Roadzoflife - Michael and Janelle

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Brainwaves. Hear the world differently, bringing community mental health to you, raising awareness and challenging stigma. Tune in to 3CR community radio Wednesdays at 5pm. Melbourne's drive time radio program featuring community organizations, powerful stories and information. Find us@brainwaves.org.au - proud, proudly sponsored by Wellways Australia.

Ananya 0:47

I would like to begin by paying my respects to the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin nation, who are the traditional custodians of the land on which I am coming to you from today - land where at Brainwaves, we tell our stories, and land where the traditional custodians have told their stories for many, many years before us and continue to tell their stories.I would like to pay my respects to elders past and present, and acknowledge all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander listeners who are listening today. This episode is episode one of a two part series. Please tune in next Wednesday for part two of this episode to hear more of what Michael and Janelle say. 

Hello and welcome to brainwaves on three CR, 855 AM, 3CR digital radio and 3cr.org.au ... My name is Ananya, and I hope our show can be a wonderful addition to your day. Today, we are joined by guests Michael and Janelle, who are creative and life partners. In 2012 Michael developed Neurological Movement Disorder and acquired brain injury. He was renting a room from Janelle, who suddenly became his 24 hour caregiver. Within weeks, they are pregnant and soon married. 

After facing homelessness and the birth of their son, Michael began to analyse the tragic events and disabilities through the lens of a camera, showing the extreme rehabilitation process of a man exploring his loss of identity and trauma in a world that now feels foreign to him, confused and seeking deeper meaning from life, he reaches out and interviews strangers who are also experiencing extreme social situations, including drug addiction, physical disabilities, kidney failure, mental health issues, miscarriage and homelessness. He tackles topics like grief, trauma, relationships, suicide, conflict, forgiveness and humanity, exposing people's lack of transparency, communication and connection within the modern era. 

Michael's documentary draws out intense questions of what it is to be human, finalising with a deeper appreciation of the human condition, nature, life and relationships that relate to a very broad audience. Michael and Janelle, YouTube channel, roads of life has gained 550 1000 subscribers over the last year, giving them a platform to step out and share their story. They both publicly advocate and facilitate discussions surrounding the topics and social issues. The documentary explores volunteering their time knowledge and resources to not only themselves, but also not for profits. Prior to the disability, Michael had significant experience in the social work and health sector, including a lived experience position within well based. Janelle is a qualified naturopath and remedial massage therapist. We're so glad to have you here with us today. Thanks... for being on the show.

Janelle 3:39

Thank you for having us.

Michael 3:39

Hi guys.

Ananya 3:39

So so nice to have you on - I feel like we are going to have a really interesting conversation. It seems like you both have been through a lot separately, together, and really keen to dive in. One of my first questions that I have since we've sort of covered the documentary is that I did see quite a few clips of the documentary on YouTube myself, and it seems that you, Michael, have a really high capacity to empathise with others. What do you believe gives you that quality?

Michael 4:10

Wow. I honestly can say that I think it's a societal thing that we talk about empathy these days. I'm not sure I had extra empathy, rather than I think it's maybe been lost in the modern era, and that, yes, I could say that my own traumatic story from child is is quite extreme. So from a young age through to now, I've extremed experienced a lot of things a lot of people wouldn't experience, which they always say, if you go through something, it does allow you to then empathise with others. So because I've walked a lot of walks of life, I can empathise with a lot of different subcultures, and I can also empathise, just in general, with the human condition when it's suffering. 

But I think, deeper than that, I would question that in its essence, and say that I think looking thousands of years back, I feel like there was a lot of things that I had to go into survival mode in certain parts of my recovery that go back to a very simplistic format of relationship base, food base and... just being able to be present with your suffering. And I think in that, that's what was for thousands of years. And I think when you've got a smartphone or devices that, well, they're called iPhone. So I think the more we're looking at ourselves, the less we notice others. 

And I think the blessing of me and Janelle's lifestyle for a very long time, I think I've discussed with you previous, I've never owned a smartphone... you know, never. And I think it's those little things that have allowed me and Janelle to see the world differently and see the way society has evolved and changed quite rapidly over the last decade especially. Previous to the disability, like you explained in the promo. I think... you know, the vast change from prior to when I was cognitively impaired, and then coming back out of that coma state and being more intellectually trying to analyse society on a social level and psychological level, blows my mind on the whole concept of... compassion and empathy. I think it's something that is better discussed as a societal value, rather than an individual goal, that we lift people up that are empathetic, as if there's something special about them. I think it's more society raising each other up to actually be more community-focused and care about each other,

Ananya 6:43

You're so right. Like, empathy is given this like badge of honour nowadays, because it's so rare to come come by. It's so rare to come across. But I do think that, you know, the experience that you've had, which is living life through such a different perspective, which is not having a smartphone, for example, has given you this creative license that a lot of us don't have because we're so locked in - and it's beautiful. I think it's such a authentic way of like living and bringing your story forward. 

You have, you know, mentioned a few times now that you've had a very tough life, difficult upbringing, and even in the promo that I mentioned that you had a Neurological Movement Disorder. Do you, would you like to speak some more on that?

Michael 7:24

Again, it comes down to the documentary we created, which was accidental. So I don't even think I'd be speaking with you or comprehending that I had cognitive impairment, because most people aren't blessed to be in my position, where you have a third they call it third party perspective, where I accidentally came across this... kind of idea after my first son was born, when I was cognitively impaired, where I could view myself through a camera and realise that there was something different about me - the first year of the disability, for example... you explain what it was like at the start with the cognitive impairment.

Janelle 8:05

Well, to be honest, we didn't really get very much medical support, so what Michael was experiencing was never actually explained to us in any kind of detail from a medical professional. So it was every day, just learning as we went.So, I mean, an example of that is, one of the first times we left the house, you know, we were preparing to cross the road, and Michael went to step out in front of a bus, and I literally had to grab him and pull him back. And so then we're like, Oh, okay, this is an issue that we need to be aware of. And it was like that the entire way through, like... him just learning how his brain had changed and what those limitations... were.

Michael 8:54

And it was physical and cognitive. So you've got the cognitive side of... well, it was a it was a mix. It was... hard to get into. So you got up to, I think there was up to seven days of no sleep. So cognitively, if you see someone in hospital that's had a stroke, for example, I presented cognitively similar to someone with a stroke. So my ability to shower, feed myself, understand time - all that was gone. I mean, you're fried, and it's not just for a day, you're talking 12 months later, I was still... I didn't drive a car again until the third year, so years of your life. Then physically, the cognitive damage was extreme, Tardive Dyskinesia, so I had no ability to swallow food, speech was shocking, couldn't, had no...language. The language was gone.

Janelle 9:46

There were days that he couldn't actually speak, he would give up even trying to speak. And one of the interesting things we discovered over time too, is that if he yelled something or sang it... and that was really interesting. And so apparently a different part of the brain is used than just normal, normal speech. So we used to joke about, you know, going into a shop or whatever, and...

Michael 10:12

(SINGS) Oh lord, can I please so can that please have the newspaper Sun? (OTHERS LAUGH, Yeah!...) I'm only singing to you because if I talk normally, I can't... (SPEAKS) Like you just... (LAUGHTER) I don't, I never, I didn't actually do that.

Janelle 10:24

No, you didn't actually (LAUGHS)

Michael 10:27

So... there is a lot of humour that comes out in the world, in crisis too. But so yeah, the physical side was horrific. I mean spatial awareness, bumping into walls, smashing your body every day, to the point where I've now found out I have broken bones that I didn't even worry about at the time, because it's the least thing on your mind. I have two fractured, crushed vert... main vertebrae in my back that normally you get from an extreme car accident or jumping off a bridge, that I somehow did, and recovered from without even actually getting any rehabilitation from. And the entire process was mainly done without much medical help too. So... we didn't get the hospital flowers, skepticism from family and friends, because it was a mental health drug that I became disabled from...

Ananya 11:15

That sounds so hard.

Michael 11:17

So it wasn't just the physical and cognitive but the trauma of isolation... the unknownness, you watched all the movies, and there's these big kind of, Hey, you know, this is what's wrong with you... but the reality is, a lot of us find out when you have cancer or... even with mental health, that sometimes there isn't a magic fix, and you have to actually go through the hard process for many, many nightmarish years to be able to even have some kind of resemblance of a life that... 

And it's something you wouldn't wish upon your worst enemy, waking up in the middle of the night one time when I'm... and I got my arms against, up against the wall, screaming and... I'm wondering why I'm not in my bedroom, and then Janelle, on regular basis, having to turn the light on and, without exaggeration, explain to me and pick up the baby out of the cot and say, We've been married a year. We moved from that house two years ago. This is your baby, you're a father, and she would relay information kind of like 50 First Dates until there was some breakthrough. And then... I would be, Oh, okay, and we would shrug each other and go to bed. 

And that was just a normal reoccurrence. On any given day, I would be eating food and just choke and almost die, and she would bang... one scary one was the lungs, having no control over lungs. I still wouldn't go scuba diving now, because of the lack of of control, we all breathe and we do it without thinking. That's why I can say it is, if you get all your your brain, and all the the dopamines that send the signals and worrying, and all mine were broken - so you've got like a planet, and from that planet, if you can think of your brain and you want to call... your next door neighbor, and my brain's neurotransmitters were broken, all the roads are perfect. 

So your your memory is technically there. You are technically present. But the foundational of both speed of processing and concentration are the two the base areas of a triangle of the brain, like, if you think of a food chart, and those two areas, nothing else works. So my speed of processing and concentration were absolutely gone, to the point where I was two-second Tom, and I it looked like I would forget something, or I would roll... 

I quit cigarettes the first two months without meaning to, because I would, Janelle would find me with my tobacco, trying, trying to roll tobacco, and I would have the tobacco on the actual plastic of the pouch without a filter or paper, and I thought I was rolling a filter, and I didn't even realise I didn't have a piece of paper or... filter. If she didn't tell me, she would do smoothies for me that were, God bless you, did that for me, I just would have died. And I think the transition was bizarre, because normally there's an ambulance, and whereas for us, it was kind of like in the fourth or fifth week that she's working out that her roommate is... not quite cognitively...

Janelle 14:20

Not [?] and not eating...

Michael 14:21

And she's having to, kind of... she became my carer... accidentally. And that's... humanity. So if you want to talk about empathy, I think even our entire story is one of where we just had to, well, I'm not sure... we both sacrificed, but I didn't have a choice. She did, and she... fed me, and if she didn't feed me, I would have died. She just a smoothie van, she would have to spend half a day, a day, forcing me to drink one smoothie, and I'd have one sip...

Janelle 14:52

Because then he would forget it existed. Yeah, you know, if I didn't remind him and say, You have to keep drinking, then he just wouldn't have, you know, like...

Michael 15:01

Eyes... rolling, grimacing, permanently like that. When I became chiselled, I had a six-pack because I was permanently rocking. If I was standing, I was pacing, I had piano fingers, and would be... like out of the the days of the 1950s when you see people in the straitjacket. So I was like an extreme case, and it was... to this day we've normally had to, normally still tell people it was just similar to Parkinson's and a cognitive in... cognitive movement disorder, because as soon as we've ever mentioned Tardive Dyskinesia or medications, it's always come with a very strong sarcasm and stigma, and we've just had to, pretty much, I had to not only go through that, but know that there was no hospital flowers. And I just had to do it for years and years, knowing that, on top of that, I was probably still seen as just... a piece of crap that you know... there was no real, yeah, we got nothing, even family just bailed.

Ananya 16:06

That sounds really alienating. Even though the circumstances are terrible, at least I'm glad you had each other. Oh, of course, you're in a very different place right now, Michael - do you want to maybe share with us your rehabilitation process? Did you even have one? What did that look like?

Michael 16:23

You can see why. Now, if I'm exploring my recovery, how the Roadzofife documentary, why I would then just walk out into the... she let me off the leash in the third year, like a child, and I was like a child. I was relearning how to interact with people, and I was so excited in the second year when I learned how to do sandwich again, I was like, Woo-hoo! It's not until the fifth year you start emotionally, starting to have to recover from severe cognitive damage and restoration. So yeah, though you can see why I would end up interviewing - if I saw an [? I say], Oh, there's something different about them, bang! Straight into it... and I just naturally... the more I spoke to others, through that empathy you were talking about earlier, why would I not? Because I was in the same boat, if not worse. Most of the people I interviewed, I was... it was in a very bad state myself. So... it's a very natural progression for me to always go back to that... I...

Janelle 17:21

Sorry, I was just going to say like that, literally was his rehabilitation because we didn't have medical support. You know, he wasn't put into a rehabilitation hospital and given all the exercises, and... you know what I mean, his real rehabilitation, literally was him relearning how to make a sandwich without completely destroying the kitchen. You know, how to how to start writing again and just keep practicing and practicing until it was actually legible. You know, how to hang up washing on a washing line. And then...

Michael 17:55

I used to love cleaning. She loved it. First three years I just, my passions were... I had gone from being an intellectual musician writing hundreds of songs to... I just adored mopping. I loved it. It was like (OTHERS LAUGH) you get this magical stick and push it round on the floor, and you got this transformation. Or I would sit out on the beach. A lot of the documentaries is kind of subliminal messages of my child and dog. So you got these nightmarish chaos in the videos, even the short videos for the doco that are online now on YouTube, that have blown up... and it's clear that it's like this, it's like meant to take you into that erratic space of what I was experiencing. 

You're kind of getting my son and dog permanently in this nature that's calling you to say... The fundamentals never change, whether you're cognitively impaired or not, whether you're mentally unstable and struggling with cancer, that you can still feel... you know, there's still those similarities. So I like the idea of being able to take what you're saying about the injustices, and I like exploiting that suffering to then explore the same thing thousands of people... you know, even only 500 years ago, if you had a mental health issue, you did not get the luxuries we we get. You were gone. 

There's even countries right now that people will still even cut their own foot off to pay for their... family's meals at night time. So a lot of Non For Profit stuff that I learned about Africa and overseas countries back in my twenties probably held me in good stead. I was very always searching. So I think even the way I... transitioned out of disability, there may have been others that it may have destroyed them. But I think even ironically, I look at as a blessing, that the ten years on mental health medications and case managing people with mental health issues, by the time I chose to come off the medication that I saw as a detox, I was not expecting what happened - by any means, and I was working in the profession, so it was the last thing I was expecting. 

But, it allowed me, you know, those years of in my twenties being gorophobic and lying in bed for weeks on end, you know... my mother at 24 coming to me and saying, you know, We've paid for your funeral because you're just in such a state and a mess on illicit drugs. So I think all those things all the way back to childhood... of being on artificial growth hormones at the age of 13 for being too short through to... my puberty was induced by testosterone tablets, no different to a transsexual does at 13 because they thought my puberty wouldn't come through. So, I mean, my history with substances is so extreme that how can I then throw a pitchfork? 

I say in the documentary, I don't want to be the number one, one billionth-and-one new cause. I think anyone can come on a show with a story like mine and try and monetize their story or become a Savior. And what I like the idea of is I just can't forget how many times I've been up and how many times I've been down. And the one thing I do know is the last 12 years, since the disability, my wife and kids and and being part of just a small group of people that love me, and what Janelle and the kids do to my daily life, is worth an... is far more important to me than the 500 subscriber count that we slammed up on YouTube. 

And so I like the ironicness of my story. It's like the foolish confusing the wise. I like I like my broken, shitty film on a handheld camera that's done on a $0 budget, that I can speak this elegantly, even though I feel cognitively still impaired, even though parts of me know that I might ramble, I love it, and I think that's what listeners want to hear. This is something that I'm not stepping away from - and if that means that it actually can make a difference, it shows that if we can do it, and I did this on the disability pension, it's not... Hey, you can do it too. It just shows the contradictions in what we're showing. I'm not saying that everyone's going to be able to get off their mental health drugs. I'm not saying that this is how you become... successful on YouTube. 

What I'm saying is that it through the brokenness and being honest and real and facing that hell, and through just being me, it's allowed me and Janelle to find some kind of life and dignity... and I think that's more important for listeners to hear than the billionth-and-one formula. And many people would take even the story of the mental health drug and turn that into a documentary on its own, to be honest. And we I could have done that. I could have, Oh, you know, get your pitchforks. 

But I actually say in the film, you know, the pharmaceutical industry is made up of human beings like me. And if I was in a position that I was being given a large wage, would greed fail me? Because I know every day I fail in small ways, and we all do. And so how can we not... you know, I wouldn't want to be handed a billion dollars, and because I think we're such a flawed humanity, and I like the idea of the film and my story also being about the flawedness - that sometimes we don't get an easy answer, sometimes it's not fixed, sometimes it's messy, and it never stops being messy. And what's more important is... who we go through that with and stop worrying about... 

I think our culture is very consumeristic, so it's if it's good, celebrate it, if it's bad, fix it and get it back to good. Or Michael, you've had these problems in your life. This is not good enough. someone needs to pay. And I think what I've learned is that when, when we grow old and weary, which I feel, I experienced my death bed ten times over, far too many times already, that when you're in those dark, silent moments, and they go on for a very long time,you realise at the end, you're born alone and you die alone - and it's having the grace to be able to have the humility, to let go and have forgiveness, and to let go of those egotistical parts of you, so that you can actually, genuinely not be robbed of the gifts you've been given... 

And sometimes a lot of mental health I had was because I was looking in the mirror, I was looking at a neighbor. And the more we actually are okay to be in our flawed ways, and look at our basic diet, look at our basic fundamentals that aren't a quick fix - and then, and then, then, normally, that's a good starting block, and that's probably the only reason why I'm alive right now.

Ananya 24:45

Janelle, you mentioned a lack of support a few times in different ways. Did you want to maybe elaborate some more on that?

Janelle 24:52

Kind of what, going on from what Michael's saying, is probably a big reason why we didn't have support, particularlyfrom family and friends that... you know, Michael kind of started to say earlier over this last ten year journey, we've met people from lots of different walks of life, and you know, even people, whether it's cancer, whether it's having a child with a disability, or whatever it is, we've met numerous people that when these crisises have hit in their life, the people that they thought were the closest that would be there to support them are the ones that have bailed the quickest. And, you know, they've just been left going, What the, What the heck? 

And I think a big part of that is because in our culture, we're not actually taught how to deal with negativity in a healthy way. We've kind of been brought up in this society that the media has pitched to us for many, many years, what we need to be living up to, what life is meant to look like in order for us to be happy. You know, if you've got the bigger house, you'll be happy. If you've got the new car, you'll be happy, if you've got... whatever it is, it can cover such a broad range of things. And I think in our culture, we've never really been taught how to deal with our emotions in a healthy way, yeah, and how to deal with negativity or anything kind of challenging or confronting in a healthy way. 

And I think what you what you were saying, Ananya... the lack of support that we've had, I would say, has been just as traumatic and just as, yeah, as the disability itself.

Michael 26:38

And to jump in there, which... Janelle may talk about this so much, and it's following on, which I think she was probably going to say, is that I don't think it's our parents fault or the people around us that bailed... Janelle kind of worked out later on - a lot of the trauma you go through, it's ten years later, you then reassess, and you go Ahhhh, and you're able to really understand why people did things. We can genuinely say that we have no anger towards anyone. But the reality is, we kind of realised that because of what she's talking about, our culture not dealing with negative things - and on top of that, it being kind of hypersensitive through people having devices that bring everything on so quickly so they they always have an option, an easy option to take, an option that they like. 

So what happens is, then, because no-one is dealing with anything negative when you do have cancer, or, like some of the people I interviewed that felt isolated, it's because the person themselves... we noticed that a family can go through a great life if they have a semi-normal, if can be called a normal existence. And then suddenly, what happens is, it's not until these traumas or extremities like cancer or what occurred to me that relationships are tested, and so what happens is, the cracks show up. Yeah, so there's a lot of family members in Janelle side, especially, they're really lovely human beings. 

And then, ironically, nothing's ever tested. And then once those basic bumps come, Oh, this guy's fried, or That person's seriously got cancer, it opens more intense questions, where you have to actually start having dialogue on a more serious level. And then what happens is, then it breaks down, because you start realising family members haven't actually really discussed anything on a deeper level.

Janelle 28:22

So nobody really knows how to...

Michael 28:24

... People that have never fought with you suddenly start fighting, and they they start showing these emotions you didn't even think they had. And we noticed that over and over with people we interviewed, I noticed it... the more I would be honest and raw like this and talk about my own disability... I've been around people where I barely say a word, and I can already see uncomfortabilities bulging up.

Ananya 28:45

What you're seeing is sort of creating the change that you want to create, but just not how you want to create it, you know?

Michael 28:51

And building relationships.

Ananya 28:53

Yeah, exactly, yes... exactly... yeah...

Michael 28:54

This realness that we're connecting right now builds some kind of authenticity, so that then, instead of being about the problem and fixing the problem, and the red, the red tape that a lot of non-for-profit stuff has become, it can then actually be about people feeling like they're actually part of something...(Yeah...) and that means, under any circumstances, no matter how bad it is, you know, it's still an extraordinarily beautiful life - which is a pretty intense and powerful thing for me to be able to speak out, considering I'll probably spend another twenty years... I don't think I'll ever properly fit in. I can do this now with you guys, but I'll get the earphones off and I'll be straight down to the beach and putting my feet in the water and...

Ananya 29:41

That sounds amazing. I want to do that. I wish I was near the beach.

Michael 29:45

And probably having a cry as well. So I also wish...

Ananya 29:48

I was doing that as well. (ALL LAUGH) Even... like, what you said before, Janelle, about, like, you know, it being so traumatic. Like, yeah, of course, the whole situation is traumatic, but not having that connection... I like, I definitely have felt that a lot of times in my life, where if, even if I'm going through something really difficult, it's the fact that I can't turn around and speak to somebody else. That's what hurt the most, and that's when you feel the loneliest. So like you said, like, this is... a connection. 

This is like, building that community of people who can have those difficult conversations, of... we know what words to use when someone's going through something difficult, because we have gone through something difficult, and we're able to meet them in that space, which is exactly what your documentary is about. It's beautiful, and I think that's what a lot of people are really craving, even though they've got all these fake personas, like none of that's real because they're not giving that connection, which is, that's what we need. We need that real human ... community, you know? ,,, Exactly.

Janelle 29:48

Yeah, energy between two people. And I think, I think, too, that what can occur is, as much as we've been talking about, the people that kind of shy away from those negative things, I know also what we've found is, you know, when you do meet somebody else that that is going through or has been through something tough, the more you can be honestabout your own experiences. It encourages somebody else to then also let their guard down and be able to be honest as well. And I think, like what you're saying, a lot of people now, especially these days, would have limited amount of people, if anyone in their life, that they really feel like they can do that with.

Ananya 31:27

Exactly and sort of like, [?] Janelle about naturopathy, and, you know, the whole healing through letting go of Western medication. Because, Michael, you've said a lot about, you know, how it's impacted you negatively, being on all those medications, getting off of that - the withdrawal process sounded, sounds really terrible, which is what I'm assuming led to your cognitive failure. Is that correct?

Michael 31:50

Nightmarish. Nightmarish. Things that, things only nightmares are made of.

Ananya 31:56

Yeah, that sounds horrible. So Janelle, where do you come in? How does how does... your practice help, Michael, can you shine some light on that?

Janelle 32:04

Well, I guess for me, I've been... I studied naturopathy when I was in my kind of early-mid-20s, so I've been a naturopath for 20 years. So for me, when all this occurred with Michael, obviously it was just very natural for me to turn to alternative therapies... I guess too, because with his story, he was actually withdrawing, or, you know, coming off a Western medication that is what had actually done the damage to his brain and nervous system that caused, you know, the disability and what he was experiencing. So it was also then finding alternatives to try and help deal with that. So I guess one example is Michael mentioned earlier, you know, he would go for days back in the first month or so without sleeping. So it was using herbs, you know, like Valerian and different kind of calming herbs to help him to get through that and re-establish healthy sleep.

Michael 33:11

Aren't I so lucky? Like, what's the chances and what chances would other people have to have that kind of person around them? So I'm very lucky.

Janelle 33:19

And then things like... even basic nutritional supplements like fish oil,you know, cognitively for him, have been amazing that, you know, he notices a big difference when he's taking them and when he's not, just his own cognitive functioning. So, yeah, so naturopathy and that side of nutrition and Western herbs really played a big part in helping him to... be...I wouldn't probably necessarily say recover as much, I think his body did that natural recovery process on its own. I think the herbs helped to enhance that, and like enhance his cognitive functioning to be the best that it could be. And herbs that helped to kind of calm down his nervous system, which is obviously what the medication before was doing, so to kind of replace that and enable his nervous system to calm down. 

And the thing too, with with herbs and with natural medicines is, the way they actually work is to restore the body to equilibrium. So they're not a band-aid fix as such, although there are different things that can be used, you know, that will work immediately, like if you've got a cold and you take echinacea, it helps to ease those symptoms, but... holistically, naturopathy is about restoring the balance of the body, and so a lot of herbs work by restoring that natural balance. And so it can mean... kind of, in a way, like what we have been talking about, in some ways, a lot of times, it's a process, it's not the quick fix that most people are looking for these days. It can take a number of months for it to really kick in and help to re-establish that... homeostasis, They call it in the body.

Michael 35:18

Would you say... an example... would be going to McDonald's and grabbing a quick meal, or having to actually grow the food yourself, harvest it - you know, there's a big difference. And I think that, again, ironically, it comes back to the same problem: a modern society that that is very self-absorbed, and there's these quick, easy ways, and even seeing it with how we're impacting the world with food and environment issues. So I think a lot of what Janelle did for me, I wouldn't even focus on the herbs as much as the mindset of getting back to foundational basics, where I was blood, sweat and tears, went down to 40 something, low 40s, skin and bone. You're literally ribcage, and you're just like, fully shot, and your body's just gone - and then building that up with something that's half decent. 

So I think it was the, as much as the herbs, I really appreciate Janelle's ability to give me lots more natural yoghurts or berries, or things that were just sustainable, natural foods that gave my body some kind of chance of restoring... if that makes any sense, it kind of...

Ananya 36:33

It makes a lot of sense, yeah.

Michael 36:34

But it's not like a magical... I think a lot of people can think of naturopathy as some kind of magical thing or kind of hippie thing, it's... but I think what I learned from Janelle, it's kind of similar to what we're talking about social media. It's kind of like, I think if you went back a thousand years ago and said everything you know, saying doing naturopathy, that's not neuropathy, that's just life - like, I think a lot of what naturopathy is is just getting back to those foundational areas of eating normal foods that aren't overly processed and manipulated for the masses, and getting back to those basic fundamentals...

Janelle 37:11

Natural, healthy lifestyle.

Michael 37:13

Yeah, and another thing Janelle taught me was the band-aid effect of... you know, it's easy to go to a doctor's and ask for medication. It's harder to look into your childhood. And even when I was case managing back in the day, a lot of it comes down to that - someone standing in front of you every week saying, I'm still anxious, I'm on the medication. In one hand they've got a coffee, and in the other hand they've got a monster power drink. And... I mean, you can say 1000 times, but I know when I was young, I did the same thing. It's like Stuff, it man, like... it's sad how much we don't... does everyone have to get to the state I went through to learn? 

That's my question. Maybe we do... maybe you do. I don't know, but I know Janelle's way of of slow-pace naturopathy, really already sung to me in my 20s, I was already, I think everything you were talking about the philosophical side kind of just danced into natopathy. Because I feel like when I had to deal with my mental health issues and get to a state where I wanted to be free of medication, which I've now been free for 12 years, I feel like that was a shocking process in its own right in my 20s, and maybe I could have chosen to just keep taking medications and trusting the medical profession, but there was just part of me deep down that kept saying, You know what? 

Like, there's more to this, and the more I kind of faced myself and the atrocities of my trauma in my life, the more it just automatically guides towards naturopathy and natural eating. The more it naturally guides to wanting to slow down, the more you do want to visit a beach. So I think, rather than labeling naturopathy, I think it's something that we can appreciate in all areas of our life.

Janelle 38:58

It's true because I mean a big foundation of naturopathy is getting to the root cause of something rather than just dealing with the symptoms of it. And as you know, we would all know that could be many varied factors that then need to be looked into and the time and effort put into actually dealing with those issues at a base level, rather than just trying to deal with the symptoms with a medication or even with a herb, you know.

Ananya 39:27

Yeah, exactly. But I think you're very right in this, in the stripping back, because God knows what, like and how Michael, yours was like, you know, the worst case scenario, in a way. But I'm sure there's a lot of people who experience that, and we just don't know it, right?

Janelle 39:41

Yes, and you never actually then getting to the bottom of why those issues are there in the first place.

Michael 39:46

And then you wonder... why males have midlife crisis [? LAUGHS]. You wonder why teenagers lose the plot. You know, I remember being so swayed at 12, 13, 14, by, you know, gangster rap music, and then you could see the other guys being swayed by metal music and... all those things. And you start losing your relationship with your parents. And I question that. I say, What was it like 1000s of years ago, when a man turned 12, 13 and that was the most intimate times... with their father, where they sat and learnt the trade. They sat with their father and learnt... to work with whatever trade he was doing. And that was a beautiful time where they needed the... and the father was like, You need me, or you're gonna, you're not gonna get into manhood. You're screwed without me. 

So... it's kind of ironic to have a modern day society that rolls their eyes and says, This is how teenage years are. This is... so I guess I had to just smash all that to pieces, otherwise I just wouldn't have... I was the kind of person, if I had've... if I hadn't have looked outside the box, I wouldn't have survived. I would have... been another number. I would be dead, whether it's in my teen years, whether it was in my 20s, whether it was when I was case managing and mental health, whether it was the disability, whether it was now, I think each year of my life, I was lucky to to be so extreme and shocking that I had to look outside the box.

Ananya 40:30

You had to deconstruct from what you've been taught. Throughout our conversations, you brought up the documentary, Roadzoflife, a few times. Did you want to tell the listeners a bit more about it?

Speaker 1 41:27

Well, you could just say one brief thing about the documentary is, it really is a lot of what we've been talking about. You know, it was never set about to be like an anti-pharma thing or anything like that. It's... far more about those sociological and philosophical questions of, who are we as human beings? Obviously Michael experiencing, sorry, excuse me, what he did... I think the documentary started out really as his own creative way of journalling and trying to understand what the heck what he was...

Michael 42:01

What the fuck is happening? (LAUGHS)

Janelle 42:04

This, you know, incredible change in his own identity and trying to process that and understand that. And when you lose everything, including your ability to write and speak, who are you even anymore as a human being? What gives you value? You know, all those kind of questions are really what the foundational message of the documentary is about, and like we've been discussing, you know, the simplicity of life, connecting with nature, connecting with other people, being okay to say It's okay not to be okay... this kind of thing.

Michael 42:40

Or also allowing ... the documentary to be what it is. So I like the idea of... a documentary that documents me over 12 years, collaging this nightmare - kind of the same way we're talking now - and at the end of it saying, Well, fuck it, you as the viewer, have to watch this nightmare of 93 minute bombardment that is going to just push you to the limit, psychologically, emotionally... and then at the end of that 93 minutes, it may allow that viewer to then kind of step back and go, Wow, this life is really serious. It's really messed up, it's really complicated, but it's really beautiful, and...

Ananya 43:18

I really want to watch the documentary. I think it will be really insightful and really confronting as well, which we all need to be confronted a little bit. I think, yeah.

Michael

we were talking at the start, which might be a good way to wrap up, which is that we were talking about how people, it's easy for people to be real and authentic, and it's easy for these things now. And I think my documentary gets lost in that, that... it really is a guy with a camera on a $0 just storming through this chaos and smashing out their recovery in some kind of bizarre art form. And I think it's easier for people to look at that and see it alongside all the other films that are coming out that may replicate these things. 

And people forget how much money and time and planning and how many people actually create most documentaries and films - it normally costs hundreds of 1000s of dollars, it normally costs... there's someone that does so many different areas of the film. And as I was coming out and recovering, I was doing all areas of that. We've done all the marketing. This is us with you guys now, pushing this side of the film. It's absolutely madness. 

So for me, it's that... that's the part. It's not just the film, but it's the back story to who I am and who we are, and how the film was created, that I think gives it its genuineness - and that it kind of shines separately from other films, and allows people to be... to go into the film with that mindset, to go onto the YouTube channel, realising that, so that then you can actually really appreciate the chaos and beauty of how it can really impact you, rather than seeing it as just another entertainment or philosophical thing. I think it's important to know that history. (TRANSCRIPT ENDS AT THIS POINT)