Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jGmNfDfUT5M Starts at: 01:19:55 (jump to 01:19:55)
Spencer Tau — Veteran’s Story of Rage, PTSD & Healing
[01:19:56] Give it up for him, y’all. [01:20:00] Oh, he well-dressed, I like this. [01:20:04] Snazzy. [01:20:04] Dang. [01:20:07] Give it up for his dress, you feel me? [01:20:09] Yeah, for his suit. [01:20:11] I like that. [01:20:12] Hey, the shoes. [01:20:14] Okay, good luck, bro. [01:20:19] So I’m kind of a hypocrite, not the hypocrite. [01:20:22] So this is for the past almost 20 years, [01:20:27] what Master Sergeant Spencer Tau is. [01:20:31] And I’ve spoken at Case Western Reserve University, [01:20:34] multiple universities about leadership. [01:20:37] But, [01:20:39] four years ago, [01:20:41] everything went black. [01:20:44] And the reason being was because I was lost, right? [01:20:49] There’s not a better way to put it than because, [01:20:51] besides, [01:20:54] the rage won. [01:21:03] And once the rage won, I was no longer Spencer, right? [01:21:07] So there I was, [01:21:09] sitting in tears at my table on the phone with very important people, begging, [01:21:18] please, can I go anywhere? [01:21:22] Will you help me? [01:21:23] Can I go somewhere? [01:21:24] But the thought that I might harm myself was a detriment to someone else’s career. [01:21:32] So I was not allowed to go anywhere. [01:21:34] So as I sat there, I thought, oh, I’m going to be a lawyer. [01:21:35] I’m going to be a lawyer. [01:21:36] I’m going to be a lawyer. [01:21:37] I’m going to be a lawyer. [01:21:38] I’m going to be a lawyer. [01:21:39] And I ended up being a lawyer with my family. [01:21:40] Which led to paralysis for three days and then driving myself back home and begging [01:21:53] the professionals from my hometown to help where I was greeted at the ER by strangely [01:21:58] enough a reserve Lieutenant Colonel who said, [01:22:02] I’ve seen this. [01:22:06] You have to talk, right? [01:22:07] I’m going to talk. [01:22:08] Okay? [01:22:09] I thought I was saved but of course the only savior is pills so a cocktail of 12 [01:22:23] pills and to include opioids I don’t know if you’re sure what happens when a [01:22:28] guy that looks like a bad guys from WWE in 1980s takes a cocktail of 12 pills you [01:22:38] don’t become calm all of a sudden right [01:22:45] but of course you try to sedate this beast right and here’s what I had to [01:22:51] find on my journey these hard men my cohort right I made most of my money in [01:22:57] Iraq and Afghanistan as a bodyguard or a guardian angel right the soft people and [01:23:05] this is not to put down anybody the soft people [01:23:08] in the world are the ones that are the most vulnerable and the most vulnerable [01:23:08] in our lives and in our relationships are what break us finally [01:23:20] I couldn’t find a way to express to my family my rage to try to tell a [01:23:32] five-year-old boy that you have to walk into a building with a plan to hurt a [01:23:38] everybody whether they’re good bad or indifferent it’s impossible to tell [01:23:49] that to your wife of why you drive the way you do why you act the way you do why [01:23:54] you eat a French dinner in 4.7 seconds and think that you might be able to use [01:24:03] this butter knife as a weapon if you need to it’s not normal [01:24:08] if I told you if I’ve experienced and been around 14 of my peers committing [01:24:16] suicide that’s not normal six of them were personal that’s not normal if I sat [01:24:27] here in front of an audience of professionals and said there’s a cohort [01:24:30] right now rewind three years ago of 35 to 45 year old people G watt people who [01:24:38] are in the hospital right and they’re in an unspoken location in San Antonio Texas getting [01:24:43] treatment mission 100 and they’re the best of the best the best of the best PJ’s Navy [01:24:53] Seals bodyguards CIA airborne Green Berets you would be told it didn’t exist but we’re [01:25:07] speaking the truth [01:25:08] not just our truth we’re speaking the truth so you get there and finally the man on the island is no [01:25:16] longer the man on the island he has a community but again there’s still fences so it’s nearly [01:25:26] impossible for me to break that fence to come and talk to you the culture it’s so hard to [01:25:38] say that I’m realized that I’m not the man of color I’m I’m not the man of the Lord It’s [01:25:43] hard to say it’s not but it’s also it’s a little I mean it’s just so hard making the transition [01:25:47] because I spent the large portion of my life becoming a man trying to figure out [01:25:49] how to raise America’s men and women [01:25:55] think about that every year I got a new group of forty five young men and women [01:26:01] and I knew at the end of that 12 months out of red cycle [01:26:07] I was going to have to figure out which 40 I was going to take to Afghanistan [01:26:11] that was me writing those names [01:26:15] but here’s what I figured out [01:26:20] and this will be the closing statement because this is a long part of [01:26:25] a one man show that I’m putting together but [01:26:28] I had to swallow the proverbial pill [01:26:33] and understand that in that suspended adolescence that I’m trying [01:26:37] to figure out how to not be 23 years old for the rest of my life [01:26:41] I’m trying to figure out how to not be 29 years old for the rest of my life [01:26:45] I will never be 23 again [01:26:51] I will never be 29 again [01:26:55] I will never be 29 again [01:26:58] I will never be 29 again [01:26:58] you will never be 23 again [01:27:00] you will never be 29 again [01:27:05] but all my friends [01:27:08] they will never be 23 again [01:27:11] they will never be 29 again [01:27:14] thank you