What the Recovery Industry Won’t Say: Recovery Expert Reveals Major Key Steps | Recovery Vow Podcast

In this eye-opening episode of The Recovery Vow, Eric Kennedy sits down with recovery legend John Shinholser—founder of the McShin Foundation—to unpack 40+ years of recovery, advocacy, and unapologetic truth.

John got sober in the Marine Corps in 1982 and went on to become one of the most recognized voices in addiction recovery in the U.S. From painting houses to building one of the most effective peer-led recovery organizations in the country, his story is equal parts raw, inspiring, and practical.

John shares how a backyard campfire conversation with his wife led to the launch of McShin, what it takes to build sustainable recovery infrastructure, and why real help means meeting people exactly where they are. He also opens up about his recent work in harm reduction, kratom, cannabis, and why he believes the future of recovery must be more inclusive and less dogmatic.

With decades of experience, brutal honesty, and a deep love for the recovery community, John brings both wisdom and warning: we’re at a critical turning point in America’s recovery landscape—and we need to get it right.

Learn more about McShin: mcshin.org

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• Transcript

  Hey, just want to say thanks so much for uh joining us on the Recovery Bow podcast today. In this episode, I've got a good friend of mine, John Shinhoer. He'll be here from what used to be the McShin Foundation. It still is the McShinn Foundation, but you'll hear us talk about um the legacy he built and left with McShinn Foundation when he retired. Uh his work he's doing now, especially in there's a lot of conversations um in that world. And so I don't mind sharing this platform and you'll hear him talk about that and you'll hear me question him about um you know how's viewed um what the future of it is. And so I just want you to sit back and just listen to this episode if you're watching it. You can subscribe to us on our YouTube channel or stream on any of your favorite platforms. Welcome to the Recovery V podcast. I'm your host Eric Kennedy. tell my listeners, tell the rest of the world what you're working on right now and and what's got you going. Well, in I mean in a nutshell, let me give a little the elevator talk on how I got Give me the elevator pitch and then I'm going to walk you through what a quick elevator pitch is. I got sober in the Marine Corps in 1982. Okay. So, I'm coming up on 43 years clean and sober and I've always wore my recovery on my sleeves. In 2000, I started advocating heavily while I'm in I'm I'm a paint contractor. I'm in the contracting field. I got the Marine Corps, went back in the paint business, did highly successful. Around 2000, I started advocating at the state level for our local tax provider agencies cuz we needed more funding for sober living and recovery supports basically, you know, cuz in my home group, you know, I'm I'm a meeting maker. I'm a 12steper and and I noticed back then people they were coming to meetings but they couldn't find services. It's a long story why there was no services available. Big criminal justice build up, all that stuff. So I started advocating for, you know, more funding for services, you know, common sense, simple services, nothing major. Give me an example of of what Well, back in 2000, see, I I opened up a sober house in 1985, recovery house, sober home through my paint business, and I had a bunch of them. I had like six of them at one time back in the 80s. You know, they I'm known as the mayor of Sober Homes in Richmond, Virginia. And uh but I was doing good in the pain business and and it wasn't wasn't a problem. Funding was never an issue. You know, I I was always went to jails and prisons and talked to people, did the meetings in there and people would come out. I'd give them jobs and sober living and 12step. That's what I knew. Or faith-based. They you had one or the other back then. And they would live there and then come work for you and and your library. Yeah. Well, yeah. But a lot of them didn't work for me more than half a day. They decided painting ain't their thing. But, you know, they still had an opportunity. They had connection to community. connection to recovery supports. That's we didn't call it that back then, but that's what it it really is. Well, the CSBs asked me to help them get the legislature to give them more money. So, I started just advocating for them, you know, testifying at committees down at the capital. This is why you need the funding. This is what you get for it. And uh and a few years into it, I realized that these these bureaucratic agencies, they were not wired or equipped to do but so much. you know, they were restricted by the nature of their agencies. And uh me and my wife, we were at a NA camp out July 2004, Saturday night campfire, sitting around the fire with a bunch of addicts. And we we said, "Man, we got to do something to help these people." And just the idea said, "Well, let's just start a recovery organization and see where it goes." you know, because we had experience with advocacy, we had experience with entrepreneurship, uh, recovery, sober homes, you know, we knew what connection was vital. Yeah. You had a team right there pretty much just God spoke and we listened, you know, and Monday morning I went down to a lawyer and got an LLC and and my wife worked in Washington at the time and and I called her on on the way down to the lawyer's office and I said, "I'm going to the lawyer to start that LLC we talked about Saturday night." Yeah. She goes into this dissertation, you know, like, "What are you doing? What do you mean? We were just talking." I said, "No, we said we were going to do it." That's you got to be careful when you talk to us men, folks. Because we're looking for the next We take it as marching orders and they just talking. Yeah. Well, we had an argument over what to call it. And I said, "Look, I'm walking in the lawyer's office. What do you want to call it?" And we just came up with the name McShen. Her name was Carol McDade. My name John Shen Olser. You know, we kept our names when we got married. Make a long story short, I retired a year and a half ago. And when I retired, we started in 2004 with nothing. No vision, no no nothing. Just, you know, a a thought process. And when I retired, you know, we left them. I left them. This was we it was a charity all these 20 years. They had uh like 16 recovery houses, 15,000 square foot facility, uh federally funded jail and prison re-entry program, staff of 25 certified peers, uh you know, several million dollars cash on hand, several more million in, you know, assets. So, just a solid This is the way you left McShen Foundation. We left a solid recovery community organiz one of the best in the country. thinking back because I mean it it was labeled that uh in some in a write up or on the news or something, right? Weren't you the number one in the country? Well, I think we're the one everybody wanted to be like because we were we were we were established by recovering people. We we were sort of self-funded. So, we didn't really have to bend the knee to any agency. And we sort of cracked the code on how how to develop a peer workforce, how to get them credentialed and how to reach the population we needed to reach, and most important, how to give them the immediate services that they needed at the moment they needed it. We didn't have to wait for permission, you know, we just did things. All right. So, back then, did it matter if you were for-profit or nonprofit, faith-based or not faith-based? Well, I think it mattered if you were a nonprofit because you could raise funds. You could reach populations to donate money to you to you and um we were never a clinical organization even though we have a fabulous linkage in relationships with clinical organizations and we could do things clinical organizations could not do. And uh I think the faith-based part Yeah. I think because we weren't strictly a faith-based that we were secular and we wanted to keep it that way. We didn't want to, you know, we, you know, we tried to follow the 12step spirit, so to speak. You know, don't let them know it's really a faith base. Let them think and figure it out. I think that might have hurt us because we couldn't raise as much what I call Christian money, you know, cuz Christian folks like to keep money with Christian organizations, which is understandable. That's their message and whatnot. But I think down the road they realized, you know, we were for real and we were probably more Jesuslike than most Christian organizations. You know, I think they pro they figured that out. We didn't discriminate. You know, we we loved everybody. So, just a fabulous journey though, Eric. I got to tell you, just an amazing journey. Well, when you think back to it and and you started with nothing like I'm I'm just starting this, so this is me picking your brain. I've been following you, so I know what you're starting with. it it's doing really great, but what do you feel like was the moment that you said, "Okay, we're doing the right thing and this is what's going to keep us sustainable for 20 years." Like what was what was the moment that happened when you felt like you start taking a breath? Well, and it just became a project. When I left, when you left, when I left during the process, you got to realize that it's like combat, man. you just you never really you just see the victory you're having that moment that day and and you react to your setbacks cuz you want to correct it. You know what I mean? So I never felt like we had a maid in the shade. You know, and and you got to realize these kind of organizations historically if you go 20 years you've beat you've beat 90% of the startups if not 95%. Most of these type organizations don't go, you know, 30 years is probably life for these if if when when you look at it historically. You know, name some that's been around forever. Salvation Army, there's not many, you know. So, you're talking about recovery centers, treatment centers in general, right? Well, you ever heard of William White, Bill White, he wrote Slaying the Dragon. See, to me, that, you know, that was kind of like a textbook on the history of addiction and recovery in America. and and to know where you've been can help you know where you're going. So to know where you're at can kind of help you decide where you think you can get to. It's kind of weird, but America has a 250 year history of of ebbing and flowing. Mhm. You know, when there's high stigma, there's low services. When there stigma, there's high services. You know, we we have the history now. And we know like that's why right now we're in a critical turning point in America. People have no idea how critical it is right now. In in what regards to Well, the stigma toward addiction and recovery, it's pretty, you know, it's it's good right now. It it's the best it's been in my lifetime. And in the 42 plus years I've been in recovery, but I can see the tide turning. We're starting to recriminalize usage right now. You know, you notice like during the crack epidemic, for example, you know, they reelonized consumers and they they had a whole new segment of criminal justice issues and problems which directly affected funding and policies to access treatment and care and recovery and services. And they're starting to do that now with these psychedelic products and the fentanyl products and uh you know so I can see a downturn and and the current vibe we're getting out of the providers like the Medicaid folks for example you know they got they got to drill back on those reimbursements and and one of the first places they're going to hit is is the recovery world, the treatment world, you know, so nationwide we're starting to go back the other direction right now and that and it's it's it's critical that we don't That's why as I pivoted into the harm reduction space, I see this is the final frontier, folks like me, you know. Well, and it's hard to do um recovery work, ministry, nonprofit, for-profit, you know, there's there's plenty of it out there, but just finding the people that that aren't getting forgotten about. you know, the and the biggest thing, and I've said this before, is um the balance between them finding you and cuz you can't find them. They're out there, but they're not they're not going to take any help until they're ready for it. Well, that's why these these these peer engagement community workers are so critical. There is a rising regiment of of peers who their heart is to like go out into communities, find these people that are hurting and just develop relationships with them by whatever tool or mechanism they can at that time and then when the time's right, maybe those people the light bulb goes off and they ask for more. And at that point in time, we just got to be ready to provide more. And it's and it does, you know, I know that I know you're a good Christian man and this is a Christian type or you know show here. And you know, Jesus always went to where the sinners were. You know, Jesus would go out and find the sickest people who needed that love the most, needed the message the most. That's what he did. And that's what these engagement workers do. They go to where the the hurtest people are, the ones that nobody, the untouchables, nobody wants to touch these folks. And they're magnificent at the way they reach these people. And I think that's the most admirable space you can be in. They do, you know, our our human ego wants us to, you know, who don't like a stroke on the back every now and that's that's normal. You know, we like that. Yeah. You know, but we have a tendency to kind of pull toward that direction. You know, if if we're going to get rewarded, well, I'll do a little more of this. Well, that's where the humility of recovery principle comes in. You know, service work. Do as much as you can as often as possible and expect nothing in return. And that that's where that field is. Now, did you did you build a McShen Foundation to kind of operate in that vision? I know you said you didn't have vision in the beginning. Our founding principles were we wanted to meet people where they were at and when they were ready, provide them the services that they needed at that moment. Because we we sort of profiled that window of opportunity, you know, when when an addict's ready or an alcoholic's ready, when they ask for help, you got to jump. You got about an hour. Yeah. You don't do what you got to do within an hour, they going to change your mind. Same principle with these outreach workers. But Mcshen since then, you know, because the the new regime taken over that they have a flare for bureaucracy, which puts a little damper on some of that. But we it's still a beautiful wonderful organization. I'm impressed by what we do do. We do really really good. Tell me a little bit about what you what what you do. What does Mcshen Foundation do? Well, primarily it's a I'm coming into the organization. It's we have a 15,000 square foot recovery center in in you know the heart of Richmond almost. And seven days a week people can walk in there and and ask for help and a peer will engage them. And if if we have a space for them in our organization in our one of our sober homes, of course, we'll we'll if they're fit for that, they go we can get them right there that day. If uh if they need a program and they have some kind of funding and they're fit for us, we we have a beautiful 28-day program that I put it up against any clinical treatment model in the country. And uh and if if we don't have a spot or if we're not a fit, we know every resource in our area where we can link them and and do a warm handoff, soft handoff. Yeah. And so and we also have I mean every day of the week we must have four or five meetings open to the public whether they a scheduled 12step meeting or some sort of secular recovery group meeting. And we four days, four times a day, five days, Monday through Friday, we have our our own, you know, groups that we do for our participants that the public is invited to attend. And this is male and female. Male and female, uh, black and white, overweight and underweight. We we got them all covered, straight, gay, it doesn't matter. And uh and usually we have several events a week on the property, whether it be a a cookout, a uh a speaker jam or something, you know, some special event people can attend. And then of course we do activities throughout the year in the community and you know, we're good collaborators with the whole industry in our community. Have you ever heard of a group called um City of Refuge out of Atlanta? I have heard of City of Refuge. So, I had a a gentleman that runs that organization. His name is Bruce Deal. He was on the pod on my podcast last week. Well, it won't come out for a while, but kind of the same uh when you're when you're talking I I hear that um what Bruce does. How long Bruce been in business? That's not as long as us, I don't think. Early 90s. Okay. Well, he then he goes way back. He's back in the uh I I would like kind of like a um like we got Salvation Armies, we got uh we got several oldtime Christian type places and in a lot of cities they have that. I I think what we weren't so restricted to one one pathway. That was our our mojo, our juice, our spirit, so to speak. You know, we we we just we have something for everybody. And we're in an old church building, by the way, an old Baptist church. Really? So, we have instant access to Christian pathway if if that's your thing. And and yeah, I mean it I don't well when I'm when I'm pushing my book to be used as a program, you know, some of the times they're asking me, is it well, is it is this faith-based or is this is this religious model? It's not a religious model, but I talk about faith in there, but it doesn't have um scripture and things like that. So, it's it's a spirit. It's okay if it does. I mean, you know, I'm just saying it. Um, you got to keep it real, man. Yeah. Well, and that's just not me either. I mean, I wrote it from my DNA, what happened to me and how I view 12 steps and what I think was practical. How many uh or is there a percentage of men and women that come through your program that um are married or look look forward to getting married one day? I would I would bet I don't know. That's a great question though. But I would bet maybe 90% either have been married or in a committed relationship equal to marriage or or are married. So we do get a lot of married folks. We do. So that's my goal is to send home some of these books with you for the program. Now I know you've kind of sold it off, but I'm sure you got some say so. Well, they you know, trust me, the new regime don't they they they trying to prove to the world they don't need me around here. But I'm still board member of Meridus and I do show up and yeah, you know, you know, I'd love to uh I'll let them know I'm watching. Yeah. I'd love to just give them a resource because it's written as a workbook for the person that's a recovering spouse to have a a practical guide and then the person that's in recovery, it's a practical guide for you go to walk through recovery together. So, that would be the big push. I think another thing I want my listeners to hear is that this September I'll celebrate 15 years in sobriety. Oh, congratulations. I appreciate that. But 13 years ago um is when I started going to a church called Stevens Creek Church and we showed this movie called The Anonymous People. Do you remember that movie? Oh, classic, man. Most most viewed recovery movie of all time. Well, it was it's kind of like it wasn't it was formatted like a documentary the way they followed it around. It was, you know, that's what it was. But that's when I saw you on this film. I saw you um and I guess y'all were doing something with McShinn Foundation. We we had like a five minute clip in there just kind of an overview of who we were and what we were doing and the progress we were making because I remember the Now I think this was you did you have a sign where it said smoking meat not drugs. Smoking meat not drug. We we we created a barbecue team and participated in the Kansas City Barbecue Society state championship cookoffs. And we we hosted an annual cookoff at our facility every year. And then we would go around the state with our team. We had a McShen team, smoking meat, not drugs. I like that. That slogan stuck out. And that slogan is why I'm like, I want to get in touch with this guy. though for like a year I was been I was trying to find John McShinn. I even sent you like your business chat and I never got anything back. And then a couple months ago you reached out to me or somebody reached out to me. I did cuz I I saw your podcast when you had uh oh heck was that Jordan. Jordan. Yeah. And I thought man that's a great podcast. Well I appreciate that. And so that's yeah, I want to open the door to talk about um people in recovery need to see that there are different there's many different kinds of people that are in in recovery. Got John, you got Eric, you got Jordan. Our views are going to be different. Well, there's 50 million Americans in recovery. Okay. And and let's to break it down. Only two million are in a 12step pathway. Yeah. And there's probably 10 million in a Christian pathway. Okay. So that's five times bigger than the 12step, but yet there's another 10 million in some kind of plant-based pathway. And then, you know, the other 20 million, it's a mixture of everything. They just, you know, they work through it. They they got a great job. They they they love their family more than drugs. You know, something they just went through the phase. They were out of it, but they walked away from it. Right. And on any given day, there's 50 million Americans that need recovery. Eric, we're up to 100 million Americans. Okay. 5% of our population. I want to make sure that we put that in our bio for this episode. So, when we break this down, we're saying 100 million, 50 million probably needed. 50 50 need recovery. 50 have found some kind of recovery. And then there you said maybe 25 million. No, no. There's 50 million have found some recovery pathway that works for them. There's another 50 million that need to find a recover pathway. That's 100 million. Okay. Now, we you can give or take a million or two and and that's 25% of our population is either in recovery or needs to be in recovery from a get high product. Okay. I like those numbers and I and I'll throw gambling in into the get high segment, but it doesn't go for food overeating, you know. So, let's talk about one of those three that you mentioned, though. There's um there's the people that work 12 steps. There's the people that work um they just go straight into their belief system or spiritual system. And then there's some that do it that are plant plant-based. And what I discovered, see, I spent for about 10 years, I've been just reading everything I could read about plant-based products. Okay? And because we were in the sober home industry and in the recovery industry, you know, I started following everything, especially cannabis is what kind of kicked it off. I'm thinking, well, cannabis, you know, I know I watched those documentaries where the CBD was curing those children with epilepsy and whatnot, and I knew cannabis had the CBD and the canabono had a lot of healing power in there. Now, for our population, it's such a slip slippery slope because there's a GitHub component to it. And you know, us, one's too many, a thousand, never enough. And and if we trip the dragon, we're going to chase the dragon. You know what I mean? So for for for the absinent world this is this is you know it's such a major warning here but most of the world and here's another there was a survey done you can Google and probably find which one I'm talking about. Well, today you're Google. Yeah. Well, they they surveyed tens of thousands of people that needed help and and the number one reason why they weren't going to get help because in their mind they figured it was a abstinentbased treatment center. You know, they did not want to quit everything. You know, like crack was their problem, fentanyl was their problem, not Budweiser, not, you know, wine. So, tell me, I'm going to go just ask you point blank. Tell me your belief in that. Do you feel like people can be in sobriety but be in sobriety from a drug, their drug of choice, but still be able to take other substances? That's why like to me, common sense, it's harm reduction. It, you know, now people want to glorify it and call it some kind of recovery. Fine. I'm not arguing with these people, okay? But I think less harm is better than no less harm. I mean, I'm a human being. If you can do less harm, please do less harm. So, I'm looking at it from that angle. The from you I would have never got clean or sober if I had access to a bong or a Budweiser because I that is just not my I got that uh I got the gene mapping that says that's not going to be my story. And gene mapping is true too, but apparently it's too expensive for everybody to map their genes and get the addiction genes. Yeah, I've I've had u a lady on the episode, Cat Sornston, SoCal Cat is her name on Instagram for you that want to go follow her. But she talked about gene mapping with the doctors that work for her recovery center in Laguna Beach, Laguna Shores. Well, that's real. That's true science, gene mapping. Really? And you can you can map if you got Don't There again, don't quote me on the exact number. Let's say you got 75 of a specific gene. If that's a prominent gene and they can determine that, then you're in that category where one's too many, a thousand never enough. You don't have an off switch. Now, if you don't have all those genes, then there you are more suited for other pathways if if that's your thing. But let me finish backing up. Those folks that need help aren't going to get it because of that 50-year antiquated system of care, the absinbased treatment centers, you know. So we're leaving 40 million people a year on the table that probably not even going to try to get help because they don't want that antiquated system. That's where I think the power of the plant pathway can can be a huge first step for these people. And so I was reading up on cannabis. I even went to Syracuse University and got a I'm a I'm a certified cannabis healthc care and medicine, you know, person because I wanted to learn all I could about it. And then then I ran across them, you know, about 10 years ago. We we my organization didn't want to do this. So I got another organization in town to take 30 addicts off the street, put them in sober living for a week, and give them access to cratom. And 29 out of 30 successfully got off of opiates. The one guy run off cuz he had a pocket full of money and a strip of girlfriend. He didn't need recovery. And you know, I related to that. So I said that we'll give him a pass. I got so excited about that. But that same year they expanded Medicaid in Richmond, which meant that there's now a Suboxone clinic on every corner. So I think Suboxone is great medicine, but overprescribed. They they blew this thing up and they got everybody thinking that's the golden cow when when it when it really isn't. But it's a great tool, but it's overused, right? Half those people using could get the same effect and the same outcome and the same benefit. And the difference is you didn't need a medical doctor. You didn't need a prescription. You didn't need to being reversed through somebody's provider ship. Isratum viewed though as um as a drug. Is a botanical and I sent you just a little bit of paperwork to point out why it's got demonized. But back in 2014 or 15 nationwide when they shut down all the pain clinics, a lot of those people were legitimate pain patients that got treated along with the addicts that were drug seeking. Well, they went to the internet and they found and this is very legit, you know, andratom is is a plant. And back then most every product was a plant product, a natural plant like a tea that you either ate the powder and drank water with it or you brewed a tea and drank a tea. Now the the FDA wanted to ban that but it couldn't pass the congressional threshold for banning eight factor analysis where the FDA told the DEA it's bad you got to ban it. The DEA sent out a notice we're going to ban cratrum schedule one it make it a a felon if you have it and now that really irritated me that's like such BS and uh but there was so much push back like 140,000 people went to Washington and raised hell and um bunch of senators in congressman said what are you doing and when one of them said I take the stuff it's it's solving my problems and so that so the DEA didn't ban Only time in the history the DEA reversed the ban. FDA's had a resentment ever since then in poisoning the well demonizing unjustly. But now since then here we are 2026 a lot of these marketers have gotten very creative and they've created a lot of uh super potent liquids and and they flooded what I call the get high industry with them. you know, the the head shops, the uh the vape shops, the smoke shops, and we have a ghetto industry in America, whether you know that or not, and they use these store storefronts for it. Well, and then comes along the adulterated products. They got some stuff on the shelves. They call them cratom. It's not even. It's a chemical made in a 55gallon drum and they get away with it. the the American Cratum Association, we complain to the FDA religiously about these terrible products that aren't even a plant product. They're 100% chemical and the FDA does nothing because they're using that as a cudel to ban them. And that further irritates me and my colleagues. So, so let me just get this straight real quick. What what is it aboutratom? And Jordan may have answered this, but I just don't remember. Oh, he's a lot smarter than me on that. What is it aboutratom though that people um uh don't want us to I say us I'm I'm neither here nor there. I have no idea. Um so I've got a couple questions. What is it aboutratom that they don't want us to know about it? is because the way it's delivered like in the packaging because it's in these different shops or because it's not coming from a doctor at Walgreens. I think you you got to understand this theratom as a plant product. It's a natural pain reliever. It it it it actual it doesn't have any opioids in it. Anybody said it's an opiate, they're lying. It doesn't have that. It has alkyoids in it that that rest on the opioid uh receptors and it can act like an opiate. If you take enough, it acts like a partial agonist. Suboxone is a partial agonist. If you take enough of it, acts as a partial agonist and can do the same thing Suboxone can do. Probably not as consistently and probably not quite as good, but it does it good enough to work in the event you can't get Suboxone. And I discovered that in that survey I did. Now you can take take some of it just gives you energy. It it actually comes from the coffee family. So the the the the indigenous folks and you know they use it as an energy booster to work in the fields all day. And it does help with arthoritis and and pain, chronic pain. So there's three things it does do. in. But what happens if you got that DNA mapping where you like the gith and and andratom if you take enough of it, it has a little gith factor to it. Not a big one, but but but a a small one, but a big enough one to where some people like to use it as their gith of choice. Now, when you mix that in with the fact that there's so many adulterated products on the marketplace, there's there's so much bad product out there that our society lets exist that can definitely affect that. So, it has such great value, but it does have a downsides to it. And they got some products in the marketplace called 70 and warning that that that that's not even cratom. It's 100% chemical. It's a synthesized alkyoid that they make it in barrels and that's a full agonist is what uh Kevin McCertie calls it who's the number one scientist or one of the leading scientists in the world down at University of Florida. Terrible product you know and to even suggest it's blasphemous you know they they should be executed for that you know the way I see it. So there there's just a lot of moving parts. It takes a minute to sort it all out and get a good comprehensive understanding. How are um how's them taken? Is it smoked or is it like a pill? You can't smoke it. You kill all the alkaloid. Anybody said they smoke it, they they don't know what they're talking about. You just eat straight plant product. They they do make a concentrate out of the plant product itself. You can drink it. They can put it they can uh they can take some of the alkaloids and infuse them in in some gummies and stuff like that. You know that they're very creative and and very good at certain products and then but those those ones they can synthesize the hell out of and make it super potent and powerful and that that's a stuff that we're just we're gasping over. So what are you doing man? You know you can't do that. That's that's it keeps you guys from pushing it to be like a legitimate drug to use. I guess I that's what that's what my question is is you familiar with the cannabis industry. Yeah. I mean some people um you got regular you got regular pot. You know most 87% of cannabis consumers want flowers. They just want regular plain flour they can smoke. But they've they've done such a a crazy job synthesizing these other canabonoids and plants and reinfusing hemp plants and making them like good ganja or whatever. They completely adulterated the cannabis industries, you know, to a degree. Well, they adulterated the creative industry, too. And they and if and if a get high industry can adulterate a product, you know, China's got chemicals lined up for the next 50 years of get high products, you know, that the DEA or the government will always be one step behind chasing trying to catch up to to outlaw it and ban it. Know that. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, it's frightening to to know what's in store for our nation. You know, the addiction is not going anywhere. It it's going to be strong forever. Yeah. You know, which is sad but true. We just got to keep, like you said, we got to keep handing out tools. Yeah. Oh, that's why we keep doing what we're doing. But that's why the uh the harm reduction is so valuable right now. It just to me that that is where we should be investing so much energy and and it's not even an expensive industry to invest in other than the part where when the person's ready for help, you got to have the appropriate help ready for them, you know. So John, do you takeRatom? I I participated in uh John Hopkins did a first ever human clinical trial ofratom. They did it they started last year about two years ago and I knew enough about it that you know I'd like to see what that's all about for the clinical side but I could never take it cuz I was at McShen and we have a policy can't take them at Mcshen. But when I retired over a year ago, January, well, I knew, okay, well, I can try it. So, I participated in the John Hopkins clinical trial and I took a gram ofratom one gram four times a day for nine months. And and what it did for me was it gave me a little more energy. It uh I had a you know, a little better focus. I I have chronic arthritis. It it knocked it back. I haven't had an ibuprofen in a year and a half. you know, I don't I don't take any medication over the counter for anything other when I get allergies and a cold, I'll take something. So, I did that. Then I went to my detox at John Hopkins cold turkey. I didn't didn't have any of these detox symptoms I was scared I might have. You know, my my NA buddies thought I was crazy, especially the ones that were hooked on. Yeah. I said, "Well, you know, one gram four times a day, you got to understand somebody who abuses cratoms, they're they're taking a 100 grams a day. You know, compare that to one gram four grams a day to 100, you know." And how much time in sobriety did you have when you went in for this clinical study? Yeah. Uh, I was over 41 years, you know, that I I hit 41 years clean and sober in August. And this was December 20th when I started consuming a gram four times a day. And uh, and I still got over 42 years of recovery, by the way. Do you still celebrate your recovery date? Absolutely. You know, there's nowhere in the basic text or the big book it says that a recovering person, an old-timer, can't participate in a clinical trial. You know, our our we just don't go get high. We don't chase getting high. Bill Wilson, the founder of AA, participated in the LSD trial. Okay? And he had great results. Now, you and I both know, well, if you took LSD, you were tripping. Now, to me, that'd be getting high for about 3 days. But in AA that ain't drinking. So, you know, he I guess he got a pass for that. But he actually said back then that, hey, you know, this will help a lot of alcoholics. And what do you know? Here we are in 2026 and they got they're making great discoveries where micro dose and mushrooms and stuff like that is they're getting great results. So, you know, just because I'm an oldtimer doesn't mean I can't do things. Well, and I'll take cratom periodically now small small dose and I'll take it for basically pain and you know because I don't want to take gaba pentin or any of that stuff. I qualify for probably 10 different prescriptions right now. I'm almost 70 years old. Eric, let me ask you this question. You've had 40 41 years going in before you try this clinical. 41. Would you agree if somebody that's one year in decided to go be a a person for a clinical trial of it a that's a tough call you got to understand I never took the amount ofratom it took to tickle the dragon to feed the dragon you need to take probably five grams in one sitting to get that your fur component they're talking about if you're a new person and you want to get off Suboxone and you want to try them to get off Suboxone, I'm I'm perfectly fine with that. You know, if uh if you're a new person in recovery and you got chronic pain and you're getting strung out on prescriptions, I'm 100% okay. We'll see if the right product for you. 100%. You got to you got to know why would somebody want to take it though, you know? And now a gram of cratom is like a Red Bull when it comes to energy. So I'm drinking full Red Bulls a day. You know, if if you're a newcomer and you're slamming those Red Bulls all day long, you know, if if if you can do a gram of creative instead of a Red Bull, that might be a better hit for you. But we will go through a lot of trials and tribulations. you know as well as I do when a new person once too many a thousand never have enough and once you you're off and running it's hard to stop it. So it's a slippery slope Eric it is slippery that's what and I don't want that responsibility either. Well and that's that's what I was going to ask is um if someone new in recovery uh had one year in recovery and someone said you should try them to help with XYZ. Well, what's the XYZ? That's important to know. Well, if it was something that would be applicable to them, chronic pain, they're on GABA, you want to try something different. 100%. So, and I'm not saying this because I agree or don't agree. What I'm saying is for people that may listen to this episode and they're saying, "Oh, I can go try them." But I don't have to say that, "Oh, I'm taking so much that it's messing with my dragon." Let's say, but let's say that it is messing with the dragon. Would you encourage that person to say, "Okay, you need to confess that you've now relapsed." You got to research. Let me tell you something, Eric. I did 10 years of research before I touched it. Okay. 10 years I've read it. I've read over 500 scientific studies. For five straight years, I I navigated and circumvented theratom the true community across America. I've met and talked to thousands of consumers that take it for the right reason, you know. Plus, I met the crater matics along the way. So, I knew I knew both sides. Yeah. Now, a new person is not going to have that that institutional knowledge I had, and they're probably not going to be surrounded by the right people to get that institutional knowledge. So, for for any new person that might hear this and might want to try it, talk to your mentor, your sponsor, read the literature that Narox Anonymous puts out on medicine and recovery. Talk to your support group, your physician, your psychiatrist. you you talk about this, spend months talking about this and you'll know if it's right for you or not just on the conversation and just on the just on the side of precaution. You're better off not touching it than than touching it if if you got any doubt whatsoever. And and so it's not a curiosity. Yeah. I don't want people to do this as a curiosity. See, oh, if it'll fix xyz and then have so much guilt. Yeah. But here's another hit. If if you're taking an illegal drug of any kind, please go try them. See if that can get you away from the one pill killed. If you can pivot from a one kill pill product to a cratom product, that's a win. Cuz the ch if it's a pure natural cratom product, the chances are good you have a bad event is damn near zero. Now those adulterated products are bad. Those 70 products are bad. Don't pivot to those natural credom product. You know, if you're taking a one pill kill, I'm all for it. If you're drinking a fifth of liquor a day and you can't stop drinking, try try natural. See if that doesn't help you. And you're saying that can cure the appetite. It it it it absolutely in many many cases it it it's it's a replacement therapy on on a substance and it works works like a charm for so many people. not for everybody. Just like a lot of medications aren't for everybody, right? You know, and I would say that if you decide to try them, um there's a lot of websites they can go to. Yeah. Do your homework, but also have a plan of action saying, "Okay, be honest and say, "Today I took two. I I need to talk to my sponsor. Let's say I'm supposed to take one. Well, now am I considered abusing this cratom if I'm not taking the dosage that I'm supposed to take?" I think that's where the responsibility comes in too so that you don't have to carry that if you ever take that burden or that weight of guilt. Those little shots, some of those shots is equal to 10 grams of cratom. Okay, little shots. The little cratrum shots you buy them at the Mini Mart, the gas station, they're equal to like 10 grams and some people are going through five of those a day. Okay. To me, no. That's not a replacement therapy. That's not an alter. That's that's you're you're chasing something. Okay. And of course, I don't know why you're taking it either. What you're taking it for. So, but when you take a cratom plant product and you know two to three grams three, four, five times a day, you're still not getting up to a couple of those shots that somebody can be taking five or six of a day. So, there's a lot to learn. You got to do your homework. And unfortunately, we don't have enough educated people to help the amount of people that need to get helped. Yeah. But there there are Reddit has great sites to go on. Uh so does answer.org that there if you search for the the good websites, theformational ones, you can get a lot of good intel. Do you think that umratom would be looked at differently if it was handed out at your primary care doctor's office versus being able to get a shot at a Circle K? Well, that's the problem. Yeah. Oh, hell yeah. I'd be all for doctors. A lot of doctors back in 2014, 15, and 16, they were recommending them. A lot of veterans, the VA doctors say, "Look, try them. Try them." That that was the go-to product back then. But since then, the FDA, the AMA have put such a fear if you hold any kind of clinical license. Now, they threaten to take your license if you make such a suggestion today. That's how bureaucratic it's gotten behind the scenes. What do you think they're finding in it that makes it bad in their eyes? It's competing with the suboxone industry. It's competing. Yeah. It's competing with the pharma industry. If you got 20 million Americans taking cratom instead of two, three prescriptions a day, Eric, that's 50 60 million monthly prescriptions somebody's not taking. Pharma losing money right now. When I heard RFK got in there, I got so excited. I mean, this this is great, man. I hope he's wise enough to understand what's happening. I guess we'll see. I want I want the plant-based industry to be as healthy and as good as it can be. Yeah. And the quicker and sooner the better. Yeah. You know, there's so much promise in that industry, but to have these clinical world slash him and demonize them and hold them back. See, I think that's wrong. Yeah. That's self- serving wrong. And I have to say this cuz I said to Jordan, too, is, you know, just because I don't understand all of it, um, and I haven't made it to a point where I'm studying it or anything like that, that doesn't mean I approve it or deny it. I'm just here to hear about it. you you know one of my jobs is to go around the country educate people. This is this this is I love the job. It's great. It's perfect for me. I'm a good educator. I'm a good community organizer. I have several colleagues that that help me that one of them's a doctor. One of them's uh they cratom the only thing that helps her condition. You know she I can't even pronounce the condition she's got. There's so many people they don't they never take more than the same amount every day. They've been doing that for 10 15 years. M so they're not chasing to get high. But everywhere I go, people are desperate to want to know more. You know, you know, and and and and it's a I'm not going to say it's a slippery slope. It's a necessary slope. When I go into these these recovery centers and I talk about it, there's always a bunch of these suboxone kids. They say, "Man, I I'm trying to get off Suboxone. I can't or I don't want to be on methadone or all kind of products." and and absolutely it's worth a try, you know, but just make sure you're using a good manufactured practice product. The FDA actually has regulatory guidelines of manufacturing cratum, you know, make sure you use an FDA regulatory package product, so you can get it somewhere that's FDA approved with the FDA. Yeah, but it's a botanical. Uh 1994 FDA wanted to ban all dietary supplements. Congress passed the DHEA act. Okay. And that that paved the road for all these vitamin stores, these GNC stores. You go into the drugstore, the grocery store, they got rows of vitamin. That's because the the 1994 the Shay Act. But the the key is you have to use good manufacturing practices that that the FDA designs the regulatory practices. So you're following FDA regulatory practices and that's the products you want to use. If it if it's not that product, don't touch it. Number one. Unfortunately, like some of these 70 dealers, they use GMP standards, but they're fraud products because they they haven't passed the safety test at the level that passed. You know, the way I see it, right? So, there there is some cracks in that. And some states, you're not allowed to have it at all. There's five states that have banned it, and that was back in 2016. They did what the DEA did, but they haven't turned them back yet. Now trial lawyers are involved. You know, there's been some adverse events with these these adulterated products. So now, you know, factories and manufacturing are being sued and they're paying lawsuits. So there's a big mess out there right now. Well, tell me, John, where do you see this thing going? I mean, where where do you see it's a race right now? It it's a genuine race to the finish line. We have a congressional What's the finish line, though? Is it going to be on the stores of shelves of Walgreens and Publix and you'll get it filled by pharmacists one day or is it still going to be bought at Circle K's and head shops? If I had to answer that question, I'd be a billionaire. I don't know because you can't predict, you know, we got President Trump now. You can't predict anything. I mean, if if he likes cratom, it's going to be a win for everybody. You know, if he doesn't, game over. It is that simple, you know. So, I'm not going to say he likes Kratom or not. Well, but if it got him on the podcast, I would I would let me let me Nick when I see him, I'll invite him to your podcast. When are you going to see him? I have no idea, but but I'll try to remember to bring up Eric. Well, whenever I see him, I I'll tell him all about smoking meat and not drugs. Well, I I was a friend of mine I met when he was a little kid. He's now as a congressman. I was talking to him the other day. He was down in Marago playing golf with him. So, I got that close to him. Yeah, I haven't I haven't got that close. Well, I just want to say thank you so much for coming by. Pleasure is all mine being on the podcast. John, I want to give you a couple of the books and take I'll take them back. Give them to our CEO and say, "Look, look at these. See, see if they um it's it's written to every person that's in your program or in their program, the McShen Foundation program." you you know we're we're we're primarily a 28 day program with stay as long as you want sober living. Mhm. But I I did I I read I I don't have the book. I didn't read the book. I will read it by the time I get home. I promise you that. But I read a lot of little bits and pieces about it. And and that struck me as a as a thing where if you could if you got facilitators all over the place that were facilitating that course using that book, that to me is where it needs to go. Well, we've got approved in the state of Georgia. Um so any counselors that go through the class that that I've built out, they get their ongoing credit hours. Um and then we've got a train the trainer program and then we have these workshops like I do here in Texas. I'm doing one today. See that? That's the model right there. Train the trainer. Get some trainers doing these workshops and in the books and and several people, good friends of mine, they're great uh masters level social workers, couples people. I'm going to give them that book and say, "Look, yeah, I I want you to I'm going to give you a few of these copies to take back with you." And I'll try to make sure somebody in the Richmond area is doing this for you. I'd love it. That's something I can do for you. So, I'd love that. Well, thank you so much for having me. Yeah, John. Thank you for being here, buddy. I appreciate it. And I, you know, like I said, this it's an education thing. It's also a God thing. I was trying to look you up and and and by you finding me, we get you here 10 years later, but or 13 years later, but you came here and and shared the platform what you thought about cratom from your point of view and and that's what we're here for. I tell you three things before we quit about God thing. I remember in ' 82, a few months before I stopped drinking, I got slammed in ream. I had I had a God moment. If it was God's will, it was meant to be. My recovery was meant to be. When we started McShan, during my conversation with my wife, walking into that lawyer, I said, "Look, if it's God's will, it'll work out. If it ain't, it won't." And it worked out great. Now that I'm in the harm reduction, same thing. Look, if if it's God's will for me to be in this space, there'll be an impact somewhere. If not, it won't meant to be. So, I'm I'm not afraid of God's will. I'm certainly not afraid to try what I think is God's will, but I always accept the outcome.