Join Will Schmierer and I as we discuss the “you can’t make this stuff up” experiences he’s had and how it has led him to learning how to breathe again.
If you’d like to get in touch with Will, you can find him at:
https://twitter.com/BougieWill
https://www.linkedin.com/in/willschmierer/
Transcription
Stacie Crawford
Hi, everybody, and welcome back to the changes in our lives podcast. I am here today with my friend Well, I met Well, I think it’s been a year since we have met up in clubhouse. And we were introduced by a friend, a mutual friend. And I got to experience Will’s wonderful viewpoints and clubhouse for quite some time. And then we ended up actually chatting outside of clubhouse. And when I decided to do the podcast, I knew that I wanted to have will share his story, because it’s kind of mind boggling. Kind of amazing and super inspiring. So well. Thank you for coming here. Appreciate it. Yeah. Good to be here. Yeah, I think it was. I think it’s actually been about a year and a half. Yeah, I was trying to think about it last night. I’m like, How long has it been? It’s been at least a year. Yeah, we’re almost at the end of 2022, which is kind of unbelievable to me. Exactly. It’s, it was just doing my beginning of the year planning. And here we are at the end. Exactly. Exactly. So well, you have had some interesting years.
And a lot of changes going on in your life. So I’m going to start with this question. What was life like for well say prior to 2018 2019.
Will Schmierer
So prior to 2018, I was in my mid 30s. And I was
doing pretty well. I was working in tech, predominantly the web at an agency. Um, you know, it wasn’t I don’t think my ideal career, but it was definitely stable. We were building a family and a life in Virginia at the time. So we had gone from renters to owners, it had been a little slower than probably a typical process. But my wife and I got married closer to our 30s than in our 20s. So you know, we were starting a life and it was a
you know, I wouldn’t say it was my, like I said it was not my ideal life. But it was it was good. I was having fun.
Building the web work with a big agency with big companies. So it was kind of interesting work. And I was kind of climbing up the ladder so to speak. I’m getting a little bit away from the day to day and more the management side of things. But yeah, life was pretty good.
Again, first house, I was getting into hobbies like woodworking, which is awesome, because I love woodworking. And
when you work behind a computer all day, it’s good to get away. You know, it was the garage was by escape. We had two young children, which my wife was instrumental in. I was not the I was not the one feeding the babies, when they were babies up for probably obvious reasons. So yeah, it was a nice little hideaway, and it worked out. But like, you know, wasn’t wasn’t bad. You always could do that. Or I’m sure at any point, no matter how far along you are in your career. It doesn’t matter what you do or where you’re at with you play in the NBA or NFL or you’re just like me, like a regular
mom or dad just doing nothing. You know, it’s it’s got its ups and downs. So yeah. Yeah. So it sounds like you’re pretty settled.
Stacie Crawford
doing that. I guess that normal expected, you know, run of like getting married, getting the house getting the kids doing work, just settling into what is kind of the expected route for people to go. Yeah, yeah. And to be honest, it was kind of what I wanted. I mean, I had a you know, as much as I loved renting. It was nice to own a home for the first time. So I was able to do things like woodworking.
Will Schmierer
And you know, just make choices. I hadn’t been able to make the first part of my life. And there are pluses and minuses to renting and homeownership. We’ve all probably experienced them at some point. You know, that first thing goes wrong in your new house, and you’re like, Oh, this is no longer fun.
Stacie Crawford
It would be so nice to be renting and be able to call somebody else to deal with this. Yes,
Will Schmierer
yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So that was kind of that but yeah, no, it was good. And it was, like I said, that was kind of what I wanted. It was kind of what my wife wanted. It was like we were on different pages at that point. It was cool. And my job was great at the time. Because with young children you just want like, maybe not everybody. I had been in entrepreneurship, but I just wanted a little stability. I just wanted to go to work, do my thing.
Stacie Crawford
Come home work work in the garage. Your family. Exactly, exactly. So what happened?
Will Schmierer
Well, things were going pretty well. Like I said, I was moving up an agency kind of climbing the ladder, so to speak, for lack of a better term. It was pretty fun work. And, you know, 20 My parents had retired down the street. So we saw them all the time, which is great. That’s why we moved to Virginia, because we wanted out of Miami back in 2011. And we got out and my parents were there to help raise our children. You know, I’m just the trusting type. Having grown up in Jersey in New York. I think that’s kind of the MO when you live in that area is thing and a process. But yeah, so my parents were there. And then in 2018. Life got weird. My parents were again, retired in Williamsburg. They lived like three miles away. We saw them like once a month, which is amazing, considering they live three miles from our house. Yeah. And so in 2018, June of 2018, my parents had gone out for Memorial Day weekend, and they unfortunately, never came back. Which was crazy as it sounds is having is the truth, but it’s also Yeah, kind of wild. So that was a fun twist that I hadn’t been expecting. I don’t think anybody saw coming. Yeah. You know, it’s it’s not terribly difficult now, because it’s four and a half years since to happen, but definitely doesn’t get any less weird every time I talk about it. But they were retired, they had gone out to California to travel. Despite what all the newspapers reported, they were not seeing any family out there because the only family we have in California was my uncle who is much older. He’s my, he was well he is a guest. Verb to you there. He is my mother’s oldest brother. So he’s like now in his mid 70s. Like the record she had, she was one of six so they had a few years between a bunch of them. I guess she’d been pushing 70 If she’s still around this year, so yeah, so they went out on a hike and unfortunately it was a really kind of I’m still shocked that they went out on this hike. It’s a it’s a remote part of the California High Desert. They just went out on a hike. You know, it looks very when you go out there because I had been out there now a couple times. It looks like you know, a quick like in and out camp just to see this mysterious weird kind of volcanic formation in the California High Desert. You know, it’s far but it’s not that far. It’s like Biola half out mile and a half back in you think okay, in and out. Check it out. Right. As I told you before, my mom has this weird fascination with Hawaii and volcanic formations. I don’t understand till this day. Volcanoes I guess are cool. When you’re seven and into dinosaurs and volcanoes. Like I just I don’t get the appeal. But uh, you know, I like air conditioning and inside for the most part. I love riding a bike, you know, but I like the peloton. Not the actual outdoor bike. You know, things like that. But, yeah, again, it’s my parents were retired, they liked traveling around the world and around the US. They were kind of awfully into hiking. I don’t know where that comes from, because we’re kind of my dad was New York City guy. His whole life grew up in Brooklyn and Queens. I grew up in Brooklyn and Queens. My mom grew up in the city and jersey and kind of boots all over the place because my grandfather was a professor so she had lived all over the US throughout her life growing up. But yeah, we’re not. We’re not known as a real outdoorsy family.
Stacie Crawford
That was like they were into it. And
Will Schmierer
I still have no idea why like if they’re like Why do you guys love hiking so much? Like, why? What, like just walk on a treadmill? Like, I don’t get it? I don’t, but
Stacie Crawford
they knew. Like they they had experience with it. So yeah, they went into this situation where like you said that, you know, a mile and a half and and a mile and a half out. That’s not really that far.
Will Schmierer
No it’s not and where they were was called a Amboy crater. Which if you’re familiar with California and Joshua Tree so there’s Joshua Tree than there’s one more town I don’t know what stretch I think a little more East called Twentynine Palms. And then you drive for like, two hours till you get to Vegas. But it’s, it’s pretty open and nothing. It’s really I’ve never been to the Sahara, but you know, it has a very desert feel. If you know, and it’s out by route 66, which is famous from I think music, and I think cars the movie. You know, I’m famous enough that I don’t, I don’t care. I have no idea. But route 66. My love of California was already pretty low. And because of this, it’s not California’s fault. You know, I’m just an East Coast guy through and through. I know many people have California, they’re lovely. But the general vibe is different than my it would be. I don’t like going east of I 95 on the east coast. So you know, I’m weird.
Stacie Crawford
Three miles of two
Will Schmierer
miles, I live two miles from from there. And I don’t even want to cross like that part of town. I’m very biased that way.
Stacie Crawford
So I know that you it was quite an ordeal to to find them. And I know that your family had to deal with that, as well as like you had mentioned before, this is all over the news that these people are missing. And you don’t really know what’s going on. You guys did eventually find them?
Will Schmierer
Yes, we did. So I heard that you have this deep tattooed on my arm. Not because of their passing. But because June 13 2008 is the death of Tim Russert who used to do a morning. You know, he was the host of the show. What’s the show? I don’t I don’t watch it anymore. But it was a political show on NBC Sunday morning. You know, and and demersal was kind of like a big broadcaster. I was in school after college for broadcasting. So Tim was a big broadcaster on TV, kind of like the last of the great, sort of real solid interviewers, I think I mean, there still are today but I don’t watch TV nearly the way I used to. And Howard Stern being the other one. So I had these tattoos that are dates on my arms. And the ironic part is I got a call, you know, from my sisters back in June of 2018 They’re like, Have you heard from mom and dad? And I’m like no, but you know we never give you the thought we could care less they were doing their thing you know, they traveled all over the world. They had been through Africa on the other thing they love was cruising. They’re like I will go back but that didn’t work out but they love going on cruises so they had been through like West or sorry Eastern Africa and like Somalia and like all these like really even places I haven’t been that are like super dangerous around Asia and Africa. Even part of the you know, even northern part of Africa in the bed. Wow. You know the world is pretty safe for the most part. But there’s a lot of the places around the world that are very much not safe where I would be at six foot eight and 325 pounds I would be like pausing and taking a minute be like do I really need to go here like so long story short, my I get the call You know my for my sisters the their concern, so I go to my parents condo because again, they lived down the street from where we lived. I get there had just happened to remember it was Wednesday, June 13 2018. Get there, go home. There’s a voicemail because I still had the last of landlines back in 2018 got calls from Bureau of Land Management out in California. And they had found my parents car at the trailhead to Amboy crater, which is not a national park. It’s a national monument. And that distinction is very important because, you know, they’re they’re concerned, they think my parents are maybe missing, I started to think that we all start to think that, okay, they’re going to start looking. But because it’s the National Monument and not National Park, it doesn’t have the resources, or the bandwidth to really pull together a search and rescue the way they would is if it were Joshua Tree. So it’s all by volunteer. This is a pretty remote part of California. Like, again, it’s the high desert, it’s the land between kick, you know, the west coast of California and Las Vegas, which for anybody who’s ever been out there is pretty barren. So they find my father couple days after. Because very much in this period of my father. He was far from the trailhead, but it the whole thing winds up being very clear that they obviously had some kind of heat event, probably heatstroke because it’s 160 degrees, which also begs the question, why were they out there in the first place? They knew better. They were smart. Yeah. So to kind of wrap this one up, they they find my father, you know, we know things are obviously that can end well. They don’t find my mom for like nine more months. till April 2019. Wow. Yeah, her a VA he. So when they file my father, he was kind of Momo Mumbo vide, for lack of a better word. I think that was actually the technical term. You know, they were able to identify him, my mother, they have way, like, I can’t even describe just just in us, but they finally found her body remains, which were pretty. At that point, it had been nine months. So they, it was basically bones. But yes, she she was I always joked I was like, Mom’s gonna walk a bomb, probably walk to the wheels fall off. And that was probably true, because she was about as far from the crater as you could have been, but still technically on the property, which is like Israel? Yeah, I have
Stacie Crawford
to imagine that. You know, when you have say heatstroke going on, there’s confusion going on. So like, there’s just your brain is not working? Correct at full capacity, because your brain is trying to survive, you know. So, they found them. Eventually, you guys had to adjust to not only losing your parents, but also the, frankly, the limelight of like everybody in the world, knowing about this, because it’s on the news, people are talking about it. And you know, I am in the DC area. So you know, anything happens to anybody in the DC area, anywhere in the world. It’s on the news down here. It doesn’t matter, you know, so, you know, that had to be a really huge adjustment. And, yeah, yeah. And, and I know that you’re not in Virginia anymore. Did you leave Virginia right after that?
Will Schmierer
No, I, we stayed there for another year and a half. We got things kind of situated it was you know, it’s a whole process for anybody that’s lost a parent or have had parents pass. You know, even when you plan it out to a tee, it’s still very technical always involves some kind of lawyer, which always involves some kind of time. So yeah, we went through the process. And it was like, I think it was really only annoying because of the way things kind of panned out on. You know, I think in a more typical situation, it’s much more structured. Thankfully, my parents had things structured so it wasn’t a terribly. It was a lot of paperwork and a lot of stuff but yeah, I mean, it wasn’t wasn’t ideal wasn’t the way we wanted it to happen, but you know, we kind of postponed on Monday. while we waited a little bit, obviously, randomly, we just decided to do it in June of 2019. So fortunately, they had actually found my mother’s remains before all that happened. And one of the craziest things I think about this whole process was like, so when it all happened, obviously, it was shocking. It was great. They found my father, we knew kind of just based on the spirit of my mother, she’d be a real pain in the ass to find. And then she, you know, owned that part to the very end. She was in fact, a pain in the ass. And I love her for that. Yeah, so we also went out there. So the reason you know, they were pretty sure we did, obviously, talk to authorities and stuff, but we know there was no foul play. Really, it was all just unfortunate circumstances, bad choices. And now that’s a good lesson is that like, the smartest fucking people on Earth can make all the best choices all the way through? And then you have, you know, in an incident, you can make one bad choice, and it could, uh, you know, it could all the good choices can go kind of a way. But yeah, I think I think what we learned too, was that it was definitely heatstroke. Because my sisters and brother in law. And I, we went out there in June of 2018. We hired drones, initially, from the DC area, a drone company to kind of help do search and rescue because it’s all volunteer because it’s so remote, because are not resources from National Park. Resources, you have to kind of figure it out, you know, and we did that a couple times. And then we also went out there and like, literally, not in the summer, because obvious reasons, a little too hot. We went out there in October of 2018. With the help of my uncle and some of his because he’s a big national park hiker. He does the Pacific Coast Trail. And he organized people. So we had like a group of like, 3040 people in October 2018. We went out for like, seven days just walking this bizarre. Wow, land. You know, looking back, I kind of laugh at it now. Because like, my mom, you know, we obviously we never were the ones to find her. Because she was so far from where, where most people would have thought reasonably. But yeah, we were out there doing searches for like seven days. And I’m like, why are we climbing up these? Like, can we really? It’s just so weird. Like, you’re out there, you’re climbing like this crater like, alright, if I you have to put yourself in the person of heatstroke, which personal doesn’t make any sense could not make sense this, right? And like, we’re just climbing all over the place on Wow. Like, I’m just like, what are we doing? Like, it’s just it was so I think you grasping for straws. And you’re just walking with the hope? Like maybe you’ll you know. And that’s probably I think they were probably a little more organized when they did the actual searches through the county, but they’re volunteers who have a little more experience. Not much. But yeah, it’s it’s a whole weird thing. So
Stacie Crawford
I guess it’s so strange. It’s yeah,
Will Schmierer
I mean, there’s no other word other than just strange. I mean, it’s kind of Dateline III, but not today. Because there was no foul play. So it’s not that. Yeah. And the other other thing is that didn’t happen before. My parents were not the first people to pass out there that had happened in 2017. And I think even before that, so Wow, it hasn’t happened a couple of times, and there were no upgrades to the trail itself, you know, because I don’t know in a heat stroke that would help anybody, right? Because just too dang hot. But, you know, it wasn’t well marked, which by the way, now, it’s well marked. It’s, it’s a well oiled machine out there. So if you go hiking, you’re gonna at least find your way. But back then it was just dirt and sand and like trailhead, so like, if you don’t remember where the trailhead is or it’s too hot and you’re too
Stacie Crawford
on you. Right right your your brain isn’t it just does not work capability to work at at the highest level when
Will Schmierer
that’s when it’s 160 degrees on the ground. Yeah,
Stacie Crawford
yeah, I can’t, you know, I don’t know about you, but like, I’d like to stop at 100 100 is very uncomfortable. Yeah. 60 more you know that. That’s, that’s too much. Yeah. So you will have the memorial in June of 2019. Yep. During this time you know you’re taking care of everything that needs to be taken care of.
Will Schmierer
Yeah. And at this point then then I decide in April of 2019 that we are going to move back to Florida because my parents have passed my others my both my sisters are younger but I have an older younger sister and a younger sister. So one decides she and her husband are going to move out to you know, Colorado because I guess she still likes hiking at this point. At this point. I’m done with hiking. You know, boutiques around they want to move out there so they they kind of pack up shop and DC sell their bougie fancy apartment or not apartment, townhouse row house, whatever you call it in DC and move out to Colorado. I decide. Let’s go back to Florida. I really love the idea moved back to Miami but I liked the idea of Florida had been toying with Jacksonville for years. Because I saw the market was still affordable we could get we could have bought a house a little bit of an upgrade in the area and Williamsburg we were in but like I wanted brand new. I wanted a fresh start. I wanted to go back to Florida we had you know our boys were three and four back then. daughter was going into high school she was in the middle of high school but everybody on the in the family was on board so we moved to Florida. Pack up shop, do everything all having that Morial get into Florida. Boom we’re ready to go. Fresh Start for the whole family closer to my you know my wife is from Miami in laws are in Miami. Miami is far enough away from Jacksonville that I feel okay. Because I was not into that so much. You know, but nearby was better within several states away. And yeah, and then in so we get into the house September of 2019 brand new super excited. And I realized my health is declining, but I’m still working. You know, things seem weird in November I feel like am I sick I thought I was sick the whole month. Long story short, I had not been taking care of my health as well as I wanted to I had plans within the new house. And thankfully, I had bought a bunch of equipment prior to COVID. But in December December 23 of 2018 I had an unexpected stroke while in the hospital here in Jacksonville, Florida. And to say that caught me off guard would be an understatement. Yeah, I remember it all very accurately. So I had some things I had started my wife for it really pushed me to go to the doctor so I was like alright, let’s go to the doctor. Let’s figure out why am I sick for a month? Turns out I’m really sick My blood pressure is just so astronomically high that I basically I had shallow breathing know I was a smoker so I knew that was part of the issue. At that point I had not declared myself an alcoholic but I had been an alcoholic for a long time. You know it’s now something I own. And I don’t take lightly you know, I really just I guess I just thought I’d figure it out. I wasn’t drinking I guess I was drink because I was like a little you know, I’m sure we go into that for like 10 hours but I’m a little bit of parent numbing. It was a little bit of you know, I can’t say that much to do with my parents because because that alcohol problem was just lingering way before that. I did have genetics that are predisposed me to that and I never really listened to them. I went to college I had a good time. I love going out I love partying drinking you know is a very for somebody that’s so introverted i i guess alcohol didn’t like make me do things I just that that was kind of my gateway to just having a good time being a little more fun. I’ve always been into comedy and I did improv and like I don’t know, I just I can’t I say I guess it’s I’m predisposed, so just kind of like drinking. And I never really saw it as a problem until I realized I was drinking a lot. But I’m also a big dude. Like, I was drinking like, well, a lot of beers, but like what a normal person would consume baby a six pack, you know, I would consume an 18 or 24 Pack, but I wouldn’t even think about it because I’m just a big boy. And not to call myself thirsty, but like, literally, I will have a bottle of water. And I will smash 10 bottles of water in two minutes, whereas a normal person has one bottle of water, and that that is still just a thing. Like, even now I’m having like, a 32 ounce Gatorade and there’ll be I’ll probably have 10 of them today. Like, yeah, I’m a big, big human beings. So it never really occurred to me. I think I knew deep down but yeah. So alcohol played a part, smoking definitely played a part being big plays a part. There were just so many factors in this stroke. And the real thing is, I did have the stroke in the hospital. Yeah. How
Stacie Crawford
have you managed to do that? Like I got that pretty well.
Will Schmierer
Okay, so a couple things. So I was in the hospital. I think I went in Saturday, December 21. They had actually caught on, they had me on some monitors because I had high blood pressure. So they were monitoring me. And I guess AFib showed up? No, I never knew I had a fib. I never probably because I didn’t go to the doctors, like at all. So that’s problem number one. Like, I don’t care what age you are. I had no excuse at that point, because I had health insurance like in my 20s it was a little a little rocky to start, but like by the time you have health insurance, you should be going to the doctor
at least for a checkup. And I didn’t so that was my bad. You know, I own that. Yeah, I certainly wish now I had but uh, yeah.
So they call it the afib. So they, they basically the plan was to, okay, let’s monitor. Let’s get them established in a room. And basically on Monday morning, they were going to shock my heart back into rhythm because that’s what they do with afib. Now, that doesn’t necessarily mean cures it but it will put it back in a spot where you’re okay, ish. Unfortunately, for me, I also had undiagnosed sleep apnea. I’ve been a mouth breather my entire life. I just thought that’s what happens to big dudes. I just thought, you know, I’m fat. Like, you breathe through your mouth and you’re fat? No, not entirely true. So yeah, I guess that’s Sunday. It’d be Monday, maybe Monday. Is it good to get a little foggy, but basically, I took a nap at the hospital. As you do nothing else. What else you’re gonna do, right? My wife and kids went out for lunch. I took a nap. I woke up. I went to the bathroom. I knew something was wrong, because I walked very strangely, but I thought, Okay, I just been sitting in the bed like I must, you know. And the staff, this is around Christmas. So it’s understaffed. It’s, you know, whoever has a pulse, who works in the hospital is working. Nobody’s thinking this guy might have had a stroke. They say, Oh, it’s probably a pinched nerve from being in the bed. I agree. My wife comes back from lunch. She’s like, your face is droop. And I’m like, What are you fucking talking about? Like, there’s no mirrors. So I don’t I don’t I don’t know. I did no. Now in hindsight, like, I remember that pace group. And the I mean, I knew that, but I just didn’t think I had had a stroke. And never did doctors nobody did. Long story short, they going to do the reversal, they find out oh, you did have a stroke. They found out the next day. The other issue was because I was so big and fat at the time I was pushing down near 500 pounds at that point. I was too big for an MRI so they couldn’t even determine with the machines at the hospital if I had the stroke so at that point, I didn’t realize there was even a procedure you can do to run a reversal to where I might have had less deficits. So yeah, I had a stroke and I still remember a lot of these conversations because it was like right after the one of the doctors there one of the drivers is like yeah, you’re not gonna be in good shape. I’m like now but getting Two days. Yeah, well, it’s been almost three years. And it’s come a long way done a lot of work, but it’s, um, could it could have been all very different. And it would have been, it would have been nice if it was different.
Stacie Crawford
I had to be so surprising to because you were young, like, Yes, I know you were a smoker and you drank and you’re big guy. And, you know, like, I get all of that. But still, there’s this, but you’re so young. Yeah,
Will Schmierer
there is. Yeah. And I was at that time I was DJ, I had just turned 37. So, ya know, that was my thing need to like, okay, there’s plenty of people that drink and smoke, and maybe we’re even alcoholics. That guy was or, you know, there’s just so many things. It’s like, not everybody has a stroke, like,
Stacie Crawford
right? I mean, like, when Al Roker would give the Happy Birthday, you know, call outs on the morning show, and you’d be like, and here’s Alice, she’s 105. And Allah says that, you know, her her secret to living long life is smoking a pack of cigarettes every night before she goes to bed, and it’s like, okay, well, she made it to 105. Yeah. Do you and all that, like, why is it that at 37? This is going on?
Will Schmierer
Yeah, that was that was actually very similar to my role model, which was my grandmother who passed away like 89, she smoked a pack of Salomon hundreds. For for my entire life. You know, I remember them specifically. You know, because she was not the most friendly lady in the world. But then she also was the one who had the gene that got passed on to me. So she’d be sipping her little cocktail in the evenings in the kitchen, and smoking to sell more hundreds. For years and years and years, she was smoking on oxygen till she died, like you’re not supposed to. Yeah, I mean, she, you know, and that I was like, Oh, I have those genes, like, I’ll be unstoppable. Mm hmm.
Stacie Crawford
So yeah, you have the stroke. You tell everybody, you’re gonna be good. And two days? Yep. Which we, you know, like, I have to say, as somebody who has been around you, I would not know that you had had a stroke unless you hadn’t talked about it. Frankly, pretty much from the beginning of us needing it. It was really part of your journey, and part of how you showed up and you would explain certain things and be like, Oh, I do this this way because of this. And it’s like, Oh, okay. And, you know, in the few times that we’ve been on camera together, I’m like, No, you don’t you don’t look like somebody who’s had a stroke. That’s fair. You also don’t look like you’re six foot eight, because I always get to see you sitting down to so you know,
Will Schmierer
standing desks. Yeah, no, it is it is deceiving. You know, and that’s good. I mean, I people often say this, and they especially says In the beginning, it’s like, Oh, you don’t look like you had a stroke. And you know, that’s good. That means I’m doing the work. It doesn’t make it any easier for me. But you know, I don’t, I don’t some people get upset about things like that. And I’m like, now, I mean, I want to look like I didn’t have a stroke. That is my goal is to like, you know, really get back to where I was and that is incredibly hard. It is taken a tremendous amount of work that I never really give myself credit for. come a long way since a stroke. I mean, I’ve changed my entire diet my entire life. I don’t drink alcohol. I do not smoke cigarettes or anything like I am about as boring as you can get. Which is pretty much one AV for me. I think my my vices now are cheese, which I earn. And I still drink coffee because I’m not giving up coffee. could pray that. I’ll give up a cell phone. I’ll give up my iPhone before I give up coffee or cheese. That is that is you know, I’m sticking to that and yeah, but uh, no, it’s good. I mean, like I said, I I worked really hard to get back to a place that feels good. Um,
Stacie Crawford
yeah. I feel like this is the time where I should put on my commercial person voice and be like, but that’s not all.
Will Schmierer
That is not all unfortunately happen next well, well, so I had the stroke. And I was able to get into a really good facility here in Jacksonville, one of the perks of moving to Florida has actually been that I got into one of the top rehab facilities in the country. Which for all the drama around medical stuff, and strokes, and any, you know, we can kind of go into those things. But, you know, it is kind of imperative to get the, you know, to put yourself in the best spot, you can be like, when you’re 37, and you have a stroke. I’ve heard everything at this point. I’ve heard all the advice, all the secrets, you know, it’s it is very different for everybody. So I was able to get into a good facility here, thankfully. And I started doing the work. Yeah, I didn’t have an option i At that point, I had two very young boys and a daughter in high school. And the wife, who I love, and, you know, none of this was planned shit was already fucked up enough. And I just thought, Okay, well, I’m going on short term disability got 10 weeks to figure out how to get this back in action. So I start doing the work. I’m in the rehab facility, I can’t walk, I’m paralyzed on the entire right side of my body, I’m in a wheelchair. But I just get to work because what else am I going to do? Right? Like, I could sit there and feel sorry for myself. I probably did a little bit of that. But I really tried not to do a whole bunch of work for 30 days, January 2020. Yeah, feel good. I come out of the hospital, I’m still not walking. But I feel like we’re on some kind of track that is better than where I started. I had good insurance, but no insurance will cover you beyond really the initial 30 days in patient. So I do a whole bunch of research, I do what I do, I get books, I get everything I can find to figure out how to make myself better. Because one of the worst things about having a stroke is that it’s kind of unlike anything else. When you have a heart attack, from what I know. It can be very different for everybody. But a lot of heart attacks won’t paralyze you, they will they will hurt your heart, you will be messed up, you will need to see doctors and do certain things. But it will not totally impair your overall ability to walk, talk and function. It is not a brain injury, a stroke is a brain injury. It’s like having 27,000 concussions at one time. And of course, every stroke is different, my least favorite phrase in the world because it makes it incredibly hard to describe to other people what’s going on or what happened because one person could have a stroke. Like my favorite 75 year olds when I was in inpatient rehab, where who were walking two days after their stroke and I’m sitting there like, I’m 37 He can’t feel the entire right side of my body, let alone walk. So that’s fun. And then you know, so I do all this research. I’m in an education class in the rehab facility they let you know, hey, you’ve had a stroke. Good chance you might have another stroke. Good to know. Get home January 2020. January ended January early February watch the Superbowl. Cool home for a week. Seeing Dockers. Wake up the Monday morning after the Super Bowl. i Sister is one of my sisters is here helping out I wake up talking funny. Like you were going to a doctor for a checkup and I’m like let’s go to the hospital something is wrong. Turns out none of the stroke so that Elise was a win However, after several weeks in the hospital they determined that I could either have a brain tumor or I have MS I guess I got lucky in the fact that I have MS. I have no family history. So that’s a little weird because usually with MS is passed down and to be honest, Stacy I you know we’re I do have an S now so I’m you know I have neurologist, I go back to rehab because so I was had the stroke in December of 2019 and the left side of my brain which affected the right side of my physical body. So I was also right handed and still am so I have right side deficits, January 2020, from the stroke kit diagnosed with MS. And it was the entire left side of my body that was paralyzed from the MS initially. Now with MS, it is not a long term paralyzation typically it’s just like a weakness that can last anywhere from a couple days to a couple of months. Mine, of course, was a couple months version. However, I go back to rehab, mid February, to March of 2020. All right, up until the week of COVID.
Stacie Crawford
Right. And I was gonna say which of course is also you know, all of this is going on as COVID is making its way through the world. And then we get into that what was it the first or second week of March, march, like, boom, it’s here. And it’s really here. So you’re in rehab.
Will Schmierer
And I get out of rehab the second time literally the week, the like, I remember watching an NBA game. I think it was like the Oklahoma City. I forget the game. But yes, you know, people walked off before the start of the game. And, you know, I was lucky in that regard because my family was here we live barely not like super close, not like next door but close enough to where my family can visit the whole time. It was kind of we were kind of managing it because like I kind of, for lack of a better term like I do a lot of the bills and the phone calls and our family because I’m the hearing person because my wife is deaf. So we were able to manage as a family bills and everything of that whole first three months, but it was because of my family come to the hospital. So I got out just in time before they shut the world off. Yeah. So I make it home. Finally, after like 90 days and and I always careful when I say we have because I was talking about being an alcoholic. No, no, I alcohol just I don’t refer to myself really as an alcoholic anymore. Because like, I’m not in treatment for that. Like I was just able to very kind of easily stroke stop done is never been a part of my life. Since I have no desire. Like, are you so you
Stacie Crawford
didn’t have any time even if you had the desire? Because you’ve been working on trying to get Yeah, tip feeling a place of normalcy? Yeah, yeah, I
Will Schmierer
mean, I’ve been in search of normal ever since I think that’s what I meant to say earlier. It was that like when you my wife was born deaf, so she doesn’t really understand what it’d be like to be hearing. But anybody who’s had a traumatic anything, like when you can remember exactly how you walked, right? And you don’t even think about it, right? Like now when I walk in like, this doesn’t feel like it used to I wish it felt like it soon. It’s getting better. But it still involves a little thought, which is annoying because I got enough going on. I don’t want to have to think, you know, people take for granted like I do a lot of different things. And I sometimes like oh, you know, just make a note on like, I can’t really write the way used to I can’t type 90 words a minute without looking at the keyboard. Now I have at the point where I can pick to death. But like, that isn’t the most efficient way to type. Like it’s not it’s, it’s fine, except for when you used to be able to do it a certain way. Yeah, that made it effortless. I wouldn’t say fun. I would never use the word fun and typing in the same sentence. But like, you just do it. You know, now it’s like I get to think do the damn thing. Like, yeah, and I can right now. It’s just exhausting. Like it’s like a whole
Stacie Crawford
was That’s exactly it. It’s a it’s a conscious process with effort, as opposed to, you know, it used to be, hey, if you were on the phone with somebody and somebody else was talking to you in the room, you could still write down the notes of what’s going on. Because you could do all of those things easily without thinking just like walking without thinking you just you just do it. Now it all has this big effort.
Will Schmierer
Yes. Which actually is not the worst thing in the world. To be fair, I’m annoying Yes, but not the worst, I guess. You know, I’m not really known as positive poly, but I’ve gotten a little bit of a rap but like I feel like Yeah, well, like I said earlier, like I’m gonna sit here and feel sorry for myself like yeah, I have my moments. I have days like there Still, even now I’m getting better, but I’m not, you know, nobody’s perfect. And there’s still shit days that are fast. Yesterday, I had a really tough day, not from any stroke related stuff or MS related stuff, but like, it’s just like, we got some things going on in our house and it looks like you know, um, but because of all the tools that I’ve had to relearn, and you know, I wasn’t, I wasn’t a big, I’ll be honest, I wasn’t into coaching at all before the stroke, obviously, probably, because if I was, I probably would have made different choices sooner that might have prevented a lot of that stuff. But yeah, you know, and I don’t know that I would have stopped drinking. I might have just kept saying, oh, okay, I’m okay. Okay. But honestly, I was at the point of drinking that I was trying too hard to drink. And I’m not exaggerating those numbers to be shocking, or, or, you know, to be whatever, where I might have when I was a 20 year old, but like, Yeah, I mean, I I was drinking really a lot of a ton of beer. And my logical thinking was, well, it’s not, you know, shots, or mixed drinks. It’s beer, so it’s safer, you know, but no, like, yeah. Like, my wife was like, oh, I should have tried to help more. I’m like you, honey. No, like, this was on me. I was the one like, I’m from Jersey, I’m masterful at like, kind of creating a facade, which is odd, because I went to school for architecture, right? So I can like, I don’t want to say it could pull the wool over anybody’s eyes, because that is not the intent. But like, I wanted to drink after work. I had very specific rules, like, no drinking during the day, no drinking and driving, period, no drinking with the kids. Like, you know, the kids were like, in bed and I would pound beers from the time the kids were in bed till the time I would go to bed. So I thought I was being safe, right. And I was like, I was sneaking, not sneaking. But I wasn’t openly walking in with 24 Pack, I would just kind of spread them over the fridge and put them in the other fridge and like it’s like, a very sort of I guess it’s fucked up. But like, it wasn’t. It wasn’t to be malicious or harmful to anybody is just like, I didn’t even want to. I didn’t even want to look at my own secret, which was secretly drinking a fuck ton. Right? Right. You know, and I was really trying to hide it to protect you know, what I thought was my secret little drinking fun time by myself. Because my wife would go to bed early because she’s a runner. Ironically, now I’m I’m a runner, too, but I’m still not on the early morning of running. You know, that was just I think I think the signs are on the wall. Like I should have seen the writing on the wall. I was on inside edition. At 20 years old back in 2002. For my friends and I partying in high school, in Seaside New Jersey, for underage binge drinking after prom. So yeah, my drinking days go back to the age of 15. Wow. Yeah, I started drinking at 15 and I didn’t stop till 37. So I had a 22 year run. And as I said, I got it. There are peaks and valleys in my in my in that time where it was like, Oh, just a six pack you think no big deal. But then, you know, two years later be like six pack became a 12 pack and then you know it might go back to a six pack and that’s expect came 18 pack? I can tell you, I can tell you what’s the I mean, I knew everything about every beer, I could tell you what state like what say sir 40s would say it served 32 You know, I was never into fancy IPA.
Stacie Crawford
This is the interesting thing because, you know, like other addictions. And we’re going to talk about beer specifically, it’s a culture there. You know, you have the art you have the art of making the beer. You have the art that’s on the beer like I love going into beer stores. Just look at the art on it. You have all the stories behind why it was bad why it was this and like all of that it’s a culture and when you are in it. You don’t think of not being in it.
Will Schmierer
Yeah. No. I mean, yeah, it’s a cool little hobby. And if you know, the thing is I’m not I’m not against it, I could still be around people that drink. It doesn’t bother me. I just can’t, you know, and that’s fine. Because like I said, I tried so hard for so long. I’m retired like, that’s, you know, I, in a way, I feel lucky. Like, I don’t have to there’s there’s no debate, there’s no going back. Like, I yell in that sense. I’m not fighting an ongoing battle, like it was just super clear cut. Stroke done. Yeah. Yeah, same as smoking, you know, and they were kind of synonymous for me. I think that’s why it went on for so long. Because I think despite what my parents would think, or even realize about themselves, there was probably a bit of anxiety. I think that’s typical of, in general, I’m not the one a broad statement, but I feel like East Coasters sort of have a high level of like, it’s just different, right? People in California are typically a little bit more laid back. That’s probably true in the Midwest, and not everywhere. But like, there is kind of like this, this, you don’t even we didn’t call it anxiety. But I think it is anxiety and its core like East Coast, especially when you grow up in New York and DC, right? Like, it’s just a high energy, run, run, run hustle culture. I don’t think that’s so bad. But if you’re not aware of it, and you let it take over, it becomes bad. Just like drinking, drinking, it’s not bad. There’s a reason that like, you know, my daughter is in college, she’s not quite 21. But I’m not like anti, don’t go to parties don’t have like, no, like, just don’t, don’t, don’t be like me, you know, if it becomes a problem, let’s have conversate. You know, that’s all I care about, like, get the help you need before. You know, I hate to be the example, just to get the help you need before it gets to where I got, like, I didn’t I didn’t want to get there. I didn’t think I could get there. Yeah, yeah, it wasn’t on the radar possibility. So the reason I talk about it really is because I don’t want anybody else have to go through it. And I do, you know, that’s so narcissistic. But I think if there is a person built to go through the shit we’ve talked about, I wouldn’t sign up to volunteer for this. But I think, yeah, not every handle. I don’t know that I’ve met a lot of people that can handle as much as I’ve kind of taken off. And I still don’t know if that’s a good thing to promote, necessarily. But I feel like I can handle it. And I feel like I will be better going into my 40s having handled this. It’s not the way I envisioned it. It’s not the way I’d want to do it if I had the choice, but I am very lucky and fortunate to one still have my life because one of my people die from a stroke. You know, and the only thing that I’d never really cared about the classification of stroke, but um, apparently I didn’t have a massive stroke. But I’m still confused by that because I’m, I feel massively fucked up.
Stacie Crawford
Yeah, like, Okay, well, I feel I feel like I had a massive stroke. So but like, what am I missing here?
Will Schmierer
Yeah, I mean, I guess to be fair, I have met some fellow stroke survivors in some out patient rehab here in Jacksonville, Florida. And there are people who have had a stroke who are older, and who have completely lost the ability to communicate. So it really you know, at first when I had the stroke and the IMS they always they always recommend that you tell people your symptoms, and I was like, Why do I have to do the work? I’m the survivor. I’m the you know, whether I did it to be or it did it to me or whatever combination is like, but now I get it. Now I get it because a stroke is so vastly different. One person could have a speech problem another person could have a leg problem doesn’t persecutory paralyze the persecutory partially paralyzed it just it’s amazing how brain injuries can just spanned so many things. Things you don’t even think about like picking up a fork. I had to have a weighted fork I until just right now. I forgot. January 2020. I ate all sandwiches because I couldn’t pick up shit with a fork. uh you know, I take that for granted now again, because because I can use a fork but shit. Totally forgot about that, like I had turkey sandwich every day. I only remember because I got them turkey sandwich every day for 30 days.
Stacie Crawford
Gotta remember that.
Will Schmierer
Yeah, it wasn’t that bad.
Stacie Crawford
That’s where we’re gonna leave you hanging. So join us next week to hear the rest of Will’s story