What's happening? I'm Brandon Novak. Some of you guys might know me from those movies Jackass.
You might know me as a former professional skateboarder. You might know me from those TV shows Viva La Bam. You might know me as the author of that New York Times top ten selling autobiography addiction memoir titled Dream Seller.
But what I am is a person in long-term sobriety. I'm in recovery and I keep that first and foremost throughout anything I do. Because I've seen in my story, in my experience, what happens when I put my sobriety second.
I lose it all. lose it all, I give it away. You know, I hear people say I lost the career, the wife, the kids, the home. I didn't lose anything. I gave it away happily and willingly.
As a matter of fact, I can take you to the street corners in Baltimore City where the new owner still resides. You know, that's the reality for an alcoholic like me. Who you're looking at now, what you see, and what you hear is not what you would have saw or what you would have heard two and a half years ago when I walked into my 13th inpatient treatment center.
Had lost count of outpatients and detoxes. My mother had bought me a plot. People had taken life insurance policies out on me and I was on life support for seven days.
Did things in life that people equate to success and happiness, things that most would dream of doing. In reality on paper a very successful individual, a millionaire three times over at the age of 23. At the end of my run at 35 years old I walked into my 13th inpatient treatment center and my worldly possessions. Everything that I owned in my life consisted of eight scarfs, two jackets, three socks, and a stick of deodorant.
It all fit into a bag that doubled as my pillow and four cigarette butts that I dug out of a receptacle from a building. I didn't come from there. I knew better, I was raised better, I came from better. My mother's a nuclear physicist on the board of Mercy Hospital.
My brother's an attorney in the White House. He does pensions and benefits. My father died as a direct result of the disease from which I suffer from.
You heard it, former professional skateboarder. Been in movies that break box office records. New York Times top ten selling author.
It wasn't in my plans, it wasn't in my cards to be a homeless drug addict in Baltimore City doing whatever it took for ten more dollars. And I'm not lying when I say whatever it took. The only thing I didn't do for one more bag was homicide and that's just because it never presented itself.
Because my disease of my addiction... It doesn't give me the privilege to have choices and options of what I will or will not do for one more. When I pick that first one up, it tells me when to go, who to go with, and where to go, and how long. When it says jump, I say how high. How to get there.
How? I had goals, I had dreams, I had ambitions, I came from better, I knew better. At 15, I was the first skateboarder to ever be endorsed by Gatorade.
They flew me down to Chicago to the Quake Roads building, they put me on one treadmill, Michael Jordan on another treadmill, they put wires and tubes in our nose and our mouths, and they gave us each Gatorade to see the effects it has on different sports players. At 16, I'm traveling the world with my mentor, Tony Hawk. I have a tutor that flies with me. My disease doesn't care.
It says, yeah, that's great, your goals, your dreams and ambitions, but I'm sorry boy, you don't have time because right now I'm calling and you answer. You know? Let me give you a little bit of a of a background on me and who I am and where I how from. I was born and raised in Baltimore. I came from a rather extreme family if you will.
Like I told you, my mother, she's the most important person in this world to me. If I can be a centimeter of what she is, I have arrived, right? This woman is the best thing that ever happened.
to the world or me in that matter. At 15 years old she got her first job at Mercy Hospital drawing blood for $5 a pop. Three years ago she recently retired as a nuclear physicist on the board of Mercy Hospital. 53 years of gainful employment, second longest employer in Mercy Hospital history. My brother, he wanted to be an attorney his whole life.
By the time he passed the bar and graduated law school, he was literally blinded in student debt. He had no idea what he was going to do, how he was going to get out of debt, or how he was going to breathe to see another day. Like I said, today he currently resides in the White House doing pensions and benefits. My father never held a job a day in his life.
He taught me one thing. If and when I go to prison, how to conduct myself. I'm not a psychic by any means. I can't predict anybody's future. But if you suffer with the disease of addiction or alcoholism, I can tell you how your future plays out.
And this is a fact. You go to jail, you go to rehab, or you die. That's it.
That's it. For 21 years, I was an IV heroin user. I drank, ate pills, smoked weed, sniffed cocaine for a grand total of about 24 years.
I tried every which way in the world known to man to get clean and stay clean. But on the flip side, I've also tried everything in the world known to man to get high successfully without any consequences, right? Because, you know, I'm not one of these guys that you hear the stories that, like, I didn't have good times while getting high. I had a lot of great times.
A lot of great times doing drugs and alcohol, right? I really did. This is my experience.
This is not everyone else's experience. I can only tell you about my experience. But what happened is that party, somewhere along the lines, became a full-time job. And that full-time job paid nothing but pain and misery.
Right? So much like... My father, my mother, and my brother, and my sister, who also works at Mercy Hospital for my mother, I possessed the quality that they had that I didn't realize until later on down the line, which was despite any and all adverse consequences that came their way, they did what they had to do to get what they wanted to get. I carried that over into my life.
At seven years old, I got my first skateboard. And that night when my mother put me to bed, she said, Brandon, what do you want me to do with this skateboard? I said, I want it in bed with me. She said, why? I said, because if I die, I want it to come with me.
It was like God had came down and handed me the Holy Grail in the form of a skateboard. You might be the best ping pong player in the world, but God might not see fit to put a paddle in your hand. But like, I had this skateboard, and the moment that I got that skateboard at seven years old, and I put it in bed with me that night, I said, I am going to be a professional skateboarder.
I ate it. I breathed it, I slept it, I dreamt it. At 15 I became it. Much like my mother, brother and sister, despite any and all adverse consequences, it came my way. I did what I had to do to get what I wanted to get.
At 15 I'm designing my own shape for a professional board with Palo Peralta. I go on one of my first tours. And I'm on tour with a fellow by the name of Mike Villalli. And on this tour, he finds me with a lot of drugs. And he said, Brandon, get rid of the drugs or get off the tour.
I throw the drugs down the sewer. I meet a girl from the demo. I have her drive me back. I fish the drugs out of the sewer.
Long story short, I get caught with the drugs. Mike Villalli kicks me off the tour. I'm now home.
I get a phone call from my mentor, Tony Hawk. He said, Brandon, we have one of two options we can do with you. We can put you into treatment. You can save your life.
You can continue to be a professional skateboarder and get things in life. that you have no idea exists or you can quit the team. From 15, I'm sorry, from seven years old, that's all I thought about. I ate it, I breathed it, I slept it, I dreamt it. From seven to 15, it happened.
And in the blink of an eye, I was forced with an ultimatum and I didn't even have a breath of fresh air in my lungs when I said I quit. Because what I didn't know then that I know now that drugs and alcohol completely consume me. But see, I suffer from this delusional disease called alcoholism. The factual evidence dictates if you're diagnosed as an addict or an alcoholic, that disease, left untreated, equals fatal death. You can't dispute that, right?
But I have this delusional alcoholic disease that as far as I'm aware of is the only fatal disease that tells me that I don't have a disease. Right? Now follow me here. You diagnose me with HIV. I'm rushing to the hospital to get medication because I don't want to die.
Fatal disease. Right? You diagnose me with cancer. I'm rushing to the hospital to get chemo because I don't want to die.
Fatal disease. You diagnose me as an addict or an alcoholic. I need a glass of wine or a bag of heroin to figure out what the hell is wrong with you for doing this.
diagnosed me with such disease and it's just as fatal as the first two diseases but left to my own devices I'll believe that I don't have a disease it's the only one that tells me I don't have a disease so so he I don't have a breath of fresh air my lungs when I say I quit the team Because in my delusional mind frame at this point in time, the skateboarding world needs me. It cannot go without me. I am an asset. In reality, the skateboarding world did not need me.
It went on quite fine without me and I was a liability. Unfortunately, I'm the last person to see or know that at the time because... Because I have this job, and this job is a very tiresome job and it pays very, very poorly.
And that job consists of knowing everything. Like I know everything. Too smart for my own good. So I'm not really ready to hear what you have to say yet because after all I'm a very successful individual. At 15 I'm doing things that people equate to success.
I've made a career, I've made a living out of this. So like how are you going to tell me what I'm doing is wrong? People trust in me, people believe in me.
I don't have somebody like saying Brandon be in when like the street lights come on. Make sure you're in school at 8 a.m. because people like have seen what I've did up to this point. So they say, well, he must know what he's doing.
And I really believe that I knew what I was doing. And my disease of alcoholism, addiction, what have you, told me I knew what I was doing. Because it's cunning, baffling, and powerful.
It's so powerful that that is just an understatement. So now I'm home. Packages aren't being sent to my house.
Tours aren't being scheduled, flights aren't being booked, video parts are not being produced. Because those things require me to be honest, reliable, or dependable. And you'll hear in my story that anything that requires those three words do not work well with me. Because they don't help me get one more.
Anything between me and that next bag or bottle, must and will go. And it's not personal, it's just business. Because I don't have the privilege to have choices and options of what I will or will not do for one more. Right? I'm trying to paint a picture here for you people to let you see what the disease of addiction does in like a slow motion movie here if you will.
will. Right? So now I'm home and I'm with my mother and I'm with my girl and about two months into this they come to me one day and they said, Brandon we have a great idea for you. I said, what's that? They said, we want you to go to treatment.
I thought about it for a second and I said that's a phenomenal idea. A, I have the time and B, I'm going to report to this treatment center and I will report back to my mother and my girl why I'm not those people nor will I ever be. Follow me here.
I'm going into this treatment center with a closed mind and a closed heart to prove to these two why I'm not those people. Simply caught me at a bad time on a bad way in a bad day overreaction at best So I go into this treatment center. I'm 17 years old It's around 1030 at night I'm in this big cafeteria. I'm all alone. I'm by myself.
I'm ill as a research monkey because I'm withdrawing from heroin I'm trying to make a bowl of this chicken flavored ramen noodle soup, and I'm spilling the broth all over me and out of nowhere this This older black gentleman walks up to me and he says, white boy, what are you doing here? I said, heroin. He said, how old are you?
I said, 17. He said, do yourself a favor and don't turn 18 in a place like this. And as quick as he came, he left. He nor I had no idea the significance of this conversation would ever have on my life. You know what I can tell you about that gentleman?
I can tell you where the four teeth were placed in his mouth because at the time I had all mine. I can tell you that he was 75, I'm 17. He's black, I'm white. He smokes crack. My delusional alcoholic mind tells me that I successfully do heroin.
He's homeless. I live with my mother and my girlfriend. He needs this place.
God help him. He needs this. He's in the right place. Mind you, close mind and close heart, proving why I'm not these people.
You know what I can't tell you about that first treatment center? I can't tell you my therapist's name. I can't tell you about the relapse prevention packet they were trying to shove down my throat or the healthier, unhealthy boundaries they were trying to instill in me because if I could tell you about those things, that might mean that I can relate to being one of those people and I want no part. I leave that treatment center, disease untreated, no defense against me and that first drink or drug.
I turned 19, 20, 22, 23, 24, 25, 27, 28, 29, 32, 33, 34, 35 in a jail or a treatment center. And every year on my birthday I would sit on whatever bed of whatever treatment center I was in or whatever bunk of whatever prison cell I was in and think back to that older gentleman from that first treatment center. And all I could say to myself is if I would have listened to him with an open heart and an open mind, I...
I, I, I, me, myself, Brandon Novak, would not continuously find myself in this situation day after day, month after month, year after year. Meaning that it was fully self-induced. I had created and painted this picture for which I now live in. So in between all those birthdays and incarcerations and rehab stints, I'm in and out of treatment centers.
I'm in and out of treatment centers. And I'm the kind of alcoholic that I loiter with the intent to recover. Right?
So I'll get a sponsor. I'll get a home group. I can fellowship fairly easily because I'm a people person.
But you say work the steps. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Number one, the word work is not my forte unless it pays with $10 or a glass of wine. Number two, I guess you didn't get the email.
That Brandon only attends Brandon's Anonymous, Brandon only sponsors Brandon, and Brandon is Brandon's God. And then for the life of me, I can't understand why I'm back on the corner of Eastern Avenue and Patterson Park selling my body for $40 to anyone that will buy. How did I get there? This wasn't in my foreseeable future. My mother's a nuclear physicist.
My brother's an attorney in the White House. Former professional skateboarder. Been in movies that break box office records.
New York Times top 10 selling author who's written a book on addiction. Now I'm selling the corner, selling my body. I had goals. I had dreams. I had ambitions.
It was not supposed to play out this way. And the hit is that it didn't have to play out this way. It didn't have to play out this way.
But I told you, I have this job of knowing everything. Right? So, in and out of treatment centers, the skateboarding world is now awash.
And throughout my whole life you'll hear a common theme is that I was always confused and I thought social acceptability equaled personal recovery. Right? So as long as the house was new enough, the woman was pretty enough, the bank account was high enough, and the car was new enough... and you told me those things that validated me how I was feeling and I had to be doing good. I had to be doing good.
So then I stumble into these movies called Jackass. TV shows called Viva La Bam. Traveling the world ten times over. I keep going to these meetings because what I realize now that I didn't know then is I was trying to fill this internal void with the external solution. So, uh...
Keep going to these meetings and in these meetings they tell me that my life is unmanageable. I believe that my life is unmanageable. I know that my life is unmanageable because I can't stop drinking or drugging. But I told you I have that delusional alcoholic mind that tells me that my life is not unmanageable and I'm going to take it a step further.
Now I do appearances in night clubs and when I do appearances in night clubs they say, Mr. Novak, what would you like in your green room? And I say, I need some heroin, some cocaine, some Xanax and some wine. They give me those substances, they put them in my green room. I hang out in the audience, I take pictures, I sign autographs. And then at the end of the night I get a check for $10,000.
I already suffer from a disease riddled mind that tells me I don't have a disease. If that's not hard enough now... Literally, I get paid to get high.
Now I'm like really delusional. I don't know, up from down, right from left, hot from cold. I don't know. But I'm too internally unique. I see that it works for you people, but it can't work for me.
You haven't seen what I've seen. You haven't done what I've done. You haven't felt what I've felt. I'm just trying to paint a picture for you of what I felt like going into this, right? So I'm not willing to go back to treatment because I feel like I can drink successfully.
I'm not going to do heroin or cocaine or Xanax because that brings me to my knees. I know the death, the destruction, the despair that that comes with. But I can drink wine because I don't shake when I don't have it.
I don't get cold sweats when I don't have it. So I come up with a foolproof plan of how I'm gonna beat my alcoholism. It's gonna work. Strap me up to a polygraph.
I will pass with flying colors. I'm gonna move to Helsinki, Finland. That's literally across the world. They don't even speak my language. I can go there.
I can regroup. I can rebrand. I can reassess. I can reevaluate. I can redo life.
And I'm going to do it. I am going to do it. I'll bet my mother on it. I told you how much I love my mother.
I'll bet my mother on it. I am going to do it. It is going to be different when I touch down in Helsinki, Finland.
And as a young age, my mother used to say to me, show me who you walk with and I'll tell you who you are. So I touched down in Helsinki, Finland. I told you, social acceptability equals personal recovery. Filling this internal void with an external solution. So I go right to a five-star hotel.
I go right to the lobby bar. And there's all these businessmen in like thousand-dollar suits having meetings. So I gotta be doing good.
Look at the company I'm in. Look at the hotel I'm staying in, right? I proceed to go right to the bar. I get bottle after bottle of wine. I get a guy, and I keep buying heroin from him throughout the whole night, and I keep going to the bathroom shooting bag after bag after bag.
How did that happen? How did I get here? I swore to God on everything that this was not going to be this way when I touched down.
I'll tell you how it happened because I suffered from a disease that tells me that I don't have a disease and left to my own devices. I believe it. So I called my sponsor up and I said Lex what happened?
How did I get here? Yet again it was not sponsored. to be this way in Finland. And he said, well, let me tell you something, Mr. Know-it-all. Let me tell you something, genius.
I guess you skimmed over the part in the book where it talks about geographical change does not equal recovery. You can't shake your shadow. You take you with you everywhere you go.
And then he says, try this one on for size. Drinking and drugging isn't your problem. What? That was like a punch to the gut.
Because I thought really and I really believe this if I just sat it down I'd be good. I can move on with my life. I won't pick it up again. He said drinking and drugging is not your problem.
That's your solution. I can put you in Finland. I can put you in Africa. I can put you in Ohio. I can put you in Philadelphia.
I can put you in Chicago, New York, Boston. You name it. You will get high.
Drinking and drugging is not your problem, it's your solution. You want to know what your problem is, Mr. Know-it-all? Yeah, I do.
I'm dying to know, right? You see, your problem is your thinking, your attitude, and your behavior. Wow! I didn't sign up for all this.
I didn't, I wasn't bargaining for this. You know they talk about triggers, change people, places, and things. My triggers are when my eyelids open. I can justify why this chair makes a great dope shooting partner and me in this chair will go shoot heroin So I get tired of carrying this thing and when I get tired of carrying it doesn't matter anyways because my disease of addiction says You don't have the choice to not carry that chair carry it and I have to listen.
Wow, so that's not what I wanted to hear So I jump on a plane, I come back, and now just like that skateboarding world, the same thing's happening in this jackass world. My delusional alcoholic mind says the jackass world needs me, it cannot go on without me, I am an asset. In reality, it does not need me, it goes on quite fine without me, and I'm a liability, but I'm the last person to see that.
Now paychecks are being diverted to my mother's house. flights aren't being booked because they say if we book him the flight when we make the flight if he makes the flight what condition will he be in when he gets here let's take it a step further and we book him the flight and he makes it here is the same thing that's gonna happen that happened last time where we have to kick the bathroom door down at Paramount Studios and find him dead on the ground with a needle hanging out of his arm That's not a good look for the work world. But see, I have this selective memory when it plays in favor of my alcoholism.
Meaning that I can tell you about four years ago on Halloween, like it just happened just right now, when I was able to go to Ram's Head Pub in Westchester, have two glasses of wine, and be home in bed by 9 p.m. I can tell you a bar store... sat on, I can tell you the barkeep's name was that served me, I can tell you the music that played on the jukebox, I can tell you that it was snowing out.
I remember it like I just snapped my fingers. Why, might you ask? Because that night I controlled my drinking.
I did exactly what I set out to do. I went, I had two glasses of wine, and I was at home in bed by 9 p.m. That plays in favor of my alcoholism. My disease of alcoholism says, Hey, remember that? you could probably do it again.
Oddly enough, what it allows me to block out is being medevaced to four different hospitals in four different states from four different overdoses. It allows me to block out a few Christmases back-stealing every Christmas present from under the tree at my mom's house. my mother's house. It allows me to block out my mother buying me a plot six years ago on Mother's Day.
It allows me to block out 13 inpatient treatment centers, lost count of outpaces and detoxes, being on life support for seven days. It allows me to block out when I'm sleeping in an abandoned house in Baltimore City on Christmas Eve and all I have is a t-shirt on and it's freezing cold and it's snowing out and I have to put my shirt over my knees and and pull my arms into my shirt and put my face into my shirt and breathe out of my nose and my mouth hot air so I can have some feeling of heat. It does not allow me to remember that because if I remember that, my disease wants no part of that because that allows me to see that I can't control my drinking or drugging.
Cunning, baffling, and powerful. Social acceptability equals personal recovery, right? So I gotta keep the outside appearances up so you people think the N-word is doing well.
So I gotta come up with something else because the skateboarding world's a wash, the jackass world's a wash. I gotta do something here. I gotta do something to make you people say that I'm on the right track. So I decide I'm gonna write a book. I'm gonna write a book.
Mind you, I have no GED. I have no high school diploma. I got my GED later on down the line in prison, right?
And the only reason why I got my GED in prison is A, because I had the time, and B, if I passed the GED in prison, you got a pizza party that was supplied by Domino's. And I don't know about anybody else in the world, but it's kind of a no-brainer. Who doesn't want dominoes while you're in the joint, right?
So go figure, I aced that test. But prior to doing the GED and having a diploma, I decided I'm going to write this book. Follow me here.
Former professional skateboarder. Travel the world with Tony Hawk. I've been in movies that break box office records. Paid rather well.
Now I'm going to be a writer. I'm the kind of person, if I believe it, I can see it. I write this book, take it a step further, the book gets published.
The book happens to be an autobiography addiction memoir. Now I'm a published author who's written a book on autobiography addiction memoir. Let's take it a step further and it becomes a New York Times top 10 seller.
I'm receiving hundreds of thousands of pieces of mail from all over the world of people saying, Novak, I read your book. I didn't want my story to get as bad as yours. I have 30 days. People saying, Novak, I read your book.
I understand why my daughter picks the needle over coming to have dinner with me on the weekends. It's not because I was a bad mother. It's because she suffers with a disease of addiction.
My delusional alcoholic mindset, I just wrote the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous or the basic text of Narcotics Anonymous. And what that is, if you don't know what that is, that's like the Bible for people in the program. It's like a code of how to live, right?
I'm saving all these people's lives, but I can't keep a needle out of my arm. So I come up with another foolproof plan how I'm gonna beat my disease of Alcoholism because see now I'm at the point where I'm like the alcoholic that wants to kill himself on a daily basis But I don't want to hurt myself in the process So I stay in this weird purgatory state, strap me up to that polygraph, pads with flying colors, tomorrow is going to be different. I'll bet my mother on it, you name it, I'll give it to you because tomorrow is going to be different.
Only to wake up tomorrow to repeat yesterday's actions and be stuck in like a groundhog's day effect for the better part of 21 years. In theory, on paper, very successful individual. Did things in life people equate to success or happiness?
Most even dream of doing. I'm not at the point where I'm ready to walk into a treatment center, admit defeat, and say, I don't know, maybe you do, can you help me? Look at my resume, I can make things happen, right?
I'm not ready to go back to rehab yet. I have another foolproof plan of how I'm going to beat my alcoholism. I'm gonna go on tour with a major rock and roll band.
We're gonna do 29 countries in 32 days. That is gonna work, right? I believe it's gonna work. How could it not work? Clearly Finland was the problem.
Now I'm gonna go to the UK. I have 28 other countries to pick from. One of them have to take. And I mean it, I don't wanna do what I'm doing.
I'm gonna like really give it my all. Needless to say, I make it to the fourth country. I'm not so kindly asked to leave the tour. Get on a plane from Australia.
I come back to my mother's house. I knock on her door and she's crying. She's crying.
She's like water's pouring out of her eyes. I said, what's wrong with you? She said, Brandon, I've received four different phone calls from four different. men with four very heavy accents today. They said if I didn't deposit X amount of dollars and X amount of bank accounts, I was to view your body at the morgue tonight.
I said calm down, I'm here. Right? Because now the abnormal has become the normal. I'm living on that animalistic level. Right?
I think she's out of her mind. So now my book's getting ready to be released that night. In Times Square, New York City, at the Barnes & Nobles.
My literary agent's there, my manager's there, my publishers are there. All these very well-to-do scholarly people in that world. And I don't have any heroin.
I told you I'm the kind of alcoholic that doesn't have the privilege to pick and choose what I will or will not do or when I will or will not use. When it calls, I answer. By any and all means necessary.
It's not personal, it's business. I love you, I don't want to hurt you, but I don't have the option not to. How did I get here?
How? How did I get here? Mother nuclear physicist, brother attorney of the White House, former professional skateboarder, been in movies and breaks box office records, New York Times top ten selling author, my books being released in Times Square at Barnes and Nobles. But I don't have any heroin. My people won't give me any money for any of my heroin because what I don't understand then, what I understand now is that it would not be a good look for me autographing these autobiography addiction memoirs while falling asleep into that.
Right? But my disease knows no boundaries. When it calls, I answer.
And me and my buddy from Baltimore are sitting in these two chairs, and they wheel my books in. And me and him look at each other for one second, and we have like a full conversation without opening. our mouths.
I stand up, he stands up, we go over to the boxes of books. I grab two boxes of books, he grabs two boxes of books, and we jump right to the Amtrak station and we get on the train and we go right back to Baltimore and I sign them off and I sell them to two different stores. I just stole my own books from my book release.
My delusional alcoholic mind says the literary world needs me. It cannot go on without me. I am an asset.
Next Stephen King or Edgar Allan Poe, if you will. The reality is the literary world did not need me. It went on quite fine without me, and I was a liability.
That's a common theme in my life, but it's because I suffer from a disease that tells me I don't have a disease, and I also suffer from a man who has a job that knows everything. So I go back to my home at the time, where I had my fiancee at the time. She's now an ex because I gave her away for ten more dollars. And I went to put my key in the lock and it didn't work.
And I kicked the door in and it's this big shell of an empty house. She had taken my cat, she had taken my furniture, my paintings, my clothes, her clothes, you name it, it was gone. And I got on the floor in a fetal position that some of you guys might be able to relate to and I cried. Because what happened is that house was a spinning image of me. I was in this big empty shell of a house and I was living in a big empty shell of a man.
And I knew that it was fully self-induced. It didn't have to be this way, but I didn't know how to not make it be this way. But how did I get here?
I was not going to be that older gentleman for that first treatment center. Remember I said, God help him, he needs this. I'm now a spinning image of that man. It's not like I was less fortunate.
It's not like I didn't have the opportunities. I have nobody to blame but myself. So this all took place around May, beginning of May 2015. I get a phone call from my mother. I'm from Baltimore. My mother still resides in Baltimore City.
And around that time in Baltimore City was when the police killed that young black man, Freddie Gray. And if you remember correctly, Baltimore City at that time was like the movie The Purge. There was a 10 o'clock curfew. They were robbing, they were looting, they were shooting, they were stealing, they were burning blocks down, they were burning police cars on fire. The National Guard was there with their tanks and their machine guns.
And my mother was terrified. And she called me and she said, Brandon, I am terrified. She lives about 15 blocks from where that took place. where they killed him.
She said, Brandon, I'm terrified. Can you come take care of me? I said, absolutely. There's nothing in this world I will not do for that woman. My intentions are to go back there and take care of her.
My actions dictate something completely different. I jump on a train. I go back to see my mother.
I plan on going there to take care of her. My actions dictate I run up into this bedroom. I leave that bedroom once a day for three months.
Every morning at 5 a.m., I wake up, and I sneak down the stairs because she sleeps in the living room on the sofa. I know exactly what step to step on because, God forbid, I step on the wrong step, and it makes a noise. I see... He says, Brandon, can you get me something to drink?
I would love to get you something to drink, but I can't. It's not personal. It's business.
My disease calls, and I have to answer. Former professional skateboarder, better movies that break box office records, New York Times top 10 selling author who's written a book on addiction. In theory or paper, very successful individual. In reality, I'm a 35-year-old man living in my mother's house. I leave once a day to go buy $180 worth of heroin and cocaine.
My worldly possessions consist of eight scarves, two jackets, three socks, a stick of deodorant. All fits into a bag that doubles as my pillow. By this point in time, my mother had depleted several savings accounts. She had sold four different homes to financially pay for me to go to treatment. There was nothing else she could do for me.
And she went to the church across the street and she saw Father Mike, and this is when I'm still in the house, and she said, my Father Mike says, Pat, how's Brandon? She said, Father Mike, he's never been worse. There is absolutely nothing I can do to help him anymore.
I'm completely incapable of helping him. She said, I went to God with one simple prayer. And Father Mike said, oh yeah, Miss Pat, what's that prayer? She said, Father Mike, it's simple. I went to God and I asked God to please cure him, kill him, or kill me because I can't take it anymore.
Father Mike looked at my mother and he said, how dare you, Pat? He screamed at her. He said, how dare you, Pat? Don't you ever tell God what to do with your son.
Little do you know, God has a plan for him. You don't have an idea what the plan is. I don't have an idea what the plan is. And Brandon damn sure doesn't have an idea what the plan is. So around that time, I get a phone call from my best friend, Ben Margera.
And he said, we're going on tour to Australia. If you could just drink wine, you'll do great. Most people would say, wow, this is your golden ticket. You better take advantage of this. A month and a half long tour of the Gold Coast of Australia.
You get paid rather well. And you can drink wine. Who wouldn't want to do that?
I was immediately furious at that opportunity. And I'll tell you why, because I had been to Australia before, and with the flight zone time change, it's like a 22-hour flight. And the last time I went there, I brought enough heroin that should have lasted me for the month.
But I'm not the kind of addict that can ration or portion out my intake of substances. So by the time my flight landed, I had no more heroin, and I felt kind of normal. And I couldn't find any heroin in Australia.
Needless to say, I did not want to go back to Australia because I told you anything between me and heroin has to go. But I knew if I stayed in my mother's house, it was going to end really, really bad because I worked really hard to get out of Baltimore City. So against my better judgment, I jumped on a train and I go back to Philadelphia. I stop in Kensington, I buy a decent amount of heroin, and I go over to Bam's house.
And he says, come upstairs, I want to show you some footage that I'm editing. And when I get upstairs, I go to pull my cigarettes out of my pocket and all my heroin falls out of my pocket. And he says, you're not going on tour and you're not staying in my house.
Get the F out. Most people would say, wow, you just blew it. Like I told you, the abnormal became the normal. I'm living on this animalistic level that I'm now used to. And for me, at that point in time, at that very moment, on that very day, it was like I hit the mega millions.
Because now Australia will not get between me and shooting dope. And I run to the train station, I get back on the train, I go back to my mother's house, so happy. And I get to my mother's door and I've had a lot of ass whoopings in my careers of drinking and drugging. But this particular ass whooping on this Wednesday night at 10.30pm on the stoop of her house in Little Italy, I cannot put enough drugs or alcohol on to allow me to forget this. I get back to her house, I go knock on her door, it's 10.30 at night.
I said, Mom, congratulations, the tour is canceled. I'm here to take care of you a little bit longer. And she looked up at me, and she said, Brandon, no, no, you're not. They've called and told me everything. Theoretically, I've had much lower bottoms.
I've had much, much lower bottoms. But this is the worst bottom that I've ever hit in my life. And let me tell you why. Because this night, Wednesday night, 10.30 PM on the stoop of her house in Little Italy, my bottom came up to meet me. It rose up to meet me and yet again I thought back to the older gentleman for the first treatment center and said if I listened to him with an open heart and an open mind, I would not be in this position yet again.
Fully self-induced, my mother did the worst thing that she could have ever did for me that night. She didn't scream at me, she didn't cuss me out, she didn't say, why did you mess up again? She simply stared at me with that thousand mile stare.
As if she was watching her only son stand in front of a head-on coming train going a million miles an hour. Her eyes were full of fear, of terror, of heartache, heartbreak. She didn't say anything. And all I could say to her is I looked up and I said, Mom, do you hate me now? Do you hate me now?
And she said, Brandon, I don't hate you, but I will no longer love you to death. You cannot stay in this house anymore. And with that, my hotshot attorney brother from the White House comes walking down the stairs, and they went up in that bedroom that I left once a day for three months.
And it looked like a murder scene in that bedroom. There's blood on the ceilings, on the walls, there's needles, there's cookers, there's bags, there's paraphernalia. And with that, a police officer comes around the corner and he serves me the restraining order. My friends have left the country.
The woman who has never said no to me has served me with a restraining order. First skateboarder to be endorsed by Gatorade. Traveled the world with Tony Hawk.
Been in movies to break box office records. Published author of a New York Times top ten selling book or an autobiography addiction memoir. With no GED.
I've made things happen. In theory, no paper, a very successful individual. In reality, I'm a 35-year-old man whose worldly possessions consist of eight scarves, two jackets, three socks, and a stick of deodorant that fits into a bag that doubles as my pillow.
and I'm walking up the street with nowhere to go. How did I get here? I had goals.
I had dreams. I had ambitions. I lived with a cautionary tale. My father was what I was that day.
And I always swore that I would never be him. I lived with a cautionary tale. I excelled at skateboarding. I went above and beyond because I did not like that man and I would not turn out to be what he was. I'm what he was.
I am that first guy in that treatment center. This was not my intentions. Walking up the street, I go to this abandoned shooting gallery. I go into the shooting gallery. I'm doing what I do best.
I'm shooting up, and my phone goes off, and some woman through social media, and she says, I've read your book. It saved my life, and I could care less. because I don't want mine.
And she said, what do you think about an all-exclusive paid trip to Fort Lauderdale? I said, that'd be great. I need some heroin, some cocaine, some Xanax, and some wine.
She says, no problem. That's red flag number one. My book has saved her life. life but she's gonna give me substances that kill mine but who cares I do a little bit more research I realized she lives in a hotel that's not a good look either I do a little bit more research I realized she's like a lady of the night or a dancer which I have no problems with because I've seen me become both of those things for $10 She has two requirements that I must fulfill when I touch down in Fort Lauderdale. Mind you, it's all on her dime.
She's paying for everything. When I touch down in Fort Lauderdale, she wants to party and she wants to make love, for lack of better words. And I don't know about anybody else, but when I do heroin, I sleep.
So now I'm going to wear my welcome out really quick and I don't want to do homeless in Fort Lauderdale. It's hot, it's sandy, I don't know the hustles. I can do it in Baltimore. But she has what I need. I don't want to go to Fort Lauderdale, but I don't have the privilege to say, no, I don't want to go to Fort Lauderdale.
But what I'm forgetting to tell you, it's Wednesday night. It's around 1130 p.m. I'm in the... shooting gallery in Baltimore City.
I am to see my probation officer tomorrow morning at 8 a.m. in Westchester, Pennsylvania. I'm supposed to be in Pennsylvania.
I'm not supposed to leave the state of Pennsylvania. I'm supposed to be clean and sober. I'm supposed to report to her office tomorrow morning at 8 a.m.
to produce a clean urine in a cup. I'm in Baltimore City. I have a needle hanging out of my arm.
I've left Pennsylvania. I'm en route to Baltimore Washington International Airport to catch a red-eye flight to Fort Lauderdale. My disease is so powerful, it tells me, don't worry, get on this plane, you'll be able to make it there tonight, turn around and get right back to Westchester, Pennsylvania by 8 a.m.
and produce a clean urine for this woman. It's physically impossible to catch a red-eye flight and turn around and make it back, literally, unless I have my own jet, to 8 a.m. in Westchester, Pennsylvania.
And then it tells me that I'll be able to pass this urinalysis. That's physically impossible. But I believe that it's going to happen because my disease tells me I don't have a disease. Follow me.
So I get dressed as though I'm going to see my PO. I put these tight slacks on. I have this button-up shirt on.
And I have these at-once, point-in-time, nice Brooks Brothers shoes. But I lost a shoestring along the way. I'm dressed as though I'm going to see her tomorrow morning because I really believe it. That's how powerful my disease is. But before I go get on this plane tonight, I have to go back into East Baltimore and buy a few more things of heroin.
Because I can't be sick for the plane. So when I go to buy some more dope from the boys, I'm going to go to the store. boys, the boys see fit to rob me as opposed to give me my drugs. And when they rob me, they rip my front pockets out and my back pockets out.
I don't wear underwear because I get high. I don't have time to wash underwear, find fake imaginary dressers to put them in. My life is consumed by the getting and using and finding ways and means to get one more, so I don't do that stuff. I get high. They ripped my front and back pockets out.
My back and my front are completely exposed. They ripped my shirt open. The only button that stays buttoned is this top button.
And I got these shoes on with one shoe string. And I'm roaming the streets of East Baltimore looking like a gay East L.A. Cholo gangbanger. Right?
How did that happen? I don't want to go to jail. My father taught me when I go there how to conduct myself.
I've been there, I've done that, but I can't get high like I like to get high in jail. So I tend to show up for court dates and work out a layaway plan with the judge, right? Against my better judgment, I'm headed to BWI Airport because I don't know how to say no.
I don't want to get on this plane. God knows I don't want to get on this plane. My heart's beating a million miles an hour.
I walk up to the ticket counter to get my ticket and they... take one look at me, they say, Mr. Novak, are you under the influence of anything? I say, nope. They say, we believe you are.
You will not fly for 72 hours. Not like you can catch the next flight or tomorrow morning. Three days.
What my delusional mind says is, I bet this woman's son or daughter has an issue with drugs or alcohol. She knows who I am. She's blaming her kid's disease on me.
She's pissing on my parade. Something very valuable happened at this point of my sobriety right here at this moment. Two things I've learned in my career. I never have won an argument with a judge or a TSA airport security agent. What they say goes.
happened was I told you I did not want to get on that flight. I did not want to get on. I knew that it was, my heart was beating out of my chest.
I did not want to get on it, but I didn't know how to not get on it. And what happened was God dressed up in the form of a TSA airport security agent and did for me what I could not do for myself. And when they say I'm not allowed to fly for three days, I'm like really relieved. It's like a million pounds have been lifted off my shoulder because I didn't want to get on the flight, but I just didn't know how to not do it because my disease told me to do it. So I get out of line and I...
go over and I call the same sponsor that I called when I was in Finland. I said, Lex, I'm stranded at BWI Airport and I want to kill myself. And he said, no, what you're going to do is you're going to get on a train and you're going to come back to Philadelphia. Some people are going to leave their Memorial Day cookouts May 25th, 2015. They're going to leave their families, they're going to leave their cookouts, and they're going to come get you and they're going to let you stay at their house. Now mind you, from that very first treatment center, I walked in there, I wasn't buying what they were selling, I was not drinking their Kool-Aid, I wanted no part of them.
Now at the end, those people are the only people that answer my phone calls, and to make matters worse, they don't even give me ten bucks. So I get on the train, I go back to Philly, these guys pick me up. I stay at one of their houses, the next morning I go see my PO. And she takes mercy on me.
I believe she takes mercy on me because I'm still wearing the same outfit that I was not allowed to board that flight on because I didn't have a change of clothes. She said, go up here, let's see if we can get you a bed. So I go up there, they get me a bed, and I go into the intake chair, to the intake room with the same intake woman that I had been to four previous times. And I sit down in the chair.
And the four previous times she would say, Mr. Novak, your insurance covers 90 days. And I would always say in theory, 90 days sounds great. But in reality, I'm more of like a 45 day kind of fellow.
I have this job to see, this woman to do, this state to go to. And she would laugh at me each and every time. And she'd say, sweetheart.
The same thing I said in the very beginning of this interview. Sweetheart, anything and everything that you put in front of your recovery does not or will not matter because you will lose it. I'm now sitting in this chair, four times later out of my 13 treatment centers. And when she comes to me with the same offer that she's came to me before, I could not come back with a counteroffer.
Because if I said no, that entailed an explanation. I had been demoralized in just such a fashion from drugs and alcohol. I had been beaten into a state of reasonableness to where now you have my attention.
And when she told me the 90-day offer, all I could do was shake my head yes. She said, sweetheart, you're in no condition to do your intake. Get you up to detox.
I'll see you in four days. On my way to detox I see my counselor she says Mr. Novak you're back I said yep she said if you play your cards right today could be the best day of your life and I looked at her I said Christina do you need a urinalysis are you high you know what I'm capable of you know what I've done in my past I stand before you today with my clothes ripped to shreds my work worldly belongings in this bag, eight scarves, two jackets, three socks, a stick of deodorant, and four cigarette butts that I've dug out of a receptacle. She said, trust me, play your cards right.
Today could be the best day of your life. What happens is she saw in me what I did not see in myself. She said, get up to the detox. I'll see you in four days.
I get up to detox. There's a 19 year old kid. He says, Mr. Novak, your clothes are not rehab oriented.
You need some sweatpants. You need some underwear. You need some slides. I had never prayed for such simple articles of clothing in my life.
But the fact of the matter is my disease said you don't have to have underwear. You don't get to have sweatpants. You don't get to have any of that. That gift of desperation, that God moment is appearing as we speak.
He said, come downstairs, I'm going to take you to the donations box. I was a millionaire three times over at the age of 23. I'm now 35 in the basement of a Catholic charity's rehab as this 19-year-old kid rummages through old clothes looking for a pair of second, third, fifth, tenth-hand pair of underwear. And I'm praying to God he finds it. How did I get here?
How? I had goals, I had dreams, I had ambitions. I got here because I have a disease that tells me I don't have a disease and I also suffer from having a job that knows everything. I'm now beaten in that state of reasonableness.
At this point in time I'm so low that the curb looks like a skyscraper. I'm so horrible at suicide because I keep waking up, so I'm willing to do whatever you tell me. And the kid's looking for a pair of underwear and he doesn't find a pair of underwear.
But what he finds is... a pair of size 40 women's sweatpants with no drawstring. He finds a woman's tank top and a pair of size 13 Jesus sandals.
I don't know how alert or attentive any of you people are, but I'm not a woman and I don't wear a size 13. But the reality is... God had showed up in the basement of that Catholic Charities Rehab, that gift of desperation, that God moment showed up and with that became this side of willingness and I'm willing to do whatever it takes to stay sober one more night and if that entails wearing women's clothing and shoes that don't fit, bring it on because I've accepted that if I continue to drink or drug that I will die but worse than that I won't die, I'll wake up every day and use against my will. I come upstairs, I go upstairs, I get a shower, I get that Baltimore City smell off me, I put these women's clothes on, I successfully stay in that treatment center for 90 days. From there I go to a sober living house.
Somewhere in between that time I had been on parole and probation from 16 years old to 30. I never had a free day in between. About a year and a half ago I signed my release papers. I am no longer the property of any state.
I'm literally a free man that no longer lives in that self-induced prison that cost me $10 to get out of on a death. basis that's a four block radius. I decided I wanted to get my two-year medallion in a different country. I flew out to Paris to do that.
That same woman, my mother, who served me with that restraining order called me nine months into my process. She said, Brandon, I hate when you come to visit. I said, why?
She said, because I get so sad when you leave. That book deal that I told you about when I stole my own books and they ripped my contract up afterwards, my last book was released two months ago, my second book. I have three more books that will be released. I have the first ever addiction graphic novel coming out.
I have a documentary that's going to the Sundance and the Cannes Film Festival. It's not me bragging or boasting. It's me simply saying, if you want what I have, do what I do. You can get what I got.
I was that addict alcoholic that was deemed unhelpful or unfixable. My mother prayed for my death at the end. Those people that I want to know part of in the treatment center, I now work in the treatment industry field. Most importantly, I have not had the desire to have a drink or a drug in two and a half years. Sobriety has given me everything that drugs and alcohol promised me.
I'm gonna close with this story. There's a father that works from home and he's swamped in work and his son keeps banging on the knee, Dad, take me out to play, take me out to play, take me out to play. The father's thinking of a way to buy eight hours, one day, two days, and he looks on his office and on his...
desk in his office at home and he sees this big picture of a puzzle of the world map. The father thinks to himself, I got it. He says to his son, he dismantles the picture of the puzzle of the world map and he throws it on the ground. He says, son, when you put the picture of the puzzle of the world map back together, I'll take you out to play. The father leaves the office on the phone surely thinking he bought one or two days 20 minutes later the son comes back and he bangs the dad on the knee dad.
I did it the father's thinking to himself impossible He walks back into that office as sure as the day is long the picture of the puzzle the world maps put back together He said son. How'd you do it? Son said, Dad, it was simple.
On the back of the picture of the puzzle, the world map, was a picture of a man. I put the man back together, the world fell back in place. Together we stand, divided I die.
My name is Brandon Novak. Thank you for listening.