Category Archives: Sickness

Surviving Storms with your partner is a double obstacle because you have to hope you will have the support when you need it the most!

Managing storms in your Life have their new paths, new decisions and new attitude. Our interview with Mike Daly, is outstanding and explicit journey of the United States Air Force, a Lawyer, of course a Cancer survivor. Yes, that is definitely part of the journey too that left Mike legally deaf.

“Love him and let him love you. Do you think anything else under heaven really matters?” – James Baldwin

“In his iconic novel Giovanni’s Room, gay author James Baldwin makes a powerful statement about love. He proclaims that sex and gender don’t matter; all that matters is that two people love each other. Nothing should stand in their way if they have love in their hearts. These words resonated with millions of people who felt like their emotions were invalid because of the gender of the object of their love. With this quote, Baldwin assured them that it didn’t matter because love is love.”

Our story today is called Surviving storms with my partner. And we are going to bring Mike Daly in from Connecticut. And what a wonderful, inspiring story. Especially this month of June, I feel that it’s super important to talk about these things.

Because we don’t always just have one storm that we have happened in our lives. We feel we’re Superman, but we’re really not. But we think we are. And I would like to you know, we just we just think it’s it won’t happen to me. We we don’t prepare for the unexpected. We truly we weren’t prepared for the pandemic. We weren’t prepared for wildfires or hurricanes. When we’re given you know that five minute evacuation notice. It’s unbelievable to you know, what do I take what what do I What do we do next?

Yeah, it’s crazy. And I’ve been in that five minute evacuation. Notice, and it really is life changing. Um, you know, I just wanted to mention your backup plan puts your life all in one place everything that’s all up in your head into one place in case of any unpredictable circumstance. And that takes that aftermath, a painful Aftermath out of a tragedy because you’re prepared and you don’t have to worry. And you don’t have to stress. Yeah. So I’d like to welcome our listeners, our listeners.

So I would like to welcome our wonderful Connecticut guest today. It is going to be very, very huge because Mike didn’t have just one storm hit his life. He had many. And we are going to bring him on right now.

Hey, Mike. Hi, how’s everybody doing today? Awesome. Awesome. I’m just gonna give here a little introduction to every all our listeners here. So Mike comes to us from beautiful Connecticut. And I would like just a second. He has an outstanding, and he has an explicit journey that he talks about with the United States Air Force. He is a lawyer, a pilot, of course, a cancer survivor. And yes, definitely part of the journey that left him legally deaf. And I can’t believe how many storms you have managed. Mike. Unbelievable. Do you want to tell our listeners how this all started? where it began for you?

Well, it kind of was, you know, we have a plan, or we think we have a plan or people have a plan for us. So the plan was graduate high school, and go to college and being from I was born and raised in New York, all of the Irish kids in New York, where do you go to college, you go to Florida, and offline. first cousins went to come. And of course, I was going to follow those steps. Until I realized I didn’t want to go to Fordham. So the first thing was I went home and I broke news to my parents that I didn’t want to Fordham, which was the first storm. And little did, I realized that wasn’t even a storm, the best was yet to come. So when I finally convinced them that a college education was better than no college education, they agreed that I could go to a State University in New York. And then I came home and I told you that I had decided that I wasn’t going to go to college because I was going to get married.

Surviving Storms with your partner and that was the said, that was the big storm. So the question, of course, then became, how is it that you are going to do this? And I said, Well, I’m gonna enlist in the military, which was not wasn’t planned, it was seven days, Southeast Asia was still an issue when it was difficult, you know, my parents weren’t, you know, particularly thrilled at the prospect of you know, their eldest son, enlisting in the military and perhaps finding himself in Southeast Asia.

So my father said to me, which is one of the things that has stuck with me through my entire journey was, acts have consequences. And if you take the action, know that the whatever comes from that you are responsible for, you have to dress good, bad or indifferent. And one of the things that he had said was, this is the day that you go to college. So if you’re looking for a college education, go now, because you have two sisters that have a brother, that’s 14 years younger than you. So I have three additional children to educate, and two weddings to pay for, because with that switch you did back in the day. And so if you don’t go now, don’t come home thinking that you can say, Okay, I want to go to college now. Because your decision not to go now means that when you’re ready to go, you figure it out. But so that was the first thing I didn’t have a plan for.

So I went into the military. My father didn’t give me some good advice. He said to me, you know, the military might not be your career. So make sure you figure out what you’re there, you’re going to have them teach you so that you have a skill that translates when you come out, which was sort of interesting, because I got involved with telecommunications and air to ground communications.

I was very fortunate that I was trained and my background investigation came back clear. And I was able to get into air to ground communications for the National Emergency airborne command post an Air Force One. So I got excellent training. I had a skill that that was that translated. And ultimately I was stationed back in Washington DC working on presidential communications. When my I stepping back before I went to, so I got after I got my training. The wedding was being planned. And that wedding plan didn’t go particularly well and it became apparent that I’m at the ripe old age of eight 18 I was not ready to be married. And so we broke off the engagement. sort of interesting because now my plan has changed, my life has changed.

And again, I don’t have necessarily have a plan because this wasn’t how it was supposed to be. But I mean, the best of it. And I certainly not consider not getting married a storm, especially as things begin to unfold. But it was different, it was different than I wasn’t prepared. So I found myself at 18 years old, being stationed at what they considered a remote base in Germany, where there was no barracks, there was no housing, I didn’t speak German, and I had to buy a car and I had to find an apartment and I had to learn to grocery shop, because the closest based was about an hour away.

But you figure it out, but you figure it out. Guess as I went through, I go through life, finding out more and more that I can hold on to that actions have consequences. But I, but that, but only enables me to say, Okay, this happened now. And what am I gonna do? I have never really reached the point where I need to have an action plan. There’s never been a decision if this if then. So I made the best of it. I had a great career, I got that as transferred back to Washington, DC, and I met somebody. And it was a man. And I started to come to terms with emotions that I didn’t really understand. But I did know, that couldn’t stay in the military. Because back in the 70s, the theory was if you were in the military, and you were gay, you were considered a national security. And who’s going to because national security risk then somebody who’s working on presidential communications and national airborne, emergency everyone command plus communications, but me.

So I felt like I had a target on my back. So again, we’re faced with a change in plan. Thanks to my dad, I did. I didn’t necessarily have a plan for what he do next. But I was prepared for whatever happens next, because he encouraged me to not look at the military as a career in case I wanted the ability to go out. Well, as I was getting out, Mike.
Yeah. Is it is it different now in United States Air Force?

I don’t I you know, it goes back and forth. You know, I’ve understand they’ve had the don’t ask, don’t tell policy. So you could stay in and as long as you didn’t advertise the fact your sexuality, and nobody was allowed to ask you about your sexuality. And I understand that under the Trump administration, they changed it so that it was not as as open and affirming. And quite frankly, oh, but there, yeah, it’s up. But right. Yeah, you’re back. There you go.

Okay. Switch it a little bit to your right. My right. Here, no, your left. Better. There you go. I can see your head. Right. There’s my symbol in the corner. And it’s right in your eye there. So yeah. There we go. There we go. You’re back. So you think, yeah, there you go. You think it’s different now?
I think it probably is a little bit different. I mean, back in the 70s, it was an absolute. So when I wasn’t going to stick around long enough to find whether this was a passing phase, or for real or not. I mean, I had gone in thinking that I was signed all the paperwork and everything. And suddenly, you know, you meet somebody and everything turns upside down.

So do you think these feelings just really like they came out of nowhere and you weren’t really sure you weren’t understanding yourself? Is that part of the problem?

I think? Well, I think part of the problem was was that I wasn’t understanding myself. Part of the problem was, you know, I had never considered it. I don’t remember, particularly being attractive. Certainly not that I can recall being attracted to men when I was like in high school or anything, whether that was my own fear, my refusal to acknowledge it, or just I’m not but It was never anything that I addressed or was concerned with, right or dictating, you know, did I, you know, was any good, what I suppose a good relationship, I was thinking that I was going to spend the rest of my life with this person. And it was, you know, and it was a traditional, you know, was a woman relationship, right.

So, it wasn’t until I, you know, I spent two years in Germany on my own, I, and I dated, and then I went, I was transferred to NBC. And I dated, and I met somebody that big I became friends with that just led me to have a different set of emotion, not understand what was happening to me, knowing that it wasn’t a one afternoon or a one week thing, it was an issue that, that that remained at the forefront caused me a lot of concern, both because I didn’t know how to deal with it. Plus, know if it was reciprocal. And honestly, at that point in time, I didn’t know how to find out it was. So but I did know that it was occupying enough of my time, and thoughts to be taken seriously, which meant that I didn’t believe that I had a future in the military.

I despite the fact as I made the decision to leave the military. People saying to me, but you know, Mike, you know, you’ve got good career I was, I was young, I was in a very a field where I’ve always going to be comfortable a field that I knew where I could be answered, I had been promoted. as quickly as possible, I had made all my promotions The first time I was eligible. So from both a career advancement perspective, as well as a technical perspective, and and I had started to go to college, when I was in Washington, DC I was taken, like I said, University of Maryland, everything seemed on track, but for this other feelings, this other feeling. And it actually was and and the other overriding theme in life is everybody’s named Mike.

So my name is Mike, the gentleman that I found myself wanting to be romantically involved with his name was Mike. And it was his father that actually gives me my gives rise to my second monitor. So his father, I, who I met a bunch of times, couldn’t understand why I wanted to get out the military. And I couldn’t tell them, you know, what am I supposed to say, you know, I think I might have a crush on your son. Yeah, just kind of puts me in this awkward position. You know, so you can’t say that. But you know, so basically, he said, What are you going to do? And I said, I’m finished my degree. And who knows, maybe I’ll go to graduate, maybe I’ll go to law school. And then I immediately said to him, but people like me, don’t go to law school. So I’ll probably just get my degree and get a job and do something. So he said to me, you know, what do you mean, people like you, you don’t go to law school. He said, when you’re my age. And you said yourself, she was I wonder why I go to law school.

He said, I just I said, he said, I want you to just get up and go and look in the mirror? Because there’s your answer. Because the only thing stopping you from doing anything is yourself. And when you accomplish something, I want you to get up when you say, Gee, I wonder how I how that happened? Or how I did that, or anything you need to happen. Go look at me, again. Because there’s your answer, you get it. So I had both of these ideas, you know, actions have consequences, which I to heart. And then if you don’t do something or do accomplish something, it’s because you did it or you told yourself you couldn’t do it. But there was some there was still though, if you tried and there was never a discussion if you try and it doesn’t work out, whether because the person in the mirror I can control the outcome which I found out later on, or you know, the need for a backup plan.

So despite the fact that my everything in my life kept changing, I recognize that the action or the change had a consequence. I and I would also recognize that I’m responsible for it. But with that yet and figure out okay, what’s the next step? So I came out of the military and I got a job working for American Airlines. And it was it was was a good ride me while I was there, I came to terms with what I was feeling, realized that I was in fact gay.
A little bit, it gave me a little bit of space to, to allow your career to continue, but allow space for your emotions and feelings to figure out where you’re at with that.

And it was actually kind of funny, because I had a meeting room, there was no pressure, there was no pressure to date, there was no pressure for to not D, I could just be open to the stability. And I was able to support myself. So I was in a position where I could continue my education. And I could move forward with my life in whatever direction it went, still not having a plan. So I met somebody whose name also is Mike. And we, we dated for many, many months before I could even decide what it was that I wanted to do that I could be sure that this was what I wanted. He Fortunately, he was very patient. That was kind of our first storm. You know, I mean, I think many times were scratching his head saying, you know, what are we doing with this lunatic who can’t make up his mind about anything? You obviously have a thing for Mike’s. Oh, that I mean, that’s, you know, every pretty buddy was Mike. But, you know, fortunately, he he was patient, he dealt with me, he kind of waited until I sort of figured things out. I was ready to make make the move, and it would go now looking back 43 years later, it obviously was the right.

You know, we were supposed to be together because, you know, he became my support, I became his support. And we decided to make a certain commitment. Um, and it’s, it’s, it’s interesting, because when we made that commitment, we also that was probably the only time in my life I’ve had a plan. Because what we did was we bought one and bought a second home. And he went through all of the legal mechanics that we needed to go to to be to be sure that we could, if there was an illness, we had access to each other that we were able to make decisions with respect to each other’s care. We could make decisions with respect to each other’s finances as well as own. We both had conversations with our families. So interestingly enough, not about the nature of our relationship, just the fact that we had invested together and everything. And we, so if anything happened, nobody’s family should expect anything, because everything was going to the other. And it was sort of interesting, because my parents never asked any questions needed. Hey, the two families came together like any other relationship. Mike’s Mike’s folks and Mike were so good that my parents table for all of my for both my sister and my brother’s weddings.

Surviving Storms with your partner is a whole bunch of obstacles like when my parents became friends with his parents, we spent holidays together. And nobody ever nobody ever asked any questions about what the needs are really, two boys, everybody just accepted it. So from that respect, I think I was pretty lucky because it was one big change in my life that I didn’t have to plan for. Because I know so many people that have had, you know, issues with their family issues with their sibling issues with their social network and everything. And you know, Mike and I were pretty charmed, our parents accepted us they know, we made the decision. When we bought a home, we were going to tell people that we had separate rooms or anything, we weren’t going to advertise the situation to the neighbors into the community, a large book, we weren’t going to deny it. And we weren’t going to talk about going away with someone or doing something with someone it was always Mike and Mike. And if people chose to question us, we would answer them. And if people chose not to question, we were going to let them accept whatever was going on in their own terms. So it was sort of interesting, because neither nobody in either family ever asked anything.

SAME SEX PARTNERS

That’s really nice. Isn’t that when you think about it, because there’s so many family I mean, who doesn’t have family issues? Right. Right. So especially with same sex partnerships, and and trying I think it’s even more important to have a financial and, and not even just a spiritual but a financial plan of, of small and big things in your life. more organized. And then the average heterosexual partnership because of, of the ability to make a plan together. And and I think what happens when a man and woman get married, they don’t really get all that stuff together normally, like they just get on with their lives, they did their wedding they did their whatever their parties, and then they just both work and and go on from there. But I really like how you
said that you try to get your life organized with each other. And that’s super important.

Well, it was important. And one of the reasons that it was important is because the Lord, there was no mechanism to do it for us. But traditional, we never had the opportunity to have a traditional marriage recognize our relationship. So if something happened to me or something happened to Mike, and we didn’t have those documents in place, we could we it would have been impossible. Absent our families recognize our relationship and agreeing for us to take care of each other, you know, we can have life insurance. But what happens, you know what happens with all of that stuff, if we or for that matter, what happens is later on when I found out that I had cancer and stuff, what happens when those decisions need to be made, and everything so that we were all very aware of the fact that that we needed those protections. And that was one of the things kind of that that really made our cemented our relationship was you know, our concern out those those things.

And you know, those are pretty big life decisions. When you start buying homes together in planning. You’re not relying on the Lord to take care of you but relying on each other to to affirmatively take those steps and take that time to make sure that the other person is, you know, is taken care of. I think what happens is that cements the relationship in a different sort of a way than a traditional marriage and stuff because it does, it says to a certain extent . And and that’s one of the ways when you don’t have a sodomized or legal ending. I think that’s one of the ways that you show your partner that you’re all in.

But we all should do that. Well, we doesn’t matter what laws are in place really. Right? We should all be thinking about, okay, I want to make sure you’re going to be okay. I want to make sure that I’m going to be okay, if I get sick. And you know, can you look after me? Would you be able, you know, like looking at all of those viewpoints. And that’s, that’s so awesome that and I just wish everybody did that whether there’s a law or not, the laws change and we need to be better prepared. Right. Yeah.

So yeah. You know, and, you know, so and, you know, so when we bought the house and everything, you know, we we, we knew that we were going to need to play and we both, you know, we had though we had our first house, which is where Mike’s folks lived, then we had the second house, that we really kind of needed to plan for that. Um, and then, you know, I finished college. And it was sort of interesting, because then it became the decision of what, what’s next? You know, are you going to stay at American Airlines? Are you you know, and if you are, what’s your career path. And one of the things was on. Because we both worked at very different deployments. I was on the technical side, and he was on.

And believe it or not, you’ll you’ll kind of laugh Tina I knowing that the challenges to get myself on tours to do this podcast, I was actually doing data processing equipment and computer system design and everything. But that was many years ago, and now is a very different world. And now it’s sort of funny. Once again, I guess I should have stayed up on the technology, because then I could work myself on and I wouldn’t have tortured you the way I did. Try to get up on the air and do this podcast. Well, you know, things change every year. You just can’t keep that mic. It’s, it’s all cool. It’s all cool.

Thank goodness I have I have my background in Microsoft Certified systems engineer. Sorry. It was all trouble troubleshooting. Absolutely, yeah. So no problem. So we decided, you know, so what do you do next?

I really I was in my late 20s. I didn’t particularly feature myself staying in this job was 65 years old. Mike and I were in different An area. So it wasn’t a transfer within the company together wouldn’t have been the easiest thing to do. And even if I did, my job would have stayed this, his mind has changed, but my job would have stayed the same. So I decided to go to graduate school and I went to law school. And so for the next three years, once again, it was kind of all about me. You know, I was I worked full time, you know, so I, the household and stuff.

So what with the way that this would work out, was I would get up in the morning, I would study, I would go to school, I leave school, and I would drive into Hartford and I would work usually from like four o’clock in the evening until one o’clock and then do like, computer simulations and other things. And then I would go home, and I would fall asleep, and I would get up in the same routine. And then the weekends. Were pretty much dedicated to, you know, study catching up, you know, and we were in the middle of, you know, work renovating a home, we but you know, what we could afford, which was a handyman special, so many weekends, you know, or many nights after work or many weekends, you know, the goal was to just get a couple of sheets of sheetrock up on the walls or anything. And ultimately, we finished right before graduated from law school, we finished renovating the house.

Um, so there was a lot of stuff going on. And things weren’t particularly always easy. Because of all of that. I wasn’t feeling very well. And I said to me, I was talking to my mother who is was, is that that was a diabetic. And I kind of told her how I was feeling. And she kind of raised her eyebrows and made an appointment for me with her endocrinologist. And when they brought me in and started doing the testing, I rang all the bells. And so in the middle of going to graduate school in the middle of renovating a house in the middle of trying to get everything, I found out that I was a type one diabetic, and I needed to learn how to adjust my diet, adjust my exercise, manage my sleep and everything around the need to give myself shots.

Which was you know, which was a very big deal, it was a big lifestyle change. And you know, as always, it was all about me, no plan, no discussion about what happens if either one of us ever gets serious mess, but fortunately, you know, Mike was there, I’m rolled with it, Mike took the time, he learned probably he was more willing and open to learn than I was because I was much more comfortable defying. And I recognize that many ways. I was fortunate because it didn’t happen to me when I was 17. And it didn’t happen to me when I was 20. When you know you you want to out have pizza and you want to just kind of do what all of your friends are doing. Because that’s the most important thing. Other than trying to figure out if you’re gay or straight, but the secret that I didn’t have, you know, but being a diabetic, you can’t keep it a secret. So, as always, you know, Mike came through with the master plan, Mike came through and said, You know, we’re gonna do this, we’re gonna do this, you know, we don’t have a plan. He didn’t plan for it. Maybe we should have planned because my mother was a diabetic, but you know, we didn’t. So once again, he stepped up and you know, do what you have to do.

Which go here, while you were doing all those things, you were probably eating wrong, and you were probably not exercising. Right. So it it said, check your health, Mike.

Yeah. So suddenly, you know, instead of being able to grab a Burger King on my way from, from Springfield, Hartford to go to work, it became either finding a place where I could get a reasonable meal or planning in the midst of everything to have food with me that was not going to you know, was not going to tip the scale and, and it was also a lot of coming to terms. I mean, Mike had just pay close attention to me because oftentimes, if your blood, especially if it’s going very low, you don’t right, you don’t necessarily realize it and that’s actually much more dangerous. In the immediate, then, that high blood sugar, blood sugar will affect you over time. A low blood sugar in essence makes you incapable of operating a motor vehicle or anything.

So he really had to be very much on the ball and it was an It was incredibly stressful because there weren’t you know, now we’re talking about the mid 80s there weren’t card phones, there weren’t cell phones he couldn’t fall in said you remember to he, he could go and say how are you feeling or anything else? So And I was gone from, you know, six or seven o’clock in the morning, until, until midnight or one o’clock at, you know, so there was a lot, you know, was a lot of stress and there was there was no plan. Other than, you know, when I got to work, obviously, I would make it a point to call them and say, you know, or I’d say in the bill, but you know, once again, we had, you know, no plan, which takes me back to my two monitors, which probably are not there, okay. But there should be a third which is make a plan, which actions have consequences. And, you know, and you got to make it work. And you know, you’re you are responsible for yourself, if it goes right, you look in the mirror if it goes wrong in the mirror.

So, but, but still no plan. Yeah. So I was on fortunately, you know, so, either. Either way, when you’re thinking about this where you know, your life is going to change, I was going to law school. Nobody was under the impression that I was going to continue in American lines as an attorney. But there was no plan. There was no what Where do you want to work? Don’t know, what kind of job do you want? You don’t know?

What kind of law Do you want practice I want to do with planning and taxes. Well, that didn’t fit with my personality at all. I had been out in the community I was when I was born networker. I thrived on meeting new people and new experiences and everything. And there I was putting myself into a position where I would be miserable. The last thing I could do is sit in a room by myself, and draft documents and do that other stuff. Lots of people thrive on it, but I need to socialize the outlet. But even even as we went through three years of law school, there was never a discussion. The plan was that I was going to graduate. And the long term plan was there was going to be a lawyer. That was it. So when I you know, fortunately, I was very lucky when I was the tester plan had been to take my last school course, we were going to go to Europe, take a vacation, and then we were going to come back and I’m just going to resign from the company which would have terminated my flight benefits. And and my health insurance and a whole lot of other stuff. No, we didn’t talk about getting health insurance.

No, we didn’t shop around and we had diabetic in the house who wouldn’t be unemployed who didn’t make any plans for health insurance. Yeah, but once again, I got lucky because the the end of the in the middle of third year of law school, the company offered a severance package that included a year salary and an include lifetime health and medical insurance and I qualified even though we knew that we should have had a plan, we chose to not focus on it. And we got lucky, we got lucky because what ultimately happened was I was able to leave the company in March instead of waiting till May. And I was able to leave with money to take us over as well as health insurance that was so critical for my medical issues.

But no plan. And Gail when I came out, I passed the bar and I found a job and I tried my hand at a state planning and tax law for probably about 60 days. Fortunately, we had a litigator in the same firm who took me to court with him and I took to that like a doctor. So I for almost 30 years was a litigator but don’t help me. And you’re with people though, so it was right up your alley. Well, yeah, it was right up my alley because I was out networking trying to find business, make connections meet potential clients. I you know, was gregarious, and I was outgoing and as you can tell, I like to talk and and I enjoy problem solving my I have an enjoyable evening if I’m just by myself as you know, I used to follow the Supreme Court like many people follow the New York Yankees. So I I don’t mind sitting there and speculating on you know, what’s Neal gorgeous, got to watch Sondra Sotomayor gonna do and everything and then reading a decision or reading a book about the philosophy of the law or anything else. So yes, what was great If you like that, if you like that, yeah, unfortunately, I did. Fortunately, I did. I mean, I also liked the New York Yankees, but but I liked doing that. So it was, you know, so it was good and I enjoyed it and, you know, putting the argument together and, and you know, and having a thing come to you.

And, you know, tell you what their issues are and you figuring out the strengths and the weaknesses and making recommendations. Now, you also need need to plan that. And you don’t, because law school doesn’t train you for any of that law school does not prepare you for the prospect of people trusting their lives to you. And you making decisions, you don’t make the decision, you make the recommendation. But you know, what, you, you make a recommendation and you say you should do this cause and you’re not usually whether it’s a financial issue, or it’s a marital issue or anything else, people aren’t necessarily in the best position to make those decisions. So you do find yourself guiding people through their lives. And nothing prepares you for the emotional toll that that takes because you home at night. You go home at night, and your life remains the same. But all of those people whose lives you touched, they are not saying often times, they’re very, very, very fewer.

You know, when I started out, I started out litigating in a general practice, and I was doing divorce work. And it used to frighten me because you know, that you’d get into you get into the, you know, into a courtroom and you’d settle something, and there will be a lot of pressure for you to not only settle the case, but to resolve it that day. And I like to do that. Because you don’t know, you know, something sounds good. But you need to live with it. You need to figure it out. And I kind of had a lot of people aggravated because I said yep, I think we’ve got a deal. And we’ll finalize it next week. And I would tell my client, you go home and you live with it. And you think it and, and things so I just want you to know, which was unpopular. So then you’re swimming upstream.

Yeah. But I found my niche, I found my niche. And, and, and it was going well, and then something else hit. Right so that it was going well. And then we came back from Europe and I had a an odd rope on my back. And somebody pointed about to me and I scratched it and it bled. And Mike said to me, you know, you need to get that checked out. So I tell him the next day from work, and it was a you need to get that out. And I was they came over the next day. And Mike said, Have you made an appointment yet now, we had a very good friend, that was physician and he was a surgeon. So my thought was I should just call Tom, he’ll cut it off. And that’ll probably be it. So finally, I came home after about a week and I said okay, so this is how it works. You either make that appointment based on your schedule, or I don’t care if you’re in front of if you’re planning to be in front of the United States Supreme Court. If I have to make that appointment, you don’t come out of here.

You know, and we never talked about what it was we never talked about what it could be it was an annoyance. It was annoyance. So I went, I call I made sure that I called and I made an appointment and I went in and I had to taken out this friend of mine, this friend of ours, Tom, so not a problem, Mike, you’re fine, nothing to worry about. I think, you know, we had mutual friends and one of their daughters was getting married. And he said to me, You know, I’m sure I’ll see you at a meeting give my best and we’ll talk soon. And about four days later, I was in the office. And I got a call. And I was a smoker at the time. Like I smoked from the time I was 14 or 15 you know in the military smoking at then was a big deal because you got to get out of formation. They you know, the old term smoking if you got it would spray. Little did we know them what we know now but anyway.

So I’m in my office and I get a call from Tom. And he says want to see you Michael tonight. And what’s going on? He says I don’t want to talk about it. I’ll discuss it with you guys tonight. And I was like well, if you don’t tell me why I’m coming. I’m not going to come. So he told me that you know I had a fairly dire diagnosis and that I had a form of cancer that, you know, was pretty blunt with Brad. And he needed to talk to us about what our options were, and how we wanted to approach this. And he wanted to make patients receive both assert, uh, you know, scheduled surgery and also to see an oncologist. So I kind of had them figure out how I call my and tell him this, you know, without dropping a bomb on them on the phone. And what year are we talking about for this? At this point, we’re talking about 2004. We had kind of coasted I got I graduated from law school in 19. You know, in 1988.

We had we had our home, we bought in a larger home, we sold a home, things were going well, life was good, life’s good. I was very fortunate. You know, I mean, Mike and I were traveling, we both had flight benefits from American Airlines. Everything was going, you know, we feel we were finally we weren’t struggling to put anybody through school. You had more time, we had more time we were spending more time together. We unfortunately weren’t spending any time talking about the next phase or what if, or anything else, like every couple we have a good days are bad days, we had some days where I’m sure probably more than me, scratched his head and said, you know, what have I done here? But you know, and you know, during that time, you know, we lost mom to cancer, and you know, so there was good times and bad times. Like it like that, you know, life life happens.

So, but we had never discussed what was going to happen if one of us had serious illness, we never discussed what was going to happen if one of us, God forbid, had cancer. I mean, we didn’t, we didn’t think that those things would happen to us. If we didn’t, they wouldn’t happen to us, or we just didn’t think. So. I called Mike and I said, you know, Tom wants to see us and we went in and he kind of outlined his, you know, his concerns were and the fact that I needed surgery, and the fact that I needed to go into chemotherapy and stuff. Oh, what do you do that what happened, believe it or not, was my dad was in hospice at that point.

And so I was told this, and I was told that, you know, and, you know, give you a diagnosis, they also say, don’t go on the internet, don’t do this. And don’t do that. And I didn’t do any of that. But my dad, so he also knew that the that my chances of survival were not very good. And I’m like, why is that? Did they ever sink? Why?

Well, because the form of cancer I have, is it. It doesn’t act normally as a cancer doesn’t. It’s also very great. It’s very aggressive, and it’s virile. And so normally what happens is be asymptomatic at the beginning, it’s usually test the size to other organs and and other places in your system before it’s ever diagnosed and treated. Before it’s shown its little head, right. So and at that point, they didn’t know what my prognosis was specific to me. They only knew the fourth can’t based on the biopsy and everything in the prognosis wasn’t good.

But unfortunately, I had to start I couldn’t go through treatment because the following morning, I got notified by my father’s physicians that I needed to have being inside I suppose papers. So I signed the hospice papers, and I called my doctor and I said, You know, I gotta wait, my mother’s got Parkinson’s disease. And I’ve gotten care of this, which, you know, again, you know, what are you going to do? No, Master. Yeah, we didn’t plan for cancer, we didn’t plan for my father. We certainly didn’t plan for them to both happen in the same week. You know, that was pretty upset. You know, he was like, like, you know, every day every day matters. And I was like, Yeah, but these days matter in a very different way. So, so, we got my father taking care of and I went in and I can like, you know, get your treatment. Hat started my treatment, had some issues along the way, like everybody does, you know, you sit No, we used to call it the big red chair club. You know, you sit in those great fluffed, recliners. They’re all red and and, you know, I I couldn’t, I couldn’t let cancer control me.

The deal really was that Mike and Mike came to every single doctor’s appointment, he came to every single scan, he came to every single chemotherapy treatment and everything. But I was struck because I felt like, for the first time in my life, I had no control. So for the guy that needed to recognize that actions had consequences, and that I was responsible for those appointments, and then if it was good or bad, however, it turned out I needed to look in the mirror, but I had no plan. I was just I was floundering, I was floundering plus the fact that was a bit of a control freak. So I decided that cancer wasn’t going to control me, I was going to show the world that I could control it. So the thing that I started to do was I started riding a bicycle, not that I ever thought I was going to be Lance Armstrong. And I was never done a ride in the Tour de France, but that I could do it. And what I started doing is I would ride to my therapy treatments, which was almost 80 miles one way.

And I would try to ride home. And I’d get usually about halfway. And then I would call Mike and I’m done. And we have a point, I’d load the bike in the car, and we would come home, you know, and we would do you know, with all of the stuff that you’ve learned about answer, nausea, the vomiting the body, the inability to eat, I lost a lot of weight I didn’t want to eat I had no appetite. And the game we used to play was we used to go to a restaurant that had mud pie, mud pie was a big, because my everyday it didn’t taste like 10. And it was cool in my mouth. And I was getting sores and I was getting blisters and everything else. But the deal was they had to have meat and vegetables before I could have the mud pie. So it became a bribe bribery thing. And so one thing leads to another. So now I’m writing the by going through these chemotherapy treatments. And then I decided that I’m going to ride in the lance armstrong ride for the roses and in Austin, Texas.

So now I’m training 100 a ride because I cancer is not going to control me, I’m going to control it. And also it gave me an opportunity to raise money for cancer survivorship program across the country. People learning how to live with cancer because one of the things that I realized is that kids young, they can cut the kids are at your body, they can’t ever cut the cancer out of your mind. So I became very much the scan anxiety the fear the something bothers me right?

That’s a strange paint is it and everything. And I was having you know, I was having a fair amount of side effects. I got the chickenpox I got shingles. Wow, a lot of you know, a lot of, but every day I went to chemotherapy, I rode my bike, and I would go to chemotherapy. And I would have a joke. Many, many days. They were filthy jokes. A joke for us today, not what you want me to put on your podcast. But, but because none of us had, you know, we all the group of us became Oh, close that there was no filter, there was no barrier we just communicated. So one of the goals that Mike and always I always had was jaw and I will tell you a quick story.

One of the jokes, we would have the jokes too just to make people laugh. Because the other thing is you never knew you would go there sometimes there’ll be an empty chair. Oh, and of your team. What are your team missing? What missing? Yeah. And you’re almost didn’t want to ask because you hoped that they were just in the hospital. But you know, and you know, so we so So Mike and I became recognized, as you know, the guys and we would do a lot of noise, we’d be noisemakers and we would have all of our jokes and everything else. And one day, one of the aides came and she brought us believe it or not board a sportily and sources for lunch. When you see toward ladies in a boat, at least I did because I’m very sick. have their sixth year I really thought that I said to her What are you expecting us to eat? Is this the medical waste? From the pediatrics lounge Have you like collected up all the four skins and thrown them in a bowl? You know, that’s what tortellini looked like.

And that became He came everybody’s war cry. And he was like, I don’t believe and I said, and then you served it with a sausage. You know. And, you know, when I go back there now for my checkups and everything, they still tell that story and how they would end would never serve tortellini and saw john the same day in the in the US and said, but you know, but it was hard. It was very hard. But so the fundraising became a vehicle became very important to me. And, yeah, the and then what happened was, I had an opportunity to work with a cancer survivorship. So I’m riding my bike, going for chemotherapy, I’m trying to run this practice this law practice. And now I’m trying to raise money.
And then they tell me that the cancer survivorship organization located in Connecticut, so I reach out to them and I, they have a ride. So now I’m writing in two rides, I’m going to Austin, Texas, I’m packing Mike up. And we’re flying to Austin, Texas, he’s not riding a bike, and I’m getting 100 miles.

He doesn’t know what’s going on, I’m still going through chemotherapy treatments, I’m telling them that I’m fine. So that I can do this. He’s doing things like taking a tour of excess capital, while he doesn’t know what I’m doing, or if I’m okay. Fortunately, by that time, we have, you know, we had cell phones so I could stay in contact with stuff came back. And I was writing to this organization in Connecticut, and the doctors told me very specifically, you know, you’re limited to 50 miles. But a friend of mine who was very successful, they owned a company and everything offered, if I could ride the 100 he would match everything I raised in that particular year, I’d raised $35,000. So was huge to get a $7,000 to get a $35,000 match. But I had to coerce my friends to lie so that we made a mistake, misread the sign when you return way in a bike race to go, the shorter loop and you turn the other way to go the longer road, we all agreed that, you know, I was just going to make the mistake, and they were going to follow because they also didn’t want me riding along. And you know, then I was working at the Children’s Hospital with the pediatric and that led me to the Hole in the Wall Gang camp. So what ultimately happened was cancer, I had no plan. I use reacting on a day to day basis to my inability to control my life.

And suddenly, I started making mistakes at work. And it was all starting, it was getting too much because there was no plan. So each day, I had a plan to get through the day or the next thing, but it was always it was always to show cancer never to show me never to show my never to show anybody else that I was in control. It was always really to show cancer and I didn’t recognize what was going on. And what happens again, in that situation is the person that’s closest to you in the world. In my case, Mike would say to me, Mike, what are you trying to do? Yeah, you know, you you’ve got too many irons in the fire. You know, this is your he used to say he says you’re behaving like Don Quixote. You know, you you’ve got your Lance and you’re charging and windmills, Mike, you can’t control this. My way that you pro This is that you take care of yourself. You take care of us, you come home at night, you sleep you rest. You don’t find another project, that you somehow convince yourself that cancer is not you.

Because you can do that yourself. So we had almost the perfect storm because we had actions have consequences. We have it want to do it. And you do it go look in the mirror. And if you don’t do it, and you go look in the mirror, but we have no plan. So my plan to be cancer was my plan was to beat it every day at what I was doing. So I made some mistakes in my practice, which caused a whole host of additional problems. And then I happened to mention one day to my secretary. I’m one of these guys you can tell that you know always talks and my hands are going and everything else and I we do the Hey Jen, get this Hey, Jen, what do you think about this, she was my you know, the person that worked directly from me and I had made six people working for me. So there was also that pressure to keep the farm going because I had payroll, these people that were that depended on me to pay their bills that depended on me to provide them with health insurance, and everything.

So, one day I walked out, I said to her, I noticed that when I yell out, hey Jen, could you give me this file? Or some? Or I’d ask the question, nobody was answering my questions. So I walked out and they said, Hey, Jen, what? Are you going deaf? Can’t you hear me? And she said, I’ve been waiting to have this conversation. Let’s go in your office. And she said, go in depth, but I think you probably are. And I said, What are you crazy? And she says, No, no, I spoken to Michael about it. You know, when we had this conversation, I’m going to tell you that I want you to have you here.
So you’re not I had just finished a trial, I had just gotten inverted. How could I not here. And so no plan, I didn’t have a succession plan, I didn’t have a plan to how to wind down my practice. I didn’t have any plan for what to do if I couldn’t practice for a partner that, yeah.

And now they’re telling me that not only am I coming out of chemotherapy, finally, and I’m thinking I won, because I did all of this stuff. Forget about the fact that I was leaving a trail behind me of things that I wasn’t focused on or wasn’t focused on correctly, including my relationship. I mean, you know, I wasn’t obviously, when you’re when all of the lunatic stuff that I’m doing. I wasn’t paying attention to Mike. But he, you know, but he stuck with me, you know, he’s, you know, and he, we had no plan for how we were going to deal with chemotherapy or anything. And, you know, fortunately, I was able to make money. And fortunately, he was able to manage money. And those were the roles that are playing, those were the roles we adopted, which put us in a position where we could weather that storm, both financially and everything else. So they want me to get my hearing. So I’m just getting out chemotherapy. And I’m just thinking that I’m going to get my life back.

Yeah, and now that tell him he can’t hear. So, I, I’m gonna humor them. They want me to go get my eyes, my ears checked, I’m gonna argue with them, I’ll go get my ears checked. So I go to the I go, and they they test my hearing and I am at probably 30% 30 to 40% I’m hearing 30 to 40% of what goes on, like, it’s impossible, I can hear fine. And they’re like, No, you can’t hear my so now where I’m dealing with the fallout from finishing chemotherapy. And now I’m gonna death and assess cause from chemo or the drugs. It was as it was a result from it was one of the chemotherapy drugs that they initially they didn’t find out was they just knew that my hearing was decreasing because and then over time, we found that other patients that were on the same types of drugs, we’re experiencing similar issues. So the way they convinced me that I couldn’t hear because I refuse to accept the I did, I was trying cases I was riding my bike I was communicating with people. And my thing was if I’m deaf how I’m doing that Yeah, so but like my my my sister, Jen said, but Mike, you don’t talk on the phone anymore.

You talk on a speakerphone and it’s very loud and they can hear it down the block. So there were all these little changes going on. I was yelling to them like I always get get me this so what do you think of this are you know, do I have to I have to be and I wasn’t hearing and the answers but it was never may it was them.
It’s funny how your body just assimilates to whatever your if your eyesight starts going your body just manages it like you don’t even realize it near hearing the same. Yeah, it’s it’s crazy. Yeah.

So but I so what they did was when they told me I needed to get hearing aids. So I said sure, sure. I’m gonna wipies because God knows you know, he’s been throwing up telling me that I need to get hearing aids, I should get hearing aids. I’m thinking to myself, getting hearing aids. This is a small price to pay. I’ll just keep them in the glove box in the car. So but what I did unbeknownst to me was they told him, that when they fitted me for the year moles, they wanted when I was distracted, they wanted to slop back so that I couldn’t see him. And when they took the earmolds out, and we began to converse again, they wanted him to create a disruption.

To get my reaction, well, there was no reaction. So he was sitting behind me, and he was clapping his hands. And he was calling me names, and he was counting, and he was doing all kinds of things, but I didn’t hear any of it. And what they what we found out was that it wasn’t that bad. What I done was I’d had subconsciously learned how to read lips. So what, like what and you know, you just don’t realize, you know, like, he would say to me, I realized that, you know, when we were in the car, you don’t want to drive anymore. And I would sit sideways, I put my seatbelt on, but they’re always sets, I was always always looking. I changed the seating in house, I didn’t sit where I used to sit, I always used to sit on the couch next to him. Now suddenly, I’m sitting in chair at an angle to him. All these things were happening, but I had no idea that that was happening or anything else. So what ultimately happened was, I made so many mistakes in my practice that I had to shut down. I couldn’t hear I call it again, I couldn’t go into court and read people’s lips. Um, so and no plan, no retirement plan, no nothing.

As this was going on, a friend of mine, and I’ll spare you all of the details, except to say that to you, that I was going down and I was helping him every day because he was going through divorce, and I’m completely incapacitated. I was talking to his brother. And I’m saying, you know, Sam needs help. Sam needs help. He should be impatient. He was suffering from severe depression and everything. This was a guy that was 10 times smarter than me. He was the valedictorian of my law school class, and everything else. He ultimately took his own life and took life of both of his children and his wife. So that just kind of completely destroyed me, because I felt so responsible. I was talking to the sky every day, I was going down, I was taking them to a psychologist, because I couldn’t take him to a psychiatrist. Because if he was on medication and sticking psychiatry, he wouldn’t be able to have unsupervised rotation. And I’m saying to myself, so it’s the law telling us that it’s better to stay broken and to get fixed. Stay broke, and you can see your kids get the help that you need.

You’re not allowed to spend time alone with your kids. Is that is that what happens. And at the same time, I had a very well known litigator that wanted to present against my physician in the drug company that they suspect caused my my deafness. And he said, and I said to him, but mark, I met with him and I said, That’s not going to work. Because first of all, I don’t want to sue these people, these people saved my life. I had a very, you know, I’m still here. And granted, I’m going to the dermatologist every 45 days, and I’m having biopsies and I’m this and I’m taking shots, and I’m on chemotherapy and everything. But I’m still here. Yeah.

So. And if they said to me, maybe they said it. Maybe I didn’t hear because I couldn’t hear. But if they said to me, yeah, one of the side effects is that you could lose your hearing. I would had I not maybe a year. But that doesn’t mean that insane. I said, and if they didn’t, if they did, didn’t say it, they didn’t know because I believe that they were dealing with the best knowledge that they had at the time. And more importantly, if I heard them say it, I would have said you can’t hear from six feet under in a wooden box.

So I would I would have waived, I would have gone down this road anyway. And it was very hard to be here for 28 for almost 30 years and have him say to me, that doesn’t matter, Mike, we can work around this. We’ll settle the case. And I was like, there is no case nobody didn’t think wanted me. Everybody did the best that they could and I’m still here and I’m proof of that. And you want to do to vote. Yeah, absolutely. So I had that and I had the death of my friend Sam, saying it’s better to stay that broken where you’re suicidal, you cause for deaths rather than move forward. And that’s okay. Because he, and then I lost the second friend to suicide was like a real wake up call for me. So I tried retirement and that didn’t work out that worked out fine for the summer. I hear that a lot. Yeah. And then it got close. And this is a true story. I was watching daytime TV, because I was going out later. And later in time, I was watching I was watching Kelly Ripa in the morning. So at night, I’m reading books about the Supreme Court in the morning. I’m reading Kelly Ripa watching Kelly. And one day, I turned on the remote to see who our guest was the next day.

So I could plan my day. And I was like, What have you if you can’t add to your mind? You’re planning your day around around TV? This is your spy camera cancer for Are you not? And I had no plan. I had nothing. I mean, it was one day at a time. Nobody. We didn’t plan for retirement, Mike will work and we didn’t plan for retirement, no plays home watching daytime TV. So I started volunteering at the hospital. And there I was just an amazing, amazing journey. But more importantly, I got myself a job. And because of the thing that affected me the most, which was which was, um, you know, I’m suicide of two friends. Right? And that I got a job working for a young adult mental health awareness organism and I started to volunteer. And now I’m the office man. You know, it’s like your passion. Yeah, no, it turned out to be my passion that and obviously, I still go to the dermatologist every 45 days, I still have my biopsies I have, you know, an experiment. And, you know, I have medication that I have to take and everything, but from my diabetes. You know, that was the other thing that made it very difficult, you know, that you died using the chemotherapy or on a collision course? Yes. But you know, it was sort of interesting for me to suddenly realize I watched daytime TV that there was no for this either. It was just life was happening.

And, you know, in many ways, it’s still happening, because now I’m old, I’m working here. Mike is now 70. He has gotten me through every, every day, every single day. I one of the habits that I developed as I was going through all this was at night when I go to bed, I take off my slippers, and I purposely get down on my knees, I wish them all the way under the bed.

Because then I get down on my knees and I realize how much I have to be grateful for. And in the morning, when I get out of bed. First thing I’ve got to do is get down on my knees to get my slippers out from under the bed. And the first thing that I see is my sleeping on the other side of the bed. And I realized how much I have to be grateful for. That’s awesome. But I say to myself, would it have been better? If we had thought about these things? Two reasons, it would have made the journey that much easier, that much less chaotic, that must less frightening. Nobody’s going to plan to get cancer. Nobody’s going to plan to go death. But you can plan for a catastrophe.

So what if the what if what if I can’t work, it doesn’t matter if I can’t work because I have diabetes, and I’m losing my eyesight or I have cancer or I’m losing my hearing? Or I’m just old or you get arthritis? Or who knows or if you have a car accident, right? COVID Yeah, right, exactly. But we never plan that. And you know, But through it all. Michael stayed focused on the need to control the circumstances, to organize, to keep to organize it to figure out what we were doing and how to move us forward. So when I say there was no plan, Michael always had a focus on the end, Ron. So Mike might not have. So Michael had planned Michael knew what he had to do. Michael had to manage. Michael had a plan for our retirement, Michael had to give thought, Michael Murali on and encouraged both of us to get long term care insurance and disability insurance.

All of these other things. So he had the plan, but I lived, I’m 65 years old, I lived without a plan. I lived reactionary, the two things that I believed, because I had been told Young was that actions have consequences, good, bad, or indifferent. And you have to control those. And you have to figure out how you play the cards that you dealt. But I never gave any thought to how to play the cards when I got dealt a crappy hand.

Now is that kind of like the same same as you made your bed, you can lie in it now. It’s similar. It’s similar, you know, you played the card, you’re dealt, you know, so you make good choices, you make bad decision, I tell the dealer hecha, whatever it is you got, you got to play them, you’ve got to figure your way out. And you know, and the other thing was, you know, when when things go wrong, you go look in the mirror, things go, go look in the mirror.

So it wasn’t a matter of not having any sense of responsibility or anything. It was a matter of always reacting, always reacting, never being proactive when it hit the fan. And But Michael, on the other hand, was always focused on the end run. And that’s about a stroke. That’s what got us through, if he just saw and if he didn’t look forward if he didn’t take stock of the situation, and have a plan for moving through it. We I don’t know. I don’t know if we were to stay together. I don’t know what our retirement is, you know, for all I know, you could be eating cat food right now. You know? Yeah. Yeah. And that’s expensive, too. Yeah, that’s better than a GP, especially.

FINAL NOTES FOR LISTENERS

But what what kind of final note would you have for our listeners, that’s brought you to this point in your life, you’ve helped so many people in mental health, in cancer and raising money in in being trying to find your passion. I think you have many passions. But yeah, what kind of message do you think you would have? You know, maybe just another LGBTQ partner? Like, what would you have? I mean, what you’ve gone through is different than what others especially in that era, because we didn’t look at it in the 70s, or 80s. But I think the thing is, is thing is, is to take stock of who you surround yourself with, whether it’s a same sex partner, or opposite sex partner, or whatever, you build your life together.

Understand that there it’s not, it’s not all candlelight dinners. And you need to you need to plan for those nights. That’s not a candlelight dinner. And getting old is not for the faint of heart. So we can all you know, it we were living, what do they call it? spontaneously? Yes, the badge of honor. And I did that I did that for I just reacted to everything that happened. And thank God, it has a happy ending. But it has a happy ending, because I’ve made good because of the person that I was fortunate enough to be making choices. So I think that we can all spontaneously for the day. But think that we all have to recognize that life is not a spectator sport, and that we do have to plan that we are going to have good days and bad days, and how do we get through the bad days? And how do we capitalize on the good days? How do we know? We don’t know what’s next? So how do we make sure that we give ourselves as much insurance and by insurance, I don’t necessarily mean health insurance or life insurance or anything else. But just insurance that that the people that we care about and the people that care about us get what they need from us in good times. And
oh, that’s so beautiful. If this wasn’t recorded, I would have recorded that. Oh, that’s so awesome. Thank you. Did you have any other final message that you’d like to get the listeners?

I mean, what the story? Yeah, I you know, I want to thank people for listening. You know, I mean, I hope that, you know, they certainly if anybody had a question they could get in touch with me through you or anything. You know, I just, I just hope that when you go through this by yourself or alone, it’s a waste in many ways, not a waste. Because we come out strong, he come out differently. But if I can avoid if I can help one person do it better than me. Because they plan and they thought about it and they’re a little bit more introspective. And they recognize that it could happen, then yes, it gives what I went through, meaning purpose.

And so I just hope that one person that nobody gets cancer and that nobody needs a plan. But they can all say at the end of the run, Mike told us to plan. And isn’t he adult because we didn’t need to plan? Yeah. Oh, the the situation is that’s not going to happen. Because we all need a plan. We all need to know what it is that we’re doing. And we all need to know how it is that we’re going to weather the good days and the bad, bad. Yes. That’s perfect. That’s perfect. Absolutely. Perfect. Thank you so very much for your, your passion and helping others. I know, I really, really appreciate that. My Kim, of course, your other Mike has a big point in all of this as well. Getting to you to where you’re at right now as well. So thanks, Tom, your other half? Maybe your better half? I’m not really sure. But absolutely my better half. Sometimes I do have better halves. Yeah. And yeah. And what he shows is that, you know, it takes patience, both with yourself and with so I guess the other thing that people should always remember is, is they go through these good times and bad times to have patience.

Patience. Yeah. And we all hate patients. I know I do. Yeah, it’s it’s tough. We we have to wonder why we need patience. But when you’re in it, you sure You sure do. So well. Thank you. It’s that time again, listeners, I can’t believe it’s already, you know, we could talk to Mike here for forever, I’m sure you’re full of knowledge, you are full of experiences. And I may just have you come back on again, at some point in time again, because, you know, it’s it’s really beautiful. Unfortunately, you’ve had to go through what you’ve had to go through. But at the same time, wow, your experiences can help so many people. So thank you, thank you for that. Thank you look back at your convenience. And you know, yeah, yeah, and update us and give us some more highlights. So thank you. Thank you everyone, for watching and listening to our show. And take a moment and make sure you click on the subscribe button, share this with others. And click on that bell. And I know one of our other guests makes me want to sing. to click on the bell, there’s a bell right before beside the subscribe button down here somewhere right down there, right there. So make sure you click on the subscribe like this, this show as well, it helps to make sure that we’re getting more of the shows out to other people. And click on that bell because that really means that you get notified when we come up with more great guests like Mike, and you don’t want to miss it. So if you don’t click on the bell, you might miss a show. So um, I want to thank everyone for coming. As you can see, Mike is perfect for expect the unexpected. No one is Superman, and why not look at what we can do today to be better protected for tomorrow. And I coach each and every one. Because there’s nobody that gets out of this life alive, so to speak. And I just want everyone to feel that, that they don’t have to live in stress. They don’t have to live and not knowing what to do next. Because you’ve already consider the what if especially with your friends and family, parents, brothers, sisters, that type of thing, because that’s a tough situation to be in after the fact after the storm has hit. So thank you everyone for listening and watching. And if you were thinking of someone today, that’s in your mind that you haven’t spoken to, please reach out to them. Tell them how much you love and care about them. Because you don’t know what tomorrow may bring. Thanks Mike!

MIKE DALY AT : https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100014065901310 mikedaly0956@gmail.com