From Tragedy to Triumph: A story of Addiction, Loss & Redemption

In today's episode, you are getting a deeply moving testimony and story of a man who has faced unimaginable trials and emerged stronger than ever.

Rick Cheatham, a former Fire Captain and Union President, shares his journey of overcoming addiction, rebuilding his marriage, and facing the tragic loss of his son.  Through faith and resilience, Rick finds strength and purpose in advocating for others.  His story highlights the importance of shifting our mindset, practicing gratitude, and embracing our stories to inspire others.

This episode is a testament to the transformative power of faith, love, and forgiveness.

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Contact Rick at rkconsulting292@gmail.com

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Transcript

Jill O'Boyle (00:05.262)
Well, hello friends and welcome back to another episode of Your Life, Your Story. Rise up. I'm your host, Jill O 'Boyle. It is so great to be here with you all and thank you so much for always tuning in. I so appreciate you all. So you all know if you've been following me for a minute or two on this podcast, I love to bring powerful stories. Stories of just real people navigating this beautiful thing we call life. And so friends,

Today, I have a truly inspiring guest who has walked a path filled with some of life's most challenging moments. From the heartbreak of burying his own son to a life altering injury that left him with a broken neck. Our guest today has faced unimaginable trials that many of us can hardly begin to fathom. I know I haven't, and I'm so excited for you to hear from him today.

But yet through all of his challenges, he has emerged not only as a survivor, but as someone who has found profound freedom, purpose, and the ability to make a difference in the lives of others. And so today we're diving deep into his journey, exploring how he learned to navigate life, not as a victim of his circumstances, but as a student of life's lessons. Rick.

Thank you so much for being with me today. I am so excited for our guests to, to learn from you. the first minute I heard your story, I was like, you are definitely coming on the podcast. So welcome. Thank you for having me. It's an honor to be here with you today. Yeah. So I, just, you know, met Rick a few weeks ago, actually from another, connection. That's what I love about podcasts is it's,

It really is a small world when we look at, you know, who knows who and the connections and had an opportunity just to hear your story, Rick. And it is a powerful story. And so just as I had alluded in my intro, you you have a powerful testimony. You have a powerful story that we're going to.

Jill O'Boyle (02:17.452)
we're gonna unpack a lot of that in this episode. But before we dive into that, would you just mind sharing a little bit of your journey, know, life prior to that, those life -altering moments that I just mentioned that will maybe give some context to the listeners about maybe your line of work, your hobbies, your interests, just a little bit about Rick Cheatham.

Certainly. You know, I grew up in Southern California. My father was a preacher. So I grew up one of those PKs, those preacher's kids. So the stories are true. I a mind of my own. I had an adventurous soul, had a heart that just wanted to have fun and got myself into some trouble here and there. But was grounded, was grounded in my faith, was grounded in my belief.

and God was grounded in the spiritual principles that life offers all of us to follow if we choose. So much so that I ended up praying in the parking lot of a little church that I was attending out in Brea, California. And my prayer was very specific. I was looking for a wife. I was 23 years old.

I knew that it was time for me to settle down. So I just prayed a specific prayer in the parking lot of that building, of that church building. And it went something like this. You know, I pray for a woman that was five foot two to five foot three, weighed a hundred and three hundred and five pounds, dark, complexed, dark hair, beautiful, stunning to look at, know, the typical physical things that, you know, I needed to see in order to know that, Hey, God just answered my prayer or God's not answering my prayer or.

Maybe I need to revamp this thing. So anyway, it was a very physical prayer, but at the end of it, I felt a little guilty and I asked, but most importantly, Lord, I pray that she will help me become the man of God you want me to be. Amen. And, two weeks later, that vision in my head walked through the doors of that church building and six months later we were married and we started months. Love that.

Jill O'Boyle (04:32.044)
We started a journey we could never have imagined. And good thing, because had we known what this journey was going to entail, we probably would both would have backed out and said, now we're out of here. Right. We love that God holds those all the details back, right? He doesn't give us all the story. So, know, as, as, as, as we got married and we started down this journey together, what soon

developed was something that I'd been hiding from my wife for the whole six months I knew her. But I struggled with a porn addiction. And that porn addiction took its toll on our marriage for 10 years. And so at the end of 10 years, my wife told me, she says, I hate you, I hate God, I hate the church, I quit. And she was done. And at the time I was, you I mean,

Believe me, I felt.

I felt so empty as a man that I could take a prayer, an answered prayer that was so specific. And two weeks later she show up and we start this beautiful life together. And then 10 years in, she not only hates me, she hates the church and she hates God. That rocked my world. It rocked my world in such a way that,

I went and found some help and through the help of my mentor, Kevin Quinn and his wife, Deborah, they literally got in the trenches of our marriage and our spiritual warfare and became our allies and became our guiding light. And they walked us through it.

Jill O'Boyle (06:29.804)
Now at the time we had two small boys. So when my wife told me that she was pretty much taking my two boys and someone else was going to raise them. Wasn't going to be me. other than maybe the occasional visitation rights that fathers in Southern California sometimes get. so it really, it really rocked me. And so as we went through this process with Kevin and Debbie, one of the things that we started to understand was that all that

addiction was a trauma response to when I was a kid. And some of the things that I didn't quite understand as a youngin, you know, between the ages of one and eight when we're developing these ways of handling our emotion. And I just didn't have the love that I felt from my mom, you know, but at the time, what do I know? I'm just a little kid and

I didn't realize that my mom had struggled with her own demons. man, when I found that out and I started to understand my mom's perspective, everything started to change for me. I started to accept and love my mom unconditionally, appreciate her for what she was able to accomplish in, in, her life and in her marriage and in, in, in us as kids and the role that she played. so my, my struggle started to wane a bit, but they were still there. Sure.

But what was the real turning point for me was during that mentorship program, we were praying for another child and we prayed for a little girl and by God, he delivered. I got a beautiful little baby girl. She was born in November or September of 2000.

And it was such an incredible testimony that she could even be born, because we had been trying and trying and trying for years after the two boys were born. So when Michael, my oldest, was 10 and Kyle, his younger brother, who at the time was like eight, I think, we had our baby. We had our little girl and we named her Victoria as a, as a symbol and as a sign to the greatness that God has in our lives that

Jill O'Boyle (08:55.084)
He not only gave us a victory in our marriage, but he gave us a victory over this young baby. And we didn't think we'd ever have a girl. so, you know, life was looking good. mean, life started and man, we were having the time of our lives. We were raising our three children. We were incredibly connected at a spiritual level with each other and with others around us.

specifically with God. Yeah. And God was revealing things to me and my wife as we were on this journey. And it was very specific. And I'd like to share one of those specific moments if I can. Yeah, go ahead. I was in my morning meditation. And as I was accustomed to doing every day before I went or every shift before I went into work as a fireman in Southern California, I had this vision of me and my wife.

crawling out of this pit and in this pit there were creatures that were constantly trying to grab hold of us and grab us back down into the bottomless pit. And every time I'd grab a handhold, some creature would grab me and try to throw me out. Finally got to the top and I was able to survey the land that was up on out in front of me and I got out of the pit.

And I started to walk around and examine what was going on. looked behind me and there I saw my wife. She was still in the pit and she was like this. She was just watching me looking. I thought, man, that's weird. And I asked her, I said, what's wrong? And she didn't say anything. She just looked, I said, it's safe to come out. And she did. And then the next thing I know, I'm hearing this voice tell me, go tell your wife what you just saw. And it's.

Five in the morning, she sound asleep. I'm getting ready to leave for work. It would be so easy just to dust that off and say, it's not important. Who cares? And leave, right? It was just a weird vision. It was just a weird experience. But I didn't. I decided, OK, I'll go wake her up and tell her what I saw. So I did. I woke up Kelly, explained to what I saw, and I saw her crying. And I thought, what?

Jill O'Boyle (11:20.322)
What did I say? I said, what's going on? And she said, that was my dream last night. Wow. And I just shocked myself. said, that was your dream? And she's crying. said, Rick, you just told me my dream. Ow. What does this mean? Right. And so that kind of started us on this little journey here that led to so many other amazing

encounters with coincidence. Yes. Which I don't believe in. think they're more like God cadence. Absolutely. there is such a thing. I love that. just coming down and just putting his fingerprint on our lives. Yeah. And as we started to develop trying to understand this connection we were having, a lot of other things were happening too. I mean, I've got stories after stories. If time permitted, maybe we can get in and share, but I'll

I'll come to the one that really started the journey for me of where I am today.

That was in those same morning meditations. One morning I got this feeling that something was going to happen tragically to one of my kids. And I didn't understand it at first. Didn't want to understand it. Tried to ignore it. Didn't even tell my wife about it at first. I just kind of went on about my day and, didn't really put a lot of thought into it. And then things start happening. I started seeing more and more signs of.

that tragedy unfolding. I asked my wife, said, you know, I had this this vision in my meditation a while back and I feel like something's going to happen to one of our kids.

Jill O'Boyle (13:11.402)
And I thought it was maybe my middle son because he was struggling with some issues in his teenage years. my wife said, I've had the same thing happen to me and it's Michael. And she flat out told me, she said, Michael's going to die. And again, I mean, I'm just blown away that we're hearing this and

I couldn't deny it just because of all of the other signs and all of the other things that had happened to solidify this faith that what I was hearing was from my God. And so I just thought, okay, well, if I'm hearing this, then maybe I need to start preparing myself and start preparing my son.

and find out what's going on and why he does what he's doing and, and, know, get, get an idea of where he's headed in life. And so I did. And I sat down with him and man, I'll tell you what, for the next three years, I got to know him inside now. And it was one of the most remarkable blessings, I think. In the journey is I got to see his heart. I got to see who he was as a man, what he was developing into as a leader.

you know, with that story comes a tragic end. And as much as I was prepared for it, it was still a difficult experience to have. Yeah. And so I want to, I want to get into that story, but I want to pause for a minute because there's so many things that you have just shared leading up to that moment. And I really,

A, know, some of your, some of your, first part of your story was really talking about these answered prayers. mean, really the power of seeking, seeking God. but there was two times where you mentioned in your morning meditation, in your stillness, in your quiet time, that you were able to see these, these visions clearly. And then not only were you able to see these visions, but you were able to get confirmation from your wife as well, who's probably also taking time to, to slow down.

Jill O'Boyle (15:23.274)
That's one of the biggest things that I love to help, you know, my women that I coach and others that are listening to this podcast is the power of, of slowing our life down and not always moving in the fast lane. And so I think there's just confirmation right there, just hearing your story, Rick, that if, know, if we're going through anything in life, but just navigating life in general, you know, God is always speaking to us if we're willing to slow down enough to hear it. And so, in those early, you know,

stages of your life when you were going through this, what do you think maybe God was trying to, what were these visions for people that maybe have, this is the first time ever experiencing something like this, where you've heard or you've seen, like, what do you think was God was speaking to you in these, in that, in those visions of you with the, you know, trying to crawl out of this hole and your wife peering on the,

just this vision of this thought that your, your son is in danger. Anything that you can think of, know you're probably going to get into that story, but was it just a matter of preparing, you know, your heart? What's some thoughts that you have on that? Looking back now, it's a lot easier to kind of define what was going on for me at that point. Yeah. I came out of.

I came out of a very legalistic religious mindset and God just didn't work that way. You know, the only way God worked in my life, according to my religious foundation was when you read the word and then you obey the word and then you practice it with your fellowship and then you, you,

Agree and revolve around the doctrinal beliefs that that particular religious Ideology demands right? So in my case it was as long as you were going to church three times a week twice on Sundays and Wednesday midweek As long as you were doing the sacraments and partaking the Lord's Supper Every Sunday not once a month once a year what but every week

Jill O'Boyle (17:45.646)
As long as you were singing with melody in your heart to the Lord, and not using musical instruments, were okay. Your faith was great and you were going to heaven. that's where I come from. Yeah. And so when I'm hearing all this stuff, I'd already left that denomination and now we're probably five to 10 years on the other side of it. And I'm starting to

I'm having a relationship with God like I have never experienced in my life. That's right. And it excited me. And at the same time, it even scared me some to a bit because

How do I know I'm following God? I was taught that demons can become angels of light. And how do I know I'm not following a demon? I was very apprehensive to challenge all this stuff that was coming up for me. But when I had the...

the faith and the courage to just go and express it to my wife and say, Hey, this is what happened to me. And, and not worried that she was going say, what the heck is wrong with you? Are you crazy? What's are you whacked out somehow? Right. And she didn't. Yeah. She acknowledged it because she was experiencing the same thing. So I think what this was all about was me connecting to the God of my spiritual being rather than the God of my religious identity.

good. Yeah. You see, so it was just solidifying. Yeah. And also the power of just not staying, staying isolated in your own thoughts, you you surrounded yourself, like even back when you were talking about, the addiction and, and the, with the porn and you came out to your, to your wife and, opened up and then you, then you surrounded yourself with a community of people who helped you walk that through. There's so much power when we can,

Jill O'Boyle (19:45.422)
not be ruled by fear of what others are gonna think or say about us, but that we step out in boldness to talk about what we're going through because nine times out of 10, somebody else is also dealing with that that can help you or has already went ahead of you and knows the path to make that easier. So, so much power in that just from both, I see both sides of what you were saying there that was also helping you to find community, find people to talk to.

that may be what we're leading to now, right? Whether you're going to go into a life altering, several life altering moments perhaps, which I would love for you to tell us the of that story. It's the difference. Exactly right. It's the difference between living a life of faith and living a life of fear. Yeah. 100%. When we live the life of fear, we recoil back.

And we go into these quote unquote, these safe spaces where nothing can touch us, hurt us or harm us. But a life of faith is stepping out of the comfort zone and experiencing something that's miraculous, that's supernatural, that's beyond our expectations or even our understanding for sure. But stepping out in faith has an anticipatory element to it.

So you get to anticipate what God is going to do. Yeah. But fear holds us back and says, but you don't deserve it. You're not faithful enough. You're not prayerful enough. You're not whatever enough. so fear keeps us into ourself so that we cannot experience the anticipation of joy and peace and comfort and, and love that

God is trying to prepare us for so that we can open our eyes and not see the physicality of life, but see the spirituality of life. Life is spiritual. are spiritual beings and we are experiencing the humanness of our nature. So we are having a human experience.

Jill O'Boyle (22:04.278)
Right, but we're spiritual beings. We didn't come from earth. We came from above. came from our source. We came from him. We came from God. Yeah. And now that we're here, he wants us to be the light to the world that manifests his divinity through us. Yeah. But we can't do that if we're living in fear, because fear is the natural man. Fear is the natural way. Fear is what we conform to. And he tells us

not to be conformed to the world, but be transformed by the renewing of our minds. And so until we have the faith to overcome the fear of transforming our minds, we stay stuck in a cycle of habitual habits that keep us on a track of pain and suffering, and we can't figure out why. Well, guess what? Faith unlocks that door.

And I think that's what everything was going on with me and my wife, Kelly. We were experiencing a faith for the first time outside of religion. Right. That was opening doors and transforming our minds in ways that we could even start to begin to accept. Yeah. What God was teaching and telling us. Yeah. And being grounded in that faith was huge for you to see and hear a vision. Cause I can only imagine.

the amount of fear that would come up when you see this vision, this crazy thought that my son is gonna die. And then you talk openly to your wife and she confirms that. Not only, yeah, it's not one of our kids, it's Michael, right? The amount of fear that somebody would be hearing that and what would maybe cycle from that.

but it sounds like you were in a place to receive that even though it's not maybe something you wanted to hear, but you trusted that there was a reason why God was speaking to that. And you spent the next, think you said three years building this relationship with your son. talk about where did that end? So you built this relationship with your son, you're spending time with him. What ultimately happened?

Jill O'Boyle (24:27.586)
This is where a lot of my religious friends kind of get squirrely with me. my son, Michael was in the cannabis industry. He was in the medical cannabis industry. And this was at a time when, the medical side of things was fairly new. There was not a lot of a movement or, advocacy for it, but there was definitely a move in that direction.

But coming from my background, when I talk about cannabis, all I think about is smoking weed and getting high, and you might as well be drinking and getting drunk. So what's the difference? Yeah. And I had this, I had this, this way of evaluating what he was doing and I didn't agree with it. And, so I sat down with him and I said, look, I can't stop you from doing what you're doing. So what I'm going to do instead is I want you to tell me your why. Why are you doing this?

What is your purpose for it? And then share it with me so I can get in sync with where your heart is. And that's exactly what he did. He spent the next hour or two explaining to me as why he was in tears. And it came down to this. He says, Dad, I've got so many friends that I've had to bury because of heroin addiction, because they were hurt playing sports. Something happened. They got

caught up into the pharmaceutical mindset that this pill will help you overcome your pain. This pill will help you overcome your depression. This pill will help you overcome your anxiety. And so he's got all these friends that are hooked on all these pharmaceutical medications designed to help them. in reality was just getting them more in bondage.

And then of course, as they start to see they've got addiction problems with these pills, they have to wean off. And so the doctors are just cutting them off cold turkey. And so what they were doing is instead of turning to some other source, a spiritual source, they would turn to heroin on the black market and heroin's cut with all kinds of nasty things. And so he was losing friends. And so what he thought was a, a sign from

Jill O'Boyle (26:51.586)
God was there's got to be an option to help saving my friends. And so that's what he did. He got into the cannabis industry and he told me of all of his patients that he was helping, all the things that he was doing for them, how they was transforming their lives, how they were taking them in a depressive state. And now they were in a place where they could actually be parents and they could actually have a life. And so I said, okay, I cannot deny your why. So you have my blessing.

The only problem was he was doing it in our back house on my property and I couldn't have that. as a fireman, somebody who's a tenured in his pension.

If I was ever have something happened to me that included a felony, I would lose all of that. So I didn't want any part of it. And so I, I finally had to come to the decision of having Mike move out of the house. But that was a long process for me. That was like that three, that was the three years he was living with us. Right. But in that three year struggle, I was having this own come my own conversation with God was Lord.

If you take my son, if my son dies, I don't know how I'm going to respond. don't know how I'm going to react. I don't know if I'm going to, I mean, I really don't even know if I'm going to be able to love you. Yeah. You know, I really don't. And so I was battling that for three years. And then one morning I went out in the backyard and I met my son out there. He was coming out. He was headed off to wherever he was going. And I remember sitting there watching him walk through the gates.

of the backyard out to the front. And I remember thinking to him, God, I love you so much that even if

Jill O'Boyle (28:49.002)
Even if Michael is taken from me, I'm gonna still love you. And I'll still follow you wherever you take me.

Jill O'Boyle (29:01.119)
One month later.

Jill O'Boyle (29:05.645)
He was killed.

in his apartment.

by a friend and that rocked my world. He was betrayed at a level that back. had Thanksgiving dinner with this man and his family, his wife and his children. He didn't have Thanksgiving with us that year. He had Thanksgiving with the guy who murdered him.

Jill O'Boyle (29:33.368)
Somebody he was trying to help to? He was a patient of his, but he was also his delivery driver. So he would deliver his cannabis to his patients. So he was his full -time delivery employee. He was also kind of like his protector. He was older. And Mike trusted him.

trusted that he would protect him if somebody else tried to hurt him. And it turns out he was the one that ended up hurting Mike. So anyway, he was within a year of within a month after I had prayed that with God that, okay, I'll love you. Regardless. Michael just had moved out like a week later and boom, he's

Jill O'Boyle (30:23.822)
So I can imagine the many, many, many thoughts and emotions and feelings and even praying that prayer, that is called faith, that we trust that God has purpose and plans. But even in the sadness and the horrific accident, there had to been so many emotions that were coming up for you, even after praying that prayer.

I mean, the first thought to me is, we always go back and think, what if I could have, you know, maybe I shouldn't have made a move out. Maybe I could have protected him if he, if he would have stayed. I mean, I'm sure there was so many what ifs that you went through. How do you stand here right now and share that story?

you know, and still know, because I know we're going to get to, there was some other things that happened along your journey. But how did that experience just knowing that you saw that vision and it came to life? I what was your, you know, probably after a long healing journey, was able to see some things. But what do you think? How did that that experience just shape you from learning that to hear what you're what you're hearing from God is truth. Whether we like this outcome or not.

That's right.

Well, it shaped me into the man that I am today. What I wrestled with through that was a lot of guilt. The guilt that I had him move out. Yeah. You know, had he still been living in my backyard, I doubt that that man would have ever tried to do something like he did. Yeah. I lived with a lot of resentment against myself.

Jill O'Boyle (32:18.74)
Even though I heard this was from God, even though I knew it was from God, still had, I still wrestled with all the humaneness that I have, my emotion and my beliefs. And, a lot of it, tried to bury Jill, you know, I didn't want to address it. I didn't want to face it. I just wanted to just, okay, this is my lot in life and I'm going to make the best of it. So I poured myself into my work. I poured myself into my career.

I poured myself into being an advocate for others in my profession. have, know, firefighters are always responding to trauma and tragedy and you see it every day. mean, every single day I saw not only what I had gone through, but I had, I had witnessed it at a level that was so much worse than even I had, which gave me

the ability to say, you know what, at least you're fortunate that this didn't happen. So I was always able to compare even a worse outcome than what I even had. So it gave me a little bit of solace, I guess. It gave me a little bit of comfort, but the emptiness and the ache of missing somebody so much, you can't even put it into words. are no descriptive terms that I can even.

accurately described that would give justification to the feeling and the emotion that I was having. It was heart wrenching, but at the same time, I knew that I couldn't allow it to affect what I did in my career. I became a member of our union board and the next year, and that was the year Mike died. So I became a union member or board member. And then I ended up one year later after his death, became the president of the union.

And for the next four years, we led our organization through some of the most trying times of leadership that we'd ever faced. And I think for me, that was me working through my grief. I worked through my grief by being an advocate for those victims of bad leadership, poor organizational structures, manipulation, of fear -based manipulation.

Jill O'Boyle (34:45.96)
And I stood in the gap and made my life one that in order for them to have any effect on my members, they were going to have to come through me first. And so I put my career on the line. And at one point I was even threatened with termination. But it didn't matter to me because I had this mentality that I'm going to stand the gap for

victims. Yeah, I'm not going to let it happen. Yeah. So it gave me even more, strength to go to battle and to fight through whatever it is that we were dealing with. Yeah. And over time,

I was able to forgive this guy, at least through my words. I was able to verbally say it, but emotionally, I was still very, very hurt, very broken, brittle. And as I started to see what Michael's death caused my children, Kyle and Victoria, I became more enraged.

And I went right back into that feeling of, I just stole my son. He brutally murdered my son and that anger started to well up. And I guess that's best described by what my, my bonus mother told me. And my bonus mom being my stepmom, she said, you have this undertone of anger that comes out.

just naturally. And she was right. Even though I had said the words, even though I felt I had forgiven him, I hadn't let it go. And there was this undertone of resentment, bitterness, hostility. This man took the most precious thing from me, my offspring. Yeah. And he didn't just take him. He murdered him in a brutal, brutal way.

Jill O'Boyle (37:06.382)
for $20 ,000 worth of weed. And it just seems so insignificant. It just seems so unfair. So unfair. That my life, my, my son's life was only worth $20 ,000 on the black market. Right. It just, it was confusing, you know, and that's how life is. We are all experiencing life and we get confused. We get mad, we get angry, we get resentful.

we get to be a victim, blame the outside circumstances and that's what I was doing again. And that rage had led me to a place where...

Jill O'Boyle (37:48.622)
When I ended up retiring in 2020, I moved to Nashville, Tennessee. And at the same time, my daughter, who was at the time 20.

She said, I want to move to Denver and I want to snowboard and I want to live the life that Michael wanted. And so off she did. So I moved her, I moved her to Denver in October and I moved us to Nashville in November. And we went back to Denver to help her kind of get her apartment squared away and ready to go for her and her roommate.

And just kind of love on her and just be with her. And lo and behold, we found it out that she had a next door neighbor. This guy moved in while, while just after she did that turned out to be kind of a scary and he was threatening the girls and he was making weird advances and kind of like a stalker and, scared my daughter. I wouldn't say it scared her to the point where she was, you know,

worried for a life. It scared her in the fact that, if this guy wants to come at me, I'm going to, I'm going to stand my ground. And I kept telling her, go there. Just leave it alone. I'll be out there soon. If anything goes down, let's hope it goes down when I'm out there. So sure enough, if I get out there and this guy starts making weird advances, wouldn't advance. Is it more like he would make, he'd say stuff like your daughter is, not everything that you think she is.

That's what he told my wife. And this was as we were just at the apartment coming in and out of the door and he's the next door neighbor. And so he comes out onto the patio or on the deck there and starts to have this conversation with my wife. My son hears the conversation. The next thing you know, my son and him are getting into this verbal altercation. My wife comes yelling over the balcony to get up there. This guy and Kyle are going at it. So here I come running up the stairs and you can imagine. yeah.

Jill O'Boyle (39:58.668)
I'd already in my head realized that I've got this guy that is living next door to my daughter, who is not being the kind of man that he needs to be. Yeah. I've already lost and buried one son. I'll be damned if I'm going to let somebody else come and intervene, and interfere with the life of my daughter. Yeah. You're going to, I confronted him. I was in daddy mode. I was in papa bear mode and, I ran up the stairs. I don't even think I hit one of them. I just flew up there.

And confronted this guy head on. And when I did, he pulled a gun on me that he had concealed in his pocket. And he pointed at my head and, know, after a conversation with him, I mean, I stopped, I stopped in my tracks. But after having this little conversation with him, I could tell he, wasn't going to pull the trigger. I could see it in his eyes that he was trying to protect himself from me. And I ended up saying, if you got the, you know, the.

The Cajon needs to pull the trigger, pull it, because I don't think you do. think you're a coward. And so I charged him again with the gun pointed at me and was ready to take him out. And he ran down the stairs and cocked around into the gun and then pointed it at me again. Meanwhile, in the background, my wife and my kids and our friends are just going crazy and yelling and screaming and worried.

And I ended up finally getting to a place where I was able to calm down and walk away from that. He was arrested. He spent the weekend in jail. He was kicked out of the apartment complex. He lost his ability to have a weapon because he had an illegal concealed carry. Everything went for us in our favor and against him. Yay. God way to go. We're glad that all worked out, but I was still angry and just human mad and still wanted a piece of this guy. Yep. But then I go home.

What did I, on that weekend, instead of me, instead of us helping our daughter get her house ready to go, we ended up having to move her out of that apartment into another apartment. Cause I didn't want this guy to ever get out of jail and find out he comes back. Now he knows where my daughter lives. we moved her out of the apartment, got her to the other side of town. Didn't worry about it anymore. got home and, now I'm looking at retirement. I'm looking at.

Jill O'Boyle (42:20.172)
My daughter's safe. I'm looking at life is going to be good. Now I can experience all that I had, you know, put my heart and soul into preparing for my retirement as a fireman. Yeah. And five months later I fall and I break my neck and I'm paralyzed from the chest down.

And I'm thinking myself.

Jill O'Boyle (42:46.924)
Why? Why is this happened to me? What did I do to deserve this? now I'm in this hospital bed, unable to move and all the thoughts are coming back. How am I going to get through this? All right, God, you put me through the wringer. start my fifties, buried my son and now I'm ending my fifties with a broken neck. The two most fearful things.

anybody could ever face. I remember growing up, my mom would always say, don't do that. You're going to break your neck. Yup. Well, I did. I broke my neck at C three or C four, C five, and had to fight to figure out how to walk again and spent two and a half months in rehab and put my mind to it and said, okay, God, you have been able to get me through everything. Will you get me through the ability to walk again?

And so I put my mind to it and two and a half months later, I was able to walk out of the hospital. My body's still not where it was before. mean, I'm still about, I'm probably at 60 % of what my body was. I'm still numb. still have nerve damage. I still have muscle spasms. I still deal with the day -to -day issues, but I can walk. I can care for myself independently. can drive. I can do little chores here and there around the house.

I have a life. Yeah. And my wife had helped prepare the environment for that growth. She, she set everything up so that I had the perfect environment in that hospital that if I was going to walk.

That was the environment that I was going to be able to make it happen. And then I had all my friends from the fire service who, you know, had lived, you know, 2000 miles away. They flew out and I had somebody at my bedside from my fire department that I retired from every single day for two and a half months. Wow. That they were helping me. They were helping, get my house in order. We had bought this house in Nashville, Tennessee. It was a part of it was an Airbnb.

Jill O'Boyle (45:04.012)
business that we were purchasing. So they helped get the Airbnb up and running. So when I got out of the hospital, I had a fully functioning Airbnb ready to go. Wow. And

I thought I was living the dream. thought, man, know, life is gonna be good. I'm gonna be able to get through this. But then they all went back to their normal lives. My wife went back to work and then it was just me by myself thinking of everything that I just went through. And that's when my mind started to cycle out of control again. And I started to see the resentment and the bitterness and the hostility and the rage and the unfairness of life.

asking all the wrong questions. What did I do to deserve this? How come this is happening to me? Why me? How come? How come you're doing this to me? God, you're doing this to me. Why? just that rage and that anger and it was all coming out and, and,

Jill O'Boyle (46:12.79)
happen outside of me. I evaluated it. It had an emotional response. That emotional response was from the experience that I was having, and it caused me to validate my thinking that I was a victim. And so I was looking at life through the lens of fear. The fear that I will never be the same. The fear that I will always have a debilitating injury. The fear that

Jill O'Boyle (46:44.386)
I'm not going to be normal again, whatever normal is. Was it my normal? I'm not going to be the way I was. My identity was built around my fire service career. I was a fireman. I was a union president. I was a captain on a very busy truck company and truck companies are notorious for having a multitude of disciplines that they have to know.

not just one set, but a multiple set of disciplines. So I had all this identity that was stripped away from me in an instant. that's what I was thinking about. And then I finally was able to get my mind in a place to where I needed to break out of that by going back to what I had realized and what I'd remembered from the early days of breaking through addiction.

the early days of overcoming our marriage, the early days of dealing with the trauma that life was throwing at us as we went through the three years of restoring our marriage. And then I dove back into that. I ended up going to this workshop and there was this man that was the keynote speaker of that workshop. And he walked us all through an exercise.

And it was designed to bring up what is it that you think about yourself the most? What is it you thinking? What is your thinking causing you in life? So let's find out what you're thinking. All right. So we go through this meditative exercise and I start to, and I'm thinking what I think most of all, almost on a daily basis is that I'm useless.

I have no value to offer the world anymore because I can't work with my hands. I can't do the physical work that once identified me and gave me purpose and meaning.

Jill O'Boyle (49:03.63)
So he asked after that exercise, is there anybody that liked to share what was going on in their thoughts and what they, what they came up with. And it was almost like God just raised my hand. I didn't even, I wasn't even thinking about even raising it. I just, my hand went up and as soon as it did, he called on me and I thought, my goodness, I gotta go up until a room full of, I don't know. There's probably at least 500 people there that I feel useless as a man.

I have no value as a man. My identity as a man has been stripped away.

I asked, he asked me, what was it Rick? And I said, well, I feel useless. And he let me tell my story, let me explain it. And then he asked me this one question. He says, do you think I'm useless?

And I said, of course not. Now to the audience, they might think, well, why would he ask a question like that? Do you think I'm useless? Well, this young man was a man named Nick Santanestaso and Nick has no legs and one arm.

He was born that way.

Jill O'Boyle (50:23.478)
And here he is instilling value everywhere he goes, not as a victim, but as a victorious achiever of life. And now he's instilling in me.

Hmm. This sense of value and victory. If I could just shift my mind, one little degree. Yep. And of course it hit me like a ton of bricks. Here I am complaining to a man with no legs and one arm that I feel useless in life because I can't use my body that I have completely intact.

Well, almost. lost a finger one time. I mean, right. for the most part, my is fun. It's completely restored as an individual. have all my body parts. Yeah. But I felt like about that small that here I am complaining to him to make a long story short. He became my mentor and he's walked me through a journey of transforming my mind, renewing it.

getting out of the victim mentality to be over coming life rather than have life overcoming you. Yeah. And, that's where I've been for the last, two plus years is been working, on my mindset and, here in the last, with, with Nick, it's been the last three months that he's really come alongside to help me develop my story, help me to get my

message out there helped me to get speak with people on stages where people need to hear the message of hope and that that we can overcome anything if we just willing to go in and do the little mind shifts that need to take place and those mind shifts start with our belief systems. It does. And we have to change our beliefs and we have to change who we think we are. We have to change who we think God is. That's right. And we have to change who we think

Jill O'Boyle (52:35.79)
our spouses are and our relationships are, and realize that everything that our entire existence, our entire reality that's happening out there, it's a reflection of what's happening in here. good. So it's a reflection of my internal. Disharmony, my internal strike, my internal battles, my internal demons.

my internal limited beliefs that are coming out and I'm validating that as I look out into the world and the result that I get in return validates that my belief is accurate. So I'm a victim. So because I'm a victim, when I look out into life, I see all the areas that justify that belief system and it validates that I'm a victim.

I've been able to shift that mindset a bit is that instead of looking at it through the lens of being a victim, which is actually the lens of being fearful. Yep.

I shifted over to looking at it through the lens of faith and through the lens of love and through the lens of God's orchestrated plan for his purpose to be accomplished in you. And when that happened, everything that was holding me back,

fell apart, it fell away. And I could see for the first time clearly and with confidence.

Jill O'Boyle (54:20.472)
that the courage it takes to make that little mind shift will be what your story is so that others will be able to transform their minds and make an impact in their life that will not only change their life, it will change the lives of all those who come behind them.

An entire legacy can change. We don't have to be tied to our circumstances and say, well, that's it. That's me. I guess you're, you're just going to be numb from the chest down from here on out, Rick. I guess you're just going to be a grieving father for the rest of your life, Rick. Well, I guess you're just going to be a guy that had to deal with sexual addiction, Rick. guess that's all. No, it was all designed to prepare me for the man I am today.

And it goes back to the answered prayer. Father, help me become the man of God you want me to be. Well, sometimes to become the man of God you need to be. You got to go through the crucible of life and the enemy wants to come up and tell you that the crucible is your fault that you did this. It's because of you, you're bad, wrong and awful. And instead of looking at it through that lens, I finally changed and said, you know what? This has been God's plan the entire time.

This has been his purpose from day one. When I made that prayer.

I think he keyed in on, you want to be the man of God? Way back then. was over 39 years ago. So the journey is a journey. It's not a destination. Yes, it is. It's a process. And the process is learning how to overcome the mindset of conformity that this world throws at us. And that conformity is fear. The mindset of fear.

Jill O'Boyle (56:24.91)
the mindset of being a victim, the mindset of being justified to be a victim and then overcoming that through the power of faith and the power that comes through the transformation of the renewing of your mind. And when you renew your mind, you renew your beliefs. And when you renew your beliefs, you renew who you are. You renew your personality.

And then it comes out and now you're clear, you're confident and you're courageous to go tell your story of transformation. And that's what this is all about. This is about being able to tell the story of transformation without fear, without any doubt, without any negative feelings of, I going to say it right? Am I going to be right? Am I going to look right? Am I going to...

None of that matters anymore. Nothing matters anymore. The only thing that matters now is that my light that's within me, the essence of who I am.

Jill O'Boyle (57:36.504)
Becomes a light in the lives of others so that they can see through their own darkness Yeah, right and come out on the other side of it. Yes Victorious. Yeah Yeah, I mean that's that's God's biggest command right is for us to go in all the nations and be you know His decision light and be light and and share our stories and that's why this podcast is why God, you know

brought this vision to me was, your life, your story. And because it is all about sharing our stories and, know, for somebody, you know, just I've taken so many notes as you were talking, but, you know, we share so many stories, but I think Rick, your story is so impactful for the mission that, you know, God is having me on too, and really to just be open and vulnerable about the things that we have went through. And I mean, you have went through a lot.

And to come out on the other side and see that all of this was a process for you where God says, you want to be a man of God? Well, let me show you. I will give you the lessons along your life to stand and who I created you to be. And that came with a lot of fear. That came with some anger. It came with resentment, came with bitterness. But at the end, you found forgiveness and you found peace and you found mercy and you found his grace and you found his love. And now that's what I see in your story.

is that is what you are giving others. You are giving an ounce of love and hope for somebody that is listening that says like, wow, if he has went through all of this, well, I thought I was just dealing with this and not to diminish anybody's story because it's your story, right? But we will go through challenges in life. But God's grace, if we can hold on to the faithfulness that you share. And so I guess I want to, you know, as we wrap up here,

Somebody listening today who has heard your story relates to some of the things that you had mentioned. Like earlier I wrote down, you know, it was an identity crisis for you. You you went from a firefighter who's looked at as being a hero to now having your wife take care of you, others having to take care of you. You know, you're falling into that victimhood of, well, you know, look at their happy family. They have all their kids still, you know, I should never have to bury a child.

Jill O'Boyle (59:58.804)
And so, you know, have all of these incidents that could put this whole fear, you know, in your life or this identity of like, well, I was that and now I'm useless, you know. Somebody who feels that, you know, I've been there. my whole, you know, I look at my life and you talk about fear. It's a big, big issue that a lot of us face. mine...

I call it the three P's. said, I lived my life of people pleasing perfectionism and procrastination. And one people pleasing was I had just this fear of rejection my whole life, perfectionism, fear of failure, thinking I wasn't good enough, never going to be good enough. So I have to work harder, do more, push myself more. And then the procrastination piece came to what you were just saying before you get in the state of woe is me helplessness. Eh, it is, is what it is. You know, this is my life now.

suck it up, Jill, you know, and you lived out and you stay in that procrastination phase. That's where you really will link arms with, you know, bitterness and, anger and resentment. And, and so the path forward is to find freedom and that God, you know, all of this is not happening to you, but, it's happening for you and there's lessons to be learned. And so I guess I want to leave the listeners with

people that are dealing with fear, people that are dealing with identity issues, people that are living that life of why me God, maybe angry with God. What are some practices that you've found because of anybody listening, we can see that you have had series after series of challenges. What are some practices that once you finally were able to look, you said the transformation of your mind, it's so true, but wow.

Somebody listening is like, well, that sounds easier said than done. It is easier said than done. But what are some practices that have keeping that have kept you anchored in that love rather than fear that have helped you did really just shift that mindset to look at life in a new lens? Gratitude, just having a life. I wake up in the morning and I give thanks that I'm alive. I give thanks to God that we have a purpose together to accomplish.

Jill O'Boyle (01:02:18.318)
Meditation. Meditation is a big one. Sit quiet and just listen. You can even do guided meditations.

The religious background I come from, when you talk meditation, that's more of a Eastern religion kind of thing. We had to push that away, push it away. And so I didn't really meditate a lot in my religious identity from that standpoint. I started to, as I left that one org, that one religious denomination and I got to, then I went to another one. They were more proactive in that. And I think that's where I really got grounded in having that morning time of meditation.

But during that window from my son to my neck, I hadn't done that anymore. I stopped. was just too angry. I didn't want to hear from God. I really didn't. Last time I heard from God, he told me my son was going to die and I didn't want to hear anything more from him anymore. just, so I stopped all that. So getting back to your point, what do you do now? I like to meditating. I'm back to actually reading. I mean, I read scripture.

But I read scripture from the lens of how can I apply the spiritual principles, not necessarily all the doctrinal beliefs, but what's the spiritual principle that's being taught that I can apply to my life today? And then I meditate on that. yeah, after meditation, I do workouts. I'm now, I've got to, hired a personal trainer. I worked out two times a week. So I'm getting out of myself by.

being active and taking action to not be victimized by my circumstance. Yeah. Yeah. That's so good. That's so good. And I think the other, the other thing too, I think you didn't say, but I bet you would agree with this. heard you, I heard you mention, you know, your mentor that you've been working to, and probably there's some community of people. Like I think the other thing is this fear base is, is what

Jill O'Boyle (01:04:26.17)
you know, came through all your stories, the ability to speak up and talk about it. Yeah.

We all need to have a coach. We all need to have a mentor. We all need to have somebody that's wise beyond our wisdom so that they can help lead us to that next level. Yes. And when you isolate, that's when you're left to your own devices and your own demons. Yes. And because of that, that's where addiction is usually found strongest is in isolation.

Yep. So stay away from the, the, the, the possibilities of just being by yourself and get connected with the community. But most importantly, get connected with a coach, mentor. Yeah. And that's what I do now. That's my practice now is I mentor and I coach men, women, couples, my wife and I do couples together. And we just help people navigate life's trauma, tragedies.

and trials in a way that brings about clarity, confidence and courage. And that's pretty much what we do now. And so we are coaches. We are mentors for those who are struggling to break through the bondage of their own darkness by giving you just a little tweak in your belief system so that you can go in another direction.

And it's fantastic to watch the lights come on. And it's fantastic to watch lives just explode with excitement and anticipation and faith and love, knowing that everything they are doing and experiencing is designed for them, not happening to them. It's like your workout.

Jill O'Boyle (01:06:30.048)
It's designed for you so that you can strengthen your muscles. Well, life is doing the same thing, but it's designed to give you emotional intelligence and learn how to navigate the emotional bondage that we find ourselves in from bad experiences. Because that cycle starts with a thought, it goes to a choice, from a choice to a behavior and to a behavior and experience and from an experience to emotion.

And that emotion just solidifies and validates that your belief is right. And so you get stuck in that loop and that's life. That's the loop of life. And we get into a rut and before you know it, we're spinning out of control. so I think what you said is very powerful. You need a community and you need a mentor to help navigate that. wherever you can find them, I would get in their back pocket.

And I would ride the journey with them as long as you need to so that you can then become the light you need to be to the world of darkness. That is so good. That is so good. love, I love how God just restores, you know, and he just, he has, he has created you a story to tell and to make a difference in other people's lives. And now you're taking that a step further and actually, you know, work, you know, partnering and working with, with men and women and couples and collaborating with your wife. mean,

It is awesome. And I love the analogy that you just used of like your muscles and working out because for me, if I go and work out by myself, my muscles get real tired real quick and they were like, I don't like this. This isn't working for me anymore and I'm just going to quit. I want to quit. Yeah. But if I go work out with a friend and I see she's like really killing it over there, well then I'm just going to keep going. And so I think that's a great analogy to think about coaching. Like a lot of times when we try to do things ourselves,

We're our worst enemy. think we, we always go negative before we go positive. say, never going to work. I'm never going to get out of this. But if you link arms with somebody like Rick, you know, and, and his program, you, can probably be, you'll be, he's the one, he's the motivator, the cheerleader that's going to be moving you along in your journey. So Rick, where somebody that's relating right now to your story, where would they be able to find more information, you know, about you, your coaching, your consulting?

Jill O'Boyle (01:08:50.572)
Or just have a conversation. Just to have a conversation. I can be found via email and my email is rkconsulting292 at gmail .com rkconsulting292 at gmail .com or you can find me on Facebook, just under Rick Cheatham and Instagram. Those are the two social media platforms that I'm on. And through Instagram it's a at Ricky C.

AFD R I C K Y C AFD DM me if you've heard this I want you to DM me with a heart and I will get back to you and I will I will I will work with you for one hour just to find out where you are what's going on and how I can be of value to you and then together after that one hour we can

put together a plan moving forward on how we can transform your life. Awesome. Awesome. I will put all of those connection opportunities in the show notes. So listeners, please, please don't. right now you're probably heartstrings pool and you're like, wow, that was a powerful testimony. That's a powerful story. I should do that. And that, that is what you should do.

You know, and that's one of the things that happens is fear gets in the way and says, I don't want to do that. But faith does the opposite. Faith goes, Hey, I can anticipate good things are going to happen. And that's what happens when you step out on faith. So like you said, Jill, if you're fearful of getting connected with a coach, a mentor, a community, just remember, that's your ego trying to keep you safe from not experiencing life the way it was meant to live.

Yep, a hundred percent. Well, thank you, Rick, for your vulnerability, sharing your story, just being a light in this world and just helping others get out of the darkness so needed in this world right now, in this fear -based world. So I appreciate the connection. I so appreciate you sharing your story. I'm excited for the lives that God is gonna bring to you just by us.

Jill O'Boyle (01:11:14.318)
having this conversation on Wednesday afternoon. exactly. Be careful, man, because faith is anticipatory. So get ready. Anticipate, anticipate, anticipate. Good things happen when you walk by faith. 100 % great way to end this episode. Appreciate it so much. Listeners, thank you so much. As always, I love helping you rise up, go out, make it a great day, be you love life and rise up.