Shattering The Youth Treatment Mold And Getting Real About Drugs, Alcohol and Mental Health, with Wes Robins & Zac Sweat of Eternal Strength

SPEAKERS: Wes Robins, Zac Sweat, Brenda Zane
[00:00:00] Wes: And just because you’re a youth, doesn’t make it any less important than anybody else. That voice is important and we want to empower those youth not to grow up, not to become part of society and blah, blah, blah, but more so to tune into their truest light. To find their empowerment and to begin to grow and expand in ways of beauty and expression. 


[00:00:32] Brenda: Welcome to HopeStream, the podcast for parents of kids who are misusing drugs or alcohol, or who are in active addiction, treatment, or early recovery. I’m your host, Brenda Zane, fellow parent to a child who struggled. So I’m right there with you. If you’re enjoying the podcast and want to hang out with me and a bunch of other great moms after the episodes, you can check out the stream. 


It’s a positive online space where you can get support and take a breather from the stresses of dealing with your son or daughter. Just go to the stream community. com to learn more. Now let’s get into today’s episode. Hello, friends. I am back. I am rested. Thank you so much for staying tuned. And let me tell you, you are going to be so glad that you tuned in to this particular episode because it is so much it’s real, it’s deep, it’s hopeful. 


And I’m really, really grateful to my guests for making the time to share so much with us. I had the chance to sit down and talk with two incredible guys, Wes Robbins and Zach Sweat from Eternal Strength Therapeutic Youth Center, just outside of Atlanta, Georgia. They’re the founders of a very unique, mold breaking team of therapists, mentors, and healers. 


And they work in a space that’s filled with talent. These different experiential arenas, including a musical jam area, a full recording studio, podcast room, art studio, ceramic studio, a rock wall, Wim Hof station, if you don’t know what Wim Hof is. Google him, crazy. And also a recreation area and a full gym. 


And in this space, they work on an outpatient basis with young people who are struggling and they help them navigate and heal from challenges like anxiety, depression, substance use, addiction, clinical diagnoses, loss and grief, family system struggles, gender and sexuality challenges, self harm and suicidality. 


So pretty much everything we covered a ton of ground when we spoke, and I feel like we have just scratched the surface. So you may eventually find a follow up with these guys, but for now, please listen into my conversation with Wes and Zach. from eternal strength. 


Hello, Wes and Zach. I’m so excited to have you on Hope Stream and talk today about a lot of things. We’re going to cover lots of stuff and I’m sure we might cover stuff that we don’t even know that we’re going to cover, which is always fun. So welcome to the podcast and thanks for making time.  


[00:03:28] Wes: Yes. Hello. 


Thanks for the invite. Every time I hear, hello now, Zach and I have been joking about that movie, Mrs. Doubtfire. When Robin Williams comes up and he’s got the whipped cream all covered on his face, he’s hello. 


[00:03:46] Brenda: before we dive into stuff, why don’t you just give us the quick 101 of sort of each of your background. I will point people to Joanna. Lily has a podcast called success is subjective where you, I just love it. You guys go into this amazing story about your backgrounds and how you met and then how you met again, and which is super cool. 


So if you want the deep dive on these two, listen to their episode on success is subjective because it’s awesome. But why don’t you just give us the quick. 101 who you are how you got to be doing what you’re doing today so that we have some of that context  


[00:04:23] Wes: you go awesome Awesome. Yeah, and i’m glad you said that because I would i’d be like I was born 


So I am wes robbins i’m a licensed professional counselor I am Inches away from completing my PhD at the University of West Georgia in Consciousness and Society. Wow! Yeah, and it’s been a beautiful, beautiful program that focuses on humanistic, transpersonal, and critical psychologies. Very, eclectic study, and it’s been transformative in many ways. 


And I’ve devoted my life to Exploration and examination of human behavior and love what I do and focus on psychology and so worked for several organizations, whether they be nonprofit advocacy centers, psychiatric hospitals. Mental health therapeutic treatment centers and did a lot of work with youth returning from wilderness programs, therapeutic boarding schools and residential treatment centers. 


It’s where I cut my teeth doing experiential therapy. Did that for seven years, started a private practice in 2014, and it grew and grew and worked with hundreds of families and then linked up with Zach and created eternal strength, which now we have a beautiful team of 17 and serving over 70 families. 


And then I’ll let this guy talk about his, I don’t always let you go first, cause it’s really,  


[00:05:58] Zac: help  
 
out Wes from time to time. No,  


I have  


a pretty diverse background, but it wasn’t until Four years ago that I really got into coaching. I was a wellness coach, certified in cognitive behavioral therapy, therapeutic mentoring, life coaching. 


And I was coaching more on the nutrition side and really got into a subconscious programming coaching, but it was coaching adults. So I never really worked with youth. So I was doing that for the last few years. And I was living in Hawaii and that’s when me and Wes linked up and I came back and helped him create eternal strength. 


But a quote by Jordan Peterson is what inspired me to do what I do now. And what is the most noble thing that someone can do is heal themselves and then share that with others so they can do the same. And that resonated to the deepest part of my soul. And ever since that, I’ve just been, feeding my life with that and trying to, reach my highest potential and share that with others. 


And this guy, this guy’s so hot. you put yourself in comparison to me and we were on very different journeys. But when I look at his journey and what he was doing, what he was doing in Hawaii, Although he wasn’t directly working with youth, the amount of self growth work that he was doing holistically on himself, he minimizes because there was quite a bit of, I learned a drastic amount from him when he came back and we, when we linked up, especially in terms of mind body connection, nutrition, nutrition. 


Physiological well being, caring for your body, moving your body, and then psycho cybernetics, subconscious programming, affirmations, manifestation, and so all these things. I was keeping it surface level, man. But my psychoanalytic mind wanted to cut all of it off at the knees and discount it and, In our reunion with one another, I think we both benefited greatly and brought, rounded out our thinking in a more holistic frame, but I’ve benefited greatly from these liminal spaces of when you wake up in the morning, when you go to bed at night, what your, the messages that you’re telling yourself, your internal belief system, your cognitive narrative about yourself, You were massively influential on that. 


Meanwhile, I’m super heady and critical and deconstructing everything, but my internal narrative is just full of fear and anxiety 24 seven. So it’s good  


because we have a, we have, we do have a nice  


energy balance. Like we typically, our approach is like he’s philosophy, I’m strategy. And it’s a nice mix, especially in the leadership roles that we played eternal strain. 


In our other endeavors, but it’s a nice mix because we definitely balance and ground each other and got you most days  


[00:09:00] Brenda: That sounds like a really powerful combination. I think that’s really interesting because I do feel like a lot of that stuff Stuff gets left behind. The mind got connection and all of that, especially in the young adult, the teen and young adult treatment space. 


And so I’m just wondering what, when, when you guys look out at the landscape of what’s available right now, and maybe even like over the last five years, and I know things have evolved. What do you think about the options that are available for teens? Because the parents who listen to this podcast are primarily parents of kids who are, I would say 14 ish to, mid twenties, some older, but it’s really in that zone of high school and then, early young adulthood. 


what do you think about? what’s available for people in that zone who are struggling with substance use in particular. There’s always, as co occurring, there’s mental health stuff, there’s all kinds of other stuff going on. But if you’re dealing with substance use, what do you think about what’s Out there. 


[00:10:14] Zac: Yeah. Woo. His leg was moving. He’s  


[00:10:19] Brenda: let me get in here. You  


[00:10:21] Wes: know what? I obviously, I know you lead, but cause he’s been in the industry for so long. It’s I’ve learned so much from him. Just, I’ve only been in the industry for the past year and a half on this side of it. Yeah. Wes can speak to it very well. 


Yeah. And Brenda, it’s, it’s hard because, so I’ll start by saying I have a massive amount of respect and reverence for the mental health industry, for clinicians, for programs. I think there are beautiful healers in many different modalities. I, the reason I created Eternal Strength and Zach and I built that was because of my disillusionment. 


With what was available and it was more so I guess the best way I was thinking about it as you were talking about because there’s all these I’m well versed in everything that is available. So you have your private practice clinicians, your LPCs, your LCSWs, your LMFTs. Your psychologist, your psychiatrist, and like I said, beautiful, professional, seasoned, studied, holistic. 


Then you have your partial hospitalization programs, your intensive outpatient programs, the wilderness therapies, the therapeutic boarding schools, the residential treatment centers. There’s a lot of options, but I find for families, it is exhaustive and overwhelming, and that’s where you also see the educational consultants that have devoted their profession to helping find correct placement. 


and different programs. My frustration with it was time and time again, I would work with young people that had been in these programs and were not resonating with it as well as they could. So there was beautiful healing methodologies. There was Cognitive behavioral therapy, dialectical behavioral therapy, EMDR, brain spotting, trauma work, inner child work. 


None of it fucking matters if the kid’s not resonating with it and it’s not touching their heart and it’s not waking them up and they don’t feel like they can be empowered. And I think it was, I couldn’t find any treatment centers that were providing therapeutic work in a way that made the kids hungry for more and a willingness for them to want to engage. 


There was always this intense reluctancy. And so nothing was as compelling as their social group, as their peer group, as the adrenaline seeking that they were doing over there. They’d always choose that over the treatment. And beautiful healing stuff that I saw, but I had this vision where I was like, it’s gotta be something that the kids are jazzed about and get excited about. 


And they feel like it’s theirs and they get some ownership over their therapeutic healing journey. And so then I have a lot of really intense thoughts about monetary gain, corporate programs, hierarchy, and ethics. And I think ethics have gotten lost. Integrity has gotten lost and it is become a business development scene for the mental health industry. 


And again, I don’t want to speak ill of anyone. That’s, I’d rather, instead of critiquing it and deconstructing the shit out of it all day, just go create my own healing, loving, light place and do it the way that I think it needs to be done instead of sitting there on the stands and complaining about it. 


And so I feel like a compass, an internal ethical compass has gotten lost in what the work is meant to do and what it’s trying to do, which is help families heal. And it’s become big business and large corporations trying to monetize mental health work. And I’m not down with  


[00:14:10] Brenda: that. yes, I would agree with so much of that. 


There’s the financial devastation that occurs in families going through this. Having experienced it myself is it doesn’t just impact the family at that moment. There’s just. It radiates out the financial devastation when you have to sell your house, sell all your possessions, cash out your 401k, all of those things to send your kid out for treatment that they’re not resonating with. 


And like you and my son went through so many programs and he learned so much. And just because he, Ran away from them or went back to using doesn’t mean that they failed. I think that they continually added all those layers of knowledge for him that he used later. But yeah, I would say the same, that there’s a lot going on. 


And do you think that the, the industry hasn’t necessarily kept up with what the kids are going through? Because it, it just seems like from my vantage point, I have 15, 16, 21 and 24 year old boys and they’re going through so much and I just wonder, is it that the treatment world just didn’t keep up with the pace of what they’re dealing with or what are your thoughts about that? 


[00:15:33] Zac: I think I’ll probably answer and honestly answer and say, I don’t, I say no, what I see since I’ve been working with West last year and a half, that I just feel that a lot of the treatment centers, even the new ones that kind of pop up out there that are more corporately based, they’re carbon copies of the last one, they see a system that works on the business side. 


But they, they’re not paying attention to what the kids are asking for. They’re setting up this system and this business model that works financially, but I don’t think they’re really tuned in to what the kids want. Yeah. And to piggyback on that, I love this comedian, Bo Burnham, and he just put out a really cool special on Netflix and he would always, he had one skit where he was like, They were telling him what to do with this comedy and they were like, the kids aren’t going to like it. 


You got to market to the kids. You got to make sure that the kids think it’s snappy. I also that’s bullshit. like you shouldn’t be able to come in and steal and co opt. A subculture to then try and sell and market to them. And you watch that happen a lot with these beautiful organic subcultures, like the punk scene and kids fighting for freedom to break free from a system. 


And then next thing you know, targets got the new line of punk clothes that they’re selling to the kids. Big business will always try and co opt and sell. Youth back to itself. We keep using this term, the radical pilgrimage of growth. And so our goal isn’t to come in and get our finger on the pulse of youth culture so much that we don’t know it. 


And we somehow bamboozle them. It’s more we want to give you a voice because this journey is so special. You’re so free and organic and creative in your exploration and your childlike wonder. We want to give you an open container to express that and walk with you on that journey, instead of trying to, I’m not a kid. 


I’m almost 40. I got two little daughters. There are certain parts of my growth that have become formulaic and crystallized and I’m not as fluid. So I’m not trying to look all hip and cool and be covered in tattoos to pretend that I am a kid. I’m gonna tell you who I am as a man and my growth and what I’ve been through. 


But I’m damn sure going to provide an open space for you to have a voice in where you’re at in your journey. And just because you’re a youth doesn’t make it any less important. Then anybody else, that voice is important. And we want to empower those youth not to grow up, not to become part of society and blah, blah, blah, but more so to tune into their truest light, to find their empowerment and to begin to grow and expand in ways of beauty and. 


Expression. So it’s, do I think that the industry has lost sight of youth? Yes, but I also think that they market to, again, it’s to Zach’s point. It’s a marketing.  


Yeah. And then they  


[00:18:54] Wes: can, they can co opt the subculture. They, they can, but the, the youth, they see right through the bullshit, they see it. The programs talk about it as a census. 


And programs will text one another. We’re slow. We don’t have that many clients. Keep us in mind. If you have any referrals, it begins to dehumanize. Yeah. And that’s not okay. And it’s pervasive in the industry. And it’s sad to watch because I know the ins and outs of it. Zach knows it. We’ve both been through addiction and the hell of that, and you’ve watched, your journey and your own family, when you’re there, you’re so vulnerable and you’re looking for any help and guidance you can. 


And I just feel like many of those, mental health industry organizations have become, whether it’s conscious or not, they began to prey upon. The, vulnerable states of those families. And that’s why we always hold this flag and wave it strong of look, man, if eternal strength is cool and it vibes with you and we can help your family. 


Awesome. If not. We want to give you every fucking resource that is available anywhere to get you and your family linked with whatever’s going to work. That’s ethics. That’s do no harm. Do what’s in the greatest good of the client and the family. That is the code of honor that we walk with. It’s not about keeping We know we got people we can help but it’s like it’s about finding the right fit and helping these families have all the information They need to be able to get help. 


[00:20:37] Brenda: Yeah, that’s beautiful. What I hear you saying in that is that you’re You’re really learning like you’re learning from the the young people that you’re serving You’re not trying to push something on them or Say hey, we really get you like You’re you’re just giving them a space and I wonder if that’s something that kids are missing is that I love what you said about giving them a safe container and an open container because I think there’s a lot of parents that are There, I see two things either. 


They’re like, here, just go do whatever you want. And there is no container, which isn’t necessarily healthy. Or it’s such a constraint. Like you can be in this container, but you have to do these 12 things to stay there. But what it sounds like you’re saying is we’re, we’re not saying like we’re the coolest or we know you, but you can be here and. 


Show us. Is that kind of how it works out?  


[00:21:36] Zac: Yeah, absolutely. Full expression itself, lead kids lead the entire time that they’re in our space, for sure. And if you,  


I’m sure you visited a website and seen pictures, but I don’t think you get the full experience without being there, feeling the energy and then meeting our, our funky, funky team that we have. 


And they’re just, they’re just a beautiful group of healers and it’s really cool. But, and everybody’s this truest expression of themselves, so it’s Man, I’ll sit there all day with a 17 year old kid and be like, juice world sucks. And Patsy Klein is amazing. Or Dolly Parton. You know what I mean? Like we’re all being, it’s not an attempt to have a false front or a persona or an image to get the kids to think that we’re cool. 


Everybody on that team and eternal strength is a true expression of. What they align with, they’re all doing their own work. That’s what makes me the most proud is like every single person on our team meeting with these young people is following their truth. They’re an empowerment and their journey of growth and let being a model, a mentor and a model for what finding your own light and walking that path is. 


And a lot of people on our team have been through it. So several of them have been to wilderness therapy before, went on their own journey, have dealt with, substance abuse, addiction, self harm, suicidality. So they’ve been through the dark night of the soul. They’ve done a lot of their own work, they’ve unpacked it, and now they’re ready and willing to sit with these young people, never in an abrasive way or a forceful way, but to just say, I’ve been where you’ve been, and I can’t do your work for you, but I can damn sure sit here with you as a guide and a support as you walk through it. 


[00:23:31] Brenda: That’s super cool. I would love to be a fly on the wall there one day.  


[00:23:34] Wes: I was there and I was hanging out, I’ll just say real quick, and we had this fire pit out back. We got an 8, 500 square foot facility and we got like a music room and a full gym and an art room and expressive arts therapy, ceramics, half pipe, rock wall, skate gym, but I was sitting out by the fire pit. 


And Ty, one of our mentors and our creative director, Erica, one of our mentors, Smitty, one of our therapists, Morgan, our program director, we were all just hanging and talking. And one of the youth that comes there came out and he had just got done with a fitness session in the gym and he came out to sit down and it was his mentor session with one of the mentors. 


But it wasn’t like, okay, let’s walk away from the fire pit and now begin your mentor session. We all sat out there and cruised for another 10 to 15 minutes, joking about music, art, talking about movies. And he felt a part of our crew and could feel our energy. And so there’s such this free flow organic piece where it’s not and now this session is done and you go here. 


It’s we’re a family we’re a community and while you’re up here you’re doing healing work and we’re listening to you And we’re checking in with how you’re doing and you get to segue it and Maneuver it some but it was beautiful It was this moment that I just had where I was like I couldn’t imagine this kid in a traditional iop program because that would never happen. 


It would be like I’m gonna walk you to the other office to do this session Most of the time if they’re not in an office behind closed doors, you don’t know if the session’s going on or not There is structure, but it’s just so free flowing that it’s just a beautiful thing to watch  


[00:25:20] Zac: and experience and be a part of. 


Yeah.  


[00:25:22] Brenda: Yeah. that lack of structure. I think most parents would agree, and I only have boys, so I don’t know the girl situation, but just the best conversations happen when you’re not. Intentionally sitting face to face, like we’re now going to have a talk. So having that adrenaline moving and the motion and not sitting face to face is just so important. 


[00:25:46] Zac: Yes. Yeah.  


[00:25:48] Brenda: So what does a, I know there’s no typical, so I don’t mean to like. Put your kids that you work with or your young people in a box But if you had to describe the eternal youth, kiddo What would that person look like?  


[00:26:05] Wes: Okay, so i’m gonna i’m gonna ramble through it and give more information than less so Right now youngest client is eight or nine Oldest is late 20s. 


We don’t have a particular age. I’d say roughly it’s 12 to 25 is probably 20 Majority of our youth that we work with, but it’s anybody that’s on the radical pilgrimage of growth and development, the once humanistic and person centered soul work and in terms of population and like different challenges and struggles, which is a conceptualization framework that we see where it’s like. 


There could be a multitude of things, but all of these young people are on a growth journey, and we want to help them. But we have a lot of young people who may have clinical diagnoses, whether it be, a personality disorder, a mood disorder, prodromal schizophrenia, schizoaffective, different clinical challenges. 


And I could go into the DSM and diagnoses and do a whole thing on that, but I won’t.  


[00:27:10] Brenda: It’s another podcast.  


[00:27:13] Wes: Substance abuse, self harm, depression, anxiety, grief, peer relationships, behavioral issues, challenges academically. We look for the heart of the kid. And so all those things may be going on. But we want to know the heart and soul of that young person and help them find alignment with their higher self and push them to grow. 


And then we find that all of those deficits, challenges, or struggles will begin to lessen as they do more work on themselves. And then in terms of engagement, We do our best to do everything completely customized and individualized to the family and what they need and where they’re at. So everything’s on a monthly basis. 


We sit with the family initially for a 90 minute initial and we make a clinical recommendation for that first month. But everything is completely customizable and a la carte. And so there’s everything’s pretty much on an hour session basis and there’s like a mentor hour hour. A psychotherapy hour, a family session hour, a fitness hour, process groups, parent hours, and then we help the family construct how many family sessions they want in the first month, how many individual therapy sessions they want in the first month, how many mentor, how many fitness. 


And and we involved the kid in that choice too. Like how often are you willing to come up here? What’s good to you? what do you want to do? we don’t have a program. there’s no program, there’s no agenda, like there’s not a 12 week booklet manual through week 1 through week 12 where we’re gonna go over certain topics and stuff and it’s it’s not the way healing works, so it’s very organic, free flowing, so they can customize, like Wes said, every single month. 


And about the three week mark, we, two or three week mark, we check back in and they can, raise their engagement, they can lower their engagement because we’re just meeting the family and the kid where they’re at as they go on their journey. And the cool thing about it is there’s no end date. 


They can stay with the same treatment team for as long as they want, even. They, they work through their challenges on the radical pilgrimage of growth. And they just want to come up there and be part of the community and stay close with the mentors and coaches they work with or other kids they’ve met up there. 


It’s what happens after 12 weeks when you’re approaching,  


[00:29:44] Brenda: what do you do? Then that’s it. That’s all the magic. Hey  


[00:29:50] Wes: kid, you’re good. See you later. I don’t know. And what, Wes put me on so much and it’s great because I’ve only learned from him. Which is great because I think he’s the OG gangster, but I, having been on everything else, what I’ve seen, it’s just it resonates with me and I’ve seen the work and I’ve seen what it does and I’ve seen the results of it and it’s just beautiful. 


So it’s just not having this. Completely black and white structured program. That’s not the way life is. So why why create something that you think a kid’s gonna follow? Yeah.  


[00:30:22] Brenda: Yeah. it sounds like you just decided to start without a mold, it’s not even breaking the mold It’s just let’s just start without a mold so that you can work because you’re right. 


It’s like Whoever just said, okay, these 12 weeks, this is going to fix you. And then you’re going to be fine. And your whole family’s going to be fine. Like it doesn’t work like that. Have most of the kids that you’re working with been to other programs or are they like net new to this whole thing on working with themselves when they come to you? 


I’m sure you have a mix, but what are you seeing as far as when people are coming to you, what’s their kind of frame of reference?  


[00:30:59] Wes: Yep. So it’s probably a percentage breakdown of maybe. 25 percent of our kids have gone to a wilderness or a therapeutic boarding school and are now returning back home and coming to us to get some support as they do that. 


And it’s beautiful because we can mimic and mirror. The level of therapeutic support of an extensive PHP or ILP. So those kids that have gone to a wilderness program and then done a year at a residential program and are coming back home and the family families, like looking at what’s the continuum of care, what do we do? 


How do we get support? They can come to us for the first few months and be up at the center, Six, five, six days a week, a few hours each day, getting tons of immersive support. And as they get regrounded back home, start to step and taper down. So I’d say a big chunk who have been to program a big chunk of kids who have done other traditional therapy, whether it be private practice or family therapy and need more support. 


At the level of an IOP or a PHP, and then a big chunk of youth that have never done really any therapeutic work and are just looking for a community of support to better themselves. And that’s been beautiful. And as Zach was talking, Brenda, I think it’s important to recognize we are outpatient. 


So there’s, I do think there’s a time in particular families lives where things have gotten so. Wildly out of control. And there’s such clinical severity and safety issues that were not appropriate. And I have grandiose plans that I absolutely will bring to fruition to completely subversively change the mental health industry and offer all of those things I can’t do it right now, but in the next five to 10 years, we have plans Really create customizable, different levels of support that go beyond outpatient is just doing that in the appropriate way. 


But for right now, we really want to support those families. So there’s sometimes where youth will come to us and. Our clinical work will see we’re not enough support and we really do need to link them with a higher level of therapeutic support and a residential or a wilderness. And then I lean on the people that I know in the field that I know have ethical integrity. 


And do the work from their heart and try and get these families set up with programs that I know are really trying to fight for just what’s right. And so there’s particular wilderness and residential where it’s and we’ve had some beautiful journeys where a kid has come to us at Eternal Strength, done some work for a few months, things have unraveled. 


We’ve recommended a higher level of care. They’ve gone and done that and then they come back to us and that’s been beautiful That’s  


[00:34:08] Brenda: very cool  


[00:34:10] Wes: Yeah,  


[00:34:10] Brenda: yeah Yeah, that’s something that, the moms that I work with struggle with a lot. It’s like, how do you know when they need to go to a wilderness or a residential program? 


And I always just say your gut, lean on your therapist, obviously, and your mom gut is going to know. that’s how we knew when, with my son, it was like, we have to remove him from this. Location physically to keep him safe, but that’s such a painful decision to make. So I’m glad to hear that you’ve got a team there who can help through that process, because you’re like, you said, you’re so frazzled, you’re so vulnerable. 


You’re you’re not making the best decisions as a parent. I don’t think a lot of the time when you’re in that amount of crisis that having somebody rational. Trained who’s seen this a thousand times before be able to help you with that decision is so important  


[00:35:08] Wes: and Brenda there’s I want to say really quickly as you bring that up. 


There’s a lot of elements. So when I worked with families in private practice, and even now at eternal strength, it is it’s a deeply personal decision to make as a parent. And I would never as a clinician or a psychotherapist tell a parent what to do. But I would always tell parents that I found a scale of one to 10. 


10 is complete chaos. You’re drowning and you can’t breathe emotionally and psychologically. If as a parent, you’re living in seven to 10 with no relief whatsoever for months on end, then it may absolutely be time to look at a higher level of care. Now, that being said, I have my finger on the pulse of quite a bit. 


In terms of the industry and what’s happening and there’s, I would say across the board with the kids that I’ve worked with that have gone to wilderness and come back home, there’s probably 30 percent that will look at me directly in the eye and say, it was one of the most difficult things I ever did, but I am grateful for it because without it, I would not be alive. 


It was my savior and I completely understand why my parents did it. And I am grateful to them for that journey. Now there’s another 30 percent that will say it was bullshit. I didn’t get anything from it. It didn’t help at all. Meanwhile, their behaviors are much better and they’re doing okay. And they’re at home and I’m like, okay, we’ll just give you some time to frame that work. 


There is a small percentage that I’ve worked with, and this has been very challenging who have. Framed it as severe abuse, neglect, trauma, and have held on to massive amounts of resentment for years on end with their parents. And there’s a couple different Instagram accounts and organizations and documentaries in the work, one called Teens for Profit. 


Another called Breaking the Code of Silence, and these are young people telling their journey about wilderness, therapeutic boarding school, and residential treatment in a way where they feel like it really was traumatic, abusive, and neglectful, and I would never want to not have those young people have a voice. 


But I think it’s just important for parents to know the broad spectrum. And I think the most important thing is to know that you don’t know. All you can do is gather the right information, go with your gut, follow your parental intuition. But there is absolutely no guarantee and any fucking program that tells you that there is a guarantee that they are going to change behaviors is full of shit. 


And they’re preying on severely vulnerable, distraught families. And so I think it’s the programs that speak in a certain language and say, We can’t make a guarantee on behavioral change, but we can damn sure create sacred space, build trust. And here is our mission and here’s the work we do and here, talk to some other parents and put them in contact. 


So I think all those things are just important to acknowledge.  


[00:38:22] Brenda: Absolutely. I 100 percent agree. And I appreciate that group that came back and said it was horrible and all of those things. Because my son said the same thing. he ran away to punish us because we sent him to wilderness. And yet today, five, seven, I don’t know how many years, it’s all a blur. 


He will say that, At this point, it saved my life because of the things that I was doing. So there is that lag sometimes that you have to just as a parent, steal yourself for to say, I made the choice because I could see what I saw at the time. And I worked with the information that I had and I think you’re right getting resources that you trust and this is the other thing that I tell moms and parents on this podcast is if you’re neglecting your own self care, you are actually not just doing a disservice to yourself, but to your kid because when you need to go to make that decision. 


You need to be in the best place possible, and you can’t be in the best place possible if you haven’t slept, you haven’t had any water, you haven’t had any food, you like, you just can’t do that. So if you want to help your kid, you got to be in a good frame of mind because you’re going to make some really hard decisions. 


You need to be prepared for those and be able to actually like function when you’re making them.  


[00:39:39] Wes: Yeah. And it’s tough because parents do not need to feel guilt nor shame for doing whatever is necessary to keep their child safe and alive and thriving. And if this is a level of severity where your child is taking such severe risk in terms of self harm, suicidality, substance abuse, addiction, do whatever the fuck you got to do to keep your kids safe. 


And to, you Mimic what’s going to happen in the real world in terms of natural consequences. I went to jail three times and I probably bitched about it for years where I was like, I wouldn’t have gone to jail if you and mom and dad did this extreme ownership. And it was like, I probably wouldn’t have gone to jail. 


But  


[00:40:29] Zac: there is  


also a group and I do, I do not want to speak ill of them, but I want to encourage them and empower them and support them. There’s a group of parents. That I have seen continually throughout the years that are afraid to parent and what comes along with that journey and they want to subcontract out healers, clinicians, treatment centers, schools, and coaches. 


To do the work that only they themselves as a parent can do. And so I would encourage those families to look at all the options at home If it’s not severe and the child’s not in immediate danger Exhaust the resources at home And then be ready to take the deep dive with your kid and to your point do your own work Because that is the most you want to help your kid Do your own work. 


You, you want your child to move in a certain direction. You need to be able to model that for them and as frightening and as scary as that is, you just have to do that.  


Yeah. you can’t ship your kid off and they’re doing this deep immersive work and they come home to the same family dynamic in the same environment. 


Like, how’s that? How’s that going to mix? You know what I mean? So yeah, we, we encourage, yeah. At least, one to two or so sessions with the a la carte choices and the customization of what we do. I can’t speak, but yeah, including a parent session, including at least one family session, the parents have to do the work. 


And there’s some good wilderness programs that are starting to integrate more of that and really doing family systems work while the youth is in that immersive environment. And to Zach’s point, it’s look, man, we’re not going to tell the parents what to do, but we very candidly would be like, you want to get the most out of this work that he’s doing up as a general strength. 


You need to be up here too. And you need to be ready to be vulnerable and to be honest and reflect on where you’re at. Because. This isn’t, it’s a family system, much like a spider web. And if you go and touch a spider web at any part of it. It will rock the entirety of it. So whatever’s going on in, in terms of a family system, every individual in that web is going to feel and experience that. 


And so I think it’s, you begin to do the healing family system web work, not that each person doesn’t have their own shit to work on, but it’s recognizing the inner personal relationships, the dynamics, the communication, and the healing of the family system as a whole. I think is really, really important and the families that have done the best are the ones who finally get to a place where they stop pointing fingers at each other and they say, here’s what I can do better. 


Here’s what I have control of and here’s what I’m going to work on.  


[00:43:33] Brenda: Yeah, yeah, it’s not that and this is just something I’ve learned in in doing this podcast and talking with so many different healers and and professionals is that it’s not. Your kid is the identified patient. It’s like they’re, this is what they’re going through and they’re dealing with a lot of stuff, but they’re not the reason why everything’s going crazy. 


There’s so many. It is that total spider web and there’s so many entry points, and I see the same thing. parents get their kids off somewhere and then it’s oh. Wait, I have to do some work now too? It’s yes, actually, now is your time, especially if, if it has been serious enough that they have to be out of the home, that first, like sleep for a week, get some food in your body, like start moving and then start working, because yeah, having them come back into that same exact container, just. 


Isn’t super helpful.  


[00:44:30] Zac: Yeah.  


[00:44:31] Brenda: Wow. So so many questions But I would ask if a parent is listening to this Usually they’re in some sort of a crisis or obviously they’ve identified some things going on Are there some things that you would want them to start thinking about? So let’s say it’s not like a horrible crisis, but things are getting a little crazy They know there’s some substance use going on. 


There’s some self harm. There’s You know All the things are the things that you would want them to be thinking about. And is there anything in particular that you would say probably don’t want to do this? Like just words of wisdom from your chairs.  


[00:45:08] Wes: Yeah. So I’m going to start super meta like backup and I’ll probably get emotional. 


Maybe I can detach from it enough that I don’t just sob and cry. You’re on a journey and you’re a human being and you’re going to die. And this may be your child, but it’s not something that you need to project onto. It is a human life that you are ushering into the world and it’s frightening and you feel powerless, but you need to, to back up and constantly remind yourself of that. 


And we live in a society and a culture that will continually indoctrinate and condition you to think that you are to raise. A certain person in a certain way and your ideas of what success is and what growth is and what health is may be drastically different from the journey that your child needs to take. 


And so I think doing a lot of work on unraveling what it means to be a parent. And what shows up for you when you view yourself as a parent and what that mission and that journey is. I think spending a lot of time reflecting on that is important. And there are some beautiful teachers that remind of that all the time. 


There’s a, clinical psychologist, Dr. Gabor Mate. Who has done a lot of work on addiction, wrote a brilliant book called in the realm of hungry ghost, and he’s done massive work on trauma, childhood, growth, and development relationship between parents and children upbringing. And then there’s another bad ass lady, dr, Shefali, and she’s been on Oprah’s super soul Sunday. 


She’s written. The Awakened Family, The Conscious Parent. I always, I always think about this mom. You remember, dude that just came in that I hadn’t seen in forever? That played the VR? Yeah. His mom got Dr. Shefali’s book, The Conscious Parent, and she was reading it and fell asleep on the couch. With it and he woke her up and he was like the conscious parent, huh? 


More like the unconscious It was awesome though. That’s awesome But dr. Shefali is amazing and she really Every time I listened to her and gabor mate, I gained deeper wisdom into What it means to be a parent what it means to walk that journey So I think one thing that parents could be doing is really really focusing on what does it mean to be a parent? 


You What does it mean to raise a child and what shows up for you? In terms of the things that you haven’t worked on in your own healing journey around that, your own childhood, your own relationship with your parents, with your family system. That’s all grist for the mill that if you can go and do work on, you can be a much more present guide for your child. 


And then I was going to, read really quickly, man. Khalil Gibran, the Lebanese poet.  


[00:48:23] Brenda: Yes.  
 
[00:48:24] Wes: He wrote the book to stop it. Which Allison gave me, Dean. That was the first book she gave me when I was young. My wife, back when we were dating, gave me this book. But he, I’ll read real quick, it’s called On Children. 


And he says, Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of life’s longing for itself. They come through you, but not from you. And though they are with you, Yet they belong not to you. You may give them your love, but not your thoughts. For they have their own thoughts. You may house their bodies, but not their souls. 


For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams. You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you. For life goes not backwards, nor tarries with yesterday. You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth. The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, and he bends with his might, that his arrows may go swift and far. 


Let your bending in the archer’s hand be for gladness, for even as he loves the arrow that flies, so he loves also the bow that is stable.  


[00:49:31] Brenda: I cry every time I hear that poem. , right?  


[00:49:34] Wes: I tried to read,  


[00:49:36] Brenda: I dunno how you did that. I’m impressed  


[00:49:38] Wes: about my daughters. And then I’m like, yeah, that, and there’s flashes of like memories of them growing up. 


And then I gotta be like, you’re on a podcast, stop crying.  


[00:49:47] Brenda: No, you don’t have to not cry. That’s what I love about a podcast. I can do whatever I want.  


[00:49:51] Wes: It’s a beautiful example you ever seen where. The Obama translator, Obama will say this whole long thing, and then the guy comes in and he’s what he meant to say, it’s and I want to do that now, it’s it’s a beautiful example of I get emotional, I read that, it’s just a chance and a space to be vulnerable, if I could say anything to parents, I’d just say, cut the shit, be willing to be vulnerable with your kid, that’s it. 


That’s it. Don’t posture. Yeah. Just get in there. Be vulnerable. Open up. And they, you know what, they might do the same fucking thing with you.  


[00:50:24] Zac: Yeah.  


[00:50:25] Wes: Be ready to ride that roller coaster. Yeah. Whatever it  


[00:50:28] Zac: looks like. Yeah. Just be willing. Just be willing. That’s it.  


[00:50:33] Brenda: Yeah. And what I hear in that is let go of the expectations that you have of your kid that the world puts on your kid. 


That the world puts on you as the parent of a kid, right? there’s all of these expectations of this is how it has to look. And this is how they have to be. And if you can let go of those and the poem says, just let them go and see what they can do. And I think I always struggle with this balance because I see that. 


And I hear that. And I talk about that with the parents that I work with and they say, okay, I’m willing to do that. I’m willing to work on it. But my kid is using fentanyl. And I don’t have time to, There’s this struggle of, yes, I want to do all of those things and I want to let them be, and I want to da, da, da, da, da, but they’re so in it. 


And I don’t know if this is the time where then you have to remove them. Physically, but there’s this urgency that I feel having just lost three kids in our community in the last few months, 18 year olds, who just made it through COVID high school senior year, who just got their recreational all. 


Marijuana cards so that they could be safer. these parents are doing all of the things and they still lose their kids, which is obviously a reality, but I think this is what I hear from parents. I’d be curious to know what you hear is yes, I want to do all of this and I’m willing to let go and I’m willing to do all this work. 


But the reality is our kids are doing things every single day now with fentanyl on the market in the way that it is that Is killing them and it’s terrifying to these parents. They’re just paralyzed with this fear that today is going to be the day that I get the phone call, even though I, we talked about it and I’m trying to let them be there. 


It takes time. As it doesn’t take 12 weeks. It doesn’t take 18 weeks. Or whatever it is, how do you approach that with parents to, to help them do the work that they need to do, but also deal with this reality that we’re all faced with with fentanyl on the market?  


[00:52:41] Wes: Yeah, man. Oh It’s so heavy. I don’t think it has to be either or I think you can to zach’s point I think you can be loving Vulnerable and constantly send that message and then I think if there’s a level of severity You Man, even as I talk about it, I feel my words fail me because I feel like I want to talk about it on a certain level, but I need to go to the heart of it. 


So there’s a kid that I worked with for years. Beautiful, awesome young dude. His favorite show was Trailer Park Boys. He was a badass dude. He wore a hat and he had the Trailer Park Boys pins and he made music. Had a killer tapestry and his dad was amazing. Dad was really cool. Drove a motorcycle. That doesn’t make you cool, but that was  


[00:53:28] Brenda: it. 
 
It’s a good element.  


[00:53:32] Wes: I worked with this young guy who went to a wilderness and then went to a residential, and then he came back home from that, and I worked with him with the program I was doing, person centered work with, and we had all these different adventures, man. We went downtown, he was adopted. 


Light skinned black dude and his dad, his adoptive dad was white. And one time we were driving, he’s dude, I’m trying to get my hair cut by like a black barber shop, man. let’s go. And I was like, let’s go, dude. I don’t know. I hope it’ll be cool. Alrighty there. And we went, it was really cool and loved it. 


We’d always eat these fire tacos at, It was, it was awesome, but we had these beautiful adventures together and I loved him, man. We listened to music and he turned me on to, to cool music, but he ended up dying, man. And he went and his dad did everything, sent him to programs, did everything he needed to do. 


And I think at some point there’s we’re fooling ourselves. If you think you can stop a moving train, but still do what you got to do, And, and so I sat with his dad Went to the funeral and I sat with his dad and his dad was badass and just You know was there and he said, wes i’ve had so many mixed emotions and one i’m just like i’m relieved and I feel guilty Because I feel relief but yeah He ended up You know going into the young guy ended up going in the army and doing well for a while and doing all this and then He came back out and he he relapsed on heroin there was fentanyl in it And I think it was an unintentional overdose and he died that way You But, the dad had a solace and a peace in his heart because he knew he had done everything that he could do. 


And I was able to reassure him of that. And so I think it’s the exhaustion of being as honest as you can with your kids, setting these very firm boundaries. And, the dad actually said to me, All I know is I set the boundaries that I needed to. And I think the parents that I’ve watched struggle the most with intense addiction is when they didn’t get to the boundary setting place. 


And at some point, if your kid’s going to go on that journey and they’re using and there’s massive risk taking and they’re in a daily. Danger of death. The only thing that you have is what you have control over. And that’s where you got to bring some real clarity to not fooling yourself that you can control their behaviors. 


You can’t, you can never ever control your child’s behaviors, but you can damn sure look at every single thing that you provide them with. And say I won’t fucking enable self destruction. I love you. I care about you. I’m here for you I’m always available. I’ll meet you for dinner for lunch. You can come over here. 


We can spend time together. We can talk I’m never going to emotionally detach from you, but i’m not giving you a car. I’m not giving you any money I won’t give you a cell phone because it’s like me putting a loaded gun in your hand And I won’t be a part of it and for in order for me To even be able to fall asleep at night. 


I have to know that I didn’t contribute to your self demise And I think you know after my third arrest my parents said that’s it. We’re done. We’re done If you get arrested again, we’re not bailing you out. You we’re not giving you a car You can’t have any money. You can’t have a cell phone. You can’t live here now You want to go into a treatment? 


We’ll pay for it. You want to show us that you’re working on yourself and you’re clean and you can give us some own drug screens. We’re here and we’ll support you and we’re open. At that point, we can talk about you. If you can get to a healthy place, we can talk about supporting you with these privileges. 


So I think to those parents that are in it right now, and it’s detrimental. You’ve got to know that the best thing that you could ever do. To help your child is to get very fucking clear about what you will and what you won’t support. And to know that in that you’re not abandoning your kid, you still love your kid. 


You’re actually helping them have to look at themselves and it’s scary. All of it’s scary. The fentanyl is scary. The pressed pills are scary. The risk taking is scary, but I’ve learned enough. The repeated lesson for me is You can’t stop that you can sit with that person and then I think it becomes it does become a god a spiritual a philosophical Existential thing where it’s like every time you get a moment with your kid cherish that and be with that kid So the moments I had with that kid that I lost and his dad lost I don’t regret any of those and they were beautiful and and they’re memories and I carry him with me You And so I think it’s just. 


Not fooling yourself to think that there’s a way to save your kid. You can’t save anybody. The asshole poet, Charles Bukowski, that we have up at the center says, only you can save yourself and it’s a war not easily won, but if anything’s worth fighting for, then this is it.  


[00:58:28] Brenda: Perfect. It is. It’s just a torturous place to be, but I like the reminder of the boundaries, which is so hard for parents. 


And also that just cherishing every moment because it’s hard in the moment when they’re not. So loving to be with, to do that, but I think you do have to put yourself in a different space and recognize that that is a cherishable moment because you have it. Oh, wow. there’s 5 million other questions that I have for you, but I would love to know, and I know you’ve been thinking about this, so I’m curious if I could give you a billboard in downtown Atlanta. 


What would it say?  


[00:59:14] Wes: So we get any billboard we want middle of downtown ato and it can say whatever we want. Yep It says, fuck off, get free, we pour light on everything.  


[00:59:28] Brenda: Love it. Love it.  


[00:59:30] Wes: He’s got a little eternal strength, Mandorla. That, that piece of anybody that tries to stifle your light, that tries to stop you from living your life. 


It’s true expression. And it’s the Marianne Williamson quote, playing small does no good to you or anybody else when you let your own light shine, you unconsciously give others permission to do the same. That’s been my healers, my mentors, the people that keep me going, our music. So yeah, fuck off, get free. 


We pour light on everything, but that’s our crew.  


[01:00:02] Brenda: Love it. Love it. What are you guys working on now? I know you hinted at other modalities. I’m not a therapist, so I don’t know all those words, but maybe different formats. But what are you guys working on or what’s getting you really excited? 


Because this has been a really tough past, 18 months or so. What are you jazzed about?  


[01:00:24] Wes: So I’m going to let Zach take this one. But first I’ll say so eternal strength is it’s. Own thing that’s organically growing that we’re we’re trying to listen to the community Again, I loved how you framed it where you were like It sounds like you guys started without a mold and you shaped it as it grew I think eternal strength is going to grow in such a beautiful organic nature with that community That we’ll know how it needs to be shaped. 


And so that’s one element that we’re just very patient and persistent with. And pouring the energy into the work we do with the youth. But, Zach and I are crazy bastards. We are, yeah, somewhat maniacal in a sense. Because we still have an addiction quality about us. But we’ve  


learned how to channel it.  


[01:01:09] Brenda: Yes. 
 
[01:01:12] Zac: Uplifting things,  


eternal strength, et cetera. So we like Wes said earlier, we have built a team of 17 and it’s beautiful. And they have given us the ability, like. Eternal Strength is now that team. Like me and Wes oversee and we support in any way that we can, but the kids don’t even like us anymore. 


They’re like, we’re like the old guys. We tried to run a community event. We were like, it’s a camp out like campfire thing. And all the kids went over and hung with the mentors, like a wave. Yeah. They like went in the woods with the hammocks and me and Wes were sitting around the spire by ourselves and okay, so we can’t do it. 


Maybe, maybe so the team’s beautiful. And shout out to all those guys. They’re, they’re such a beautiful tribe. They are eternal strength. So my point is it has given us the ability to step back. So we’re up there. Two or three days a week when it’s appropriate. And so in our, in our free time, we’re like, what do we do? 


So we had dreamt up this idea of really just creating another sacred space because we work with so many youth and young adults with addiction and substance abuse problems, and a lot of the teams in recovery, and we just know a really big sober community. So what me and Wes have created. And have recently opened. 


It is now opened. We have opened, it’s called Anti Psychiatry. And what it is, is a health conscious lounge to support a sober community. So it’s basically set up like a very, very funky lounge speakeasy, but it’s set up like a bar.  


We have  


distilled non alcoholic spirits. Botanical distillates, sparkling botanicals, local and organic coffees and teas. 


And so that’s currently what we’re doing. We literally just had our grand opening on Saturday. It’s in downtown Roswell for all those people listening that, live here in Georgia. It’s right off the historic square. It’s funky. It’s funky. If you want to go to anti psychiatry, atl. com to check it out. 


Our Instagram is the same thing. So basically we created another sacred space to help the sober community and to build that and to get their support and network to meet people that they otherwise may not have met. And not, not just for, people who are in recovery, but. You can come there and hang out and, maybe it’s like a first date type of thing where you want to have a safe date and you can meet there and have a drink that looks, it feels like delicious. 


They’re awesome. They’re really, really good. So that’s currently what we’re doing now. We literally just. We worked on that the last couple of months and we just opened Saturday and it’s  


[01:04:05] Brenda: so awesome. I love that. Love that. I want to get your mocktail recipes because I’m a new non drinker in the last year. 


And so I’m like, and I used to love gin and tonics. And so I’m always looking for that. there’s that one taste that you.  


[01:04:20] Zac: Yeah. So ritual is a company we work with and seed lip is a company we work with and our ritual is a, it’s a zero proof alcohol alternative and they have wisdom. gin, tequila, and these drinks, these drinks are amazing. 


They give  


that kind  


of effect and that feel, and it’s, they’re garnished, they’re mixed at the bar, just like you with a bartender. And it’s just really, really cool garnishments. They have the appearance of it and the taste of it. So it’s really cool, but there’s over spirit.  


[01:04:54] Brenda: Love it. 


That’s super cool. I’m sure there’s a lot of parents that are either wishing that they lived in Atlanta or they may be moving to Atlanta so they can be near you. So yeah, I think that’s, that’s a struggle that I see. So I’m excited to see where you guys go with this because the problem that so many parents face is you do have your kids go to a program and it’s great and they, they learn a lot. 


And then you have to just bring them right back to the exact same environment that they were in, because you don’t, there’s no like foster system for these kids. And that was, my son’s struggle is he kept having to come back to the same city, same people, same triggers, same everything. But what are you going to do as a parent? 


there’s just, it’s, it’s such a struggle. I appreciate hearing about that and we’ll be looking for all of your new creations that you come up with super cool Thank you for the time and  


[01:05:49] Wes: this has been awesome. We can’t thank you enough And i’m so glad you reached out. I feel fortunate that we connected through joanna lily. 


Yes Amazing in my connection with her through willow rubin. It’s just It’s amazing to watch the universe work when the right people are in alignment. And we feel grateful and fortunate to even have this platform and everything you’re doing is beyond just miraculous. I think your own journey, your devotion and what you’re doing and the community you serve is awesome and we feel humbled to be here. 


Thank you.  


[01:06:22] Brenda: Thank you. Thank you so much for listening. If you would like to go to the show notes, you can always find those at brendazane. com forward slash podcast. Each episode is listed there with full transcript, all of the resources that we mentioned, as well as a place to leave comments. If you would like to do that, you might also want to download a free ebook I wrote called hindsight three things I wish I knew when my son was addicted to drugs. 


It’s full of the information I wish I would have known when my son was struggling with his addiction. You can grab that at brendazane. com forward slash hindsight. Thanks again for listening and I will meet you right back here next week.