Eddie Gallagher #2

Summary

The Antihero Podcast: Eddie Gallagher #2 – Detailed Summary

Release Date: June 23, 2025

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Introduction and Personal Reflections

The episode begins with Unknown Speaker A sharing a pivotal moment in his life. While incarcerated, he experienced a profound spiritual awakening that led him to give his life over to Christ. This transformation marked a significant turning point, offering him control and peace amidst adversity.

"[00:00] Unknown Speaker A: ...that is when I completely just gave everything to Christ."

Running a Podcast: Challenges and Insights

Tyler and Brent Tucker delve into the intricacies of managing and sustaining a podcast. Unknown Speaker A recounts how his co-host, an adept individual, swiftly set up their studio by researching successful podcasters like Joe Rogan. This proactive approach has allowed them to maintain and continuously improve their podcasting setup over the past three years.

"[01:05] Unknown Speaker A: ...we have everything we... But we're constantly updating, like, getting new cameras and stuff like that."

Tyler emphasizes the demanding nature of weekly podcasting, highlighting the discipline required to produce consistent content. Brent echoes this sentiment, noting that the intent behind starting the podcast significantly influences whether it remains a hobby or becomes a demanding commitment.

"[02:16] Tyler: The live. Last night, when we were talking about it... I've been doing it for three years."

"[02:50] Brent Tucker: ...if your intent is just to have a podcast, have fun... but if your intent is to be a business..."

Lifestyle Changes and Health

The conversation shifts to personal health and lifestyle choices. Tyler reveals his decision to reduce alcohol consumption, motivated by observing positive changes in his wife’s life post-abstinence. Unknown Speaker A shares a similar journey, emphasizing the importance of self-control and the benefits of minimizing alcohol intake.

"[07:00] Unknown Speaker A: ...I'm not quitting for good. I just want to go and see, like, what's the difference..."

Brent Tucker discusses the adverse effects of alcohol on his cognitive functions, advocating for moderation and exploring alternatives like CBD and THC-infused beverages.

"[08:34] Tyler: I think a lot of people are moving to CBD and THC type drinks..."

Training Law Enforcement and SWAT Teams

A significant portion of the episode is dedicated to training law enforcement and SWAT teams. Unknown Speaker A recounts his experiences training various tactical units, emphasizing the importance of adapting military-grade tactics to civilian law enforcement protocols. He highlights the challenges of bridging the cultural and operational differences between military special operations and civilian policing.

"[58:32] Brent Tucker: ...the major differences between... just between the culture of the two elements."

Brent Tucker adds that effective training requires understanding the unique needs and legal constraints of law enforcement, advocating for a collaborative approach that enhances decision-making and tactical proficiency.

"[69:09] Unknown Speaker A: ...there's a legal framework that influences how these operations are conducted."

Starting and Managing a Non-profit

The hosts discuss the inception of their non-profit foundation, aimed at supporting active-duty military members and addressing systemic issues within military justice systems. Unknown Speaker A shares his disillusionment with existing organizations like United American Patriots, citing corruption and inefficiency as primary motivators for establishing a more transparent and effective non-profit.

"[79:07] Unknown Speaker A: ...we need to pass that on."

Brent Tucker and Tyler explore the complexities of managing a non-profit, emphasizing the necessity of maintaining integrity, transparency, and ensuring that donations directly benefit those in need without undue overhead costs.

"[85:13] Unknown Speaker A: ...you really have to take your time and make sure that the individual that you're helping deserves, deserves that help."

Future Reflections and Life Decisions

As the conversation progresses, the hosts reflect on personal goals and the balance between professional commitments and family life. Unknown Speaker A contemplates retirement and the desire to prioritize his family over continued involvement in high-stakes professions or public roles, drawing parallels to historical figures like George Washington.

"[95:04] Unknown Speaker A: ...I want my kids to remember me as a good, loving, caring father."

Brent Tucker echoes similar sentiments, discussing the challenges of transitioning from a structured, high-intensity career to a more balanced family-oriented life. Both emphasize the importance of being present for loved ones and ensuring that their legacy is defined by personal relationships rather than professional accolades.

"[96:23] Unknown Speaker A: ...I have to protect my own time now."

Anecdotes and Personal Stories

The episode concludes with Unknown Speaker A sharing a humorous yet harrowing personal story about accidentally burning himself while cooking, illustrating the unpredictable challenges of daily life and the importance of resilience.

"[107:04] Unknown Speaker A: ...I had third degree burns all down my legs."

Brent Tucker and Tyler respond with empathy, reinforcing the theme of enduring and overcoming personal hardships while maintaining a sense of humor and camaraderie.

"[109:53] Unknown Speaker A: ...I'm a little, you know, in a little shock. I'm like, what just happened?"

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Key Takeaways

1. Resilience Through Adversity: Personal transformation and spiritual awakening can provide strength and control during challenging times.
2. Podcasting as a Commitment: Consistency, intent, and passion are crucial for sustaining a successful podcast.
3. Health and Moderation: Reducing alcohol intake and exploring healthier alternatives can lead to significant physical and mental improvements.
4. Effective Training for Law Enforcement: Bridging military and civilian tactical operations requires understanding cultural and legal nuances.
5. Integrity in Non-profits: Building a trustworthy non-profit involves transparency, dedicated leadership, and ensuring that aid genuinely benefits those in need.
6. Balancing Career and Family: Prioritizing family and personal well-being is essential, especially after a high-intensity career.
7. Humor and Resilience: Personal anecdotes highlight the importance of maintaining humor and resilience in the face of unexpected challenges.

Notable Quotes

• "[00:00] Unknown Speaker A: ...that is when I completely just gave everything to Christ."
• "[02:50] Brent Tucker: ...if your intent is just to have a podcast, have fun... but if your intent is to be a business..."
• "[08:34] Tyler: I think a lot of people are moving to CBD and THC type drinks..."
• "[69:09] Unknown Speaker A: ...there's a legal framework that influences how these operations are conducted."
• "[95:04] Unknown Speaker A: ...I want my kids to remember me as a good, loving, caring father."
• "[107:04] Unknown Speaker A: ...I had third degree burns all down my legs."

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This episode of The Antihero Podcast offers a deep dive into personal growth, the challenges of maintaining integrity in high-stakes professions, and the importance of balancing professional commitments with personal life. Through candid conversations and shared experiences, the hosts provide valuable insights for listeners navigating similar paths.

Transcript

[Unknown Speaker A]

I really wasn't 100 there. I mean, I still was like, I'm in control of my own destiny, just like most of us think, you know? And then obviously when all that happened, I had a breakthrough when I was in a prison cell, when everything was taken away from me. That is when I completely just gave everything to Christ.

[Tyler]

Hold on, we're not recording. Do you want to buy a shirt to support military dance? People want to see their sausage get made.

[Brent Tucker]

An appropriate level of inappropriateness. Something happens in my family tonight. The Delta Horse isn't coming to rescue my. My kids like it is. First responders that are. That are going to save my. My family.

[Tyler]

They want the culture to be down. They want people to not want to be cops. And the people that do want to be cops are now walking into the job scared to do the job.

[Brent Tucker]

I'm going to try to act like it didn't happen, although we. We all know it did.

[Tyler]

JV team for life.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay, on the podcast stuff, how did. Did you have a lifeline to call to be like, hey, what. What equipment do. Do I. Or you just.

[Unknown Speaker A]

So luckily, my co host. Yeah, my co host, he's very successful dude. So he literally just googled everything Joe Rogan had and built the studio. And so that's. That's how we. We have everything we. But we're constantly updating, like, getting new cameras and stuff like that. I mean, it's always a work in progress. Dave was my neighbor. Well, he was my wife and kids neighbor when I was locked up. And then he was just super awesome guy, like, and then when I got back, I would always have him over for UFC fights because he's a UFC fan. And then eventually he moved down the street to a bigger house, but he was like, hey, I want to start a podcast. I'm gonna do it now. He wanted me to co host. And so I thought about it and I was like, you know what, I'll try it out. You know, I was like, we'll see how this feels. And, yeah, we've been doing it ever since. I like it. You know, it's like you get to sit down, have two hours, interrupted time with somebody, and actually get. Get their story. So with the more we've been doing, we're doing it three years now, going on a third year.

[Tyler]

It's definitely got to feel like a job at this point.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah, it is, man. It is. And at the end of the day, and that's what I tell people when, like, I'm gonna start a podcast and I'M like, buddy, you better buckle up, because it's work.

[Tyler]

The live. Last night, when we were talking about it, I. I was. I was. I don't want to say I was shocked, but I kind of was when you said, I've been doing it for three years. And I said, oh, just whenever you can. And you said, no. Every week.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Once a week.

[Tyler]

And, man, that is the hardest part.

[Unknown Speaker A]

It is.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah. It's. Until you. It is fun. And it doesn't have to be work, and it wasn't always work when we started this. Once. Once. You. It's your intent, I guess. Right. Like, is your intent to start this. To be a business is. And sometimes that wasn't necessarily our intent. It turns into that. But if your intent is just to have a podcast, have fun.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

And, you know, fill some time, do something, make it a hobby, then it will be fun, and it'll maintain being fun. The moment you grab a sponsor and go into some sort of contract and are obligated to put out episodes almost immediately, it stops being fun.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Well, that's what the pressure.

[Brent Tucker]

I shouldn't say it stops being fun. Yeah, it's. It's different.

[Unknown Speaker A]

It's different.

[Brent Tucker]

It's different.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Well, you get a little bit of pressure now because you're like, okay, I. I owe this. I have to put this out. So, like, before, when you don't have sponsors.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

It's like, all right, dude, if we miss a week.

[Tyler]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

Miss a week.

[Unknown Speaker A]

I don't want to miss a week. But it's like, it's not going to hurt anything now. It's like, dude, no, we. We owe it to our sponsors. We have to have an episode out. So, yeah, it sort of adds that element to it. I mean, but at the same time, that's kind of fun, too, because you're like, all right, we're under the gun. Let's get this done.

[Tyler]

We've put out some of our best episodes under. Because there's times.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

Some fun ones.

[Tyler]

We were. We were under. Under the pre. Like, we. There's been times where we did not schedule very well, and so we had to look at our month and go, we've got to put out four episodes. And then some of the quick guests that we were like, hey, I hate saying this, but, like, some guests are way more high profile than other guests. This is what.

[Unknown Speaker A]

It's just the way it is.

[Tyler]

Some of our best conversations were with people that we didn't think were going to be that interesting. But yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah, we knew they were going to be interesting. But yeah, we didn't know how to sell. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I hate it because sometimes they don't. And they don't get the views that, that, that bigger names that weren't as entertaining get. And I was like, there's no justice in this world like that. We bring us in up all the time. But it's just a good example. The, the ranger kid from, from California.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Oh, the gangster.

[Tyler]

Oh, Angel Cortez.

[Brent Tucker]

Angel, yeah, Angel Cortez. One of the most interesting guests I think we've ever had on. If anything should have got, you know, to me, like a million views, I wanted it to be angel because the story is just so good. He's such a genuine person.

[Unknown Speaker A]

He's a good kid. Yeah, he's. I would call almost. Don't call him a good kid. But yeah, dude, he works with one of my good buddies, Michael. Doubt over the defense strategies or whatever they're doing, but yeah, they're good people.

[Tyler]

Should we start the episode? All right, let's do this.

[Brent Tucker]

Started eventually.

[Tyler]

Welcome back to the Anti Hero podcast. Part Delta Force, part street cop. All truth. I'm Tyler, owner of Counterculture, Inc. Go to Counterculture Inc. Threads.com use promo code ANTI HERO and get 15 off. The best in counterculture. Graphic tees, stickers, hats, team room flags, ranger panties. We have it all. We sell refractive wolf apparel. I even have some anti Hero shirts on, on the, on the, on the shelves. So go to Counterculture Inc. Threads.com promo code Anti Hero, save 15%.

[Brent Tucker]

And I'm Brent Tucker, owner of FRCC. That's First Responder Cigar Company and First Responder Coffee Company. Use promo code FRCC15 to get 1515 off the world's best coffee and cigars. That's FRCC15. FRCC1 5.

[Tyler]

And of course, this episode is brought to you by Human Performance Testosterone Replacement therapy. Go to HP TRT. I guess technically it's hyphen. HP hyphen trt.com and use promo code HERO and get 20 off. Not just your. Not just your first month, 20 off every single month after that. And if you've had blood work done in the last six months, if you upload that work straight to the patient portal. I did it the other day. They waived your lab costs. So go to hp-trt.com use promo code HERO and save 20% every single month.

[Brent Tucker]

And if you want to continue to support us, please consider joining our Patreon for extra content, behind the scenes looks, and our Thursday night live podcast. Every Thursday night, 8pm Eastern standard till whenever we decide, it's over.

[Tyler]

Right.

[Brent Tucker]

The one with Eddie. Last night went a little long.

[Tyler]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

But it was a good time.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

So join in the Thursday Night Live. It's for the boys.

[Unknown Speaker A]

I.

[Tyler]

Speaking of Thursday night, so I. I was telling you guys beforehand that I had gone a week. The last time I had drank any alcohol was the Thursday before last night.

[Brent Tucker]

Right.

[Tyler]

And I made the decision sitting here at 7:59. I was like, you know what? Thursdays is for the boys. I don't have a problem. So I felt selfish saying, not having any beers with you guys. So I had two beers, went home, did my routine, and I. And since three days ago, I was at 208.8. I know. Everybody shut up. I'm 5 11. I'm at 206.2. I've almost lost three pounds just with no alcohol.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah, I believe it. Yeah. Three weeks. Three weeks in one day. Yeah. I haven't. Hadn't had a drop. And I did that. That's like, a personal choice. I was like, dude. And it's not like I had, like, a drinking problem where I was like, this is. I just.

[Brent Tucker]

Right.

[Unknown Speaker A]

No, that's.

[Brent Tucker]

That's the right thing to say.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's denial. Right? But I was like, dude, it's. My wife had quit the first. January 1st. And so I kept. You know, I was like, I'm not quitting. I'm like, I'm. I. I like it. I enjoy it. But then I noticed. I'm like, dude, she's definitely like. You could see her game, like, level up from not drinking. And I was like, all right, there's. There's something to that. So I was like, I'll quit on my birthday and see how. And I'm not. Not gonna. I'm not saying I'm quitting for good. I just want to go and see, like, what's the difference, you know, like, and how I feel and everything. And I've noticed it. I mean, you're definitely a lot more on, but you also got to deal with that five o' clock rolls around, you're like, oof. You know, dude, I can use a drink right now and gotta overcome that a little bit. But it's going good.

[Tyler]

I think a lot of people are moving to CBD and THC type.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Tyler]

Drinks to. To just. Instead of having your beers at the end of a long day, you kind of have that. Get the kids to bed, lay in bed, and then you're passed out.

[Unknown Speaker A]

I've Done. I do that. Yeah.

[Tyler]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

I'll have one of those THC drinks if I'm grilling it. Because usually it's like grilling out, right? Is. That's when I'm like, dude, I want to drink in my hand when I'm grilling out. It's just a American thing to do.

[Brent Tucker]

And I hate complaining about it sounding like some sort of victim, but it's TBIS is. It's just been, like, the worst. The worst thing about service, like, it's messed with my sleep, it's messed my hormones, and at, you know, at bigger levels than I think I wanted to admit at the beginning. And the. What alcohol will do to me the next day. Like, my brain just doesn't function right after. Like, it. It's not. It's not like a beer or two, but it's not as much as I would like to, you know, admit. Maybe like six beers, which you. You can do easily in a long evening. And I can just feel my brain not firing. Right. I don't know how else to explain it. I'm slower. My word finding. Yeah, it's a lag, and it lasts all day. And so I kind of. I've never. I've never smoked weed. I could care less for people who do, but for people who are looking for alternative things, like. I'm just saying. I get it. Like, you're not taking in 800 calories off of six beers, yet they're not feeling the same way.

[Tyler]

That's a light beer today.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah. Yeah, that's a light beer. So I get it. And I almost. I don't know. I don't. I don't know if maybe one day I will break down and be like, you know, why did I fight it for so long? But you're gonna grow. But I haven't. But I haven't yet. Yeah, but I haven't yet.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Listen to Bob Marley reggae music all the time.

[Brent Tucker]

It's. I'm not gonna tell you guys when I do it, but there'll be signs.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Be filling these cigars with something else.

[Brent Tucker]

I'm. That's. That's one of my biggest complaints against. Against weed. I smell of it. I just. I do. I hate the smell of it. We can. All the technology we have, and we can't make that smell a lot of different.

[Tyler]

A lot of first spawners or cops, I should say if. When they retire or if they get out of the game, that when they'll do the gummies. But for me, I'm tainted with that smell that Smell to me is.

[Brent Tucker]

Smells like crime.

[Tyler]

People crying.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Oh, I got you. Yeah. The way you were brought up. Yeah.

[Tyler]

The car that smells like that is now in my head, like, oh, this could be a criminal in here. And then I can't ever.

[Brent Tucker]

Just can't. Just can't shake it.

[Tyler]

This concert's full of criminals.

[Brent Tucker]

I don't know how you could put a. An exact number to it. But how. How many podcasts have you done?

[Unknown Speaker A]

Oh, man.

[Brent Tucker]

Not. Not your own. Not your own.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Not my own, as it gets. Probably. I mean, between 50 to 100, you know. Whoa. It's a lot. Yeah, it's. I mean, it's. Especially when I got out, it was like everybody wanted, you know, for me to come on. And then he did the book tour and all that. So, I mean, it all adds up. And then I still go on from time to time now, like.

[Brent Tucker]

Yes.

[Unknown Speaker A]

More to, you know, talk about with the foundation and stuff that we're doing.

[Brent Tucker]

So the have. I know, like one of the. When you came on our podcast the first time and you talked about your story, it wasn't, you know, like this where you're kind of hanging out.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

Conversational. Like you actually had to go back and probably feel like the same old, same old, like having to tell the story again. And we're super grateful that you did. How many podcasts have you done since. Since that one. Back. Back to the story. Do you still do those podcasts?

[Unknown Speaker A]

So I've done. Just recently, I did one and it was a connection through a buddy of mine. Actually two. I did two since your guys. Where I had to go back. It was a Julian Dory. He's out of Jersey. He actually has a really, really awesome podcast. He had reached out, so he. I went up there and that was like three hour, like going through everything again. And then one more. It was a couple out of. Actually, I think they're out of Orlando, but that was remote. And they were. They were more. It was called the canceled podcast because they got canceled for refusing to abide with the coveted rules and all that stuff. So they. They wanted to talk about that. But then eventually it just like goes right back into the story and then they start us. So, I mean, it does happen. Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

It's surprising, I guess. I guess I shouldn't say it's that surprising that. That you can still go on a podcast, tell that story, you know, and it's going to get views because. Because your name and the amount of people you go in the comment section like that don't know the story. And that's still having to explain yourself to people who don't really know the story.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah. And which is why I don't have like an issue half the time. Like, okay, dude, if you want me to explain it and go. Go through it, obviously I'd like to talk about other things. The things that I'm doing now. Like, I'm more of a, like, hey, that's in the rear view. I'm. This is what I'm doing now going forward. But at the same time, I do think it's a story that if you hadn't heard it, you do need to hear it and you need to know, like, these things do.

[Tyler]

History will repeat itself for sure.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

And this isn't a leading question. Interested in your answer? We did the live last night of the fifth of the 500. You know, you know that you, that you've done. No, I'm sorry. Would you say 50 to 100? Yeah, yeah, 50 to 100. Gosh. Added a zero. How many. How many were like the Thursday Night Live.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah, me and Jim were talking about that when we left. I was like that. That was awesome.

[Brent Tucker]

Pretty unique.

[Unknown Speaker A]

I think it is unique. I like the way that you guys have. Have it and like, I think it's just cool because you're interacting with your, with your fans and then the fans are able to, like, you know, I think it's cool that they donate money to get their question asked and answered and it makes, makes it go by. It's fast.

[Brent Tucker]

It is.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

Every Thursday night. Tyler, stop. Hey, time to stop for, for, for sponsors.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Boo.

[Tyler]

Tyler.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah. Like, we're 20 minutes into this thing. We're an hour into it.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

Where does it take time go on this thing?

[Unknown Speaker A]

We went pretty late last night and we did.

[Brent Tucker]

We go three.

[Tyler]

I used to have to get up for shift at 3:45 at the latest because I had to be in at 5. So on a Friday when I had to do that, it was every other Friday. Some of those Thursdays I was like, man. But now it's. I think we're. We just got so much to talk about. We have so many people engaging with us and we have. Man, we didn't even break down videos yesterday. We didn't even get to it.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Tyler]

Like, we have so much to do.

[Unknown Speaker A]

You guys usually do that too, right?

[Tyler]

3 video. I think usually when we have a guest like you, the, the comments double. We had. We had. Who was. We had Jay Dobbins on here.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah, he's awesome.

[Brent Tucker]

That was a good one.

[Tyler]

And a lot of engagement. So when it's just me and Brent, like, just mom and dad, no. No cool uncles or aunts, they, you know, they don't ask as many questions.

[Brent Tucker]

But the. So what your podcast is, for a second.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah, the Shoot Me Straight.

[Brent Tucker]

Do you have a. It's hard. I know it's hard to narrow down to one, but we kind of talked about, like, our kind of favorite unsung hero, Angel. Angel Cortez. Do you have, like, an episode or two, like, something that pops out to you is like, hey, this is one of my episodes. You know, not. Not the biggest name we have, but this is one of my favorite episodes that I wish that story got out more. Have one of those.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah, I do have one for a specific reason. I had on a team guy sealed at Dan C. He. He came on about a year into it, and this guy, he had. He's well known in. In the SEAL community. Just a freaking awesome guy. Went through kind of a similar scenario as I did at Team seven, got accused of war crimes and then got acquitted. But obviously he had. You know, he got out after that, and then he was working. He did all these jobs, worked. He was part of Joe Rogan Security, was running that. I mean, phenomenal, dude. So he came on our podcast, and it was the longest one that we had done. It was like three and a half hours. And he sat. I mean, he broke down his life story from beginning to end and, like, didn't leave anything out, was vulnerable. I mean, he got to a point where he was, you know, crying. He was going through the. The hardships, everything getting out. And then he died about a month and a half later. So I went to his funeral and the memorial. And the podcast was actually brought up at his memorial. They were like, hey, he had never opened up like that. Listen to this podcast. And so that right there was like, a sign, like, dude, okay, we're doing the right thing. Like, I am so glad that he came on and was able to tell his story. Not just, you know, for the listeners, but for his wife and kids.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

You know what I mean? It's like a piece of history.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah. Yeah. Would the. What he died from Heart attack.

[Unknown Speaker A]

And what was crazy is when he. Because he stayed with me for those couple days at our house and he called it. He's like, dude, I don't. I think something's gonna happen. Like, I'm not. Like, something doesn't feel right. And I. I honestly. And this is. And I'm not saying this is the reason But I. I'm all like, I'm on trt. I'm. I'm all about it. But you better make sure you are doing the correct levels of TRT and not just injecting a bunch into you, because that will do damage to your heart. It raises your blood pressure. It has all sorts of issues, and I think that might have been some of the issues.

[Brent Tucker]

Contributing factor.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah, contributing. Not the complete.

[Tyler]

Was he a big guy? Like, muscular?

[Unknown Speaker A]

He. Dude, he was probably 5, 5, 8, 5 9, maybe a little bit to 5, 10, but yeah, just like.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

You know, big.

[Brent Tucker]

Average size.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah, average. That's right.

[Brent Tucker]

It is, actually. We had to look that up. Yeah, we did five, 10. Yeah. Maybe it was five, nine. Five nine or five, 10. It's one of those. Yeah, it's actually average. Average size.

[Unknown Speaker A]

But.

[Tyler]

Yeah. Well, I learned if the bigger. The bigger your body gets, the more your heart has to work.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Tyler]

Which is common knowledge. I just didn't know that till, like two years ago. And that's what creates the cardiac issues, is your heart's working to.

[Unknown Speaker A]

It's going over time. Yeah. To keep up with the weight that you're carrying. Yeah, yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

And, you know, and. And fairness, because I know you already. You already said it. But it's not. It's not like a TRT thing. That's a life thing, right?

[Unknown Speaker A]

It is.

[Brent Tucker]

There's nothing wrong with alcohol. We're talking about alcohol earlier. You have too much alcohol. It's deadly. Do you know what kills people way more than steroids?

[Tyler]

Alcohol.

[Brent Tucker]

Well. Well, that's that people, according to House Advil, overdoses. Oh, I bet that kills more people than steroids. And everyone's like, oh, steroids, like, that's bad for. You got to watch out. Like, it's crazy. You have anything done outside of regular doses, you know, is. Is. Is bad for you. Anything, Anything.

[Unknown Speaker A]

You can die from drinking too much water.

[Tyler]

Yeah, moderation.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Moderation. Unfortunately, in our communities, there's no such thing. Moderation for cowards. So everything is to the extreme.

[Brent Tucker]

Right.

[Unknown Speaker A]

That is the way we're raised. And that's the way. I mean, when you get out, you still have that mindset. It's like, go, go.

[Brent Tucker]

Right?

[Unknown Speaker A]

Just give me. And it's like.

[Tyler]

And we talk about putting. You're going to have that go, go, go no matter what. So you can either put it towards businesses and, you know, things that are going to benefit you, or you can put it towards eventually not knowing substances. On that bad track.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah, yeah.

[Tyler]

JV team for life.

[Brent Tucker]

Tyler, how many Critical incidents do you think we've covered so far in this podcast, man?

[Tyler]

At least five, six and, and, and.

[Brent Tucker]

They'Re not going to stop. You know, there's you, you cannot stop them all. So they're going to happen. And you really have two charters of that. Obviously one is to stop them from happening. But since you can't stop them all from happening, you owe it to the people that you protect and depend on you to react to those situations in the most effective and efficient manner. And right now, really, whether you're a fire department, ems, law enforcement, you're, you're stuck with essentially radios.

[Tyler]

And Apollo is the best way to manage resources during these events because it's designed by first responders for first responders.

[Brent Tucker]

It gives first responders a common operating picture which allows them to see where everybody is in real time, overlaid onto a map to see where they are. You can drop pinpoints and let them know where they need to go. And without constant talking on the radio, everybody knows where the incident is, where it's happening and where they need to be.

[Tyler]

Apollo's an app based application. This is just download and go.

[Brent Tucker]

It's an app and so it works with androids, it works with iPhones.

[Tyler]

Apollo makes sure on the back end everything works and you can just plug and go. They handle all the licensing, all the encryption compliance, all the security. It's all handled by Apollo. Apollo, it's crucial to know where everyone is and what they are doing in order to effectively control chaos in one of these, either natural disasters or shootings or anything like that.

[Brent Tucker]

So if you want to learn more about Apollo, scan the QR code and ensure your department is ready to react to any crisis in its most effective and efficient manner possible.

[Tyler]

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[Brent Tucker]

It can, it really can be, it can be easily, you know, aimed at, at something beneficial. But you know, if we just either don't do it or, you know, some, some sometimes you get a friend to be like, hey, why don't we, why don't we focus that over here, Reel.

[Unknown Speaker A]

It back a little bit. Yeah. And then. Yeah. And you have to do that.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah. Speaking of, just can't do things in moderation. You did something not too long ago where you could have ran a 5k for a benefit. You could, you could. We could have got a stream. We could have gone to the stream. You could have ran a marathon for a benefit.

[Unknown Speaker A]

That's.

[Brent Tucker]

To be honest, that's a little longer than I want to run. What, what, what'd you guys end up doing?

[Unknown Speaker A]

So we. This was a year and a half ago. My buddy Johnny Wilson started this company called Envy. And it's. He. It's like a whoop strap but for your mental health. So. And they were developing it and working on it and they were trying to, you know, obviously get the word out about, you know, what he was trying to do. So he was like, hey, I want to put on this event and it's going to be, you know, a. A ball kick, you know, kicking the balls. But we started talking about it and of course, you know, you get enough team guys in there, it's like, well, why don't we just do this? And like, all right, let's add this. So it ended up being a 10. We started off with a 10 mile swim in Wyoming. A 10 mile swim during the winter. So there's snow on the, on the ground. And we got. Yeah.

[Tyler]

Swam 10 miles collectively in my life.

[Unknown Speaker A]

You know, they had a current going, so it wasn't, you know, it was still long, but we had the current with us. We jumped out of a hilo, swam 10 miles. Got.

[Brent Tucker]

Couldn't even start normal. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

You know what I mean? Number one rule, dude.

[Brent Tucker]

Always look cool. Always look cool. That's right.

[Unknown Speaker A]

And so we got out and then, yeah, we, the goal was to do 200 mile run with plates. And so there was probably eight or nine of us. So there was about six or seven seals and then there was one Green Beret and one Marine. So everybody's obviously out. They're retired. We got to about mile 160 and dudes were, I mean dudes were already.

[Brent Tucker]

You're just breaking guys and yeah, guys.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Were getting in the van, like having to, you know, ride a little bit. A little bit. Except myself and one other guy, Aaron Kendall. We, we were full on thing. Yeah. We didn't end up accomplishing the whole thing. It got to a point where we had like, I think 30 miles to go and they had a, they had a finish point. Like the whole town was involved. They had, you know, the cops were out there. And so I, you know, we, we talked about it and I was like, hey, dude, if we continue on, like, I'm ready to go. Like, we'll continue, but we will break. There's like three dudes here who are barely hanging off.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

So we called it at like 170something, I believe. I mean, still, it was a long, long way at that point. I'm like, I could have done like. Yeah, there's no nowhere in my mind where it was like, oh, I was, I was like, I could have finished the rest, but it's like, dude, 170, 200, I don't care.

[Brent Tucker]

Do you think you had advantage because you had the opportunity for that long train up before you started?

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

Is that what kind of gave month and a half?

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah, no, we went full. Full as always.

[Brent Tucker]

That's the crazier part of the story to me was this, you know, I'm just saying I wouldn't, I wouldn't take that on without. I mean, I'd have to trade up. And. And it's going to take more than six weeks. And you did it. You did this on six weeks notice.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Pretty much. But here's like, you know, obviously I keep in shape. Like, that's. It's part of my daily routine. It's always has been. And the way that I work out is I work out to like the same way I worked out when I was in the teams. It's like I should be able to accomplish whatever task is given to me, whether it's, you know, you got to go swim or dive and do all these things. Yes, I can. I'll be able to swim that long. Or, hey, we got to traverse up this mountain. Like, yeah, I'm not at the peak performance to do that, but I'm in shape enough to where I can. I can accomplish that without having to put it like a thousand percent effort, you know, So I try to keep it that level. And because I keep it that level, it wasn't like a hard transition to be like, all right, dude, we're. Now we're just doing long distance.

[Brent Tucker]

So I. And I've proven I'm not a runner. But if, but if you ask me to run, I can run with the best of them. I'm not a. I'm not good at wrecking. I'm just not naturally good at wrecking. Most people aren't. It's kind of like pull ups, Right. No one's naturally good at it, but if I train up for it, I can rock with the best of them. And same thing with finning. It's. But we all know guys that are just more. They're just naturally kind of better at those things. So I was never naturally good at those things. Do you still thin? Because man, you don't. Okay. This is what people don't thinning like with. Yeah. With, with flippers, scuba dive fins is that it's not necessarily like your quads that are going to give out first now. It's a different motion. So it's something you need to work on.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

It's your feet and your ankles.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

That just. It's little muscles. Yeah, yeah. It's little muscles that you do not use anywhere else any other. Any other way. And if I have to go in and do a 3 or 5k like we were on the teams, like I would still have to go in like, hey, well we got this coming up. Like I, I need to go fit a little bit.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

Or I'm not going to be.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Get those hip flexors too. That's like my main element of thinning.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah, that's a little bit. I'm sure you guys do plenty of rucking as well, but because we do a lot of rucking, you know, the hip flexors are, are kind of built up but still not a, it's not a one for one exchange because you don't have the resistance, you know, and rucking that you have in the water. But gosh. So like so you. So you don't Finn.

[Unknown Speaker A]

No, man, I, you know.

[Brent Tucker]

Well, what was. I don't even know if it's a fair comparison. What was. What do you think was when you trained up for it? You did it. Did you? Was what was harder? The. The 10 mile fin or the 170 you put on?

[Tyler]

The.

[Unknown Speaker A]

The hard part was. And here's, here's where I messed up for the training is I was running the whole time. So I would get up and run 20, 25 miles with kid on at like 4am and then you know, do something else throughout the day. What I didn't work on was walking and that is we. You end up having to walk. Right. So.

[Brent Tucker]

Right.

[Unknown Speaker A]

I think I walked. We started off walking first. The first like 30 miles and that destroyed. It destroyed me. It destroyed my hips. It destroyed everything because I was so used to just keeping that nice jog pace which I wish I would have done just from the get go. So that is the. Probably the hardest part was getting up in the morning for the second day because we would sleep In a trailer for like a couple hours and then get up in my hip flexors and everything were just beat to. And it was just from walking.

[Brent Tucker]

It's such a. Well different all together but you know, the, the 40 miler. But yeah, that's done after a month of. Of getting your body broken down. But it's got to be somewhat similar. Like my body was broken for, you know, after selection and the amount. The equivalent of putting, you know, hundreds of miles on. You did it?

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

In a day. What was, what was. What was the. The recovery like?

[Unknown Speaker A]

Recovery sucked. I mean I wouldn't say it was just. I mean naturally, you know, I was 40 something at the time.

[Brent Tucker]

40 something.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah. And so the recovery took a lot longer. So I literally got done with that race in Wyoming, flew home the next day and I had to go work at the range. I was actually doing the selection process for Florida State guard. I was one of the cadre for that. So we went back the next day and I could not put my feet. Like no shoes would fit on my feet. So I was walking around in flip flops instructing and like this limp and my knee was beat to. So.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

And I'm not the. The brightest when it comes to recovery. I got. I just have. I mean like, I think some were just caveman tendencies. It's like I have to do something. So I didn't give my body adequate time either. I was like. I think I was running the next week but like hobbling running.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

And eventually, you know, you know, a little help of some peptides. I did, you know, BPC157. I got exosomes which is like a. They take. Since you can't get stem cells in the United States legally yet, they take these things exosomes out and it's almost. It works almost the same. So I had them put that in my. My knee that I had. So I started off the race with a tone rotator cuff as well because I was doing. My dumb ass was doing jiu jitsu and training for this at the same time. And I ended up separating my like rotator cuff. So I was doing PPC 157 before to try and heal that up. So it was just, you know, it's a cocktail of everything trying to get back. Get back on online.

[Brent Tucker]

Do yourself a favor, next time this comes up, call me and Tyler. We will have. We will have options for you.

[Unknown Speaker A]

All right, well, I think we're planning one. They're trying to plan one this year.

[Brent Tucker]

Music.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

What. What are they. What are they planning? They got to that the text thread.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Has started and I'm, you know, I'm like, dude, let's not do this. I think they will do. I think we're like a 50 mile ruck with like a, a mile swim. Okay. With some shooting involved now. So I was like, let's make it start, you know, Cool.

[Brent Tucker]

And, and here's. Here's what's funnier about that. Would, Would you listen from, from my side. This is what you guys have gone down to. You've gone down to a mile swim and now you guys think like, yeah, that's, that's doable. Everyone else is like, that's. Whoa, that's. You weren't here last year, man.

[Unknown Speaker A]

You know what? So what's funny is like, so doing that 210 miler obviously was to raise awareness for suicide. And while I was doing it, you're like, dude, how the. Like, same thing. How the is this raising? We're like, I'm putting myself through this pain. But what I realized and I had to give sort of a. They asked me to give a talk at the end of it to like, you know, say, you know, talk about the race and why we were doing it. And what I realized is at some points during that race I was by myself. Right? And you're. It's like one in the morning, you're going up these mountains in Montana, it's freezing and you getting. I was getting in my own head, right? That's when you're about. You're like, dude, everything hurts like, like and your body wants to stop. It's like your brain will come up with every excuse. But then I would catch up or another buddy would catch up with me and we'd be together. And that though none of those thoughts had crossed my mind, I was like, we were just laughing in pain, like laughing with each other, doing, you know, joking like we did back in buds and through the teams. And really that was the. When I, I was like, that's the point of this is like, we're not good. It's not good to suffer alone. It's like you need to have a swim buddy or a battle buddy or whatever you know, with you to be able to continue pressing forward no matter what, no matter how bad you're going through it. And like, that's what I got out of that whole, that whole race.

[Brent Tucker]

That's a really good takeaway.

[Tyler]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

I mean like, you're, you're absolutely right that things are so much different going through the Suck by yourself.

[Tyler]

Yeah. Like, if it's raining, like, with.

[Brent Tucker]

With. With your teammates, whether it be a, you know, you know, a bad deployment and take the. You know, take the infantry. Those guys are in the worst environment with the worst support with the worst equipment, and they're always having a good time. I say always having a good time. They're sucking together.

[Tyler]

That built that.

[Unknown Speaker A]

I think racing it together.

[Tyler]

That built the Marine Corps.

[Unknown Speaker A]

That is a Marine Corps in a nutshell.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

That's quite the event. I don't even want to drive that far. Oh, man.

[Brent Tucker]

Sorry.

[Tyler]

So a lot of people, it's not that they're not open or honest about it, but this is. I don't think it's talked about enough, and we're guilty of it, too. But you mentioned last night, I think on the live about, like, your faith and did that come about and during what you went through, or have you always been so.

[Unknown Speaker A]

I was raised. My dad was a strict Irish Catholic. You know, they grew up right outside of Boston. And so when I grown up, yeah, it was no matter where we were, because I. I grew up in Asia most of my childhood. My dad was in the army for 24 years, West Point grad. So.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Traveling around the world. No matter where we were, he would find a Catholic church, doesn't matter. And we would go. And, like, so I, you know, I did the whole altar boy thing every, you know, but then once I got out of the house, it was like, no, I'm done with all that. And it wasn't until, like, I had married my wife. That was like a. That was in the contract. She's like, you have to be a believer or else I can't, like, do this with you. Which I'm. Thank God she did. And so I. I was, you know, going to church with her and the kids, but I. I really wasn't 100 there. I mean, I still was like, I'm in control of my own destiny, just like us think, you know? And then obviously, when all that happened, I had a breakthrough when I was in a prison cell, when everything was taken away from me. That is when I completely just gave everything to Christ. And like, that. I literally had a physical transformation in there. And I. I've told this story numerous times on podcasts, and it's one that I'm never tired of telling because it's the absolute truth. There is no drug, no psychedelic, no whatever treatment out there that can compare to the. The physical feeling that I had when I finally released everything to him. I was like, dude, you're in control. Whatever is destined to be. I'm, I'm. I have complete faith.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

So that, that really transformed me. And then obviously when I got out of everything, you know, you get out of pr. Well, one, you get out of prison and you're back into society. And so society is constantly trying to distract you from that, like, pull you away from faith. So for the first year or two after I got out, I was struggling, you know, just with everything that I was going through. And then the whole transition out and I sort of had veered away. I was, I was seeking treatments elsewhere. You know, I did the whole ibogaine. I did all that stuff. And all that I will say does help, it nudges you in the right direction. But it wasn't until I really, about two years ago, I buckled down. I was like, I am making it a point. Every morning when I get up, I spend a half hour with God, talk to him, and I ask him to just get me through each day. And dude, I haven't had, like, it's been, you know, up, up and up since then. I haven't had any real issues, you know, like, you still will, but you have the. You have him back in you, and you can feel that. Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah, I almost said it. And I stopped myself from saying it because I remembered how much I hate this saying, which is, you know, when you're at your lowest and you're on your back, you got nowhere else to look but up. But that's just not true because we've, we all have friends and, you know, in the, and the professions that, that all three of us worked in or work in that. That they get to their lowest. And one option is to look up. But some people, you can still look to your right or left at people and, and, and join with people who are in the suck with you, but not look up. Hey, they're. They're in this horrible situation. Their life isn't going well either. So let's not, let's, let's not really get advice from them. They're in the same situation as you.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

Or some people grab a shovel and just keep on digging.

[Unknown Speaker A]

You know, I did that for a long time. It's. I mean, I think most of us do that while we're in. Yeah, we don't know we're doing it right. But.

[Brent Tucker]

And that. Yeah, exactly. That's a hindsight thing. Like, at the time, it, for some reason, it feels like a good option. Or, or an option. Yeah. But every time you look back, you're like, why, why. Why do we do this?

[Tyler]

Because you said, like, when you think you're. When you Essentially, when you think, like, you're like, I'm the shit, right?

[Brent Tucker]

You're.

[Tyler]

Everything's going well, and then, you know, it comes crashing down. But I can't remember the terminology you just used. But, like, when you're. That when you're looking in yourself and you're, like, looking at yourself as, like, the highest. Yeah, right. Like, and you don't put Christ first. That's when.

[Unknown Speaker A]

When you hit your lows, you're like, oh, well, especially. And I think most of us, when we're in, no matter what branch or especially with the special operations, right, that becomes your identity, no matter which one you go to, man, because you have that belief system. And you. You sacrifice so much to get to where you are. You're like, this is what I am. This is what I worship. And my wife had always told me, she's like, you hold that trident up as an idol. Like, you hold the teams up as an idol while I was in. And I would always look at her like, you don't. You know, I did. You know, that was the number one thing in my life. And like, you said that that worked while you're there and while you're around it. But once that's all stripped from you, then you're like, dude, I have nothing.

[Brent Tucker]

So we talked about this last night, and I'm not saying this is what. What you meant by it. Just want to make sure people don't take it this way. When. When you're in the SEAL teams, when you're a Green Beret, when you're on a SWAT team, when. When you're a cop, I don't care what it is you do that is your identity.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

They almost want to say, to take it with a grain of salt. It should be. It should be everything about you. Because all those professions are professions that deal with life and death. Your life and your death, your teammates lives, your teammates deaths. And in the cop world, civilians lives and death. And if that's not your identity and that's not what you, you know, sleep, eat and breathe, then you are not a true profession of your trade.

[Unknown Speaker A]

And that's the just position. Whatever. It's like you. You want to go back and talk to these younger guys that are going through and sort of like, pass on the knowledge that, you know, especially that. And you're like, hey, man, don't make this. Don't make this your whole Life. But at the. As I catch myself, like, thinking that wanted to say to them, I'm like, there's no other option. Like, especially in that. Those types of jobs, like, dude, it has to be, otherwise don't come here.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah. You know, and now I'm not saying, obviously, when you get out that you're going to have to change gears. Yes, we have to change gears. Is, is, is when you get out.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yes.

[Brent Tucker]

And. But Iraq left, like, we're gonna keep, we're gonna, it's gonna circle back to the same lessons. I luckily did this. I was not smart enough to do this. When I was getting out. I reached out to teammates that were out and I said, hey, like, what. What do you do now? Like, you know, how'd you deal with this? What'd you do wrong? What'd you do right? I talked to four or five guys and I got, I got really good advice, you know, from those guys. So, like, anything else, don't even retire by yourself. That's dangerous.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Oh, yeah.

[Tyler]

The basic things, like, do you pay for your own insurance?

[Unknown Speaker A]

Well, yeah, it's. And this is the way I describe it to my friends now that are getting out or about to get out. I'm like, dude, just realize, like, it's a whole nother selection process you're gonna about to go through now, and that's the way you sort of have to go into it. I'm like, you have to use the site the same, like, drive, grit, determination that you put into becoming whatever your profession is. You're gonna have to put that same amount when you get out to sort of reinvent yourself or just, you know, get out of that transition phase. That's, that's tough. And I was like, it's not easy. And I think that's the, the military doesn't do a very good job or maybe in the special operations community too, like, they don't prep guys. They're just like, hey, here's your taps. And like, go be. You know, you can get a management job here and see ya. And it's like, no, you need to prep them to realize, like, you're about to go through some mental, mental problems, emotional problems. It's. It's going to happen at some point. And here's like a buffet of things that you can do to mitigate those.

[Brent Tucker]

Ironically enough, when I got out, I didn't go into a normal, like, office job where, where everything is structured again and it's nine to five. I mean, my life was pretty structured. I mean, yes, it was big Boy rules. But I had to be certain places at certain times. Like as I got a job as a program manager that essentially worked from home. And oddly enough, like, the biggest thing that was not good at was time management. I know. And when I say that, just things. Yeah. Your kids can just walk in, you're. You're working from home. But I'm not. But even when you work from. I'm not really home. You just can't come in, say, you know, ask me a question. You know, we can, you know, I mean, but then as a dad, like, oh, well, I'm going to fix this. So then you get up and then you get, you know, you get taken away, then you sit back down, you're like, oh, where, where was I?

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

And it took me way too long to finish what, what, what I should have finished in much short amount of time. Like, it, it took me a little bit to, you know, honestly, with no oversight, no. No structure, to be like, hey, I. I have to protect my own time now. And that took a little bit.

[Tyler]

Be honest with you, with the, and going back to the culture thing. That's the, the catch 22 about building a culture is that when you are building it and you have a lot of young minds staring straight at you, you can't go, but don't make this. This isn't your family. These guys will not have your back. You can't. That cynical approach, that's not, it's realist. But when you're trying to build a culture of, I mean, warrior, you know.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah. Warrior class or whatever. Yeah. Whatever you're doing, I mean, you can't. No. And that's. That's one thing. Like, does it happen? Obviously, yes. Do, do dudes turn on you or does the institution that you work for going to let you down from time to time? Yeah, it will. But at the end of the day, man, it's like you chose to volunteer to be a part of that institution to do that job, and you owe it to this country to give 110 each and every day. And you do need to make that your lifestyle. You do need to make that profession everything and otherwise than go seek employment elsewhere. Yeah, it's. We, we can't have you next to us.

[Brent Tucker]

And that's. I'd say that that's an ironic point you bring up. That's. That's absolutely true. We just got telling people you have to be all in or you're not a professional. And then in a weird way, gosh, I don't even know how to how I. I can. I can much easier say this in hindsight than what I would tell to a young person, because you can't. I don't think you can mentally live in both worlds. Either have to be all in or you have to be a little cynical. But. But. But you. But you can't be both. But you're absolutely right. No matter how big, you know, the organization is, how great of an organization is, it can be the organization I came from. At the end of the day, that organization will protect itself.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yep.

[Brent Tucker]

And they will push you to the curb so fast, it'll make your head spin, even though you gave your life and your friends literally gave their life to it. And it'll. It'll rock your world. I don't have to tell that story to anyone, you know, sitting here. And I don't. And in a weird way, I don't. I don't think you can let them in on that part. But are you doing a disservice by not letting them in? That's a. That's a quandary, right?

[Unknown Speaker A]

It is. It's a hard thing to. To deal with. And, you know, especially when you're trying to mentor these younger dudes now, like, because I'll have guys reach out that are brand new in the teams, and I'll talk to them and, yeah, I can't. I won't ever tell them, like, don't take the teams too seriously.

[Brent Tucker]

Right.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Make sure you're, like, focusing on your own life and you're. You're doing this and this. I'm like, no, dude, like, if you want to be the best, which you should, is a mindset, you have to make that the priority. The teams will always come first. Yeah, it doesn't. It doesn't matter. I mean, my, you know, my wife, God bless her, dude, she. She understood that. It's not like she liked it, but she would tell me. She's like, oh, we know. We. We know we come second. And that's like, as a husband and father, that's hard to hear.

[Tyler]

Is that a dig at me?

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah, it's also a. A little punch of truth. You're like, yep, that's. You're correct. You know?

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah. And. But it's so true. Like, you have to know what. What you signed up for. I mean, in the essence, that they said, hey, no one's. No one's making you stay here. Like, it doesn't matter whether. It doesn't matter whether you're a cop. Doesn't matter if you're A Navy seal, no one's making you stay there. And yes, there are those bad parts about it, but if you really think about the good parts. Oh, is it worth it? Yeah.

[Tyler]

It's really hard to, like, put into words, but I need to know that If I give 110 straight and I'm going to somewhere, I need to know that everybody else, whether they make it there or not, is doing the same thing. Because if I start looking back and I'm in some kind of community or on a team where I'm the only one doing that and everybody else is like, I'm not doing that, then you go, well, then that I'm not doing that. And then that whole, that whole built mindset for whatever element or team that is is now useless.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah, I, I talk about it all the time, and I wasn't the one that came up with it. Someone, again, someone much smarter than me, it was a sergeant major at the unit was. Was just really preaching culture, culture, culture, culture, culture. And I was like, this is a really weird, you know, soapbox for him to be on, because this place is the best culture that I've, I've, I've ever been at. And then when I got out and I looked back, I really saw the brilliance. And him preaching culture because of this culture is the hardest thing to get. It's the hardest thing to get. Right. It's the hardest thing to do. It really is. And it's the easiest thing to lose. You can lose a good culture so fast, and it's so hard to turn around a bad culture. So even though our culture was good, we had to protect that culture to ensure that. And so what you're talking about, when you're the only one doing things right, no one else is really taking their job serious. That's. That's a bad culture. And they will bring everyone else now.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

And the other ironic thing about culture, though, is it's free. Like, at any point, it's a mint. It's literally a mental choice. Everyone, the next day, day could come into work and be like, you know what? We're not doing this anymore. This is the culture we want here. This is the standards we're going to pull. We're doing it. They just, they just don't. Yes, it's, It's. It's the hardest thing. It's the hardest thing. And I, and I preach culture all the time. When I walk into to train a SWAT team, almost immediately, one of the first things I can within just a couple hours assess is the Culture of that SWAT team and just by the way they interact with each other, the mood, the way juniors talk to seniors and back and forth. I can almost tell you now how they're gonna act in the house. Whether. And I've never even seen them act. Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Oh, I. I get that completely. Yeah. That's the one thing. When we go train, you know, I go train law enforcement or SWAT teams or whatever, I do, I ask them those questions just like, hey, do you guys. What's your guys routine when you're not training? What are you guys doing on your off time? Like, together. Are you guys working out together in the morning or doing, like, doing things to build camaraderie while you're not training? And then when you start training, I'm like, that is. That's culture. That's how it starts forming. You guys start becoming a tighter unit. And I just. I. I don't see it a lot in the. The law enforcement community because you. What I. What I find is there's always a batch when we show up that are like, we talked about, like, the fanatics. Right? They. They're all in.

[Tyler]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

They're like, dude, I want to train this. And most of them are the ones that hired us. Like, they're the ones who brought us out there.

[Tyler]

Yep.

[Brent Tucker]

Yes.

[Tyler]

And then there was the ones that did it.

[Unknown Speaker A]

And you have the rest of the guys like, oh, my guys are here.

[Tyler]

We're gonna have to change this.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah. And you can tell they were mandated to come to the training, and they're just like, like, all right, this is a nine to five. And that's where I'm like, dude, it's not a nine to five, bro. Like, this is a lifestyle. Like, this is what your guys profession is, and you should want to be here. You should want to be getting better, you know, and that's. I've seen that more times than not. Like, there's always. It seems like there's just a smaller group that wants it, and then they're dragging along everybody else.

[Tyler]

Brent says every team needs to find the lowest one and cut them, and then everybody else will shape up.

[Unknown Speaker A]

That's. Well, there's that so true.

[Brent Tucker]

The as. As you, you know, transitioned and. And trained law enforcement. And I know it's. I'll say this is. It's a small portion of people. There's a small portion of people. And maybe it's just. They're getting tired of seeing it maybe of special operations guys training law enforcement. And in a weird way, I kind of understand it in a weird because they're like, you know, these outsiders are coming in and they're trying to train us. They don't understand us. And there's a little bit of pushback. That's really, it's, it's, it's an uneducated thing because there's so much crossover and I'm really talking about tactical teams is what. You know, so much crossover in tactical teams. And, and there's so much of the height of the G WAT which we were both in. Like, we got actual gunfighter experience. Like, we're not just telling you, hey, we're not just saying this is what we learned from the team, from, from the, from the schoolhouse and telling you what you learned at the schoolhouse. Because if you really think about it, those cops more operational and have more real world experience. And, and one side of the argument that most special operations guys did before the G WAT or at the tail end of the G what? Law enforcement teams are very operational. The biggest difference is that they don't get opposed a whole lot the way that we got opposed. So even though we have less missions, we'll call missions under our belt than most SWAT teams, we SWAT teams of.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Hundreds and oh yeah, they're doing hits all the time.

[Brent Tucker]

But, but the ones that we get opposed of is where we learn like, all of the hard lessons learned that turn the schoolhouse tactics into real lessons that we get to, to take over to them. So I'm a big proponent that guys like us should teach them and, and train them from the, just from the, from, from our experiences.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yes.

[Brent Tucker]

We're not trying to turn them into mini Navy SEALs.

[Unknown Speaker A]

No, I know. And you're not trying, I'm not trying to, you know, when we go train them, we're not trying to dictate like, hey, this is the way you will do it because this is the way we did it.

[Brent Tucker]

Right?

[Unknown Speaker A]

It's like, here's the way we did it. Here's some lessons learned that we did. You should be able to pick little things out of there. And the big thing I, I when we're training them, especially with cqc, is like, there's ways to do your job where you can mitigate risks to yourself and your buddies and still complete the same task. And that is what I, we really want to bring to them, like using the space that you have, using the angles and distance in the house, making the correct tactical calls, but also like, hey, man, build the younger guys up as leaders as well. And I think that is missing a lot of the times we talked about it last night, you know, there's usually a. A TL and maybe one other guy that is literally making all the calls and everyone else is just a sheep in line waiting. And it's like, that is something that needs to be broken as well. You want thinking shooters. The only way that you're going to be able to do that is apply that pressure to them, show them why you are putting these things out, and then put them in positions where they have to make decisions.

[Brent Tucker]

As a new guy, I think some of the. And really what we're talking about now is, which kind of want to transition to. Is like, what you think. What are the major differences between. Even though I just said in cqc, clearing, clearinghouses and. And hostage rescue are so similar, whether it's law enforcement or military, it. It just is so, so similar. Yet when you go do these things, there are drastic differences just between the culture of the two elements. And that's kind of what we're talking about now, and we'll talk about that more. But to your point, those one or two guys are making all the decisions in the house. What, what I'm trying to get them to understand is at the end of the day, you should want to push this down to the lower level because everything is riding on you and things inside the house move so fast, and decisions need to be made so quick, and the right decision has to be made so quick. You can't control that. Like, you want to give. Yeah, that, that, that freedom down to those guys. It'll make your job easier.

[Tyler]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

And it's. It's hard getting that, that point across to them.

[Unknown Speaker A]

It is. And I think, you know, to be fair to them as well, is they don't get the amount of training that they need. So for them to sort of let the reins go on these guys, I understand why they're like, well, these guys don't know what they're doing.

[Brent Tucker]

Right. I have to see that.

[Unknown Speaker A]

And that's where it's like when we talk to them, like, well, that's on you as a leader. I'm like, you have to build them up to where then you can release those responsibilities and take some off your plate. And now you can focus up and out a little bit more rather than down and in and constantly in the weeds. Like, you should have guys that you're confident in to make decisions. And all they have to do is, you know, overcomes, like just at a critical decision point, like, hey, we're holding left, pushing. Right. Cool. Great. I know what's going on, but that's. That comes down to training and that comes down to the amount of time they put into it.

[Tyler]

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[Unknown Speaker A]

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[Tyler]

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[Unknown Speaker A]

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[Brent Tucker]

Even polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons.

[Tyler]

Some of the same chemicals found in.

[Brent Tucker]

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[Unknown Speaker A]

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[Tyler]

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[Brent Tucker]

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[Unknown Speaker A]

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[Brent Tucker]

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[Unknown Speaker A]

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[Tyler]

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[Unknown Speaker A]

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[Tyler]

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[Brent Tucker]

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[Tyler]

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[Brent Tucker]

Whether it's the first, second, third, I'll probably say it's probably took because we haven't necessarily talked about this but I already know the experiences are the same. Whether it's the first time you trained a SWAT team, probably up to I'm going to guess the fifth, the 10th time you figured it out and adjusted to it. What was the biggest difference when you came here and you know when you went to train them? You go to train, have you trained military units since you got out as well? A couple and those are easy day because we come from those units. So I know exactly how to set up the training. I know exactly what they're supposed to do. I know how to set up a scenario to be like okay, go. So but when it comes to law enforcement, I didn't necessarily. Even though I just said everything in the house is the same.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

Do you remember what at the beginning you like that you had to figure out that you're like okay, this is different. It's law enforcement like that. You had to kind of learn to apply the same lessons to them to get them to to that point. Talking around it a little bit. But if I'm not describing right, I'll just get right to it.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah, go ahead.

[Brent Tucker]

Sure. Yeah. Where we'd set up like okay we'll go now go hit the house and set up a cold hit and there and but if we're talking like a full mission profile type thing, they'll look at me like well why are we hitting this house? I was like well there's a bad guy inside. That's all it takes for. That's all it takes for the military to get to go hit a house. Now. They have a lot of. I'm not talking inside the house. Inside the house. The legalities and everything we do inside the house are really the same because we don't go and just murder unarmed people.

[Unknown Speaker A]

And that's what I think. A lot of them think that we.

[Brent Tucker]

Do that all the time.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

But the difference is the leg is the legalities outside the house. And they're like, okay, well, why are we going in the house? Well, there's a bad guy in the house. Like, well, there are several steps. Like, there's something that has to happen to force us into the house. Just can't be a bad guy in the house. So I'm like, oh, okay. I had to, like, learn.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

Say, okay, it's a hostage rescue. Just go rescue the hostage. Like, well, we can't do that. Like, he has to be making an active threat right now or some sort of countdown to release us to go into the house. I'm like, okay. And so I had to reset up the scenario to make sure that they knew, hey, he is now talking about taking the hostage's life. And. And they're going to send you in, like, things like that. Or they'd say, well, we just sit out there and gas them. Like, okay, well, you've gassed him now. He hasn't come out. Now what? Like, oh, we sit in the robot. Let's sit in the robot. Okay, well, we sit on the robot and nothing happened. And now you got to go get them. Like, you really had to.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Like, it's like, listen, you will enter this house eventually.

[Tyler]

Let's just get to that point.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah. And some of them. Some. And again, we're not bashing by any means. We're just making a little bit light of them. Some will sit and. Because a lot of times that's all it takes. And they do come out and I have to go, hey, listen, I know at some point you're gonna have to go in that house. I see it on social media all the time. Like, I. We break down videos of. Of tactical teams entering the house. Like, so you tell me what is going to take for you to get in this house? Because at some point in your job, you're going to hit this house. So let's get there.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah, I think. I mean, I ran into those, you know, because they. They have all these stipulations of, you know, when they can enter and, like, do all those things. And I don't get when we're we're training. I'm like, I don't want to get into the weeds on that, dude. That is your guys thing that you have to deal with. What I am here to show you is when you do have to enter the house, here are some things that you can, you know, do to mitigate risk to yourself and to your. Your teammates. And here's. Here's a proper way that you can clear this. I'm not dictating this is the way that you should do it, but as we're going through this training, take mental notes like, oh, I like the way this, you know, he showed this. Or I like the way we took this barricade instead of, you know, the other way. And at the end of the day, that's. That's all I really want to do, you know. And you're not. Yeah. You're not building a Delta Force team or a CAG team, you know, or a dev group team out of law enforcement. No. And we're not trying to.

[Brent Tucker]

Right.

[Unknown Speaker A]

It's like we are literally just trying to pass on knowledge that we learned in blood over the past 20 years. And it's like, do I. What do I do? Just keep this knowledge and be like, well, that's it, like. Or do I will pass it on to the one. One group that I know is doing the work on a daily basis, and that's law enforcement. And I'm like, for sure that's. And there shouldn't be. I understand why there's some pushback from law enforcement on it, you know, because there are a lot of people out there teaching.

[Brent Tucker]

Some watch shouldn't be doing it.

[Unknown Speaker A]

That shouldn't be doing it. And you know, you see them on YouTube and wherever else, but once you. They find like a good professional group of instructors that's like, hey, man, this. We're literally here just trying to help you out. It's like, you should probably stick with that and build a base.

[Brent Tucker]

My favorite thing to do. You already touched on it because it literally, it's almost like a copy and paste. Everywhere I go, the, the few, like, really good guys, they're the ones who brought you here. Yeah, they're really excited, you know, that you're here and then you have. And usually it's some senior guys that weren't real excited about things.

[Tyler]

Things might change.

[Brent Tucker]

Things might change. It's the way we always did it. But really, when you come in with the mentality already talking about, with the experience that you have, my favorite thing to do is win those guys over by by the end of training. Yeah, it happens every time. I don't know if. And you can pick them out. They're the ones asking, you know, the questions. The questions.

[Tyler]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

And the way it's, you know, what about this? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. They're the what if guys. But. But because we have experience, we have answers to all those at some point by then you break them down and that's my favorite thing to do, actually. They end up being really good dudes.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah. If you, if you are instructed, man, you should be able to explain the why to everything that you're putting out, and that's what gets through. It's like, I can. Yeah, I can show you. But if I'm not telling you the why, then. Yeah, what then you're not really learning. Right. And so, I mean, that's, that's also a huge thing. So I mean, for like, law enforcement units that are out there getting training by, who knows? Like, if they're not able to explain the why and what they're doing and they're just having you do it just because I'm like, you better be wary.

[Brent Tucker]

This is, this is what they don't understand. One why. The. The why is always so important, is in cqb, it only takes one variable, and it could easily be a different tactic. So if I just tell you the what to do when you see the situation, you're not going to see the same exact situation again, like, more than likely, like the same exact, exact situation. So if one thing changes, if you don't understand the why behind it, you won't know the right tactic to choose. Because. Because you just throw on this answer against everything that looks like it and only takes one variable.

[Tyler]

Calculus. If you change something and you don't understand the theory of calculus, you're not going to know how to follow the problem.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah, exactly. It just takes one. Take the parentheses off this letter, which should never be in math anyway. But that's a whole nother that gets me. Then it's. Yeah, it's a completely different way you go about it. That's. That's a really. It's a really good example. And I say this all the. So you could be a simple. It's so simple. It can be.

[Unknown Speaker A]

It can be.

[Tyler]

No, no. It gets over. Complicated sometimes, I think by people. I mean it. And then by the time an element learns it, they change it again. And they're changing. Not the simple parts of it that always stay, but the more advanced that's, you know, that's.

[Brent Tucker]

That's a good point. That's, that's something I understand. Some of the, the weariness I feel like, of them bringing in outside structures is this. And I get this. There's so many people that will come in and tell them something different at some point. These teams are looking for the right answers.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

I think they get tired of changing things. Like, oh, well, the last, the last guy you brought in, like, said, like, this was right and we, and we conformed to that and now we got to do it this way and I got to do it that way. Like, we just, just give us a way to do it. And the answer to that is, we already talked about it is we're actually the good guys. We're not coming in here and telling you do it this way.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

We're saying this is the way we do it. Cherry pick what, what's best for you and you'll figure it out. But so many guys, as soon as someone comes in and tells you this is how you should be doing business, probably not. The guy should have it.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

Be careful because I wasn't a cop. So I'm not going to tell you exactly how to do this.

[Tyler]

What do you guys like with the. I'm kind of a joke, but it's not really with the pacification of law enforcement. We were talking about how at work, you know, like, if, like if I was a defense attorney and you know, the pushback that the police would get in general when, you know, if you, if you smoke some kid in their house and their family suing, which is gonna happen.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Tyler]

No matter what, you know, would the defense attorney be able to go and say, hey, you, my client was, was murdered by people who were trained by professional killers overseas. And, and like I said, all you got to do is sway a jury.

[Brent Tucker]

Right.

[Tyler]

Like, all you have to do is sway people that really don't know. And if you. Some people are so wet behind the ears that they're like, oh my God, that's so true. Seals in Delta Force kill people. And now they teach our, our police officers here at home.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah. I mean, I can definitely see that happening.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

You know, that's especially if you got a power hungry prosecutor and he's, yeah, he's going to pull everything he can. And I've actually had that, that similar thing I was telling you guys happen where, you know, I trained. We put on two days of training with Tallahassee pd. The dudes loved it. It was like they wanted to come back. But then we took a picture together and then an article came out like, oh, you know, Tallahassee PD trained by, you know, war criminal or whatever. And that's just, I mean, obviously specific to me, but they can have, like, they will use that and the media.

[Tyler]

Will use it, and they can't. And they, and they bow and all it takes. We see him here in Florida, the sheriff going like this, puffing on cigar, going, yeah, they train my SWAT team. So next question. Like, my SWAT teams is meant to save lives, but if they have to, they will take lives. And I want them taking lives. Trained by the best people.

[Brent Tucker]

Right. Now, to be honest, I think that's, I hate to say, I just said, to be honest, I'm trying not to use that. Yeah. So let me get ahead of that. Before, Before I meant to tell you.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Why don't you try telling the truth from the get go?

[Brent Tucker]

What were you gonna say?

[Tyler]

No, I can't tell you yet.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay.

[Tyler]

I'll say offline.

[Brent Tucker]

Is that, that actually would be a, a brilliant defense. I mean, that's, that's what they got. And that's, you know, I always give a tip of the hat to, you know, people. I respect a good adversary. And that's, yeah, that's, that's, in a weird way, that's where they should go. That's, that's their best, that's their best defense. But, you know, the, the truth is the, that training isn't what's on trial. What those police officers did in the house and did they follow protocol and what the actions, taking the correct actions. Oh, they were. Well, then the training must have been good training because. Because the law enforcement guys didn't do anything wrong.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

And that's, you know, and that's, that's what, that's what you push back.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Oh, for sure. I mean, there's an answer to it.

[Brent Tucker]

For sure.

[Unknown Speaker A]

If you got a good attorney, he's going to have an answer to it.

[Brent Tucker]

It took me a second because at first, like, that's, that's really good. Like, what, what do you say to that?

[Unknown Speaker A]

Oh, it is, but. And that's what it comes down to at the end of the day. And as like, you know, we deal with this all the time through our foundation when we're helping law enforcement. I mean, what it comes down to is like, especially if, okay, so if we're deciding, hey, do we want to take this case on in this campaign, we, we get together, we have discussions, and what it comes. It's like, did this individual do exactly what he was trained to do? And if that's then. Yeah. Then we are going to support him. Right. He didn't do anything. Wazoo off the books, didn't go off on his own. It's like. And then he. Once he gets cleared, especially if he's cleared by his department, it's like, dude, okay.

[Tyler]

Yeah, right.

[Unknown Speaker A]

We are supporting this individual, man. Like, he didn't do anything wrong. And you just have to know going into it. Yeah. They're going to try and demonize you in every way possible. And that will, you know, even including the training that you got, they'll. They'll throw spaghetti at the wall. Something's gonna stick, you know, especially in.

[Tyler]

A civil case because a cop could be cleared all day long by the agency, by the state, you know, by the. Even by the prosecutor. If you got a good prosecutor. Yeah. We see nothing wrong with this. But then we've talked about time and time again, they'll pay out still. They'll find a problem with it and.

[Brent Tucker]

They'Ll pay that so much. I hate that so much. It's insanity to me. If, if the cops have proven to do nothing criminal by their. By their own department and we're not going to bring charges up against the. The police officer because he did nothing criminal, how can you have a civil case.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

Which is wrongful death. It can't be wrongful if no one did anything wrong. But we see. I don't know who set that precedence, but I hate it.

[Unknown Speaker A]

What's crazy is in that cop some units while they're being investigated, like, even though they're in the right, they'll get. Sit on timeout for two weeks sometimes.

[Tyler]

Like without pay because it's murder charges.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah. While they're getting cleared. You know, eventually. But they're giving money to the family.

[Tyler]

Yes.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Like, it's like, dude, that money should be going to that cop who did his job.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Tyler]

Whose wife is now having to support.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

How about give him a bonus.

[Tyler]

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

[Unknown Speaker A]

I mean, Florida promote that man. He's got some clout now. He's got a kill under his belt.

[Tyler]

Street cred.

[Brent Tucker]

You remember when it is, you're gonna say, you're like, not yet. Is it. Is it.

[Tyler]

That's it. Okay. When I. It's like the best podcast.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay.

[Tyler]

To be honest with you.

[Brent Tucker]

All right. Yeah.

[Tyler]

Like, when I'm gonna sell it somebody. I'm gonna give you. I'll give you.

[Brent Tucker]

Oh, okay. Okay.

[Tyler]

Someone's gonna listen because that's my podcast.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay, fair enough. Fair enough. The what where the where the idea come for the for the foundation. And I know maybe I say maybe didn't even cross your mind of like, ah, it's kind of cliche to do another foundation thing, but like, they're like, we're going to do this. This is how we're going to be different. And what were your lessons learned about starting a foundation?

[Unknown Speaker A]

So there's two reasons we started the foundation. One, obviously with what, what we went through. When I was in the brig, I was, you know, talking to all these 19, 20 year olds that were in there that literally, you know, made a mistake, you know, showed up late to formation, maybe popped on a piss test, but they're serving like five years and their lives are your, you know, your life's ruined after that because it's on your permanent record. So I was like, you know, telling Andrea this. I'm like, this is insane. This whole system is insane. And so we decided we're like, we need to do something, you know, about especially because we were going through the same corrupt system. We're like, we, you know, we should start something to where we help active duty military members because we were able to pull through it. So we need to pass that on. Well, the other factor is while I was going through all that, there was an organization called United American Patriots, a nonprofit. It's still out there and exists. So be wary if they approach you. But they, I approached them once I got found out I was getting investigated because my buddy was with them and he was getting investigated too for similar things. And so they were like, yeah, we'll, we'll take your case on. Like you don't pay a dime. But they provided lawyers. They're like, the lawyers were on the board. What we uncovered going through all that mess, what my wife uncovered is that was a corrupt non profit where they were using my, my face, my name, like, hey, donate to this. You know, they were only giving 5% back of what they were getting.

[Brent Tucker]

5.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Oh my goodness, yes. And so then they started calling my wife and extorting her because there was another non profit that raised money, the Navy Seals fund. And they're like, you need to give us that money or else we're not going to represent you, your husband properly. And so we ended up firing, I ended up firing those lawyers probably two months before my trial. What that was like when everything became uncovered of all how corrupt. So that is another reason we're like, we need to start this non profit and actually do the job that they were supposed to be doing.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

And so what we. The only thing that we don't do that's is we don't provide lawyers because that's where it gets very incestuous. And like, okay, like these lawyers are literally on that board just making money and they don't give a how long you sit in prison. So that those are the two main reasons we started it. So one, we got approved I think in 2019 or maybe beginning of 2020, right after I got out. I think the. And I think the last part of your question was like some lessons learned from starting the nonprofit. Yeah, you need to have a first I'll say this. I. We have my wife and Dina Cruden who's our executive director. They both are like organizational pit bulls, dude. Like once they get something, they're on it. Right. So you need to have people like that as part of the board who are willing to like go out of their way to put in the time and put in the work that needs to be done. And you need to have a. Obviously a good board. And I guess the number. There's a correct number to have on the board, which I still don't know to this day makes. But our executive director knows all that. I think the biggest lesson learned is, and we're still to this day is like you literally have to go out of your way to stay above board. There are so many opportunities when you run a non profit to sort of go down a slippery path because you get offered this and this or hey, why don't you guys do this and we'll, we'll funnel money through here and give it to you. It's like, nope, we, we go out of our way to like stay clean and stay above board. One, because we knew because when obviously the Biden administration was in is when our nonprofit started. And we're like, if there's anybody going to get audited, it's probably going to be us at some point. So we need to make sure everything is clean. And then I think the other lesson learned is just, you know, the. Well, just for our non profit in general is I, you want to help everybody that that's, you know, fills out a grant. But you really do have to take your time and make sure that the individual that you're helping deserves, deserves that help. And we, and not saying that we have that hasn't happened to us. You know, I think there's only like one individual that we helped that we were like, all right. But the one thing that I will say though, once we help you, I don't care how jacked up you are we're staying with you.

[Brent Tucker]

This is, it's just, it's just nature of the beast. The people usually, unless their backs really against the wall, the people who need the help the most won't ask for it. And the people who need the help the least will scream the most for it.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yes.

[Brent Tucker]

And it's.

[Tyler]

Yeah, that's hard.

[Brent Tucker]

It. Yeah. And it's. And it's really hard. We've had it here at the podcast when we help people and usually the, the only way kind of around that are when friends ask on behalf of their friend and it's like that happens. He won't. He'd never ask. But let me tell you, this guy needs help. And anytime, almost every time that happens, that's, that's usually a worthy cause because someone's willing to put their name on the line.

[Tyler]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

For their friend and reach out to you. And that's usually a good indicator.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah. It's like a good voucher, you know.

[Brent Tucker]

Right. Yeah. You're gonna look into it. But almost immediately it's, it's, it's.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah. And it's a good one, I'll tell you. And then, you know, shout out to you guys too, like, and I mean with what you guys, you guys have law enforcement on and tell those stories. I mean, and that's how we, we ended up supporting Sal.

[Tyler]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Is here in. You have his. You had his mom on. And I mean that's, that's another thing is like not everybody knows about our non profit. So, you know, I'll scour sometimes and look and like listen to podcasts like, oh, what's this about? And as soon as, like I hear a story like that one, it's like, dude, have them reach out, fill out a grant.

[Brent Tucker]

How do you, how do you guys raise money for the non profit? Because it's everyone one. If you're starting on profit, it's got to get funded.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

And no one wants to ask for money. But you know, it's not all about money, but it's all about money. You can't help.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Money is a necessity.

[Brent Tucker]

You can't help anyone without money.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

How'd you guys, you know, get a. Was that something you guys kind of had to figure out? Is that something you already had figured out? Say we have, we have this. How do you guys, how do you guys raise money?

[Unknown Speaker A]

So when we started out, we pretty much used what my wife did for me, so we would take on somebody to help and we would start a campaign right then. And everything was very reactionary based it was like donate now. And a lot of the times, like people would, you know, we had enough followers that people were donating and they thought it was a worthy cause. And then eventually, actually just last year we threw our first fundraiser down up in the Panhandle, which we're throwing one this September. I'll. If you guys can make it out, that'd be awesome. We do a whole like day on the range dinner and everything. But that was our first fundraiser we had last year. Was a good turnout, Jim. You know, we had a lot of good auction items. And so I think this one this year is going to be even bigger. So, you know, that's the other way we raise money. But I, and then people can go on to our site and you can see everybody that we're supporting their story and everything. So if you feel compelled, it's like cool, I want to donate to this person since you know, while they're going through this. Or you can just donate to the non profit in general and that money's going right to.

[Brent Tucker]

You know, there's a couple things I wanted to spell about non profits and they actually go at, at odds with each other. One, there's some cynical people out there and understand why not all non profits are bad.

[Unknown Speaker A]

No, not all of them.

[Brent Tucker]

There's a lot of good non profits out here. The other flip side of that is, oh, it's a non profit. Not all non profits are good and.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Not all non profits are non profits for profits.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah, for sure. That, that being in the non profit world really opened up my eyes to that and something. And this is, this is something. That's, that a view of mine that's changed since doing it. I used to have this maybe you call like an altruistic view. That is, that is just wrong. And I was like, well, hey, if you're getting paid like if you have, if you're getting paid as a non profit like all the, all the donations like should go to the cause and some, and some people will have that. Maybe that's why they think, hey, like they look at that and they'd be like, oh well, you know, you, then if it's, if someone's making money then it's, it's not a good one. People do not understand the amount of time, energy and effort it takes to keep that thing going. And, and here's what's always ironic about it. The people that have that opinion and, and stay on that opinion is you wouldn't do anything for free. You know, and I'm not. And it's not like do something for free. I don't know. It's not the best way to say it.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah, I got.

[Brent Tucker]

But like you want someone to, to put in 40, 50 hours, you know, a week to make sure that everything is done right. The government has a lot of restrictions and things that you have to do. Right. Between the money, between the cause, between the follow ups, there's a lot of work to be done. Unless you're rich.

[Tyler]

Well that.

[Brent Tucker]

Or that it's necessities what I'm saying.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Well, it's a necessity if you want to get. So for our non profit in general. Like you're in specific. Like if you want us to support you in the best way that we can. Yeah. Like some people are taking a paycheck because we have to pay the marketing team or like a marketing person, you know, social media person. Like all that stuff matters because that is what's pumping out the information of the person that we're helping. Right. And we had started off where nobody was taking a paycheck and that we were fine with it. It was like this is what same same view.

[Brent Tucker]

That's how it should start doing it. So that's how it should start out.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah. And it was like, hey, we're gonna put in the work. But it wasn't until we paid. The only person that was paid was our executive director, Dina because she ran everything right. And she was that it was out of her own goodwill. And you know, we're like, hey you, you do a phenomenal job. And it wasn't until I think we were like four or five people in that we were supporting. And I mean I'm talking. My wife and I and Dina were working around the clock 24 7, like not sleeping like trying to do our best to support these individuals. And what that does is like now that's taking money like that's taking time away from my real job that where I'm supposed to make money. I'm losing opportunities which fine. But it's like okay degree to a degree. Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

And it's like, yeah, you do need to take a little small cut to be like okay. You know, and that's. So we take I think out of everything that's donated. I believe we're up to. We started at 5. I think we're up to 10 is goes back to the non profit.

[Brent Tucker]

And that's exactly. So it's some people's opinion is falsely. Oh if they're. They're getting paid. And it's not. It's Not a good non profit. What's way, way bigger indicators that is what is the percentages of their donation is going to the cause and what's going to overhead.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yes.

[Brent Tucker]

And that's where people really got upset about Wounded Warrior.

[Tyler]

It was like nothing.

[Brent Tucker]

It was their, their percentages had just gotten so out of whack that it was, it was justified and it had to need to be rectified.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Tyler]

If they don't happen, if they all modeled after Black Lives Matter.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah. I mean but I will example, I.

[Tyler]

Will say that if you look into why that foundation exists and who created it, I feel like, like yours, you look in the backstory, if I didn't know who you were and I read your story and I'm like, holy shit, this guy believes in it.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Tyler]

If I look if you met me and you're like, yeah, this guy named Tyler, he runs a Delta Force non profit for fallen fan. You know, fallen warriors and their families. And you'd be like father. No, no action.

[Brent Tucker]

What's your emotional tie to it?

[Tyler]

No, I found a way to make some money, you know, have a good job.

[Unknown Speaker A]

I can pull at the heartstrings and have you donate money to me and that's, that's where it's going to end up. Yeah. And that's, you know, and that's like we talked about the beginning. There are good non profits out there. There are also bad ones. And you really have to just like anything else critically think before you start donating these non profits. I would look into like where their money's going. Like those percentages, especially with these really big ones, dude, that are massive and I would say a large percent of those percentage of those. You'd be surprised how much money is actually going to the individual that they're helping and what's going to the organization itself.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah. I asked this question not because I need you to have a plan, but how old are you now?

[Unknown Speaker A]

46.

[Brent Tucker]

So you're 50. And it's, it's started to creep up in my thought process too, about my age, you know, I don't know. I. I'm not saying I will, I'm saying it won't. I don't know if I want to be 50s on the range or, or in a catwalk telling people to clear the corners. I don't know if I want to be in my 50s doing a podcast. Maybe I do. Maybe I, I don't really know. Has like what, what do you. Are you just gonna make that decision when it gets there? Like do you have a. Like, I'm a. Like, do you have something? Like, you're like, you know, I. I'm actually. I want to transition into this for my next phase of life. Like, have you. Have you given that any thought?

[Unknown Speaker A]

So those, like, those thoughts of, like, do I want to be 50 or 55 still on the range daily? I. Those have crept into my mind, like, okay, how. What's the longevity of this? Right?

[Brent Tucker]

Some people do, and then.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah, I do. I love training. Like, I love what I do. It's not like, you know, and it's. But at the same time, it's like, okay, can my time be spelled spent better elsewhere right now? I don't. I'm not a very good, like, planner. Right. My wife's always busted me. She's like, I live in the birds and bees. And she's like, some. She wants to get a teacher that says, somehow I manage. Like, I don't. I don't know how you made it this far, but I do think, you know, think of the future as far as that. And, you know, I think I will. I'll keep doing what I'm doing right now until, you know, I think there will be a point is where it's like, okay, I gotta make a switch to something else. What the problem is. I don't know what that else is.

[Brent Tucker]

Politics.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Buddy. Yeah. I've been asked.

[Brent Tucker]

Have you.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Oh, yeah, I got asked to take Matt Gates position.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay.

[Unknown Speaker A]

And that was a weird phone call. I. And I'll say this, I thought about it for about two days. It was, you know, I talked to my wife. I'm like, what do you think about this? And the whole. But I had a. Just disgusting pit in my stomach the whole time while I was thinking it. And then I ended up talking to Eli Crane.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Who's the Congress seal congressman. The only one that I.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay.

[Unknown Speaker A]

I trust and that I know is actually doing the job up there. And he was like, buddy, he's like, do you like sleeping with your wife? Do you like, you know, being home? Do you like this? He's like, you can say goodbye to all that. Like, that's what this job entails. And he's like, and when you get up here, it's a snake pit. And he's like. And if you are trying to do the right thing and abide by your morals and everything that you believe in, he's like, you will. It's like pushing a clown car uphill. He's like, you will not make the progress that you think unless you Start doing all the dirty work with everybody playing the game and that to me, I'm like, dude, I don't, I just don't want to be, you know, in that environment.

[Brent Tucker]

I'm gonna say something that almost makes you feel two faced, but I'm sitting anyway and it will continue to be that way unless good guys show up for the job. I understand there's the dilemma.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yes. But I mean, how many good guys have you seen that have gone in for the right reasons and then get turned just like that? Like it's, and it happens in an instant. I mean, the way the game is played up there. And that's what Eli was telling me. He was like, dude, if you're not going to these parties every day during the week and like, and pretty much at these Republican parties, it's cocaine, hookers and everything else. And he's like, that's the, that is the in crowd. And he's like, and if you're not part of that, then you are not.

[Brent Tucker]

So now I am interested in politics.

[Tyler]

Go on.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah, now you're making it sound fun. Well, what I had told him, I was like, well, why don't we just go to these parties and start, start cracking skulls and like, start cleaning up shop around here and you know, but I, I do think it's possible, I think you can go up there, you know, and maintain your morals, but I think it's not going to be a very.

[Tyler]

Well, you've already done, you've already showed up and done the right thing your entire life. Like, if there was a, if there was a, a young mid-20s, early-30s, you know, retire or maybe not even fully retired. I know you got out of the military and wanted to do it and he was like, I, I still have some time to serve. Yeah, but like the right guy showing up for the job and nothing like, man, dude, I'm not just about to say 50's old, but you're almost 50. Yeah, like, I only got so much time left.

[Unknown Speaker A]

It's, you know, and I guess it's not 100 out of the realm of possibility. And you know, my wife gets asked too to do it. She's like, that was the thing. It's like, hey, if you don't want to with your wife.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

And here's a discussion, here's a dilemma, is say we said yes. Yeah, sure, one of us is going, we're going to be back in the limelight again, getting demonized, getting. And guess what? We can take that on. But do I want to objectify my kids to that again. And I'm like, no, dude, I don't.

[Brent Tucker]

It's the, the other part of that. That argument is. And it would be basically what we just said already is it. It traverses. If you're not all in. Into the teams, then you're not gonna be exacting guy. If you're not all in to this, you know, to be in a politics, like, you just have this fire in your gut that says, like, I. I want to do it. I wanted it for the right reasons. Like, I. I will be that guy. Then, you know, it may not be the. The.

[Unknown Speaker A]

No.

[Brent Tucker]

The. The. The best.

[Unknown Speaker A]

And that is the main reason why I said no. Because I knew at the end of the day, I'm like, I don't have that all in feeling. It's like, ugh. I'm like, dude, I'm not. Yeah, no, thanks.

[Brent Tucker]

And when you look back, I mean, we talk about 70s and 80s and being old, like, it's so far away. And as you get a little bit older, you're like, man, it's, it's, it's, it's there. It's not, it's not that far. We've. We're. We're 45 and it seems like it happened in a couple weeks. Like, where'd my 20s and 30s go? Yeah. Now I'm afraid that's how fast my 50s and 60s are gonna go. And for you to do that, you know, do you want to spend the next. It'll possibly 20 years of your life and then look back and be like, man, I invested so much time, energy into the sloth. Cause I should invest it into my kids, my family.

[Unknown Speaker A]

You just.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah, something I can actually control.

[Unknown Speaker A]

You hit the nail on the head, man. And that's all that matters. Like, I think especially at the age that we're at right now, like, you get to be in your mid-40s is weird, man. Especially in the position like that I'm in right now. It's like, you. My kids are old. You know, my youngest is 16 or he's turning 16 actually this week. And then the other two are out of the house. And then I'm at a point now where my parents. You're sort of watching them.

[Tyler]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Dwindle. Right. Like my dad was in his final stages of Alzheimer's. And you're going through that whole dilemma. And I, I really like going through that. You. I sit back and I'm like, dude, what. What is them in 10 years from now, 20 years from now? What is it? That I want to be remembered for. Like, and the only answer is like, I want my kids to remember me as a good, loving, caring father. I want my wife to remember me as a good, loving, caring husband. And titles and all that doesn't matter, dude. They want, they want me around. So that is like the majority of my focus. And like you said, I've given. I gave 20 years of my life.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

To a title to this country. And I don't regret one bit of it. I'm glad I did it. It made me a better human. But at the same time, like the rest of my life is that's owed to my family to be there 100, to be all in at home and still been able to protect, provide, do all that. But if you, if I sit there and chase, you know, another dream like, oh, I want to go to Congress or whatever, it's like, guess who's sitting back? Like, well, I guess we'll see you when we see it. My wife and kids again.

[Brent Tucker]

It's just like being on, on the teams again. Guess, Guess who takes a back seat to, to your decisions.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

And now this is a decision that you made that first decision with, more than likely without them.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Without them. Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

But now you have. Now you're, now you're intentionally making this decision with them. I know it's a, it's a. Mason. It's an odd history lesson to this. I don't know if it exactly applies, but I can't stop thinking about it. Is big fan of George Washington. The guy gave his adult life to this country. When it came to becoming president, he really didn't want to be the first president. He definitely. Well documented, did not want to, to do it for a second term, but he did it out of, out of conviction that he needed to. The whole time that he was at war, the whole time that he was the President, the guy longed. He longed to go back to his farm in Virginia. That's. That's where the guy wanted to be. He wanted to be with his wife. He wanted to be on his farm in Virginia. He finally gets out of the second presidency. Do you know, you want to know how much time he spent on his farm that he longed for? Years and years and years before he died.

[Unknown Speaker A]

I don't even.

[Brent Tucker]

About a year.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah. Because that job sucked.

[Brent Tucker]

That's all he got. He got a year. He got this weird throat infection from riding his house, riding his horse in cold weather. Penicillin would have cleared him up like that. You know, if it, if it was around it ends up killing him. The guy gets to enjoy his life for roughly a year that he longed for, and that was it. I wonder if you could ask George Washington, was it worth it? Or do you feel like, you know what, someone. It. Someone else could have taken the mantle and I deserved my time.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

At the Farm, and it was taken from me. I don't know. We can't. We can't answer that question, but I think it's. It's definitely an interesting.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Well, I think.

[Brent Tucker]

Topic or viewpoint. Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

You see the same thing in our. Like, in our community. Like, guys that get out at 20 and I almost went down the same. And they go contract, and they're like, okay, I'm gonna go to Ground Branch or wherever, and hey, nothing. Like that's what you want to do. But let's be honest. Like, how many dudes have you met that are in their 50s at Ground Branch that are happy? I. I can't think of one that has. Has, like, a happy life outside of that job. It's like, you can go ahead and keep doing that, and that's with. And I'm not. I'm just bringing that profession up as an example. You can. You can apply that to any profession. It's like, yeah, the job will continue to suck you dry as long as you let it. And then what you have to think about is, like, when I'm done with it. 55 or whenever, do you. What do you have left to give back to the people that have been waiting for you? You know what I mean? And a lot of times guys get out and they're a shell of who they were.

[Tyler]

They're gonna take your rifle and go, there you go next.

[Brent Tucker]

Man. Well, I'll tell you what. This is. I think this is a. This is the first time, you know, that we did. I really enjoyed it. You know, we didn't have you to come in here to tell a story.

[Unknown Speaker A]

No, man, you guys just.

[Brent Tucker]

Just come in here, you have it. Have a discussion with you, and I really enjoyed it. So I appreciate you coming back.

[Unknown Speaker A]

No, I appreciate you guys having me on. I'm glad I got to bring my man Jim Hood down here.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Florida, man.

[Brent Tucker]

Florida man.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Elevated silence.

[Brent Tucker]

That's right. We're going to the range with them after this.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah. Yeah. Probably one of the best human beings I know, man. Yeah, dude, I. I love. Yeah, coming down here. I had a blast last time I was down here.

[Brent Tucker]

How'd you two meet?

[Unknown Speaker A]

So, Jim, you want me to tell us the story why I call you the Ultimate.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah. We didn't get to it at the. At the Live last night, did we?

[Unknown Speaker A]

So Andrea and the kids were down in Florida. They met. So Jim's kids went to school with Ryan. And so that's how you guys all met with Andrea. So when I finally got back, Andrew's like, oh, I met this couple. Like, we're gonna go out to dinner. So I ended up going out, dinner with Jim and Kendall, his wife. You know? You know, it's like you're feeling each other out sort of, but, you know, we got it. We had a good time. And then we get back to the house, Jim drives us back to drop us off, and Jim's like, you got any guns in the house? And at the time, I didn't because NCIS still had all my stuff. I'm like, no, man. I was like, I don't have anything. He's like, I'm about to remedy that. Gets out of the truck, pulls an arsenal. Like a SEAL platoon. Arsenal out. Like, he has all these drawers, and he's like, here, I'm gonna give you this. Take this, take this. And I'm sitting here like, what the.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

You know, I just came from California, so I love Florida.

[Tyler]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

And then Jim's like, yeah, yeah, I do suppressors, too. And he puts a suppressor on one of the pistols, fires it into my neighbor's lawn. He's like, yep, that works. There you go. And I was like, holy. I was like, we're definitely not in California anymore. Like, this is awesome.

[Brent Tucker]

I just made a really good friend.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yes. So, yeah, from that point on, it was like, yeah, me and Jim were boys. And then we took a. The next trip, we went to the USCCA concealed carry instructor cores together, and we drove. It was like an eight hour drive or something like that. I mean, we still didn't know each other that well.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Got in the truck, no radio, no nothing. Silence. Didn't say a word to each other for like six hours. And that's when we were both like, dude. We're like, if you can sit in silence comfortably with somebody, like, dude, you're a cool dude, man.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah, one. You know, Magnet, he was the. He was here, the guy with the long. Yeah. White beard. Last night. It when I realized, like, me and Magnet can be really good friends, is I lived his house for a little bit. We just go to the garage and. And smoke cigars at night. Just like a decompress, like from like 9 to 10, we go in the garage, smoke cigars. Takes an hour to Smoke a cigar at times. Maybe we'll smoke, too. It was a long day, and we won't say a word to each other. Just.

[Unknown Speaker A]

That's perfect. Four.

[Brent Tucker]

Four feet away. Maybe I say not a word. Something real quick. And that's it.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

And just enjoy the silence. I'm like, that's. And I don't think that's. Some girls will ever understand.

[Unknown Speaker A]

No. Silence is golden.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah. You guys could just be in separate rooms and do this, like. No, I just. Yeah. I just want my friend here.

[Unknown Speaker A]

I want my buddy by my side. But nothing needs to be said.

[Brent Tucker]

Nothing needs to be said. If something. If. If. Well, if something needs to be said, we'll say it.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

Nothing has to be said. There's the fallacy. Nothing has to be said. It's just inefficient.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Oh, yes. Me and Jim and boys ever since. Yeah. And our families are close.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah. I'm looking forward to going to the range. I don't. Traditions are traditions.

[Tyler]

He did end it with a funny story.

[Brent Tucker]

Oh, yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

I'm gonna end it with a funny story.

[Brent Tucker]

You kind of did with the shooting the. The pistol in the ground. So I'll. I'll give you. I'll give you that as a. As a pass. And. And Unless. Unless you got one of the hopper. Yeah, unless you got one of the hopper.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Dude, I thought I had one. Dude. I always got to be careful which ones. I know the Rolodex of storage, like. Nope, nope, nope.

[Brent Tucker]

Not that one. Not good enough. That one's too good.

[Tyler]

Your limitations still apply to this one.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Oh, nice. All right. I guess so. Well, I don't know. That's funny. It was. Yeah, I guess it's funny now. I got blown up by my grill about was it a month ago. I came back from a trip, and so the whole family was there. My son from the Marines was back home, so we had, like, a full house again. It was awesome having the kids home, which. You want to feel old.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

I was like. Once the kids were all like, oh, my gosh, the whole family's back. I was excited. That made me feel like, dude, I'm like a grandpa. So I go out. I'm going to go cook steaks for everybody. And while I was gone, so we have a basketball hoop in the backyard. Kids are always playing the ball. What I think happened is a ball hit one of the knobs on the grill. Who knows how long that gas was on for? Two days. I go out there, and you can't smell it because it's just all settled to the bottom. And so I'm sitting there, all the whole. The kids are out. I'm like, yeah, just. And I go turn the thing on. Like, I was engulfed in flames. My beard went from here to singed down to my face. I had third degree burns all down my legs. Like everything. I was in tank top and shorts, just, I mean, from head to toe. So I'm like, I come back, you know, my, you know, Andrew's like, holy shit. Because she's like, I just saw you disappear like a fireball of flame. And so like, I get back and I'm like, I'm a little, you know, in a little shock. I'm like, what just happened? And I'm trying to process it and then I can feel the immediate pain. I'm like, oh, dude. I looked down, my skin is already sloughing off my legs. And my first thought, I was like, I'm looking at my oldest son. I'm like, because I got a call, I'm like, take me to the cold plunge. He's like, that is not a good idea. And he was right. It's the worst thing you can do for a burn like that. So then I'm like, you know, shaking a little bit. I'm like, dude, I just look at my wife and like, take me to the ER right now. Like, we gotta go. So, yeah, we went to. Ended up going to the er. You know, there's nothing really much you can do. Yeah, but I will. That's a funny story is about Florida medicine that the hospital I went to this, this nurse, I'm in there and I'm like, hey, I don't want any opiates. Like. So I was like, just give me. I will take some Torado. Give me a shot of Toradol to reduce the swelling. She's like, no, no, no, no. I'm going to get you some oxy. And I was like, no, I was like, I won't. I don't want it.

[Brent Tucker]

Right?

[Unknown Speaker A]

The whole time she's like, I think you're going to want it. Like, you're, you're going to be in some major pain later.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

And you know, I'm like, listen, I. I'm good at being in pain, right? I'm good at suffering. Just let me. She's like, nope, I put the oxy in for you. This is. She says this in front of my wife. She's like, this is what you do. She's like, you go home, take a couple oxies, throw a couple drinks back. And she's like, you'll be fine. You'll be riding high. And I'm looking at her like, dude, are you supposed to be telling me this right now? Like.

[Brent Tucker]

But you know what? That's some real advice though, to a lot of people. A lot of people. That's some real advice. I appreciate that. There's a good Florida nurse.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah, it is. That was some good Florida medicine.

[Brent Tucker]

That's Southern hospitality.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Straight.

[Tyler]

Did you take the oxy?

[Unknown Speaker A]

No. No.

[Brent Tucker]

Did it get. Here's a good question. Like, because it's, it's a. Obviously that's, that's a different type of pain.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Oh yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

Were you prepared for that type of pain? Did it surprise you or. Like, I could handle it.

[Unknown Speaker A]

What surprised me was chest penis.

[Brent Tucker]

Is an honest question.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. What's up? The actual like burn itself wasn't, you know, but I mean, obviously it hurt a little bit, but you're like, whatever, I can deal with it. It's the, the healing process of like your muscles. Like, it felt like every morning when I got up to take a step, my shins were gonna snap because everything is like healing around there. So. Yeah, it took about two weeks and I was still teaching courses, so I was like going out, you know, hobbling, like just in major pain. And then having your feet swell up too. I don't know what.

[Brent Tucker]

But Right.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah, it's. Do. You don't need the painkillers. That's what I'm saying.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay. I'm glad to hear that. Of sorts, you know, because really that's, it's, it's just like everything else in life, if you're told you, you, you have to take this, then you will take it. Yes, but who said that, that I had to take this? Like, you know, who said that because I went to war, I had to have ptsd, you know, I know it's kind of a jump, but it's not necessarily true if someone tells you this just because they were told like to tell you that. And it's, it's a, it's a really bad cycle I think we've gotten into when it comes, especially when it comes to, to, to painkillers.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah. I mean, I. And you know, it's a money making business. At the end of the day, that's. That's all that nurse was trying to do is just right. And you get a repeat customer, you know, and there is a time and place for it, but I think it's pushed way too much. And I think pain is a good thing. Pain will let you know, like, hey, maybe I shouldn't be doing this right now, so I need to recover. If you start taking painkillers, you're going to push. You can hurt yourself envelope and hurt yourself more.

[Tyler]

Teach you to check the grill.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah, that too. Believe me, that's a.

[Brent Tucker]

Well, now I got a new question. Was the worst part about getting burned is having to continue work and explain to everyone not a cool story?

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yes.

[Brent Tucker]

About how you got hurt? Like, all right.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Oh, yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

It's like they're gonna ask, or it's gonna come up and you gotta go, I burned myself for the grill. Guys, let's. Let's. Let's move on.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah. You know those safety briefs you get at work before you go on?

[Brent Tucker]

Right?

[Unknown Speaker A]

I just made it. I'm the idiot.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah, they're there for a reason. All right, well, man, we will reciprocate. You let us know what you guys got going on September, and, you know, the anti hero podcast will come out and support you. You've been a huge supporter of us, and it doesn't. We're very grateful for it.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Oh, dude. Awesome. Yeah. Reciprocal, brother. And, yeah, we got to get both of you come up to on the Shoot Me Straight podcast at some point.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Yeah, that'd be awesome. Show you guys around 30 a.

[Brent Tucker]

Perfect. Oh, I do want to go to 38. It's been on my list. I want to go to 30A. How far are you from. From 30A?

[Unknown Speaker A]

I live on 38. You live on 30A, right on the beach? Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

All right, I'll see you next week.

[Tyler]

30A.

[Unknown Speaker A]

Awesome.

[Tyler]

We're going to.

[Brent Tucker]

We're going to. We're going to shorten this timeline up.

[Unknown Speaker A]

We're in. Hey, definitely. Anytime.