How Chris Powell Survived Drug Addiction And Financial Disaster | Clips | Dad Saves America

0:00 (whooshing) - The first real canyons that I ended up going through in my life, it was actually David, and it was David's family who helped me out. But it was after he'd gone through his transformation. and he and I were like best friends. I ended up herniating a disc in my back, and this is back in 2006. And back in those days, it was like, you know, you pull a muscle, you hurt your back, so a herniated disc is something that's, it's pretty severe. - Yeah.

0:25 - The doctor was like, "Hey, here, take this, you know, for pain. It's called Vicodin." Okay, cool. You know, and sure enough, take a couple of Vicodin. I'm like, "Whoa, man. I'm feeling good. Okay. That's a lot better." - [John] Yeah. - At that time I was like, I've always been a dreamer and I like to create and build and so I, in the process of, you know, David going through his transformation, something that kind of helped teach him the process of nutrition, I invented this nutrition system.

0:50 And it taught people how to eat by colors and numbers. And so I ended up going to a colleague of mine, tooled a factory in China, borrowed a couple of $100,000 and made 12,000 of these things. And I shipped them over. - Wow. - Yeah. Shipped them over. And I'm like, I'm gonna teach the world how to eat, and I'm gonna teach everyone. They're gonna have the tool that they need to finally change their life for good.

1:13 And just this perpetual... I'm a dreamer, but I just didn't understand the business side of anything. And so they ended up shipping this product over and I remember opening up the box. I was at the docks in San Pedro. We shipped it over to a nearby warehouse and I tear open the box and I pulled the first one out, and it, like, falls apart. - Oh. - And immediately, I don't remember all of that moment. I do remember, somehow, like I was on the ground with my hands on the ground, and like, I put my head on the concrete and I just, I remember just feeling the...

1:44 so much weight and just thinking, "I don't know what I'm gonna do now." I was sitting with a container full of a couple of hundred thousand dollars that I had borrowed of product, and I had saved $100,000 training people, so 100K of my own money, 200K of borrowed money. - [John] Wow. - And I just thought, " How am I gonna get myself out of this?" In the process, like, in the midst of that, I was, I mean it was a couple of weeks later, that's when I herniated the disc in my back.

2:11 And it was just... - So you got this, like literal this, well, I guess this is not technically literal, but this giant financial weight, and your hopes, and it's all wrapped up in this, like, vortex, like the abyss moment. - Yes. In the meantime, I'm having panic attacks. So I get a prescription for Vicodin and I get a prescription for Xanax. And I quickly realized that that made the pain go away. And by the way, opioids and benzos, not a good combo.

2:40 Vicodin quickly turned into Percocet. By the way, the doctor wasn't prescribing those anymore. You ask around, you can, back in those days, you could find anything that you wanted really, really quickly. And that turned into Oxycontin. And before I knew it, I was two years severely addicted to painkillers, to opioids. And I ended up, I mean, money was gone, everything that I had saved up. I spent two years running from the people that I had borrowed the money from.

3:05 I was running and running and running. In the meantime, though, you know, painkillers, not only do they kill the physical pain but they also kill the emotional pain. And so it became my escape. So from 2006 to 2008, I was gone. I don't remember much of that window of time. I really don't. It's interesting even trying to go back and remember and tell the story of it. I'm like, I, it's all, it's a big blur. I ended up moving in with a really, a good friend of mine, but unfortunately this good friend of mine was also severely addicted to painkillers.

3:37 And so we had a lot of them coming through our place, and he owned the condo. He was going upside down like I was. And we end up... - No. - I remember one night he ended up getting something called Suboxone which, it blocks the receptors. And so actually if you take opioids it's supposed to make you sick and we were trying to come off of it together. - Oh, okay. And so we're like, "All right, dude, we're gonna do this."

3:59 So he got some Suboxone and it blocked his receptors, and he ended up... his intestines, 'cause, you know, it stops the peristalsis in the intestines. And so you get like backed up, right? - Yeah. - And so his intestines ended up releasing and he had developed all these cysts around his intestines. So he started bleeding out, like right there... - No. - In the living room. And I was like, "Dude, you have to go to the hospital."

4:22 He was like, "No, I can't go to the hospital. My parents are gonna kill me. There's no way." I was like... - So how old are you both at this point? - This is 2008. So I was 30. Here I had gone through this incredible journey, like how David changed his life. At this point, I mean, we had been... his story, it was everywhere, I mean, we had been on "2020" and "Oprah" and everything. And it was like, I was trying to keep it together, but people don't realize...

4:49 And even though, even when I was on the morning news, I was popping Vicodin just to be myself, 'cause you start chasing that. You just, you have to be high just to be yourself because when you're not on it... - Right. - You're in this severe chemical depression. So it was, I was doing that just to get by, and it was just this huge mask of me trying to cover up that my life had completely fallen apart.

5:08 It was just, I was a shell of a human. So my roommate's bleeding out. I finally, we get him to go to the hospital, and I'm just seeing him laying on this gurney just writhing in pain, also because he's detoxing off of these painkillers. And I'm still high on 'em right now, thinking, "I'm done, I'm done with this." And so, I don't recommend this. I should have sought help for this. But I was like, "I'm going cold turkey."

5:32 I came back. He owned the condo. He was, he hadn't paid rent on it for I can't tell you how long. So he's like in the hospital, he's like, "I don't know what to do. You gotta find a place to live." I'm like, "I don't have a place to live. I don't have any money. I'm out." He was letting me live there rent free. Packed everything in my duffle bag. The next door neighbor saw the whole thing happen.

5:49 He knew what was going on with us. And he said, "Hey, why don't you come crashing in my..." - So you were basically homeless at this point. - I'm, I got no place to go. And so the next door neighbor, nicest guy, his name is Dave. And he's like, "Hey, why don't you crash in my guest room for a minute, you need to." Because he knew I was gonna, I was gonna grind it out. So he let me stay in his guest room for about two weeks while I detoxed.

6:11 - Wow. - It was a rough three days coming out of it. - And then, from there I was like, "Dave, thanks so much. I don't wanna be a burden anymore. I'm gonna call around and start sleeping on couches." And so that's what I did. Started calling close friends, started sleeping on couches around town, kind of figuring out what I was gonna do. I ran out to California. I was staying on my friend's couch in California for a little while.

6:30 So I was bouncing around on couches from, for about three months. I thought I was gonna run away and like, you know, solve my problems. At least I don't have to face the people I owe money to. It was actually in LA when I realized I gotta get... I got myself into this. That was the big wake-up call. It was just, it was the fact that I was so busy, especially when I was high on opioids, I was so busy pointing the finger at everyone else.

6:53 It was, "My intentions were good, I did it the right way. Everyone else screwed me over. It's your fault. It's your fault. It's your fault." I was so busy pointing the finger at everybody. And you know, I finally woke up on my friend's couch with a chihuahua licking my face. And I always slept there... like she had like three chihuahuas. I woke up and I was like, "It's my fault." - [John] Hm. - "I got myself here and there's only one person in this world that's gonna get me out of it.

7:18 Damn. All right, let's go." Pulled up my pants. - This is such a... - So, and I was like, let's go. - This is such a big thing because it's like this victimhood mentality is everywhere now. - [Chris] Mm-hm. - And some of it can be useful to understand like, well, what is going out there in the world that impacts your life? But I've never met anybody who improved themselves by not recognizing that it's within themselves to do it.

7:39 But that, and instead is always pointing outside. - It's impossible. You cannot. And in fact, that's one of my rules with transformation. If someone comes to me and they want to change their life, they have to take responsibility for all of their actions that got them there. Not for the trauma, but for their reaction to it. And you're right, you cannot change, you cannot transform your life in any sense, by any stretch of the imagination, whether it's physically, whether it's your career, whether it's your relationship.

8:05 If you don't take responsibility for your role in it and that's, you can't change victims, at all, period. I refuse to even take on someone if they cannot get themselves out of that role because I am no good. I am not a coach to that individual. I'm just another person sitting in the room that they can start telling their story to, looking for some sort of feedback, like "Oh, I'm really sorry. Oh, I'm really sorry." That doesn't help anyone change. You have to own it.

8:28 (whooshing) - If you enjoyed this clip, we've got more where that came from. Be sure to check out my full conversation with Chris Powell. And one of the best ways you can help support us is to subscribe to the channel so you won't miss our interviews and short videos as they come out each week. (whooshing)