Connections that Count: Exploring Relationships in Business and Family 170

Today's episode of Share the Thugall podcast is an emotional balancing act as I try to celebrate a successful event amidst an incredible amount of stress and fear of the unknown. Stick around as we discuss a milestone week and dig into extremely difficult emotions. Let me tell you something Everybody struggles. The difference is some people choose to go through it and some choose to grow through it. This is completely yours. Which one you choose will have a very profound effect on the way you live your life. If you find strength in the struggle, then this podcast is for you. You have a relationship that is comfortable with uncomfortable conversations. Uncomfortable conversations challenge you, humble you and they build you. When you sprinkle a little time and distance on it, it all makes sense. Most disagreements, they stem from our own insecurities. You are right where you need to be. What a deal. What a deal. Hot Diggity-damn. I'm so excited to be back with you, episode 170. That is equivalent to 170 consecutive weeks of me and you. Okay the Struggle Podcast. What up? Y'all? Put your fingers up. What my day one's at? Put your ones up. Y'all, put your ones up. If you're a day one loyal listener, share the Struggle Podcast. If you're new, y'all welcome. We welcome you to share the Struggle Podcast. In case you don't already know, you can find all things podcasts related at wwwsharethestrugglepodcastcom. Yeah, get on over there. Leave a review, say how do you do? Hit, subscribe, grow the tribe. Spread that love y'all. Speaking of some podcast love, I want to start today off with a little podcast love for some loyal listeners out there. That surprised the pants right off me because I didn't know you were listeners and it just means so much to me. So this week at the Freiburg Fair, I was a recipient of an awesome visit, a reconnecting Reunited, and it feels so good. I know that was. Y'all know how I do. You know I'll be lame sauce. I've got a big old splash of lame sauce over here. But sometimes when I get reconnected, when I get a visit, when we just are, two worlds collide again and I find out that someone is listening in, that someone is a dedicated, loyal listener. It surprises me, it always surprises me. Who listens, who cares, who tunes in, who enjoys it. And this week was truly special because some friends that I haven't really been able to see or speak with in quite some time but you know you still keep tabs on each other online, but I just didn't know that y'all was listening. Sean and Nicole White, I love y'all. Thank you so damn much. I was so freaking shocked when you guys rolled in the tent. Number one I don't recall ever seeing y'all at the fair. So, first off, you got a fair surprise regardless. Number two when you guys said that you were listeners, that you've been listening in, man, it blew my socks right off. It's always a surprise. It is always a surprise to find out who listens to the podcast. But I had no clue. I never guessed it was you. Sean, nicole, I love you guys. Caden Cole, man, I tell you, man, I'm never I don't know, I'm never prepared for the shock of someone telling me they listen. You know like I do this every week obviously we've been doing it for 170 weeks and sometimes a complete stranger from across the country reaches out and sometimes it's just a great friend that you haven't shadowed with in some time. And it's heartwarming every single time and it's the reason why I continue to carve out a time in my life to share my life with everybody, because you never know who's listening, you never know who it's going to touch. But, sean, when you send me that screenshot of all the episodes you've got downloaded on your phone. Man, I just can't tell you what it means to me that you guys listen and the connection that we have. It's people like the whites that are one of those things that I count as a true blessing for my previous life, my previous career, because when I worked for Harley Davidson I was able to meet some awesome people and some of those awesome people turned into awesome friends and awesome family and I'm surrounded by so many people in my life today that came from that Harley world and I continue to be surprised by how many are still in my life or still rooting for me, still pulling for me, still connected to me and believe in me. And it's man, it's special. If I was to sum up Harley Davidson in a very short way, it would be lifestyle. Harley Davidson is a lifestyle and it's something special about Harley and the moment that I started to lose that lifestyle feel from Harley Davidson, I knew it was time for me to move on, because I never wanted to not give all of me to all of you that came in. I truly feel like in the world of Harley, true, genuine Harley Davidson owners. It's a lifestyle, it's a way of life, it's a monumental achievement, right? Some people work their entire life to purchase a Harley. Some people buy a new one every year, but it means just as much to all of them. And when I found out the dealership that I was working with when they sold and all those things, you can go back and hear all that history in some of our previous episodes. But when the new ownership came in and I was having those conversations, I knew it was no longer a lifestyle. I knew it was no longer a way of life. I knew it was a transaction based relationship and that wasn't going to cut it for me, because relationship sales are what means everything to me. That lifestyle of Harley Davidson and that relationship sale ability that you have from Harley Davidson is the reason why I was doing it, and it just goes to show based off of all of you that I'm still connected with. It goes to show based on all of you that are helping me to be consistent with this podcast, that are helping me to push to be successful with this business. It means everything, man, and it just goes to show it was always more than just Harley Davidson and that's what's great about Harley and that's what's great about that customer base that I met and made, because it wasn't just customers. Many of you turned into friends and a family, and Sean and Nicole, I can't thank you enough, man. You guys blew me freaking pants off. You blew me bloomers. You blew me bloomers red love for me. Yeah, man, speaking of Harley, it was kind of a crazy week for me. I was able to connect with so many previous co-workers and staff. I was able to see so many because Byberg Fair for those of y'all who don't know that, don't live in Maine it's a Maine reunion. It's a Maine tradition, it's a way of life. That week, so many schools kids are just getting pulled out of school to go jobs are closing, people are taking time off, putting vacation time in. It's a big deal in the state, especially up there. Most of the schools in the area close on Fridays for the fair. It's a great opportunity to reconnect with so many people and my phone was blowing up with previous teammates, co-workers and I was able to see so many and share so many great conversations and memories and it made me thankful for the time and experiences that I had and it also made me grateful for having the ability to bet on myself the confidence to take the chance to step out of the comfort zone and to walk away from what I was doing. Because I ultimately truly feel today, if I had made that commitment to stay, if I had made that commitment to not bet on my own dreams and turn my back on what I wanted to do, I really feel like today I would absolutely regret it. I would be miserable if I had not already been fired. I would have been miserable and I would have been starting over today trying to find my way, starting to maybe push record for the very first time on this podcast and maybe spend that first year in fear, trying to learn how to design a payroll and to get out there and put myself out there. This was a week where I really truly felt grateful and blessed and appreciated the risk that I've taken. It's really easy to look back on things and say I wish I would have, I wish I wouldn't. You know, we all second guess ourselves. We all second guess our decisions and our choices. There's been multiple times along this journey of loud, proud American where I've been trying to make it, when I've been scraping by, when I've been maxing out credit lines and depleting bank accounts, where I thought to myself man, you'd be living a much more comfortable life, pal, you'd be doing a lot more different things for your family heads. You stuck around for a paycheck. After this week. It was very I don't even know how to express it I just felt thankful and proud of myself for betting on myself, because I feel like this was a week where I really was able to close off that chapter of my life and say that you made the right decision. For years I've been saying that and I've moved on from what I used to do. I'm not saying that I've been regretting it this whole time, but what I'm trying to tell you is there's moments of doubt, there's moments of potential regret can leak in your mind when you're what's that old saying You're Robin, peter to pay Paul. You're just scraping by. You're doing everything you can to get up each and every day and try to pay the bill and to make things work. You have those moments of weakness where you wonder hey, man, did I do the right thing? I've always come around to saying to myself yes, you did the right thing and I'm happy that I'm not doing the previous thing. That part of my life is closed down. I don't miss it no more. I don't regret any of those choices and decisions and I don't ever want to go back to them. But sometimes you just need a stamp of approval. Sometimes you just have that letter and you put it in the envelope, but sometimes you just need to lick it, stick it, stamp it, seal it, file that shit and, talking to so many of that family I used to work with that had been able to just reconfirm that I made the right choice and have those conversations. It was interesting because I just found myself being really proud of the fact that I was able to move on and it sealed off any ounce of regret that ever would have been there. So that was one milestone moment for me for the week. So if I just start kind of stacking some of these things up, seeing Sean and Nicole having those conversations, all the former staff I used to work with, former customers coming in, rooting me on, cheering me on, supporting us that just means so damn much to us Now. All of the customers, all of the new relationships that we're building for Loud Proud American this is our third year at the Flyberg Fair starting to see some of those faces all over again. Hey, I buy from you every year. I look for you every year. It's a real good feeling, y'all. It's an amazing feeling to go from being the new guy on the block to being somebody that people go to a fair to see. Like you're one of the reasons now, you are now one of the reasons why someone goes to the fair. That's an awesome feeling, dude. I got something that I didn't expect, that I'll never get used to To have so many people come in and say hey man, I came here specifically for you. Here's one moment that was truly just pants blowing. Okay, blow your pants off. I don't know why. I don't get it. I don't know why this is the approach I'm taking today to blow my pants off. But y'all know how. I think it was brought to my attention that last week's episode was 169. Hello, and I did not take advantage of the clear, defined opportunity to make a multitude of 69 jokes. That's a surefire. Let down America, that is. That is Because we had a tremendous celebration for episode 69. To leave 169 on the table, just to leave it face down or face up. You know what I mean. One of you has to be faced down, the other one has to be faced up. That's how 69 works. People, I don't know if you don't already know that. If you don't know that, then I'll do an after dark episode and we'll explain some things to y'all. We'll break out the book, the book of sutra Camera. Hey, I don't know. I'm an idiot. What was I talking about? Squirrel? Anyways, scratch, scratch, scratch. Let me get a drink of water. Yeah, because I gotta clear my head and I don't usually do this. But yeah, I'm not even gonna edit this out. Hang on, I needed that. I needed to clear my palate and my mind because, clearly, scott told me I left 169 on the table, face down, face up, whichever way you you know, you get it. And now I got clearly off the fricking rails because I was talking to you about what was it? Oh, blowing your pants off. That's how this all came about. I'm not even gonna edit it. That makes sense now. Actually, that's a full circle moment. So, sean and Nicole, coming in, all these previous you know, customers and relationships from the dealership, former employees and coworkers and friends and family, all these conversations, I had another situation, another conversation, another opportunity. That Really just, I don't even know how to put this. It's more than blowing your pants off. It's like blowing your pants off and taking your skivvies too. How do you do? You know what I mean. Like here you are standing on the tent ballerkey, your ballerkey naked in the tent, still wearing a top, like you got your top on, but this news, this interaction, blew your pants and your skivs right off, maybe one sock. So imagine you're in the tent, ballerkey. Okay, when I say ballerkey, that's short for bare ass. Okay, that's naked, waist down, one sock on, all right and maybe a long sleeve t-shirt on. Imagine that weird, right? Yeah, crazy, crazy description. But what it is is a clear description. It's me taking the opportunity to paint the picture, to frame the photo, to pave the road to tell you I had a fucking awesome thing happen to me. Wow, what a buildup. Huh, what a buildup. Anyways, I was standing at the edge of the tent and these two ladies were in shopping around and I think it was maybe mother-daughter scenario and they were walking around shopping and one of them had somebody on FaceTime and they were looking at different items in the tent and showing the person on FaceTime what it was that we had to offer. And then I started to gather that the person on FaceTime obviously wasn't at the fair, wanted to be at the fair but, more importantly, wanted a few items from Loud, proud American and maybe indicated some of the things that they wanted. So during this time I kinda cruise on over and I'm trying to interject and to see if I can help answer some of the questions, cause you're lost, right, you're walking around on FaceTime trying to figure things out, so why can't I lend me expertise, eh? So I wanna try to help out and at this time I can't remember who had the phone. But the other family member was telling me like, oh yeah. So I think maybe the sister was like oh, my brother sent my brother or my son, whatever, sent some pictures over. He wanted us to get some stuff from you. He just loves your stuff, he loves you, he loves the brand, but he couldn't be here. We're from Connecticut, he's at home, we're all up here camping. So I go over and I'm trying to answer some questions and I'm like, what are we on FaceTime? So I jump on FaceTime with a dude and he was like laying on the couch and he just like pops up like hey, you know, like I mean I can imagine if I was on FaceTime, like my wife will try to FaceTime me and eight out of 10 times I'm taking a poop. Okay, I mean true story, hand on the Cabello's catalog out of the sky. Truth from this guy eight out of 10 FaceTimes I'm gonna be taking a poop. So I'll answer that sucker right from the party. But if I were ever to answer the phone from Deschette, from Des Tron, and then you popped a stranger on the phone with me, it might be a little awkward y'all. Okay, so I fell for this dude because I know that eight out of 10, I'm taking a poop. So, you know, he pops up off the couch and we started FaceTime and he pulls up one of my hoodies, right, one of our loud, proud American hoodies, and he's showing it to me and I'm like, yeah, this is fucking awesome dude Number one, the sure fact that he had one of our hoodies so close by, he was able to grab it and jump on FaceTime with me Super, damn cool. And he was shopping around, you know, via the phone, buying some things, and I was talking to the family and they said we had very detailed instructions to find you that he needed something from this tent. And she took her phone and showed me screenshots of me, screenshots of my freaking mug. Oh my God, I thought it was hilarious, dude. There was I think there was two or three photos. One of them I was kind of professionally, casually, like pointing, you know, doing one of our normal things. The other one was me being in a complete goof where I take my fingers and turn them into spectacles. I put my other three phalanges per hand up in the air and, you know, frame out some feather-like, peacock-like glasses and it was a zoomed-in photo of my mug. And they had directions, instructions, detailed description Find this man. I'm not kidding y'all has to be one of the coolest things that's ever happened to me, man, it was. It's the little things in life, y'all. And when a family comes in that has pictures of your dumb ass on their phone saying find this dude, you must buy from this dude that can more than make your day, I'm gonna tell you right now that's a ballerkey moment right there. That'll blow your pants, you take your skiffs, lose a left sock. You know That'll leave you standing on the tank, ballerkey with this freaking long-sleeve T-shirt on. Yeah, I'm telling you that was a Bout of Pot. American ballerkey moment right there. I couldn't believe it. It just came to me again while we were having this conversation y'all, I threw some extra Chachis in there and we had a great laugh. And then they came back the next day and got something else and was talking about how excited, you know, her brother was and man. So I didn't catch that dude's name, at least I don't think I did. But if I, if you're out there, if you're listening to the show, because I dropped some podcast stickers in the bag for your brother, shoot me a message, introduce yourself, man. I wanna make sure we know each other by first name and I wanna say thank you, thank you so damn much for being a loyal supporter of Loud, proud American and all it is that we do here, and I hope that you're if you're not, a day one here on the podcast, that maybe your journey just begun. Welcome, my dude. I can't thank you enough and I can't express to you how much it means to me to have you just give a shit about me and what I do, and I don't. Hopefully that ballerkey moment that I just described can kind of put a little picture, can put a bow and a frame on what it is I'm trying to tell you and that is thank you so damn much and it was an incredible moment for me and I appreciate you and I can't thank you enough and I had so many of those types of awesome things that happened at the fair this week and normally I would be on here today and we would just be throwing one hail of a shindig because I had a tremendous week, y'all. I had an absolutely tremendous week. Our third year at the Fiberg Fair, the third time doing this, our third year around the event circle for Laoproud American, our fourth year in business. We just wrapped up the biggest, the largest, the most successful grossing event of all time for a loud, proud American Boy. Give yourselves a round of applause, y'all. Yes, herculean, it's Herculean. Oh, look at him. Yeah, yes, oh, no, don't stop clapping y'all. I said big, it's real, it's big, it is so big. Yeah, oh, my gosh, look at it, it is so big. That was the. It's disturbingly big. Okay, don't get weird on. People. Clap for snaps, golf clap, oh, hey, okay, oh, all right, yes, man, what a tremendous week y'all. What a tremendous, freaking week. I'm gonna say you guys heard me talk about it last week when we were saying, hey, we're already off to a very successful week and a lot of it was contributed to the extra footage right, the extra frontage, the curb appeal, if you will Like. I can't even tell you how many people came into the fair that actually came into the tent and said hey man, first time here, never seen you here before. Like, can you believe that I've never seen you here before? So our third freaking year, and it just goes to show how difficult it is for people to find you, to identify you, when you only have 10 feet of space. You've got four or five steps to grab their attention, and this year we doubled our attention span and we grabbed a heck of a lot more of it, so much so that I had multiple vendors come over to me looking to buy tents just like mine, which hopefully that doesn't go to hurt me in the long run when everybody starts trying to up their game. But, man, what an absolute success. I only had one day in the entire eight days where we did not beat last year One day. If you guys know and understand, if you've been listening to the podcast all season, you know that we've had a lot of down events. We added some new events, so it's hard to tell if those are up or down, but just about every other event I did this year, we were off above 50%. So to go into this event and only have one day, that was down, incredible. And we more than made up for that day with our other days. Actually, scratch that. I had two days, okay, I mean, but don't get carried away. All right, don't freak out. All right, I had two days. One was middle of the week. We missed it by a few hundred dollars, and then one was on Saturday, which I'll explain this. If you're gonna lose a day at the fair, you don't want it to be Saturday. You don't because Saturday can be your best freaking day at the fair. It should be okay. Saturday should be your best day period. And we had a wet one, go figure, because I don't know if I've done a fair this year without rain. I don't know If I did, then it was extremely hot. But what I'm trying to say is, if you were to lose a Saturday at the Freiburg Fair, that's like for my state, for my area, that's like losing a whole week at another fair. I'm not kidding, I can do in one day, in one Saturday at the Freiburg Fair. I can do what I do at just about every other fair in my state for the entirety of that fair. Does that make sense? I can go to some of these fairs for four or five days and I can beat it in one day in that one Saturday at the Freiburg Fair. That's not the day you want to lose, y'all. So I think we were down not quite 50%, maybe like 35, 40% down, but that's a big number. When you're looking at a really high grossing number, when you're looking at one of your best days of the fair and you're off by that much, it hurts, right, because the amount that you're off is actually greater than some of the whole days during the week, if that makes sense, like whatever you would bring in on a Tuesday or Wednesday or a Thursday, you're off by more than that amount when you're off by 30 or 40% because that Saturday number is so much higher. But Sunday we crushed it and during the entire week we were up so much that those two days, even including a Saturday, didn't hurt us because we killed it y'all. We crushed this fair and I can't thank y'all enough. I know it's all the support and belief and just man, it's all of you pushing for us right. It's the new curb appeal, the twisted steel sex appeal, it's all of it. It's all the positive momentum, all the things that are building, that are brewing, that are rolling, and, man, what a tremendous week. And by the end of it, when you're like two days from close, you're already writing notes and analyzing what can I do different next year, what am I gonna replace, what am I gonna add, how do I expand, how do I grow? And you start having these very powerful discussions, like I would say. I think there was maybe one night where we get to spend some time with Matt and Sarah. It was a real hectic week and I'm gonna get into that in a minute, but there was one night where we were able to sit down and spend some time with Matt and Sarah from Ledgeway Farm and you guys have heard me speak of them and how much we care about them and all they do for us and we had some extremely productive conversations and some things that just opened up new horizons and that's gonna take us out of our comfort zones in the next year or two to try to expand for the both of us. So that's what happens at these fairs, man, that's what happens and some of the biggest accomplishments happen after the doors close. It happens after they close the gate, when fellow small business owners get together and stop brainstorming things. If you're not doing those things when you're at these fairs, you're missing a big opportunity. Your first year it's real tough to do because you don't have the relationships or connections. But even during your first year you should be asking things. You should be kind of provoking things right, provoking conversations and ideas and trying to learn and grow as much as you possibly can. So if you're a new vendor, if you're a new business owner and you're out there and you're trying to put yourself on the line and put your product out there in front of people, ask questions, be curious. You guys have heard we had one episode called Genuinely Curious Conversations and that's the truth. Man. Be genuinely curious, ask questions. You don't know where you're gonna end up. You don't know what you're gonna learn. You don't know what relationship you're gonna form, so had those questions. Be vulnerable, share things. Don't expose your freaking meat into your veg. I'm not trying to get you to share everything, right, but the point is, if you don't talk, you don't learn, and the more you do this and the more your relationships strengthen, the more bonds you build, relationships you form, then the further you can pull and push each other to new horizons, to new heights, and I'm excited about that, and I'm truly excited about that. So I could spend all day discussing with you just how tremendous this fair was and all the accomplishments that we had. But it's been such an emotional week for me that I've really haven't even been able to fully enjoy all that we've been able to accomplish, because it's man, it's hard to put this out there y'all. But this week was a real challenging week, as you guys know. Like the fair schedule is tough in general. Right when we're on the road for this fair you get down to the actual fairgrounds Like I camp right across the street and you get down there anyways between 7.30 and 8.30 am, right, the fair gates open at 9. But you try to get in there, you know a half hour, an hour, so beforehand, so you can restock, and then you have to stay open until 9 pm, which usually I try to stay open a little bit after to try to get people as they're leaving, and then by the time you close up and all those things. So let's say, on average you get down there about 8 am and you close somewhere around 9.30 or 10 pm and then you just keep doing that for eight days, right, and between all the setup that you do before the fair, you know days before all the buildup that goes into it, and then all the you know the tear down that happens after, it's a lot right, it's an emotional roller coaster of just your business and your finances and putting all your eggs in one basket and hoping that the Easter Bunny doesn't run off of them. So there's so much that happens for that. And then there's always other, you know, just moving challenges where the beginning of the week it's me and my wife, and then, you know, my dad comes up and brings my mom up and I always worry about my dad driving long distance and him driving home, and you know, and then him being home alone, and then my wife will go home, so she's home with my dad and she's taking care of the chores, and then at the end of the week my mom will go home and then my wife will come back up for the weekend and you know, you just there's all these moving parts, right, there's all these things and there's always, every time I leave the house, there's this anxiety that comes over me, that about leaving my family behind, leaving the animals behind, the responsibilities behind. There's always, always have fear, right, there's always a fear. And if you guys have been day one listeners and you've been on this ride me for a long time, you know one of my biggest fears in life is those phone calls that you get that something's wrong, especially when you're too far away. So this week at the fair it was Thursday morning my mom and I had walked down to the fairgrounds. She was putting things out in the tent, getting things ready to open, and I was out in the, in the, in the loud, proud American Express, grabbing some, some apparel, trying to restock, getting ready things, get everything ready to rock and roll right. And I got a phone call from my neighbor. I call him Uncle Mike. He's basically been my uncle growing up, you know Uncle Mike calls me and says hey, keith, I got to tell you something. I don't want to alarm you, I don't want to, I don't want to scare you, but I need to tell you. I just got a phone call from Fred who, uh, fred is a mutual friend of Mike's and my dad. And he said, uh, freddie just called me and said that your dad's not doing good. And uh, he said something's wrong with already. And uh, he said that he just saw him at the flea market and he was coughing up blood and he passed out on a picnic table and they called 911 for him. So he's on his way, the ambulance is on his way and, uh, your dad's going to be going to the hospital, but I'm going there right now for you. But I know you and your mom are in Freiburg, so I'm going to run down to the flea market, I'm going to be with your dad and I'm going to. I'm going to try to figure this out and I'm going to get right back to you. And I said, all right, well, ali's at work across the street from the hospital, so she can meet you at the hospital. So Mike heads to flea market to get my dad, now that the Rundle flea market is right next to Bentley Saloon, here in a Rundle, and it's my dad stomping grounds. He's there, you know, two to four times a day, basically, and he knows everybody there. Thankfully, that's where he was right. So I tell the wife and she says well, I'll, I'll meet them right at the hospital. And, um, I go back to my mom, who's putting money out in the tent, and I said, uh, mom, we've, uh, we've got a problem, something's wrong with the dad. Mike just called and said that they had to call the ambulance for him and he started coughing on blood and he passed out and, uh, and he's on his way and now he's gonna meet him at the hospital. It's a couple minutes later, might calls me and he's in the ambulance with my dad and I can hear my dad and in the background and he's telling people off, which is True, true to fashion for my old man, I'm fucking fine, is what I'm hearing, and I don't need to go to no fucking hospital. I'm fine. I didn't pass out and they did an EKG while I was on the phone and those things came back good. But the EMTs are encouraging him to go to his doctor at least, and he was talking Very unfavorably by his doctor and I'll say this my dad's doctor. I think he's afraid of my dad. So his answer is yep, you look good and all your back hurts. There's some pain pills or here's some also relaxers and everything else looks good. Now check your sugar and he'll always send them on his way. So my dad doesn't have the best relationship with his doctor in that sense, and every time he goes to the hospital he doesn't get to leave. So he is very Scared about going back to the hospital and he didn't want to take a ride in the ambulance because Lord knows doesn't want to pay for that. So there's the. I hear them talking to him and they're like you know, and Mike said he's refusing care so they can't make him go to the hospital, but they really think he should, and and so, having these conversations, and then Mike says I tell you what I'm gonna bring your dad home and Ryan's gonna drive his truck. Who, ryan's one of our neighbors that works with, works with Mike, great kid. And so I tell Ali all right, I think everything's okay, my dad's going home. And I tell my mom I think everything's okay, let's just try to come up with a plan here, just in case. And then shortly after, mike calls me again and says but I'm bringing your dad to the hospital. He has to go to the hospital. He ain't right, something ain't right, something is, something is really wrong. So I get a hold of the wife and I have her Head over to meet them at the hospital and I find out a lot of these details over the course of time, but I'm gonna put him in kind of chronological order for you, just so you guys understand and we don't have to go back and retrace information as I, as I found out. But Mike tells me that you know my dad's kind of being himself, but a little more honoree, a little more angry where he's you know, fuck this, fuck that, don't touch me, go fuck yourself. Which is all those. All those phrases are commonly added to my dad's vocabulary, but they're coming out a little different this time. And Mike said when they got to the hospital my dad was trying to put his coat on and he couldn't, and Mike was leaning over to try to help him and he was they, don't fuck it, don't fuck it, touch me. And Mike's like art, your your seatbelts on, that's why you can't put your coat on. And so he does a seatbelt, and he starts telling him like I'm gonna come around and help you. There's a, there's a step side right there for you to get out. There's. Mike goes over to help my dad and he falls out of the truck and lands in the parking lot at the, at the hospital, and when they're trying to check him in, he gives the wrong birth date and he's off by a few years and some guy next to him says, you know, basically calls him on the math and says that you know, that's not the right birthday. My dad's like mind your own fucking business and Just proceeds to start, you know, getting kind of angry and violent and my wife shows up and she's there and Mike hangs out for a while and he's, you know, obviously, obviously nervous and you know he calls me and we have all these conversations and my wife stays with my dad and the and the and the waiting room and she's sending me all these messages where she's like man, something is not right and she was getting to the point of being Beyond frustrated. They were making them wait so long. And then she was like I don't understand, like your dad's acting like a child right now and he's throwing temper tantrums and he's causing a scene. If, if no one's giving him attention, He'll just start yelling and screaming. Jesus Christ, in the and the waiting room. She's like he's tried to curl up and sleep on a little table, like I have to keep him from walking out. He keeps trying to leave the hospital. He stole some ladies pretzels. He's telling people off and she sends me a video and he's Walking around and talking and it's not. It's not my dad, it's not him and you can visually see that there's that, there's, there's a lot wrong. And my wife waited in the lobby I think for almost five hours and they called him. When they said his name, they mentioned back pain and my wife said back pain. You're fucking kidding me. We've been sitting here for five hours. A man still has EKG stickers on him went on here for back pain. He was seen by an ambulance. He came over here to get checked for a stroke and you have him in the books for back pain, so they bring him in. I Start to panic and they start to bring him in to get him seen and Ali had to go back to work and said you know, you just call me when you're running tasks and we'll in on, I'll be right back. And she no sooner gets back to work and the hospital calls her and the work is right across the street. It's like a 20 second drive. And then and the hospital calls and says he's being combative, he's threatening the doctor and he Won't have to discharge him if he don't come over here. So my wife calls me all under stress. She runs to the hospital. She's in the in the freaking waiting room and she can hear him screaming Don't fucking touch me, fuck you, fuck this. And she walks in and he's he's like ready to fight. And my wife matches energies with my old man and they have this kind of relationship. So she says who the fuck do you think you are? And I don't have to have Ali on here to Share her side of this. But she says who the fuck do you think you are? Shut the fuck up. You're not talking to anybody like that. Get your ass back in that fucking bed. I've been in this lobby with you for five fucking hours and you're gonna get seen. Get back in that fucking bed. And she made him get in there and he's arguing and they're fighting about everything back and forth. But she gets him in there and they start running tests and the doctor thanks her for making him stay and for him agreeing to the care and they start proceeding and things. And Ali sends me a video of my dad in the hospital bed and I instantly know this is real serious. This is not my dad, this is. He's not himself. Something is drastically wrong. I show the video to my mom and we both agreed and you need to go, like we need to get you home. My mom doesn't have a license, she doesn't drive. So my cousin Joey, shout out to Joe for taking the trip. He drove all the way up to get her, to grab her, to turn around and drive all the way back to the hospital. Probably you know, three hours on the road to make all that work. So my mom and my wife are there with him and so is my cousin's girlfriend Nissy, and they find out that my dad's septic. He's a sepsis. His intestines, part of his intestines I can't even talk guys part of his intestines had ruptured and detached his colon and it was leaking into his stomach. So he was getting, you know, very large infection. The irony here is I've had my intestines do the same thing and it nearly killed me and I had that surgery, had the same surgery where they go in, cut out a section of your intestines, reattach your colon. I've had that surgery and then a year or two later my mom had that surgery. So now my dad's having it and that's kind of crazy that three of us, that all three of us would have that. But to me it explains a lot, because you get in an incredible infection and you can hallucinate and you can not process things and you're in so much pain you can't stand up because your stomach will start to wall off, it'll start to try to close itself up from leaking, so it'll pull you forward and it's a tremendous amount of pain. And if I think about all the infection my dad was dealing with this year and all the antibiotics and things he's had, I start to think maybe maybe this has been going on for a long time for him and that's where these infections have been coming from, and maybe his back pain could have a lot to do with this. And so we're starting to identify that maybe this is, maybe this is a good thing and there's nothing good about this surgery. There's nothing good about this outcome or this infection. But what's good about it is the fact that I've been through it and I also know that my mom's been through it and we know what the recovery is like and we know that there's a clean bill of health on the other side of that and we know that it's all a better outcome than the things that was worried about, right, because they're talking about extremely high white blood cell count and all these other numbers and things that scare me, that make me think of cancer, all these things that make me think of the same diagnosis my brother had before. They diagnosed him with bone cancer and he died a year later. All those things all too similar, all too similar, all too scary. And all I kept thinking about is my dad's gonna have cancer and he's not gonna wanna fight this and I'm gonna lose my old man. And when I found out that night that it was a stomach, I was encouraged. I was incredibly encouraged because I thought this he can beat. I know he can beat it, especially if I tell him you kidding me, I already did it, ma, already did it. If we can do it, why the hell can't you right? So I felt incredibly encouraged by this. And they're saying they thought they identified a blood clot in his lung. So we're like, okay, that's where the blood came from the coughing. Obviously, the pain from the stomach could have made him pass out as well. I've been there. The infection can make him act crazy, make him forget things, make him say crazy things and all kind of leads up to some of the things he's been dealing with all year. This could be the better of the scenarios, right, this could be some of the better things. So Thursday night they'd rushed my dad in for emergency surgery and they take off some of his intestines and they reattach his colon and they say he's gonna be here for about a week. They had to install a colostomy bag, not knowing if they'll ever be able to reverse that, based on his age. So there's some definite downfalls here, but there's some positives here, because we're thinking this could be a very encouraging thing, right? And they're still running all these tests and in the meantime I'm at the fair and I'm trying to just go it alone, because now I have to just figure things out on my own. So Thursday I ran the booth from the rest of the day on my own and then Friday I did a full day on my own and actually Ali was able to show up around, I think maybe eight o'clock at night to help before the final hour or so of the fair. But what is pretty crazy to say is that Friday ended up being one of the top grossing sales days of all time for a loud, proud American and I did the bulk of that all by myself. Nothing I wanna do again y'all. But it's encouraging to know that you did it right, that you made it through, and it's also heartwarming to know that I couldn't have done it if I didn't have the support of so many people that came in to check on me. You know, between the pettingills Scott and Lindsay coming over and Pete I gave their boy Pete like we were on the same radio signal for walkie talkies and I was able to call over to Pete and he came over and helped me while I went to the bathroom. Marina and Elena coming over and watching the tent, just friends coming over, nate and the boys, you know just it was awesome to have people come over and check on me to see how I'm doing and make sure it okay. And I'm feeling encouraged by things, you know, and the wife shows up and we're thinking, all right, everything's on the up and up now. You know this is gonna work out and sadly it might've been a wet day, it might've been down, but we're feeling incredibly encouraged by things and the way we were headed until Sunday morning. And then on Sunday morning I got a phone call. I think maybe it was early Sunday afternoon. It's hard to put it all together, but my mom called me Now I'll say this. In the morning, my mom, I was checking in with her and she said dad's doing great. He's sitting up in a chair like he was maybe having some jello. He was having conversations, hanging out with my aunt, his sister and my mom and he was having a great day and my mom was going home to get him some sweatpants or something, or going to the store to buy him some sweatpants because he'd be coming home in a few days and everything was coming together. Right, it was a bright, shiny horizon on the other side. Right, we were all starting to be encouraged by the outcome and feeling good. And then I found out that a couple of hours later my mom had left and she got a phone call from the hospital that said that my dad flatlined, that he was sitting in a chair and he fell out of the chair and all the monitors went off and a nurse and the doctors ran in and I grabbed my dad and threw him on the bed and had to begin CPR to resuscitate him. That he flatlined, he was gone and they had to hit him with the paddles, the defibrillator a couple of times and they brought him back. They saved him. They brought my dad back. They were so surprised that it had happened. They didn't understand what had happened because he was doing so well. So they started these testings all over again, basically, as we're starting to put all the pieces together now, when we go back to the beginning of all this, when my dad was coughing out blood and he passed out at the flea market. He had a heart attack. He had a heart attack and he passed out and thankfully he was able to come out of it and the ambulance got there. Fred called Mike. Mike went there and brought my dad to the hospital. My wife went there and stayed with him During that time. My dad doesn't remember any of this. He doesn't remember any of that. He doesn't remember the flea market. He doesn't remember any of this. We've told him about Mike. We told him about Allie and he's starting to piece some of these things together. This is what I'm gonna say If Fred doesn't call Mike, if Mike doesn't go there and call me and Allie doesn't sit there with my dad and argue and yell and swear at him to stay at the hospital. He's not here today Cause he would have gone home, he would have sat in his chair and he would have died. He would have died either from his stomach leaking or he would have had another heart attack. And had we not had him in the hospital, had he not been there and had his stomach fixed, had his intestines removed or part of his intestines removed and his colon reattached, had that not happened, he wouldn't have been sitting in the hospital when he had another heart attack and flat line. And if that happened at home, there's no way any of us could have brought him back. Man, there's moments like this when you realize how important your actions are, when you realize how important other people's actions are. If it wasn't for Fred, if it wasn't for my uncle Mike, if it wasn't for my wife, my dad would have died while I was at the fair. If he wasn't in the hospital and those doctors weren't there to save him, he would have died on Sunday. That's hard to process, y'all. Mike had come up to the fair on Saturday the whole family and checked on me and see if I needed anything and tried to cover me. And we had such an optimistic outlook for my dad and we were just waiting on tests and I was still nervous about cancer and I was still nervous about all these other things, but we thought we were on the other side of it, you know, and then Sunday I get that call and then has all this fear and has all this panic and you don't know what to do. And you know, talking with my mom and figuring things out, the doctors were just getting him comfortable and his heart had gone from, you know, like the 80 beats a minute or whatever, to when he had his first heart attack and he went there. He was down to 35 beats a minute. And then he had his second heart attack while he was at the hospital and then he was down to about 18 beats a minute and his kidneys are failing him, his liver was failing him. All these things to make you think my dad's not gonna pull through this. And you're battling all these decisions and you're thinking about all these things and I had the support of so many at the fair to say you go and we'll take care of this, you leave and we'll take care of this. With all the conversations with my mom, I was at a place and a point where I knew that nothing was gonna change in this moment, that yes, there's still the chance we could get another phone call, that he had another heart attack. But they had him comfortable, they had him sedated, things were improving a little bit, and where we were at is waiting for main med for Portland's hospital to give us an okay, because Bedoufret's hospital is not equipped to handle the heart issues that my dad has. They're equipped to keep him comfortable, to keep him alive, to improve things, but to have the test that he needs, to have a potential surgery, he needs to go to main med. At this point they're under the impression that he probably has a blockage, but to have the test for the blockage, the way the test goes, is incredibly difficult for your kidneys and his kidneys aren't strong enough to handle that test. So if he were to have the test, the test itself could kill him because of the damage he already has in his kidneys. So they need him to be healthy enough. They also needed Portland to say yes, a, we'll take him now, or B, you get him healthy and we'll take him. So right now we're currently at a spot where Portland has said, yes, we will take him, we will do the test and when the test is complete, if we see the issue, we rush him into surgery immediately. But we're not gonna take him until his kidneys are strong enough and they don't have a bed for him at this point and all they could do is exactly what Bedoufret's doing right now. So right now my dad is trying to get his kidney functions to improve and then we're gonna transfer him to Portland and then we're gonna run the test on his heart to see if there's a blockage and then we're gonna go in there and fix it. But what I can tell you is when I got home and I went into the hospital to see my old man, he's coherent, he's alert, he's talking. He might say some crazy shit from time to time, but most of the time he's completely there, he's with it, he's on top of it. He forgets a lot of things. He doesn't know a lot about the events and what happened, but he's incredibly thankful for my wife, for Mike, for Fred, and incredibly thankful to still be here. And you have some scary conversations right, and I've had a hard time having these conversations. I haven't been able to speak with my dad. I haven't been able to have these conversations where he talks about what it's like to die and that he wants to see his son and some of his friends and his parents and my grandparents. But I was in the room when he called my mom over and he started tearing up and he said I don't wanna go, I don't wanna go. And my mom said no, you're gonna have to go to Portland, but you're gonna be okay and we're gonna go with you. And he says no, I don't wanna die, I don't wanna leave you guys alone. My mom said well, you're not gonna die. And he said I don't wanna be the only one dead. God bless him. Now my old man starts talking about I don't wanna leave you guys with a list of shit to do. We've got so many more things to do and I had to come home and do those things. And when my wife was there, he said I don't wanna go anywhere until I have a grandson. And he said I want a little boy, about this big with a beard oh, my wife's like. I don't know about the beard, but I guess we can buy him one. And at that point, every time a nurse or doctor would come in, my dad would say she doesn't know how to make a baby, oh boy. And I was talking to my dad on the phone when he was in the hospital before he had that big scare. He was telling me how incredibly proud he is of me and I was thankful for all that he said. But I was afraid of what he said because I was afraid it was a goodbye. And this whole time at the fair, when you're achieving these milestones for the business, when you're at the point where you wanna celebrate, like your mind wants to celebrate, you wanna celebrate all that you've done. At Close of Business on Sunday, we wrapped up the biggest event we've ever had, the most successful event we've ever had. At the Close of Business on Sunday, loud, proud American has reached the highest grossing dollar amount we have ever had in the history of our business. And I still have the rest of October, november and December to go. I'm not saying we're rich y'all so I'm gonna dial it back. I'm not saying I've even hit the goal that I set for myself. I'm not saying I've even hit the original goal that I set for this business when we first started. What I'm telling you is this four years of business, this is the number one grossing year we've ever had. I mean, you'll live a couple months to go. All these great things to celebrate the end of our busy, busy ass schedule going home, being able to unwind, to say goodbye to all of our fellow businesses that we tour around with, to close out the count a year to start planning for the next one. Coming home, working on all the yard projects, all the things that I like to do, to patching up all the things for the farm, getting ready for winter, discussing new products and new adventures and new ideas and all these new things. So many things to be excited about, to relish in our accomplishments, to celebrate those things, to just be at peace. And I couldn't, because I was full of fear, full of fear, fear that my old man would pass before I got home, fear that there's a chance that my old man would pass, that my mom was alone, all those things. You guys can imagine how I was feeling, the selfishness of not being there. Like there was moments, y'all. There was moments where I was scared, where I was completely scared that I thought that I needed to be home, that I needed to be home, I needed to leave, I needed to leave and I needed to get home. And then there was moments where I would say to myself no, no, he's gonna be okay and you just finish out what you have to finish out and you get home. And obviously there's a lot of praying and there's a couple conversations where there was one I was maintaining pretty well the whole time. But when I got the phone call about my dad having to be brought back, I had to leave the tent and I just went to the ambulance that's our shop truck not to add any drama and I moved the totes aside, I lay on the floor and I just cried With all the world happening around me, everything outside this busy day at the fair, people everywhere, all those things. There I was, 41 year old man laying on the floor of a truck, balling his eyes out, just asking for strength and safety and asking what to do. I pulled myself together, went back to the tent and finished, finished what I started, just like my old man used to tell me to do, like when I was a little kid. All I wanted to do was play football. I had two weeks to practice. All I wanted to do was quit and my old man said not a chance. You wanted it, you started it, you finish it. I finished it. I finished it as the biggest event I've ever done. I finished the busiest season we've ever had. I came home to my old man. Thank Jesus he's still here for me today. Thank you to my wife for being there, for making him stay and then coming to me and keeping me strong. I don't know how to say this y'all, but there's a different feeling in life when you realize that if it wasn't for your wife, your dad would be dead. There's a different feeling when you realize if it wasn't for your uncle Mike or your dad's friend Fred, he wouldn't be here today. When you're dependent on other people's actions. One of the most important things in your life is dependent on other people's actions. You become incredibly humble and grateful for those people's actions. I am on a emotional roller coaster. It's been hard, extremely hard. It's been really challenging to navigate eight of the busiest days of my life With four of the most difficult and challenging days, to manage to navigate those emotions, those decisions, those responsibilities. This has been an incredible challenge. I know I'm built for it because here I am and I know he's built for it because he's still here too. I thank each and every one of you because some of you knew about this, some of you have known, some of you have stopped by to help. I know a lot of you have been praying and I can't tell you how much it means to me and my family. I don't know a good way to wrap up this podcast today. I don't know what I'm doing today. It's hard to wrap my emotions on my thoughts. It's hard to connect those two together. It's hard to put everything together. You want to celebrate successes, you want to acknowledge fears, but you don't want to live with them. There's so much, y'all. There's so much. I don't think it's day by day, I think it's minute by minute. With that said, I've only got a few more minutes for today's podcast, because I'm going to dry my tears and gather my emotions. I'm going to drive back to the hospital and I'm going to spend some more time on my dad, but this podcast is called Share the Struggle. And, lord, I'm Struggling, I'm struggling, but it's going to be okay. It's going to be okay. I know it's going to be okay and I thank each and every one of you, each and every day, for all that you've done for me, and I know that the end of this episode front to back. You'll understand the emotions that I've been living with. You'll understand the successes, the highs and the lows and everything that goes with it. I'm thankful for it. If this is the first episode of the podcast you've ever listened to, I apologize. We're all over the place and I know that not every episode is going to be this way, but on every day in life is this way and not every day in life isn't this way, right? That's why the episode, or the show, I should say, is called Share the Struggle podcast, because everybody struggles and I feel like I have a unique ability to turn a microphone on and to share all my struggles, whatever they are. I have a willingness and an ability to share my life with you, but thankfully, a lot of you have reached out and have benefited from me sharing these things with you, and that's why I continue to do it. So today's been incredibly hard. This week's been incredibly challenging, but I'm incredibly grateful to turn this microphone on and to be transparent, to be raw and real and to share my life and my struggles and my journey with you, because I hope and pray that it makes a difference for you and I can't thank you, each and every one of you enough for all your support, both in the business, the brand, the podcast and the man. I thank you so much. Wow, what an episode today. Guys. Moral of story is I love each and every one of you, whether this is day one or you've been here since the first one. I thank you and I encourage you to tell someone close to you that you love them and that you care about them. Make an effort today to make a memory today, because you don't know when it'll be your last. So until then, thank you for supporting my American dream. Gotta go, wash your fucking hands and get building savage. That's it and that's all. Biggie smiles. If you found value in today's show, please return the favor and leave a positive review. Share it with someone that is important to you. Hit, subscribe and help us grow our tribe. Are you interested in sponsoring the show? Maybe you're looking to be a guest on the show and all that you need to know about the show at sharethestrugglepodcastcom. Subscribe to grow our tribe on Apple Podcasts, spotify, google Podcasts, amazon Music, iheart Radio and all other major platforms, and don't forget to like and share our official Facebook page at Share the Struggle Podcast If you're a loud, proud American and you find yourself just wanting more. You can find me on YouTube, on Facebook or the face page, as my mama calls it, just search Loud Proud American. If you're a fan of the Graham Cracker, the Instagram or the Tickety Tuck, but a kid's to be a Tickety Tuck in the Tick Tuck, you can search Loud Proud American. If you want to join the 2% of Americans that support American manufacturing, head on over to wwwloudproudamericanshop and get your hands on some of that made in USA. Apparel and join the mission, mission 2%. Together, we can bring back American manufacturing. A big old thank you to the boys from the Gut Truckers for the background beats and the theme song that shared the struggle podcast. You can find the Gut Truckers on Facebook. Just search Gut Truckers and show your support to those Mother Truckers. I truly thank you for supporting my American dream. Now go wash your fucking hands, your filthy savage.