.
Yeah, And I mean the hardest part is definitely the guilt of like wishing I wouldn't have never went to sleep and just like looked for her more and like went in the parking garage. It's just like it was the first we had moved down there. We had hung out that day, Like we went to the grocery store together,
we went to the gym. We were like, yeah, like let's get ready like this year, and then we were like, we're going out later, and then like we literally were at the gym and then we hugged and we were like see you later, like because she was gonna come over that night anyway. And so it's just crazy that like we were texting and it was like twelve, it was midnight, and I was talking to her and then like I could tell she was drunk, but then I thought I was going to see her later, and then
I just woke up to that the next day. And I mean, even the crazier part is that my like the other person that's in the trio or our best friends, Like her best friend was murdered like four months prior to this, So this is like the second time that my other friend was going through this. And like she genuinely was in like disbelief when she called me. She was just like, I can't even like process this.
Well, you know, your friend's friend had another friend to get murdered four months before this. Yeah, at the same school.
No, he didn't go to college with us. It was a friend from home.
How long ago did all this stuff happen?
This is all the year twenty twenty two, so.
It's still pretty pretty new.
Yeah, it was a.
Two year deathmark of our friends, a male friend that we had that passed away just.
A week she did.
Man, So the things that you were talking about not getting closure on are really just like like what exactly happens? Right?
I'm like, did were they doing cocaine? Like like I just like I just want to know, you know. It's like and then we obviously, like me and my other best friend are like freaking detectives because the police weren't doing as they should. They treated the whole case like an overdose when they found my friend not like a murder. They didn't fingerprint anything. There was like cut straws. There was definitely probably drugs present, but like they said, there wasn't.
I mean, they see and the guy that did this, keep in mind, was thirty five or thirty six and she was twenty years old.
Mm.
So yeah, And this all happened at a thirty six year old's parents' house, and the parents were the.
One that called the police, not the guy that did this to my friend.
And so so that guy didn't get charged with murder, you said, what, but he's behind what exactly happened.
He got charged with rape.
And for distributing alcohol to a minor.
That's fucking crazy because he.
Admitted to supplying her with weed and alcohol. But her assistant says, spinal.
And who are you? Who are you with?
This is my boyfriend?
What's up?
Man? Like you have to go on here? He's like, yeah, it's just it's a lot of a lot of crazy ship honestly, can I want to expose the state because Indiana Indiana's laws are the reason that his motherfucker's not gone for murder.
Right now, I will say a few pe people I've I've checked out the chat a couple of times while we've been talking, and there have been a couple of people who deduced that it was Indiana. Damn, somebody in the chat, And I don't know if this is true, but I and I actually might be making this up because I just kind of glanced at it. But somebody in the chat said that like Indiana like an like Indiana University, that like ship like this happens a lot. Is that true?
Yeah, that's what I'm saying. It's not surprising. The culture that's breeded at Indiana University is the most toxic and just messed up, like culture of kids dying underage.
And so you've graduated way.
Too many dots there.
Yeah, what are you doing now?
I live like near Chicago.
Okay, and I guess I have a few bunch of questions. I mean, how how often are do you do you think about this? I mean, it's only been two years, It's not like this is something that is heavily in the past, but like, how often do you do you think about it? How often does it like persist in your brain?
Oh? Man, I mean I mean recently, I've had an easier time with it I don't really know why, but I feel like the weight of it is finally getting a little easier to put them in my fath just trying to stay positive and like live a normalish life
after all this, you know. Yeah, yeah, but I mean before, like over the last summer after I graduated in May twenty twenty three, I started working right after it, just because I was like, screw it, like I want money, Like I just don't need to sit around and like pretend all this didn't happen, you know, and like what was I gonna say, Oh yeah, back then, like in June and July, Like when I first started working, I thought about it so much, Like I couldn't sometimes during work,
I would just have to like get up and go to the bathroom just to like sob a little bit. But I mean, it's way better than that now, just after the trials. The trials was a lot, and leading up to that, because I had to be on the
stands a couple of times. Didn't want them to like like grill me about stuff, you know, like why I wasn't trying to help more like they were, because basically the other side of the case, the defense of the criminal was trying to say like Avery did this often and like this was a part of her behavior to like be reckless and drunk and all this, And I like it was just hard because they had the evidence on my phone and stuff, Like I thought they would
like look through our messages and stuff and kind of like see that. You know, we were partiers at the time, truly, but who is it? You know, it's like we were in college. Everybody was drinking, everyone smoked a little weed everyone and I you stay it in the chat everyone ie you does blow that's the culture.
And how long How long was the How long was the trial for?
It was a week?
When did that end? Was that also like around the end of twenty twenty.
Two, right right before fourth of July of twenty twenty three. This is like lessons, this is like six months ago, No, almost a year actually, like eight months.
Yeah. Well, you know, like I know you talked about like this, this feeling of guilt, and I am sure I'm not the first person to tell you this, but you know, of course your friend getting murdered is not your faults.
Right, But I feel like every single day is like like I look at a picturver and I'm like fuck, like why, like why did I go to sleep? Like It's just it goes to show for anybody in out there right now listening to this, never leave your friends alone, and don't go out with the dead phone, and always keep your stuff on you, you know, and a weapon and a and a fucking weapon if it's a niney
or pepper spray or something like Lord forbid. You know this stuff happens every single day, and you don't understand that the depth of it until it's someone that you really love, like someone that you talk to every single day.
M How has the uh process of moving on? Now that you're out of school and you're working and it sounds like you're living with your boyfriend, how's the process of uh? You laugh? Are you're not living with your boyfriend? No?
Okay, we we live like it's funny, like we joke. We're like medium distance right now. We live like thirty minutes away from each other. But it's way better than how we were when I was at school. So I'm grateful.
I I you know what, I guess. I guess for like a little second, I lived in a universe where, of course, why would her why would her boyfriend just be over. They have to live together. I don't know why these I lived.
In for a second we're living together. Why they live together and get married and have kids?
Like, yeah, wait, vibe vibean's good vibein is A is A is a relationship status? I would I would put that on your Facebook. How's the process of Okay, so you're a vibe? And that's what I was going to ask you is, how's how's vibing? How's the process of vibing? How's how's today? How the last week?
Yeah, I mean it's definitely it's been a lot. Like I've said, the past couple of weeks been a lot, just better. I don't know. I've been more positive and just I don't know, not not getting over it.
But she's always positive. I've seen nothing since before from after. She's changed so much, but in the greatest way possible. It's it's shocking to me. She's always positive, which is crazy.
I like, this guy's cool guy? What is is he on the speakerphone?
Yeah?
Yeah, yeah, can't talk to can't talk to him real Quick's so good? What's your deal?
Man? My deal is her deal? I just told her to call and because I got the notification that you're streaming, and I just found you a couple of months ago and I've been watching NonStop. So I was like, well, I don't have ship to tell, but he does. So I'm just glad she called you.
You quicked up.
We were cracking up right before you called, because like my text were so dry, and I was like, I was like, he's not going to know what I'm saying.
I'm well, so okay, So you guys aren't living together, but you're vibing. That's good, and uh, you got it? What are you? What is it? What's your job now?
I'm in marketing. Yeah, I graduated from the business school. Yeah.
Are you enjoying? You know? I guess I'm curious because the way that you kind of opened to the call. I know that you you know, a lot of what you seemed to be dealing with right now, you know is in relation to this, but it seems like you were in some sort of of a of an overall encompassing malaise of some kind. Is that is that? Is that true? Am I making that up?
Yeah? I mean that's the thing. Is like all of this just really made me so eye opened to like how I mean, this honestly is gonna sound so corny, but there's that Kanye video where he's like I ask God to deliver me from pain and he took my mom And it's like, in a way, that's like how this feels, Like it's it's hard to have anything that
could ever really hurt that much. And it's like it's kind of made me so like not even in a bad way, like not numb, but just like it made me realize how little so much means, and like how much someone means, you know, m h m hm.
Ask good delivery from pain. So he took my mom as in, like you want me to deliver you from pain. Here's the most painful thing now, right, there's no more pain in comparison.
Right, It's like it's it's not even and obviously like I live in fear of just like even my little brother, like he still goes to IU. So it's definitely like i still have a lot of like worry with that, just because I'm like the culture there, like I said, is very like toxic. So I'm like that definitely still
stresses me out. But I'm like at the end of the day, like yeah, like at the end of the day, it's like all these things I just think that I can't control, and I'm I kill myself worrying about all of that when I you know, try to chill out for some time. But yeah, I haven't really been going to therapy much when I probably should be. But I don't know. I just feel like if I was going on like a consistent basis, it would make it like weirder.
It would make it harder for me to open up about it authentically because I feel like when he just told me to come up here, I was like, screw it, I'll talk about it right now, because like I definitely like feel the love for my friend enough to talk about her every single day to anybody. But at the same time, it's like to a therapist and like paying someone and like, I don't know that that.
To me is titchy.
I don't know.
I guess you, yeah, you don't want it to see to seem like you're like rehearsing it or something like that, or is that is that kind of.
Right?
I mean, it's it's genuinely like I've talked about it so so much and like just even with you know, like obviously you can imagine my best friend's text and I like or like our text every day are very like we talk about our friends that we lost quite a bit, and it's like I get a lot of just release, like just talking to them about her and like, you know, looking at old video stuff like that, and like obviously just like having my boyfriend and my family
and stuff, like they all understand everything that and it's it's also kind of crazy too because my little brother was also very good friends with this girl, so like sometimes we talk about her and it like hits a different part, you know.
I was going to ask, how's your relationship with that? So it was a trio. It was you friend Avery and this other girl? Who's who's this other girl? Are you still friends with her?
Oh?
Yeah, she's my best dat day one? So we talked. Yeah, every day, we hang out quite a lot. We go to church together.
We're very.
Encouraging.
I would say we both have like opposite work schedules right now. So like she's on midnights and I have a regular nine to five. So she's always like up when I'm not up, and I'm always asleep when she's up.
And yeah, oh is she like a like a nurse or something.
Yeah, she's going to PA school, so she's got to get those patient care hours in at the hospital. M Yeah. But yeah, super encouraging. And like she was the friend that also lost someone else very close to her too,
so like it's super weird. It's like, you know, she lost her best friend and then like I mean not to say that like we weren't all best friends, but like I avery, I had known her like quite a long time and stuff, like since high school, and just like to have her kind of like help me through that, you know, because I couldn't imagine like what she was feeling like back then when like I was with her at the funeral and stuff, because I wasn't as close
with that person. So I was just like I could never imagine what she feels like right now, and then I literally had to go through it. I'm like, damn, you know, some things maybe really do happen for a reason.
You know, what are you excited about for the future.
I'm definitely excited about the business I'm going to start in honor of her, because.
It's a business.
Yeah, So I think I'm just gonna do some digital marketing, like what I do as a career now for a brand. I'm just going to do more agency type of work and try to work for some cool brands. Because it's funny when we were when Avery and I were juniors, we were actually going to intern at this for a marketing company or a tequila company. We're going to be
in the marketing department together. But then she ended up like needing to stay home that like summer because she had just been abroad, so her dad didn't want her to like live in Chicago and blah blah blah. But yeah, so I was just like she was a super creative person and like she was into digital and social media.
Just like me.
So we're very similar in that way. And I just thought it'd be sitting to have a company, you know, name after her, and then we'll always have something with her around, you know.
Are you gonna name your your your agency after her? Mm hmm yeah, very nice, very nice. Yeah, no, go ahead.
And then I'm gonna try to incorporate some philanthropy into it as well, with just trying to give back to anyone with mental health and the opioid addiction in the crisis going on in this country right now. It's just
really personal with all of that. I mean, if truly, if all these drugs weren't as accessible and weren't as you know, accepted in our culture and all that, Like, I just feel like this wouldn't have happened to her, Like, I mean, I just I've never heard of someone just like killing someone with fatan all until this like happened. And then I just realized, like, wow, this like actually
happens with people every day. There's really sad that, like the number one leading killer of people eighteen to thirty. Is that all?
Really that's the number one.
Yeah, it's like besides, I'm pretty sure it's like car wrecks and satanal is like in the top five. Now the number one too.
I'm pretty I thought it was suicide.
Maybe maybe that is too. Honestly, I'm not sure, but I saw I know, I thought no, I thought he said, gont forget that big one.
Yeah.
I was about to be like this is a fun little conversation.
Yeah, no, I don't know what it is, but I swore I thought I saw a statistic that top three fetanyl for sure.
Tough three, Top three sounds sounds accurate.
Yeah, It's just it's just really sad, and it's it's also crazy because like the guy, me and my best friend, like we would stop the guy that did this, and like his family and just like see the things that they would post and like leading up to what he did to my friend, he would like post about like drugging and raping and like taking money from white women and stuff, and like how white women were so gullible and like all that, and I was just like, that's
so disgusting. And then you'd go to his mom's Facebook profile and she literally would say, my my sons are addicted to fetanyl. But they couldn't put they couldn't put one in, you know, two and two together to pin the fetanyl on him.
I was about to say, like, was there were those Facebook posts? Not were they like brought into the trial?
The trial The trial was at that point had nothing to do with the fetanyl. Basically, the trials was all to do it's like the rape and and whether or not alcohol contributed to her death.
So there's there was no like if the guy just goes on Facebook and and and admits to that, there was no like did that that didn't like trigger any any anything.
Yeah, they want to do it as they don't want to do more than they have to do.
Yeah, they were like the murder isn't going to get in The murder for like basically selling someone or giving someone a drug and it kills them in Indiana is like five to seven years in prison.
Oh okay, so that's like that's a technicality.
In in aena.
Yeah, that like rape getting him on, like the rape and the distribution of alcohol to a minor. And he also while he was in jail, he also used a different inmates pen and tried coercing the person that he called at five am when Avery was quote unquote still alive to live for him on the stand, and they had recordings and transcripts of it all and we've got to listen to it all in course. So he also got charged for that.
Geez, Yeah, what idiot are you? What's his mom posts? Do you still look at like his family's Facebook posts?
Yeah?
Sometimes we haven't really looked recently. I should honestly look.
Ye, it's probably I don't know, I'm not a it's it's probably for the best to not look at it.
I think, no, right, And it's like, honestly, it's like with all this it's like, as much as I love her, it's like this is how it was for like a whole year when we didn't know anything about what happened. Is like we were constant looking and like searching, and so then it's like after the trials and stuff, it was just really good to be able to just kind of have some peace with all of it and like not really care because I knew he was gonna probably
be back there for life. Plus when he got arrested in his prince went in the system, it actually came up and matched another girl's rape kit from a year before Josh, And so now he's getting tried for that one too, So now he might be and it's the same judge, so she's definitely gonna like back to back the sentences and then like he'll probably be in.
There for life.
That's fucking crazy, right, Yeah, it just it makes me sick. It makes me so sick that and and one time I was actually recently I don't want to say this girl's name, but shout out to my one friend that
lives in Hyde Park. He told me that if it gives me any closure, Avery, this happening to Avery might have been for that girl, you know, to have her closure with it, because that they would have never found him, and they would have she probably never would have got justice at this then, like avery had to be the reason for all this to stop, because who knows how many girls there were form.
And in the future.
Right, And this guy he just like openly and admitted to it on Facebook.
Yeah, but no, no, his yeah, he tiptoed around it. He was just like I didn't get like I don't even know. The way he responded to it all just like made him look so guilty, Like yeah, he was like I didn't do shit, Like I never even knew this bitch, Like you know what I'm saying, Like had this attitude that like he didn't know what happened to her. And I'm like she was alone and without any phone wallet, if she didn't have any of that, how the fuck
would she have fatanal? Like you clearly supplied her with it. Where did it come from? What did you do to her?
You know?
It's like I want to know if he like did that to her and then raped her and kid, like you know, like I just like I just want to know. I just want to know, Like I'll never know. But I mean, I was just praying that she was in a honestly, I pray that she was like out of it when all that was happening, you know, for the best of her.
Well Amy, Wait, Amy was the name I gave you.
Yeah, we got you know what.
You know what, after all this, if you want to pick a different name, you can pick a different name.
I don't even have a better one. Yeah, I don't even have a better one. But yeah, I mean all this definitely some crazy ship.
But well, I'm glad. I'm Look. Look man, I'm glad that you're doing You seem like you're doing better. You're ready to go and do this. This marketing agency that you're going to name after her. I think I think I'm glad. I'm I'm I'm. My verdict is, I'm glad you're you're not swarming Facebook with looking at at your friends. No, you're not your friend looking at uh uh this guy's family.
You know, it's not like you're you're I like that you're doing the things that are are are sort of forward moving, you know.
I think it's good. I think I think it's important to do that and to anybody, even just struggling with grief too. I mean, the thing that gives you comfort to is that they wouldn't like if if Avery had in my life right now, she would want me to live that shit to the fullest.
Absolutely, you know.
She was full of life, literally so full of life, and so if I didn't the days that I don't feel like getting out of bed and like doing anything and being sad, it's just I'm like, she would not want this for me at all.
Well, Amy, is there anything else that you or or or your boyfriend want to talk about or say to the people of the computer before we go?
No, I'm good. Yeah to everyone out there, hug your friends, extra clothes, every take.
Care of me. Thank you for calling, and thank you for sharing your story. How did it feel to talk about?
Was?
Did it feel good to talk about? At least?
Oh my gosh, it actually really did it really good? Thank you so much?
Gag of course, of course have Yeah, we got to hear what this guy's story is, but that's for another time. I'm sure he's got stuff all right. You gotta take care.
Hello, big hands there.
I don't know what you just said, but what's your name?
My name is Ryan.
What's up? Ryan? How can I get you today?
You could?
You could get me, get me in the mouth, feeling a little hungry, and I just want to talk about food food for a little bit.
Oh man, all right. I respect the boldness that you just just put on display.
What's your what's your favorite food?
What's my favorite food? Oh man? You want to talk about food? You want to talk about food?
Ryan?
Ryan? Is that what you said? Your name was? Yes, you want to talk about food. Let's fucking talk about food. Okay, here's my thing, Ryan, I'm god, I'm trying to lose weight because I'm gonna tell you, guys, I'm gonna just rant for a second. If if you don't mind, you got me going a little crazy. I do so in
ju I think so. I started doing therapy getto in June of twenty twenty, and in the four years that I've done this podcast, I think I gained forty or fifty pounds or something like that, forty fifty pounds because
I just well, a couple things happened. One thing that happened was, you know, once the podcast started to like be a little bit more successful, I think I thought to myself, like, oh okay, I'm just gonna, you know, put all of my stock into this podcast and then who gives a shit what my body looks or feels like because I have a successful podcast. You know. That was terrible decision. But also I just like what I
would do. It was four years, Ryan, it was four years of Okay, sit in this chair three times a week and talk to people on the phone for two hours. And then how does one how do you think one decompresses after talking to strangers about stuff for two.
Hours, breath eating, by stress eating by no, no, by first getting extremely high and then eating an extra genuinely maybe four thousand calories every single night.
I mean, it was. It was crazy. And then at the beginning of this year, I was like, all right, I got stop. This is not cool. So now Ryan, I have a little I have a folder on my notes app. I have one for food and one for fitness, and the fitness one I track my my lifts, and then the food one I'm trying to eat at a caloric deficit. I put my I put my ship into that calculator, you know, that calculator that tells you how many calories to.
How many you gotta burn and how much you gotta eat and how long you gotta run?
Yeah, yeah, so I got I'm a caloric deficit. I gotta I've limited myself to two thousand calories a day, which is, you know what is actually a pretty sizable amount of calories, I think, But now I'm like.
A daily value of that that it's like for a normal cuman human mail.
I think it's a daily value value for a normal human male. Now I don't do I haven't been doing it every single day for the for the whole year. God No, I've had plenty of I think I've actually done it like most of the days in the last two months. Maybe, but I mean there's been a lot of times I'm going on venders and still but I low, here's what happens now. I log my venders, so like I no matter whether I log everything, now, I log
everything now. And I'm like, oh my god, I was eating like I law I had I had this day recently. I was just feeling pretty miserable and I was like, the only I just need some dopamine in my life. And I it started with it. It started as it always does with I'm just I'm just gonna say this. I don't care if they want to sponsor this podcast one day, I'm not. I I cannot in good faith, UH promote this company because the Okay, my least favorite brand of all time is Starbucks. For multiple way. I
hate Starbucks. I love Duncan. If Duncan ever wants to be a sponsor of the Therapy Gical podcast, I got them. But I hate Starbucks. I hate them because I think their coffee tastes shitty, and I think it's it's the most pretentious brand of all time. They sell a cake pop, they sell a unicorn cake pop, they sell a variety of different cake pops, and it's a It's literally it's a one single bite of cake. Ryan. And guess how much one single bite of cake cost your.
Soul, your corporate soul is sold to Starbucks.
I'm pretty sure it costs. I'm pretty sure it costs like four dollars for this one bite of cake. I hate these cake pops. I eat them all the time. I'm addicted to them. They're delicious. So I had a cake pop, which was the start of the beginning of the end, uh, and then I just snack in Ryan, I went to the bodega, I got my favorite fucking Neon sour gummy, fucking Neon War of the Bright Sour Worms.
I love those. I got a cookie from Starbucks. I got Pringles and with all this shin, I logged it all and it was like the fucking five thousand, six thousand. It was crazy. This is crazy. And I was like, oh shit, I've been like in twenty twenty three and twenty twenty two. I ate like that every fucking day. Dude. It was insane. It was insane.
Wow.
So anyway, so now I'm I I have a secret. I'm gonna give some free pro I'm gonna give free promo right now. Okay, so I give. I gave free anti promo to Starbucks. I'm gonna give here's my here's my secrets.
Now.
One is Factor. You know I talk. Factor sponsors a podcast. Factor's been sick. Another one Chapotle. Okay, I'm meeting Chipotle every single day because i can actually track the fucking uh macros on. So I'm just eating uh that. I like that, I mean right now, rocks Rocks. So every day I'm eating quest bars, I'm eating mussel milks. But but here's the thing, Ryan is I'm counting calories and
it's like, I don't know if it's worth it. Man, I don't know if it's worth it, because sometimes I'm just like I'm just sitting in my fucking bed or I'm walking down the street and I just don't feel good. I just feel sad and depressed, and I'm just like, God, nothing would make me fucking happier in the universe right now than to eat a giant chicken parmesan sub and French fries and mazzarella sticks and fucking king sized Reese's
cup fast break I have. It's just my brain. It's like, there's nothing that would make me feel better in this universe than to do that right fucking now, and then I wake and then but every time I do that, I wake up in the morning and I'm like, fuck, I just I ruined all my progress. I gained back the one pound. You can literally you can eat a pound if you can eat three thirty five hundred calories. Like, if you lose a pound a week and we just decided to go on a crazy bender, you could get
a gain a whole fucking pound back. Just raises your progress. It's so fucked up. I don't know when it's gonna end. And uh, I'm just I'm going crazy out here because because I don't know whether to to give in and just be like all right, fuck it, I'm just gonna be a fat guy. It's fine. I'm sure I can
find somebody who loves me like this. I'll we'll figure it out, or to be like you know what, No, we're gonna lift, We're gonna do this, We're gonna get back in shape, We're gonna be But what's the point. What's the point of any of this shit? I don't know. I'm feeling too existential, you know, if you haven't noticed this, If you haven't, if you haven't noticed, I'm actually asking you to be the therapy. Get go for this call.
Oh yeah for sure. I mean I've definitely gone through like the ringar when it comes to food.
Because growing up, I didn't have a lot of food, so it was like eat and then I got a job in college working in the restaurant and that turned into like a like a survival thing, like yeah, so I got I got diagnosed with the stomach issue and uh diabetes also, which was major because and I track I track all my ship too, and sometimes I'm staring up the ceiling at night, like do these numbers really matter?
And they do, yeah, especially for me because I'm diabetic. And literally I see a wrong number and I'm like, oh shit, I have to eat, but I can't have pizza, I can't have donuts. I have to have low carb red and bage old. And I never had a sweet tooth before, but now doughnuts, ice cream, I have one, and I'm I'm good, I'm set. And then there are some days where I just now all binge eat an entire bag of frido is just just because I can, and then not be able to eat for the next three days.
Yeah, oh god, it it It's so brutal, Ryan, It's so brutal.
Well, that will like just looking at that number and and and and realizing how much like food is cent thrilled to like culture and like society and like economics and even just like your mental state too. And yeah, what comes from behind like eating with intention or when you cook for someone and make them a nice meal and or you know, like you said, you're you're you're eating a chicken parm That's that's life right there, man, That's like, that's pure well, it's what I think it is.
It is it is. I've thought about that. Man, I'm like, I really I really was thinking and like it's like it's kind of the simple things in life. I'm noticing are are the best ones?
Like, but it's also so destructive and like so cast Yeah, it is.
It's very destructive.
Eat like having to be more intuitive to what I'm eating. I'm like, okay, Like it's like I I really have to start thinking about it now. You know, I can't eat ultra process foods anymore, even even though I want to. Or like you said, the cake cake pops are like two bites and they're selling for like five dollars, like yeah, and that man, like it's food. It's tucking food.
You know what was I gonna say? It's, uh, here's what I'm doing now here. Here's here's a I mean, I'm trying to count and like get undertooth that but it doesn't always happen every day. And here's here's where I'm at is I'm just trying to be reasonable now because I was eating Unreasonable'm like, let's just be reasonable, you know what I'm saying, Like, like if you go out to dinner and you get a big fucking burrito
and you eat it. That's cool. Or like if you got if you just get a chicken parmesan sub and you eat it, like whatever, that's fine. But like I was doing unreasonable shit, like like eating, like eating candy every day is not reasonable eating a chicken parmesan sub and then going to the bodega and getting a big bag of fritos and getting a thing of the read like you know, like you know when you're being unreasonable
versus just like eating a meal. And I've loved to myself like, oh I can actually, I can actually live my life in a way where I can eat pizza and a doughnut and ice cream and whatever. But just you know, don't be a thick about it. Don't be a fucking asshole. Don't eat you know, four donuts, don't eat candy every day, don't eat pizza every day, don't don't be a fucking asshole. But you can still live a life where you have it. And I don't know, I've been pretty good this year, but it's only been
two months. But I'm I am worried, especially like if I go to a I've been thinking about I think I'm gonna take a trip soon. I've been doing a lot of touring and I want to do I haven't been international for the sole purpose of just like hanging out as a get go and filming stuff. So I'm thinking about a few places, and I'm like, fuck, man, if I end up going to like Thaighland or whatever I'm gonna, I'm gonna fucking I might get back into it. I might because I'm gonna go to seven eleven anytime
I go international. I am literally I went to Hawaii to do a show and my hostel had a seven eleven in the literally next door. And I didn't eat there every day. I ate there every two hours. I mean, it was crazy. If I go and when I go to Europe, I'm eating at the McDonald's. I mean, it's like, I don't I'm not gonna be I don't. I just I don't want to revert back to how I was when it was gaining, you know, when I gained fucking forty pounds. But it's like, I kind of had a
lot of fun doing that. I had a lot of fun. I kind of had a lot of fun eating a shit ton of food. But I've also I'm looking at it with rose colored glasses because I also had a lot of shit misery of like, oh man, I'm an adult, this is not sustainable way to be as a human being at all. And I'm also I started, I feel like kind of unattractive and fat and gross, and I'm trying to you know, be not that you know, so I don't know. I I have marginal amounts of faith
in myself, which is good. That's all you need.
I think about looking back at the times where I was working in the restaurant and how destructive it was
at those times. And I look back to with roast colored glasses and think like wow, you know, like having that intense amount of like dopamine, like just like just based on food, it's just scary, scary typripe to walk because I've seen a lot of friends go down really terrible drug roots with that too, and because they were in the kitchen industry, and luckily I stayed away from all that, and it scared the shit out of me.
But I looked back when I used to go out and I would, you know, eat a bunch of pizza, go home, get stones, and drink till four o'clock in the morning, and I'm like, yeah, that was fun. I'd love to do it every day. But also my body is scaring me now, so yeah, that and and I think it's it definitely was like a blessing in disguise because it was like ship, like you really have to
you know, you have to take care of yourself. And before then I wasn't really like in tuned with my body, and now I'm super aware of like it's like like a weird like power, like awake and work and feel people's vibes or like through their their food, if that makes sense, Like I could tell if you put love in your food or not.
Ye Starbucks, no love, Fredo, no love.
But when I eat them, I still get joy, but there's no love in it. And I think that's what.
You know.
What else I hate about Starbucks is I hate how popular it is. Why is everyone everyone loves fucking Starbucks. I go to the airport at six a m. You know what, It's fine. I was at a fucking airport the other day and I'm walking past all these all these places that have coffee. There's like a fucking kiosk that sells coffee. There's like two people in the line. There's the McDonald's coffee. McDonald's a little crowded, but there's this like nameless coffee shop here in a nameless coffee
shop there I walked past, I see the Starbucks. The Starbucks has like a literally like a half hour long line, and I'm like, what are all you people fucking doing? Go to the father places? What's just so? I don't get. I don't understand what's so great about Starbucks. It's better than the other places. It doesn't make any sense. It doesn't make any sense to me.
What's my favorite things at the airport is to watch the people at the Starbucks because there, like you said, there's always a line in a mile and a half. And then literally down the road like the hallway or whatever whatever it's called, there's like a local coffee shop and it's like empty, and I'm from the from the airports that I'm plying out of, and I'm just looking at them. I'm like, all it looks so sad over there, and I and I that cheither coffee is probably better.
Like I love to go to a little cafes of River, but it's like, why would you wait in a line like that long for some like half assed coffee when you can literally just walk up here like get something pretty simple.
It all probably gotta, I gotta, I got a hot take for you, I got a hot take for you to me. To me, all coffee tastes the fucking same, like coffee, like a coffee you know when you go you know, and they're like, oh, this coffee is is the beans are from Machu Picchu and blah blah blah, and then like a fucking uh gas station coffee all the same to me who gives a ship all exactly the same.
There's a lot of people talking out their ass like they know and and then but then there are fun there You're like, okay, this is like this is pretty different. Like I had a coffee with like a mushroom apricot like syrup in it, so they like fermented their own syrup and they added to coffee, and it's like why would you put apricots and like mushrooms in a coffee? But like you can actually taste it like it was. It was weird, man, but I liked it pretty good.
That's another thing. My is my therapy session. If that's okay with you.
Oh that's that's okay.
You sounded pretty disappointed.
Actually, you know, no, no, dude, Like I think they're you know, having a conversation about these things instead of like someone just like talking at you. Like I feel like we're talking like together, you know, like an actual conversation with time.
Yeah. Well, I was just gonna say it's I tore. I think I did like fifty five different fucking cities last year, which was like I I took it. At least I took at least more than like one flight a week. Like I was on a plane multiple times a week. And the airport there's nothing to do but just there's this thing at the fucking airport where it's like, okay, I'm about to be trapped to the sky for like six hours. Let me stuff my bag with food because I don't know what I'm gonna get. And also, oh
my god, it's the weed, dude. That's what I realized was was like a big crux of all my eating thing was the weed. Because yeah, airport.
Yeah, I love doing things at airport because they're so ridiculously overpriced, like seven dollars for like a bag of check next. Nah, I'm good.
Yeah, go ahead. No, I think I think I would put I would put airports on a on a I mean.
Yeah, okay, I forgot my headphones.
But like I had a thing where if I didn't have a show that night, I would get crazy stones before anytime I would get on the flight. So just be stoned in the airport, going fucking crazy with the fast breaks and the McDonald's and it is just crazy, man. And yeah it's all overpriced. Dude. You ever you ever try to buy beef jerky at the airport?
Oh no, that's what that's like. What told bug.
Twelve dollars? You think beef jerky at the airport is twelve dollars, buddy, beef jerky at the airport is like thirty dollars.
Okay, Because I'm getting like chips and getting loaded on the planes like bloody Mary's.
Yeah, I'm They're getting drunk on the plane. It's fun. I'm not a big I've kind of I'm not a big I've decided recently. This is another like kind of Calorie County thing. Is that uh, this is another kind of Calory County thing. Is like I'll uh, oh, I'm not I'm not drinking as much, and I'm like, if I'm gonna get drunk, I want it to be like for an occasion. Like if I'm just like out at a bar or whatever, I'm not gonna probably get drunk. But if it's like a good if there's a good
reason too, I'll get drunk. But not so much anymore. I I like getting high at the airport because like there's all there's a there's all these like little things at the airport. Like next time, if you're listening to this, next time you're at an airport, look at some of the little ship that they have going on. Like there's
like art galleries at some airports. They just are like here's a local Kentucky artist and when he does these these uh portraits of steel workers, you know, like that kind of ship is in you know what I'm talking about, right, Like that kind of ship is all over the airport. Nobody ever gives a ship looks at it because they're
on their way to you know, catch a flight. But like I like going to the there's like art galleries and every air not every airport, but they always have like little installations or fountains or or ship like that. So it's fun if you have some time, you know, I would get high and I would I would look at all the stuff. But you don't even have here's the crazy thing. You don't even have to get high to look at that stuff. It's it's uh, it's just right there for you.
Yeah. In the Las Vegas Airport, they have a hallway that is because it's mcarens and he was a pilot, So they have a whole like avia aviation section and like a I think, like a giant, giant culture that you could climb all over. And I know in the Portland Airport they have like a like a dog petting area. Really that's kind of cue anxiety or whatever, but I'm just like, I'm gonna pet these dogs before my funny and I'm really stoned right now.
Yes, brilliant, that's actually pretty cool. That sounds pretty cool.
And then there are like really like we're not really shitty airports but like kind of like like it's just an airport, like uh, this whole like city one there. That one was kind of like they had like a kritty cream and like that in a bunch of like Mormon stores like like like book like what do they call it? Like the bookstores. I guess, I guess they'd just be like religous bookstores or whatever. But that was
probably the the worst airport that I was at. And it's not not even bad just I've been to better airports.
Man. I really got to say, I'm like sitting here talking to you right now, and you mentioned Krispy Kreme, and I thought to myself, I don't think that there's anything that would make me happier right now than eating six Krispy Kreme.
Donuts, those dumpster dives Christy creams, because they really throw out everything at the end of the night and they just they're just boxes, like untouched.
Great, Ryan, we got to get out of here before one of us does something crazy.
Okay, Well it was pleasure. Thank you.
Yeah, Man, good talking to you. Is there anything else you want to say to the people of the computer before we go.
I would say to uh, love your friends, guy laughing, and uh, remember the food is fuel. Food is important. Food is also just sometimes you eat it to take a ship.
You do need it to take a ship. That's the one thing I will say about food.
And some people can't take a ship.
So be thankful, grateful for for your ships. I like that, thanks for calling Ryan.
But it goes on the line exp