Name: Justin Wren's Sobriety Journey
Uploaded: 2021-01-28T18:37:47.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Justin Wren's Sobriety Journey' from PowerfulJRE on Comedy Buff. Published 2021-01-28. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Justin Wren's Sobriety Journey' from PowerfulJRE on Comedy Buff. Published 2021-01-28. Transcript available.

the Joe Rogan experience I decided not to go to I could have gone to some of
these places in Scottsdale or LA or Malibu and I could have gotten massages
and had the green smoothies and stuff like that which which can help a lot of
people but me after having like a 15 year off and on battle 10 years where I
was pretty solid and I you know I'd come out of it I'd get right back on the
horse I'd be good for you know years I decided I needed fight camp I needed a
training camp I needed the right coaching the right strategy and I needed
people to ride me you know like you know be hard on me this is to get sober
yeah
this is get sober so that's that's what I wanted and so I sought out one of the
toughest places in America to go to it's kind of a like a 12 step completion
program it's a big book boot camp but it's also like a it's developed a little
bit out of like militaristic style and I was really hard on you you know I mean
while we were there people were being called you know mask wearing clowns you
fake as fuck motherfucker and you dr. Jekyll mr. Hyde I mean just like they
would just grill people and you're up at five good I I I don't I don't know
exactly but it was what I needed at that moment really is what I need at that
moment because I needed to not run from it I needed to face it and I needed to
look at the the stuff and that are the people running or people that have
gotten
clean this way yes and they have it they have 87 percent success rate for the
people that do 90 days now a lot of them only do 45 some of them only do 60
days
and then I would say probably more than half of the people that went there
ended
up leaving because of how hard it was so the only reason they wanted people
there
is if you really truly wanted to get sober because for years you've been stuck
in the
cycle of addiction and for me the easiest way I mean they explained it and I'd
drawn it on whiteboards a lot but for me whenever you would have that first use
you'd have this what they call an allergy set off you you have an abnormal
reaction
to a to a substance just like someone else can't have peanuts I can't have
drugs or
alcohol because when I do an allergy goes off that says in my body I have an
abnormal reaction that says you know I know rationally that one is too many but
whenever have that first use a thousands not enough I got to keep having it and
this is explained to you by these people at this rehab or this is just your own
feeling no no this was explained and there's this doctor that's really great
his name's dr. Kevin and he's got like a Irish last name but he's he's got some
stuff on I think Netflix and Amazon and he was a Navy surgeon and basically
like he
ended up writing himself scripts for oxy and then he was injecting himself with
other stuff and he got put in a prison a military prison that one that got
taken
down in like Kansas I forget what it's called but anyway Levensworth or
something
like that he was put in that prison anyways now he spent his time there really
trying to help people in addiction and that cycle of addiction basically is
explained as after you have that first use and the allergy set off now you go
on
your spree because what that doctor did why I brought him up was he shows
scientifically through brain research that addicts brains different like they
don't have enough dopamine receptors and whenever that hits now all of a sudden
it goes back to that almost hunter-gatherer brain where it says this is a
priority for survival like that's why some addicts will prioritize it above
food
or water or family and you see them do irrational things and then they go on
this run and then when they after after that spree after that run they come out
of it and they emerge remorseful they feel terrible I've had moments like that
and then all of a sudden you you make a firm resolution that's what you back it
up
with is that what you felt when you did it the first 30 days you did for 30
days I
came out I emerged remorseful and then I promised myself I promised my wife at
the time I
promised my family friends that that this isn't who I want to be and and what
they
say about an addict is you could hook them up to a lie detector and they
absolutely 100% mean it that they never intend to use again but then what
happens
is they back with that firm resolution I promise this was the last time all of
a
so you get restless irritable and discontented well whenever an addict gets
restless irritable
discontented I I would ask the question what's the what's the difference
between discontent and
discontented you're just can't discontent you might be a little restless but
discontented
basically says well if discontent is I'm thirsty discontented is there's not
enough water in the whole
world to quench this thirst and so you get in that place we have this mental
obsession so you have this
mental obsession you get restless irritable and discontented and then you go
back to that first
use and then you get stuck in that cycle of addiction again and that's where I
lived for
five years from 17 to 23 was I was just looping back and forth so you get sober
for a little bit
then go back again and from 17 to 23 no I wouldn't get sober hardly at all I
would get sober for my
fights the eight weeks of fight camp 10 weeks of fight camp but then that's why
um that's why grudge
training center had to kick me out you know I mean Brendan was on that vote I
think Rashad Nate
Marquardt um Shane Shane Carwin uh Dwayne Bang Ludwig all those guys that
invited me on the team after
I got off the ultimate fighter it was just a short while later that they were
having to ask me to leave
the team it was like a vote Elliot Marshall uh Trevor Whitman I think Justin Gaethje
was just
starting to come up I don't know if he was actually training full-time then uh
but he was still at
north uh northern Colorado state or northern Colorado uh wrestling there but
they said you know Justin
like um you we love you but you got to go you got to go get help and I should
have went and got
helped but that's when I found my purpose with the Pygmies I I've heard this
quote that said
no act of kindness no matter how small ever goes wasted and so I started at the
local children's
hospital became a local volunteer went through night school for it later you
remember hd net and uh
inside MMA with boss rootin yeah um those guys came out to the Denver children's
hospital this was
like nine months of me being sober all of a sudden now I have Rashad visiting
um the kids at the and
Shane Carwin Dwayne Bang Brennan Shaw visiting the kids that I would push
around in the wheelchairs
and stuff it gave me purpose so that purpose helped me stay sober sorry so 2020
this was the first time
you had had anything since 2000 and like when uh it wasn't I I'd had three
pretty big relapses so
so 10 whole years of sobriety oh pretty much but I had relapsed three times in
that time oh in the 10
years in the 10 years I'd relapse for 30 days I'd relapse for nine days and I'd
relapse for five days
oh because these are different relapses yeah this is not the ones you're
talking about the recent
ones with your shoulder uh no that led in that five day then led into a big a
big one I'll go ahead and
I was confused because when you said 30 days no I thought you meant this year
no no not this year
um basically March to May 15th when I was out I was out there using and um I
felt so much shame
and so much guilt um because you know I've I've been on your show I've been
doing good things I've been
um really trying to live the right life and uh my marriage failed which is okay
that happens
and I just took on a lot of like shame I couldn't I couldn't you know have that
relationship be a
success then whenever I went back to weed all of a sudden that weed I I just
kept going more and more
and more and more and then all of a sudden I found oxy then all of a sudden I
found coke so you started
with weed yeah but then I went right to the oxy and I would I would what I
would do as in my addict
mind I would think it would sound rational I'll just have weed so I don't go
back to oxy
and and and that will help me with pain if I'm injured because I'd I'd actually
hurt my neck
training with Raphael a little bit and um he was sweeping me and I I put my
head out whenever I put
my head out I crunched right on top of my my neck or my head and it just sent
this like crunch down
into my cervical neck and it was hurting I was hurting um more emotionally and
I was stuffing it I
wasn't looking at it I was stuffing it stuffing it stuffing it and then what
happened was I felt so much
shame I told I told my board I needed rehab and I said I need I need help like
I've relapsed
and I need help and they've always supported me but I was scared that would
they support me in this
you know if I'm the leader of the organization or the founder and the
spokesperson you know we got an
incredible internal team but like we've had donors from thousands uh thousands
of donors from all 50
states and 59 countries you know did I just let everybody down you know and is
this going to be
taken from me is this life of purpose that I found you know am I going to lose
it all um and I felt so
much shame they were going to send me to a place in Oklahoma not not to knock
it at all but I had
known people from the recovery world because I had been going and sharing my
story of recovery
um in rehabs in in uh in uh different sober living homes and now all of a
sudden I'm back to where they are
what is this rehab place you said this hard-ass rehab place that has a an
amazing percentage of
people get success it's out of Dallas Fort Worth and it's called Stonegate and
I don't think they
advertise it as that hard but it is that hard and I wanted a place once I
talked to them I realized
like so they get there and shit they do they absolutely do they did yell at me
really I had
a 21 year old kid yelling at me that was over what uh over a green towel uh I
was just like bro I
didn't I kind of wanted to at first uh what they think is they got to humble
you and I'm like man
life has humbled me that's why I'm here right and I've been humbled enough and
now I came here to get
help and but their whole thing is if if if there's no bullshit if they get to
you to actually look at
your if they call you on your your shit then you can start working through it
yelling at you over a
green towel because you we're only allowed to have white towels that they gave
you so when you get
there they give you walmart shoes they give you paper underwear and they give
you this hideous what
paper paper underwear why they have paper underwear uh because they they take
your clothes and they put
them in a hot box and then they try to kill if there's any because there's guys
coming from all over
the place right and um I mean we we had people that were ivy league professors
professional athletes
I'm not sure we had people also that from like homeless shelters and what do
you mean hot box
was a hot box kills any of the the like bed bugs oh so if someone were to bring
bed bugs in um and
get in the mattresses and things like that like if someone came from a homeless
shelter or from the
streets how could they afford it uh I don't know honestly I think there was
like a scholarship program
because some of the people were paying $895 a day there but that they think
that's what they charge
insurance um it was expensive man so I just went through the divorce and I I
basically gave
the finances we had so she could go back to school and I was going to restart
and then um then also I need rehab and that's expensive um insurance helped but
then I had to
do you find yourself this is a weird question but I think it's I think it's
valid do you you find
yourself always in like a new problem do you do you create problems do you
think
I think I try to help find a solution to problems but I think for me um you
asked me a question after
we got the treatment our shoulders our knees and you asked what are you manifesting
to have this
like sickness you know these all these sicknesses inside of you I think now
that's not exactly how
you said it that's not exactly how I said it I said do you wonder if you're
doing that you're right
because sometimes people do you wonder if you're bringing this into your life
yeah sometimes people
do create problems it's like fine they find themselves in this eternal state of
conflict
like some people they figure their way through life with very little conflict
they're magical
people yeah I know a few of them it's rare yeah some people are constantly
engaged in some
insurmountable problem and then they also go and like in your case you find insurmountable
problems
like what you're doing with the Congo and the pygmies in Uganda and and helping
these people like it gives
you purpose and it helps define your life in a positive way yeah then when you're
not there problems come
up again like all kinds of major problems there's always something right we've
had some health problems for
sure and then these relapses that had happened were really tough the the
biggest one was this one
um in March and let me let me tell you what happened because um I didn't want
to go to this rehab in
Oklahoma that that I had known people that were there that talked it had a
reputation for people using while
they're even there because they could have their phones at 5 pm they could have
visitors they could go to
Walmart two or three days a week and then you can call your your connection and
they could leave it to you at
Walmart they could throw it over the gate and it's on 110 acres and they can
send you a picture of where
it's at right you can just go dig it up or find it and use and I wanted a place
where there I wasn't
going there for that I knew I was going to get sober but I didn't want to be
around other people so
they take your phone we're doing that yeah you don't have your phone paper
underwear paper underwear you
get comfortable or paper underwear it's terrible but you get it back uh the
next day or that night
how long it gets out of the hot box so it's one day so that's how I get my
towels back I brought nice towels
and I got they gave me my towels back well this guy's doing room checks room
checks are every day
uh at least once a day um and uh anyways he found my green towels it's my first
like 24 hours being there
at our you didn't know that I didn't know you couldn't have green towels they
given them back to me
so also I was using that and he gave me an infraction for uh and if you get
three infractions
you lose your phone call that week you don't get you don't even get one phone
call until you've been
in there three full weeks because normally when guys go to rehab and then they
start calling their
families they start feeling like I got to get out of here I got to get home you
start telling yourself
this like it my family's more important to take care of than me right now when
then really you're in
crisis mode and you got to take care of yourself before you can take care of
anyone else
and so um I got two infractions for the two green towels I had and uh I was
about to lose my phone
call at the three week mark and uh if because you're getting three if you get
three infractions in
those first three weeks you lose your phone call I got two for things I didn't
even know I couldn't
have what was the other one um no that was the green towel he took one green
towel he started walking
off with he looked back and he saw in my my cubby that there was another green
towel there so you
get two infractions for the same thing right and so um what a dick so but but I
would say that the
counselors that were there and the recovery added advocates they're really hard
on you because some
of the guys that have left there if they let them leave they're overconfident
that they've got their
problem nicked um then they can go right back out and relapse so how do they
keep you from doing it
again for me well they can't you have to keep yourself from doing it no one can
keep me sober
no no no therapist no sponsor it's got to be me but what what do they do to
give you the tools to let
you do it yourself I think you really start to unwind the the tangled web of
why um you use
and for me it's always been like self-worth it's been uh like that bullying
moment when I was a kid
my my record can go right back to the three things the kids told me and so I
dressed up for a costume
party I went um to my middle school crush's birthday party I crushed there
because I was
dressed up like a dr pepper transformer 24 pack on my head 12 packs on my arms
I went all out everyone
was excited because she loved transformers optimist prime I went as dr optimist
pepper anyways I get
there go to the backyard when the door opens I get hit with a couple flashes of
light and it's them
taking pictures I hear the sound of laughter I see that no one else is dressed
up and my middle school
crush said I can't believe you thought you're good enough to come to my party
right next to her a boy
said you're worthless and then my notorious bully from like third eighth grade
said you should just kill
yourself and so that leads to basically whenever I would relapse I would say to
myself you're not good
enough you're worthless maybe you should just kill yourself you know I was
suicidal at 13 I didn't kill
myself because my mom I thought what would this do to her do you still go back
to that one day like
that one day when you were a child hurt you so badly that's that's still in
your mind almost as like a
benchmark for who you are I did and that's why I think I've really come to a
place of like self-love
seeing myself that like when I'm needed well the last six months but this is
after your UFC career
after your Bellator career yeah all the amazing things you've done with fight
for the forgotten
all the time I would know it Congo I would know it but when I would relapse I
would feel like such a piece
of garbage I would feel like I was a disappointment to myself but also to
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Justin Wren's Sobriety Journey

the Joe Rogan experience I decided not to go to I could have gone to some of
these places in Scottsdale or LA or Malibu and I could have gotten massages
and had the green smoothies and stuff like that which which can help a lot of
people but me after having like a 15 year off and on battle 10 years where I
was pretty solid and I you know I'd come out of it I'd get right back on the
horse I'd be good for you know years I decided I needed fight camp I needed a
training camp I needed the right coaching the right strategy and I needed
people to ride me you know like you know be hard on me this is to get sober
yeah
this is get sober so that's that's what I wanted and so I sought out one of the
toughest places in America to go to it's kind of a like a 12 step completion
program it's a big book boot camp but it's also like a it's developed a little
bit out of like militaristic style and I was really hard on you you know I mean
while we were there people were being called you know mask wearing clowns you
fake as fuck motherfucker and you dr. Jekyll mr. Hyde I mean just like they
would just grill people and you're up at five good I I I don't I don't know
exactly but it was what I needed at that moment really is what I need at that
moment because I needed to not run from it I needed to face it and I needed to
look at the the stuff and that are the people running or people that have
gotten
clean this way yes and they have it they have 87 percent success rate for the
people that do 90 days now a lot of them only do 45 some of them only do 60
days
and then I would say probably more than half of the people that went there
ended
up leaving because of how hard it was so the only reason they wanted people
there
is if you really truly wanted to get sober because for years you've been stuck
in the
cycle of addiction and for me the easiest way I mean they explained it and I'd
drawn it on whiteboards a lot but for me whenever you would have that first use
you'd have this what they call an allergy set off you you have an abnormal
reaction
to a to a substance just like someone else can't have peanuts I can't have
drugs or
alcohol because when I do an allergy goes off that says in my body I have an
abnormal reaction that says you know I know rationally that one is too many but
whenever have that first use a thousands not enough I got to keep having it and
this is explained to you by these people at this rehab or this is just your own
feeling no no this was explained and there's this doctor that's really great
his name's dr. Kevin and he's got like a Irish last name but he's he's got some
stuff on I think Netflix and Amazon and he was a Navy surgeon and basically
like he
ended up writing himself scripts for oxy and then he was injecting himself with
other stuff and he got put in a prison a military prison that one that got
taken
down in like Kansas I forget what it's called but anyway Levensworth or
something
like that he was put in that prison anyways now he spent his time there really
trying to help people in addiction and that cycle of addiction basically is
explained as after you have that first use and the allergy set off now you go
on
your spree because what that doctor did why I brought him up was he shows
scientifically through brain research that addicts brains different like they
don't have enough dopamine receptors and whenever that hits now all of a sudden
it goes back to that almost hunter-gatherer brain where it says this is a
priority for survival like that's why some addicts will prioritize it above
food
or water or family and you see them do irrational things and then they go on
this run and then when they after after that spree after that run they come out
of it and they emerge remorseful they feel terrible I've had moments like that
and then all of a sudden you you make a firm resolution that's what you back it
up
with is that what you felt when you did it the first 30 days you did for 30
days I
came out I emerged remorseful and then I promised myself I promised my wife at
the time I
promised my family friends that that this isn't who I want to be and and what
they
say about an addict is you could hook them up to a lie detector and they
absolutely 100% mean it that they never intend to use again but then what
happens
is they back with that firm resolution I promise this was the last time all of
a
so you get restless irritable and discontented well whenever an addict gets
restless irritable
discontented I I would ask the question what's the what's the difference
between discontent and
discontented you're just can't discontent you might be a little restless but
discontented
basically says well if discontent is I'm thirsty discontented is there's not
enough water in the whole
world to quench this thirst and so you get in that place we have this mental
obsession so you have this
mental obsession you get restless irritable and discontented and then you go
back to that first
use and then you get stuck in that cycle of addiction again and that's where I
lived for
five years from 17 to 23 was I was just looping back and forth so you get sober
for a little bit
then go back again and from 17 to 23 no I wouldn't get sober hardly at all I
would get sober for my
fights the eight weeks of fight camp 10 weeks of fight camp but then that's why
um that's why grudge
training center had to kick me out you know I mean Brendan was on that vote I
think Rashad Nate
Marquardt um Shane Shane Carwin uh Dwayne Bang Ludwig all those guys that
invited me on the team after
I got off the ultimate fighter it was just a short while later that they were
having to ask me to leave
the team it was like a vote Elliot Marshall uh Trevor Whitman I think Justin Gaethje
was just
starting to come up I don't know if he was actually training full-time then uh
but he was still at
north uh northern Colorado state or northern Colorado uh wrestling there but
they said you know Justin
like um you we love you but you got to go you got to go get help and I should
have went and got
helped but that's when I found my purpose with the Pygmies I I've heard this
quote that said
no act of kindness no matter how small ever goes wasted and so I started at the
local children's
hospital became a local volunteer went through night school for it later you
remember hd net and uh
inside MMA with boss rootin yeah um those guys came out to the Denver children's
hospital this was
like nine months of me being sober all of a sudden now I have Rashad visiting
um the kids at the and
Shane Carwin Dwayne Bang Brennan Shaw visiting the kids that I would push
around in the wheelchairs
and stuff it gave me purpose so that purpose helped me stay sober sorry so 2020
this was the first time
you had had anything since 2000 and like when uh it wasn't I I'd had three
pretty big relapses so
so 10 whole years of sobriety oh pretty much but I had relapsed three times in
that time oh in the 10
years in the 10 years I'd relapse for 30 days I'd relapse for nine days and I'd
relapse for five days
oh because these are different relapses yeah this is not the ones you're
talking about the recent
ones with your shoulder uh no that led in that five day then led into a big a
big one I'll go ahead and
I was confused because when you said 30 days no I thought you meant this year
no no not this year
um basically March to May 15th when I was out I was out there using and um I
felt so much shame
and so much guilt um because you know I've I've been on your show I've been
doing good things I've been
um really trying to live the right life and uh my marriage failed which is okay
that happens
and I just took on a lot of like shame I couldn't I couldn't you know have that
relationship be a
success then whenever I went back to weed all of a sudden that weed I I just
kept going more and more
and more and more and then all of a sudden I found oxy then all of a sudden I
found coke so you started
with weed yeah but then I went right to the oxy and I would I would what I
would do as in my addict
mind I would think it would sound rational I'll just have weed so I don't go
back to oxy
and and and that will help me with pain if I'm injured because I'd I'd actually
hurt my neck
training with Raphael a little bit and um he was sweeping me and I I put my
head out whenever I put
my head out I crunched right on top of my my neck or my head and it just sent
this like crunch down
into my cervical neck and it was hurting I was hurting um more emotionally and
I was stuffing it I
wasn't looking at it I was stuffing it stuffing it stuffing it and then what
happened was I felt so much
shame I told I told my board I needed rehab and I said I need I need help like
I've relapsed
and I need help and they've always supported me but I was scared that would
they support me in this
you know if I'm the leader of the organization or the founder and the
spokesperson you know we got an
incredible internal team but like we've had donors from thousands uh thousands
of donors from all 50
states and 59 countries you know did I just let everybody down you know and is
this going to be
taken from me is this life of purpose that I found you know am I going to lose
it all um and I felt so
much shame they were going to send me to a place in Oklahoma not not to knock
it at all but I had
known people from the recovery world because I had been going and sharing my
story of recovery
um in rehabs in in uh in uh different sober living homes and now all of a
sudden I'm back to where they are
what is this rehab place you said this hard-ass rehab place that has a an
amazing percentage of
people get success it's out of Dallas Fort Worth and it's called Stonegate and
I don't think they
advertise it as that hard but it is that hard and I wanted a place once I
talked to them I realized
like so they get there and shit they do they absolutely do they did yell at me
really I had
a 21 year old kid yelling at me that was over what uh over a green towel uh I
was just like bro I
didn't I kind of wanted to at first uh what they think is they got to humble
you and I'm like man
life has humbled me that's why I'm here right and I've been humbled enough and
now I came here to get
help and but their whole thing is if if if there's no bullshit if they get to
you to actually look at
your if they call you on your your shit then you can start working through it
yelling at you over a
green towel because you we're only allowed to have white towels that they gave
you so when you get
there they give you walmart shoes they give you paper underwear and they give
you this hideous what
paper paper underwear why they have paper underwear uh because they they take
your clothes and they put
them in a hot box and then they try to kill if there's any because there's guys
coming from all over
the place right and um I mean we we had people that were ivy league professors
professional athletes
I'm not sure we had people also that from like homeless shelters and what do
you mean hot box
was a hot box kills any of the the like bed bugs oh so if someone were to bring
bed bugs in um and
get in the mattresses and things like that like if someone came from a homeless
shelter or from the
streets how could they afford it uh I don't know honestly I think there was
like a scholarship program
because some of the people were paying $895 a day there but that they think
that's what they charge
insurance um it was expensive man so I just went through the divorce and I I
basically gave
the finances we had so she could go back to school and I was going to restart
and then um then also I need rehab and that's expensive um insurance helped but
then I had to
do you find yourself this is a weird question but I think it's I think it's
valid do you you find
yourself always in like a new problem do you do you create problems do you
think
I think I try to help find a solution to problems but I think for me um you
asked me a question after
we got the treatment our shoulders our knees and you as