Transcript
WEBVTT
00:00:03.750 --> 00:00:31.559
Hello and welcome to The Storied Human. I'm Lynne Thompson. And today my guest is Trent Brock, a man who has overcome health challenges and has been a very successful entrepreneur. Originally from the deep south Louisiana, Trent considers himself a little rough around the edges Southern gentleman. He's a world traveler and Small Business International entrepreneur that introduced owns and operates a kettle corn manufacturing business in New Zealand over the last 13 years.
00:00:31.859 --> 00:01:05.219
He's also a three time cancer overcomer. He's now two years cancer free and has beaten incredible odds. And we'll hear more about that later. He considers his purpose to share his journey, giving others inspiration and hope. Recently, he's co authored a bestseller that has been released on Amazon called Breaking the Silence, voices of survivors. He's a coach, a speaker, and now a podcast guest with me, and best selling author. It's so nice to meet you today. I've been very excited about this interview.
00:01:03.030 --> 00:01:05.219
Welcome, Trent.
00:01:06.719 --> 00:01:27.629
Thank you so much. It's a pleasure to be here with you guys. Oh, man. I mean, what an intro there. I don't even know we're gonna have to talk about I know, sometimes we give away too much. Right? Yeah, yeah, there's a lot of details in between, I'll take Sure. That's what makes the story is those details for sure. Absolutely. So where would you like to start?
00:01:25.409 --> 00:02:09.840
Would you like to start with the medical or with the entrepreneur? God, you know what I'm really, I you know, it's your podcast. And so I'm happy to go any direction that you would like to go. You know, I usually I usually will just, you know, you ask me something. And I'll just keep talking. Yeah. So if you just say, okay, I'd like to start let me know, I'd really like to start with the cancer story. Because I think it's unbelievable what you beat the odds that you beat. And I know, my readers, my youth, my listeners would love to hear how that started. How you got through that? Sure. Three times.
00:02:05.879 --> 00:02:09.840
I mean, that's crazy. Yeah.
00:02:11.219 --> 00:02:16.830
I know, I know. You know, I honestly, I can't even I can't even believe it sometimes myself. Yeah.
00:02:17.849 --> 00:03:21.270
Yeah, so let's see you back in back in spring of 2019. I'm in the popcorn factory. And it's a small, it's a small business. So I wear many hats. And you know, I'm around the factory, you know, lifting stuff carrying stuff, anything from cooking, cleaning, ordering, whatever. And I went to excuse me, three different GPS, and they all just came up with the same thing. They're just like, we think you've torn one of your gluteus buttock muscles. And, and so I just kind of left it and it just kept getting worse and worse. And so I actually had to go in to the hospital to get some blood work done. And the hematologists just said, Something's not right. We're going to do an x ray before you go. We bickered about a little bit. And I said, Okay, well, that's fine. I'll, I'll do an x ray. And I left. And excuse me, my throat here.
00:03:22.379 --> 00:03:28.229
So, you know, as that cliche goes, you know, I can remember it.
00:03:28.439 --> 00:03:45.780
Like it was yesterday. And I was I was off and I was headed off to lunch. And the the hematologist called and she just said, Hey, that x ray, it's, it's it's canes, and, and it's it's very aggressive.
00:03:47.069 --> 00:04:00.449
And it's to the point where you have about a quarter inch of your pelvis, holding your leg on every step that you take, you're in danger of breaking your leg.
00:03:57.719 --> 00:04:30.029
And if you break your leg, we can't save it. So you need to come to the emergency room right now. And when you get there, you sit in your when you get there straight into a wheelchair. And that's where it started. So New Zealand has public health care. So they admitted me and, and kind of the thing that happened was over a six month period, they would they would do the X rays and scans it would take an take them a couple of months to create the implant.
00:04:30.300 --> 00:04:42.240
Then when they were ready to do surgery, it didn't fit because the cancer progressed. So third time, third time, they're like, well, it's it's too far along and we're cutting the leg off.
00:04:42.600 --> 00:06:04.829
Oh my so I lost it. Right. And at that time, I you know, I had kind of gotten you know, after several appointments. I gotten to the point where I would ask my parents, you know, they'd be on the speakerphone with me and just kind of a tip A you know, one of the tips that I would give anybody is, if you're if you're if you're going into a situation where you're going into the doctor to see something about about serious things, what happens a lot of times is you get in there and you've got an agenda or things in your head that you want to talk about some questions you want to ask. And, and what I like to do is, let the doctor talk first, you know, he's got his, he's got his points he wants to make. And a lot of times, the first point is the only one you hear, because it blows you out of the water. So it's so true, that you are trying to comprehend what's going on. And you talk to him for half hour, and you don't remember anything. And we're talking life and death or limb and losing and things. And so, you know, I had done that a few times. So I had my parents on the line. They were they were in the States. I'm in New Zealand, and my dad stepped in and he just said, Hey, look, you know, Doc, you're not cutting this guy's leg off. Oh, he's a fighter. He's not a quitter.
00:06:01.379 --> 00:06:35.009
He's never quit on anything, you leave that blank. And I guarantee you somehow he's going to make it work. And so the doc just say, Well, okay, and he came back a few days later, and he said, Look, we'll leave the leg, basically, it's, you know, it's going to be maybe no better than a stump, it's going to be a lot harder for you, instead of just cutting it off, and I'm not guaranteeing functionality, I'm not guaranteeing any feeling. And it's definitely going to be shorter than the other.
00:06:36.120 --> 00:07:17.939
And, you know, my dad said, Leave it leave it or we're flying home tomorrow. So we left it. And, and so let's see, I had about I got infected, it got infected in, you know, somehow during the surgery or whatever. Now, there were five or six surgeries, never could never could get over the infection. Did all the antibiotics did all the surgeries did everything for five months in hospital and, you know, finally got out. And, you know, back back to work and my folks went home. So I you know, I was on crutches at this time.
00:07:18.810 --> 00:07:34.379
And I had never, I never stopped working the whole time. You know, it's a small business. I you know, I felt like you had to Yeah, I felt like, you know, either either we shut the doors, or, you know, I keep doing that.
00:07:29.250 --> 00:07:55.110
And it was to the point where I wasn't allowed out of the bed literally for 60 days. And, yeah, and so like, you know, I couldn't even get up to go to the bathroom. So, I mean, it was like, when somebody rolled me over, they brought in about five or six nurses. And it was like this money thing where they roll you over design roll you back.
00:07:55.680 --> 00:08:14.730
But hey, I had my computer, and I had my food train, and I put my laptop on that thing. And, you know, my staff would come in, my staff would come in and we would have meetings, you know, in in, you just kept out of the room. Yeah. And you know what? The thing is?
00:08:16.259 --> 00:08:30.420
It actually was good for me. You know, people think people think if you think you do there? Well, let me tell you, you know, like, if you've been in the hospital, the doctor comes to see you, you know, for 15 minutes, you know, like, once a week.
00:08:32.159 --> 00:09:03.539
What do you do? What do you do with the other 24 hours in the day? You know, way too much time to think about what's wrong with you? Yeah. And you know why most people when they when they do that, they go south instead of going north if you sit there long enough, right? And so it was great for it, it was actually good for me because it allowed me to take my job somewhere else and concentrate on something because there's only so much you can think about, you know, how am I gonna do this? What am I going to do?
00:09:01.350 --> 00:09:26.340
You make a decision and then you're just waiting around so it actually was good for me in that respect. So yeah, so Ryan got out of the hospital mom and dad went home and back to work. I had my next scan and it was long and pancreas cancer. So double doozy on that one. Yeah. Oh.
00:09:28.620 --> 00:10:00.000
Double do stay on that one. And in between in between the scan and the appointments and the schedule on the pancreatic surgery because obviously that's the more serious of the two COVID hips. And so yeah, so in New Zealand, they locked us down like a vedantam they did right away. Yeah. Yeah, it was it was really tough. So add the pancreas surgery and luckily it was on the bottom into my pancreas instead of the top end.
00:10:00.000 --> 00:10:20.940
Because the top end is where it connects to everything. And so they remove that and I had to take my spleen as well. And when we went when I got to the debrief after the surgery, it actually was a misdiagnosis.
00:10:15.240 --> 00:11:20.309
Okay, it was it was a blood clot. It wasn't a it wasn't a tumor. So they, they removed all that. And it was a bittersweet thing, right. So, you know, congratulations, you don't you don't have pancreatic cancer, but, uh, you know, we just, we've compromised your, your health, you know, and everything. Yeah. So, you know, that was that was that was that, you know, I just, Hey, man, you know, we're still alive. And then, you know, several months later was the lung thing. And so went in, and, you know, still the COVID deal, still a COVID thing, you know, no one can visit you, no one can see you and have a long surgery. And that that went okay, they removed one of the lobes one of the lobes that had a had a tumor in it. And the orthopedic had found out that I knew that I was in the hospital. And I had kind of decided after these guys had six or seven tribes on my on my hip.
00:11:16.950 --> 00:11:24.929
I'm kind of done with it, you know, not do anything. Yes.
00:11:20.309 --> 00:11:28.679
Anybody would be. Yeah. And I knew and I knew it was infected.
00:11:24.929 --> 00:11:44.970
And I knew it. I you know, I mean, I drove the thing around, it hurt all the time. Every step you take every time you roll over anytime you move. I mean, you know, the thing, the thing I kind of try to give it a part, you know, somebody to compare would be like, you don't get a splinter in your finger. Okay.
00:11:40.649 --> 00:11:48.629
You know, when you get infected, splinter in your finger helps.
00:11:45.210 --> 00:11:48.629
Yeah, well, yeah, you know, so.
00:11:49.649 --> 00:12:11.970
Yeah, you know, I had an infection spot about that big in my hip. So he said, Hey, look, you know, when we did the first surgery, we attached a little wire to the leg bone to the little piece of bone he had left in your pelvis, so the leg wouldn't continue to rise up, because over time, it's jello.
00:12:12.389 --> 00:12:35.970
And so it's just going to continue to tick up. So this is this. This is what it looked like when they did the initial surgery. And you can see, there's actually no pelvis on the side. So that's a normal that's the normal showing me I'm just looking at an x ray and there's no like wing shape of a pelvis on the right side. Or your left side. Yeah, yeah.
00:12:36.000 --> 00:12:49.139
Correct. Holy moly. And you can see that's the wire that they put in to hold the leg bone from building up. Oh my god pretty pretty, pretty good idea. I mean, you know, a bit of a you know, a bit or a bit of a rough you know, rough a rough deal.
00:12:49.139 --> 00:12:55.860
But But it worked. Well, they thought that was the, the source of the infection. So I went in and took it out.
00:12:57.870 --> 00:13:20.580
And in the end, it didn't actually, it actually wasn't the source of the infection. So I'm in hospital with Oh, yeah. And by the way, the day after my lung surgery that got infected, so I had an infected lung thing so it affected lung thing and infected hip. And let's see what else let's see.
00:13:21.690 --> 00:13:42.929
So I was supposed to be in the hospital about two weeks, weeks and ended up being two and a half months. attached a I had put an IV thing in my arm and I had a vacuum suction thing on on my leg for you know, to try to help the healing. So I didn't get you know, got through all that.
00:13:44.190 --> 00:13:48.149
And back to work again, right back to work. Oh my gosh.
00:13:49.529 --> 00:13:50.490
You and your work.
00:13:51.929 --> 00:13:54.720
It was the only thing I had to keep my sanity. I get it though.
00:13:54.720 --> 00:13:59.070
No, I get it. You got to think of something else. Yeah, yes, it was your life.
00:14:00.690 --> 00:14:11.940
Yeah, right. And here's the thing you know, you know, you know, world traveler career guy, you know, no kids, you know, never been married no family.
00:14:07.679 --> 00:14:13.889
And so you know, my popcorn business is my baby. That's your thing.
00:14:15.240 --> 00:14:30.330
That's my thing. That's my thing. No one else is going to do it like you do it. That's exactly right. You know and unfortunately I've been blessed with you know that semi perfectionist thing as well so golly man.
00:14:31.649 --> 00:14:35.820
Yeah, very difficult to give up.
00:14:31.649 --> 00:14:37.830
Control and trust and all those things. That's a whole nother conversation right?
00:14:39.000 --> 00:14:48.029
So hey, you know got through all that and you know, do my thing next scan? No, no, no, for real.
00:14:43.019 --> 00:14:59.970
You really do have pancreatic cancer this time. Oh, give me a break. You really do. And so back and forth with the with the with the surgeon over a couple of months. I'm like, you know, I don't want to remove it.
00:15:00.000 --> 00:15:04.080
It makes me surgically a diabetic. I don't want to go through with that.
00:15:05.639 --> 00:15:34.649
You know, can we radiate it? Can we do something? And I said, we got to prove it this time as well. Because the last time, you know, we skipped the biopsy option, because, you know, you you just convinced me that it was, yeah, cancer, and it wasn't. And so, you know, we got the biopsy and, you know, I mean, were you starting to lose faith in them? I mean, they sound a little bit like, they failed a couple of times.
00:15:30.960 --> 00:15:34.649
Absolutely. Absolutely.
00:15:36.480 --> 00:15:53.639
Yeah, you know, it's a public system. You know, I mean, I mean, we tell, you know, public system, government systems, they, you know, they, they're there. And, but they just don't, they just don't work as well as private things.
00:15:51.629 --> 00:16:04.590
Right. I mean, we've all been involved with some government things. You know, I mean, from anything from the post office to, you know, Medicare or whatever, it just how it goes.
00:16:00.120 --> 00:16:11.220
And New Zealand is a bit behind anyways, it's just a, you know, it's just a little slower. They don't have the technology here.
00:16:07.080 --> 00:16:11.970
All those things, all those things. Yeah.
00:16:13.139 --> 00:17:14.609
And so, over when I first discovered it, you know, I like to give people, you know, a couple of visuals. When I first discovered it. It was this size, basically, a couple of nickels. Okay, they showed up on the scan. Yeah. After a few months in everything getting the biopsy. It had grown to the size of a tennis ball, get out. That seems impossible. A couple of months. Oh, my God, about about for about four months. Oh, my gosh. And, you know, I knew that time was working out in pancreatic cancer, with treatment. Okay, is less than 5%. I know that the odds are bad. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's, it's a death sentence, right? So I decided, you know, what I know, I mean, I look in the mirror. And honestly, I'm like, You're dying. I can just tell, you know, my, my stomach, my stomach is killing me the tumors growing into my stomach.
00:17:15.839 --> 00:19:06.509
I'm having trouble eaten, you know, my stomach hurts all the time. But bah, bah, bah, whatever. So I went to, you know, went through a couple of private colleges, oncologist, and, you know, radiologists, and things like that. And he just said, Hey, look, you know, this has progressed too far. And there's nothing we can do for you. And I'm thinking, I'm thinking we, you know, we waited around, and I'm gonna die from this. So they couldn't do surgery. They couldn't do radiation. Chemo didn't work on this kind of stuff. And so, I just thought, well, you know, I mean, I've got a year left, I'm gonna go home, and be with my parents for the year that I have left. And so, you know, I was on the phone with my folks one day, after we had talked to the pancreatic doctor. And, you know, my folks are awesome. They are awesome people. I mean, they, you know, they've been with me through this thing, I wouldn't be here without them. And, you know, I could feel them starting to kind of lose, lose hope to, you know, you know, the hope, dismiss their despair, a, you know, their, their son's dying, and there's nothing they can do about it. And he's on the other side of the world, you know, and I thought, you know, what, because, you know, once I got diagnosed with the pancreatic thing, you know, my team, my team's like, you know, trenches, just take it easy. Go home, you know, hang around, you just just relax, take care yourself. And, you know, I did that for a couple of weeks. And I'll tell you why. You know, I thought that was cool. But I'll tell you, what, about 1011 o'clock. I was going nuts. I saw the news.
00:19:01.589 --> 00:19:12.119
I saw the news. I watched the talk shows, they made me depressed. There's no one to play with. Everybody's at work.
00:19:09.630 --> 00:19:20.279
There's no one to play with. I'm bored. I'm waiting for lunch to get here. And I thought the hell with this, I'm going back to work. And, and I just decided, You know what?
00:19:23.849 --> 00:19:29.970
I'm gonna I've never quit, just like my dad said, you know, this guy iniquity. He's a fireman.
00:19:27.269 --> 00:19:35.970
And I just thought, you know what, I will fight this thing.
00:19:29.970 --> 00:20:27.869
Till until it's over. And I just decided, You know what, I'm going out. I'm going out with my dignity, and my pride that I never gave up until my last breath. And so that's when I decided I'm going forward. And so I came home. And, you know, with everything being all over, you know, all had them having to come all the way down in New Zealand and all this stuff. And I'm like, well, well So I'm home, where am I gonna go? Go to, you know, am I gonna go to MD Anderson or to Mayo or a big clinic or you? And I thought, You know what, let's just start at home. Let's just start at home, you know, and my folks live in Northwest Arkansas. And from the research that I've done, it's it's a nice little pocket of healthcare, that they're really working hard on developing, you know, Walmart's the headquarters here.
00:20:23.069 --> 00:21:23.069
And, you know, JB Han, and Tyson and things like that. And so they're really working on, you know, making this place, specialized with some of the health care stuff. And I thought, Hey, man, yeah, let's do that. So we started, we started here and a day I got off the plane. You know, I went into the clinic, and yeah, it's just kind of good old contributor, radiologist. And, and we talked about, we talked about, you know, my concerns, and he said, Hey, look, you know, if we don't do something, you're definitely going to die from this. So we need to do something. And I think that we can get this thing. And, you know, my concerns about you know, what, we're gonna burn a hole through me or the surgery or whatever you say, Look, you know, we have pretty good machinery here in a humble way. Yeah, he said, he said, I there, the stuff we have here is probably a little bit more advanced in New Zealand.
00:21:20.430 --> 00:21:50.640
And, you know, I think we should give this a shot. I really think we can get it. And so, by that time, that by the time I had started about a time I started radiation, it was the size of a softball. No way. Yes. Oh my God. And so your pancreas, your pancreas, full pancreas is about the size of like a frankfurter, sausage.
00:21:45.150 --> 00:21:56.759
Okay. Okay, and so I had half of my left. So I had about three inches left, and a softball was growing. Oh, so.
00:21:57.839 --> 00:22:27.660
But hey, you know what? We zap that sucker. We zapped it. And wait about three months. It was the longest three months of my life. You know, praying and praying and believing and prophesying and open and everything else. And we got it was apt It was after? That's amazing. Yeah. And then after that, I did some immunotherapy.
00:22:23.789 --> 00:22:31.980
And that's kind of the newer thing. It's kind of kind of the, you know, the new Big Brother cool thing to chemo.
00:22:33.299 --> 00:23:00.450
Chemo is basically like, A is like a nuclear bomb, right? It just goes in. It just flattens everything. It's poison. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. I mean, it doesn't care if it's good, bad or whatever. And yeah, okay. It's just gonna just wipe out everything. This immunotherapy, it's like, it's a target. It targets things. It's like a missile, right? It finds these it finds these bad cells, man, and they just get snow. So it doesn't kill the good ones.
00:22:57.569 --> 00:23:08.130
Yeah, that's really cool. Yeah, yeah. And so it was good that we did that. Because there was some other things that we're wanting to want to want to start, right.
00:23:08.130 --> 00:23:11.789
But this got it before all that happened. That's so good. Yeah.
00:23:12.269 --> 00:23:19.079
And, and so, you know, it's like, okay, you know, my plan was when I got home was like, we're going to beat the cancer.
00:23:19.650 --> 00:24:55.170
And we're going to beat this leg infection. And then I'm going to walk again. Okay, I'm going for all. Wow. So we did think we got the cancer thing. And so here's the deal, right? If you add chronic infection in your hip, most most surgeons won't operate on you because you have something like an 80% chance of a reoccurring infection, even if it's not evident, even when they take biopsies, aspirations go in there, look around do whatever, it doesn't matter. Okay. They just won't touch you. So, I had a hard time finding anybody that we that would even talk to me that would talk to you. Yeah, yeah. And so I found that, you know, again, here in Northwest Arkansas, I found a guy, man, and, you know, he's just, you know, he's a little fell out and works out and he's buff, and he's a go getter, and he's got his killer attitude. And, you know, he's just like, train, I think we can get this, I think we can get this I love. And one of the things I've learned, you know, is, you know, it's your life, it's your life, you know, you don't have to if you and this doctor, they don't get along. That's okay. Okay, you can go to another one. Yeah. And, you know, one of the analogies that I that I, that I used, that kind of helped me through this was, you know, it was such a, it was such a, you know, this big, massive, heavy thing of like this life and death and living and dying. And, you know, I mean, I just started taking it like a challenge. Like, we're gonna play the game of life.
00:24:52.170 --> 00:24:55.170
We're gonna play again. Yeah.
00:24:55.829 --> 00:25:33.930
And my game is football and currently I'm a football guy. I love football. You You know, I mean, you know, typical, right? And so on the quarterback is my team. Yes, you are. It's my team. And so I get to choose who's on my team. And, you know, if they didn't, if it doesn't work out, I will use trade you all trade, you often get a new one. So I think people shouldn't people should, you know, have the confidence. And you know, if you have a doctor that isn't open, open, you know, even the saying, hey, you know, like, this is what I think we should do. Yeah. And you want to go get a second opinion. He doesn't agree with that. He's probably not the right guy for you. That's good advice. Yeah.
00:25:34.200 --> 00:25:55.589
Because what I'm hearing is, there's some creative doctors that you found that were willing to take up the challenge, and that's who you need. You need somebody who's creative, ready to go? Like, they're not all like that. Right? That's a great point. Yeah, no, they are. No, no, they aren't. And, yeah, and so. So you know, this guy, you know, this guy was on my team.
00:25:55.799 --> 00:26:26.759
And we, and you know, we beat the infection. And, you know, we did everything we had to do was a three month course of IV antibiotics every day, two hours, you know, it, you know, with these with these little ball things, it's got all the stuff and you connect it up. And it you know, it made me made me feel terrible when you know, when I was sick, and, you know, I mean, but hey, I will do anything to walk again. Any getting? So here's the question.
00:26:21.329 --> 00:26:30.450
I got enough. That's a hell of a lot to go through for anybody.
00:26:26.759 --> 00:27:12.420
How did you keep your spirits up? How did you get through this? What did you say to yourself? Or have you always been somebody who meets challenges? I don't understand where this came from. It's like, amazing to me that you got through all this? Yeah. Well, I'll tell you, I, you know, normally, when I see something, you know, first thing that hits me, you know, I can be quite quite pessimistic about it. Right. Quite realist, you know, and, and what I did is, I started to change my mindset, and the way that I did that, with the way that I did that is, I started cutting out negative things in my life.
00:27:12.660 --> 00:27:48.690
Okay. And so, negative things being some friends and some friends that, you know, weren't on the same page with me. And, and things like that. And I started if I wasn't at work, I was doing anything, that would be something towards saving my life. Right. So, you know, I started to change my diet. And, you know, and I, you know, when I just started simple, and I, you know, I couldn't, I started training my diet. And, you know, I couldn't even even know where to touch my toes, right?
00:27:49.740 --> 00:28:12.329
But I don't Yoga, you know, I, I've always worked out, I've always lifted weights, you know, I've been an athlete since I was a little kid. And, you know, I used to do yoga once a week, you know, instead of just pound on the one night, and I started with the yoga, in my office, by myself, two or three minutes a day. And I started doing that.
00:28:07.319 --> 00:28:19.799
And then the self help stuff started, you know, and what I would do is, you know, I'm a Christian, I'm a man of faith.
00:28:15.509 --> 00:28:28.140
And I'm not like some crazy, Jesus freak guy. But I believe in God, and I believe in my higher power. And, you know, a lot. Absolutely, absolutely.
00:28:28.440 --> 00:28:40.109
And, you know, I find I found some of my scriptures, they, they, you know, I would, I would say, We're P Diddley. And I started live listening to self help stuff, and positive things.
00:28:40.109 --> 00:28:57.750
And what I would do is, you know, at night, I would put something on, and I would put it on repeat, and I'd fall asleep listening to it. Yeah. And I, and I'd wake up in the middle of the night, and I'd be saying it to myself. And in the morning, it would be playing yourself.
00:28:53.430 --> 00:29:14.910
Yeah. I love this, too. How did you know to do that? Like, that's so cool to me. How did you know to go towards the positive stuff? And to cut out the negative? I mean, you said you were an athlete, it might have come from that, you know, like, were you have to have a certain mindset to do well as an athlete. Sure. Sure.
00:29:15.000 --> 00:29:19.230
Sure. You're trained a little bit in that already. Yeah, yeah.
00:29:19.259 --> 00:29:39.269
Yeah. You know, I my mom, and my mom was a powerhouse Christian lady. And, and so, you know, I was getting I was getting some advice things from her. And the thing is, you know, I knew I had to convince myself I had it, I had a really hard time trying to convince myself I, you know, a fax guy. Yeah.
00:29:40.559 --> 00:29:58.859
Make practical decisions. I got five or six doctors telling me you're not going to make this these guys are the experts. You know, and, and so what I would do is anytime I put up, I put up you know, like things around the house, right? So, you know, I have a vision board now. Okay.
00:30:00.269 --> 00:30:11.939
Yeah, every morning when I get up, I look at that vision board and I think about it. And I put up little pictures around places, you know, to remind me, okay, you you set this goal.
00:30:12.990 --> 00:30:26.940
You know, my goal was my goal was, I want to live. But my y had to be more important than my goal and my why was because I'm not down on my parents. I'm gonna do Oh, that's powerful.
00:30:26.970 --> 00:31:29.400
Yeah, I can't do it. I can't do it. So, you know, I had an I had a friend, about nine months before I gotten diagnosed with cancer. One a really good friend, my brother's best friend, my animals, godson 38, died of cancer left his kids left his wife, okay. And then, a few months after that, one of my buddies owned a restaurant that we went to, on the daily, all the time, down there on the waterfront in New Zealand, looking at the beach, you know, and he got he got he got sideways and ended up taking his life. And, you know, I just thought, you know, there's too many people dying to weed people dying, and I'm tired of watching Parents bury their kids. And so this ain't gonna happen. And, and I've that's kind of how I started to define that. And you know what I mean?
00:31:22.170 --> 00:31:32.160
It was, it was, it was, I don't even know how I made it through.
00:31:29.400 --> 00:31:45.599
But I would get up in the mornings. And, you know, thank God for my team. You know, there was some days, I mean, I just couldn't even I couldn't even hardly get out of the bed. And they'd be calling. They'd be calling. And they're like, Trent, we need you work.
00:31:46.619 --> 00:31:59.730
We don't know how to fix this, you have to come to work, we need you. And, and you know what? I just I, you know, I just tried to take it day by day.
00:31:55.559 --> 00:32:16.170
And, you know, some days I couldn't even handle the whole day. And I would, I would just say, No, I just got to get my butt in the car. And I just got to get to work. And in most days, most days, I was laying on the couch in my office, okay.
00:32:11.759 --> 00:32:26.069
And my team would come, my team would come in. And, you know, in the beginning, they're like, Oh, are you alright? Alright, I'm just, I'm in so much pain. I mean, I couldn't sit, I couldn't sit up.
00:32:26.640 --> 00:32:39.869
You know, I lost, I lost, I lost half of my core. I couldn't even hold my sofa up, you know, it was either it was either I was laying down, or I was on my crutches, you know, holding myself up, you know, sitting down and, you know, didn't work.
00:32:40.049 --> 00:32:48.029
So I, you know, I had to lay on the couch. And my team would come in and say, Come in, tell me all your problems.
00:32:49.170 --> 00:33:39.000
Sit in my desk, because, because when you leave this room, you're going to be the boss. Yeah, you gotta go fix this. Okay. I can't do it anymore. I can't I can't I can't show you anymore. But I can tell you. And, and if you can't fix it, if you can't fix it, come back. I'm gonna be here. Okay. Yeah. And we're gonna try again. And it was actually good for my team. It kept you down. Yeah, it kept me going. And it kept my team, it kept my team, you know, made them grow. You know, they, they, they they grew is is is is man and, you know, as people and got more confidence in themselves and learn more skills, and, you know, I was I was even I was kind of holding them back, you know, you know, instead of showing them how to do it, they answer.
00:33:40.319 --> 00:33:52.289
You gotta go. You can this is the direction you gotta go. Go figure it out. That's kind of cool for you. Yeah. So different kind of. Yeah. That's so cool.
00:33:47.490 --> 00:33:52.289
Yeah. And so, where are you now?
00:33:52.589 --> 00:34:41.400
Now? I did read about, you're part of a special thing going on at Mayo? Door. You're part of your hip, right? That's right. That's right. So, you know, I researched about, uh, you know, all over the world, you know, when to doctors all over the country, and allows one guy by just one guy. There's actually a University of Arkansas medical school graduate, that I was referred to, by my, my kind of my senior orthopedic kind of advisor, the, you know, has been around the Arkansas on the medical network forever. And he said, Hey, look, I think this guy, I think this guy can do something for you.
00:34:35.340 --> 00:34:47.579
And so he's like, one of the only guys in the world that would even try something like this. Another creative guy, another guy willing to step up.
00:34:48.960 --> 00:34:58.230
With right? That's right. So you gotta look for I'm sensing a theme here. I think it's so important to get this out to people that you don't have to go to the first doctor you find.
00:34:58.889 --> 00:35:00.000
That's right. That's right.
00:35:00.000 --> 00:35:04.260
I mean, I mean, I can't tell you I mean, MD Anderson, okay.
00:35:05.338 --> 00:35:08.159
They wouldn't even touch me.
00:35:05.338 --> 00:35:08.159
Okay. Yeah.
00:35:09.210 --> 00:35:13.980
God's other doctors at Mayo wanted nothing to do with me.
00:35:14.940 --> 00:35:23.550
Yeah. The people and people in the, in the Arkansas University of Arkansas medical system.
00:35:25.380 --> 00:35:50.639
We don't have the expertise, you know. And so, yeah, you know, and the whole time, you know, what, I was training, I was getting ready, because I was told, you know, you're never gonna walk again. So I had gotten to the point, and I want to show you, what happened over time is that my leg got to where this was the shoe I was wearing.
00:35:46.619 --> 00:35:59.610
And he showed me something with about four inches of a platformer and a quarter. Yeah, and a quarter inches is what I had gotten to that I have to show that because that's amazing.
00:36:01.769 --> 00:36:25.079
And, and so, you know, that's what I was told. So, you know, I was staying in shape. I was still believing I was like, You know what, I'm going to keep working. I'm gonna keep doing this. Because I think I'm gonna find somebody. And I found my guy. And, yeah, and, you know, when I went and saw, you know, I wasn't going to be the one.
00:36:21.090 --> 00:36:39.690
Like, physically, that was going to prevent me from being able to do this, you know, I'm, I'm, you know, I'm, I'm like, I'm like, 40s. You know, this is only for young guys. Right? And so, we did all the tests. We did all this stuff, man. I was in shape.
00:36:36.510 --> 00:36:51.960
I was ready to go. I had been training. I trained for two and a half years trying to get this leg in good enough shape. And, and so we did. And I'm in the middle of a three part three part surgery thing right now.
00:36:52.500 --> 00:36:56.849
And so just to give you an idea, this is what they've done. Okay.
00:36:57.179 --> 00:37:04.409
This is the largest, most complex hip implant ever done.
00:37:04.829 --> 00:37:19.679
It's like nine screws, three rods. 18 hours surgery over two days. You actually have a pelvis on that side now. Yeah. Yeah, that's what you're showing me.
00:37:16.019 --> 00:37:31.920
Oh, my God. That's it. Does it hurt? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. You're just used to pain, aren't ya? Yeah. I mean, I've had like, I've had like, 10 or 11, hip surgeries or something.
00:37:27.960 --> 00:37:39.030
So you know, living with living with pain. But this has given my This has given me my stability back, right.
00:37:40.650 --> 00:37:46.199
It didn't give me all the length back. So I will show you today's a pretty big day, actually.
00:37:47.699 --> 00:37:52.170
So this happened back in July.
00:37:47.699 --> 00:38:14.039
And unfortunately, it got infected. And we didn't know so in October, I had to go back in they had to take out all the bits and pieces that they could scrub it out, clean it out, and and basically had to start over in the middle of October. And yeah, so that was that was rough antibiotics that just killed me.
00:38:08.280 --> 00:38:26.760
I came in side effects with all sorts of stuff, you know. And so now, they've gotten me down to this. And I got this shoe today.
00:38:19.079 --> 00:38:35.730
Is that two inches? This is an inch and three quarters. Oh, even better. Yeah. Yep. And and and so, you know, that says it all to me. That's huge. Yeah.
00:38:36.420 --> 00:38:42.329
They they can't you know, there's only after ever something shrinks. There's only so far they can stretch it.
00:38:42.389 --> 00:39:00.179
Okay. Yeah. Before it won't work. And so you know, if they if they just stretch it too far, it a paralyzed the nerves, the blood vessels, and so they have to be careful as far as we could go. And so I got about a year. I got about a year. Oh my god.
00:39:01.559 --> 00:39:04.889
I gotta get this thing, right.
00:39:01.559 --> 00:39:15.119
And then if I want to, to get that extra link back, what they'll do is a bone lengthening procedure where they go in, they cut the femur. And then they use kind of like a bit of a ratchet system.
00:39:16.139 --> 00:39:24.840
And it'll grow about an inch a month. Oh, they can they can make it. That's so interesting.
00:39:20.460 --> 00:39:24.840
They can they can make it grow.
00:39:25.380 --> 00:39:36.809
Yeah, you know, because some people you know, like in a car wreck or you're born with your legs, not even they do that kind of thing for people. Yeah. I have heard of that. Almost like a graft. Almost like a tree.
00:39:33.150 --> 00:39:45.869
Yeah, yeah, that's exactly right. Can you walk now? Are you walking? I am. I mean, I can tell you now just from having an issue today.
00:39:47.460 --> 00:39:50.670
I'm going to be able to walk.
00:39:47.460 --> 00:39:55.380
I'm gonna be able to walk and I will I'll be walking this year.
00:39:50.670 --> 00:39:58.469
So, you know, you know, from you know, from having the infection and everything that this happened.
00:39:59.579 --> 00:40:06.150
I'm still premier if I'm going to do the bone lengthening thing, right, let's just see, it's an option.
00:40:03.030 --> 00:40:09.960
That's how you feel. Yeah, that's right. It's an awesome.
00:40:06.210 --> 00:40:27.838
So I can't believe how far you've come. And I can imagine it, you do coaching and in your in you do positive thinking, speaking, inspirational speaking, I can imagine you're really good at it because you've walked the walk, you know, you don't just talk the talk.
00:40:29.579 --> 00:41:01.980
I'm still amazed that you made it through and that you you were able to. Yeah, you said yourself, you look back and go, How did I do that? Yeah. You know what I mean? I just had to break things down. And some days, I'm like, you know, what, I, it's all I can do is just to get myself to this appointment, or just to sell to lunch. But you know, what I tried to do when I tried to do is, you know, every day when I'm laying in bed, right, and I'm thinking, I'm thinking about how was my day? I'm one of those people?
00:40:57.809 --> 00:41:21.360
I'm one of those people where, you know, I have to know that I did enough. Okay, that I did enough, because if not, I'm gonna go to bed upset with myself. And you know, you don't win every day. You know? Right, right. You don't win every play.
00:41:17.219 --> 00:41:41.130
You don't win every game. You know, you don't make yardage on every on every on every day. But but you know what, I knew that if I won enough days, that I was gonna make it. And, you know, that's, that's, uh, you know, it's, there's not a bait, there's not this big like, secret, crazy formula. Okay.
00:41:42.119 --> 00:42:08.880
There's not it's all about hard work. Okay. Yeah. And if you don't believe in yourself, I every time I didn't believe in myself, I would just tell myself out loud. I'm going to beat this cancer. I'm going to walk again, I'm going to do it. And I'll tell you what, if you keep just saying stuff and keep telling yourself something enough, you believe it? Because you know what, it's the same thing, right? You hear people say, Man, I'm a loser. I'm terrible. You know, whatever, what happens?
00:42:09.000 --> 00:42:18.929
They begin to believe it, and then we'll go through their loser, right? Since your subconscious doesn't know any different, it does what you say, right? It makes it come true. Or you attract those things, too.
00:42:20.219 --> 00:42:25.860
I'm just reminded of my own cancer journey, which is nothing like what you've gone through.
00:42:23.070 --> 00:43:02.639
But okay, yeah, I did have breast cancer. They caught it really early in 2018. And I did the same thing, I started to get super worried I did the same thing you did where I just said, and this is very weird, because I'm a worrier. But I just said to myself, No, I'm just going to get through the next doctor's appointment, I'm not going to worry about all those surgeries or the possibility of this or that I'm going to do bit by bit, the next thing and that helps so much. But something also occurred to me. So I was at a really good place in my life when this happened. Yeah, a really good place. Like I had a great job that I loved, and husband and I are good. And my, you know, son was doing well.
00:43:02.639 --> 00:43:19.860
And I felt well, you know, in my life, so I was able to handle it. I think I think what I'm hearing from you is, you had the wherewithal to handle it. You were not in a bad place. Like, I wonder what happens to people.
00:43:16.349 --> 00:43:28.199
Sometimes I can think of darker times in my life where I might not have handled it as well. Or I was alone, you know, I wasn't alone. And it was I love that.
00:43:28.530 --> 00:43:44.969
Part of how you went ahead was for your parents. Because when you're doing something for someone else, there's so much more motivation. I think for yourself. It's always good to do stuff for yourself. But when you're thinking of your parents, that just really moved me. Yeah.
00:43:39.449 --> 00:43:49.320
Yeah. Yeah. So yes. Your, your inspirational motivation. Yeah.
00:43:44.969 --> 00:43:56.610
I mean, very, like, it's like you have a superpower, though, you're kind of, you know, what's the word? I can't think of the word.
00:43:58.199 --> 00:44:02.340
You're humble. You're humble.
00:43:58.199 --> 00:44:59.969
Yeah, I tried to be you know, I mean, I'm not perfect. And I made a lot of mistakes along the way. And, you know, the way I looked at that was, you know, I gotta do the best I can, with the things that I have and the knowledge that I have. Yeah, and the mistakes and, and my intentions are right, my intentions are good. And, you know, God's gonna give me grace on all the parts that I screwed up on, or I didn't know about and, and that's how I that's how I kind of got through that part where because, you know, I thought I thought I had screwed up to the point where I waited too long in New Zealand, I'm gonna I'm gonna I'm literally going to, I'm literally going to die because I like to be more terrifying. Yes, that must upset with myself. So disappointed, you know? And, and, and still, you know, we still there was a way, you know, and, you know, that's the thing.
00:44:57.989 --> 00:45:21.420
It's Like, you know, if you have a chance, that's all you need, you just need one chance. Yep. It doesn't matter the percentages, it doesn't matter anything, you know, and, and you know, what I would do is I would go and learn it. And I'd find stories about some dude, some dude, they beat pancreatic cancer, right?
00:45:22.769 --> 00:45:32.789
This old guy, this old guy can do that. You got to, you know, you can do what I was firing yourself. Yeah, we're gonna watch the movie. That's right.
00:45:29.070 --> 00:45:34.320
When I was Gladiator. I was the Gladiator. Yeah.
00:45:35.489 --> 00:45:45.119
Yeah. You know, and I'm the one I'm the one in the ring. And in the stuff, the stuff that I'm whipping, I'm beating that cancer up, you know, I'm beat.
00:45:42.030 --> 00:45:57.090
Yeah. Infection. Oh, that's, you know, and so, that's, that's how I that's how I tried to win, you know, I mean, it's, it's, I don't think it's I don't think it's like this super big, you know, Formula rocket science.
00:45:57.329 --> 00:46:08.820
It's just continually continually just, you know, just keeping it keeping, going, keeping going, you know, and I just state, you don't give up.
00:46:05.159 --> 00:46:12.300
Everybody has troubles, everybody fails and slips, but you get back up.
00:46:13.650 --> 00:46:17.190
The only way you can really fail is to just, you know, not do it.
00:46:17.610 --> 00:46:45.389
Right. That's right, you decided, I mean, against all odds. I mean, think about all the time, I don't know, if I would have kept going. I mean, you just kept deciding, no, I'm sure someone will help me, I'll find that next doctor, and I'll keep going. I had bad days. I've had terrible days. You know, I mean, I'd go in and the doctor would tell me something, and it would crush me. You know, and, yeah, I'd go home, I go home.
00:46:41.340 --> 00:47:04.019
And, you know, I just clear the afternoon, you know? And I'd say, you know, I gotta think about this, I gotta absorb it. I got to think about what my options are. I gotta go to the sidelines. I'm calling a timeout. I'm going to the sidelines. I'm talking to my coach. I'm talking to my folks.
00:46:59.730 --> 00:47:21.090
I'm talking to my best best friend. I'm talking to the people that I trust. What are my options here? What am I going to do? I'm going to try to get a good night's sleep, get something good to eat me. I'm going to get the best sleep I can. And tomorrow morning, I'm going forward. It's a whole new, fresh start. It's a fresh start.
00:47:21.329 --> 00:47:32.969
And I'm gonna I'm just going to, I'm going I'm gonna go forward, you know. And, you know, I mean, that's, that's all I was, you know, because, hey, you know, I tried to give it up thing, the given up thing.
00:47:35.159 --> 00:48:02.670
You know, I mean, it was it was, like, I gave up for a couple of weeks just hanging around. And I was like, You know what, I might as well just go in the backyard and dig a hole because I'm just waiting around and die for you right now. That was that was worth I think that's worse than even dying. You know, that's a horrible state. Right? So, so tell me, is there anything we didn't cover? Is there anything you would like anything else you'd like to share that you want people to know about? You?
00:48:03.420 --> 00:48:31.920
Um, gosh, you know, the thing is, you know, we all have, we all have things in life. And, and there's always, you know, there's always something I'll tell you, this is one, this is one other little analogy, I like to I like to kind of give out, you know, I get people people people ask me, you know, like, Oh, my God, you know, you had cancer three times, are you afraid you're gonna get it again? And I'm like, No, I'm not. I'm absolutely not afraid.
00:48:31.920 --> 00:48:50.579
And I'll tell you why. Because I have a little deck of cards, right? At 52. There are few cards in that deck. And, you know, it's the deck of cards of life. And you know what, I got some tough cards a while back.
00:48:46.079 --> 00:49:09.090
And I played them. I played that hand. And I got rid of those cards, and they're gone. And they can never come back. And I'm optimistic about what the next card is. I'm pulling off the deck, because it's gonna be better than what I had. Because I've already been through so many of the bad ones. Yeah.
00:49:10.500 --> 00:49:22.139
Good for you. Yeah. Yeah. Well, now, if we want to read your book is the best place to find the book you co authored. Is that on Amazon? Yes, ma'am. Yes.
00:49:17.849 --> 00:49:22.139
And what's that called? Again?
00:49:23.190 --> 00:49:24.780
What's the title is called?
00:49:25.889 --> 00:49:39.510
Oh, gosh, I always get so confused. It's called. You know what? Hold on one sec. I have it. I just wanted you to say it on air. I mean, I'll put it in the show notes. Yeah, sure. I've got it. I've got it right here.
00:49:34.920 --> 00:49:45.269
Okay. It is called Breaking the Silence. Voices of survivors.
00:49:39.510 --> 00:49:53.070
Right. tastic. And it's got a lot of wonderful, different stories. I was reading a little bit about it. Breaking the Silence. Wonderful. Yeah. Yeah.
00:49:53.130 --> 00:49:59.969
There's a lot of awesome people involved in this. Yeah. And that just came out. Right. You just said a couple of weeks ago. Yep, that's true.
00:50:00.000 --> 00:50:03.809
She's just hot off the presses.
00:50:00.000 --> 00:50:14.730
And what's the best way to get in touch with you if people want to talk to you more or communicate with you or, you know, get your coaching services? So, absolutely.
00:50:09.690 --> 00:50:23.550
website or your email, email emails, great Trent brock@yahoo.com. Okay. And, and my Facebook, you know, I'm pretty active on my Facebook.
00:50:23.550 --> 00:50:33.000
It's Trent Brock, and I'm the guy. I'm the guy doing the victory polls just like this. I look to your Facebook today.
00:50:33.000 --> 00:50:36.539
It's very inspiring. You're winning. We're winning.
00:50:36.719 --> 00:50:46.980
Excellent. We're gonna well, I'll put all that in the show notes. I cannot thank you enough. I was spellbound by your story. It's an amazing story.
00:50:43.349 --> 00:50:51.420
And I can't help but think that God has used you. Absolutely.
00:50:46.980 --> 00:51:19.530
Absolutely. To help others in a way that not everyone can, you know? Yep, you were up to the challenge. You were up to the challenge. And I'm so touched by the beautiful creative doctors that you were able to find because that excites me that, you know, they're out there. That's really important to remember. They're brave doctors that are called to do you know, the difficult things? Absolutely. And they served you and you you must just love them. You know? Yeah, yeah.
00:51:19.530 --> 00:51:33.000
You know what the thing is? The thing is, it's out there. It's out there. But it's but it's not going to show up at your front door. You gotta go. You gotta go get a really good point. You gotta go get it. If you look up your name in the dictionary.
00:51:33.000 --> 00:51:37.440
Proactiv is in the description.
00:51:33.000 --> 00:51:37.440
Right? You go and you get it?
00:51:37.440 --> 00:51:57.570
Yeah, you're not you're not a passive person. You're proactive. Your hair? Sure. You have to be you know, those, you know, and if you go, if you go, there are people that will help you. Yeah, I want to help you. Yeah, you know. So I mean, it's there, you know?
00:51:52.409 --> 00:51:57.570
Yeah. Yeah. Well, good for you.
00:51:57.690 --> 00:52:37.980
Thank you so much for sharing with us. Thank you so much. I just appreciate you giving me the platform to you know, to be here. And, you know, I don't I don't do this, I don't do this to get paid. I do this, you know, to pay it forward. And, you know, it's just hey, if somebody you know, we all have a bad day, we all have bad things in life. And I hope that someone hears this and you know, it's like, hey, you know what, if that guy if that guy can make it through that, through that I can make it through what I'm going through, you better believe it and you never know who's going to hear it. That's what I love about telling stories so that people can hear them and be inspired. You have a great day.
00:52:34.079 --> 00:52:37.980
Thank you again. My pleasure.
00:52:37.980 --> 00:52:40.230
Thank you so much. I really enjoyed it. Yeah, meet
