Producer Dan (00:00.33)
I'm going to say hi to Scott and I are going to talk for about one minute and then bring you into the conversation. Cool. All right, man.

Sean Young (00:04.696)
Sounds good.

Producer Dan (00:09.13)
You're tuned into Positively Terrible. I'm producer Dan, and each week, my buddy Scott and I discuss surviving and thriving after trauma. It's a journey that started when Scott, his wife's fiance, and her boyfriend all walked into a bar. This week's Decent Human Being is Sean. He's got a fucked up story about trauma, addiction, and recovery. Settle in, my terrible listeners. Today's episode is going to be Positively Terrible. Hey, Scott.

Terrible Scott (00:34.71)
Hey, Producer Dan, how's it going today?

Producer Dan (00:36.982)
Man, it's going pretty good, how are you?

Terrible Scott (00:39.05)
Oh, I'm tired, but feeling pretty good. But I can't stay tired when you read the intro. It makes me feel so good. I feel like I have to rip off my warmup pants right now, maybe stretch out a little bit. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, oh, for sure, for sure. And that is a great segue, because we've got a guest today who loves the wrestling. That's not what he's here to talk about today, but Sean, how you doing this morning?

Producer Dan (00:51.234)
That's a really good idea. Yeah. Or you should get one of those tear away shirts like Hulk Hogan has.

Sean Young (01:09.156)
I'm good, I'm good. You know, my whole military career was kind of a shit show filled with addiction, trauma, and all kinds of stuff. So I'm glad to be here and talk about my fucked up situation.

Terrible Scott (01:21.934)
Yeah, well, we definitely do. And Sean, you are a host of a couple of podcasts. We'll give you a minute at the end to plug it. But what are the names right now of your podcast?

Producer Dan (01:22.134)
Well, we appreciate you sharing it with us, man.

Sean Young (01:33.932)
So my first one, my baby is called Recover Out Loud, where we talk about addiction and recovery. And my second one that is gonna be debuting soon is called Beyond the Veil.

Terrible Scott (01:45.242)
All right, awesome. I'm excited.

Producer Dan (01:47.204)
What's the teaser on Beyond the Veil?

Sean Young (01:50.44)
Oh man, paranormal and supernatural. Yeah.

Producer Dan (01:51.714)
Good name.

Terrible Scott (01:55.686)
Hahaha!

Producer Dan (01:57.026)
That's that's the money making podcast. It's really nice to talk about addiction and recovery and all that, but you want to make some money, man. Let's talk paranormal.

Terrible Scott (02:01.746)
Hehehehe

Sean Young (02:04.577)
Yeah, yeah, we'll talk about that a little bit later on but yeah, absolutely

Terrible Scott (02:09.606)
All right, so today you're gonna talk a little bit about your trauma, your addiction recovery. And we talked a little bit about your military service and just kinda wanna get some background here. What branch of the military did you serve in? Okay, okay, is that something that you kinda knew you were going to do growing up?

Sean Young (02:27.572)
I was in the army for 12 and a half years.

Sean Young (02:35.44)
Mmm. 9-11 was kind of like the deciding factor. And I know that's like really cheesy. If you talk to a lot of veterans, that might be their answer. But 9-11 was the day that I was like, I got to do something. Unfortunately, I was in seventh grade at the time, so I really couldn't make any moves through life and through childhood. My my focus kind of shifted.

Terrible Scott (02:48.362)
Okay.

Sean Young (02:56.78)
And my dad knew I had a fallen out when I was 17 years old. And I told him I didn't want to join the army or the military in general. And I wanted to become a pastor. I was, I was a good church boy. And he said, no, you're going to join the military because you need structure in your life. We, we fell out. I ended up walking into a recruiting station and signing a contract that day.

Terrible Scott (03:20.37)
Wow. Was your dad or did you have a military family? Had others served before?

Sean Young (03:26.836)
My great grandfather was a calf scout in World War II. And so one of his jobs was to shut down the Nazi concentration camps. And my grandfather was a Marine in Vietnam. So my dad never served, nobody else in my family served. And I just felt this calling that was greater than myself.

Terrible Scott (03:48.682)
Okay. And what was going on in your life that your dad thought that you needed structure?

Sean Young (03:55.565)
Oh my goodness, I was a kid and I was a product of my father.

Terrible Scott (04:01.922)
Okay, that leads to a lot of questions. And of course, anything that you are not comfortable with, you don't have to talk about. But what do you mean by that? What was his deal?

Sean Young (04:05.837)
Yeah.

Sean Young (04:13.5)
Okay, so my father was an addict alcoholic and he was very abusive and So my whole childhood was pretty fucking traumatic to me and that was one of the things I had to work on later on in life but

Terrible Scott (04:17.63)
Got it.

Sean Young (04:31.14)
It was very traumatic. I got kicked out of my dad's house at the age of 16 and upset to my grandparents house in Maryland back where I grew up at and When I got there I started falling into faith and into a religion and dad was like I don't like that right like and he was trying to control my life from a distance and

he made it really hard for me when I was a child. And unfortunately, I kind of bowed to his will, unfortunately and fortunately.

Terrible Scott (05:03.392)
What is the fortunate part?

Sean Young (05:06.096)
I got to go see the world. I got to go do things. I got to go do things and see things that you only read in books and see on TV. And it was amazing.

Terrible Scott (05:09.182)
Just piss.

Terrible Scott (05:16.914)
Yeah. It it it. It sounds I mean, that is one of the opportunities that I look at when I see people in the military. That's like, holy shit. I, you know, and especially well, let me ask you, I was going to talk about me, but nobody wants to hear that shit. Where were you from? Like, what type of area was it? City, rural? I mean, could you tell us that?

Sean Young (05:38.11)
Hehehehe

Sean Young (05:44.644)
Hmm. I moved around a little bit. So I was born and mostly raised in Sharpsburg, Maryland. And if you're a big history buff, and if you know anything about the American Civil War, I grew up right next to the Antena battlefield. And so I grew up there. And

Essentially it was like just backwoods. I lived backwoods and Grew up around in a community of about a hundred people and It was a small community and then when I moved with my father I went from small backwoods, Maryland to the city City life where the houses were literally pretty much right on each other small backyard and it was a huge culture shock at the age of like

or 11. And so like adjusting adjustment has always been my problem and it started there.

Terrible Scott (06:44.114)
Okay, so what would you think was the biggest adjustment of making that move?

Sean Young (06:50.208)
biggest adjustment and this is gonna sound really bad but the biggest adjustment was going from a predominantly actually all white community to now I'm intermingled with people from all cultures right people from the black community people from the Hispanic community communities from Africa Europe Eastern Europe everywhere and so like having like inserting myself

with kids that...

Sean Young (07:24.512)
I grew up in a Christian household, and I grew up, I went to a Christian school up into the age of 10 or 11. So growing up with kids that didn't have that background was hard for me because I didn't understand like why they didn't believe these things or why their families didn't go to church on Sunday, or where the actual religious structure was for them. And that's just not the case anymore. But that was one of the hardest adjustments.

Terrible Scott (07:48.23)
Yeah, and I can imagine that. And I am from a rural community and. Everyone assumes that your opinions are the same, that you're going to the same church, that I mean, there's there is just a set of expectations when you grew up in rural white America. So.

I know, and you said this is gonna sound bad, but I understand it. You're going from one homogenous culture, basically, culture, I don't know if that's the right word. Yeah, it's the right word. But then you're going to one where you're exposed to a lot more. And it's different. And then I'd imagine that when you join the military, that you've got quite an expansive, you got a lot of different cultures there too. Is that a good assumption to make? I was never in the military.

Sean Young (08:20.94)
Yeah.

Sean Young (08:26.873)
part.

Sean Young (08:37.288)
Oh, yeah. Oh, apps.

Absolutely, yeah, you get people from all over the place, like all over the country and the world. It's people who are not national citizens that come in to the military because they want a different way of life. They wanna provide better for their family and all the love and support to them. I've met people who gain their citizenship through the military, through service. And I have nothing but the utmost respect for those human beings because they're some of the most amazing human beings I've ever met in my life.

Terrible Scott (09:10.026)
Okay. So, well, I'm sorry, Dan, it looked like you were gonna ask a question. No.

Producer Dan (09:15.062)
No, I'm with you. Keep the conversation going. Don't let me screw it up.

Terrible Scott (09:20.322)
Okay. I won't even look at you again. So I don't get confused. Maybe you were just thinking about eating something. Your mouth was hanging up a little bit open. So, but no, Sean.

Producer Dan (09:22.53)
Ha ha ha.

Sean Young (09:31.739)
Hey, I woke up with drool this morning so good.

Producer Dan (09:34.89)
It's tough, man, when it gets deep in that beard. Yeah.

Sean Young (09:37.065)
Oh, it smells terrible.

Terrible Scott (09:37.389)
Oh, yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah. We haven't told the listeners yet that today I've got the second best beard in this. Sean's got an impressive one that goes down at least to chest level. I can't see any further down than that.

Sean Young (09:44.376)
Hehehehe

Sean Young (09:51.868)
It was belly button and it started dying off and I had to trim it down. So it goes to about my sternum.

Terrible Scott (09:56.866)
Oh no, wait, that's a different, that's a, I was gonna say, that's a trauma in itself, dying off. What do you mean by that?

Sean Young (10:03.076)
So once your hair reaches a certain length, you have, you know, the maintenance is no longer an issue for you, but the roots tend to start dying off, right, so if you don't trim it off, the hair naturally, like a plant, will start, you know, dying off, so you gotta trim it down to keep it formed, keep it alive, and stuff like that.

Terrible Scott (10:19.934)
You got it.

Terrible Scott (10:25.178)
All right, okay, and I'm sorry. I may not have the second best beard here. Dan's is pretty nice. I just like to take a shot every now and then.

Sean Young (10:32.02)
Hehehehehehe

Producer Dan (10:33.494)
I just got to keep it so short now that it's so great, man. It used to be a lot mightier, but.

Terrible Scott (10:36.378)
Eh, I don't think you need to.

Sean Young (10:39.744)
Dan's like the Richard Greer of beards.

Terrible Scott (10:45.25)
I mean, you've got to get that about every day, right, Dan?

Sean Young (10:48.524)
Hehehehe

Producer Dan (10:49.292)
I should, I should get that every day.

Terrible Scott (10:52.736)
But, alright, so Sean, you joined the military and what is the experience like when you start there? I mean, like, can you just kind of describe what happens when you join the military?

Sean Young (11:05.032)
Yeah, so you, there's a process prior to joining the military. People think that you just sign a contract and then you go, right? Like, and you're off and you're off to the races and you're shooting bad guys. And that's just not the case. Um, so I signed the, I signed my contract in, um, Baltimore, Maryland. And then I moved up with my dad. I ended up getting sent to Buffalo to get sent out, but I had to take a placement test, right? Every branch of the service, whether it's Marines, Navy, Air Force,

Terrible Scott (11:11.261)
Mm-hmm.

Sean Young (11:34.906)
Army and now I guess we got Space Force and Coast Guard.

Terrible Scott (11:39.072)
Okay.

Sean Young (11:39.228)
You have to take a placement test, right, to see what job you would fit into. And, and so when, when I did it, I got, I went in there and I got a pretty decent score and I chose to be a four observer and I had no clue what that would be. Right. And, and the, the recruiter was like, yeah, dude, you're going to sit in New York and watch bombs drop on a TV. I'm like, dude, fuck. Yeah, I'm for it. Let's do it. Right. It's call the duty. Well, call the duty was not at that time, but.

Terrible Scott (12:04.259)
Okay.

Okay, ready?

Sean Young (12:07.452)
So I went to basic training at Fort Sill Oklahoma and read off about Oklahoma sucks. If you guys are from Oklahoma, I'm sorry. Well, at least Fort Sill did it. It was right outside of Lawton and it is just terrible.

Terrible Scott (12:15.434)
Hehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehe

Terrible Scott (12:23.594)
Okay.

Producer Dan (12:24.342)
Big apologies to both of our Oklahoma listeners. Sorry about that.

Terrible Scott (12:27.21)
Hehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehe

Sean Young (12:27.72)
Yeah, yeah, I'm sorry to you two guys, or gals. I appreciate your service in Oklahoma. But it...

Terrible Scott (12:36.106)
Hehehehe

Sean Young (12:40.408)
Basic training was, in my opinion, really easy because I lived in chaos as a child. I was used to the screaming, the yelling, moving fast, doing all the dumb shit you have to do. So it really wasn't that hard for me. The physical aspect was easy. I was in great shape going into basic training. I was 18 years old. So it was really easy for me. The hardest thing for me in basic training was shooting because I never touched a gun.

And I didn't, I understood the concept of, here's your safety, here's the trigger. I didn't understand the concept of zeroing weapons in or any of that stuff, which was really hard for me. Like I said, I was never raised around guns. My grandfather was in Vietnam, so he was naturally shell shocked from everything that happened in Vietnam. And I'd only shot in a gun probably once in my life prior to basic training.

And so that was the hardest. And I graduated basic and I went into what's called advanced individual training, where it's your job training. You learn how to the basics, just like going to any trade school, you learn the basics of your job. And so learn the basics of my job, which was talking to artillery and mortars. Uh, eventually it would move into, into helicopters and jets to drop bombs on targets of opportunity or.

and targets of interest.

Producer Dan (14:03.254)
So if I understand correct, your job was to sit in an office or like an operations type center, you're gonna take satellite information, you're gonna make sure that the people that are shooting at the right places have the right information? Is that okay?

Sean Young (14:16.724)
Yes, yes and no. That's at a much higher echelon.

Producer Dan (14:21.483)
Okay.

Sean Young (14:23.008)
Well, my job was to be on the ground, be the eyes for the maneuver unit, right? So for infantry, cavalry, and any unit that would be maneuvering. I worked hand in hand with the patrol leader, so a lieutenant or a senior non-commissioned officer, and I would watch out. And if they said, hey, that needs to go, then I would pull up the grid for it, allocate the assets for it, and then call it in.

Producer Dan (14:52.918)
Got it, so you are helping target those items from the field. Got it, thank you.

Sean Young (14:58.496)
Yep, yep, yep. And so I did that and AIT was a little bit more difficult for me because I'm not like a book study kind of person on practical application. You throw a book at me, like you take one of the books I have on my shelf back here and you say, hey, read this and comprehend it. I'm gonna be like.

Terrible Scott (15:17.578)
Right.

Sean Young (15:17.652)
I don't it's not obtaining in here But if you if you put it in my hands and you say this is how you do it and I do it like two times I got it down for the rest of my life And so that's where it was like really hard for me was they were like hey read the FM 6.30 and I'm like What is FM? It's field manual, but I don't understand what the shit means So I graduated a IT I did all right there and then I went into airborne school which

Terrible Scott (15:26.942)
Got it.

Terrible Scott (15:32.778)
Hehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehe

Sean Young (15:47.752)
Airborne a lot of people you might have heard that term but it's jumping out of perfectly good airplane Yeah, so you learn how to you first you learn how to fall and that's weird then you learn how to land and that's a little bit more weird and then they drop you from a 200-foot tower and then they lead you into jumping out of an actual moving aircraft and I'm terrified of heights

Terrible Scott (15:54.689)
Okay.

Sean Young (16:13.324)
But the adrenaline rush was amazing, something I had never experienced before. The thoughts in your head going up and then getting there and then they opened up the door and you're looking down at the ground where you're about to fucking land and you're like, I could die today. All right, but fuck it.

Terrible Scott (16:29.994)
Well, Sean, can I interrupt it for just a second? I'm a little confused how we go from, we're gonna sit in an office in New York to jumping, to being an Airborne. How did we get there?

Sean Young (16:33.506)
Mm-hmm.

Sean Young (16:42.012)
Yeah, yeah. Well, there's a common theme amongst people that join and that is that recruiters lie. They tell you what you need, what you wanna hear. Because when I initially signed my contract, I didn't wanna be a combat arms, right? Like I didn't wanna do that. I seen what I did to my dad, my grandfather. Didn't wanna do it. I didn't wanna put myself in harm's way.

And then when I got to AIT, I was like, well, I'm here. I cannot back out of this shit. I have a contract. And so I kind of adapted to it, right? And I told you adapting was kind of like my hard thing, but I started learning to adapt to it. And so when I got to AIT, they said, who wants to go airborne? And I was like, fuck it, man. Let's do it. Let's have fun. Let's make the most of this situation.

Terrible Scott (17:09.513)
Mm-hmm.

Terrible Scott (17:28.004)
Okay.

Sean Young (17:29.192)
And so I went to airborne school, conducted five jumps out of a moving aircraft. It was fun. The first one when I jumped out, I screamed fuck the whole way down, right? Like fuck, fuck.

Terrible Scott (17:38.11)
Hehehehe

Sean Young (17:41.96)
And we were loading up to do the next jump an hour later. And we called them jump masters, so the people that check your equipment to make sure that you are safe, and the people that give you the commands in the aircraft. I was like, now who in the fuck yelled fuck the whole way down? And I was like, that was me. And he was like, don't do that shit again. So I jumped out and I was like, fuck, fuck.

Terrible Scott (18:02.378)
Hehehehe

Producer Dan (18:07.33)
Hahaha

Terrible Scott (18:07.69)
Hehehehehehe

Sean Young (18:08.544)
Right? And that fear never went away, right? Like that fear of heights, the fear of jumping never went away. So I graduated airborne school and they hand you your orders and they say, hey, this is where you're going. Now everybody's like going to Fort Bragg, North Carolina, cause that's home of the 82nd Airborne or going up to Alaska, which is like 425 or like Fort Campbell, Fort Drum. And I'm looking and I'm like, Kacerma Ederly, where the fuck is that?

Now I'm looking on this map of locations and I can't find it. I'm like, dude, where are you guys sending me? This is scary. And I found out when I got my official orders, those were the mock orders. When I got my official orders, it was Italy. And I was like, oh, shit. This is cool. So my first duty station was Italy. And I went over there and at the agent. It was in Vicenza, which is like half an hour from Venice. It's in the northern part.

Terrible Scott (18:53.086)
Hehehe

Producer Dan (18:57.066)
Where in Italy was that?

Sean Young (19:05.608)
I got there in January and it was just beautiful. January 2007, just absolutely beautiful. Mist all over the place. Like it hadn't, it had just snowed and like the weather was starting to change a little bit and like it was just beautiful. And that's where my addiction started.

So I get there and the first weekend I'm there, they're like, hey, we follow the rules of the land. You can drink. I'm an 18 year old child and if you know anything about the human brain, the male brain does not stop developing till about the age of 23. So I drank like I had been a professional drinker. I made this promise to myself when I was a kid, I'm never gonna drink, drug or smoke. I broke two of those in the first weekend.

Terrible Scott (19:36.906)
Mm-hmm.

Terrible Scott (19:40.262)
Okay, yeah.

Terrible Scott (19:52.202)
Hehehehehehe

Sean Young (19:54.324)
I left up my own devices. I broke both of them, promises, in a weekend. And not drugs, though.

Terrible Scott (20:00.234)
So, so it, so is, when you are in Italy, is this an American base that you're stationed at? Is there an Italian base that has Americans? I mean, how does that, I guess I don't understand how that works.

Sean Young (20:09.101)
Yes.

Sean Young (20:12.712)
Yes. Okay, so they have these big, big bases that are called chesermas, which are during World War I and II, they were used to house Italian army.

Terrible Scott (20:26.771)
Mm-hmm.

Sean Young (20:27.244)
and anybody that was moving through the area. And so, the Americans during World War II, we held occupation in Italy. And so, just like we did in Germany and Austria and some other places. We moved out of Austria, but we stayed in Italy, England, Germany, and some other places. And so, we had these casermas all over the place. Now in Italy, I think there's three. There's where I was at, there's Pisa, and there's Naples.

Naples is for Navy and Pisa is for Military Police. Which is cool.

So we occupied this one in Vicenza and it was right in the heart one like kind of like the outskirts of the city And so we stayed there now When you think of a military base you think it's like huge which most of them are but A Vicenza was like a mile by two miles It was very small and so you had to you had to house quite a few people on the base So like everybody was cramped everybody was crowded And um, it was just wild like everybody knew everybody If you see this patch

173rd if you see this patch people are like, where were you and when were you? And so yeah, it's pretty crazy.

Terrible Scott (21:40.626)
Alright, cool.

Producer Dan (21:42.198)
That sounds like, I can imagine being 18. I mean, Italy is beautiful. I've been to Italy a couple of times, fantastic. I can imagine being 18, giving a job. I mean, a job where you make some decent money when you're 18, especially when your housing is paid for, your regular food is paid for. You've just got pocket money like you haven't had before. And then, all right, you're also allowed to drink in a spot where...

Sean Young (22:01.625)
Yep.

Producer Dan (22:10.29)
Normally your peers wouldn't be able to drink for another three years, so you might drink some beers in the woods, but you're not going out to a bar and just being allowed to do anything. And you've got like regular time off, right? You've got like some weekend time you can get out for a day or two and do whatever you want. Am I correct in all of these assumptions?

Sean Young (22:18.372)
Yeah.

Sean Young (22:30.364)
Yeah, so when you're active military, your job, they say you're a soldier 24-7, but realistically you're working from 6.30 in the morning to about five p.m. at night, and that's it. The rest of the time is your worst. You can go out, you can go fuck off, you can go sightsee. The weekends, unless you're doing a training rotation, or you have some kind of like 24-hour duty, you're allowed to go do whatever you want. We got four-day weekends, we have what civilians would be considered paid leave, where you can just fly wherever.

So I mean, you had a regular-ish life, and you had a social life, but it wasn't like normal, right?

Terrible Scott (23:09.966)
So were you running around with a bunch of other 18 year olds when you got there or was it kind of just a big mix? Okay, it was

Sean Young (23:14.214)
Mmm...

Oh, oh, oh yeah, we ran around quite a bit. I ran around with, I mean, you know, I got introduced to people in my unit, so naturally we've got people of all ages there. They don't like you to fraternize or fraternize in the army. So like you, it would be very rare to see a guy as a private partying with an officer or a non-commissioned officer. But the exception to that is because my unit was so small and there was not very many of us.

Terrible Scott (23:37.864)
Okay.

Sean Young (23:46.118)
together right it wouldn't it would be very common to go to a strip club and see a commanding officer that's fucking married out with his lower enlisted that happens you know it's much like band of brothers so if you've seen that but yeah I mean we're running around have a good time you know

Terrible Scott (23:55.434)
Okay.

Terrible Scott (24:02.463)
Yeah, yeah.

Sean Young (24:07.468)
That's where I really learned my partying was there, right? Like we would go out seven, eight, nine o'clock at night, go eat something, go out to a bar, that would lead to another bar, that would lead to a club across town, that would lead to a club out of the city, and then you wouldn't be coming home rolling back in until about 10 o'clock in the morning. It was just insane. And that was the European party style. Now that actually formed an addiction for me because I didn't understand the concept of moderation, right? Like I grew up watching my dad

shit-faced and I didn't there was no healthy observation of that so I had this what's called in the recovery field the hereditary disposition where if you have a parent that is an addict or an alcoholic you're more likely to pick that up right my mom and my dad were both addicts and alcoholics so I was at a greater risk for that and then my decision-making wasn't the best either so there's that portion

Sean Young (25:08.716)
In May 2007, I got deployed to Afghanistan for the first deployment. And I don't know if you guys like watch war documentaries or whatnot, but there was a documentary made about that deployment, my platoon, and it was called Restrepo. A second one was called Korngel. And it folk. Yeah.

Producer Dan (25:24.75)
Can you drop the links of those names into our chat real quick? Cause I would love to put some links in the show notes to that.

Sean Young (25:29.372)
Yep. So the hard thing about finding your strepo is it's not easy to find and you actually have to do some digging. But you can find cornwall anywhere.

Sean Young (25:46.968)
So, there's that. So.

You can find that on Amazon, Coral Girl on Amazon. That's the second one that was made. But it was made by Sebastian Younger, the guy who wrote The Perfect Storm, and he made some other stuff, and just great human being. But on that deployment, it was a 15-month deployment, so it was insane. The first six months of that deployment, I did absolutely nothing. Dan, like you asked earlier, I sat in the office, I watched stuff on radar.

received reports, I collaborated reports together and sent them to higher echelons. But after that six months, I actually got put in a fight. Funny story, the guy that I was replacing ended up setting himself on fire on accident.

Sean Young (26:40.522)
How did he do that? We had to burn our own shit. Like feces, human feces. We had to burn it and all that stuff. And he took a gas can and poured it directly on the fire. The fire went up, in and exploded.

Producer Dan (26:45.055)
Mm-hmm.

Sean Young (26:55.88)
So somebody replaced him and I had to replace that somebody. And so I did and went to the Korangal Valley in Afghanistan. And it was one of the most wild intense times. I was 18 years old. I had like nobody to live for dude. Like my dad was out of my life. My mom was out of my life. I really didn't have family. I didn't have girlfriend none of that. So I had this mentality of like if I die, it doesn't fucking matter, right?

Terrible Scott (26:59.454)
Okay.

Terrible Scott (27:23.119)
Yeah, and Sean, you said that was wild, but I want to ask a question that would precede this. What is it like when you're deployed? Like, when they tell you you're going to go serve a tour, how do you get those orders, and what's going through your mind when it happens?

Sean Young (27:27.713)
Yeah.

Sean Young (27:38.764)
So it's not like an individual person gets an order and you go and you don't know anybody, you deploy with your whole unit. And so the unit packs up, they train, they get ready to fight, they train everything, they train for the environment, but you can't really train for the mountains, right? Because that's where we were, we were in the mountains. So you couldn't really train for that, the best you could do was walk with a bunch of heavyweight.

And so you do training rotations and eventually you get your orders. You pack up, you fly out to... We flew to Turkmenistan because there's a base in Turkmenistan and then we would fly into Bagram, which if you followed the news for the past two years, we pulled out of Afghanistan, pulled out of Bagram. That's where we flew to. That was the hub for us to disperse out through the rest of the country. And so we got to Bagram and they gave us like a situation update

It was a huge Air Force base, so like there's all the amenities like you had Burger King, you had fucking Subway TGI, there's a TGI Fridays

Producer Dan (28:46.638)
Ha ha

Terrible Scott (28:47.05)
Hehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehe

Sean Young (28:49.692)
All places Afghanistan TGI Fridays.

Terrible Scott (28:52.744)
I think it's gone downhill a little bit. I used to like TGI Fridays.

Sean Young (28:56.94)
Oh yeah, oh yeah, I can't eat TGI Fridays anymore. So yeah, you fly there and then you go to a smaller hub and then that smaller hub leads you to where you're gonna go. It's much like flying like a regular airplane. And so we get, you know, I went to a bigger base right off the bat, so it was kinda like, we had amenities, we had gyms, we had...

Terrible Scott (29:00.17)
Heheheheheheh

Sean Young (29:21.74)
big stores, like not big stores, but we had like American tobacco, we had American products, but then you go to like the smaller base, like ours was super small, really, really small to the point where like you could see the mountains across the way and then you could see down the valley all the way to the end of it. It was okay. And like if you've never seen Afghanistan, like pictures or videos, it is fucking gorgeous, absolutely gorgeous.

breathtaking mountain scenery I've ever seen in my life, but it sucks. The Taliban sucks, but I will say, in saying that, a lot of people don't respect your enemy. And so I learned a great respect for the Taliban because we think that they're dumb because they live in the Middle Ages.

But realistically, they're some of the smartest human beings you'd ever meet in your life. I don't know a human being that can devise a bomb out of nothing. And they did. And it was wild. They could move faster than we could. They could shoot better than we could. It was crazy, right? Complex attacks. And they've been doing this since the existence of Afghanistan, right, with Alexander the Great, Genghis Khan, the Russians, anybody else's.

been gone into Afghanistan and has been won by the by the people going in. That's the fact. Yeah.

Terrible Scott (30:51.954)
Wow. That's...

Sean Young (30:53.62)
And it's because people didn't understand the concept of like how to fight in each terrain because you got every terrain in Afghanistan. You got mountains, desert, you've got a desolate desert where it's just like you got moon, you know, uh, moon sand and or red sand and you got city, you've got forest, like you've got every environment that you can think of and a lot. It's just a lot and you can't tell you can't kill terrorism. Yeah.

Terrible Scott (31:21.51)
Well, you said the first six months were... I don't know if you said boring, but it sounded a little boring. Although in war, I'd imagine boring can be good. And then the next six months, or however long that was. So it starts to change. You get an assignment, what happens?

Sean Young (31:27.989)
Yeah, it was.

Sean Young (31:39.476)
Yep, yep. So I get assigned to Battle Company 2nd Battalion 503rd and I get sent to the Korngal Valley and it was insane. A lot of people can't fathom getting shot at and when we mean shot at like direct fire about seven, eight times a day.

And that was happening every day. And it was wild. Direct fire being small arms fire, AK-47, Dishkas, Dragunovs, stuff like that. But then you get indirect fire with the mortars, rockets, all that stuff was happening all the time, RPGs. And then there's guys in other platoons that would need time off, so I'd go and fill in for them. They would come take my position for a little bit. I'd go down there.

And like I said, I was 18 years old. I had zero like nobody lived for no self-confidence, no understanding of life, no great gratitude of life. So like I was out there doing things I normally wouldn't do. I'd stand up in a firefight, bop, you know, get behind cover, stand up, leave myself a little bit more exposed, but my job, I had to observe the rounds coming down.

And so, you know, mortars were dropping, artillery was dropping, I was controlling aircraft all at one time, and it was just, it was madness. But I enjoyed it and I thrived in the chaos because when I was a kid, chaos was what I knew. So everything that was chaotic was fucking easy for me. And so that went on for like nine months. And the thing that a lot of people don't understand is when you're in that mindset for an extended period of time, that fight or flight for an extended period of time,

You don't know how to shut it off. So that's what a lot of veterans have a problem with, amongst other things, is shutting that off. When you join the military, they tell you, get angry. Everything that you do, you're going to get angry. And

Sean Young (33:33.704)
Um, you don't know how to shut that anger off. You don't know how to shut that fight or flight off it's really hard and um, so that was one of the things later on in life that I had to learn about and So in that six months man, like or sorry that nine months like things were crazy Like, you know, it's not like band of brothers or any like war documentary that you would see where you're just walking and you go To one place you walk you go to another Like you have a base that you go to and you operate out of and then you'll go on a patrol come back go on a patrol

I've had close calls during that deployment, but nothing that I would say was like life altering to me. And, in August 2008, we redeployed back to back to Italy. And that transition was hard. And it was hard because like 30 minutes after I got off the plane, I was back in my room drinking like I had been before. So I was sober for 15 months, but not willingly sober, right? And so

I was drinking for about a year straight, just like getting fucked up all the time. And like I was drinking to escape the things that had happened. I was drinking to try and fit in. I was drinking all these other reasons except for like to just to relax like a normal human being. And I met a woman and she was 27. I was 20.

Looking back now that was a big age difference and so I didn't understand the concept of relationships all this other stuff and I was just a child man. I was a child and November 2009 we got orders to go back to Afghanistan in December

to the same province, different location. And so we're right back on that, right back in that cycle of getting everything packed up, getting to go. We left and we were gone for 12 months. And that deployment changed a little bit for me, primarily because we weren't out like actively seeking out the enemy. Cause that was when the surge was kind of dying down and we weren't like out there trying to fuck people up. We were out there defending ourselves and defending other people.

Sean Young (35:47.606)
my unit, we did what's called QRF, or my platoon. We did quick reaction for. So somebody in our area of operation got into a firefight that was bad enough that they needed backup. We were up out of our beds in a truck rolling out the gate in 15 minutes, which is like super hard because you got to get equipment ready, radios, all that stuff. And so we were up out of our bed moving in 15 minutes and we're out to where we had to go. And that was like the common theme around the area. And on top of that,

um, route clearance patrols where we would go and drive down, down a certain stretch of road for an extended period of time, turn around and come back, or we would provide an Overwatch for other, uh, units that were driving through our area that had a lot more vehicles, but a lot less weapons. And so.

We got into a lot of firefights that deployment and I hit my first IED in that deployment. And if you guys don't know what IED is, it's an improvised explosive device. It's either on the side of the road or in the road. And a week before my birthday, my 22nd birthday, we hit an IED. And I was in a truck. We were rolling. I guess we hit a pressure plate, which...

A pressure plate, a lot of people think it's just, you know, it's the bomb, right? And it's not. It's a release pressure plate. So you step on it and then you release the weight and it boom goes, it blows up. And typically there's a bomb somewhere within the radius. And so our truck rolled over it. And when we rolled over it, it blew up right underneath me. And so we went ass up, nose down.

Face down, ass up, that's the way we like to fuck. And, you know, we hit and we go nose down and we're like teetering for a second. Everybody, and I mean, everybody with exception to me is knock the fuck out from the concussion. And I grabbed my gunner, cause my gunner, like I rode in the back seat and the gunner was right next to me and I grabbed his thing and pulled him down. And when we landed, like blacked out for a second, came to and...

Terrible Scott (37:36.33)
Hehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehe

Sean Young (38:00.992)
driver and my lieutenant were knocked out.

and my gunner was on the stand and I seen no blood coming out of his nose. And I was like, like instant thought was like, he's fucking dead, right? Like he's dead. And like, I started freaking out a little bit. I had never been put in a life death situation like that before. And so I was like freaking out, like shaking them, smacking them in the face, you know, releasing them from his harness. And he came to and the only thing that happened was when we hit his weapon came up and he was going down and smacked him right in the face

clean.

Sean Young (38:37.368)
So we got out of the vehicle and we got evaluated for traumatic brain injury and stuff like that. And took a few days off and then resumed. But yeah, we got back from that deployment a year later. The woman that I fell in love with, she would become my fiance prior to that deployment, was cheating on me. So that relationship was over. I got the Dear John pictures. It was great. And...

Producer Dan (39:03.556)
Was she American at the base or was she Italian?

Sean Young (39:05.901)
No, she was Italian. And so yeah, I mean, my life kind of changed halfway through that deployment when I found out like she was cheating on me. My mentality went from like, I need to be a little bit more protective of myself to fuck it, I don't care if I die. And that's the drastic like life measures that I would live in was just that mentality of like, if I die, I die.

And so we get back and once again, like I'm getting off the aircraft half an hour later. I'm getting fucked up and Um, it was crazy So for the next like six months I was drinking a lot a little bit less than that And then I met a woman at a bar and like her and I had been friends on facebook when we talked a little bit but we went out and partied one night and like we got really close really quick and um We ended up

wanting to get married and I got orders to Fort Bragg North Carolina and

So I had to transition from Italy to North Carolina. And when I was, you get leave to go home and visit your family and make your way to your next duty station in between there. So I had like 30 days to fuck off. And she met me in Pennsylvania where my dad lived and we had the bright idea of going to get fucking married. Yeah, so we got married in a courthouse.

Terrible Scott (40:24.874)
Hehehehe

I can hear by the tone that it worked out happily ever after.

Sean Young (40:32.644)
I will say in this venture of my life, I'm glad that she's still part of my life. And you're going to find out why. So on the way to Fort Bragg from Pennsylvania, well actually when we got to Fort Bragg, like a month after we got there, we found out she was pregnant. And we wanted to keep the baby. I need, oh fuck, I was like 23, 24.

Producer Dan (40:55.842)
How old were you at this point?

Sean Young (40:59.968)
I was still a child. But I wasn't ready to be a dad. And I know that's really shitty to say and I felt bad for even saying it the first few times, but I wasn't ready to be a dad. I still didn't have a grasp on my life. I didn't know who I was, none of that. So we had this baby, but she was pregnant. And I got to Fort Bragg and they were like, hey dude, by the way, we're leaving in a few months.

Let's go to Afghanistan. Shoot me now, motherfucker. So, um.

Producer Dan (41:33.623)
You

So you got a new wife, you got a baby on the way. Your new wife from Italy is now living in North Carolina with you.

Sean Young (41:37.856)
Yeah, yeah. Deploying DAFGUN.

Well, so she was American. Yep, she was American. She was a dependent. Her and I were the same age, but she was going to school with her family over in Italy. Her dad was in the army, or her mom was not. And so like they had the family dynamic going there. They...

Producer Dan (41:45.855)
Oh, was she? Okay.

Sean Young (42:04.532)
They ended up getting stationed in Alaska. And so I ended up moving down to Fort Bragg and she met me there. Anyways, yeah, we're doing the family thing and I'm relapsing back and forth on alcohol, right? Like back and forth. She'll be like, I don't want you.

Producer Dan (42:22.754)
Does she recognize that as an issue at the time? Okay.

Sean Young (42:25.392)
Oh yeah. Oh, oh, 100%. She's like, fuck no. Here, I'll tell you my mentality. I was like, everybody else has the problem. Everybody's got a problem with my drinking. I don't have a problem with drinking. And, and that was the mentality that I held for a very long time. And so, um,

Terrible Scott (42:28.946)
Did you consider it an issue?

Sean Young (42:46.76)
I was relapsing back and forth back and forth and she kept giving me the ultimatum if you know quit drinking I'm gonna leave I'm gonna go all right cool and there's something would happen and I would be like Well, I'm just gonna have one and then one led to like I was going back to the way I was That's how it is. And so, you know, I we end up deploying to Afghanistan and

We spent seven months in Afghanistan into some of the fucking wildest situations I've ever been in my life Our unit was meant to go and patrol the roads and like pick out bombs So like other people could come through and be safe. God damn it Telling you that is if you have never been in a situation where like you are tense all the time for no fucking reason or for a good reason

Terrible Scott (43:35.046)
I was gonna say, I think I know the reason.

Producer Dan (43:35.854)
Ha ha!

Sean Young (43:40.276)
If you're, yeah, yeah. So like we're walking dude, and like most units will find like one or two IEDs on the road. We were finding them like every 100 meters and just fucking walking and boom, we'd get a hit, boom. But there was this big mission in May, at the end of May, 2012.

and it was gonna be a week long mission where like if you watched war movies or war shows we're walking and we're just we're establishing a location and then we're gonna just keep continuing and we had phase lines we had to hit and all this other stuff and so um right before then you know i had a best friend his name was nick aleveson

Him and I used to go to the gym all the time, right? Like, and I ran into him at Fort Bragg prior to deployment and we became really good friends and we became better friends on deployment. Like the one thing that people don't understand is like the bond that you create with people while in those situations is one that you will never be able to replicate, right? Like I can call... I can call...

Producer Dan (44:46.754)
Totally.

Terrible Scott (44:46.81)
I can't even imagine.

Sean Young (44:49.084)
I can call somebody from my first appointment and be like, hey man, I'm fucked up here. They'd be like, hey man, what's up? Let's talk. Somebody that I haven't spoken to in 10, 15 years, and it's just like nothing happened. And so him and I created this really strong bond to the point where when we were doing guard duties together, we were asking to be switched so we would be in the same location so that we could fucking just hang out and talk and bullshit.

And so him and I had gotten into this argument a week prior to that mission.

We both exchanged the fuck yous, like piece of shit, don't talk to us. And so prior to like every patrol I'd go and I'd tap everybody on the head and say I love you. And like that mission I did that and I got to him and he was our lead guy. He was our mind sweeper. He was the guy that detected the IEDs or the signatures. I went up to him and I couldn't do it. I could, dude, my pride got in the way and I was like. I got.

I just couldn't do it and I turned back around and I sat down. We go on that patrol and we're an hour and a half into the mission and he hits an IED. Like steps on an IED. And he's not dead right away. But like that instant like...

moment was there, right? Because these are stories that you hear in books or see in movies, like that instant regret. And so like, I remember everything about that situation. I remember the taste, the smell of the air. I remember the fucking scenery. Like most people when they experience traumatic injury or traumatic situations, they don't remember certain parts of it. And there's us, some of us that remember everything about it. And I remember everything about it. Like it's ingrained in my head.

Producer Dan (46:13.387)
Yeah.

Sean Young (46:33.332)
And so I remember like walking up on him and seeing his legs gone and it looked like somebody had taken like a fork and shredded it. And his one of his arms was gone. The only reason that his other arm wasn't gone is because the minesweeper was there. And.

He was just laying there pale and like his, you know, when he actually got out of shock, we had all the medics up there. It was like four of them working on him. And he looked at one of the female medics and was like, you got the most beautiful eyes I've ever seen. And that was like tear jerking moment. And then, you know, they were going to put tourniquets on him and they had to reach into his pants because his legs were gone from above the knees. Right. And so they're going to put tourniquets on him.

And so they had to undo his pants and one of the you know, he looked at one of the female nurses and he was like Just got a question and she's like what he's like, it's my dick. Okay That's the thing like a lot of

Terrible Scott (47:33.559)
I was going to say, is this a sincere question from someone in shock? Or, okay, I wasn't sure if it was that or if he was still like trying to make a joke or something.

Producer Dan (47:34.626)
Hmm.

Sean Young (47:36.008)
Yes, he was.

Sean Young (47:41.484)
He was dead. He's like, is my dick okay? And she's like, yeah, it's fine. And he's like, all right, cool, good. And like, so they worked on them. They tried to stabilize them and everything that, you know, every way that they could. We got them on a plane. But prior to like prior to all that, like, after that happened, I was looking around the scene, like we didn't have any rear security. And now like in an element like that, you got to have rear security, make sure nobody's sneaking up on you. So like I walked out of the compound that we were in because it was small, like

Four-walled compound with an entrance and exit and he got hit on the opposite exit or on the exit so I could turn the corner and I seen like this fucking guy and I swear God like I Seen this guy in all white and he was walking he had these prayer beads and like the devil and the angel That was the moment one of the defining moments in my life where like angel devil were talking and the devil was like fuck him Take him out

And the angel was like, you don't know. You don't know if this dude had any part of this. And I was like, well, nobody else is, the devil was like, nobody else is here, right? Nobody can see this if he fucking, he had to have done it. And the angel was like, don't do it, dude. And I had my sights right on his forehead. My weapon was zeroed in, man. I put my selector switch on semi. I was like, and then he looked at me.

And when he looked at me dead in the face, right, and I seen the fear in his eyes, I couldn't fucking do it.

And like my humanity kicked in. I lowered my weapon and told him to go. And like, I'm really happy that I didn't pull the trigger because that would be something like I had to live with for the rest of my life. And I probably would have gone to jail for that because that would have been a war crime. And so, you know, we get him on a Black Hawk, which is a medevac aircraft and he dies on the way.

Sean Young (49:37.716)
And that was something I had to live with for my whole life. My pride got in the way and I couldn't say, I love you.

Terrible Scott (49:45.342)
Yeah, that's an incredibly hard way to learn a lesson.

Sean Young (49:48.756)
Oh yeah, yeah. So I get back from that deployment, but I'm like not the same. I'm not the same person that left Fort Bragg and my, at the time, wife could see it. And I had pictures of everybody I had ever, we had, I had ever lost that I knew on the wall. And I was like, that's gonna help me process through this. But it really made me numb to everything. And...

Terrible Scott (50:12.49)
Sean, did you change, did you change for after each deployment or do you think you more or less stayed the same until this one?

Sean Young (50:20.372)
I think I changed a little bit after every deployment, but that one in 2012 really changed me. I was angry all the time. I hated people, I hated myself more. I questioned everything about myself. I questioned literally everything. My decision making process was out of the window. Yeah.

Terrible Scott (50:46.95)
And Sean, I've let this go a little bit longer than we have been lately, because I'm absolutely, I mean, your storytelling is, it's hard to hear in a good way. I mean, in a good, I can't even imagine, and thank you for sharing a lot of this. And Dan, I'm saying this on purpose too to know how much time you have. Okay.

Sean Young (51:00.951)
Yeah.

Producer Dan (51:01.483)
Wait.

Producer Dan (51:11.282)
I got all the time in the world for this, man. This is fantastic. And also, you know, it's not about me, but I lost a cousin in Iraq to an IED in here. I don't know if you could see the tears behind my glasses, but yeah, your story's hitting home a little bit and I appreciate you telling it. Yeah, man, thank you. Thank you for.

Sean Young (51:35.268)
I'm sorry for your loss, brother.

Producer Dan (51:39.81)
going through all the shit that you've gone through, man.

But yeah, let's keep this going. And if you've got time, let's wrap it up with the next 20 to 30 minutes, is that all right?

Sean Young (51:48.096)
I got all the time in the world. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. All right, so yeah, I get back from that deployment completely changed. And I'm relapsing back and forth again, because I really just don't have any concept of what is going on in life and how to manage these symptoms.

and I go on one more deployment in 2014. And this one was not like the other ones, right? Like we weren't running combat missions. We weren't out there trying to pursue bad guys. We were guarding Department of State and a fucking hotel in Afghanistan, and it was chill. I didn't know what to do with myself, man. Like we had catered meals. We had like three catered meals every day. We had internet.

in the hotels, we had three gyms in the hotel. And I was working night times watching chat on a system. And I was just like, this is boring. But like what happens, at least with me, is like idle hands do the devil's work. So I had all this time to think, and I was like, well, do I really love my wife? Like I love my kid.

do I love my wife, right? Am I in love with her? And so I came up with this idea, and this thought that, I love her because she's my daughter's mom, but I'm not in love with her. And I told her that, and like, God damn it. Everybody in my life turned away from me. You're abandoning your child. And I was like, no, I'm not. I wanna be an active part of my child's life, but I don't want my child to be raised in a household where the parents hate each other, because I was raised in like that. I became public enemy number one.

Terrible Scott (53:27.592)
Right.

Sean Young (53:32.264)
Um, so we go and, and we do the separation. The hardest thing that I had to face in that time was driving my daughter and her mother down to Georgia to be with her mother. And as I'm walking out the door, my daughter's standing at the door with her little, with her little snuggie. And she's like, dad, don't go. She's two, three years old at the time.

ripped me to shreds. Cause like, I said that to my dad. Right, and I'm perpetuating this fucking cycle. And so yeah, I eight hour drive back to Fort Bragg, cried the whole time, and it was just a really hard transition. And then after that I met a woman. See this, this is another cycle.

Producer Dan (54:04.461)
Yeah.

Sean Young (54:23.416)
Everybody seen the red flags. I didn't see him. I got divorced and Less than 24 hours later. I was remarried Like what we'll just cut we'll cut the shit here, and I'll say 12 hours. I was married remarried no fucking time no time whatsoever and That was a shitty relationship absolutely terrible I got ordered yeah

Terrible Scott (54:48.586)
Can I, can I ask? Oh, go ahead. I was gonna say, I, again, I, I never served but it seems to me like a lot of people who do serve get married young. Um is that part of the service? Is this part of knowing that your job could get you killed? I, I

Is it, I just, it seems like a disproportionate number of service people get married young. And I, it just might be, I might be off base here.

Sean Young (55:24.397)
Wha-

Well, there's a statistic that like 80% of service members have childhood trauma. And so that's why we thrive in the chaos is because like we're good at chaos. Like chaos is our business, right? So like we kind of perpetuate that chaos and it sucks, and I'll be the first to admit it. Like I wasn't a great human being in that portion of my life.

made some really shitty decisions and I did some really shitty things and I hurt a lot of people that didn't deserve it. And I don't know why we get married at a young age. I think it's because we have this skewed vision of what love really is or we have this skewed vision of what a healthy relationship looks like because it wasn't modeled for us when we were kids.

And yeah, so we get married at a young age. And it's a running joke, like we don't, you know, don't marry a stripper, but that happens. You know, she's doing it for the housing allowance. That really happens. But yeah, I got, you know, I got remarried and then I reenlisted because I was like, I love the army. And then I hated it afterwards, but.

I got stationed in Alaska, right? Like moved, drove all the way from North Carolina to Alaska, 11 day trip. It was wild. I had a great time. Um, got up there and, um, we were slated to go on another deployment. And I was like, yeah, let's do it. And they do this like pre-deployment memory test or like functionality test of your brain. And I failed it on all levels, short-term, long-term memory, reaction time, and, um, something else.

Sean Young (57:17.18)
That shows my brain. Anyways, they were like, hey, look, dude, you got TBI. And I was like, what the fuck is TBI? And they were like, traumatic brain injury. It made a lot of sense. But I was in real big denial and I was like, how do I fucking TBI? What? You have TBI, right? Yeah, I'm not crying, you're crying. So when they started running down the list of symptoms, I was like, yeah, I have that. I have all those.

Terrible Scott (57:34.865)
It's not me, it's you.

Yeah.

Sean Young (57:47.044)
And so they put me in this pipeline to do treatment for TBI. And then the army was like, dude, you're broken beyond like anything that we can do to fix you. We're gonna either separate you or retire you. And like, I started going through this identity crisis. So like in my life, when one thing falls, everything falls. I don't know how to manage.

life when one thing falls. And so my health started going down. So like work was going down. My relationship went down. Everything went down. My relationship with my child went down. And it was terrible. That was one of the worst times in my life. And uh, 2018, I had a suicide attempt because I just felt like I have no reason to live anymore. And

I was going through all this physical pain, this mental, emotional pain. My relationship was pretty much over because she was cheating on me. To work, I was losing my job. Unwillingly, I didn't want to lose it, but I was losing it. I was like, I have no purpose to live anymore. People are like, oh, your kid. She has a stepdad that is like a thousand times the man that I am. Don't.

give a fuck right like she's gonna be okay but in reality like my daughter needed me she still does right and I put my truck into a tree of 70 miles an hour and I woke up in the hospital and you know some survivors will say you know they're happy to be alive and I just woke up and I was like why the fuck am I still here what did I do wrong

Terrible Scott (59:07.89)
Yeah, of course.

Sean Young (59:25.772)
And I ended up getting released from the hospital, went home and a good buddy of mine, Jeremy, pulls up, he was one of my soldiers, he pulls up, he's like, hey man, I don't trust that you're gonna be okay in your house by yourself, come live with me. So he pulled me out of the house, I went and stayed with him for a night or two. That man saved my life, because I probably would have tried to end it again. And, go ahead. (*static*)

Terrible Scott (59:46.478)
are, I'm just gonna say are other, I mean, I can't imagine that there's anybody you can really talk to aside from other veterans.

Sean Young (59:56.256)
Uh, yeah, I mean, but like I have this understanding of like suicide and suicide attempts now versus them, right? Like I can talk about suicide. I've, I've gone and talked to corrections officers about it. I've gone and talked to other people about it. Like I'm not afraid to talk about it anymore. I where

Terrible Scott (01:00:10.942)
Yeah. Well, I just mean, who else can relate to this life that you had lived in your early adulthood? It's

Sean Young (01:00:16.393)
Oh yeah. That's...

Sean Young (01:00:20.885)
Yeah, that's hard. Yeah, yeah, you're not wrong. Yeah, veterans, I talked to a lot of veterans about it.

Terrible Scott (01:00:20.93)
It's something most of us don't ever have to go through.

Sean Young (01:00:30.248)
and we'll get into that here in a second. But yeah, I ended up realizing that I had a problem that I couldn't control and I couldn't fix. And so I checked myself into the hospital on base and I spent 11 days inpatient, like the typical white clothes, no shoelaces, white rooms, get in meds every day. And I learned a lot, right? And I appreciate that. And then I did 11 days outpatient.

and that I absolutely needed that. And then I went through with my divorce, and I got divorced. And then shortly after that, I met a woman.

Terrible Scott (01:01:09.123)
How many hours? 30 times 24. 720 hours!

Producer Dan (01:01:09.834)
Like 12 hours.

Sean Young (01:01:11.736)
It wasn't hours, okay? It was a month, all right? All right, it was a month. Yeah, yeah, like how many fingers do I have? How many fingers do I have? Um, I'm not good at math. Uh, but I met a woman and she told me everything I didn't want to do here, right? Um, and it was hard, right? Like it was hard to transition from that last relationship into this one because I was going from, you know, I had baggage and um

We didn't get married right away, which I'm happy about. We waited. But I got kicked out of the Army in that time. Not kicked out, I was medically retired.

And so when I got medically retired, like there's, and I hear, you know, I know that, you know, in the news you'll hear a lot about the VA and like VA sucks and they do at certain points, at least with the benefits portion. So I didn't have an income coming in. I applied to all these jobs and I wasn't getting any hits back. And that was just in a really bad time in my life. I was sober during that time, but like, I was like, oh, it's legal to smoke in Alaska?

Yeah, let's do it. So like I traded one substance for another because I was always high. I wasn't doing it to like relieve any stress. Like I was doing it to get fucked up. And I ended up going to a, I got a hit on a job at the airport working for a smaller business. So I went and I interviewed for them. I got the job and I started working customer service. Now I'm working in a section of all women interacting with people.

Terrible Scott (01:02:49.836)
Hehehehehehehehehehehehehehe

Sean Young (01:02:51.437)
I fucking hate people. So but I was really nice about it, right? Like very judgy, but very nice. But I was very nice about it. But all the men and like around were fucking terrified of me, right? I'm a big bearded guy. I'm short. I'm like 5'5", right? On a good day.

Terrible Scott (01:03:10.002)
Me too, me too, all right. Okay.

Producer Dan (01:03:11.278)
Hehehe

Sean Young (01:03:11.804)
I'm like 5'5 on a good day. All right, and like But I got this big ass beard and I look like a Viking and people are like that's terrifying And the things I used to say Goddamnit the things I used to say you should scare the shit out of people

Terrible Scott (01:03:21.135)
Hehehehehehe

Sean Young (01:03:27.892)
And so like, I would walk into my manager's office, female, she understood my sense of humor, everybody else didn't. And so, like she had this meeting, and I remember very candidly, she had this like meeting one day with all the other managers, with the exception of like the big manager, and they're all in the office. I walk in, I'm like, knock, knock. I'm like, Angie, what's the fastest way to a man's heart? She's like, I don't know, food? I was like, no, an ax. Just turn around and walk away. And they're like, what?

Terrible Scott (01:03:53.642)
Hehehehe

Sean Young (01:03:57.112)
What? And it scared him. And I didn't understand. I was like, I'm cool, all right.

Terrible Scott (01:04:05.45)
Hehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehe

Sean Young (01:04:07.968)
Right, but I was very intimidating and I don't like that. I didn't like that about myself because I don't consider myself intimidating but other people do and that's perception. And so that drives people away.

Terrible Scott (01:04:15.722)
Mm-hmm.

Terrible Scott (01:04:19.782)
I've gotten that on occasion, not often, but on occasion. Again, I'm a five foot, five and three quarters inch man. And again, you said the beard and yeah, people see a certain look and my humor is dark as well often. And to me you say that and it's like clearly just a joke, nothing else. And I get myself in trouble on occasion that way too.

Sean Young (01:04:27.901)
Yeah.

Sean Young (01:04:37.532)
Mm-hmm.

Sean Young (01:04:49.869)
Oh yeah.

Terrible Scott (01:04:50.361)
And it's, but to me, I can't even comprehend how that's anything but a joke.

Sean Young (01:04:55.144)
Yeah, oh definitely. Yeah, I can't see that, you know, I couldn't at the time see like how that was, how I could scare people. I was like, I'm just this nice guy, right? All the women think I'm nice, but the guys don't. But yeah, right? So, I'm doing this customer service job and I'm with this woman that I like and we get married in May.

Terrible Scott (01:05:05.266)
Hehehehe

Even the X's.

Sean Young (01:05:22.088)
2019 and I'm sitting there and I'm just like you know what?

I think I can drink one more time. I think I can I got this right like I'm no longer in the army. I'm in a better headspace. I'm with somebody like I'm making all these excuses for why I'm gonna drink And and so uh, july 4th, uh 2019 fourth of july independence day. I had my last drink Well, not my last drink but my last relapse And I started that one that one lasted like six nine. Oh, yeah six months

Terrible Scott (01:05:41.168)
Okay.

Sean Young (01:05:57.216)
And so like I went and I was like, I think I'm good to drink. I'm just going to have one. And then one that led to like five that night. And I was like, you know, the next night I was like, I'll be good. I'll just, I'll have two. And then two led to five. And then I went right back to the way I was drinking. Right. And so like that relapse lasted for six months and December 7th, 2019 was like

any other day, right? I went to work, I was driving home, I had to drive by a gas station. So I was like, oh, it's a Friday, we're gonna go, I'm gonna get home, we're gonna play Carts Against Humanity like we always do. And so like, stopping the gas station, I had a little bit more money in my, in my account, because I got that Christmas pay, I got the Christmas bonus, right? And I was like, yeah, dude, I'm hot shit. Feeling good, feeling great, I'm a little bit uplifted and I get two bottles of Hennessy this time, not one, two.

Terrible Scott (01:06:41.691)
Feeling good.

Sean Young (01:06:49.464)
God damn it. And so like, I get home and I pull in the parking space. I didn't even turn the vehicle off and I already cracked the bottle and was drinking. And I get into the house. I don't remember a lot.

And I came to, and it was December, and I came to and I'm outside of my house with no shirt on. And it's snowing, and it's fucking really cold outside. I had no business being outside, but I was like angry dude, like I was fucking, ah! And I go back in the house and my house is destroyed. Holes in the wall all over the place. My shit is all over the ground. My collectibles like Funko's were like destroyed.

I'm like, what the fuck happened here? And I looked down the hallway and my wife is on the floor. But I know like I'm angry and I'm like, I need to get the fuck out of here. So I left. And I called her the next morning and she's like, you hit me. And I said, what? She's like, you hit me. I said, I don't remember any of that. She was like, you did.

She never gave me a reason to like doubt her. So I was like, you know what? Fuck this, man. I got to, I'm, I'm out of control. So I called the police. I called the Anchorage PD and I said, look, y'all have to fucking arrest me now. Like I will meet you somewhere. You fucking handcuff me. And they did.

And I went and spent 20 days in Anchorage jail on an assault charge. And, um, but that was, that was a misdemeanor. And I got a felony for, um, for criminal mischief, which is like just breaking my own shit. Right. Acting ass. And, um.

Sean Young (01:08:27.8)
I spent 20 days in jail, but in that 20 days, man, like I was like blaming everybody for my problems. I was like, it is fucking my dad's fault, my mom's fault, cause I'm an alcoholic, cause they were fucking addicts and alcoholics. It's my wife's fault. She could have like told me not to drink. I would have listened to her. It was my roommate's fault. He could have choked me the fuck out. But I had this native man, old native man. He was like, Viking shut the fuck up. They called me Viking in jail. And he was like, Viking shut the fuck up. And I was like.

Who are you to talk to me like that? He's like, you created all these problems in your life. Like when you accept that and you accept that you have caused a lot of the damage in your life, you'll be all right. But until then, you're gonna be right here where we are. That was my first trip to jail and my only trip to jail. And so I sat there, that was on December 27th and I sat there in my cell and at first I was like, man, fuck him. Like who is this old ass man to tell me how the fuck I'm living my life?

He don't know me, but then I sat and I was like, you know what, he's actually right. All these damaged relationships I had, a lot of these people were the problem, but I am a huge contributor to it. And just sat there and I played my life out, right? Played the tape and I was just like, I fucked a lot of this up. And the craziest shit happened, I accepted it. I got a knock on myself from the CEO and he was like, hey, um.

pack your shit up." I was like, what do you mean? And he's like, your bail got posted. I was like, what? He was like, your bail got posted. He was like, we're waiting on electronic monitoring to put your ankle bracelets on.

Sean Young (01:10:05.764)
Okay, all right. And that's when I got released. And that's the day that I say that I started my recovery is that day, December 27, 2019.

Terrible Scott (01:10:17.75)
Do you know who that man was? Have you ever seen him again? Had you seen him before? Yeah.

Sean Young (01:10:22.74)
the guy that gave me the advice. I do know who he is. I haven't seen him, but I seen his brother. Because when I was in recovery, I found out his brother was in recovery. His brother was a veteran, and him and I weren't in the same center together. And I went to him, I said, your brother gave me some of the best advice that I've ever received, and I fucking needed it. And the next time you see him, tell him thank you.

Producer Dan (01:10:38.624)
Wah.

Sean Young (01:10:50.244)
And yeah, so I entered into recovery. I went to what is called like a drug court. Like some, like they're called different things, but they're called drug courts or felony DUI or like mental health courts. But ours was a therapeutic court designated for veterans. And I got into it and it was a nine month program for me.

I was held accountable for everything. Every decision I made, every decision that I was gonna make, I was held accountable for. I entered into therapy, individual and group. I went into counseling. I had UA's every day. I had to go to AA meetings, fucking at least three times a week, but I went every single day because I knew I needed it. And it was just one of the...

things that really got me on this path of recovery. And I had to sit in front of a judge every Monday. And the first Monday I went in there, my wife was there, my ex-wife now, but my wife was there. And she sat there through the whole process. And she supported me through the whole process. And like, I was in front of a judge and the judge was like, man, from my understanding, you've tried to get sober many times and you've failed, what's different now? And I was like, I have to do it for myself.

Like I've done it for everybody else. I have to do it for myself. And if I'm not doing it for myself, I'm gonna relapse again. And I'm not making it back this fucking time. And that was a foreshadowing of things to come. But I graduated the program October 2020. And November 2020, some of the participants that were still in the program, we call them participants because they're not patients.

They came to me, they said, hey, we got process groups for civilians, but we don't have a process group for veterans, right? We have this alumni meeting where graduates of the Therapeutic Courts hold meetings every week and talk about their week or like a specific topic. And so I reached out to the alumni group and I said, hey, I'd like to start a veteran group. And I started a veteran group up November 2020 and it's still going strong. And I facilitate that all the way from Maryland where I'm at now.

Sean Young (01:13:02.072)
But yeah, I've done a lot since then, and I've done a lot of growing, and life has changed for me significantly. I haven't had a relapse. I've had a lot of things come up since then that were very detrimental that, if in my old life, my old way of thinking, I would have relapsed. But you know, I have these tools and these skills that I've learned now, and it's helped me out a lot. I'm a better version of who I used to be.

I'm a better version of myself than I was yesterday. I am a better human being, better father. I'm a better partner. Just a better individual.

Producer Dan (01:13:41.166)
It's amazing, man. It's amazing. And I've been, I have lived not a similar life, not a parallel life, but I also have been sober for the last two years, just over two years. The same to you, my man. And yeah.

Terrible Scott (01:13:42.459)
Yeah.

Sean Young (01:13:59.812)
That's fucking huge, congrats.

Producer Dan (01:14:06.998)
The conclusion for me is the same, that I'm a better father, I'm a better partner, and I'm in a better place with a better understanding of who I actually am.

Yeah, you know, I sat in a recruiter's office when I was 18 or 19, and I feel like I could have had a very parallel life. I just made some slightly different choices at that time. But it's amazing to hear the way that you've shared that and the way that you've lived, man. And yeah, I appreciate the hell out of you. I'll take it.

Terrible Scott (01:14:42.438)
Alright, well hug it out guys, hug it out. Um... Sean, and I'm sorry... And I'm sorry, Sean, where are you located right now?

Sean Young (01:14:45.732)
Come here. Come here you big man.

Producer Dan (01:14:47.978)
I'll take it.

Sean Young (01:14:51.936)
I leave it... I move back home to Sharpsburg, Maryland.

Terrible Scott (01:14:57.146)
The main reason I asked is because we've got a lot of fans in Maryland. One of my friends lives outside Baltimore and she basically walks up to strangers on the street and says, listen to this podcast. Maybe exaggerating just a little, but no.

Sean Young (01:15:03.296)
Mmm.

Sean Young (01:15:10.592)
Nice.

Producer Dan (01:15:11.766)
So big thanks to all three listeners out there in Maryland too. Yes, picking them up.

Sean Young (01:15:14.542)
Yeah, yeah for now

Sean Young (01:15:18.516)
Well, one of those experiences is what kind of, one of those life altering experiences what led me back home. This past December, I was in Alaska and within a matter of four days, I went from.

my ex-wife saying I'm not happy to I don't want to be in this marriage to I bought a house to I'm moving out and I sat in my house for two weeks and absolute ruins man right like I thought everything was fine right

absolute ruins, but I knew the one thing that wasn't like not gonna fucking happen was I'm not gonna drink right like if If it was an hour, I wasn't gonna drink if it was 24 hours I'm not gonna drink and I learned I took all those skills that I learned in early recovery and I applied them to that situation So like I lived on my phone 24-7. I went to meetings more actively than I was

I attended recovery meetings that I didn't fucking need to go to, but like I knew was we're going to help. And then I was just like, you know, I was like, I gotta, I gotta go visit my dad. Right? Like I gotta do something. I had changed my situation. So I packed enough clothes to like be gone for a month and came down here. And within that time, like

Here's a reoccurring theme too. Within that time, I found out she was cheating on me. It had been since August. And it fucked me up hard, right? Because this was a woman that said, I'm never going to use your trauma against you, and she did. She said, I'm never gonna cheat on you, and she did. All these promises that she made, she did. And it fucked me up hard.

Sean Young (01:17:11.244)
But I knew the one thing I wasn't gonna do was drink. No, my dad is a drinker, still is. And I went to his house. And he actively drinks in the house. And I could be around it and not be triggered by it, not be like, I need to fucking get out of here.

And so that showed me that proved to me like my recovery is working because A, I didn't relapse in the hardest time in my life in my recovery. B, I could be around it and not be triggered by it. Three, I didn't need it to survive and I didn't need it to over, you know, to overcome what I was going through or to be a reason to be a dickhead. So.

In that time, I re-engaged therapy. I went back to therapy. I was still doing all the things that I needed to do to stay sober and to maintain that recovery. And I'm still, I'm still sober. And it's the best fucking gift that I've ever been given in my life. Yeah.

Terrible Scott (01:18:10.482)
Yeah, that's awesome. What we had one guest talk about addiction early in our run. And he said that, you know, his, what he called kind of a simple life at this point is a better life than he could have ever dreamed of when he was in the midst of, of his addictions. And I mean, it's an amazing thing to hear. And it sounds like for all of our guests and for, for you that.

It really changes your perspective and once you get to where you're trying to go, you can really appreciate what you've got. And I think that that's wonderful.

Sean Young (01:18:51.368)
I'm grateful for everything I have. Right, like I used to be like want more, right? And that was my thing is, is more. I had this problem of more, I have to get more. And now it's just not that. I'm grateful for what I have, right? I'm medically retired from the army. I'm retired at the age of 35. I was retired at the age of 31, 32, right?

I live at home where I'm surrounded by my family. Not at home, at home, but I'm close enough to my family where I can be around them if I wanted to or needed to. I'm in a caring relationship now where it's a mutual relationship and where nothing, and I know that you guys are like, this motherfucker got into another relationship.

Terrible Scott (01:19:27.24)
Mm-hmm.

Terrible Scott (01:19:41.343)
Hey, you know, you do it enough times, you're going to get it right once. No, I.

Sean Young (01:19:46.445)
I went into this one with the expectation of I just want to be friends, right? Like I don't want anything else I just want to be friends I want to get to know the person that I'm that I'm gonna be in bed with Before I fucking step into that realm because that's a really tricky wick and we became friends and

We have a lot in common, but we have so much not in common that it's good, it's entertaining, it's refreshing. And I have my thing, she has her thing. I podcast, I do video editing, I do so much stuff. And I'm fulfilled with what I have, but I'm not forgetting what I have. And I don't necessarily need for more. Or.

want for more. I'm just grateful for what I have. I help other people in their recovery and that is fulfilling to me.

Terrible Scott (01:20:38.606)
Yes. And we have run long and it's been because you've been such a great storyteller. And I think our fans are terrible listeners. Fans might be a strong word. I like to think of them as fans, but, you know, let's be real. They tolerate us. They're terrible listeners. Do tolerate us a little bit. They're probably happy that you've kept. That's.

Producer Dan (01:20:39.554)
That's awesome, man.

Sean Young (01:20:53.03)
No.

Producer Dan (01:20:54.222)
Hehehehehehehehe

Sean Young (01:20:59.713)
Hehehehe

Producer Dan (01:21:02.882)
They tolerate us, but I'm pretty sure they're going to love you, Sean.

Sean Young (01:21:06.076)
Thank you.

Terrible Scott (01:21:06.278)
Yeah, thank you. The point I was going to make is you've had me shut the fuck up for most of this. I've just been listening like everyone else. So they're probably thankful for that. I can talk too much at times. But what else? So you're working with veterans and we're going to start wrapping up. Can you what does that look like?

Sean Young (01:21:12.324)
Hehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehe

Sean Young (01:21:28.512)
So I work with the Alaska Therapeutic Court Alumni and I facilitate groups every Wednesday night at 11 o'clock my time, seven there's, PM. Yep, yep, I do it over Zoom. And we do process groups for an hour. Sometimes it runs longer. I've had groups that run two hours just because like people have these really deep shares and I don't fucking care, right? If it's helping them, it's helping me.

Terrible Scott (01:21:38.704)
Okay.

Producer Dan (01:21:39.594)
and you can do that remotely.

Sean Young (01:21:54.308)
And so we either do topic driven conversations that deal with recovery or deal with life and or we'll do like a general check in and everybody has my phone number. So if shit goes down, go south, they always know they can call me. I also help veterans on social media. I help anybody in recovery on social media, anybody seeking recovery on social media. I do podcasting. Right. Like I love this shit. Pop. Like I was so terrified when I first started, but fucking love it now.

Terrible Scott (01:22:23.882)
Well, when you were talking about being fulfilled with some of the things that you're doing, I've never had that feeling until I started doing this podcast. It's been life changing for me and I have not been at my best with physical health in the last several months, but the one time a week that or two times a week or whatever that I feel like myself are when we record.

I forget everything else. It's such a cool thing. So your podcast, Recover Out Loud, is one of them. I would imagine that the recovery and addiction are the type of things that you dive into.

Sean Young (01:23:04.904)
Yep, absolutely. So we primarily talk about addiction and recovery there. I have people that are in recovery. I have people that support people in recovery. I have doctors, psychologists, you name it. If you have a situation that you recovered from, whether it be mental health or addiction, I'm here to hear the story and I love it.

Terrible Scott (01:23:25.514)
Okay, cool. And is that available everywhere?

Producer Dan (01:23:26.423)
Awesome.

Sean Young (01:23:29.524)
Yep, it's available everywhere to include iHeartRadio. I just got approved for iHeartRadio, that's awesome. Yeah.

Terrible Scott (01:23:34.958)
Oh, wow. Very nice. Very nice. Congratulations. It's super exciting. And you said you had another one paranormal. What was that? Under the veil? Beyond the veil. It's close.

Producer Dan (01:23:35.906)
Alright.

Sean Young (01:23:47.416)
Beyond the Veil. Yup. So, Beyond the Veil debuts November 6th and it primarily focuses on people that work in the paranormal field. Psychics, mediums, investigators, demonologists.

Producer Dan (01:23:49.314)
Yeah.

Sean Young (01:24:07.172)
more. I've had somebody that's not necessarily a UFO expert, but she lived outside of Skinwalker Ranch and presented evidence in that episode. It was fucking awesome. Yeah, I seen Dan like, oh shit. Yeah.

Terrible Scott (01:24:20.332)
Okay.

Hehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehe

Producer Dan (01:24:23.446)
Yeah, dude, I'll, I'll be subscribing to episode one.

Sean Young (01:24:26.806)
Hahaha

Terrible Scott (01:24:27.218)
Well, we did have a guest that grew up in a commune, she called it. We called it a cult where there was a, what was it Dan? A UFO? Wasn't there a platform where they could, I can't remember what it was. Observation. Yes. Yeah. I don't think she never claimed to see anything. She's a little more wrapped up in the commune.

Producer Dan (01:24:40.798)
Uh, you up so UFO observatory.

Sean Young (01:24:46.756)
Peace.

Terrible Scott (01:24:56.51)
weird lifestyle with her. Anyway, listen to the episode. I'm talking to John, it's a good episode. I will send it to you.

Sean Young (01:25:00.612)
Thanks for watching!

Sean Young (01:25:05.453)
Okay, so the venture of Beyond the Veil started because during October I do spooky content, right? Like I stray a little bit away from the crappy stuff because like it gets a little heavy at times, right? And like break up the content. And during the month of October, I wanted to find a certain niche of guests and...

Two of my guests bailed and I went to the podcast community. I was like, Hey, I'd like to fucking interview somebody that is, you know, X, Y, and Z. And the amount of outpouring of people to say, I want to share my story, share my experience. I was like, I cannot not fucking start a show, right? I have to start a separate show. And so I did. And you know, my, my spooky month is about to wrap up next week. I actually have that guest. Well, I kind of formatted.

Terrible Scott (01:25:37.572)
Okay.

Terrible Scott (01:25:47.48)
Hahaha

Sean Young (01:25:59.086)
everything to lead into this guest, but I have a Catholic exorcist that is, his episode is on Halloween.

Terrible Scott (01:26:03.626)
Wow.

Sean Young (01:26:10.636)
That fucking episode, I'll tell you, that episode changed the way I look at everything. Everything, yeah. Mm-hmm, yep, yep. 40, yep.

Terrible Scott (01:26:16.49)
Okay. You said on Halloween, you mean it's releasing on Halloween? Like literally? That's okay. So 48 hours.

Producer Dan (01:26:25.314)
That's right. Well, this episode will air after that. So all our terrible listeners go back. We'll put a link to that episode in the show notes because that's going to be fire. I can't wait to listen to that.

Terrible Scott (01:26:29.987)
Oh, true.

Sean Young (01:26:36.266)
Yeah, yeah, it's exciting. I had Sean Austin from 28 Days Haunted on.

before that and I've had a psychic medium, a paranormal investigator from Tennessee on and then a personal friend prior to that. So yeah I have a lot of stuff, I have years worth of content, I have a wrestler I've recorded for Recover Out Loud, I have more wrestlers coming on because I'm a huge wrestling fan, well you can't tell because it's audio but for everybody listening I'm a huge professional wrestling fan, I love everything WWE, AEW, so yeah when I got those people to say hey I'm gonna share my story

Let's do it.

Terrible Scott (01:27:13.37)
You know in one at one of our Maryland guests that we've had on before was also our last huge He had tattoos of it didn't you have Rick Flair tattoos if I remember correctly Dan Dean. Do you remember which one he had? But so yeah, awesome. That's incredible Sounds like it's gonna be a lot of fun with your paranormal Adventures, I guess is the word that I was looking for but as we What's that?

Producer Dan (01:27:23.261)
Ah, something like that, yeah.

Sean Young (01:27:25.17)
Nice.

Sean Young (01:27:39.272)
Not ghost adventures. Said not ghost adventures, wink.

Sean Young (01:27:46.848)
We don't like Zach Beggin in this house.

Terrible Scott (01:27:49.983)
I'm glad you said the wink out loud since, you know, we're, we can't quite see you. But as we wrap up, Sean, is there any last thing that you'd want to say to our listeners, whether it's about trauma, addiction, the choice of joining the military? I just kind of like to hear.

Sean Young (01:27:52.856)
Hahaha

Terrible Scott (01:28:10.943)
a little wisdom from you that you've experienced or picked up over the years.

Sean Young (01:28:15.948)
If you're gonna do something, do it for yourself, don't do it for anybody else. If you do it for somebody else, you're gonna fucking fail. You're gonna feel this sense of lack of empowerment. Do it for your fucking self, man. Everything you achieve in life, do it for yourself. There is no right way to do things. There's multiple right ways.

to do things right so just because their way is right to them doesn't mean your way is not right to you and finally like do what you love right I see so many people that suffer through life living a fucking life that they hate that they just despise do what you love do it because if you do what you love you're never gonna work a day in your life I know sometimes it's easier said than done

But it's true if you do dude, I love doing this shit, right and this is my I consider it my job, right? Like I fucking love Podcasting um, there's days where I hate it. But overall I love it Do what you love

Terrible Scott (01:29:24.063)
I hate trying to do the social media for it. But aside from that, I get it. And you're speaking directly to me more than, you know, I'm in a transition in life right now where I've left my job and now it's OK figuring out what the next steps are. And I am lucky to be in that position. I think that a lot of people who are able to do that, you know, are very lucky.

Sometimes it's a mixture of luck and a willingness to follow what you value and understand that, you know, money does pay the bills, so there's a baseline that you need to get to. I'm not gonna tell anyone that money doesn't make life easier, but also doing something that's fulfilling has a value to it too. And, you know, if you're sacrificing a few dollars, but are able to follow...

Sean Young (01:30:13.974)
Absolutely.

Terrible Scott (01:30:21.342)
your passions. It's absolutely worth it. And something that's been scary for me to think about throughout my life. And I finally decided to do it. So, you know, those words are kind of inspirational to me. And I'll make sure to keep you updated on my journey. But overall, man, thank you so much for being here today. It's been wonderful. Dan and I.

Sean Young (01:30:38.02)
Sounds good.

Terrible Scott (01:30:46.91)
probably spoke less than we've ever spoken in an interview before because we were sitting here captivated. So thank you so much. I'm so glad you're you are not only able but willing to come and share with us. Thank you.

Sean Young (01:30:59.128)
Thank you for having me. And if you guys hear this howling in the background, my neighbors have like 8,000 Dalmatians. So, oh, okay. Well, I answered, I debunked it for you.

Terrible Scott (01:31:07.79)
I've I thought Dalmatians were only bought and sold in quantities of one hundred and one. So eight thousand. OK. Yeah. So awesome. I did hear it. I it's part of the charm of doing some remote podcasting and even remote work. Dan and I have worked remote. Like I said, I'm transitioning, but I've got two days left.

Producer Dan (01:31:07.856)
I just thought that shit was haunted. Ha ha ha.

Sean Young (01:31:19.797)
Yeah.

It's a little bit dramatic, but it's close.

Terrible Scott (01:31:38.138)
I will be my last one is your Halloween episode my last days on Halloween So I guess I know what I'll be doing Tuesday night, but Anyway, thank you again. You've been an amazing guest As I always love to say you've passed the decent fucking human test Your quality dude. I've really enjoyed it Dan. I'm sure has enjoyed it. I always speak for him at this point But we're honored

Sean Young (01:31:46.401)
I'm out.

Terrible Scott (01:32:06.49)
uh, humbled, grateful, uh, all of those fun words that, that your willingness to, to be with us and share. And, uh, I guess terrible listeners, remember to like and follow our socials, listen to Sean's podcasts. Uh, we'll, we'll send some links out about those. Um, and then if you could leave us a review and follow the podcast on any of the, uh, podcast platforms, but listeners, thank you.

today for joining us. And as always, it's been absolutely, positively terrible.