What Was That Like - True Stories. Real People.

I’ve been friends with Sue for several years, so I know what she’s like. And after you hear the conversation I had with Sue recently, you’ll have a pretty good idea too. I hope you’re ready. October 24, 2015 – Sue was with her daughter Jessica, who was 14 years old at the time, and her friend Elise. Sue and Elise were skydiving buddies, and they were doing what they often did on a beautiful Saturday morning – they were going to go jump out of a plane. Since she was 14, Jessica wasn’t yet old enough to jump – but she just liked being with her mom and hanging out at the drop zone. The weather was beautiful, and everything was going fine, until Sue got to about 5000 feet. She tried to make a quick turn just before landing, and things went terribly wrong. The thing about Sue is, she has a heart full of compassion and love like few people I know. And even though she was on the ground, unable to move, with broken bones and in just excruciating pain, her primary concern was for her daughter – she didn’t want Jessica to see her in pain and be traumatized by that. Obviously, Sue survived. And wait til you hear what she’s done since then. Link: Sue's blog post about that day Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In the United States, 1 out of 3 women have experienced some form of physical violence by an intimate partner. Alyssa Moore WAS that one out of three. Alyssa lives in Tennessee, and she’s a musician, a songwriter, and an audio engineer. She was also a victim of physical and emotional abuse from her boyfriend, Jared McLemore. One day, at her request, police put out a warrant for his arrest. That night, while she was at work setting up audio at a bar called Murphy’s (in midtown Memphis), Alyssa got a notification on her phone that Jared was doing a Facebook Live video. What she didn’t realize is that Jared was doing this just outside the bar where she was working. Within a few minutes, Jared had covered himself in gasoline, and set himself on fire. Hundreds of people saw it live on Facebook. Alyssa saw it live in person. Jared died shortly after that from his injuries. Alyssa told me about Jared, what drew her to him, about their relationship, and how she handled his death. And how she is enjoying her new sense of freedom. In the video below, you can see the Facebook Live video that Jared created that night. This video will not be suitable for everyone, so view it at your own discretion. https://www.liveleak.com/view?t=dcc_1494654611 Below are some of the resources that Alyssa talks about that are available to help domestic violence victims. Domestic Violence statistics, compiled by the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence: https://ncadv.org/statistics National Domestic Violence Hotline: https://www.thehotline.org/ National Network to End Domestic Violence: https://nnedv.org/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On November 29, 2018, 50 year old Andrew Bush of College Station, Texas was driving his white Dodge Charger. Up ahead was a red light. Cars were stopped, waiting for the light to change, and one of those vehicles was a Ford pickup truck in the left turn lane. Witnesses say Bush didn’t even brake before slamming into the back of that truck. The driver of the pickup truck was 20 year old Zane Wallace, a Texas A&M college student, who was with his girlfriend Mackenzie. They were shaken up but not seriously injured. Zane got out of the truck to check on the driver of the car that just hit them. And that’s where our story today really begins. Zane had a day he’ll never forget. As you listen to my conversation with Zane, I think you’ll get the same impression I did when we were talking. He’s a good kid, very polite and respectful. And throughout this whole ordeal, his concern was not for himself, even though it was his life that was in danger that day. Instead, he was concerned for the safety of his girlfriend, and the welfare of the driver of the car that hit them. I like Zane and I think he has a great future ahead of him. The incident that Zane told me about was caught on video by someone nearby who happened to think quickly and hit “record” on his phone. This is his video: https://youtu.be/qTpd4_kjofk Also, at the beginning of the episode, I mentioned a Saturday Night Live parody sketch that poked fun at the old TJ Hooker show, which starred William Shatner. Here’s that video: https://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/tj-hooker/n9514 And if you don’t already follow me on Instagram, you really should. I post something new there every day, @WhatWasThatLike. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Every year, thousands of people all over the world go hang gliding. Some people are experienced and pretty serious about the sport, and they own their own gliders and other equipment. And there are others who are just kind of curious about what it feels like to soar through the air silently, with the only sound being the wind in your face. Chris was in that second category. He and his wife Gail live here in Florida, and they were vacationing in Switzerland recently, and they booked a hang gliding adventure. And since neither of them had ever done any hang gliding, they would each have their own pilot who would be handling the glider. So two hang gliders – Gail and her pilot in one, and Chris with his pilot in the other one. They climb to the top of a big hill, and Christ gets his harness on just as instructed. When the wind is just right, he and his pilot go running down the hill and within seconds they are airborne and gaining altitude quickly. Only one problem – Chris was not attached in any way to the hang glider. The pilot had somehow forgotten that critical part of the process. So Chris is literally hanging by his hands while they’re thousands of feet in the air, as the pilot tries desperately to land as quickly as he can. Makes you want to go hang gliding, right? Chris had his GoPro camera attached to the back of the glider so you can see the whole thing as it happens, in this video: https://youtu.be/dLBJA8SlH2w In our conversation for the podcast, Chris told me the whole story. He’s really lucky to be alive. And he answered my big question – does he want to hang gliding again? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Four years ago, Jannike felt like a failure in every area of her life. She could not envision her circumstances getting any better, so she made the decision to end her life. She wrote good-bye letters to her siblings and her four children, then she went out after dark one night, found a railroad track to lie down on, and waited for the next train. Today, she’s a much happier person and loves her life. In our conversation, Jannike told me about that night on the train track, why her life did not end then, and what she did to overcome her problem and become someone who enjoys each day. You can see pictures of her, as well as lots of other thought-provoking content, on my Instagram, which is @whatwasthatlike. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Our story today takes place on the west coast of Finland. January 5, 2017 was a sunny winter day. And it was also very cold: -4 degrees Fahrenheit, which is -20 degrees Celsius. That day, there was a woman who was at home, but outside. She was looking west, out over the Gulf of Bothnia – the body of water that separates Finland’s west coast from Sweden’s east coast. It’s about 60-70 miles across, and the surface is frozen in the winter. As she is looking out over that ice-covered body of water, she sees a person skiing across the ice – about 500 yards away from land. And during that brief time that she’s looking that direction, she sees that person drop right through the ice into the water. The person she saw go through the ice was an 18-year-old man named Matt. That was a pretty scary day for Matt. He could have died that day, but he didn’t. Thankfully he survived, and he told me exactly what happened that day. I hope you enjoy it. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jeremy lives near Corpus Christi, Texas with his wife Jennifer. In May of 2018, just a few months ago, they experienced a day that neither of them will ever forget. This was on a Sunday, about 10:30 in the morning, and they were getting ready for a family barbecue that was going to happen at their house that afternoon. Jennifer was working in their rock garden, and came across an aggressive snake. But it wasn’t just any snake – this was a Western Diamondback rattlesnake. She called out for Jeremy, and he quickly got a shovel and swung down on the snake, and chopped off its head. And of course, if that were the end of the story, it wouldn’t really be much of a story, right? A few minutes later, Jennifer is about to let the dogs out in the yard, so Jeremy knows he needs to dispose of the dead snake. As he reaches for a nearby stick, the severed head of that rattlesnake jumps toward him and bites down on his right hand. Jeremy immediately yelled for Jennifer that he’s been bit, and he struggles to pry open the jaws of the snake to get it off his hand – all the while feeling the pulsation of the deadly venom that’s being pumped into him. Jennifer called 911 and they got in the car to meet the ambulance a couple of miles down the road, just to save some time. I’ll let Jeremy tell it, but what I find fascinating about this story is how life can end so suddenly and without warning. I mean, Jeremy was just doing routine yard work on a Sunday morning, and literally within 15 or 20 minutes, he’s waiting for an ambulance to show up, and he’s thinking there’s a good chance he’s about to die, and he’s saying his last goodbyes to his wife and daughter. Just incredible. Partway through the conversation we’ll hear from Jennifer, and the fact that she’s a nurse I think played a big part in Jeremy being able to survive this. If you want to contact Jeremy, his email is [email protected]. And you can see additional pictures about this story on my Instagram, which is @WhatWasThatLike. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What you’re about to read is based on a criminal complaint and investigation. All suspects are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. This happened in Waldo, Wisconsin. Thursday, September 27, 2018. Just after lunchtime, around 1 pm. Dean Hoffman entered the home of his former girlfriend, whose name I’m not going to mention. He was not invited in; he came in without permission. She told him to leave, and she started to call the police. He stopped her from calling, grabbed her by the waist, and pushed her backwards into the stairs that led to the second floor. He pulled her hair, ripped her shirt, and dragged her up the stairs. He punched her, causing a bloody nose and a black eye. He locked them both in the bathroom for about a half hour while she tended to her bloody nose. Then he tied her up, and kept her from leaving her own house for the next several hours. He even used HER phone to text her children, who lived nearby, telling them that she was sick and not to visit for a few days. Then he made a mistake. He ordered a pizza from Dominos. The delivery driver that brought the pizza was Joey Grundl. While the suspect was checking the pizza, Joey was able to make eye contact with the victim, and she communicated with him silently that she needed help. And because Joey was alert and willing to help, the story has a happy ending. The woman is safe, and Dean Hoffman is behind bars. Pretty exciting night for a guy who expected to just bring some food and collect some money. Like most people who are in some kind of situation like this, he said he doesn’t consider himself a hero. But he is. And check this out – not long after this happened, Joey was at a Taylor Swift concert and she actually recognized him from when she saw this story on the news, because on the news story he was wearing some Taylor Swift merch. He was invited backstage after the concert and got to meet her. That story is here. If you’d like to contact Joey and congratulation him on his quick thinking, you can contact him at [email protected]. And if you want to get some really cool content on a regular basis, including a photo of Joey when he met Taylor Swift, follow me on Instagram, @whatwasthatlike. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The story you’re about to hear, I love it and I think you will too. It’s about two people. One of them is Tiffany, who is a probation officer. That means she sometimes works in a courtroom. The other person is Brett. Brett and Tiffany started dating a couple of years ago and ended up falling in love with each other. So recently, it came time for Brett to pop that all-important question. And even though they had talked about marriage, so it was already on both of their minds, Brett wanted to propose in such a way that it would take Tiffany completely by surprise. I think it’s safe to say he succeeded. Brett conspired with some of Tiffany’s co-workers from the courthouse, including the judge, and came up with a plan. He would be dressed in a prisoner jumpsuit, handcuffed, and brought in to the courtroom by deputies to appear before the judge. And Tiffany would have a front-row seat to see it all happen. And the nice thing is, the whole thing was recorded so YOU can see how it happened too. A couple of videos are below. I love a great prank, and to me, a great prank has to have a couple of elements. First, it has to be something that is planned out in detail. And second, it has to be one that has everyone feeling good about it afterward. This one definitely is both. I talked with Brett about how he planned this, how he worked with the people at the courthouse, how he felt when it was actually happening, and the publicity it has received. People really love this story. And I also got some insight from Tiffany about what was going through her mind as the whole thing played out right in front of her. If you want to contact Brett, he can be reached at [email protected]. Video #1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=btVOMXooNT4 Video #2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g_ruKBfNpyM Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On the night of October 1, 2017, 64 year old Stephen Paddock opened fire from his room on the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay hotel in Las Vegas. He was able to fire over 1100 rounds in just 10 minutes time, from 10:05 pm to 10:15 pm. His target was the crowd of 22,000 people in the open field below his room. These people were attending the final night of the 3-day Route 91 Harvest Music festival. Country singer Jason Aldean was performing when the shooting began. The end result was that 851 people were injured, and 58 people died. This incident is the deadliest mass shooting committed by an individual in the history of the country. The shooter also shot and killed himself, so the motive for the killing will probably never be known. But this story isn’t about the cowardly killer. It’s about a young lady named Kami. Kami lives in California, about 4 hours away from Las Vegas, and she was at the Harvest Festival with her parents, and her husband Eli. She was there when the shooting began. She saw the terror on people’s faces as they ran for safety, and she saw the unfortunate ones that didn’t make it. And here’s another critical fact that will be an important part of Kami’s story. She was at the festival for all three days. Day 3 is when the shooting took place. On day 1, she learned that she was pregnant. Route 91 Harvest Festival (Wikipedia) To contact Kami: [email protected] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Vincent lives and works in Chicago as a photojournalist. He takes a lot of pictures, and a lot of those pictures include crime scenes. In his line of work, he’s used to getting the call, and going to where the news is happening. But there was one night when he didn’t have to go anywhere. The crime scene was just outside his front door. That was the night 17 year old Michael Patton was gunned down during a thunderstorm. Vincent heard the shots, and ran outside while his wife called 911. The teenager had been shot in the chest and in the head, and he died while Vincent held his hand. We talked about Vincent’s perspective on this experience, both as a photographer and journalist, and as a father. An experience like this is certainly something that none of us wants to go through. If you’d like to contact Vincent, or see some of his photography, you can do so by checking out a project he’s currently working on, called Lost Americana. You can see that at lostamericana.com. Vincent also wrote an article for the Chicago Sun-Times about this incident. I’ll have a link to that in the show notes for this episode, at whatwasthatlike.com/07 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Have you ever thought about what it would be like to lose one of your legs? I think just about everyone just takes their legs for granted. We’ve always had them, they get us where we need to go, they just do their job. Until they don’t. My guest on the show today is Josh. He was in the Army and stationed in Iraq, and he worked as a gunner inside an Abrams tank. One day his tank parked over a roadside bomb, and there was an explosion that destroyed the tank, along with Josh’s left foot. Josh told me the whole story, from the moment it happened, to somehow exiting the tank and getting to safety, his multiple surgeries, and his decision to finally just amputate and be done with it. He talked about prosthetics and what it was like to put that on for the first time, and what he is able to do. And Josh also has some advice for other vets and amputees about how he has dealt with this situation. He’s come a long way. Some of the things we discussed: The M1 Abrams tank: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M1_Abrams Soldier’s Angels: https://soldiersangels.org/ David Baldacci: https://davidbaldacci.com/ Josh’s email address: [email protected] To see pictures of Josh as well as the destroyed tank, you can follow me on Instagram at https://Instagram.com/whatwasthatlike Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What kind of person gives one of his own kidneys to a total stranger? Well, you’re about to find out. Mark works as an attorney here in the Tampa Bay area so he’s actually not too far from where I live, but that’s actually just a coincidence. I heard about his story and contacted him because I knew it would be interesting, and I had lots of questions for him. I wanted to know how he found out about this person who needed a kidney, if they actually met in person, and what lead him to make the decision to actually do something like this for someone he didn’t even know. I also wanted to ask him about his own risk assessment – since he only has one kidney himself now, what if that one fails? What if HE needs a kidney later on. We also talked about the actual process – the testing, the surgery, the recovery, all the details. So if you’ve ever thought about donating a kidney to someone, this will give you the kind of overall information about what you might expect. If you want to contact Mark, his email address is [email protected]. Other resources: How kidney chain donating works Living Kidney Donor Network National Kidney Center Tampa General Hospital Living Kidney Donor Program (outside of the Tampa Bay area, contact your local hospital to ask about their own kidney donor program) Animated video of how a kidney is put in the recipient There’s a huge need for this, and most of us are walking around with the ability to literally save someone’s life. For me, it’s just kind of hard to ignore that, especially after this conversation. I definitely learned a few things, and I hope you do too. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Have you ever had one of those moments in your life where your life just changed dramatically? Like, your life is suddenly divided into two chapters – before that moment, and after that moment. Well, that’s the kind of moment Justin had recently. Justin was adopted the day after he was born. So he never knew his birth mother. He was adopted immediately into a loving family who gave him a wonderful childhood and a great start in life. And now he’s 26 years old and making a life of his own, but he always wondered about his birth mother, and he searched and searched for her. And at the same time, she was wondering about him, and hoping they would eventually connect again. Then, just a couple of months ago, they finally found each other. This is the story of how that happened. I’m not really gonna tell you a lot here ahead of time, because Justin tells the story himself so wonderfully. But I do want to let you know a couple of things. Just to keep the names straight, Justin’s birth mother’s name is Heather. His adoptive mother’s name is Sandy. So birth mother Heather, adoptive mother Sandy. And the other thing is this. Partway through the interview, I kind of surprised Justin with something. Before he and I talked, I got in touch with Heather, his birth mom, and she recorded an audio message to him for me to play during our conversation. Justin wasn’t aware of that until I told him, while we were talking. You’re gonna love it. A big part of the reason Justin wanted to come on the podcast is to encourage other people who have been adopted to try to find their birth parents or other biological family members. It’s true it might be a little scary because you don’t really know what’s gonna happen, but Justin says you should still take that step and make the effort to do it. If you want to get in touch with Justin, I’ll have his email in the show notes for today’s episode, which is at whatwasthatlike.com/04. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this episode, we’re talking with Samantha. And that’s not her real name, by the way. She has an interesting story, and it has to do with a medical condition that she’s had since childhood. Samantha has hyper insomnia. I’m sure you already know about insomnia. Maybe you actually experience it from time to time. But what Samantha has is HYPER insomnia. That’s more than just trouble sleeping sometimes. For her, it means that she typically goes about 8 days at a time without having any sleep. Can you imagine going more than a week with no sleep? In this conversation, we talked about the medical aspect of it and what’s actually going on. She also has some other medical issues that kind of complicate things. I also asked her the question she probably gets asked more than any other – what do you do with all that extra awake time? We talked about the advantages, and the disadvantages, of this particular condition. And I also asked her, “If there were a cure for this, would you accept it?” There are some online resources available to learn more about hyper insomnia, and Samantha also has a blog where she talks about it in detail. I’ll have those links in the show notes for this episode, which is at whatwasthatlike.com/03. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Luke remembers that day in January of 2016 pretty vividly. He was 23 years old, recently graduated from college with a degree in engineering, had his whole life ahead of him. On that particular day, he was in Ft Lauderdale, Florida and he went into a Subway fast food restaurant and bought a couple of bottles of water. He was feeling very sick, and he knew exactly why he was sick, and it wasn’t food poisoning. He knew that the awful feeling in his gut was because a little rubber packet had burst inside his stomach, and some very high quality cocaine was now flooding into his insides. Shortly after this happened, he would be in a coma, and he was in that comatose state for 10 days. As you might imagine, Luke has a pretty interesting story to tell. And we talked about every detail. He told me about why he made the decision to travel to Panama in order to smuggle cocaine into the US. How he researched it and planned the whole process, even though he had never done anything like this before. What it was like to be in a coma, and what it was like to come OUT of a coma. And then, the next sort of chapter in his big adventure – going to prison, and how he was able to get through that. What you’re going to notice about Luke is that he’s no dummy. He’s very intelligent and well spoken, and he has a really positive outlook on life. He also has a lot of confidence in himself and his abilities, and although usually self confidence is a GOOD character trait, in this case it was partly to blame for him making the bad decision to make some quick money. He figured, high risk, high reward, but he also did as much as he could to minimize his risk. But… it just didn’t work out the way he expected it to. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

October 4, 2016 - For Jennifer and her husband Chris, and their 4 children, it was just a regular Tuesday. Up until around 8 pm that evening. Jen was driving home and she had their two daughters in the car, ages 12 and 4. Jen stopped at a stop sign, and then proceeded into the intersection without seeing the motorcycle that was approaching on her left. The motorcycle hit her car, and with that collision, the lives of two families were forever changed. David, the driver of the motorcycle, was taken to the hospital, where he died two days later. In my conversation with Jen, we talk about a lot of different aspects of what happened. She told me a little of what life was like before the accident, and she described what happened from the moment of impact and the hours and days that followed. We discussed her feelings of guilt at being responsible for the death of a person, her overwhelming sadness that it happened, her fear of what was going to happen to her from a legal or criminal standpoint, and what happened when she had a chance encounter with one of David’s friends. She also talked about what she’s doing today to help others who have found themselves in similar situations. There’s actually an acronym for someone who has gone through this. That person is called a CADI. That’s spelled CADI, and it stands for Caused Accidental Death or Injury. You’ll hear Jen use that acronym during our conversation so I wanted to let you know what it is ahead of time. For people that have caused the accidental death of a person, there are resources available and I’ll have those listed in the show notes for this episode, at whatwasthatlike.com/01. Also, a warning. Around 14 minutes into our conversation, you’ll also hear the actual recording of the 911 call that Jen made at the time of the accident. In the beginning she’s on the phone with the 911 operator, then she hands the phone to a man who was also on the scene, and he talks to the operator briefly. Following that is a second brief 911 call from a female. Again, this is about 14 minutes into our conversation, so if you might find the intensity of that audio to be upsetting, you can fast forward about 4 minutes to skip past that. One of the takeaways from this conversation is that it’s good to see things from a different perspective. You know we hear about accidents like this almost every day, and it’s really easy to assume that the person is just some selfish jerk who was talking on their phone, or texting, or just not paying attention, even though we really don’t know what actually happened. Sometimes those assumptions are true, but not always. Today we get to hear the other side of that story. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is a summary of what to expect for the What Was That Like podcast. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices