 I really, really need to share this story with you because there's like, I don't know, 15 really valuable lessons that we can all learn from this. What is up everybody? This is Chris from the Rewired Soul, where we talk about the problem, but focus on the solution. And if you're new to my channel, my channel is all about mental health, addiction recovery, and you know, just making your life a little bit better. So if you're into that, make sure you subscribe and ring that notification bell. So a couple of things. It's six in the morning. I'm trying to talk quieter for two reasons. One, I'm doing this new mic thing, trying to hold it in front of my face, so I don't want to scream in your ears off. But two, Tristan's over there sleeping because it's still super early. But yeah, I wanted to share this story with you. I know some of you get tired of me like, you know, using YouTubers as examples and stuff like that, even though I use my examples and real world examples, but that's besides the point. Um, but yeah, something happened yesterday with my mom, and it's a story that I think so many of us can learn from. Uh, I know a lot of you watching my videos. You are the child of an alcoholic or a drug addict parent. I am too. Um, fortunately, my mom has been in recovery. She just celebrated 13 years. But yeah, I want to talk about a few things. Addiction, relapse, credentials, doctors, pain, all sorts of stuff. So a few months ago, maybe in the summer, my mom had a something happened to her like mouth or gums or something and like swole up. It like, it was nuts. She sent me a picture of it. She still lives in Fresno, California, and, um, she had to go to the hospital and she got like some infection. So it was, it was crazy. But while she was in the hospital, they, um, they had to give her like morphine or something like that. And by the way, that's something that, um, you know, a lot of people get confused about when they're in recovery. Like if it's prescribed by a doctor and if you're not abusing it, you know what I mean? Like an in times of need, you know, so why my mom was in the hospital and her face was swollen up and she was infected. Like they gave her some morphine, but she didn't bring anything back home. And I guess like, oh, rewind this back to when I first got sober. Cause I'm a prescription drug addict. Like I am a pain pill addict. Like that is my drug of choice. And when I first got clean, my mom tore, um, some ligaments in her knee chasing my nephew around at a water park. And I remember when my mom tore her knee, I was brand new sober. Like I'm talking about weeks, maybe weeks, right? And I'm sitting there thinking, cause I'm a crazy drug addict. I'm like, Oh snap, my mom gets a freebie. My mom tore some stuff in her knee. She gets a freebie. She gets to like go and like, you know, take these pain meds because she tore stuff in her knee, right? And my mom didn't. And my mom was like 50 years old at the time. And I'm sitting there. I'm like, mom, why don't you take some pain meds? And she's like, no, I don't need to. And my mom was just hobbling around for like a month or two until she got her surgery. I'm sitting there like, are you kidding me? And something that I've been trying to teach a lot of you yesterday, uh, lately is that if somebody can get through something, so can you, right? So seeing my mom get through tearing ligaments in her knee without taking painkillers gave me hope that I didn't have to take painkillers, right? And I'm not saying they're always bad or anything like that, but just bear with me. It's because my, my last relapse that almost killed me started with one Vicodin pill and we're going to revisit that in a minute. But I learned from my mom that you don't have to take these medications. She, um, she took ibuprofen and everything. And then they actually did surgery on her knee. All right. And they prescribed her more painkillers and she ended up, um, having my grandma throw them away for her, right? So she, you know, after the surgery, she's still in take painkillers. But anyways, my mom yesterday, yesterday, maybe two days ago, I just saw her post on Facebook. So she had to get a root canal. I think it was a follow up for her mouth thing. So she had to get a root root canal and she told the doctor, she told the doctor, Hey, I can't have any pain medications. I'm a recovering addict. I can't have them. And the doctor says, okay. Or the dentist says, okay. He says, I'll give you Tylenol. So my mom's like, okay, cool, Tylenol, right? Tylenol. So she goes to the pharmacy, she gets her prescription, she comes back home and she almost takes the Tylenol, but she notices it kind of looks a little different and she looks at the bottle and it's Tylenol with codeine. Okay. Those of you who don't know what codeine is, codeine is an opioid. Okay. And, uh, my mom, she's like, what the heck? And so she doesn't take it. She ends up returning it back to the pharmacy and getting rid of it. Right. And like, there's so many things. So my mom posted on, on Facebook, Tristan actually saw it and she told me and the way Tristan read it for a second, I thought she said, my mom did take it. I'm like, wait, what you doing, mama? Um, but no, my mom got rid of it. And my mom posted about it on Facebook. And this is something that this is one of the reasons why we have our discord server. It's one of the reasons we have our, um, Facebook group. And I'm always telling you guys to like celebrate your small successes. Like I'm glad that my mom posted that because it shows other people like, listen, here's something that can happen. Right. A doctor might not listen to you. They might prescribe you this. By the way, you don't have to take it because I've seen so many people relapse and they say things like, well, a doctor prescribed it to me. It's like, I don't care. Right. Like we have a massive opioid crisis. Like doctors are almost heroin dealers at this point. And not all doctors, not all doctors. Okay. But so my mom posts that and, and the comments on there. Right. Like I saw people saying like, well, it's just a little coding. Does that matter? And like, let me make it very clear to you guys. Like my, my relapse was with a five milligram Vicodin pill. Okay. That five milligram Vicodin pill turned into the next day. Me calling up my drug dealer, getting oxy. Okay. Like that's how quick these relapses can happen. All right. So a lot of people are like, well, it's just a little, it's just a little coding. But what's interesting too is that the professionals in the industry. So one of, so I called my mom after and I'm just cracking up and Tristan and I laugh about this all the time. One of my favorite comments, one of my favorite comments that I get is, what are your credentials? What are your credentials? Like you guys, that cracks me up. Like I, like I don't ever want to give the impression that you shouldn't trust any doctor or any therapist, but they're not all created equal. A lot of you know this, but you guys, like there are doctors who have gone through a decade of college and still do not understand addiction. You know what I mean? Like when I got into my head on collision car accident, and I refused pain medications, they offered it to me three times. They offered me medications three times. I'm telling a doctor, somebody with credentials, okay, that I'm a drug addict. I cannot take those. Not only did he offer to him three times, but then he sent me with a prescription for Norcos as well. Like you guys, like, like, are you understanding what I'm saying? There are also people who work in the addiction treatment field, who I've met, who would think that taking a little codeine isn't a big deal. All right. So like when you, like, and I know a lot of you, like my loyal fans and, you know, audience, subscribers, friends, support, whatever you got, whatever I want to call you guys, my rewired soldiers. A lot of you know, you know what I mean? Like you, you get it. Like you've had bad therapists, you've had bad doctors, but I, but this is why I laugh about the whole credentials argument. Like, like, you know, Tristan right now, and I've been joking with her about making a video about this. Tristan right now, she's in college for social work and like she has people in her class who like major in psychology and all sorts of things. And they just don't know left from right. And you know what I mean? So like you guys, like, just, just remember, like, go, like, go to school, get a degree, do your thing. But just remember that doesn't mean like you're, like you're like the end all be all know everything. You know, and I'm not, I'm definitely not either. I'm definitely not either. But just, just remember just because somebody has a degree doesn't mean they always have your best interest in mind. Doesn't mean they're fully educated on everything. But I hope this story gives you some hope because my mom has been some of my biggest inspiration for staying clean. Every time I didn't think I can stay clean. I remember that my mom has been through it and she stay clean. And that's why I try to share these stories or share my story every once in a while, because any of you battling addiction or any of you who know somebody who has an addiction, like just so you know, it's possible. Something I mentioned in one of my videos yesterday is like, there's a big difference between can't and won't. Okay. I hear a lot of people say, I can't do this. I can't do that. Yes, you can. All right. So if you're wondering why I give you tough love, it's because my mom is a badass. She's taught me to be kind of a badass. And like, I'm trying to teach you to be a badass. All right. You can get through just about anything. All right. But anyways, this was a little bit different of a video. I'm still kind of tired. I'm going to finish my coffee. But anyways, thanks for watching. Like this video. Thanks to everybody hooking it up over on Patreon. There's some new Patreon exclusive videos up there. We just did a Q&A. That should be up pretty soon. But anyways, I love all of you so much. And I'll talk to you soon.