319 | Cammie Wolf Rice on KKNW 1150AM!

Unknown Speaker  0:00  
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Unknown Speaker  0:11  
Welcome back to positive talk radio. Our goal is simple to explore evolving ideas one conversation at a time. So come on over and our world, I know you'll like it. Because on today's show, featured and amazing woman and a topic that is really important for everybody to pay attention to. So I hope that you will hang with us for the entire hour, it's going to be really good. And I'm going to I promise you, it, hopefully will change the way that you think about something and or will change the way that somebody that you know thinks about something, because what we're going to be talking about today is and by the way, our guest today is CAMI wolf rice. She is an author of an upcoming book called The flight, my opioid journey, and we're going to be talking about opioid addiction, and all the things that has to do with that. So it's very important that you hang around for the entire hour, because I don't know anybody that has not been touched by this addiction, in one way or another. Everybody that I know either know somebody intimately or knows of somebody that has had an overdose experience and passed away due to this horrible, horrible addiction that we all face and, and Cami is has also been through the wars, if you will, with her son, Christopher. And we're going to be talking about him. And we're going to talking about what she's doing in a very positive way to make a difference in the world as we know it. And it's something that really needs to happen. And I'm so pleased that she's here with us today. Cami How are you today, young lady?

Unknown Speaker  2:01  
Good morning. And thank you so much, Kevin for having me today. I really appreciate it.

Unknown Speaker  2:05  
Well, I gotta tell you this is I like you everybody who listens to the show knows I drove a bus for 12 years. And I had multiple incidences of people having opioid overdoses on my bus and Narcan had to be administered and all that kind of good stuff. So it has affected me I know several people personally who have passed from this addiction and, and your story is particularly poignant and important for us to talk about because of your son, Christopher, that you have started a nonprofit, that is C WC. For Christopher Wolf, crusade. And as it's remarkably important in this world today, because I think, you know, I can correct me if I'm wrong, but I think that there's still some misnomers about this, and some people who don't really understand what it is and how you get addicted and all that kind of good stuff. So let's start by talking about Christopher a little bit.

Unknown Speaker  3:09  
Okay. Well, my son, this was 20. Some years ago, Kevin, he was diagnosed with a colon disease and had to have a major surgery. And unfortunately, it was at the exact same time that oxycontin was released by Purdue pharma as the wonder drug. And doctors were told that it wasn't addictive. And he had a major surgery. And we went home with 90 oxycottons followed by 90 more.

Unknown Speaker  3:36  
So you had 180 pills. That and that seems like a lot to me.

Unknown Speaker  3:44  
Yes. And you know, we I think as a society, and don't get me wrong, there are some amazing, amazing doctors out there. However, I think that we don't ask doctors enough questions. And I did exactly what the doctor told me to do. And that was to give him an oxycontin every four hours around the clock. And he had a hole in his stomach. So he was in chronic pain, for sure. But you absolutely and you'll hear me say this over and over again, you can become addicted with one prescription. And that's exactly what happened to Christopher.

Unknown Speaker  4:21  
And when he became addicted to the to Oxycontin. It became it became a series of events that even though he went through rehab, on several occasions, he just couldn't kick it. It was part of it was the pain that he was in. And part of it was the drug itself because it changes your brain chemistry done.

Unknown Speaker  4:46  
It absolutely hijacks your brain. He we didn't even realize that he had an issue and he didn't either until he stopped giving the prescriptions and then we had a problem a serious problem on our hands and We did multiple treatment centers. And when I tell you this is a guy, Mike Christopher wanted to be a Navy Seal, super disciplined and AP students smart, and he did everything to fight it for 14 years.

Unknown Speaker  5:18  
That's a long time to be fighting anything. And, and sadly after at the tender age of what 32? Yes, sir 32 He passed away. And, and that was, had to be, I can't imagine I've got a couple of boys myself in there now, man. But I can't imagine losing one of them before I get to go.

Unknown Speaker  5:43  
You know, I mean, that's the thing that that's that's the reason I have this fire inside of me, Kevin to just ring an alarm and to share everything that happened to me and my son, my son's gone. And I'm never getting my son back. And so I am doing what I'm doing to save other kids. Because there is no word in the dictionary for when a parent loses a child, no one wants to ever think about losing their child. And I didn't think quite honestly that something like this would ever happen to me. And that's why I want to share because it happened to 100,000 parents just this last year,

Unknown Speaker  6:23  
say that again, please.

Unknown Speaker  6:25  
100,000 people passed away. Last year with the opioid epidemic 100,000 parents lost their children.

Unknown Speaker  6:35  
It's hard to believe that with such a huge epidemic, that we don't talk about it as much as we should. We're not as a lot of like the number that you just quoted, there are people in our audience, and you could raise your hand if you're one of them. That had no idea that that was the case. That and I just want to remind people that in during the Vietnam War, which was from 64, to 7556, or 59,000 soldiers were killed. And this is happening to us every year, that more more and more kids. And predominantly, it's it's the younger generation that is affecting the most, isn't it? It is

Unknown Speaker  7:23  
I mean 80% of heroin users started with a prescription. And you know, it can be as simple Kevin as taking your child to the dentist and getting wisdom teeth pulled and going home with 30, Percocet, and maybe your child has low self esteem or peer pressure, or whatever. And they become addicted just from going to the dentist and getting one prescription. And you don't need Percocet, you can use Motrin and ice. There are other non narcotic non non pharmaceutical solutions to pain. And I think as a society we look at the answer is in a pill. And that's not sustainable.

Unknown Speaker  8:09  
Well, that's what we've been told is go to the doctor, it's like here, take this and take this. But a lot of times all it does is mask the symptom. It doesn't solve the problem.

Unknown Speaker  8:20  
Absolutely. And you know, there are people out there, there are lots of people out there that have chronic pain. And believe me, I understand and I care about people with chronic pain, my son suffered chronic pain for half of his life. But opioids are not sustainable. They have many you're going to need to then you're going to be three than you're going to need for and the side effects. And addiction sets in, you know, so it isn't the answer for chronic pain. And I'm sorry to say that I know, I take a lot of heat from that sometimes, but it's the truth. And I'm going to speak the truth.

Unknown Speaker  9:02  
You know, I've had, let's see, I've had like nine surgeries in my life. And I've been in the hospital a number of times. And I also you know, I have the drip, and some of the other things that they'll they'll do for you and stuff. Now for me, that really never was a problem because I didn't like it. I didn't like how it made me feel. But if you like how it makes you feel, then I can understand that it is and and also, when you're taking it and then you go away from it. The withdrawal symptoms can be horrific. They can be life threatening, can't

Unknown Speaker  9:35  
they? Absolutely. You do have to taper off opioids in a very safe and careful way. You can't just go cold turkey if you've been on them. And so, you know, that's the purpose of Christopher wolf crusade. And you know, and I know we've got plenty of time to talk about it, but I really wanted to develop a new position in healthcare that I feel is missing from the health care team. Um, and so that's, that's what my mission is, is prevention and education awareness, we have to become health advocates for ourselves, Kevin.

Unknown Speaker  10:09  
No, I get it, I understand. And when we talked the last time, by the way, if you want to view and listen to the last episode we did. That's number 284. Can't believe doing that. Now, that's 284 is the episode number. If you go to positive talk radio dotnet, just look for that number. And that will be our original discussion, which we're building on with this discussion, because it's just is that important that people get it, after we understand that, that it's, once you go down that road, it is very, very difficult to come back. And we enjoy you so much, so that you've even written a book about your experiences, it's called the flight and it comes out somewheres in the middle of this month, you can go to camis website, which is CAMI wolf writes that calm, and you can pre order the book, I highly recommend that you do that and give it to a friend, who may be feeling like they're going down that road and, and the book is really completed says, giving great reviews. And it's very, very important that we understand how desperately our country is. And we haven't even talked about fentanyl yet, which we're going to talk about because that is a huge piece of this, this whole addiction cycle that we're in that we're in. But tell us about the book a little bit. And what decided you to write it.

Unknown Speaker  11:46  
Well, I'd like to stay up front. First of all, I am not profiting one penny from this book, all of the author proceeds go to the charity to help others. I just really felt like, you know what, I wrote this not for myself. I wrote this for you, if you're listening, I have resources in the book I have. A lot of not only did I share my journey, Kevin but I also I use the airplane as a metaphor, because that's like our journey of life. And you know, we stop at different places, right? We stop at success and happiness and forgiveness and grief. And, you know, while I share my journey, and I got to be I get very, very vulnerable in the journey. I talk about way more than the opioid epidemic way more not to say it's not as important but Christopher's story. But I had a home invasion. I was held at gunpoint for two hours. And I talk a lot about that. My objective is to share and to be open and to be truthful about my journey so others can reflect on their own.

Unknown Speaker  12:58  
I mean, you didn't know, we didn't talk about that last time. You you had a home invasion? And what was the purpose of that home invasions, what were they after?

Unknown Speaker  13:08  
Anything and everything. I'm based in Atlanta, my husband was traveling, and yeah, I literally woke up. Well, I was in bed, and I saw a little like laser light and the door open and the door shut. And then two seconds later, there was a man standing over my bed with a gun on my forehead. And they ransack the house, they took me downstairs put the execution style, I get very detail on the book of exactly what happened. But I guess my point is, and the reason I share that story of the home invasion, is you got to keep going, you got to keep flying, and you got to keep going on your journey. No matter how many things knock you down, there are lessons learned. I ended up getting involved with a charity that helps underserved youth and you just have to read the book, Kevin.

Unknown Speaker  14:06  
As soon as it comes out, I'm I'm going to get it because that is because I can't imagine, you know, that's one of those things that you are as a just a person in your own home. You are concerned that if somebody were to walk in and to do what they did to you, or to first of all, I they wouldn't want to be anywhere near me because I'd wet myself I'm pretty sure. And they would be it would be the scariest moment imaginable to have that happened to you and and that can cause them a myriad of problems. It can cause P PTSD and, and a bunch of stuff because of that whole issue. So I sympathize with you. That's, that's horrible. I'm so sorry that that happened to you.

Unknown Speaker  14:51  
Thank you, Kevin. I appreciate that. I appreciate that. Yeah, no, I mean, really, you know, I also tried to do unique things in the book. You Why is my book different? You know, I was interesting after COVID, right? We go to restaurants, and we all had to learn how to, if we want to eat, we've got to scan the QR code at the table, right to get the menu. And I'm sitting there one morning scanning and getting my breakfast. I'm like, wait a minute. If I do QR codes in my book, that means I can keep all the information in the back, I can do a library for people to have information, how to get treatment, how to help their kids. So I have QR codes in the book. And I actually took it a step farther. And I put QR codes after every chapter that has a video of me giving extra content to what I said, because, you know, a lot of people don't have time to actually I tried to keep the book short and to the point, and meaningful and resourceful. And so now with these QR codes, I'm able to keep the information in the book up to date, it will never be stagnant. And so I'm pretty excited about that.

Unknown Speaker  15:57  
Do you know that that is thy cutting edge kind of thing? I hadn't heard anybody say that as yet. But it makes just perfect sense that if you could put it in a book and then use the QR code to get to what you need to get to, and the various YouTube videos and the things that can be helpful, then that that would be that's a really cool idea. Did you think of that all by yourself?

Unknown Speaker  16:24  
I did. I was having breakfast one morning, and I was sitting there and you know, was working on my book, and I had to scan to get to eat? And I thought, Oh, oui, oui, oui. And honestly, I checked to see if anybody else had done it. And, you know, I am proud to say that I came up with it. And I've even tested it, my grandmother, I said, Okay, now you're gonna be the test, I want to see, can you scan this with your phone, and I showed her, it took me two minutes at most, because again, people are more familiar. Now. Now, had I put this in pre COVID. People would not know what to do. But she clicked it. And there was a video that popped right up, and I started talking to her, she got the biggest kick out of it. So I figure, you know, if my family, my grandparents could do it, then anybody can do it. I was pretty excited about that.

Unknown Speaker  17:12  
Well, if I might now my mom passed last year. And if you could get her to do it, then every then that becomes universal? Because, well,

Unknown Speaker  17:21  
then there's that Yes. Well, I gotta tell you, I felt from day one, my son has been helping me fly this plane since day one. And I know, you think you know, what happens when you pass away. And I will say, at least the silver lining is that I feel Christopher's presence with me every single day. He sacrificed his life so that others could live. And I've been chosen to do this work. And it's hard. It's hard to talk about my son dying every single day. But I do it so that no other mother has to feel this pain, no other father has to feel this pain, the whole objective is to save lives. That's it,

Unknown Speaker  18:04  
you are pretty special, you know that that is a and by the way, I also want to mention, I've never seen this before. Now, my associate tells me that that a real true blue, honest to goodness, charity that is on the up and up, we'll put their EIN number out there, but you're just writing on your on your website. And, and so you can you can if you are so inclined, you can go to the website and look at her and take her EIN number and and feed that into the government. And they will tell you give you the rating and all kinds of stuff. So you're not shy about it. You're you are really interested in doing the right thing. And you're not here to make. I dare I say it, but but there are some charities that are in it so that they can they pay themselves well, and they make them they make good money in and a portion of the money that they raise actually gets to the cause of they're talking about, but in your case, it's it's like everything goes there.

Unknown Speaker  19:11  
Absolutely. Absolutely. You know, I, I picked one of the hardest things to do, Kevin, like create a new position in healthcare and I had to do a clinical trial. I'm not from the healthcare world. And while data is so important in academia, and all that is important. I've finished a two year trial and now I'm ready to get to the humanity side. But everybody, I met with over 150 doctors and Dean's of law schools and Dean's of nursing schools. And I pitched this whole idea of what this position is about. And everybody said, Well, you know what, Kenny? It is needed. But you got to find the money. And I was like, Okay, well, I'm gonna find the money. And so that's why I have the charity. That's why I'm raising the money. It's too quick. Read this new position and and if you don't care, I'm going to, I would love to share what it's all about.

Unknown Speaker  20:05  
Well, I do care. And I would love for you to share what it's all about.

Unknown Speaker  20:09  
Yeah. All right. Well, you know, here's the thing, if you look at look at sports teams, for example, what would the football teams now do without a coach, even personal tennis players have coaches, we have executive coaches and dietician coaches, and there's even sleeping coaches, there's coach for everything except for if you're in the hospital, and you're in a health crisis, you don't have a coach to help you get through the recovery. And that's what Christopher didn't have. And that's what I didn't have as his caretaker. And so I've developed a new position. Again, we've had clinical trial two years in the hospital, and it's called a life care specialist to patients, we're known as a Care Coach, we're not coming in to pick and prod you or to give you medicine we're coming in to give a pain management strategy, so that you have a pain, a specific pain management strategy, to give you techniques to help with anxiety, stress, depression, and PTSD. And most patients, if you're in the hospital, you might have all four of those things, right? Yeah. And then if you've been put on an opioid, our job is to say, Okay, you're on an opioid, this is how fast you need to taper off. And here are all the things you can do when you're in pain, besides take that opioid. So it's a Care Coach. And so my goal is to have these coaches in hospitals across the United States.

Unknown Speaker  21:39  
That is a number one is a lofty goal. But number two, it is such a needed goal. And it is absolutely, because when you're sitting in a hospital, I don't know, there are people that have never been in a hospital. But I've had both my hips replaced. I've had stomach surgery, I've had back surgery I, you name it, it's been worked on. And when you're sitting in the room, and you've got a nurse that maybe has been there for 12 to 14 hours, and she's got 10 other patients. And she she's there to take care of your basic needs to make sure that you're getting what you need, and all that kind of stuff. But she's not there to handle the medical side, or the sick or the care side. And it would be really cool to have somebody walk into your room ends and sit down by your bed and say how you doing.

Unknown Speaker  22:31  
Listening Ear, a listening ear? Absolutely.

Unknown Speaker  22:34  
And in the you were telling me now, I know the world generates and operates on this green thing called money. And if if it costs money, then it's labeled not to get implemented it but if you can defray the cost and figure out how it all works. And you have you've actually done the math. And you've figured out how it gets paid for.

Unknown Speaker  22:59  
Absolutely. It does save money to the hospital. Also our country is unfortunately under a nursing crisis right now. And so we've the life care specialists have really been able to give respite to nurses, and to help them because they like you said earlier, they don't have the time. And so in I'm not saying across the board, because every hospitals costs are different. But on an average, if two and a half, three patients don't return to the emergency room within that 30 days of being released from the hospital that pays for the life care specialists for a year. And honestly, it's the solution for rural communities across this country that don't have access to health care is having these care coaches.

Unknown Speaker  23:44  
Didn't you have a meeting with someone? Who is who told you that very same thing? Tell us that story real quick.

Unknown Speaker  23:51  
It's one of my favorite stories, actually. So thank you, I appreciate that I love tell the story. So the dean of the medical nursing school at Mercer University in Georgia, she had gotten one of my presentations through a friend of mine, I didn't I don't know, I didn't know her at the time. And she called me and she said, Can you come down to the school meet? And I said, Yes, ma'am. So I went down. first words out of her mouth. Where do you realize you have the solution for rural communities across the country? And I was, I said, could you say that again? Really, really slow. Can I get my phone out and take that? Fast forward? Since I've talked to you last Kevin. I had a big event. This on September 18. It was Christopher's heavenly birthday. And I had over 300 people and I did my private launch of the book and I was interviewed and talked about the Life Care Specialist and Dean sunder who I was speaking of she was in the audience. And so this last Friday, she calls me she said CAMI there was an person in your office audience that called the president of the university, and is anonymously donating $50,000 To start your Rural Life Care Specialist in Georgia. And I got a person to match. So I got $100,000 to start the Life Care sperm Specialist Program in rural Georgia, and I am obviously be on a static about it.

Unknown Speaker  25:24  
Congratulations, that is a really, really big deal.

Unknown Speaker  25:28  
Thank you. Really excited, well, hiring in the rural community too, because, you know, I've had some debates with some medical doctors, and actually, I'm going to brag about myself a minute, I won the debate, because they said, why are you not requiring a four year degree. And I said, if you're going to have a solution in rural communities, this position needs to be hired in rural communities with someone that is a trusted person out of the community. And you don't need I can, I've got the whole curriculum, you don't need a four year college degree. First of all, you need empathy and compassion, and you don't get that in a piece of paper. I'm not slamming college degrees. So let's don't be don't no, no haters out there. I think that's great. If you get a college degree, I have three life care specialists on staff that all have their four year degree. However, you do not have to I've built the curriculum, so that I can train people, they can become certified. And there is no four year degree required for this position.

Unknown Speaker  26:35  
It's not what's in your head. It's what's in your heart. That's what makes the big difference in a position like that. And if you provide them with all the training, and they've got, they've got it in their heart, if it's in their passion to do this, that's how success happens.

Unknown Speaker  26:58  
They're gonna be across the country. And you can say, hey, I talked to her when

Unknown Speaker  27:03  
well, you know, it's a, it's when a good idea happens, and somebody with means has the ability to make a difference. I think that they'll do that, because it's a way for them. I mean, obviously, the gentleman who gave you a $50,000 check was just like, well, let's see, I won't go out to dinner on Thursday, and we'll give her a $50,000 check. But

Unknown Speaker  27:26  
I did it anonymously. So I had no idea who the donor is.

Unknown Speaker  27:30  
Well, they did that. Because they didn't want to come back from work. Probably. No, yeah. Because it's it's very important, right? By the way, we're talking with Kami wolf rice, go to kami Wolf rice.com, you can pre order the book, the flight, myopia journey, and it talks about her and her son and, and apparently, there's a whole lot more in the book than then We've even talked about. So she's going to keep that a little bit on to herself. And but please do that. And we need to take a quick break real quick. This is only gonna be like a two minute break. So don't go anywhere, anybody. We're going to talk more with Kami about the opioid op, I can't even say oh, it's Monday morning. Opioid, the drug addiction or the addiction of prescription medication that turns into heroin that turns into, but we haven't touched on the biggest thing out there that is going to be affecting a lot of kids in a really bad way. And that's fentanyl. So when we come back, I know CAMI is very versed on it and has done a lot of research on it. We're going to talk about this insidious thing that is being introduced to our culture that can have horrible, horrible consequences to a ton of people who don't even know they're taking it at the time. So we'll be right back. You're listening to KK and w 11:50am. This show is called positive talk radio. We're on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. I hope that you'll join us always and we'll be right back.

Unknown Speaker  29:06  
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Unknown Speaker  29:44  
And I'm excited that you're listening to the show right now. And if you like what we're doing here, you're gonna love what we do on positive talk radio.net Positive talk radio.net Each show is created live packed with positive information with real people discussing real issues and pauses The solutions that can work for everyone. I hope that you'll join us on positive talk radio.net And listen to all 295 Plus shows, I think it's worth your time. But then that's just me. That's positive talk radio dotnet, your home for great progressive positive podcast. And welcome back, everybody to another episode of positive talk radio. This is a very important one. I hope that you will all stay tuned. And in fact, I implore you for this next segment, please, if you have friends and family that you know, that have been either touched by this or could potentially be ringing them up and tell them that they need to be listening to cake nw 11:50am Right now, because first of all, I got to ask you, I What did you think of that theme song? That is my new theme song. What do you think?

Unknown Speaker  30:50  
I love it. Well, you have a great radio voice, by the way. I mean, you're just like, Pro. I love it. No, the intro is awesome.

Unknown Speaker  30:58  
Oh, thank you very much. The gentleman who wrote that for me. And he wrote it for me, is coming on the show next Monday at nine, his name is Tommy Tikka. And he's got a book out, which is a novel and we're also he is working with a group called Born Free. And they have put together a couple of albums now that they are selling and the proceeds are going to fight global warming. Because I don't know if you know it now, where are you? But are you back East? Atlanta, you're in Atlanta, when I tell you what it is it is October 3 here. And it is going to be 78 degrees in Seattle. Now that in all in and of itself is a huge deal. Only because it's never 78 in October of all things. So in but in any event, again, we're talking to kami wolf rice. Can we Wolf rice.com is the name of the website he needed to go to. I was watching television day before yesterday. And there's a group that is concerned about Halloween is coming up at the end of the month. And there is something called fentanyl. And we're gonna get into talking about that. But they were saying that there is a candy that has been laced with fentanyl that looks very similar to a sweet tart. And it is something that if you know what you're doing, and you know how to handle it is one thing. But if a kid gets hold of it, it could cause their death very quickly. And the damage we talked about. I was amazing. We had our interview. And then I saw this on the news. That way, he was like, oh my god, this is this is a big deal. Because they're now putting things like that into and also in edibles that go into some of the because in Washington state of cannabis is not illegal anymore. And so they have what's called an edible and in that edible that you that is not government regulated, so you don't exactly know what's in it or the amount of whatever stuff that makes you high is in there. And that can be that can be deadly. And you don't even know it until it's too late. Let's talk about fentanyl. First of all, what is it?

Unknown Speaker  33:27  
Well, it's a synthetic drug. You don't have to wait for it to grow. It can be made by the masses. It's made very cheaply. It's coming from China into Mexico, and then across our borders. And if you know the word COVID You should know the word fentanyl because our country literally and this is out of the DEA direct communication. We're under a chemical warfare attack, literally and we're not being fear mongers. It's not that at all, because there's someone dying every nine minutes in our country. And let's let's let's talk for Hank here, right? Everybody will say everybody. A lot of people have experimented in drugs in the past, you're in college, you're at a party, whatever the situation may be you experiment. You're curious. The difference with experimenting today is that street drugs have been poisoned. So it's actually not an overdose. You haven't taken too much of medicine. You could take one pill, one Adderall that you get at school that you want to stay up and study and they say, Hey, take this Adderall in that way. You can stay up and study one Adderall, and it can be poisoned with fentanyl. And you're gone. You're dead. It's an Adderall. It's an oxy cotton. It's in Xanax. It's in marijuana. And just like you just said there was a 14 year old girl got a C Wheat tart that she thought was a sweet tart at school. And she's gone. She's dead. And so we don't have a choice. As a country, we have got to be aware. We've got to start sharing with everyone. And to me, everyone should own Narcan. There are people in coffee shops across our country that are being trained on how to administer Narcan because there's so many people taking a pill and going into the restroom and dying because the pill has poison in it. So we all need to be carrying Narcan. Literally. I mean, that is what I scream day in and day out. Everyone should have Narcan. It's a nasal spray, Kevin, you can literally save a life. Now, let's say you see somebody on the ground, and you think it's an you think they've been poisoned, it's an overdose, and you give them that nasal spray. It's not going to hurt them, if that's not what it was. So let's be clear on that. You know, this is just something everyone should have in there. They should know, you know, COVID You should know fentanyl, you should know, Narcan. Period.

Unknown Speaker  36:08  
Well, your here's a story for you, Mr. And this happened while I was driving a bus like three or four years ago. And in those days. Narcan was something that only and at least in this community right now, or it was, as of a couple of years ago, Narcan was only available through medic one, which means that in this particular case, the gentleman was out, he was out cold, he was apparently in the process of an overdose. And so the fire department came, they recognized that he was in trouble. They called an aid car, who verify that he was in trouble. And then they had to call medic one and wait for medic one to get there to administer the Narcan. That it's amazing stuff because it just woke him right up. Nothing could wake him up at all. He was he was on his way out and nothing could wake him up. But But this did. And so I asked the the medic one. technician and so is he gonna be okay? I mean, is he fine? Now? It's amazing that that just he said, No, it wears off. So it's good. We got to take him to the emergency room, but it buys us time. It buys us time before that happens ends. And so you know, fast forward like six months. And I was at Kent station there. And there is a kind of a ledge that people like to sit at. And there's there's a our our comfort station is just past that ledge. And so as I'm going to the conference station, I see these two feet sticking up. Because this, this man literally fell over backwards and passed out and his feet were sticking up in the air. And it would have been very handy if somebody would have been real close. So I had I called medic one and I called the fire department who then called medic one, and then they administered Narcan. And he was okay, but I agree with you, it needs to be if it doesn't have any adverse side effects, then it needs to be more available to the public. So that when you see because you're going to walk up to somebody, and they're going to be in crisis. And if you have the ability to help them at that moment and call 911 to do all of those things, but you can prevent them from perhaps dying in the interim.

Unknown Speaker  38:32  
That's right. I mean, it literally tells your lungs to breathe. That's the best way to describe Narcan. It literally tells your lungs to breathe. Now they hold you in the ER for longer period of time fentanyl has gotten so strong. Just like you mentioned earlier, the Narcan can wear off and the fentanyl shoots right back up and you can still die. So they have to have another sometimes two, three sprays of the nasal spray Narcan before you're okay. So you have to be monitored for some quiet time after that. And just realize that, you know, it's sad to say I've had people say, Well, why would you care? If a druggie dies, they chose to do the drug. I've had someone say that to me, Kevin. And my first answer is, number one, you're not God, you don't get to decide when someone dies. And if someone was drowning in front of you, would you not give them the or I don't really have time for that kind of nonsense, because I just can't imagine somebody not wanting to save a life. And it might not be an addict. It could be somebody that just thought they were taking a Xanax for anxiety. It could be any numerous situations, but I can't imagine somebody you know, and then I also get the question of where are the statement, my kid? My kid wouldn't do that. I've had many conversations where With my child, my kid knows better. And you know my answer to that is, I'm sure that that's what the West Point cadets families thought when their kids went to spring break and tried cocaine and OD because there was fentanyl in it. We all want to think the best of our children. And it might not be your child, it might be your child's friend, or it might be a neighbor, who knows the situation and I agree with you, it needs to be easier to get. My opinion is the government should be and people that have caused this should be dispersing it for free. Many states it is for free. You don't need a prescription some states you do every state is different. Um, that's one of the other things I scream and yell at is like everyone should have easy simple access to Narcan. Absolutely.

Unknown Speaker  40:53  
Well, and the other thing that is important in my frame of mind is that if you're trying to get better if you're in rehab, and then you exit rehab, because you can you're there for like 30 days or whatever. But there's still a period where you are not well yet, you still have to it's a struggle every day. And there are times when sometimes you get overwhelmed by that struggle. And people if you are as an example, an alcoholic, and you and you fall off the wagon, and you go and you and you drink and then you pass out and then but you wake up where if you're if you do I know a friend of a friend was in recovery, had a really bad day. And he thought that he would go and have a you know a bender and rented a hotel room. They found him the next day with a needle still in his arm and he was dead. Because that can tell us how much fentanyl does it take to hurt you?

Unknown Speaker  42:01  
It depends on the situation. Kevin, if somebody there are unfortunately fentanyl drug addicts out there that have been and they have more of a tolerance built up. And but for somebody that hasn't, you can have literally a speck of like the size of a salt, salt shaker you know that much in a pill. And it can kill you. It is so deadly. And there are you know, I'll give you a good example. How many kinds of sodas do we have? Right? Soda, you got Dr. Pepper, you got root beer, you got soda, you got Sprite, right,

Unknown Speaker  42:41  
go to any grocery store. And you've got a couple of aisles of just soda.

Unknown Speaker  42:46  
Okay, same with fentanyl. There's many, many, many, many different flavors of fentanyl. And so the government and the DEA they're trying, they're starting now to treat overdoses as a homicide. They're tracking down and they're arresting dealers because it's murder, it is murder. If you know that there's fentanyl in a pill and someone dies, that's murder. So they're really treating overdoses and deaths differently in the country. And so my point is, it's coming by the masses into our country. And so you can have any kind of flavor. And it depends, it's not like you have rocket scientists making this dropping these pills. But once you get addicted to fentanyl, if you've got somebody that's in full blown addiction, and they're taking fentanyl, they're going to be back way quicker than an oxy cotton, they're going to be constantly your best customer. But if they die, most drugs are not sold on the street anymore. It's all by the black web. And so they've got millions of more customers and they go to the next.

Unknown Speaker  43:51  
I guess that's progress for you. It's all by the web now. And you don't have anybody standing on the street corner selling, selling this stuff. But then also, the other problem is, is that there is no regulation of any of it. So you have no earthly idea from one pill to another. How much in fentanyl if any that they put in there and if they put too much in that's, that's for me, personally, and this is just me. The reason I'm a bit of a control freak. And so when I get when you take a pill or you take a couple pills, you don't know what the outcomes gonna be. That kind of freaks me out just a little bit. Because I don't want to be in a situation where I feel pretty good. I don't know, I feel really good. Oh, no, I don't feel good anymore. I you know, I don't I don't want to go through the down that road. But there are some people that do and we need to help them. And we need to we need to improve our, you know, a myriad of things. But the biggest thing is the program that you're advocating that you're putting together to put people in the hospitals and not that nurses don't care but they're overworked. But if it's their job to care, and you've got the heart for it, that is a wonderful, wonderful thing I think And

Unknown Speaker  45:01  
thank you, I appreciate that I, you know, again, there's story after story, unfortunately, when I went up to when I went to DC and met with the DEA, I sat next to a woman that her 14 year old child had gone to a slumber party. All the kids, good kid, great kid, no problem with drugs, no addiction, no nothing. And they were on Snapchat. And they got hit up on Snapchat, Oh, you want to stay up and dance and laugh too? You can't stop laughing You won't stop laughing. Those kids at that summer party die, all of them. Oh, my God. Yeah. So that's what I'm saying. Parents wake up. This is not this is not we're not trying to put fear monger, we're trying to save your lives, get your children's lives, it's a real thing happening. And so, you know, I've got so many areas, it's like an octopus, and all these little tentacles, I've got the hospital, I've got the youth, you know, training youth, I really want youth to be educated so that they can train and it can be peer to peer, right? Because if we talk to youth, as adults, you know, that is that just doesn't, you know, it doesn't fly. But if we get used to train, and you get used certified in a training that they go out, and they train their friends, and they warn their friends, I think that's much more powerful. So like I said, Kevin, it's a fire within me, I really, you know, like I said earlier, my son is gone, I can't bring him back. But I can save your son, I can save your daughter. And you know, it ties into what you were talking about a minute ago. I think a big issue in this country is stigma. And we have a visual of what it looks like to be an addict. And what we think of addicts, and it is a disease, it is a brain disease, it is something you will live with the rest of your life. That's why my swim lane is prevention, prevention prevention, because once it starts, you got to you got to you got to find it every day of your life, right. And so, but I think if we all start talking about it, and that's why we really wanted to be raw in my book, I really wanted to share everything I could possibly share. So that people would have to relate and understand that we kind of talk about it because the silence is what kills, it took me two years to say my son overdosed. Because as sick as this sounds, I wanted my son to have a respectable death. So not only was I dealing with the loss of him, the loss of not having my Christopher, I didn't want people to think bad of my son. And that's got to stop, because the silence is what kills. And that's why there's so many people dying in our country every day.

Unknown Speaker  47:59  
You know, for me is the most frightening aspect of it is that in my youth, I was not an angel. I did some things that experimental things that I probably shouldn't have done, which a lot of kids do. So when I was talking to my kids about the straight and narrow and not taking drugs and not doing good doing any pot or, or drinking underage or any of the things that kids are liable to do. And they looked at me and they said, Dad, oh Thou hypocrite. Because you did the same thing when you were a kid. And so you're gonna have to allow me to do the same things. And it didn't work for me to say, Yeah, but son, times are different today. Now, if I if one of his peers were to say, No, Shawn times are different today. And then and it's not a matter of you going and having a beer, it's a matter of you could die. And then you don't have a chance. And it's and if you think that's hyperbole, it's not it's really is happening to the tune of 100,000 kids a year or 100,000 people. And that's that's isn't obscene, absolutely obscene statistic. And I thank you for doing the work that you're doing because we need you out there. And we need people to support your work doing what you're doing. And so you can go to kami Wolf price.com. And there's actually a donate page there. So if you're one of these guys in Seattle has got you know, like $100 bills hanging out of your pockets and you don't need some of them. Go there and donate for this because I can't think of a better you could. The more we talked about this, the more that camis out there, the more lives we can save, and how much is one life worth? How much is 100 Lives Worth and I really appreciate The work that you're doing, and you're doing it for all the right reasons, you're doing it for nothing other than the satisfaction and also, Christopher is with you every day, and he is driving the process.

Unknown Speaker  50:13  
Yes, yes. And I do have a website for Christopher wolf crusade, it's C wc.in G, O. And they we have a lot of resources there more stuff about the Care Coach, you know, again, just any kind of information that we could think of that would help another parent, another person's suffering, that you're not alone, you're not alone in this. And we all know one, if we're honest, we all know one. And if you don't, no one, put your seatbelt on, put your seatbelt on, because I don't wish this on anyone. But you've got to educate and be prepared for this. And God bless. God bless everybody.

Unknown Speaker  50:55  
It is remarkable that we don't hear more about this, I think that should be there should be amongst more people are dying of this than car accidents. And many other ways in and this should be a major, major, major topic, because we need to educate people. And for those among us that would say, No, we should protect our kids and not educate them for for various and sundry reasons or, or keep them on the straight and narrow or whatever. They say to prevent you from having an honest conversation with your kid. I don't know that you can start too early to have that. Didn't we talk about like five years old, and to have an age appropriate conversation with them about illegal drugs and about what's happening even at that tender age.

Unknown Speaker  51:44  
My grandson is six years old, and he can have a thorough conversation with you about self medicating about dangers of pills. about asking doctors questions, it's okay to ask doctors questions. Why do I need all these pills? Can I have something else? Why do I have to take opioids? Is this an opioid? Most people don't even know they're taking an opioid because there's so many different names for them. You know, so yeah, you cannot teach early enough. And I can tell you, you know, I have we have an army of mamas that are across this country that have lost their children, you want to talk about a strong group of women. And a couple of weeks ago, they were at the White House protesting about fentanyl? Why is our government not doing anything? Why are we not? Why are we letting all these drugs come flooding into our country? Why are we not passing out Narcan like we do vaccines. And we're talking about 100,000 people in the last year, it's over 500,000. Since this started, and just one year we're talking about it would be the equivalent of 33,009 elevens. Put that in your mind. That's how big this is. That's how enormous This is.

Unknown Speaker  52:58  
And that's why you are so passionate about it. We've got just, we've got just a minute left. And I want to set myself aside and I want you to talk to our audience, and to everybody who's listening right now and tell them exactly what you would like them to know.

Unknown Speaker  53:12  
Wow, what an opportunity. Well, first of all, I want to bless you, Kevin, because you've given me a microphone. And anytime I can get the opportunity to share what I know. I just can't explain the fire inside of me. So if you're out there listening to me right now, I'm not trying to be a fear monger. I'm trying to save American lives. I'm trying to help. If you need resources they help is out there. Get the book, get the book so you have the access to the real time information. And please have compassion in your heart for anyone that's fighting this. And if you have a child or a loved one that's fighting this bear in there, don't ever give up on your loved one. They are there and they need help and support always.

Unknown Speaker  54:03  
And if you happen to be the one that is on these drugs and and you feel like you need to fix it, there are there are resources for you. Go find them. Chemi wolf rice has been our guest and go to kami Wolf price.com get all the information you need. I want to thank everybody for being here. We'll be back Wednesday at four kami. You can come back anytime. Okay.

Unknown Speaker  54:27  
Thank you. Let's keep in touch.

Unknown Speaker  54:29  
Absolutely. And by the way behind one another because you know each other is all we got. We'll see you Wednesday.