S02E67 MENTAL HEALTH IN CROSSFIT AND FITNESS TRAINING PART 1
In CrossFit and fitness training, we focus on the health and capability of our bodies. What about our minds and our mental health? In the first of three episodes, we have special guest Sean O'Hara @sopiper38 @crossfitbison athlete and police officer to discuss his personal experience with identifying how a mental health issue can impact our physical well-being.
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S02E67 MENTAL HEALTH IN CROSSFIT AND FITNESS TRAINING PART 1
[00:00:00] David Syvertsen: All right. Welcome back to the herd fit podcast. I am coach David Saron. I'm here with Dr. And coach SHA Rhee. We have a very special guest today. this is officer and CrossFit, bison beast. Sean O'Hara Sean. Welcome to the herd fit podcast. Thank you guys. It's so, so great to be here. Yes. Sean, Sean came to us.
a couple months ago and Sean's an, an avid listener of the, of the Hert podcast. and, you know, he, he brought up the, the possibility of us doing an episode or episodes plural on mental health. And it it's a very, very well talked about, often talked about subject in today's world. And I think a lot of it.
Does stem from the, the COVID 19 pandemic. A lot of things got exposed at that certain point. And I think it actually in a good way, opened the door for a lot of us to talk. Our own mental health helping others that have potential mental health issues how to notice them, how to combat them. And I was all about it.
And here we are, we're a couple months after we actually started talking about this because it's impossible to line up everyone's schedules. But Sean opening, thoughts on why you came to us and wanted to talk. The, the mental health component to health? It was
[00:01:14] Sean O'Hara: pretty funny. I actually first approached Mike detour about it.
And if you know anything about Mike, I got half the idea outta my mouth dude. you have to do. Yeah. You have to go to Dave. You have to talk to him about it. Yeah. I have several experiences, both family, friends work related a lot of just experience over my past nine, 10 years of. Being in some sort of mental health space in terms of dealing with friends and family handling stress at work handling my own Mental health conditions and, and, and whatnot.
So it was just something that just kind of left to the forefront. And I know we always talk about mindset and everything else like that and health and fitness. And then this was just kind of like a perfect tie in to sit there and say, well, let's try to, you know, how does mental health gonna help us in terms of just our overall health and, and even in the fitness world, Absolut.
Just
[00:02:01] Sam Rhee: give us a little bit of background about yourself and who you are and you know, how you, so that people who don't know bison or know, you can get to know you and frame this talk
[00:02:12] Sean O'Hara: a little bit. Sure. So, I've been at bison now. It's gonna be a four years, the end of October. I can't, I really can't believe that.
I am a police officer in Bergen county in one of the bigger cities in Bergen county coming, coming into maybe nine and a half close to 10 years now. Wow. Doing. Which again is, is, seems like just yesterday, crazy. We were doing that. How fast? 10 years ago. It certainly flies. And then I have, you know, a lot of my family have been in several professions medical health, field, military law enforcement and dealing with these high stress and unanticipated mental health issues actually.
Interesting.
[00:02:43] David Syvertsen: So, funny story about when Sean joined the gym, we got an email from, we have this inquiry system where. Someone sends an email saying, Hey, I'm interested in your gym. You know, what are my next steps? And the name was Sean O'Hara, you know, and I was like, That's the New York giant center. Oh yeah.
and I was like, I knew he was a local guy. I saw him at whole foods one time in Ridgewood. And I was like, here we go. I'm like texting Ash. I was like, the giant center is coming to our gym and you know, I'm waiting in the gym, Sean, O'Hara, you know, arranges to come in at three o'clock on a Monday, whatever it was.
And Sean walked in the door, I'm like, Ah, what's up bro. and no, Sean, Sean's been a joy to be around. I've coached Sean in classes for a long time. I've known a lot of other people have coached him. And he's, he's one of the, I would say 10 people in the gym that like the gym up when he comes in, you know, he, he is always fun to work out with because the dude tries hard every single time, whether it's feeling good or not, whether he is going through stressful situations at work or not, it's never brought into the gym in a negative sense.
And I really think it's You know, there's a lot of people in our gym that are drawn to him and respect him a lot, but also just have like a good mix of respect for Sean for what he does and what he's, you know, what he goes through. But also. What he does at the gym. You know, the, the dude works his ass off.
He's come such a long way. He's one of the strongest brute strength people we have in the gym as well. And I don't think, honestly, you might have not even known that until you started doing this. Like you're powerlifting, the squatting and the deadlifting and it's, it's been a really, it's been a joy to be around.
And we're really glad you came on. And the 9:30 AM
[00:04:12] Sam Rhee: mom's
[00:04:12] David Syvertsen: love. Yes, Sean, what is your fantasy football team?
[00:04:15] Sean O'Hara: Well, this, this year it got deleted. It was iHeart nine 30 moms. But this year, actually, I guess we
[00:04:20] David Syvertsen: changed leagues or something. I put, yeah, I mixed up the leagues. So you're you can still be iHeart nine 30 moms.
Oh no,
[00:04:25] Sean O'Hara: no. It's no, no, no. So we came up with the new name and says my moms are harder than yours. so that is, that is now my fantasy name for this year bison
[00:04:32] David Syvertsen: league. That's awesome. All right, so we're, we're just so you guys know we're gonna kind of break this. We think into a couple different episodes. We don't have it completely regimented.
We're gonna kind of let the conversation flow. We don't like being restricted to certain things, but this is probably gonna turn into two or three different episodes because there's a lot to this. There's a lot to unravel here. And the first thing that we really kind of want to go into is just talk about the differences and even some of the similarities that you guys.
Between mental and physical health, right? One of our taglines for this podcast, it really does center around health, fitness, health mindset. Right. And let's just really briefly kind of get into the introduction of. You know, the differences between mental and physical health. And the first thing that Sean wrote on his outline was there are not many differences.
So let's, let's talk about that real quick. What do you mean by
[00:05:22] Sean O'Hara: that? So when we talk about mental and physical health in terms of just how we how we approach ourselves. Is very different, but in terms of how we should be approaching, it is fairly similar in terms of how we handle certain stressors, how we handle certain injuries, how we handle ourselves in many different aspects of it.
So I think in, in the mental health arena, the way that we handle our physical health. Needs to be the way that we handle our mental health and you know, kind of going on that, the, one of the first questions I asked and, and probably not the best guys to answer, just because of, of your career professions.
But I always asked, I said, how many days when you were at your job or when you were working like a nine to five job? Yep. Would you call in and say I had a sick day today. You, you just, you weren't feeling good and you had to call out cuz you needed to take care of your physical health. Mm. . And how many days did you call in and say, ah, you know what?
I need a mental health day. Yeah, because I'm so stressed out. I'm I'm, I'm anxious. I'm, I'm, I'm run down and I just need a day to kind of gather myself mm-hmm your boss would laugh at you. Yeah. He'd look at you. He or she would look at you and say, what do you mean a mental health day? Yep. Get into work and suck it up.
Yep. You know, so it's been an approach. we're, we're where we need to treat it the same, but we don't see it the same way. Right, right. We certainly don't. What, why,
[00:06:43] David Syvertsen: why do we think that is? Is it because physical health that prevents me from going to work? There's usually something objective, right? It's usually I have a fever.
I have strep throat. I have COVID right. Where it's like, Hey, something is on a piece of paper or on a ther thermometer. You should not go to work because of this physical objective number or result of a test medical test that says you shouldn't go to work. And the mental state of saying like, Hey, I feel like I need it.
That is where I think there. The it's almost it's it's hard on both sides. It's hard for a boss to say, okay, like you're having a bad day because where's the line drawn like a line drawn on a fever is like, Hey, if you're above 99, like yeah, maybe stay home for the day. Right. Or 99.5, whatever. And, but on the mental health, what is the objective line?
Where do you feel that differences are in there in that.
[00:07:38] Sean O'Hara: So if somebody has a fever yeah. We we'll just use that or has, you know, a cold or, or the flute or something like that. Right. They can transmit it to other people in the company, right. Or, or the business or wherever it is that you're working.
So I think a lot of it, the sick days are, I don't want you coming into work sick and then knocking out my entire workforce. Right. As opposed to you being, well, you need to take care of yourself. Yeah. And I think that's where it is. If like, as a mental health problem, I can't. my, my, my bad day mentally, right.
With someone else. Right. It's well, I need this day for me. Right? So a lot of that, and like you said the objectivity of it is like, well, are you just feeling have a bad day, suck it up. Right. You know, or no. Wow. You're really going through a lot of stress. You need to decompress. You need to take care of yourself.
Go home. Relax rest. Yeah. And, and, and get yourself collectively together. Right. And that's hard because a lot of people will sit there and think, dang, he's just using the day just to get
[00:08:33] David Syvertsen: outta work. Yeah. And because, well, the sad part and the unfortunate part is that there are people that will do that.
Yes. And that, that, that's where it's like almost, it's a disrespectful thing. For someone to not want to go to work and just say, Hey, I'm gonna play the mental health card because from a boss perspective, like if Sam came to me on Tuesday night at 9:00 PM and said, Hey, I'm not gonna coach tomorrow morning.
Cause I'm, I'm going through something. I know Sam well enough. Like I would not hesitate to say done. I'll I'll cover for you tomorrow. Right. He could text me at 4:00 AM and say that right an hour before he's got a coach and I would go and
[00:09:06] Sam Rhee: coach for him, actually, I think. People have done that. Like they let you know, like I'm really overwhelmed right now.
Yes. Yeah. And I need, I need switch it up some help. Yeah. And you've always been
[00:09:16] David Syvertsen: very supportive about that. Yeah. And that that's where, and I, we work in a very personal business. Like we care about each other. We know each other. I've, I've had the nine to five and. No, you're a number to them. Yeah. Right.
You really are. You're an employee. If I, if I quit, I did quit. I'd be replaced the next day. You know, like I don't feel that way about our coaches. Right? Sure. Like if I had some of these guys quit, it would take me a long time to fill them. Even though I have people on the outside that want to coach, I view all of my coaches as really hard to replace.
And so I don't wanna go down that road. But my, my point is this, that in, in relation to someone that does need a mental health. it can actually be clouded. It could be that whole aura around the mental health day could be made gray because you know, there are people out there that will take advantage of it.
And this is it's like hiding or creating something that does not exist for some people in a way that physical health. That to me is the biggest difference between physical health and mental health in this regard. I mean, we're talking about sick days, mental health days we'll get deeper into it. Sure.
But what do you think. just like just quick thoughts on, you know, the actual difference between mental, physical health are real, but because of personalities and because of people, human nature, though, I think that is the reason why we view some view mental health days as, Hey, that's not real. You need to suck it up.
[00:10:39] Sean O'Hara: Yeah. I, I, I agree there. There's going. There's always gonna be, there are always gonna be people that are gonna take advantage of the system. Yeah. There's always gonna be somebody that's looking to scam to get over. Yeah. And unfortunately, In more numbers than we even probably care to admit to mm-hmm so as a business owner, or as a boss of a company, I have to protect myself from sitting there and saying, well, you know, being take advantage, how am I gonna be taken advantage of?
And unfortunately, this is what we see in society that we're just not responsible enough to sit there and give people the benefit of doubt to sit there and say, okay, listen, I'm only going to use these days, or I'm only. call outta work if I really, really need it. Yeah. Whether I'm sick or whether I need a mental health day or, you know, whether I just need to take care of myself.
Like, like you said, in smaller businesses, it's great because you, as the business owner know your people, right. You know that if one of, one of the coaches comes up to you and says, listen, I, I just need this day. You're like done. I get it. Yeah. Because you know, they would never do that. Right. Unless they actually needed it.
Absolutely. And, and that's unfortunately, part of the problem that we face in terms of dealing with mental health yes. Is that you said it is not something that I can sit there and hand you a piece of paper and says, my doctor says I have 102 fever. Right. And my blood work is this, and I'm diagnosed with this, this, this, and it.
You know. Yeah. It's very,
[00:11:52] David Syvertsen: very, and this is why I want you to say that that was awesome answer. Is that the people that are having mental health issues, they get beaten down even further because of this. Right. Right. If you're someone that does have a mental health issue, and it's obvious that you have a mental health issue.
You need a, whether today, a week could be longer, right? Yeah. Because of the irresponsib irresponsibility of other people that it's now a stigma, right. It's like you're weak, you know, you're, you're just using it so you can get outta work. And that's where I think that builds up even the, that increases the strength of the mental health issue.
And it really can overtake someone.
[00:12:30] Sean O'Hara: Absolutely. You, you pinned the word on the head. It is stigma and there is different, different forms of stigma, different areas of stigma. And this is just one area of, you know, people maybe taking advantage of it. And then, you know, we kind of, we can move down into the different types of stigma yep.
That we see. Attached to mental health mm-hmm in terms of making somebody weak, making somebody coward, making somebody feel like they are taking advantage of the system. Yeah. Yep. We can, you know, unfortunately there's just so much,
[00:13:01] David Syvertsen: and then the issue
[00:13:01] Sean O'Hara: never get solved. No, it, it, it never gets solved. It never gets touched.
And then people become embarrassed to sit there and say, I have an issue I need to address it. Yep. You know, and when we talk about the comparisons of physical and mental health You get a cut on your finger. Mm-hmm you put a bandaid on it. Yep. You know, you have a, you have a bad day. Do you just keep it to yourself?
Mm-hmm is there somebody that you can talk to about it? Mm-hmm you know, even for just 10 minutes you break a bone, you go see a doctor, right. Doctor looks at it. He x-rays, it, he sets it and everything else like that, you have a trauma in your life. Most people will just sit there and say, I gotta suck it up.
I gotta deal with it. I gotta live. That's how it's supposed to be. Right. And we have these, we have these parallels of the different types of injuries that we can have both physically and mentally. We take care of them when they're physical injuries. Right. Because I can tell you say, Hey, I can sit there and say, Hey, Dave, I really screwed up my knee the other day.
I'm going to I'm gonna see Hartman. I'm gonna see Marni for some physical therapy. I'm waiting to see if I can get an MRI and I can go through the steps and I'm. I okay. All right, well, this is, this is what we can do in the, yeah, this is, this is how we can work around this. This is how we're gonna treat this.
If I came to, if I came to you sometimes and said, Dave, I just had a really severe trauma in my life. Yeah. Like something that's just, I, I can't, it's keeping me up at night. It's affecting me. How is it that, that, that I'm gonna treat this and everything. That's the way you've, it needs to be done. Yeah. You, I can come into the gym next day and you can look at me and say, well, Sean seems to be.
Maybe something's a little off mm-hmm but you don't know that I have that trauma and I'm not addressing it. Exactly. Yeah. And that's where we see the divide.
[00:14:34] David Syvertsen: It's not like an objective viewable thing. Correct? I don't, I don't see you limping into the gym. You know, like if I, you limping something's wrong.
Yes. Alert goes on. I go talk. If I see you moping around a little bit, I'm like, I don't know. Maybe he's hungover, you know, that's right. Yeah, exactly.
[00:14:47] Sean O'Hara: It had a rough night. It could be a lot of different things.
[00:14:49] Sam Rhee: I think some of this is also from a chronic perspective. So if you think about it, let's suppose you're really devoted to your job and you don't spend any time working out eating.
Right. What happens? You physically start gaining weight. You get heavy. You're you're not fit. And ultimately that impacts your physical health. Mm-hmm . You can do the same thing with your mental health. Let's suppose you are not addressing those issues that you have in your life that are causing you mental stress.
Right. And over time, if you don't address those, if you don't take the time. From work from all of your other activities to address it. Just like going to like going to the gym takes time. Yes. You know, working out takes time, all these things. If you neglect them over time, because to focus on only work, guess what happens five, 10 years go by.
Not only are you physically bad, but you're mentally in a horrible state. And I see this all the time in. Profession people over I, that was me, you know, 5, 10, 15 years into a career. Yeah. And you are worse off than you ever have been. And you can see it from a, like you said, a physical perspective. If you can look at someone and be like, whoa, you haven't really been taking care of yourself.
Right, right. But what's going on in here. Yeah. You have some people have major issues over a 5, 10, 15 years, right. That they never addressed. You might not be able to see it right away. But it's as, just as impactful to their health in life as, as what their physical appearance is. Yeah.
[00:16:11] David Syvertsen: Common ground between what two of you guys are both saying is it's easy to see physical issues popping up physical health issues.
Yes. It's not easy to see the mental health issues. Like we, we are, we. Again, you can say it's the, suck it up. Nature being a man being masculine. Sure. Can't be sensitive right there. There's a lot about that, that, but everyone has something going on inside their head. Not everyone will really expose it to, to the public.
And, and I give you a lot of respect for coming on here and just, you know, opening up about this subject, Sean. Oh yeah, no, absolutely. The LA the last thing before we get into the manifestation physical manifestations from mental health. Similarities between physical and mental health issues. And you said something earlier that little bit of a kickback on is yes.
You'd. Your boss does not want you to come to work when you have COVID and you have a flu because you don't wanna get other people sick. One of the similarities that I've seen with mental health issues, and again, mental health issues have different levels, right. Severe, right? Sure. Not severe, right.
But there's still issues. That tho those days where you do suck it up and still go to work, still go to the gym. They actually can really bring a, a room down or bring people that you are around down as well. And this is something that I've personally struggled with, but I've seen other people struggle with as well, that when you're not in a good place and you're no longer a joy to be around.
Right. And you're not good. You know, keeping it out of the gym, right? Not saying that you need to sure. I'm not saying you need to keep your issues outta the gym. Like we're here for help, not just with your muscles, but with other stuff as well. Right. That can bring a room down. I've seen our staff be impacted by people that are in a bad place.
I've been impacted by people on our staff that are in a bad place. I know I've impacted other. that when I'm in a bad place, I'm making things worse for other people. It's like, I'm almost unofficially infecting them, right. With my mental health thoughts on that.
[00:18:04] Sean O'Hara: Yeah, absolutely. It it's, it's part of, again, part of some of the things that we might get into is, is just how we, as outside people can affect each other, both positively and negatively, right.
Due to our mental health. And there absolutely. Is credence to that, as opposed to how my actions and my mood and my mental health and my mental wellbeing can actually affect others. And I know Sam has talked about this a bunch of times on the show, in terms of his responsibility about how he acts after a workout.
What is his body language? What is he dictating to people? In and doing a workout. Yeah. And he says, I have to be more responsible to that because the way I'm acting and the way I'm presenting myself is affecting other people in the gym when they're looking at this workout. Yep. So there absolutely is credence to that.
When I go back to to that affecting is kind of, you hit it on the head in terms of, we just can't see a day or two of that. That's something that may. For the most part take a week or so long time of a long time to sit there and kind of spread itself around to. Dave's really been in a funk this past week.
Yeah. And, and, and he's been irritable and short and all this other stuff, very cur with his workouts and stuff. And, and now how am I supposed to feel? Right. I don't think you see that a day, everybody kind of chalks up. Well, you had a bad day. Right. You know, you get a pass, you had a bad day, you had a rough day.
That's, you know, that that's one of those things, but over time absolutely. You can definitely see that kind of fester in, through a community or a workplace and absolutely affect people. Yeah.
[00:19:39] Sam Rhee: Yeah, when you're a leader. And if you have a lot of toxicity because of whatever you that you have to deal with.
You really impact all those people around you not and forget about your performance, even if you feel like, well, my performance is fine. I'm coaching, I'm doing the right. I'm saying the right things. I'm telling them to do the right things. But like you said, so much of what we do as human beings is. Feed of feed off of each other.
Absolutely. And especially in CrossFit gym, the number one, one of the most strong reasons why we come is for this sense of community. Yep. And working out together mm-hmm and most workplace environments also have similar senses of community where when you have people that are. Extremely toxic because they are not recognizing their, their mental health issues or they're ignoring them, or they're not given a chance to address them that that, that can.
That can torpedo a, a business, a, you know, a company a gym. You you've said it all the time. I mean, that is one of the biggest things you've always thought about was one of the things that could torpedo a gym would be that negative type of yeah.
[00:20:49] David Syvertsen: Interaction, negative culture. Yeah. And it can happen like that.
You know, I mean, it's, it's like a fear you have in the back of your head all the time. You could build something for 10 years. It, it could take a week for the whole thing to, to, it could take a night, one night of, you know, speaking of which we're, we're, we're recording on the network. There's a bunch of people going the racetrack tonight.
You know, it can happen like that. It can happen that fast. And that's just part of, of, of the risk you take when you, when you do something like this, I want to get into some, you know, with, with Sean's permission. Yes, absolutely. Just some life examples that Sean has gone through. Some physical manifestations that have come from his mental health.
And, you know, we did talk to Sean, just so everyone knows. We did talk to Sean prior to this about what he does want to touch on what he doesn't want to touch on. So I don't wanna make sure no one's listening to this and being like, guys, stop being so nosy, you know, like this is This is Sean's show.
This is Sean's topic. This is Sean's. Sean is the director of the, her fit podcast. I get a promotion
[00:21:43] Sean O'Hara: for a day.
[00:21:43] David Syvertsen: This is great. Sam and I are w two employees all hundred dollars an hour,
[00:21:46] 2022_0903_1001: by
[00:21:46] Sean O'Hara: the way, see my account afterwards.
[00:21:50] David Syvertsen: but we, we, I wanna get into some, cause I do think a lot of us, myself included Sam included our listeners.
We can learn a lot from your experience. And, and I, you know, I just to echo what I said earlier, give you a lot of credit for coming on and talking about a topic that's really tough to talk about, but let's get into some of your life examples, just, you know, living with anxiety. You're a police officer, like let, let's get into some of the nitty gritty with that stuff.
Sure. So,
[00:22:14] Sean O'Hara: First off and again, something we'll touch in later is that this is actually helpful for me as, as somebody that, that lives with this, that does this kind of stuff, all the. A platform like this is very, very helpful to, for, for my wellbeing and my treatment, and to be able to kind of give people what, what, what what I see in my life and what I'm going through in my life, because there are gonna be a lot of people that are gonna be out there and sit there and say, wow, I have the same thing.
Yeah. I'm going through the same thing. Yep. And I just can't talk about it or don't feel comfortable talking about it. That's awesome. And you know, so I'm hoping that by, by doing this, this is gonna, you know, a couple people that are listening to it, this, this will kind of kind of help them to take a step in the right direction in terms of just kind of helping them deal with that.
So in my life I've come up in a very great family, grew up in Bergen county. but within my family, we have had a lot of anxiety, diffs, different issues. I've had family that was, that served in the military that have come back and have been through several different mental health issues that they have gone through family that has been in the medical field in law enforcement that have dealt in high stress, high anxiety issues, high pressure issues that they come home.
And your, your
[00:23:23] David Syvertsen: exposure to that. Can you touch on approximately how old you were when you started to notice
[00:23:28] Sean O'Hara: it? Oh, sure. Wow. So, I'm, I'm probably gonna sit there and say, I was probably like in middle school. When, when, when you finally come around and sit there and say you're 37 36 36 36.
[00:23:38] David Syvertsen: Okay. Yep. So you're looking 20, 25 years ago.
Oh yeah. 2022.
[00:23:43] Sean O'Hara: Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So we're, you know, we're looking at like, Oh, in the nine in late nineties. Yeah. You know, we're talking about this. And you start to notice something. You can't tell what it is. Yeah. But you can tell something's not right. You can tell that something's going on. And as you grow up, you don't know anything else.
So this is almost normalized in, in your life, as opposed to, you know, this is how people are, this is how people act. This is how people deal with things. And again, we go back to that culture. we don't talk about things. Mm-hmm this is how we handle it. We are a, a strong, proud family. Mm-hmm this is how we go through life.
Yep. And you know, this is right and wrong and that's how that's how life was.
[00:24:20] David Syvertsen: And there's some families that just like my history of growing up and, and knowing a lot of people. There are certain families that it almost seems like they all go towards not the same line of work, but the same macro level of whether it's extra education.
Mm-hmm whether it's high stress environment, whether it's I wear a gun to work, you know, whether I'm putting my life on the line, I'm running to the fire, not away from the fire. Is that kind of where your family vibe came? The lot, not everyone I know, but a lot of people in your family have come from that line of work.
So my
[00:24:50] Sean O'Hara: immediate family does not, is not, was wasn't involved in law enforcement at all. Okay. That was actually a surprise to them when I got into it. Okay. High stress. Yes. My, my mother was in the medical field. She ran she ran the chemistry lab in Haack hospital for. She was there for 44 years.
Wow. Wow. She and my father was a safety engineer and he was constantly out doing commercial inspections, inspecting for OSHA. So he was traveling a lot. He was out on these oil rigs in Oklahoma and Texas,
[00:25:18] David Syvertsen: and a lot of responsibility for the safety
[00:25:19] Sean O'Hara: virus. Yes. Yes. So, you know, and dealing with the culture of, Hey, listen, I'll give you $300 to give you some good marks on the line too.
And he's sitting there. You. Thousands of guys lives are on the line for
[00:25:30] David Syvertsen: $300. It's a lot of pressure on person. It's a lot of pressure. So we
[00:25:34] Sean O'Hara: have seen a lot of high stress, high anxiety. So when I chose the job, my parents kind of looked at me knowing what they went through and they're like, do I really wanna
[00:25:42] David Syvertsen: see my son get into this?
You
[00:25:44] Sean O'Hara: know, I will tell you, my mother was not happy with the choice that I, they were supportive. Yes. They were always supportive of me. My parents
[00:25:51] David Syvertsen: always want what's best for the kids. You know, like you're, you're gonna be closer to that than I am Sam. You're not gonna make them do certain things, but you also probably have certain things like, oh man, that's gonna be really tougher, tougher than you think.
Trying to, I mean, just watching Sasha go through her, the college stuff. Yeah,
[00:26:05] Sam Rhee: sure. You, you always have anxiety about whatever it is that your children choose. And I mean, obviously law enforcement is not something that everyone's like, oh, cake, you know? Right. Yeah, exactly.
[00:26:14] David Syvertsen: So easy.
[00:26:15] Sean O'Hara: Not a problem. Yeah, exactly.
The, the funny thing with that I found out was, you know, it took me a while to. that I actually had some sort of anxiety issues. Okay. And it was a couple of years ago that I actually was having some stomach problems and I was sitting there. I was like, this, it's not going away. Mm-hmm, , I'm having some indigestion.
I'm having some, some lower abdominal pain and, and it's just no matter what I did. And so I went to see a GI doctor mm-hmm , you know, but let's, let's figure this out, you know, and I, I went to this guy and very great. Talked to me for, I think it was an hour. I sat in his office. Okay. And really went over things.
Okay. And he, he kind of narrowed it down. He's like, listen, he's like, you know, I want you to try this. He, he gave me, he gave me some sort of it was a little bit of medication. I forget. I forget what it was. It was, I don't wanna call it a muscle relaxer. Yeah. But it was, it was just kind of. Little something to, to, to calm me down.
And he said, address your diet. Yeah. He's like, he's like, I, I'm gonna sit there and say, address your diet. If things don't change. Come back to me. After a certain period of time, I think it was two or three weeks. Okay. And he's like, then we'll, we'll take the next step forward. And things kind of went away, but that's when I started to notice a pattern, it would come back.
It would go away. It would come back. It would go away. My anxiety got to a. Where it was developing physical manifestations in me. Wow. There was a, a sharp pain in my abdomen, my lower right abdomen. Every time I was getting myself into a high stress situation that I had time to think about. Can you describe one of them?
Sure. So I'll give you a, a social thing. Yeah. Like that. Especially with people that I didn't know. Okay. So if I was going to like a big wedding of a lot of people, I didn't know some sort of uncomfortable situation. Yep. And I had time to sit there and watch it come. Yep. And I would think in my head, I was.
Oh, you know, okay. I'm not gonna know a lot of people here, you know, I may be a little uncomfortable. It's a little far away from home, all of this stuff, but like the inner dialogue would start to kind of run in your head when you, when you sit there and you say, ah, yeah. You know, and then all of a sudden, you know, maybe like a day or two out.
I would start to feel like this, this, this pain coming. And it was more than just you, you get butterflies before a workout, you get nervous before a work. You just talked about it. and, and you kind of have that build up. It was getting past that to the point of maybe I shouldn't go because I'm just feeling that sick and I don't want to.
Feel this way there. Yeah. Yep. And as I went through these, I, I started to feel that once I was at the event and, and, and got to talk to people and know people that went away okay. That was gone. Okay. And part of it was, it was just my physical body. Like in my head, I could tell myself everything's gonna be okay.
There's nothing. My head could talk. My body was like, I'm not listening to you. This is the way I feel sharp pain there. My blood pressure was going up. So I have. white coat, which is white coat is a very high fluctuation in your blood pressure. Okay. You can be very high. And then 20 minutes later it'll be low and then 20 minutes will be high.
Wow. And depending on given situations, I can have blood pressure that would sit there and be like, you're borderline in the emergency room. They'll come back 10 minutes later and be like, that's actually not so bad. Yeah. You know, so I do take medication for that. Okay. And that's, that's part of that's part and tied into the anxiety of that helps keep the anxiety.
Lower and in keeping the blood pressure lower, I'm not sick. I don't have these physical manifestations, so I don't have that circle of I'm sick. What am I doing? Oh, I'm high anxiety. And it just kind of chases itself in a tail of, of having, oh, I'm, you know, getting in this circle of, of stuff. Wow. So that's kind of how, like, I first noticed that I have this and then going through some of the stuff with my job of realizing.
Okay. What's some of the things that have happened in my job that I deal with, that I've dealt with of, okay, well again, suck it up. All right. It's it's not a big deal. And then you start to hit all these things and they start to come in and, and not nearly as often as, as you might see in other departments, some of the bigger cities and everything else like that, but we deal with them all the time.
Yeah. And they're now, we're now starting to see a shift towards being more responsible for mental health, giving you more resources, giving you more education. Right. And I think education is the biggest thing. Yep. There is. Is everybody so different in their mental health and what affects them? And people may not deal with anxiety.
They may deal with a little bit of depression. They may deal with. High stress situations. They may deal with many different things. Okay. And how you deal with it is gonna be different than Sam deals with it different than I deal with it. Mm-hmm . So I could give you a template as to how I deal with my anxiety.
Right. But if you have anxiety too, you may be completely different. You should, and this does not work
[00:31:02] David Syvertsen: for me. Now, was your anxiety, is your anxiety, is it worse in those like, Hey pre-wet situations, you're not gonna own a lot of people than. Your, your job, your profession, where there is a lot of, you know, I don't wanna call it downtime, but think that you're thinking about something that could happen.
And then all of a sudden you're thrown into the, the mix. It's almost like when you don't get to think about it and reflect that much, it's actually easier to deal with. Yes. But are you are still in the car waiting for something to happen, right. And your crew are waiting for, I don't even know what you guys call 'em anymore.
did I just date myself just
[00:31:33] Sean O'Hara: a little bit back in like chips mode but
[00:31:36] David Syvertsen: like, did, did you, do you in those times where nothing is going on, but you know what, you know, law of average eventually catches up, something's going to happen? Is that anxiety different than the anxiety that you'd. leading up to that wedding because officers more about safety, life and life and death and weddings, you know, I don't know anybody am I gonna dance with on the dance floor?
You know, it's like for, for
[00:32:00] Sean O'Hara: me, it's, it's a hundred percent different. Okay. What I deal with outside of work is, and the anxiety in that portion is, is extremely different. And that, that's what I found kind of interesting. For me, I would much rather situation where it's situation react. Yes. Go to it.
Don't have time to think that's what we're trained to do. Yeah. So our training is, we're gonna give you a whole lot of training. We're gonna give you a whole lot of reps at it. So if I told you right now to go out and do 20 bar muscle ups, you could do it without even having to think about your form or anything else like that.
You. I mean, you may wanna stretch and warm up, but yeah. Right, right. You, you would be able to sit there and not have to think about how you're going to do 20 bar muscle ups. That's how it is at
[00:32:41] David Syvertsen: work. I'm gonna tie this across it when you're done with this story, keep going.
[00:32:44] Sean O'Hara: so, but in terms of, of the planning at work and the downtime at work and everything we have learned to Yes, you do have to plan.
So there, there is gonna be inevitable planning. There's gonna be okay if I ever get to a call. That's more so when you first start out. Right, right, right. When you're developing that set of, I have a Burg alarm to go to, I have, you don't have experience yet. Right? That's exactly it. Yeah. Once you have that knowledge of how you're going to address things, I'm gonna stop a car.
I'm gonna do this. I'm I'm gonna go. A person just got beat up in their bleeding and I have to now I'm the first person to render medical aid to them. How am I gonna do that? Right. Get a little anxiety from that once you know that once you've done that, once you've been through that situation, that stuff's just automatic and you can think, okay, well, how am I gonna approach this?
Or how am I gonna talk to this person? But that stuff that, that goes away very quickly. Okay. Especially when you get thrown in the mix and the more, just like anything else in life, the more you do.
[00:33:36] David Syvertsen: But social functions for you personally, like if you got invited to a wedding that's in three months and you only know three of the people, you're still gonna be going through this anxiety a little bit.
Oh yeah. Abs 100%. Yeah. Even though you've been through it before. Yes. It's not nearly as often. And it's not as thing. It's just more reflection time on it. Yeah, exactly. And that's really what probably Bo does that bother you more? That's the anxiety. That's worse that yes.
[00:33:56] Sean O'Hara: So that that's the anxiety that would, that, that, that I, that I have dealt with and have found to be more physically manifested in myself, both mentally and physically got it, of dealing with
[00:34:06] David Syvertsen: that, that, so that's why this, this gets so personal.
It it's so like case by case yes. Description when you really think and reflect about it. And again, if you're in a position where you're trying to help someone with their mental health and not. I mean, I'm definitely, you're not, we're not qualified. I don't have credibility in, in fixing someone's mental health.
But if you're just in this situation with a social interaction in a, in a position with people that, you know, they have mental health and you can help them just as a person you really do in my, you have to ask questions like what we're doing right now asking like, what's this like, instead of saying, oh no, no.
I remember Sean told me that this was worse than that. So like that person, the next time I see a person struggling with mental health, they're going through the same thing as him. It really can be the complete opposite side of. Yes. And I think that's one thing with mental health that is different than physical health in some regards is that there really is not a template to fix, you know, or help you with your issues.
Right. It it's. Yeah. You know, dealing with someone that has physical health issues, it's a little bit more, a little bit more scientific, right? Like I know not everyone gets the same treatment. Yeah, but it seems like it's more templated than someone with mental health. Yeah.
[00:35:11] Sam Rhee: But it's still, there's so much variation.
Like for example, if someone has a shoulder injury right there, you, there are my shoulder injury and your shoulder injury. Ain't the same. Right. Even if we had the same shoulder injury. Yeah. Because of our circumstances. Yeah. And our expectations and our goals and, and what we need to do. And in mental. You know, manifest, you know, this is where listening to Sean, talk about his manifestation.
Two things strike me. One is how powerful the mind body connection is. That is amazing how the mind literally wills the body into physical change. Yeah. Which, wow. Yeah. Is the biggest issue here. Sure. And so anyone who says it's in your. Really wants to say no, it's in your body because it's in your head.
Yeah. Right. That's the first thing. And, that power that we have in our mind is astonishing. And then the second thing is, is that there's no one, like you said, there's no one way to address. Whatever it is that your issue is right. And I know there are thousands of people out there thinking, yes, this is the way to do it.
This is what I did to make it better. Yes. That's and yes, absolutely. There are so many treatments, so many approaches, so many therapies, so many ways, some of them not so great. Some people will drink themselves into. Submission of their anxiety. So, you know,
[00:36:30] David Syvertsen: other people yeah. Eat themselves. Yeah. Yeah.
[00:36:32] Sam Rhee: Abuse, you know, there are millions of types of self abuse that you can go down to try to address these issues. And, so basically some of this is recognizing that the mind body connection is really important. Mm-hmm and two is, there's not one way of addressing it. And I know that there are a lot of people who deal with this as a, on a professional level.
Mm-hmm I was just thinking of Marisa and her acupuncture, for example, there's a lot of people who find value in, in that treatment. Yep. And there are 10,000 other ones as well. Yes. Yeah. That's just one other example. So I feel like listening to this one, I would say. We all, probably have some level of this,, in different manifestations.
And then two, the way we deal with it is all different. But hearing someone like you, you know, going through this is really meaningful because then I can kind of connect it to
[00:37:21] Sean O'Hara: myself as well. Yeah. Part of it is, and, and again, we, we, we, I, I wanna just touch back on stigma, just a little bit of.
Being able to bring this forward is if we is, if we never are honest with ourselves as to what's going on with ourselves, our body, our minds, our whatever, we'll never address it, we will never get better. And we have seen several times of. People building this up, like you were talking about earlier, Sam of just like this powder keg that's building inside of us for 5, 6, 7, 10 years, and nothing ever good comes outta that because the more pressure you apply to something, the more likely it is that it's going to break.
It's gonna collapse. It's gonna, something's going to majorly happen. You're not gonna have a little leak in the dam. If you have 20 years of pressure on that one little leak that dam's gonna go. Yeah. And it's just going to. It's gonna explode. It's going, it's going just to and poorly for all of this stuff.
Yeah. So the first thing that I, you know, that I always, when I speak about, you know, mental health and I've had conversations with people is just, just be honest with yourself. Mm-hmm is, and that's what I get is the minute that I sat there and said, these physical manifestations are not medical, that I don't have a GI problem.
They're being caused by, by what's going on in my. then I was able to sit there and say, what can I do about the situation? How can I fix this? Mm-hmm so being honest with myself and actually sitting there saying, okay, I have an. maybe I don't like it. Maybe, maybe I don't like the fact that I have to sit there and say you have high anxiety.
Yeah. But it's something that just needed to be addressed. And I had to be sit there and say, okay, if I want to do anything with this, I have to be honest. This is a problem. Okay. I have it. Can't do anything about, you know, pushing away now, how do I solve this? How do I help seek the outside? Absolutely.
Yeah, absolutely. The
[00:39:11] Sam Rhee: other thing I was gonna say is, as a parent we can make things worse or better for our. when we recognize these issues. I know my parents didn't make any of my high anxiety issues any better and probably exacerbated them. and I think for a, a lot of us, it's better now in terms of, our culture.
But I mean, think about the people around us, how do we feel? Or if we heard someone who said, you know, I have a lot of anxiety about. Type of situation mm-hmm would we react negatively? Would we be supportive? Would we be dismissive? And I know my parents how they would react and it would be super negative.
Let's just put it that way. Yep. And so I just wanna. Remind people that I think, especially me as a parent, I don't want to make certain situations that are similar, worse. And, I, would like to try to think that I could be supportive in that situation.
[00:40:05] David Syvertsen: Yeah. Like what, what's one thing, Sean, that you, you would want someone on the outside to know, not doesn't even have to be about your personal situation, but let's say that there's someone out there right now that is struggling with something that you've struggled with.
They haven't told anyone. and what could others do to help that person? If anything, we do know it's the personal responsibility of the one that's suffering from mental health to seek outside help. And what in, like I, I said something earlier that the people on the other side of it ask more questions, don't assume, you know, right.
Like have more conversations that are actually back and. Sure. What are some things that you think other people should know that can help others that have the potential issue you had?
[00:40:49] Sean O'Hara: Some of the biggest things, and I think we deal with this and I'm, I'm a hundred percent guilty of this, of. You need to be a good listener of people want to talk to you to tell you when they finally do build up the courage to sit there and say, okay, and now I'm gonna go talk to somebody.
So I'm gonna sit down and I see Sam in the gym, and I know he's got about 15, 20 minutes in between the class or something like that. And, and he, I have as a person dealing with this, I have earmarked Sam as that's the person who I'm gonna feel the most comfortable talking to about this. Yep. When I go up to Sam, I, I, I I'm hoping Sam is going.
be open to talking. Yeah. And actually more open to listening. Yeah. What people, most times don't want to hear right off the bat is you tell them what's going on. Sam. I have some, I'm dealing with some, some, some GI pain. I don't think it's medical. I think it's more so. My, my mental health and my high anxiety.
And the last thing I really want to hear outta Sam is, oh, you know what, the other week I was kind of dealing with the GI issue too. And, you know, I went to see this guy and I
[00:41:50] David Syvertsen: crossed the out and then after I went ,
[00:41:52] Sean O'Hara: that's, that's exactly it. Yeah, that's exactly it. But. That can happen down the road yeah.
In the conversation. Yep. They just want somebody to open up to listen to them, just to kind of get that initial. Wow. I just kind of got this off of me. Somebody else knows. Got it. And it's not always, and, and for, and for people listening to this, it does not have to be, this is gonna be hard for a lot of people.
Mm-hmm it doesn't have to be a close friend, a spouse, a family member. And I, I know I'm not married, but both. I know both, both of you guys are, and, and this may not sit well of if Sam has an issue and his wife is sitting there. She may expect Sam to come with him saying, Sam, you know, I'm, I'm your wife.
Talk to me, you know, about your issue that may not work for Sam. I agree. Sam may have to come in and talk to Nick Squire about it. I. Yeah. And I, you, you know, that, that may just be one of those things that that's the way Sam is going to deal with this particular issue. Yeah. Of, of whatever it is he needs to get off of his chest or, or what he wants to talk about.
Right. So he knows that he's just gonna feel more comfortable and it means it is never a slight to. Your significant other, your family, your best friends or anything else like that? Yeah. And I know that's hard. No, I know because they're there because they want to be there. They want like, I want to
[00:43:13] David Syvertsen: help you at some point, those people will have a role.
Yes. In, in you getting better. Yes. 100%. They just might not be the first step. Yes.
[00:43:20] Sean O'Hara: Exactly. Yeah. That's exactly it
[00:43:22] Sam Rhee: don't be insulted, Susan. I will talk to you
[00:43:25] David Syvertsen: now. And, and then the last thing we'll wrap this up because our next episode's gonna, we're gonna kind of tidy in the fitness, the element to this, right.
Is, you know, when someone does approach you and they are wanting to, I mean, in some cases, someone yes. Wants to get off their chest, but they also, they want feedback, feedback. And we had, we just talked about this on last week's episode. That the feedback doesn't always need to be all. This is how you're gonna solve your issue.
Right? If Sean or someone else comes to you and that's a mental health issue, that's underlying issue. They're not always looking for the solution. There are personalities. I'm one of them. I know Sam is one of them sort, all right, let's solve this. Like, all right. So Sean, like, you're doing this, like let's go eat some KA and broccoli and your right, exactly.
Stomach gonna be better. Right. And let's, let's go do Fran too, just because, right. You know, like that that's you might be like, dude, that's, that's not, what's gonna help me get over my hurdle. I think one of the biggest things we could all do as people is I think a big part of listening is asking question.
And like, I really, because I think it can actually open up the door for the person that's struggling with the mental health to actually say things that they haven't even thought yet, because they have not been asked that question. I think that's one of the biggest purposes of someone that's listening.
If you do want to value yourself as a listener and, and some people are better than others, right? The actual listening, right. Is ask them questions that could actually give them a different angle. And you actually might get more words out of your mouth. Yes. Like right now, talking about this is helping you, right?
Absolutely. Sam and I talk about this all the time in the podcast, off the record. When we do these, it actually helps us kind of understand our own thoughts, understand each other, and understand what other people are going through. And that is what's something I think people can do. Then they're listening is really put effort into asking more questions so that you get to do more of the talking.
And now you both are, have a more common ground
[00:45:12] Sean O'Hara: for sure. That that shows a level of, I don't necessarily wanna say interest, but it shows a level of, okay. I, I am now here. Listening to you trying to understand you invested in you. Exactly. That, that, that that's the greatest word for it. I, I am going to be invested in what you have to say and anything else like that, and I know this was gonna be a little tough on you.
Cause I know in podcast before I've listened to you, you always sit there and say, if you don't have a solution to present. You a lot of times you don't wanna bring up the issue without having may not be the right solution, but a solution. Unfortunately, when it comes to this, a lot of times you may not get the solution right away.
Yes. It, it may take time. It may take a couple of different people. I'm always big on if I don't know the answer or I don't have the answer, I will do my absolute best to get you an answer or get you to someone who does have a better background. Yeah. Or better chance of answering that question.
[00:46:08] Sam Rhee: I think listening to you.
I wonder how many times people have tried to open up to me and say something and I just. listening or your mind wasn't there. I wasn't mindful of it. And then, I just glossed over it or didn't really address it or changed subject. And then that person was like, yeah, like, oh,
[00:46:29] David Syvertsen: well, yeah, screw Sam.
[00:46:30] Sam Rhee: Yeah. Like I tried and he just wasn't particularly receptive. He doesn't care about me yet. Right. Right. And I feel like. That's going to make me feel more attentive. Mm-hmm to when people speak, because there's a lot of opportunities, even at the gym yeah. Where people do speak to you. Yep. And if I don't necessarily.
Tune in and say, wow, that comment might be a prelude to something else that they might wanna say. Like, they're just kind of feeling me out, right. To see if I am receptive. And if I just take it into some other superficial response or something, very flip then maybe I won't give them that opportunity.
To open up and say more. And so, not everything is going to be a huge, deep discussion, but I do have to be attentive and, and see, you know, and also actually with my kids too, I was just thinking about that. Sometimes they say little things and you can either kind of blow it off. Yeah. Or you can give it some space to breathe and let them open up and talk a little bit more.
Yeah. And I, I think that, you know, how many times are we with our friends where that, that might actually be the case.
[00:47:36] Sean O'Hara: Part of just one last thing. Part of what I noticed is that people feel a. More comfortable opening up the people that they don't necessarily have to see every day. That's true. And that they're not gonna look at every day and they don't have to sit there and say, this person knows something that almost nobody knows about.
Right. And it's, it's almost a comfort to sit there and say If I were to sit there and I, I know, and I've just used this as an example, I've opened up to Adam. Ramson about something, especially when we did the, the nutrition stuff. Yep. Didn't see Adam every day. But when I did see him two or three words about, Hey, how you doing?
Yeah. Talk me off. When we did our first, my first fitness challenge here, and I was feeling like absolute day. the first week of that nutrition challenge. I remember Adam. Calling me and see me maybe like once a week, how you doing? Yeah. Hang in there. It's awesome. It's okay. And, and that's all I needed, but nobody else knew that that's what was going on, but I was comfortable cuz I didn't see Adam every day.
Right. That's a good point. I think a lot of people sit there and say, I don't necessarily want to be around a person that knows maybe this personal detail about
[00:48:35] David Syvertsen: me. So everyone listening, you, you might be surprised how many people you are that person for. Yeah. And always look for those opportunities.
Yeah. All right. Thanks, Sean. We're gonna get into you know, how fitness is kind of, kind of incorporate into, you know, helping mental health, how it can hurt mental health. That'll be next week. So thank you guys. We'll see you next time.
