Latest / Finding New Waters / Dr. Yesenia Almaguer and Andrew Ditts on SOHL, Interventions, and Complex Mental Health Cases

Transcript

Dr. Yesenia Almaguer and Andrew Ditts on SOHL, Interventions, and Complex Mental Health Cases · Finding New Waters

0:00
What is so, so, so we always say that we're like the mental
0:04
health SWAT team. And a lot of people are like,
0:08
what does that even mean? So a lot of the calls that we
0:12
get, they're from worried families, worried husband,
0:17
sister, mother, etcetera, saying I have a problem.
0:21
I don't know where to start. I don't know where to look.
0:24
How do I like what? What's the first step?
0:27
So the mental health SWAT team comes and says I got you all.
0:33
Right. Well, welcome back everybody to
0:34
another episode of Finding New Waters.
0:36
My name is Bea Reeves. I'm the Director of Business
0:39
Development at New Waters Recovery here in Raleigh, NC and
0:43
I got 2 very special guests today.
0:46
Doctor Yesenia Almagar, if I said it right.
0:52
Did I? You did.
0:53
It you. Did it.
0:55
You did it. Perfect.
0:56
Beautiful. Been practicing all day and then
0:59
Andrew Ditz and they are a husband and wife team who are
1:03
also the founders of Soul. So I'm going to just sit back
1:07
and let them tell us what Soul is, and I'll start with you,
1:12
Doctor A. Welcome.
1:14
Thank you. Thank you so much for having us.
1:16
It's a pleasure to be here with you guys.
1:20
So what is sold? So, so we always say that we're
1:24
like the mental health SWAT team and a lot of people are like,
1:29
what does that even mean? So a lot of the calls that we
1:33
gather from worried families, worried husband, sister, mother,
1:39
etcetera, saying I have a problem.
1:42
I don't know where to start. I don't know where to look.
1:45
How do I like, what's the first step?
1:48
So the mental health SWAT team comes and says, I got you, let
1:54
me help you. And I walk next to you every
1:56
step of the way. And what does that look like?
1:59
It can be an intervention. It can be a case management
2:03
service or you can be coaching. And a lot of the times this is
2:06
like a triangle that we do at Seoul, coaching, case management
2:10
and interventions. And we don't really have a quick
2:13
gutter approach because every circumstance, every crisis is
2:18
different. So what we try to do is come in
2:21
with a really, really white canvas and see what is happening
2:27
across the family systems, across the individual with an
2:31
addiction or with a for the law and personality disorder and see
2:35
what is happening and what do we need to target every step of the
2:38
way. So I would say we're the mental
2:41
health swatchy. OK, I love that.
2:44
I've never heard it said just like that.
2:46
Andrew, what do you want to add to that?
2:49
Cute, complex in home crisis cases, cases other people's
2:54
can't stabilize, cases that have multiple layers of treatment
2:59
targets all happening at once. That need multidisciplinary
3:05
teams. And they need a point guard who
3:08
knows how to navigate all of those different players.
3:12
Who knows how to bring different players in at different times,
3:16
and knows how to monitor and bring that team over time.
3:19
A unified vision throughout the life of that case.
3:24
Who has the integrity and ethics to remove itself when it's time.
3:29
That is soul and that is a mineral health SWAT team.
3:33
It comes in. Give me the toughest problem you
3:37
got. I will get the job done.
3:40
From soup to Nuts A-Z. Bring the whole thing in, build
3:45
the treatment plan, build the team, implement it, adjust it,
3:50
adapt it, monitor it, then remove it.
3:55
Yeah, I like the, and they said that about remove it because I,
3:58
I do, you know, I appreciate that because I do know that
4:01
sometimes people kind of hold on a little too long where they're
4:03
maybe not quite really needed anymore.
4:06
And the person, not that anybody's ever cured, whether
4:08
that's the individual or the family, but just that it's time
4:11
for them to kind of fly the coop, so to speak.
4:14
And one other thing I noticed in your bio of, of at least of soul
4:18
is what I guess it's one definition of an intervention
4:21
instead of professionally guided conversation.
4:23
And you know that about did I say that right?
4:26
Because it, that sounds super simple, but that but an
4:30
intervention is so complicated. But I like that you're able to
4:34
kind of distill it down to, to that.
4:37
So I guess when you talk about the difference between a, a just
4:45
what, how else you would define an intervention And then kind of
4:47
the difference between what, you know, the layperson thinks of an
4:52
intervention who probably doesn't know anything other what
4:54
they may be seen on TV, maybe heard about versus your good old
4:58
fashioned like alcoholic addict intervention versus like a
5:01
complex mental health case. That's a lot to ask, but.
5:05
Yeah, I wanna start by saying, I wanna start by saying that
5:09
you're right when understood and slowly work ourselves out of the
5:15
job. I think that as a psychiatrist,
5:18
as an interventionist or a case manager and our coaches, our job
5:23
is to help the person really gain the coping mechanisms, the
5:28
skills in their daily life to work ourselves out of a job.
5:32
And always says to our coaches, our job is to work ourselves out
5:36
of a job and leave the, the client in a better way, in a
5:39
better state than when we met them wherever they were at in
5:43
their lives. So it's like so important and
5:45
that's like so ethical. And if we do that right, we're
5:49
easily able to to to to slowly decrease services, not sense in
5:55
regards to an intervention. What is an intervention?
5:58
We all say that an intervention is a process.
6:00
A lot of the times people think intervention TV show, we are
6:06
going to sit down and read letters and it's totally not.
6:11
You know, we do some interventions that can look like
6:13
that, but most of the time they don't do they don't go that way.
6:17
And the reason is because we love taking the complex cases.
6:20
So a typical sit down intervention in in the sense of
6:23
like a Johnson or a surprise, you know, model that is usually
6:28
for most of the time substance use disorders, you know, but
6:33
nowadays we're seeing that there's like no one sided just
6:36
substance use disorder, that there is depression and alcohol
6:40
use disorder and sometimes borderline personality disorder
6:43
and trauma, right? So we tried to see the whole
6:46
person and try to strategize what will best sit for that
6:52
person's in specific. For example, if a person has
6:57
some kind of personality disorder, which we mostly see
7:02
the cluster retrace like narcissism or borderline
7:05
personality disorder, whenever they are hearing what you're
7:10
trying to tell them in an intervention in in like a
7:13
typical sit down interventional Johnson.
7:16
If you have a group around and you read letters to them,
7:20
anything that they that the family says to that person will
7:24
not even register in their mind and they will go from zero to
7:28
100 and an emotional this regulation and we're not going
7:32
to get anywhere. So when we say an intervention
7:35
is really a process of looking of what's happening to the
7:39
individual and the family around the the person with with the
7:43
problem and building a strategy along with the family to make
7:48
sure that there is a change in in the person that we're trying
7:52
to help and in a change in the family system.
7:57
Got you. Andrew, I wanted to first of
8:00
all, when I was talking to you about having both of you on one
8:03
thing I wanted to make sure I mentioned is, you know, and I, I
8:07
saw, I've met you both before. And Andrew, I just saw you in
8:10
Dallas and y'all, y'all, you all presented last year at the Lone
8:15
Star Conference. And I remember thinking, wow,
8:17
this is pretty, this is a little different from what I'm used to
8:19
seeing. And then just reading about you
8:22
a little bit in the last couple of days, Doctor AII commented to
8:26
Andrew. I've, I've never seen somebody
8:28
with so much, so many credentials who's doing
8:32
interventions, which is I think is really something to highlight
8:37
and talk about that not only are you a doctor, but just the the
8:41
certifications and experiences. I've just never quite seen
8:43
anything like it. So back to Andrew, we talked
8:47
about this a little bit. I mean, why is it so important
8:49
to have somebody who's not only got some lived experience, but a
8:52
doctor involved in interventions?
8:56
Yeah. Go ahead, Andrew.
8:58
No, please. OK.
9:01
Do you know, I feel like a lot of clinicians do a lot of
9:06
interventions in their patients every single day that, you know,
9:11
they see them, whether it's primary care and intervention on
9:14
the patient that is not any sugar and is diabetic or that
9:19
are not taking their medications.
9:21
So we do a little interventions in our clinics and our private
9:25
practice when we see our patients face to face, but
9:27
they're like little smaller interventions that you slowly
9:31
start building, you know, every, every step of the way, every
9:35
every visit that that you have with your patients.
9:39
When I came into interventions to do it in a more complex way
9:44
outside of my office, traveling to, you know, somebody's house
9:51
in their intimate space, really see what's, you know, what's
9:55
around them, whether it's like a hoarding intervention or whether
9:58
there's alcohol bottles everywhere or whether, you know,
10:02
they're still have their vodka shots in the freezer.
10:05
When you actually do the intervention, really allow me to
10:09
to see what was happening besides what the parents or
10:13
besides what the family was able to tell me before I did the
10:16
intervention. And that was so valuable to me
10:19
to be able to go into somebody's home, you know, and see what's
10:24
happening. And so when I started doing
10:27
those interventions from from a person to person more in their
10:32
homes, it was really gratifying. But at the same time, I felt
10:38
honored to be in somebody's house to be able to do that.
10:42
So I went to medical school, yes, I have an MD degree, but I
10:48
would say that going and doing interventions in somebody's
10:53
homes, which a lot of psychiatrists are like, I'm not
10:55
getting out of my office. I'm not, you know, I'm not
10:58
traveling, you know, from New York to Texas or Florida to
11:02
interventions. And for me, I would say that one
11:06
of the things that really helped me to do this is the fact that I
11:09
worked in a mobile crisis unit in the Bronx going into people.
11:14
So we did we, you know, we all we had of information was the
11:18
call that hey, 911, they're barricaded in their home.
11:23
They're psychotic breaking, you know, the the walls and using
11:28
marijuana and all the paraphernalia.
11:30
So I feel like that really prepared me to do this other
11:35
work and then intervention feel, which I feel so, so grateful to,
11:40
to be part of the soul team and in doing this.
11:42
So yeah. So I'll I'll say this.
11:46
One more thing that I do want to say besides that training,
11:50
Andrew and I are also Black Swan trained and we're training
11:54
through the Harvard School in negotiation.
11:57
So a lot of the times we bring in these skills to really try to
12:03
make it or word it in a certain way that the person you know,
12:08
that we're intervening on a subsequent treatment.
12:13
Interesting. The thing, the thing, The thing
12:14
is really special about having a psychiatrist who is an
12:21
interventionist who's not not a psychiatrist who's going along
12:25
with an interventionist in the car along the ride to do a psych
12:29
assessment on scene and get them committed to us, to a, to a
12:33
psych hospital. But actually an interventionist
12:35
who's on the inquiry call, an interventionist who's doing all
12:39
the assessments and interventionist who's building
12:41
the treatment plan and interventionist who's on the pre
12:44
intervention meeting and interventionist who's in the
12:46
intervention and interventionist who's sitting with the family,
12:49
like, and they're like a psychiatrist who's along for the
12:51
whole ride is that they're picking up because of their
12:55
training. And that her, her training and
12:57
her background, she's picking up details and she's hearing words
13:01
and she's hearing facts with a whole different connotation.
13:05
Then then a layperson is so, for instance, you and me, because we
13:11
don't have medical training and a medical background and we
13:14
didn't. So she did 13 years of school
13:16
post high school, right? She did four years of undergrad
13:20
pre Med. She did four years of Med
13:22
school. She did four years of general
13:23
psychiatry residency. And then she did an addiction
13:25
psychiatry year fellowship on top of it.
13:28
So 13 years of that, in that, that immersive experience.
13:33
And on top of it, she's had other sub specialities and
13:35
trainings. And so when she hears the word,
13:39
when she hears certain things that define what mania is, she's
13:44
looking for different things than you and I are looking for.
13:47
And so like when I work with, because we have over 300
13:50
different coaches and companions and transport professionals that
13:52
are in our company that are working for us, that we're
13:54
bringing and putting on jobs when they're working with
13:58
clients and they're in the home and they're listening to
14:02
parents, right? And they're listening to
14:04
siblings and those people are reporting, they're saying, Oh,
14:07
my son's manic, my son's manic, my son's acting manic, my son's
14:11
bipolar. They're they're responding to
14:14
the fact that their son's just emotionally dysregulated.
14:17
Their son's not manic, their son's not bipolar.
14:20
Their son is just upset, right? But they don't, they're not,
14:24
they're so when they're on a call with an interventionist to
14:27
say, you have an interventionist who sourced from a, a right, he
14:29
got sober and then he's been doing like Johnson bottle
14:33
substance use disorder interventions.
14:36
He's going, he's reading letters and then he like does well and
14:38
he gets a good reputation. And then he get, and then he
14:40
gets, he's started being placed on mental health primary
14:44
interventions and he's starting to see things that family
14:47
members are saying, Oh my God, this person's manic, They're
14:50
manic. They need to go to mental health
14:52
primary. And so he's saying, OK, they're
14:54
manic. They need to be in this, but he
14:57
doesn't know. He doesn't know what to assess
14:59
for. He doesn't know on those calls
15:02
with the family what questions necessarily to ask, right?
15:06
And so having her on that with me and with my team, she knows
15:11
the questions to ask and how to disseminate to that information.
15:14
That word mania, manic, means so many different things to her in
15:17
a much more specific context. Another case in point, we do
15:21
like a whole forensic deep dive in our assessment process,
15:25
usually like anywhere from 40 to 60 hours upfront before we're
15:28
generating a treatment plan and a strategy and implementing it.
15:31
Even going in, right. We have templates, we have a
15:33
process, we do phone calls, we do interviews, We have like a
15:35
whole genogram family mapping a whole bunch of stuff we do.
15:38
And in that process, like if we get some information, they say,
15:42
oh, they're not showering and they're like chain smoking a
15:47
whole bunch, right for me. And it's like, and they're,
15:50
they're drinking, right? Like they're coming in for
15:52
alcohol. We think this is an alcohol use
15:54
disorder intervention, chain smoking a lot.
15:57
They're places in mass. They're just eating a bunch of
15:59
crap food. And I'm like, in my mind, I'm
16:01
like, oh, that's how I was when I was drinking.
16:04
You know, my place was a mess. I was chain smoking a lot.
16:06
I was eating a whole bunch. And so like I interpret that in
16:08
my mind, it's just like, well, that's just a slovenly person.
16:11
Like that's how you are when you drink.
16:13
Like you let everything go to crap in her mind.
16:15
She's like, could there also be a thought disorder here?
16:20
Because somebody who like is not showering and not taking care of
16:23
themselves and also is leaning a lot on nicotine because they're
16:26
trying to regulate the dopamine in their brain.
16:29
That also is very concurrent with a thought disorder
16:31
presentation. And so like she's, she's looking
16:35
at other things that are also coming up in the profile.
16:38
And like when I first started hearing her asking those types
16:41
of questions when we were going through these assessments, I was
16:44
like, Oh my gosh, somebody who's not coming from a medical
16:49
background and a general psychiatry background and an
16:53
addiction psychiatry background is missing all these little
16:56
details. So when we, when we do a full
16:59
biopsychosocial for every case, so like any case that we refer
17:02
to a program comes with a full biopsychosocial before they even
17:05
get there. I'm like, this is a goldmine if
17:09
I'm coming in as a client to a program because I have
17:13
essentially a psychiatrist who's done a full as much collateral
17:19
and assessment and information that they can on this person
17:21
before they're even getting there.
17:23
And we're wanting to make sure that they get to the right
17:25
place. You know, and there's a lot of
17:26
people in the field who, you know, don't have any training or
17:31
any background. We're doing interventions and
17:33
we're basically determining where people go.
17:36
And we get a lot of cases that'll come to us.
17:37
And they've already spent a quarter of a million on
17:39
treatment. And we just had this this poor
17:42
case of this this young girl, you know, she just found out
17:46
through a neuropsyche assessment they hadn't done a neuropsyche.
17:49
She's in her 20s that she actually has a thought disorder
17:52
and she'd been through, I don't know, 3 or 4 substance use
17:55
primary programs. And the mom, the family had
17:57
already spent 1/4 of $1,000,000. And by the time they got to us,
17:59
they're like, we're burned on treatment.
18:01
You can't spend any more on treatment.
18:02
We just found out to this neuro psych, she actually got a
18:04
thought disorder, but she presented like somebody who had
18:07
substance. And so it was just like, you
18:09
know, and. And what I would say where it
18:12
also comes in handy to have this perspective is, and I'm just
18:16
going to talk a little bit about that intervention that we
18:19
recently had in New York, Andrew, this kid that was
18:23
brilliant, very, very brilliant, had a very good job.
18:27
And the family was like, we don't know what's happening.
18:29
He's in New York City by himself, and he's just texting
18:33
those weird things about the world and Elon Mosque and all
18:37
these things. So we go in, knocked on the
18:41
door. He didn't let the family in, but
18:44
he said we'll have a conversation with the
18:47
interventionist. So eventually when we go into
18:49
the apartment, we just sit down, you know, as normal people, as
18:53
an interventionist, you need to be able to read the room and
18:56
know when to push and when to step back.
18:58
So in a sense, we just had a very friendly conversation with
19:02
him and asking him the right questions of like, hey, you
19:05
know, it's, you know, something. The world is just like so
19:08
different. And sometimes, you know, we hear
19:11
voices that tells these kind of things.
19:13
Does that ever happened to you? And he's like, oh, yeah, yeah,
19:16
yeah, this. And this happened.
19:17
And I was hearing voice and I was like, somethings like, do
19:20
you like it's hard to type when you're working or like, do you
19:24
like lose your train of thought? And he's like, yeah, actually
19:28
I've been seeing patterns, which is very disturbing because I
19:31
cannot go to work anymore because these patterns.
19:34
And so it's just the way that you frame the questions for them
19:38
to be able to one, trust you, to talk to you and actually be
19:43
honest about what's happening. And then three, from that we
19:47
decide like, hey, this is we just thought it was cannabis,
19:51
but if there's like cannabis and just psychosis versus bipolar
19:55
induced versus cannabis and psychosis is bipolar disorder,
20:00
but we are not going to know until we actually take him to
20:03
the treatment and get him all the substances.
20:05
So it's finding those little. Small things that is really
20:09
important to know what is actually happening and not have
20:13
him go to a facility that is only like mainly substance use
20:17
space. But yeah.
20:19
Yeah. And the one I mean, all of that
20:21
is just so valuable to be able to have that perspective and and
20:25
for you because it's two things really stood out.
20:28
I mean, everything was amazing that you just said, but the the
20:31
mania thing that that word just gets thrown around so much manic
20:34
mania. And like Andrew was.
20:36
Yeah. And so it's like I think he's
20:39
manic or I even sometimes the potential client thinks that he
20:43
or she is manic and it turns out that that's not true.
20:46
Because if, you know, mania is kind of a can sort of steer you
20:49
in One Direction versus just kind of doing some stuff that,
20:51
you know, people do when they're, you know, drinking
20:55
heavily and coming down hard. Yeah.
20:57
Emotionally, yeah. And then the the other thing was
21:02
just the the fact that like when in a you know, I've only I'm not
21:06
an interventionist. As we talked about, I've been on
21:08
some 12 step calls and it's important for me to be able to
21:11
just kind of tell like a convinced version of my own
21:14
story so that alcoholic addict can hear those similarities and
21:18
then the sounds like the similarity, but yet where it's
21:21
different with you and doing a mental health is like you got to
21:25
be able to really know what you're talking about, about
21:26
these symptoms, like these patterns.
21:28
I mean, I wouldn't know the first thing about, you know,
21:31
being able to try to help somebody understand that I know
21:34
what that person's talking about, about color patterns that
21:37
are keeping me from going to work.
21:38
But when you go in there and know what you're talking about,
21:41
maybe you haven't experienced it, but you know what you're
21:43
talking about and they need to hear that, right?
21:45
Exactly. And it's very important to say
21:48
like, Hey, I don't understand, like what's happening because I
21:52
don't like, you know, but can you like explain to me or like
21:57
get me in and to like, what does that actually look like?
22:01
Or how does that sound? Is it one voice is a multiple
22:05
voices? Are they like, are you hearing
22:07
them right now and going with like no judge man, and and
22:12
really try to see their perspective because in a way
22:14
they are suffering. They they want help.
22:18
Great in and I can imagine, you know, at work there were there
22:22
was a reason why I wasn't working out at work because
22:25
people he couldn't really say what was happening at work kind
22:29
of thing. But it's it's really, really
22:32
creative when we both come in because Andrew is like very
22:35
substance use disorder based, you know, 12 step background and
22:41
he's all, you know, asking all like the substance questions and
22:43
I'm like bringing in my clinical perspective.
22:46
So in a way we do like this dance in an intervention that is
22:51
that is very successful for for those that that we get to help.
22:56
I want to change gears a little bit here and Andrew, I want to
23:01
hear kind of about how each of you got into this field.
23:04
I mean, yours, Doctor a is a little bit more.
23:08
I wouldn't say traditional, but it makes sense.
23:09
I mean, you went to school for this And Andrew, like I told you
23:12
earlier, you know, I did a quick, I want to make sure I was
23:15
spelling your name right and the name of soul and saw that you
23:18
have an IMDb page. So I want to hear if you could
23:22
just what if you would indulge us and tell us a little bit
23:25
about, you know, your your a little bit of your story
23:27
involving that and how you got into this field.
23:32
It's all just it's all just a role, man.
23:35
It's all just a role or just acting.
23:38
We're having fun with it. You know, when you live in Los
23:40
Angeles and you get sober in Los Angeles, you get pulled into a
23:43
lot of face. And when you live and work as a
23:47
as a 24/7 live in sober companion and with a bunch of
23:50
actors on set, you got to blend in with the job, right?
23:53
And you got to do whatever the job entails.
23:55
So you end up, you end up working some jobs.
23:58
No, I, I, I ended up in Los Angeles for, to do a master's
24:05
in, in an active Conservatory at the University of Southern
24:09
California and, and I had AI had a film and television career.
24:15
And you know, John Lennon life was what's what happens when
24:19
you're busy making other plans. I bottomed out when I was in Los
24:22
Angeles and in, in my in my, in my addiction.
24:29
And it was while I was in that program, the directors of the
24:34
program. I've gotten a full ride to USCI,
24:37
had a full ride to undergrad for creative writing, actually.
24:41
And I bottomed out there, lost my scholarship and I somehow
24:45
saved it taking a psychology one O 1 course, actually, ironically
24:49
enough. And, and, and I somehow
24:53
graduated with a bunch of psych meds and therapy.
24:55
And then I got a full ride to grad school and I ended up in LA
24:59
and bottoming out the first semester again.
25:02
It was, it was alcohol, just drinking 1/5 of whiskey a night
25:07
right after full days of classes.
25:09
And the program directors came to me, Andy Robinson, dot Sue
25:14
Gohama, Charlotte Cornwall, the three program directors who are
25:17
giving me my scholarship and they told me it was time for me
25:20
to go. My family told me they didn't
25:22
want me home and the relationship I've been in for a
25:25
long time told me it was time to go as well.
25:27
And so I went to, I went to program and, and, and I, you
25:34
know, the, there's nothing like, there is nothing like 12 step
25:39
recovery in Los Angeles. I have, I mean, it's a
25:44
fellowship, it's a worldwide fellowship.
25:45
It's everywhere. But there are more meetings,
25:48
there are more diversity of meetings or more programs or
25:51
more fellowships. It is, it is one of the most
25:55
just incredible powerful communities and things that I've
25:59
ever seen. And when it says you will
26:03
experience new, new power and new life will flow in, I mean,
26:06
I, I experienced a white life, spiritual transformation of an
26:10
experience and my life changed for the better.
26:15
And I remember it changed so much for the better that I
26:19
decided to do it 6 times and six different fellowships.
26:23
And, you know, they have a, they have a, they have the same, they
26:31
have a, they have a, they have a saying in Southern California,
26:33
if you're not in five programs, you're in denial.
26:35
So I, you know, I, I wanted to double check and just make sure
26:39
I wasn't in denial. So I did it 6 times.
26:40
But I, I realized, and that's part of my journey is that, you
26:45
know, I was just, I was really, I became kind of a, a program
26:48
junkie in a way, you know, and there is an aspect to avoiding
26:53
your life through program. And I definitely, definitely
26:57
that happened. But that was my entry point into
27:01
the into the into the industry is that I knew people who were
27:04
working in private companion in case management, coaching
27:08
interventions, working through sober livings and treatment
27:11
programs out there in LA. And there was kind of like this.
27:15
It was almost like a stereotype. You could do like an HBOTV
27:18
series on this of like the like, like the, the broke actor who's
27:23
not working and like the, the newly recovered guy, sober
27:27
companion, like that like trifecta, just plug those guys
27:31
in and like put them on set everywhere in LA.
27:33
And, and that was kind of like my, that was my entry point.
27:38
And I just, we were, it was the wild, Wild West back then and we
27:43
were working with, we were working with like really, really
27:48
difficult acute dual diagnosis cases that we probably should
27:53
not have been working. And there was like really no
27:56
case management. There was no oversight.
27:58
Like case management just did not exist back then.
28:01
I mean, that is all we do now is, is case management, case
28:04
management, case management because we so have learned our
28:07
lessons back then. And I think the industry is
28:10
starting to understand what case management really means.
28:12
We're really trying to educate people on that.
28:15
But, but back then it was just kind of like throw this guy into
28:19
the fire, keep this, keep this guy alive and you know, just
28:24
keep billing. That was kind of like the vibe
28:26
for for a lot of lot of those situations for those companies
28:30
and and there were definitely some companies doing good work,
28:34
but there was also some situations that were just really
28:36
weird and and we didn't really know any better.
28:40
You know, we just, we kind of were like there's 12 step work
28:43
that is not paid. That is where you fill your cup.
28:46
And then there's this other world that is like private
28:50
wealth managers and like these high end families.
28:53
And if they're just doesn't seem to be a lot of hope there and
28:56
you're just kind of trying to do your best and you hope people
28:59
get better, but you kind of like there's not really great
29:02
outcomes. And so you just, there's just
29:05
like this dissonance between those two worlds and we're just
29:07
not going to try to make them meet.
29:09
And it wasn't really till I got to New York City 10 years later
29:14
and I started working with some really expert clinical teams
29:18
where the clinicians were the ones who really they really
29:21
leverage their power and and help the families in place and
29:26
things worked in a coordinated sense.
29:28
And that's why I was inspired to actually start the company with
29:31
Doctor A was because I was like, if I can get a clinician on
29:35
board with non clinical coaching and case management services and
29:39
we can live by the fact that we have to have teams in place and
29:44
work with people like yourself and work with programs and like
29:47
actually have a treatment path forward, then I can do this.
29:52
But if it's just like a bunch of like, you know, Clint Eastwood's
29:55
out in the wind, like operating like, like I was doing on set,
29:59
then that's not really something I can get behind.
30:02
Man, thank you for sharing all of that.
30:05
And yeah, I mean, it's just more evidence of how much I admire
30:12
your model because of the clinical medical piece with
30:15
Doctor A, your experience on what not to do, you know,
30:19
because I mean, that's there's really nothing more valuable
30:21
than like making mistakes and, and knowing what not to do.
30:26
I will spare everybody but about me.
30:28
But my IMDb, none of that had. I was well before I ever got
30:32
sober. What did you do?
30:34
And I, what did you do? The only thing, the only thing
30:37
else I I lived in New York for 5 1/2 years in the, you know, from
30:40
O4 to O9 and worked. I was started as a production
30:43
assistant and work my way up a little bit.
30:46
I mean, the smaller the project, the bigger my role.
30:48
And then I would kind of like you were saying every now and
30:50
then a friend who is a director would kind of force me to have a
30:53
bit part a line or two, maybe get killed in a movie, that kind
30:57
of thing. But it's it's significant in my
31:01
own story of recovery more in that when I was, you know, I
31:05
think it's sober till 2018. And this was, you know, up until
31:07
2009. And but when I tell my story at
31:12
a meeting, I, I always mentioned this part of my life because,
31:15
you know, I grew up here in Raleigh and I'm living in New
31:17
York. And everybody, as long as
31:20
everybody back here knew I was working in the movies, you know,
31:23
Oh, B, he worked, you know, But meanwhile, I was like, you know,
31:25
I'd work on a job anywhere from the project from three days to
31:28
three months and then make no effort to line the next thing
31:31
up, wake up hungover after a wrap party, unemployed, and then
31:34
not do anything about it for anywhere from three, three days
31:37
to three months, that kind of thing.
31:39
And but it was all a facade, you know, people, you know, as long
31:41
as people thought, you know, I, oh, he worked on Munich, Steven
31:44
Spielberg movie worked on The Sopranos, one day on The
31:47
Sopranos. But it's still, I got a credit
31:48
for it, you know, that kind of thing.
31:50
And it was all, it was part of like this facade this as long as
31:54
my, you know, my outsides look good, then I'm then I'm all
31:56
right. But meanwhile, you know, kind of
31:58
dying on the inside and only willing to internally complain
32:01
about it, not do anything about it.
32:04
Is that before you got sober? Oh, yeah, yeah.
32:06
This was from O4 to O9. And then I got sober in June of
32:10
2018. Yeah.
32:12
So I had another nine years of lying to myself and everybody
32:15
else. So moving on, back to you,
32:20
Doctor A. So you tell us about your
32:22
journey. Where are you from anyway?
32:24
So I'm from Mexico, I'm from Monterrey, Mexico.
32:27
I was born in Pharr, TX, a small town in South South Texas.
32:34
I, I migrated from Mexico to the US when I was 12 and spent about
32:39
10 years there and then move everywhere around Guadalajara,
32:43
Damica in Miami. So my university, I did it in
32:49
Ross University School of Medicine, that my clinical
32:51
rotations in University of Miami and Jackson Memorial in Miami
32:56
was there for three years. And then I was, I applied to
33:00
residency and I said, what is the city that scared me, scares
33:04
me the most? And I said New York City cuz the
33:08
train was so complicated and you know, people everywhere.
33:13
I mean, you've lived in New York, you know.
33:15
So I said I'm gonna go to New York single, no children.
33:20
What is the best time to move to New York?
33:22
You know that for residency? So I did my residency at Lincoln
33:26
Medical Center in the Bronx, affiliated with Cornell.
33:29
So sometimes we did rotations in Cornell, which was easy, greasy,
33:34
beautiful. But most of the time we were in
33:36
the Bronx, which, you know, it was a culture shock coming from
33:41
Miami and then coming, you know, from from Mexico.
33:46
I, I got there very confident saying like, I got this gonna
33:50
thing like the Bronx. It's like probably somewhere to
33:53
Mexico. And oh boy, it was not even
33:57
close. So I did my residency there.
34:02
It was, it was amazing. I learned a lot.
34:05
I, I learned to work in very acute, very difficult crisis
34:11
there. And then I ended up doing a
34:14
fellowship here at University of Texas Southwestern in Dallas,
34:19
which yeah, was also also pretty amazing.
34:24
And you're probably thinking, well, how did you guys start at
34:27
Seoul or at what point in 2020 pre pandemic?
34:32
Andrew and I met in February 2020 and when he told me what he
34:37
was doing about the silver companion name, just going back
34:40
to what he said was kind of wild that coaching companies, not,
34:46
I'm not saying all of them, but a lot of them will get people
34:49
from AA and be like, you look like you could do well with this
34:53
musician or with this rapper with this, you know, person to
34:58
help them get sober. And, and then Andrew showed me a
35:03
scar that he has in the in, in the abdomen.
35:06
It's like, what is that scar from?
35:07
It's like, well, I was working with the person that was
35:10
diagnosed with schizophrenia and bit me and I was like, I don't
35:14
know if you actually just wanted to show me the scar or what was
35:17
happening or why he was thinking.
35:20
And. I was like, OK, this has to
35:24
change. Like how like did you have a
35:27
clinical, like, do you have a psychiatrist?
35:29
Did you have a like who was in charge of making sure that
35:34
things run smooth and that there was supervision?
35:37
It was like, nobody like you just go and like figure it out.
35:40
And I was like, well, that's not right.
35:43
So we said we're going to do it differently.
35:46
We're gonna start our company and train our coaches and train
35:51
our companions and our interventionists to really
35:54
change a lot of the culture that was the wild, Wild West kind of
35:58
thing. It's like we have to stop that
36:01
because it's that healthy for the clients and it's not healthy
36:05
for coaches or companions that are living 24/7 in these
36:08
people's lives that don't understand schizophrenia but
36:12
don't understand what manic, you know, means.
36:15
So I do have to say I'm very proud of what we have built
36:19
together to be able to change this stigma or this this pattern
36:24
that was previously done. Well, you have a you've built an
36:30
amazing company, and I really don't know anyone who does it
36:33
quite like you do. And you have a great reputation.
36:36
And I'm really glad that I ran into Andrew.
36:40
I'll probably see you again in the next week or two or the next
36:43
month at least. But.
36:45
But yeah, for sure. And, you know, we got a few
36:48
minutes, but I always like people.
36:50
We're going to put all your information up.
36:52
But I mean, how do people find you?
36:54
Make sure you tell us how to spell soul.
36:56
I should have done that on the outset.
36:58
Yeah, it's SO HL and we replace instead EU for the H for the
37:03
human connection to heal the soul.
37:07
Because we, when Andrew and I started the company, Andrew was
37:12
an avoidant person, super avoidant attachment person and.
37:20
I wanted to say something else. I was little anxious butterfly
37:24
being like, right, And so when we really connected, it really
37:29
heal a lot of our attachment wounds.
37:31
And so I would say six months into dating during the pandemic,
37:36
because there was nothing else to do, right?
37:38
We're like, we're going to start a mental health consultancy.
37:40
So we did Seoul and we replaced EU for the H for the human
37:44
connection to heal us all. So that was the reason SOHLI
37:48
would let Andrew save the rest here.
37:52
Well, I'll just say ultimately the, the value of what we do and
37:55
you guys, I'm sure know this new waters as well.
38:00
And, and this is got to be divided.
38:02
I mean, it's, it's everything that we do is, is we're
38:05
ultimately leveraging our, our human relationships.
38:09
We're we're leveraging our connection, our ability to, to
38:11
form a connection. You know, there's a lot of
38:14
people, they get, you know, board certifications and
38:16
trainings and can do different things.
38:18
But if you can't establish a connection with the client or
38:21
the patient, you can't get work done right because it, it, it
38:25
involves at some level their participation.
38:28
Even even once you get beyond getting somebody an involuntary
38:32
site commitment, which you hope you never have to do, people
38:35
have to participate in their life and they have to
38:37
participate in their, their change process.
38:39
And in order to do that, we're, we're wanting to build a
38:43
connection with them and leverage that connection to pull
38:47
them along the process. And so really when we reflected
38:52
back and we looked and we said at the beginning, if we're going
38:55
to enter this space, what do we want to say?
38:58
And what do we, what do we believe?
39:01
What's our philosophy and what do we want to do that's
39:03
different than anything else? Like what is and, and when I
39:06
really think about that, I want to say what is my core pain in
39:09
life? And my core pain in life has
39:12
ultimately been, has been, has been attachment.
39:15
You know, and they talk about that in the 12:00 and 12:00.
39:17
They say defective relations with other human beings has
39:20
almost always been the immediate cause of our woes, including our
39:23
alcoholism. And, and I would say that, you
39:26
know, really healing attachment and healing relationships is
39:31
what is at the root of, of unlocking all of our power to
39:36
thrive and all of our creativity and ability to grow.
39:38
And so we said if we can really pair people right with coaching,
39:43
with companion, with the transport, with case manager,
39:46
with pairing a client, with the right clinician, pairing with
39:49
the right psychiatrist. If we can pair a family with the
39:52
right pair of coach, if we can pair somebody with the right
39:55
program, if we can get them to you guys, if we can get them
39:58
started on the right process, get the right assessment, then
40:01
get to the right next step if we can.
40:04
Build the right connection, then it does.
40:08
It doesn't matter what the modality is, it doesn't matter
40:11
what the process is. The work will get done, the
40:15
right work will get done. So that was really the idea of
40:18
the human connection, to heal the soul.
40:20
I love it. There's a guy who's a good
40:22
friend of mine in our field, guy named Patrick Balsley, who's
40:26
always talking about how his, he know he's got an all male
40:29
program. My guys have got to feel safe
40:32
before they can ever start to heal.
40:34
That's exactly what you're talking about.
40:36
Just whether it's with the individual companion with it,
40:39
you know, even in the, you know, the intervention piece, whether
40:42
later down the road as a sponsor, people need to feel, I
40:44
need to feel safe. I need to feel safe.
40:46
I only speak for me, but I know that that's true.
40:50
Yeah, we. Well, this has been absolutely
40:52
awesome. How do we find you?
40:58
Couple different different things I want to plug which I'm
41:00
I'm glad you say that. So definitely you can find us on
41:05
our our website, which is www.thesohl.com,
41:11
www.thesoul.com. We have a LinkedIn Soul
41:16
Enterprises incorporated. We have them in Instagram at the
41:21
Soul THESOHL. What I would say though, is I
41:26
would love, I would love to invite people to our monthly
41:31
trainings and I'd love to invite people to our monthly
41:33
supervision. We're really trying to spread
41:37
community for people who want to be companions and want to be
41:40
coaches. That's really our that's really
41:43
our what we want to give back to the community is a sense of
41:47
integrity and ethics to companions.
41:50
So we have the 1st Friday of every month at noon Pacific.
41:53
We have created something called Companion Circle, which is a
41:56
supervision group, so you can reach out to us, to the website
42:01
and request that link and you can meet us there.
42:04
That's a free congest companions from all across the end industry
42:08
who are supervising companions. It's like a 12 step meeting for
42:11
companions. You don't have to be 12 step
42:12
though. And then the other is we are
42:14
always doing a no charge training.
42:18
We believe in just having training available for people,
42:21
for companions. It's typically the last week of
42:24
every month. And so we just didn't encourage
42:26
people to enter our trainings. And we typically announce that
42:29
through all of our social media channels.
42:31
But yeah, you can find us on our our website or our social media
42:35
and you can reach out to us directly as well, I guess.
42:39
Andrew@thesoul.com Doctor. Doctor, a@thesoul.com I'm always
42:48
open to talking to any family, anybody that needs help, whether
42:51
we can help them or we can refer them to the right source.
42:55
We are totally open for that. Yeah.
42:58
Thank you so much for having us. Oh man, thank you.
43:01
All this has gone by fast, which always tells me that it was a
43:04
great episode. So thank you so much for being
43:06
here and thank you for all that you do and we will see you soon.
43:10
Love your work and all that you guys do and wish you many
43:12
blessings, yeah? Thank you, thank you.
43:14
The feeling is mutual. Thank you, thank you.
43:16
If you liked what you heard today or just want to know more,
43:19
give us a call on 9196708119 or visit us at
43:24
newwatersrecovery.com. Thank you.