 The first round went straight through my neck and the second round ricocheted off my helmet and probably would have taken my arm completely off. In the Falklands, they probably realised they could have done with a lot better kit. I wake up in Birmingham, ITU. Toby, how are you, brother? I'm good, thanks, Chris. And we should thank Ben, shouldn't we, for putting us in touch? That's right, yeah, he's a good lad, Ben. Yeah, very, very brave young man. He came on the podcast to talk about his... I don't even... I don't like to use the word Walter me, but that's what people will know, know what I'm talking about. And now he's actually serving himself, so big up your Ben, and thank you for putting me and Toby in touch. So, my God, so much to talk about, mate. And all the stuff I like, like South Africa, for example, I spent time in Johannesburg and went to the... Where I'm from, that's where I was born. Born and raised, yeah. It's mental there, eh? It is a crazy place, yeah, to grow up there. Yeah, it's crazy, yeah. Yeah, some people like to say it's like the wild west. Yeah, because my childhood, we lived through all the apartheid thing. We saw the zoos with their spears on TV. People laugh when they say this, they think I'm joking. I'm like, no, it's, you know... What people don't realise in Africa is when they colonise the place, they just drew these lines on a map, didn't they? And that split, literally split tribes down the middle. And, of course, a lot of the Zulu tribe, from what I understand, ended up in Soweto, so like the ghetto housing. And we would see the riots with the South African police on the tally every night. And when I was lucky enough to visit there in about 1999, I think it was, they were just coming through apartheid then. And I was with a South African girl and we were out one night standing on the street corner, and Wild West was just an understatement. And I said, do you feel safe here? You know, she's this like nine stone little white girl and there's these big, huge, tough fellas everywhere. And she said, well, when when they got black rule, she said a lot of the whites just left, even though they were native Africans, because they'd been born there, they were terrified. She said, but some of us stayed. And, yeah, I'll just I'll never forget her saying that. Yeah, yeah, I mean, I was I was born in I was born in 1985. So, you know, apartheid only ended ended when in 1995 or late 1994, four, if you wanted to get really, really technical. So the first 10 years of my life were. Brought up through the apartheid, you know, era and then off that we had to put, you know, from so from after apartheid, I grew up, you know, in my teens and whatever else. So I had that mixture of both experiences. But yeah, I was quite I was quite young through the through the actual apartheid era, but I still remember, you know, black kids not being allowed to go to school and the riots and you know, the difficult challenges. And I mean, I never really understood it because I was quite young, but it was always there, you know, and I guess that's the kind of culture that they wanted to instill, you know, that you thought it was normal that you know, indigenous people or black people should be treated this way. Which is terrible, which is absolutely horrendous. And again, my parents are English, so I'm from the English heritage and my parents didn't agree with it at all. So, you know, I was always taught that that was not acceptable at all. Even though we lived there, we were always taught, you know, this is not acceptable in any way, shape or form. Yes, of course. And what what brought you to the UK then, Toby? Was it was it a family move or was it specifically to join a core? No, I mean, I I've always been a bit of a well, my family has always been a bit of a nomad kind of no land, no place, really family here. So my parents immigrated to South Africa in like the 60s or 70s. And then after about, well, after a part that ended in 1995, you know, we we immigrated to America when I was God must have been about 12. So my 11, not 11, it was about 11 years old. We immigrated to America and lived in California for a while. So that was pretty wicked. But as as a, I guess at that age, it was tough. It was tough because, you know, a new country, new culture, blah, blah, blah, anyway. And then that didn't really work out. So then we moved to the UK. My parents immigrated from America to the UK and we tried to live here for a while. And that didn't really work out. So then my parents decided it was actually just my mom because she was a single mom. Yeah, we ended up moving back to back to South Africa, believe it or not. And that's where I yeah, I spent my sort of teenagers growing up to where I was about 19 somewhere on there. Yeah. And that and then that's when I decided I've had enough. I want to I want to join the Corps. But the reason I wanted to join the Corps or the Marines, the Royal Marines was I just needed to get out of South Africa again. You know, I was going down a bad path. I was doing some really bad stuff. I was in a lot of trouble. And I was just fortunate enough to have the sort of, I guess, the mindset to know that if I stay here, I'm even going to end up dead or in prison. And I didn't see any future for me there. So, yeah, that's why I left South Africa and decided to come over and join the Corps as it were. Yeah. You got into the party scene in South Africa, I'm assuming. Yeah. I mean, again, the party scene. Yeah. South Africa was a crazy place, you know, underage drinking and drink driving and drugs and stuff like that is so easy to do because the country's in such turmoil, you can get away with so much. And it's really easy to go down a bad path, like super easy. And you only have to be a bit of a wild child and want to try these things. And before you know it, yeah, you're up to your neck and in trouble. So, yeah, I was trying, I guess, yeah, trying some stuff and figuring out who I was and it wasn't going well. It wasn't going well. I put it that way. I wasn't going to school. And if I was, I was so hungover. I don't even remember what was going on. So, yeah, yeah, it wasn't good. It wasn't good. Did you come to UK on your own the second time then? Yeah, yeah, I came over. I was working in a bar in South Africa when I was about 19, 20, 20 years old. And I decided to just start saving some cash. So I had enough for a flight, a flight, airplane tickets. And I just packed a, you know, rock sack and came over to the UK. I didn't really have a plan. I guess I kind of knew I wanted to join the Corps, but I didn't even know how to join the Corps. I didn't know how to join the Marines. I just came over to the UK, landed a Heathrow and was like, right, what next? Where do I go from here? So my parents were from Bristol. So I figured I'd go out there. That's the only place I really knew kind of. Yeah, it was the only place I really knew. So I got a train or a bus or something. And got this one bedroom flat. No, it was a one bedroom like bed set and I was staying in there. And yeah, that's how it started. And then started just formulating a plan and, you know, getting the mindset and getting ready. You know, okay, this is really happening now. This is really what I want to do. So yeah, that's how it started. What did you do then? Did you have an English passport? Yeah, because my parents were English. So they were smart enough to get me a British passport when I was very, very young. So I had dual nationality. So I was all right. Yeah, but I know a lot of South Africans don't. And yeah, now they're stuck in South Africa and got nowhere else to go. So was that the reason I ask is obviously if you're a British national, it must make it easier to join in the military? Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I mean, yeah. Obviously, I did because I think they asked for, they wanted like, you know, a bit of a background on you when you joined the Corps. They want to know your background and I didn't have like five years living in the country and stuff like that. But it's having the British passport helped. I just needed to get a bit more information from South Africa and proof of address and stuff like that. And a few other bits. I can't really remember. And I was so long ago. But yeah, I remember having to jump through a few hoops, but it certainly did help. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Which was good. Did you have anything in the recruiting office where they said jump up on a pull up bar? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, I just went down to the recruitment office and was like, cool. Yeah. I spoke to a guy at the front desk and was like, I want to join the Royal Marines. And then he's looking at you like, okay, like a bit suspect, I guess. And yeah, he was like, yeah, I went upstairs and then some Sergeant Major, I guess, came down and called me upstairs. And that's right. Yeah. He was like, all right, can you do your. I don't know what it was, was it six pull ups or 10 pull ups? I can't remember now and 20 press ups on floor and, and that's and then asked me a few questions as to why I want to join the Corps. And that was it. Yeah. And then he was like, all right, give me details and we'll get back to you. What year did you actually join it? Join in Toby. I joined in 2006. But I think I, I think I went through training probably. Yeah. 2000 was the beginning. Yeah. 2006 beginning in 2006. Yeah. They say that's when training got really, really easy, don't they? All right, mate. All right. Yeah. Yeah. No, there was that. Yeah. We got a few. I think, I think we just started getting those blue. Do base instead of, instead of the blankets, you know, there's very lucky you are. Yeah. Yeah. But saying that, I mean, I, I saw recruits going through training not too long ago and, and now cross they've got some, you know, lower upon lower marine boots and jet boilies and all kinds of stuff, you know. So yeah, now it's even softer. I don't want to say that. Marine training is tough. It's hard. I think we were one, just about when I joined, we was the time that they swapped from, did we call them, you probably wouldn't know, but I think they were called Puss's Daps. And they were, they were white plimpsoles. Like, I mean, they're all trendy and in fashion now. But back then they were the sort of plimpsoles you, you wore, you wore to primary school to do your PA in. Oh, you mean, did you have the, because I had the black, the silver shadows, you know, the, we went on to that. For all our gym work, we had to wear these white plimpsoles. All right. Yeah. I mean, now I know they've got like ASICs. Yeah. They called, they got like proper trainers now. I mean, we just had those, yeah, the silver shadow, high tech, crappy little trainers. Well, you went downhill then because we were, I think one of the first troops to get issued Reeboks proper running trainers. What? Yeah. Reeboks Royale, I think they were called. And they actually were pretty cool. But the problem. We didn't get us. No, we did not get us. The problem was, someone has got brand new ones and they look smart as hell. And the others, we got second half ones from someone who obviously jacked it in. But, but yeah, that was about the time when they started to realize that the old school where doing stuff was just causing lots of injuries. Yeah. I think so. Yeah. And that was because we still had the old, you know, the old military boots, the black, leather thing that was so, you know what I mean? Yeah. They call them, is it DPS or something? The molded DMS something? Yeah. Yeah. And yeah, the molded solid sole and took you about three years to wear them in. And yeah, blisters, you know, and shin splints and all that. They've probably been around since, I don't know, the bloody World War Two or something. They were just literally a piece of leather with a rubber sole. But now, yeah, you're right. They started looking into these things and yeah, it was causing more injuries and they were losing so many lads because of injuries. I think they started changing things, which is probably for the best, if I'm honest. You know, if a kid gets better, it's not always the mindset of, oh, no, we'll stick to doing what we know because that's just what we know. And it makes recruits tougher and we only get the best of the best. That's not always the case, if you know what I mean. No, exactly. I think in the Falklands, they probably realised they could have done with a lot better kit. Yeah, yeah, definitely. I mean, well, you talk about the Falklands, but it was the same in the Gulf, you know, and they needed a lot better kits and it was the same in Afghanistan, you know. Yeah, and the training as well, you know, training facilities, it was crazy because I remember we were training for Afghan, right, which is the deserts and all that kind of desert warfare, but all the training was geared up for Northern Ireland. So it was all kind of rural stuff and walking through streets and patrolling through streets and stuff like that. And that just held no usefulness in Afghanistan, if I'm honest. Yeah, so I bet they learnt an awful lot in theatre in Afghanistan. Oh yeah, they did. Yeah, even the rifles, you know, the rifle, the SA-80 is not good in sand and dust, lots and lots of dust, it clogs up massively. Yeah, so, you know, things like that, they had to think about, I guess, but you only learn that and you only evolve as you go along. Didn't they realise that the SA-80 didn't have to stop and power either when you've got some mad Afghan off his head on something coming towards you, it just wasn't stopping them enough. Yeah, I think that's because of the high velocity round. It'll go straight through you so quick. And unless obviously hit them, you know, obviously in that centre of maths or in the head, it just doesn't stop them because it goes right through so quick. And I mean, yeah, so yeah, that was one of the things, but I think it was more because, you know, the SA-80 works on gas parts, gas moving parts, that just clogs up with the dust in the sand. So things like that, that's how you start thinking on their feet a little bit quicker. What's that, have you got any particular memories of training? Was there stuff you were bad at and stuff that you were good at? Yeah, I mean, I love training. Yeah, I absolutely love training. It's really one of the best times of my life. I know that sounds kind of a bit sadistic because it's horrible. It is horrible and it's tough, but the friends I made in training, I'm still very good friends with now. And then some of my best mates, you know, so things like that. And we had such a laugh together, you know. I know it was tough and that, but when you were the group of mates and you're going through tough times and adversity, it really, really bonds you together. And when you're out on those little exercises for weeks or whatever, I can't remember, you know, what they call Hunter's Moon and stuff like that. Yeah, yeah, it just brought us together and it was great. Yeah, I have so many stories that I can tell you. Because, you know, I was a little bit of a naughty little sort of troublemaker. You know, you get like your two weeks leave at Christmas. So I was at a camp all for nine, nowhere to go. And I'd made very good mates with a mate called John Knowles. And he was from Halifax up north. And he was also a proper little shitster as well. And so we went back to Halifax and the training team were like, yeah, right lads, you know, make sure you stay on top of your fizz. Make sure you stay on top of your fizz and go and do some homework and work on core history and, you know, all these sort of things and come back relaxed, fresh, ready to go. And me and John were like, I mean, we were like straight away. We were like, no, I'll tell you what we're going to do. We're going to Tenerife for two weeks. And we are going to, you know, absolutely smash it. So yeah, so we are in the middle of recruit training. Yeah, we went to Tenerife for two weeks and absolutely, absolutely just honored for two weeks, pissing it up, causing a lot of trouble, staying up all night, you know, doing all the party scene, girls, women, you know, staying in all their knickers and stuff like that, causing trouble. Anyway, we got back to Limson early January or whenever it was and we went from probably two of the fittest recruits in the troop to just basically hanging out on bottom field, absolutely hanging out of our hoops. And we had a PTI coming up to us saying, what's going on in our hoops? You know, or recruit, recruit gut ridge as it was. It was everything all right. And I had to explain to them, you know, that we'd, we'd, we'd been on a bender for two weeks. And yeah, this is going to take me a bit of time to get up to speed again. But yeah, great, great memories of training, great memories of training. But overall, yeah, we were, yeah, I was a very fit young lad. And I did very well in training. I managed to get the sort of that fittest recruits in the troop and I passed out as a, as a original, original and all these, you know, good things. And yeah, yeah. So I was, I was, yeah, I was pretty strong, pretty strong recruit. You had something that the same as me though, Toby, because I was homeless when I joined up. So I, it's like that bit in officer on a genuine where he says, I've got nowhere else to go. Yeah, exactly. You know, I didn't have an option. So it never crossed my mind to leave ever. It wasn't like a, I didn't, I didn't even have, I didn't have a girlfriend either. So it wasn't like I was going to get a dear John and get, you know, get on the rocks or something. So, so yeah, my, my, my thing was just right. What's on that timetable for the next week? Well, yeah. Yeah. If I was honest, it was always right. What we got to do today, right? We've got to do that. Let's just go and pass it. That, that was it. Yeah. No, I can totally relate to that because I didn't have anywhere to go. If I, if I go kicked out of failed or injured myself or whatever, I had nowhere else to go. And that thought was always on the back of my mind. I don't want to go back to South Africa. And I've got nowhere else to go. So it wasn't really a choice for me. I was going to smash this where there are, whether I liked it or not. Or whether I knew what I was getting myself into or not. But fortunately enough, yeah, I was, I was actually quite good at it. So yeah. Yeah. What was your endurance course experience like? Um, yeah, it was tough. I, I, that was one of my weaker sort of, um, commander phases if I'm, if I'm honest. And I don't know why, I don't know why. I think I see a lot of anxiety before, before it's, and I think I used to psych myself out like massively psych myself out before it. And I don't know why because all the other sort of things I was, I was really good at bottom field and Tarzan assault course. You know, I was top three every time. But when it came to the endurance course, I sort of, um, yeah, fall back quite a lot. And I just, yeah, I don't know why. I don't know why. Yeah, it's probably my worst, worst one. It was, um, yeah, it was a lick, of course it was, but, um, there was something about it. They used to really psych me out, uh, before it's just the whole thing, uh, psych me out massively. Didn't enjoy it at all, if I'm honest. I think it's changed a bit now. I'm not, I'm not trying to say it's got ease or anything, but when you look at all the tunnel setup, it all looks really smart. And they've got like these iron grids that they locked, I guess to stop tourists, you know, going up there. Or chucking stuff up there. But when we did it, you hit those tunnels and they were just collapsing, corrugated iron. Yeah. Yeah. And some bits of it, you literally under, you could just get your mouth above the water. And they used to say, try and keep your weapon. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think that was a thing for, for the training team, just to bollock you or just to get you absolutely in trouble for, you know, if you're doing well, that's fine. That's picking up on something, you know, and that was always something, you know, oh, look at the state to your rightful. You know, and you were like, mate, I'm just being, you know, crawling through the mud. There's absolutely no way I'd get to the end of this and pass or, you know, finish in the timeframe and keep my rifle clean. It is physically impossible. Yeah. That was my biggest fear is that I'm going to pass because I never passed it in. I think we did two trial runs and I was way, I mean, I was like 20 minutes. I walked back on one of it. I was at 20 minutes late or something. Troop officer is funny. We're still friends to this day, but he wasn't happy with me. And then when we actually did it, my fear was passing it in the time and then failing the shoot at the end. Yeah. But no, fortunately, fortunately, it's a nice, it was a nice thing to pass out as an original. You know, there's that feeling in your mind, isn't it? They make you feel every day that you're going to get backtrooped. Yes. Yeah, they really make it as like it's a stigma attached to being backtrooped or being a backtrooper or having spent time in Hunter Company or Hunter Trooper or whatever. Yeah, they do put a stigma around it. But to be honest, I made such good mates with my troop. But I just, I didn't want to leave those boats. I didn't want to have to go into a new troop and have to make new mates. I think that's something that really pushed me on. And I think they felt the same way, to be fair. Yeah, I've had a few chats with lads in Hunter Troop and I just said, look, give us a call. And a lot of it, their minds in the wrong place because it's a horrible experience to go through. And I just get them a bit fired up and focused. Right, you can get out there, you're going to fucking smash it. And next thing you know, they're sending me a photo of them in their green lid. Yeah, and that's great because, you know, it isn't, it isn't, it's not like a sign of weakness. No, not at all. The other way round, to come through that, the men's strength is good credit. Absolutely, it shows grit and determination. You know, injury is something you can't, you know, it's not, it's injury. It's an injury. But then to stick it out and carry on. Yeah, that shows true character there. So absolutely, if anyone's, if any recruits are listening to this or anyone who's, I don't know, thinks about joining and finds himself in Hunter Troop. Yeah, stick it out. I have a mate actually who, who I started training with, he was another startup in CHAP. And he ended up in Hunter Troop for so long. I mean, he broke his ankle really badly. And he had some other problems because he was compensating and so on and so forth. I mean, he was in there for, I think, he was in Hunter Troop for, I swear, almost a year before he could go back into, you know, training. And yeah, they used to call him the nod, the nod father and all that kind of stuff. Because he'd been there for so long. But yeah, you know, there you go. Just shows and he passed out and you finished training. So yeah. What unit did you go to, mate? So I went to 40. Well, when I finished commander training, I went to 40, 40 commander because that was the next, the next commander unit going out to Afghan. That was being deployed. And I didn't really join up other than to, well, I want to, you know, see combat. I want to see, I joined up because I want, that's why I joined up. Yeah. Yeah, that's all I can say really. I didn't really join up because I want to go trade and all that. A lot of it was because I wanted to get out there and get stuck in, I guess. Cool. That's a pretty stupid thing to say because it's quite naive. And when I look back, I think, geez, yeah, quite naive. But I was, I was 21 probably now 21 years old and, you know, full of full of testosterone and full of all that male provider and we're all marine now and all that kind of stuff. So yeah. Yeah, I think we've all got very different perspectives on war now. I'd like to hope so. They say if you've still got the same views, I think it was Muhammad Ali said, if you've still got the same views when you're 40 as you had when you're 18 and you've wasted your life. Yeah. Yeah. I agree with that. Yeah. I was a young naive, boisterous kid who just didn't know, didn't know what he was getting himself into. I'm honest. But that's life. That is life. You can only learn by experiences and yeah. What can I say? Like yourself. Much like yourself, Chris. You know, you've learned you must have learned a lot along the way. Yeah. I was the same as you when they said what unit do you want to go to? I said four two because I knew they go into the Northern Island conflict. Yeah, there you go. Yeah. It wasn't I wanted to. Well, I don't probably lie. If I said I didn't want to go to war, but it was more that if I'm going to be in the Marines, I wanted at least to have experienced some form. Yeah. Yeah. Precisely. That's exactly what I'm talking about. Yeah. I mean, enjoying the core because. Yeah. I want to go and see conflict. I want to know what it was like. Wanted to have a scrap. Yeah. And. No, I want to end. Yeah. I wanted to grow as a person, but I guess it's a. I don't know. I don't know. It's hard to. I would think why would you want to go to war? What a stupid thing. But yeah, I guess that's how young boys are. You know, What was that tour like? Um, Well, Eric seven was pretty. Yeah. It was horrible. Um, Yeah. It was a tough tour. Uh, We, uh, We ended up at the fobs. Um, I was alpha company and 40 monitor and, um, Alpha company, we were based at father increment, which was probably like, Yeah. It was probably about 10 K 10 kilometers from sanguine up this up sanguine valley. Um, And it was, uh, May it was just a, It was just a compound in the middle of nowhere. Um, On some higher ground looking over the sanguine valley. Um, When we got there, we took over from. I can't remember. There was an army regiments who were out there. Um, But. There was, there was literally nothing. There was nothing. It was just four mud walls, massive four mud walls. Um, And, And we, Yeah, came in and we had to, We had to make it work. If I'm honest, Uh, It was grueling. Yeah. You know, 24 hour rations. Um, Is blistering hot. There's no shade. Uh, There's no top cover. Um, We, Uh, Let's dig the trenches for, For us to, You know, Piss and shipping. Um, And we had to burn, We had like drums that we put in and we had to burn that every day. Um, In the burns pits and stuff like that with diesel. Uh, No showers or anything like that. No, No, Water. Uh, We had to wait for shipments to be dropped in or bottled water. Um, Everyone was going down with the shits. Everyone at DMV. Um, We must have lost a third of our company in the first two months to, Yeah, To DMV. Um, And we were going out of patrol every day, Every day going out on patrol. And For eight hours at a time with full on kits. Uh, In the blistering heat. Uh, So yeah, you can imagine what it was like. Um, Pretty, pretty crap. And then we get shelled most low. Well, not most days, but. Yeah. A lot of the time, you know, They'd be a Chinese rockets or, Uh, A mortar would come over. Or, Uh, An RPG or something. Um, Having to do sang a rotation. You know, century duty. Um, All night. All day. All night. Uh, Unless you're on patrol. And. Yeah, it's just, it was grueling. No, I'm not going to deny it. It's tough. Um, It was tough. No. Did you, did you lose people? Yeah, we did. Um, My, my section commander, unfortunately was killed. Um, So, yeah, my second commander, unfortunately lost his life. Uh, which was devastating because I was, I was really good friends with him. Um, And he was, He was a really, really nice guy. No, he wasn't one of these section commanders who was, Um, Uh, He was very approachable and quite tough. Yeah. He was a big, big lad. Um, Uh, His name was Danian Mobile. Um, But we scored a big D. Um, He was really nice lad. He was a very popular figure. Yeah, he was. And, Um, But he was really approachable and calm. And we, like a big giants, you know, Uh, You know, A big self-giant Of a guy. Uh, And, But I mean, He was so easy to talk to and some nights and century duty at three in the morning, I'd be on century with big D and we'd be talking and, Um, He'd be chatting about life and he'd be talking about his misses and how he just got engaged and, Um, I'd be talking about, Uh, I don't know, South Africa and, Um, He was a big water polo, Water polo player. I used to play for the core, actually. I used to play water polo for the core. And South Africa water polo is big sports. So I used to talk to him about that and rugby. He was a big rugby fan and, Um, You know, We'd be talking, We just had so much in common, you know, And, We just, We were good, Good mates, Really good mates and, Um, It was, Yeah, Worse times, Worst things I could ever think of. Um, And that, That's when I, You know, That's when you really start, I guess you should really start knowing What war is all about and what real loss is really about and, Um, How horrible it is because he can, He didn't pass away in a very nice way. Um, It was an ID. Um, And it's still, It still really shakes me up to this day and, Um, Yeah, God rest his soul. Um, It gets, Do you get that feeling it's coming back to me now. It gets really real in that moment. Doesn't it? Yeah. Yeah. Even now, It still brings it all back. I can feel it. Um, Yeah, And it's, How many years later, It's still, Uh, It's horrible. It really makes you realise the reality of life. And, It makes you, Yeah, It brings it home as well. How massively, How brave you are to be a Royal Marine. Did you think that? Yeah, Yeah, Just, There's a soldier out there. You just crack on the neck. You just got to crack on the next day and put it behind you. And it's, I mean, It's just, Beyond words, really. It is. It is. And it's, Um, I give my most respect to anyone who's, Signed up and Wants to serve. Um, And then, It's been out there and done it. Um, Yeah, Top, Top respect, Because it's horrible and it's, um, It's something that you know, Can I talk to people who have Been there and done it and Done things. Yeah, it's hard to, It's really hard to talk to people you don't, Who haven't been there and experienced it. Um, It's really hard to get that. Uh, just to relate. It's really difficult. So, I mean, I ordinary at this point, I'd say, I come, Come in with a PTSD sort of angle. But of course, That normally hits you after you leave the core. But before you left, You had your own shit to deal with. Yeah. Yeah. We'll come on. We'll come on to that Toby if I may, But first, I'm fascinated. With anybody that makes a decision to go special forces. Myself, I just wasn't that sort of person. I think I'm. Ironically, I could see myself more as that now. Well, not with my mindset now, But with my physical self now, Because I'm quite fit. But back then I thought I was, I found, I found the fizz side of it. The climbing and stuff was really good at the ropes. I was always the first or second guy at the ropes in training. But the yonpin and stuff with my little legs, I found it epic. And so based on the fact that the first part of special forces is the selection and it's exactly that yonpin with heavy weights. I, I've got the utmost respect for anyone that went, Yeah, I think I can do that. At what point did you start considering it? You know, it was actually on that when I was on tour in Afghan. Believe it or not, I didn't even know the SPS existed. When I came over and joined the Corps, I really thought that the Marines and the Royal Marine Commanders was special forces. Elite forces, I thought, Oh, I thought that was, you know, the special forces. And there was only one side got into a unit and speaking to people. And I started hearing about special forces and these other, these other units. And that's when it was straight away, it piqued my interest straight away, it piqued my interest. And I was like, Oh, what's this all about? And then everyone started saying, you know, Oh, yeah, it's just taking it to the next level. The next level is this. And that's just the way my mind works. You mean there's another challenge, you know, Oh, I can test my mental in another way. And yeah, when I got back from Eric seven, Eric seven straight away, I started inquiring. I started inquiring if there are my company, Sergeant Asia. Yeah, I started inquiring about it. Yeah, you need so much experience first. And you need to be in the, in the core, you need to serve a bit of time and do a bit more operational experience and stuff like this. And, but I was just so keen. I was just so keen. And I was, I just took the risk. And I just put in for it straight away when I got back off Eric seven, if I'm honest. Now, well, it took me about six months to say, you know, maybe a bit longer a year to put in for it. So actually, I guess, yeah, get, get the confidence to put in for it. And I did. Yeah. But I knew straight away. I guess, yeah, this is what I want to do. This is where I want to go. It just was, yeah, it wasn't really a question or anything. Just something I knew I wanted to do. Did you do the diving phase when you were doing your training? Yeah, I went through selection and did all the parts of that. And, and yeah, it's, it was really good stuff, really good stuff. And it made me just advanced, made more of an advanced soldier and a lot more strings to my bow, a lot more skills. Yeah, it was really good stuff. The reason I asked, I've had, I've had a couple of SB guys on the podcast that because the need in Afghan was so great, they didn't do the dive, dive phase, which for someone like myself, I'd have been like, yes. I like diving. I've done a lot of diving around the world, but it's the, it's the actual swimming, swimming bit. Do you have to be a really good swimmer? I mean, no, you don't have to be. I mean, yeah, you have to be. I'd say you have to have a good standard of swimming and you have not be afraid of open water and not be afraid of dark claustrophobic spaces, I guess. And all that sort of stuff. I mean, personally, I, and then this is the opposite. I, I hate heights. I'm petrified of heights. So, you know, the other side of of special forces, the, the jumping in the air phase, and then, and all that. I was like, no, absolutely not. Do you not like that? Obviously, we had to do that anyway. But, yeah, that, that side of it. That was what I was more afraid of was the heights, diving in and water. I was like my comfort zone, you know, I, yeah, well, I grew up in South Africa and the ocean and the swimming and everything. It's, it's quite common out there, you know, I guess it's the climate in South Africa and that. So, yeah, water, no, no problems at all. Heights, on the other hand, and I did not like that phase at all. Didn't like it. Wasn't comfortable. And yeah, I did everything I could to steer away from it. Did you see any shark attacks when you're in South Africa surfing? No, no, I think that's a bit of, I mean, it's not, no, I never saw any shark attacks or anything like that. It does happen. It does happen. Sure. I mean, it's South Africa, yes, it's the ocean, it's their territory. But a lot of people think the sharks are just there all the time waiting for you. You know, as soon as you get in the ocean, yeah, there's going to be a shark. No, the odds are actually really, really small. You got the, I remember as a kid, we'd be swimming on the beach, swimming in the ocean. And yeah, the shark sirens would go off because they have coastal gods a bit further out and they'd spot a shark or something. And the sirens would go off and people would all get out the water. Yeah, it wasn't anything weird. It didn't bother us. If anything, it was quite funny because, you know, you make a joke out of it. And it was, as long as you can swim faster than your mates, you sort it. So yeah, I was, you know, just one of those. Yeah, I asked, because there was a bit of, there's been controversy, hasn't there about the cage diving when they purposely chum the water to bring the sharks in? Yeah. Never did it. I mean, I'm a big animal lover and I'm not such a fan of, yeah, people making like money off the back or things like that and distressing the animal or something like that. I think, leave them in their own environment and just leave them alone and let them, yeah, if you leave them alone, they'll leave you alone, you know? So yeah, I don't really agree with things like that. I'm honest. Without giving away any, you know, official secrets or anything, but what, what, what's hard, what was hard for you in SF training? Well, like I said, the jumps, the jumps phase, hated it. You know, all the air stuff, hated it. Do you have to do the halo and the... Yeah, halo. Yeah, you've got to do all that. Which is, is not nice. You have to do all the air stuff. So starting from your basic jumps course, you know, the stuff that like the paras do and they call them, you know, your runs, your runs with just the old, like World War II parachutes who start off doing that stuff, which you don't have any control over and you just stack it into the ground and you probably end up, you know, so many injuries. In fact, a lot of bloats did a lot of injuries. I mean, there were times when I was doing the air phase on those things. Those runs were horrendous. You hit the ground at such a, such a speed of jobs. I think at one point I used to, I was like, I had such a migraine and I was going to bed from those impacts. It was horrendous, man. People twisting ankle, ankles and knees and backs and everything. But yeah, and then you go on to, just get more and more advanced to how does it go along? But yeah, it was really cool stuff. Just, I don't like heights. The secret is to land on a gerker. Why is that? Well, they're soft. Yes, man. And then they stand up and say, I'm sorry, Saab. Yeah. I mean, I know some great gerkers. So, yeah. Yeah, and I do know some great gerkers and I've got full respect for those kids. Yeah, I did my course with, I think it was a fair share of Marines, Paras and Gerkers and very endearing mountain man, aren't they? Yeah, they're lovely guys. Lovely guys. And I mean, limbs, limbs, everyone knows, limbs, limbs. Pooja now. He's a very good friend of mine and yeah, a massive shout out to him for everything he's doing at the moment. Huge props. But yeah, we, I actually bumped into him on Heroic 7. He was one of the gerkers out with, he was using one of the engineers out there, gerker engineers helping us trying to build the forts. You know, I was talking about digging those pits and trying to make his best top cover as you could. Yeah, he, so that's where our first man does. And then we were on our sort of pre-selection phase together as well. So we were on that together and then we went on, yeah, and served in the unit base down here in Port. So yeah, I'm a good, really good man to them. And Nims has been on the podcast. Oh, great. Yeah, good man. I'll ask Luke to put a link for it below. For anyone who's wondering who Nims is, Nims Die was a gerker, I think the first gerker to join the Special Boat Service. That's correct. Yeah. And he's also the first person to summit all 14 of the world's highest peaks. And he did it in just over six months, which is, I think the previous record was something like seven years. And it's quite some unit, isn't he? Yeah, he's phenomenal. Him and his team of and he did it all with a team of Nepalese. So all Sherpas and they would just smash out Everest, go down a pub, drink and dance all night. Then the next day go and smash lotsy face or something. Yeah. Yeah. That's why me and him get along. Because that's just so, my character was, get shitfaced than I before and then go and have to do whatever it was the next day. Fizz in the morning at six, six a.m. And I probably just got off the piss. I probably five a.m. and you know, straight into it. Yeah. And also he was very selfless, wasn't he? Because he saved people's lives. He was. Yeah. While he was doing his record attempt, he took time off to bring people down the mountain and some of them would have just been left for dead. Yeah. And that's credit to his character and Nepalese culture and character and the Gokas. They are just lovely people and like I said, I have the utmost respect for those people. But yeah, just, yeah, everything about them. What's the camaraderie like in, is it different to being in the Marines that I'm. No, I wouldn't say so. Yeah, the camaraderie is just good. It's just strong. Would it surprise our friends at home listening to know how kind of normal some of these guys are? Yeah, absolutely. I think we're just normal guys and I've just written my autobiography and one of the things I wanted to get across in my autobiography was the reality of what the man is behind the special forces provider. You know, who are these people in real life and what are they like in real life and where they come from. And the truth is, we're just normal men and we just, you know, we have the same problems as anyone else and that's really, yeah, one of the core threads that goes through my autobiography is, yeah, the man behind behind the soldier if you like. Yeah. Yes, we're going to come on and talk about your wonderful memoir, Never Will I Die. That's right. Because that's another thing we've got in common along with being incredibly handsome. We've both written books. Yeah. It's another favourite subject of mine. Well, I mean, yeah, I've written a book, a book, but yeah, I'll take that incredibly handsome. Hey, now, my injury. I tell anybody out there, write in a book in so many ways, way harder than becoming a Royal Marine Commando. Jesus, yeah. I'll second that, mate. Yeah. It's, and it's also slightly dip to get properly published like you've been and God, yeah, it's pretty hard. To work with an editor and to do cover design and all this kind of stuff. It's a, yeah, it's some experience. Yeah, it's a lot harder than people think and it's not just sitting down and writing and, you know, give it to a publisher and there you go. No, there's a lot more to it. And obviously, with what I was writing about, but actually, it still is going through disclosure. I found I had a lot of the backlash of talking about much like what I'm doing with yourself, Chris. I found myself going back to some dark times and not being able to sleep after writing a lot of it. A lot of the PTSD stuff coming back, a lot of the anxiety and stress and the upsets and yeah, it was a rollercoaster of a ride. Real rollercoaster, yeah. And people questioning you as to why you're doing it. Yeah, a lot of people have asked me, are you just trying to make a career for yourself and are you trying to, you know, ride off the coattails of the unit and things like that. And I have to say, and this is something I'm like, you know, fiercely protective about. This book is about trying to empower people. It's nothing to do about, you know, biceps and bullets. It's nothing to do about that. It's about showing the testament or a shout out to the testament of the human spirit. And it's a book of empowerment and I wanted it and I wrote this book to help people to inspire people, to encourage people not to try and make a career out of, you know, being an SF soldier. And that's, yeah, that's something I really just want to say. Yeah, well, you've already been empowering people up into this point, Tobi, and you're doing it now by sharing your experience on this podcast. I'm hoping after it, when anyone thinks they're having a bad day, they'll go, oh, hang on, I'm not really, am I? It's amazing what you've come through. Can we talk about that then? How many times did you get injured all together? Quite a few times, actually. I've been shot through the arm. Which was a very lucky escape. Yeah, on an operation and Sniper got me in their crosshairs and luckily it just winged me, basically. Million-dollar wounders first. One inch to the left and probably would have taken my arm completely off, completely right off. Yeah, it was the Dragunov Yeah, Dragunov sniper rifle. It's basically like the AK variant, variant of the sniper rifle out there and high velocity round 762. And if that had one inch to the left would have hit the bone of my upper shoulder and probably would have taken my arm completely off. Or had very nice shots at the bone and I would have had to have it amputated. So yeah, very lucky there. As it was, went straight through, went straight through and I was back out on the ground soon afterwards. Wow. And then the second time I was injured, unfortunately, wasn't as lucky again on another operation on the ground. This time first quarter combat went through a door and the enemy were set up ready for us and I caught up a burst of fire again, AK-47 close close quarter combat and it's it was a burst of rounds in our direction and the first round went straight through my neck and the second round ricocheted off the off my helmet. You know as a burst of fire the rounds grow up up in the straight line as the barrel of the rifle goes up with a kick and went through my neck and the other one ricocheted off my helmet which saved my life otherwise again well that one would have gone straight to the start of my head and killed me instantly. But the first round hit my spinal cord and that obviously took me out straight away and paralyzed me instantly from the neck down and that was instantaneous the lads managed to drag me out of the compound working on me there in the pitch black at night you know trying to find the wound find the entry wound find the exit wound check for a radial pulse ok he's got a radial pulse he's still alive calling the nine minor calling the helos and hopefully he gets back to somewhere where we can work on him properly but it was very touch and go very touch and go but here I am today were you unconscious instantly was there any of it that you remember yeah I was unconscious straight away you know the lads the lads when I speak to them they've seen enough death to know when it's serious because when there's no screaming and shouting that's when you know he's probably dead there's you know they're calling my name and asking if I'm ok and I'm not responding and the way I fell they the lads they've seen enough of it and they're professional enough to know ok he's seriously injured if not dead but yeah I was unconscious so I don't remember much of that night I can kind of remember up to a point up to a point and then just goes black out and the next thing I know it's three months later I've been at coma for three months and I wake up in Birmingham, ITU insane really I can't really explain it if I'm honest because there's a lot of me that was like what is going on where am I have I been captured am I being interrogated my training was kicking in so a lot of me was very scared very weary I had a lot of drugs coursing through my veins so I was very confused part of me was still saying thank god I'm still alive you know ok that's a starting point we can work with that I'm alive yeah and then it was why can't I move why am I sort of I thought I'd been strapped down you know I thought that had me strapped down so again I thought I'd been captured a lot of me so my mind was going overdrive I thought I'd been pumped full of drugs to try and deliberately confuse me so that I would be able to like truth serum and more talkative so I was I was just going through my training and what I've been taught in this scenario and that was don't say anything just show your mouth and yeah and wait and see what happens but yeah I had so much going on very scary very very scary those people you don't know who to trust I was in solitary confinement because of infection control so I was just in like a glass room one bed people looking at me through a window yeah and all I could do was stare at the roof I couldn't talk because I had this massive neck brace on and it was tracking up to me and I hadn't learned to talk okay I hadn't learned how to talk yet yeah all these tubes and you know all my arms all these lines and I had a spinal fluid drain coming out of my neck yeah all these bottles of chemicals being pumped into my system yeah very very very scary very scary who was the first person that approached you so I had the surgeons there but I weren't too sure who they were and I didn't recognize them so I wasn't talking to them I just my training I was just keeping quiet it was only until my RSM came in to the room and he was the first face I recognized and he basically had to debrief me and say Toby stand down um yeah stand down you haven't been captured you're not in that scenario this is what's happened and he was the one who explained it to me and explained what had happened and that I was very seriously injured and then he was then he called in the surgeon and they both had to explain to me the implications of my injury and that was basically I'm paralyzed from the neck down for the rest of my life um and we'll breathe on end machine for the rest of my life and yeah that just hit me like a ton of bricks um I couldn't believe it was real I couldn't believe any of it I couldn't believe what was going on um soft sets um trying to process it all I'd lost everything in the blink of an eye my entire career my body my density as a man a very physical capable man young good-looking ruggedly handsome everything was you know um taken away in one split second uh yeah and how long does it take to process this uh you don't it's it's not it's um it's more of an ongoing process it's I'm still learning I'm still processing it now you know I'm still learning and how to deal with it um and it's almost sometimes sometimes it's 100 steps back and one step forward um and it's it's something you never really come to terms with you just learn to deal with it with life um being nearly you never really come to terms with it um you're always thinking uh you know wonder what it would be like if I'd never got injured yeah was it was there a part of you that thought hang on no I'm I'm going to get this out of the way I'm going to get back to my unit get back to afghan uh yeah there were parts of me in initial phases forward I can beat this I'm going to I'm going to you know there's going to be some sort of surgical procedure and I'm going to get fixed and I'll get back to you know being myself and you know what I know um but the more time goes on you know there's yeah the more it starts sinking that's that's not going to happen were your family by your side at this time um my family did come over to um to the UK when when I was first injured and they were with me but I'm I don't have a close family um you know the only person I'm very close to is probably is my brother the brother and he stayed with me for most of the time my parents were there for the initial sort of phase of the waking up but they they went back to South Africa fairly fairly quickly afterwards um but my brother stayed with me throughout the that initial phase where I was very because I was still very very ill I was very sick you know I had a lot of um surgery I mean they the initial prognosis was that I was completely brain dead because they couldn't do an MRI scan because of the metal the metal and you know shrapnel in my neck so there was no chance of an MRI scan so the prognosis was that due to the probably the oxygen salvation and the length of time it took to get him back to from from the you know from in the middle of Afghan he's more than likely going to be brain dead um so there was this period where they weren't actually too sure whether or not to bring me out of the coma they thought it might actually be best if they turn the machine off you know um and that came to a decision that they that they gave to my brother my brother was the man who had to decide whether or not we try and bring him out of the coma and see if he is actually still in there or we do the humane thing and we switch the machine off um and uh my brother said no no let's give him the chance let's give him that chance I believe in him he's the strongest man I know and yeah so they brought me out and luckily I was actually still you know I still had yeah sort of um I don't know what you call it um yeah I still was thinking um but yeah it was tough times and like I said I was still very ill um a lot of so I still had to have a lot of surgery I had 52 staples keeping the back of my neck connected basically to my you know my head on my shoulders basically um I couldn't talk I couldn't eat um I had to learn all these things again um I caught pneumonia whilst in hospital so I had double pneumonia in both lungs um and again their thoughts that probably I was not going to make it um because of the stress on my body and what I just the stress that I just went through the pneumonia was taking hold and um they were getting IV antibiotics into the but into the body but they weren't working um so it was very touching going for a long period and then I managed to you know get better um after ah yeah terrible you know when you're very ill like that you become delusional um I was coughing up a lot of blood um all this blood was coming out suctioning that had to suction all this blood out of my lungs and then I got better for a while but then unfortunately I caught pneumonia again um for a second time um and this time my body was so swollen they couldn't actually get any of the needles into my veins to get the IV antibiotics into me and again ah they were like it would be makes it through the night it's a miracle um and eventually they got an IV drip into my foot they found a vein on the top of my foot and they managed to get that in um but they said if he makes it through the night if he makes it through the night he'll be okay but if he doesn't yeah yeah that's it and my brother stayed with me um yeah throughout the night and he was I mean I remember you know looking vaguely seeing him and seeing other people you know very delusional and couldn't piece it all together but my brother told me afterwards he said that was the scariest moment he's ever experienced you know I was he said I was white as a sheet um basically it was like looking at a dead person um yeah but I made it through it um and got better um and yeah um carried and that was yeah just the beginning of my journey really um into what is now my new life I guess did you um I mean you obviously went into some sort of supported living yeah um after spending a year over a year in total in hospital on my back um staring at the roof um and people say you know well marine training is hard and SF selection is hard and this is hard and that is hard that was probably the hardest thing I've ever had to do is to stare at a ceiling for a year um yeah it's probably one of the hardest things to do just to stay sane now I truly need that to stay sane without losing my mind um because I can't move and have a neck brace and all I can do is stare at the roof 12 hours well 24 hours a day um and then try and sleep um but yeah I moved out of that and I uh I moved into assisted living down in pool um and that's when my unit started helping me and started trying to build some resemblance of a life yeah um started trying to then get funding and you know go through the rigmarole of being discharged and moving on to the NHS and um you know yeah just going through the bureaucracy of um being an injured veteran trying to um integrate back into society I suppose which organization helped you the most uh there was a few organizations uh Help for Heroes being one massive shout outs, Help for Heroes can't thank them enough if anyone again is listening that charity what it does is phenomenal you know um a lot of people think because we're not at war at the moment we don't have troops that are in a you know conflict at the moment that there's no need for these charities but there are a lot of injured veterans out there you need life long care and that takes a lot of money and a lot of support which is expensive you know veterans are for life not just for Christmas you know it's forever and there's a lot of injured veterans out there who yeah need a lot of support um so massive shout outs Help for Heroes if anyone's listening keep supporting them when did you have your first beer do you want to hear a good story um so I was still in hospital um in recovery and I I've been moved to Salisbury hospital now where the spinal unit is and um I had one of my mates come up to hospital and um we were talking and he was like do you think it's possible if we can get you out just for a couple hours will you will you down downtown and uh yeah we can have a beer and all the surgeons and all the nurses and everyone was like you know obviously absolutely not no chance um but uh we managed to convince them like semi break me out of hospital um I don't think they actually knew I was going for a beer to the pub I think they just wanted they thought I was just going to put some fresh air because I've been you know stuck in this hospital so long anyway um we managed to get me out and we wheeled me out of the hospital really quickly quickly um got me onto the bus you know just a bus outside the hospital and uh before they could really say no officially we we were already downtown and we were yeah straight in the pub and I um yeah had my first beer um and it's like you know golden nectar if I'm honest yeah yeah but again this was after I I learned how to swallow again because um you know throughout my rehabilitation process I had to learn how to talk how to eat how to swallow um in all this yeah it was a bit of time after that but that first beer was like nectar golden nectar from the gods wondering how you're dealing with the trauma because that presents in very obscure ways I mean depression you can be depressed and not know you're depressed right um and I'm I'm wondering how you manage that route a lot of veterans obviously turn to alcohol and you're already juggling a cocktail of of drugs which which makes it then hard to we had this discussion earlier didn't we you know makes it hard to balance your mood and yeah it all can become dangerous territory is was that ever an issue yes a big issue um I mean first of all getting off the cocktail of drugs that they had me up so long in hospital um I was on some serious sedatives um IV sedatives um and then with a weaning meal fat um and and the sleeping medication and things I found that very odd uh waking up in the middle of the night you know screaming cold sweats um not knowing what was going on very confused um but yes that that was that was quite tough but um once once I got another hospital and um I was now sort of you know um I guess semi-adapted house for me while I was transitioning back to survey street um yeah I started struggling really started struggling psychologically um and I basically was finding I mean it's easy to look back now say yeah I was struggling with depression massively struggling with depression um I started finding myself asking the questions of why am I even here what is the point of this I mean you know it would be far better if I wasn't here um I started yeah I started drinking um and I started getting in touch with some some bad people um who were basically you know um I started doing drugs started getting back onto the stronger medication that was not meant for that purpose if you know what I mean so I had medication that was for pain relief and um other things and I started telling my nurse you know that I was in extreme pain so that she'd be giving me more and more drugs um and more and more sort of drugs to relax me and calmly down but it was more just because well I was just lying basically to so I could get more on the drugs to just disappear in my mind you know become dull flat not there um and I would I'd be staring out the window for eight hours a day not moving I'd just stare out the window um become basically just I don't know inert uh and it was a really really horrible time horrible horrible time uh I was sort of still on the on the marriage patch down on the unit I'd still be hearing the lads running doing fizz you know the troops would come running past uh I could hear I could hear the heroes coming in the lads were still going out on jobs and doing stuff you know um the unit was still carrying on and I just felt like I was just being left out and and yeah I I really really struggled really struggled and I eventually got to a point where yeah I wanted to end my life um and I started looking into ways of actually how that could be done um or if it could be done and it turns out it can be done can be done um through various you know sort of loopholes in the medical system of you know refusing medical treatment and stuff like that so yeah I started um preparing I actually literally started preparing um and it's a funny one because I didn't want to you know it's a massive part of me that still wants to carry on living but there's a the big part of me at the time was saying no I'm done I'm done it's um it's time to call it quits I've definitely been down the drug route I don't think that's any secret to anyone yeah and the alcohol and yeah prescription medication I I get it all me I obviously I haven't been in your situation but I I do I'm very fortunate in this life I someone said to me something when I was in Hong Kong and I was looking for a bit of attention one day so I said to my mate I'm thinking of killing myself right nothing was you know people can read my memory you want to find out more but nothing was going right and I I too all my career in the means had gone I thought I'd lost my house anyway so I said to my mate one day yeah I'm thinking of killing him and he just turns me in Chris you ain't going to kill yourself he said because and I'm not saying this is true here folks I'm just telling you what he said what he said is to kill yourself you have to hate yourself and you don't hate yourself Chris I remember thinking oh yeah don't do I and I'm laughing but it was a silly it's a silly little anecdote but basically after that I've always just remembered that conversation and I've been unfortunate I have a very fierce survival streak in me because of my rough childhood and because when you when you're in chronic addiction you've got no one everyone leaves your life and to be honest I can't say I blame them but it's the stigma the stigma that you then have to go through people saying this behind your back and and that's made me fiercely like fuck everybody you know fuck you I'm as equal on this planet to every other person on it and with that I just still do it now if ever going through a wobble just fucking hold my head up high you know yeah I relate to that there's something so common there that survival streak and that exactly what you're talking about there about holding your head high and believing in yourself believing in yourself and that's I think what made me I don't know something deep inside me was because I didn't hate myself I just thought I was just in this mind frame of I'm so depressed and I've lost everything it's just more humane to yeah I don't say kill myself it was more like just put myself down you know like like you know you know what I mean so much pain and suffering and everything there's part of me that was just like it's more humane to just let yourself go but then there's the other side of me that's like fucking hell Tony I don't know there's this anger in me yeah that's survival streak that says no I will not go quietly I will not go quietly and that's that's a poem by the way that's a poem by Dylan Thomas do not go quietly into that gentle night resist against the dying of the light and then I'm always just yeah that inside of me is just like pounds and pounds and pounds away and that was the part of me that said no Tony go and get some help this cannot be the end of it it can't be the end of your story it can't be the end of your journey yeah see I'll say this for our friends at home a big part of the battle is you're in this spiral and a big thing that supports that spiral is you're still playing by society's bullshit fucking rules and people's bullshit attitudes and in this life we need to aspire to be this or we need to aspire and we have to have we have to be physically able we have to be macho yeah my point was I had an epiphany where I couldn't go only lower I just kept having nervous breakdowns and literally crying my fucking eyes out so alone you know and on one of them it just hit me oh my god what have I done forget everybody else and whatever people may have done to you in your life but I've done this to myself and it was at that moment I realised to come out of it I had to rebuild my life my thinking what I aspire to not not you know and the one thread I guess that's so strong in all of that is you have to be grateful for this life you know and probably like yourself I thought about my mates that weren't here anymore and they'd all died young and they'd all died in horrible ways you know either in the Marines or you know through drugs whatever it might be and I thought you know I'm not them they're gone what would they give to be in my position now and that was my epiphany and my rebuilding point and every day from then on I felt different sitting here now I'm in a different headspace to that I'm so grateful that I've been given this chance in this amazing universe and I created a set of rules that's so strong that it doesn't matter what I go through I fucking wake up in paradise and I go to bed in paradise I yeah I remember the turning point for me and yeah because I've been exactly that through that point and how many people in life get given a second chance you know and I was given a second chance make no burns about it it was like I was on my bed and it was like you know alright it took me a while to realise that it doesn't come overnight it doesn't I ended up in a psychiatric hospital the priory hospital I don't know if you know it's like a famous rehab is it not? yeah it's like a rehab for people I ended up going to the priory which is where I spoke to someone he said to me I just want you to do one thing because I didn't want to talk to psychiatrist and people I wasn't interested I've made up my mind and he was like I just want you to think about one thing do me one favour and he left me a pen and paper and he said just write down three things three things that you think define you as a person I remember writing it down and it was things like resilience and passionate and loyal and all these great things and that was the point where I started thinking about what I have to offer and who I am as a person and that I don't just because I'm paralyzed and I look a certain way and there's a stigma around disabled people yeah I've still got a lot to give and I was given a second chance and I do every day wake up and I tell myself that all the time exactly what you just said about all the people that weren't given second chances it would be unjust for me to just throw it away at second chance because they'd do anything for a second chance and they're not even here to question it and I am so yeah and you owe your brother one as well big time yeah I don't like to tell and I don't like to say it to him because yeah I do owe him big time big time yeah that was it really there wasn't it so when did you start thinking about your business and my god we could have a whole another podcast on that alone perhaps we just should but do you want to give us a kind of summary how you come up with the idea how did you think it was workable well I mean this is when I was actually still in the primary and I started my rehab and I started turning my life around you know I got into that t-junction you know that crossroads in my life and it was you know make the decision and if you're gonna make the decision to stick around don't waste it let's make a good go of it let's make the best go of it you can so I started thinking about what I was interested in, what I liked doing what gave me joy and passion and made me feel happy in my life and growing up in South Africa I was always into extreme sports so I loved surfing and being in the ocean I loved the dirt bikes, the motorcross you know just being out there on you know yeah and all these sort of extreme sports so and even throughout my military career you know I carried on doing these things when I free time so there's always been a big part of my life and I wanted to try and well just keep in with that and I figured yeah why not start an extreme sports brand you know something that's got that you know really cool edge extreme sports feel about it and it's about surfing and motor bikes dirt bikes and all that but it's got a like a really cool message that I want to try and promote as well and that's bravery being brave in life and being brave enough to stand up to whatever it is that faces you challenges throughout life so yeah so trying to bring these two together these two worlds together and I thought of a wicked extreme sports brand that ultimately is a lifestyle brand and that lifestyle is about being brave and the message behind the brand is go out there live your life to the fullest don't be afraid and enjoy the ride you know do you take a part in designing all the gear I mean I'm guessing yeah I do so then I started pulling the business together but I was just to take one step back when I started looking into this I had no business background I had absolutely no knowledge on business but I was smart enough to know that if I was going to start a business I think the best thing to do is go and get some knowledge and go and learn a bit and do a bit so I decided to go back to college because my grades were so rubbish and I was you know I never did well at school anyway when I was back in South Africa they were like you're gonna have to start you have to start from scratch basically I was like alright here we go let's start so I started my GCSEs again and then from there I went on to college and I did my A levels and once I got my A levels I decided then I wanted to do a business degree so I applied for university and wanted to do a bachelor of a bachelor of arts in business and I did a four year business degree and I approached that as I approached everything in my life which is full on don't hold back if you're gonna do something do it properly and I came up with a first class honors degree and I achieved outstanding student award as well so I got a business business degree and that's just to show that people you know I'm paralyzed I'm in a wheelchair can't move and I've still managed to go right back to school start my GCSEs again pass my A levels, get a degree and start a business so yeah so I went anyway I did all that and I got my business degree so now I've got a background in business and I know what I was doing and then I started bolting the business together and then I started thinking about design supply chains manufacturers logistics you know all the things finance so on and so forth and just building it all together and I got involved in the design side because I like that it's cool, it's quite a fun part of the business and so yeah I do help out a lot with that but predominantly my background is sort of the operational side of the business and it's where I find my strengths are and that is almost pulling everything together getting a product from the design phase all the way through to the customer making sure all the parts of the business are running as they should does that make sense? I don't know if that makes sense but yeah yeah it's a big it's a big old thing you know it's a massive machine running a business, starting a business is not just as simple as buy something for this price and sell it for more and you make money there's a lot more to business than just that who does all your packing and mailing out? so at the moment I've got a couple of people who work here who do all the packaging who work with me I'm a small time gig I've got a couple of people who work for me and they help with all the packaging and all the designing on the computers and delivering and it's all eco-friendly as well so all the packaging is all 100% eco-friendly because I'm still like with the animals and things I'm a massive fan of the environment and I'm a big big big supporter of companies trying to go more sustainable and more eco-friendly and environmentally friendly I think it's the way to go we only have one planet and if we you know just if we carry on the way we are going yeah I mean we're going to attract you that really annoys me we are intelligent human beings we should be smarter than this we really should and it's because of the just the way the world is structured around business now it's almost like we've caught ourselves in a trap we can't get out of it you know what I mean? we're so reliable on these fossil fuels we're so dependent on all these companies and stuff and they're so hard to change at all yeah it's like we're living a false life isn't it? we can live in such comfort because we're burning part of the planet that we can never replace yeah and if we could just get get away from all these damaging things I know it's easier said than done because we're so reliant on it and it's like a vicious cycle you know how do you how do you get out of that cycle that's a real problem but we like I said we're intelligent human beings we can do it we just need to put the effort and the resources behind it and that's what I'm trying to do as well with Braver you know have a company that relies you know well it's environmentally friendly it's you know it's sustainable as possible it's it's a wicked side of the brand it's a really cool side of the brand which I think is the way to go and how how were the challenges right in a book um yeah going back how do you even do it um so I've got a ghost writer comes in and we have like a dictaphone records and I talk to him um and we record our conversations and then after that he types it all up like a another subscriber um basically they get um taken from audio into like written down like transcribing yeah transcribe yeah transcribe and we go through it and we rewrote it into sort of that kind of format of a book so it's quite a few yeah it's quite a bit of challenges to but it's interesting I mean but it's it's usually the hardest thing I find about it is it's just really going in depth into the memories of childhood having a rough childhood having yeah and you know losing people in the Marines and friends and then going through the SF side of things and then losing everything and then having to start again from scratch and basically build myself up from nothing um literally going back to GCSE and yeah and here I am today um yeah so yeah writing a book has been challenging but I hope it's going to all be worth it and hope it's for the right reasons if you know what I mean it's exciting when's it released uh yeah so the book Never Will I Die uh by me myself Toby Guthridge um is now available to pre-order on Amazon and Waterstones if you go there and just google Never Will I Die the book will come up we'll put a link for it below the podcast so don't worry about that yeah that'd be great thanks Chris but it's out on the 9th of June fingers crossed yeah fingers crossed um 9th of June it'll be out um and hopefully it does really well I'm hoping well you've done really well to even get a book out to acknowledge that and anything else is a bonus right and yeah it is yeah it is um but if it can help one person and it just inspires one person to get out that dark space or what's show people that no matter how how bad it gets there is always like standing in the tunnel you know just keep going um like Winston Churchill said when you're going through hell just keep going just keep going what choice do you have mate yes exactly yeah just one last thing I better give a mention your friends with Titch McCormack have I got that right? absolutely yeah great friends served together um down here in Paul we served together he has just gotten a fantastic show it's on BBC 2 on Sunday nights called The Speed Shop check it out it is awesome and I did the first episode so the first episode was about me and him and we built this work inside for myself to get me back on the motorbikes um which is so cool um and what a great project it was but um yeah well why don't you you both come on and go and talk us through it oh we'd love to we'd love to I've got Titch's number on my phone we were chatting back along and as can often happen in the podcast world you something else comes up and then you both live in busy lives and um this is where I need a PA yeah tell me about it actually Luke does a wonderful job with this sort of thing so I'll um now he's seen this hello Luke could you um get this sorted mate please um yeah that would be a great show yeah and I know Titch would love to do it because he's just um I such cool dude um in him where we get on like a house on fire and uh you know um he'd love to promote his show but he's also got some great stories about you know overcoming adversity and um that mental mind of um keep striving keep going uh so yeah that'd be great that'd be a great one and uh he's a very funny character as well so um I think that'll be a blast if I'm honest yes I think so Toby listen I could chat you forever um yeah I know and we have to wrap things up otherwise well it's um the problem of I say this a lot sorry to friends at home if you heard it before but people haven't got as much time now to listen to podcasts as they did during the lockdown that's true yeah you know so I always try to shy on going on for hours we used to just talk and talk and talk but if you think about it if you think about people looking at their phone and there's a podcast that's 20 minutes and there's one that's free free hours and they're on their way to work they're going to go for the 20 minute one so we don't do ourselves favors doing the long the long haul podcast now but the good thing about that means you can come back on the show and we can talk about business another phase of your life and yeah I mean there's so many things we can talk about there's this business there's uh the mental side of it there's and I mean when I talk about mental side of it I'm talking about the horrible side of it and the good side of it and the positive side of it and yeah South Africa we can talk about the Marines there's so many things we can talk about yeah yeah it'd be good to do a book together on the subject mate that would be yeah getting people out of a dark place exactly and I think there's so much synergy there between me and you um Jesus we could do a lot of good for a lot of people man but uh if it's alright there's I mean I just forgot to say there with bravery if people want to follow us um or follow me because I don't have any personal um social medias I only use my bravery so my Instagram account is at bravery under scroll UK um people want to check out and see what it's all about find out more about it and more about me um and then yeah on Facebook um bravery organization if they search that on Facebook follow us please follow us it'll be great um yeah on your more gets out there on your Insta you want to um if you can put out some personal stories about your time when you served it's massive massively popular and you can develop quite a quite a following it's a bit of a shame really I don't I never really thought about the Marines about 15 years after I left I didn't even like I'd maybe bump into one of the lads every five years and it was uh hello mate how's it going yet and I certainly I was you know I had no like oh I need to be wearing the core pattern shirt and I was I just didn't think about it yeah and then um when I started doing the podcast it's just one of those things and it's it's a bit sad really is you tell a story about overcoming adversity getting out smashing your goals running 999 miles pretty much non-stop doing four quadruple I and men right this this is all stuff I've done you get like 400 views on the podcast it's it's just tragic and yet if you tell a story about you know how you polish your boots in training one it's like thousands of views really and oh man I didn't know yeah so going back to what you're saying earlier is yeah I don't hide the fact I ironically for someone who never thought about the mob for 15 years I've ridden off but you know I went through I did as well I didn't want to talk about this I didn't want to talk there's this thing in in the SF world as well about how you have to keep under the radar and stay off the radar and don't don't highlight yourself and you know there's a stigma around what we what I'm doing now on podcasts don't get me wrong it's not as bad as it used to be but um there's still a stigma around I shouldn't be doing this yeah I shouldn't be talking about the stuff I shouldn't like you know I shouldn't be talking about mental health and talking about my time and writing books and doing podcasts and having a social media blah blah but the truth is is you know well they they ain't going to come and pay your bills for you no no not secondly you went for me I'm in a shit fucking situation now I wake up every day and have to fucking question my sanity you know yeah like you know it's also it's also we went through the toughest military training in the world and you went on to do tough uh we did that we have every right you know that's part of us part of our life experience yeah we have one of us yeah and the the final thing sorry I just want to say is what other people think about our business and to be in any kind of like the media game that's that's the first you got to get that fucker put to bed that's where I struggle because I'm so self-conscious anyway and my you know I don't have a lot of self-confidence because of my injury and the way I look and you know I'm conscious of the way people look at me and I'm intimidated and these things so yeah it's hard it's really really hard for me and to push my brand bravery is it's so hard but I do it because it's it's ultimately what is the brand about that's what the brand is about it's about your your challenges and then growing as a human being um so that's why I do it and that's why I use all the help in the world because you're not only helping me Chris by by letting me be on your podcast you're not only helping me psychologically you're helping everyone else by putting my story out there and and yeah in your story you know thank you mate and um you just got to keep being being yourself to because you're a fucking lovely bloke I appreciate that mate and I just yeah um I just want to be happy you know I just want to enjoy life and and yeah thank god I'm here every day if I'm up pool are you still in pool I'm over do a trip there I'm going to come up and have a go on Ben's motorbike I think so mate if you're up here and you do yeah please honestly I'd love to go for a beer and chat um where we can actually sit down and talk forever because it helps me it does help me talk humans out it's helping me you know on so many levels give no idea yeah I my simplest rule if I could say to anybody other than watch your pH diet folks but other than that is smile at the morning sun it's what I do every day and say thank thank you mother nature for this life and everything else work works itself out from there yeah yeah um yeah couldn't have said it better myself um all right Chris brilliant mate thanks ever so much Toby to everybody at home I hope you've got as much out of this wonderful chat as I have massive love to you all please look after yourselves please smile at the morning sun and just remember there's always someone out there that's going through something worse than you and things always get better see you