A 911 Survivor and Country Music Star’s Story of Physical & Emotional Recovery – PT. 1 with Michael Peterson and Colonel Jill Chambers

Dr Daniel Amen and Tana Amen BSN RN On The Brain Warrior's Way Podcast

Michael Peterson is a famous country singer, and his song “From Here to Eternity” is one of the most popular country songs of all time. Earlier in life, he had suffered a brain injury from smashing concrete blocks with his head, and it left him feeling foggy and confused. His wife, Jill Chambers, is a retired U.S. Army Colonel. She had suffered PTSD after her experience inside the Pentagon while it was attacked on 9/11. Michael and Jill share their amazing stories with Dr. Daniel Amen and Tana Amen.

 

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Dr. Daniel Amen: Welcome to the Brain Warriors Way podcast, I'm Dr. Daniel Amen.

Tana Amen: And I'm Tana Amen. Here we teach you how to win the fight for your brain to defeat anxiety, depression, memory loss, ADHD and addictions.

Dr. Daniel Amen: The Brain Warriors Way podcast is brought to you by Amen Clinics, where we've transformed lives for three decades using brain SPECT imaging to better target treatment and natural ways to heal the brain. For more information visit amenclinics.com.

Tana Amen: The Brain Warriors Way podcast is also brought to you by BrainMD, where we produce the highest quality nutriceutical products to support the health of your brain and body. For more information visit brainmdhealth.com.

Welcome to the Brain Warriors Way podcast.

Dr. Daniel Amen: Welcome everybody. We have country music week with our really wonderful friends, Michael Peterson and Jill Chambers. [crosstalk 00:01:02]

Tana Amen: They're both so much fun and so interesting. This is so awesome.

Dr. Daniel Amen: Michael whose million-selling Grammy-nominated country music star whose number one … Whose songs have hit number one of the charts five times, including the fourth most popular country wedding song of all time, "From Here to Eternity," which I've heard over and over again [crosstalk 00:01:26]

Tana Amen: Awesome.

Dr. Daniel Amen: My favorite song of his is the iconic "Drink, Swear and Lie," which is not what you think [crosstalk 00:01:35]

Tana Amen: If you listen to it it's not what you think, it's actually a very positive message.

Dr. Daniel Amen: He's been a songwriter for the stars with the unusual good fortunate to have had his compositions recorded by the hall of famers and Grammy winners of country, rock, pop, gospel, Latin, including Travis Tritt, Timothy Schmidt of the Eagles, pop superstar Denise Williams, the Imperials. Contributing author for eight books, including the number one New York Times bestselling "Chicken Soup for the Soul" series. We're actually friends with Mark Victor Hansen.

How I met Michael was when he came to the clinic, when Michael and his wife, Jill, who I'll introduce in a second, were married, one of their gifts to themselves was a scan at Amen Clinics. My staff goes, "You have to meet these two really awesome people." We've just become close friends since then.

Tana Amen: Before you go too far you need to introduce Jill.

Dr. Daniel Amen: Colonel Jill Chambers.

Tana Amen: That by itself is just so cool. [crosstalk 00:02:51]

Dr. Daniel Amen: Renowned for her path as a woman in the military and for creating a PTSD program for soldiers after her own experience surviving the 9/11 attack on the Pentagon, which we want her to talk about. She's widely recognized as the first person in the history of the US military to develop a successful sustainable strategy to reduce stigma associated with mental health challenges within military culture, which as a former army medic and then army psychiatrist, that's a hard thing to do with all those macho guys.

Tana Amen: Yeah, it's pretty awesome.

Dr. Daniel Amen: Just welcome to the Brain Warriors Way podcast. You are what I'd both consider brain warriors.

Tana Amen: And what a combo. That's so cool.

Jill Chambers: That's sweet, thank you.

Michael Peterson: Thanks so much. We've had such a privilege to be with you today. You guys inspire us every day and I mean that literally every day. When we get up in the morning [crosstalk 00:03:47] our day we think about how we're going to take care of our brains today. We think of you guys all the time.

Tana Amen: Awesome.

Dr. Daniel Amen: Tell the story of how you guys ended up at Amen Clinics.

Michael Peterson: Jill and I, when Jill got out of the military, she began to contemplate what she was going to do next. We decided that as we began to learn about different modalities to deal with post traumatic stress and mild traumatic brain injuries that we wouldn't talk about any modality that we hadn't tried. So there were several things we learned along the way. We learned about neural feedback and guided imagery and heart math. [crosstalk 00:04:34]

We were doing a show in Wisconsin and there was a little bookstore next to the hotel and we were over there just killing some time, looking for some sugar [crosstalk 00:04:44] ice cream or something. I probably had an ice cream in my hand when I picked up "Change Your Brain, Change Your Life."

Tana Amen: That's hilarious.

Michael Peterson: It was the "Change Your Brain, Change Your Life," the women's-

Jill Chambers: No, no, no.

Michael Peterson: No, it wasn't that yet? [crosstalk 00:05:02] It was just "Change Your Brain, Change Your Life." So I picked the book up, I was looking through it and eating my ice cream. I probably had pancakes for lunch or something. [crosstalk 00:05:12] Yeah, I said, "Jill, look at this book."

She started looking at it and we bought the book, we read the book. We were like, "Wow," blown away. We said, "We should learn more about this." Right about that time I found a new book that you wrote, the one that was focused on women [crosstalk 00:05:34]

So I gave it to Jill as a gift and at this point I'll hand it-

Jill Chambers: So we got married on the first of January, 2013. He gave me the book several weeks after that, so I read it and now we're living together, it's our first three months of living together, and things are happening in the kitchen. Like, Jill, if you just put these bowls here things would be easier. Jill, if you just did this you can make it … After a while it was just read the book.

Tana Amen: I can just see this. He's talking to a US army colonel. I'm trying to envision this whole conversation and these dynamics. This is hilarious. This is great.

Jill Chambers: It was very funny. There was no fights but it was … It did put just all those situations. So, read the book.

Tana Amen: That's awesome.

Jill Chambers: Shortly after that, so now we're getting to April because that's when we went to see [crosstalk 00:06:34]

Michael Peterson: It's a really cool story how this all worked out.

Jill Chambers: So we're actually at a friend's house in April of 2013, we're in Nashville, actually. And up in our room that we're staying in and I have your book, Daniel, and I've obviously already read it but now I'm just perusing through it again because I was so intrigued by it. At this point I just … I think, Daniel, we told you this story but I just looked up and I said, "Hey, if Michael and I are supposed to get this brain SPECT imaging done, how about a sign?" Daniel, have I told you this?

Dr. Daniel Amen: No.

Jill Chambers: Because this was incredible. I had your book laying open and it was in the midsection, so both sides, it's even Steven. Books just lay that way. Your book-

Michael Peterson: Right when you said, "Give me a sign," and she turned around to do something, when she turned back around-

Jill Chambers: Your book had flipped all the way to the back. It didn't close but it left it on the page where it said, "Contact us."

Tana Amen: That's so funny.

Jill Chambers: It couldn't have been any easier. There was the phone number, right there.

Michael Peterson: Wow.

Jill Chambers: That was easy, I wish I had my phone.

Michael Peterson: You know because it flips over and there's now all the weight on one side you'd think the whole thing would close but it didn't.

Tana Amen: That's so weird. That's great.

Jill Chambers: Exactly. At that point I started to giggle and I said, "I wish I had my phone," and there it is on the side table. Okay.

Tana Amen: That's awesome.

Jill Chambers: Called and I don't remember the name of the gentleman that we spoke with but he was super kind and he told us that it could take a while to get an appointment. And I mentioned my name, gave my information, mentioned Michael's name, gave the information, and then at that point he drew back and first he said, "Is this the Michael Peterson?" I thought, okay, he must be a country fan. But he said, "Is he the guy that used to go around to schools and do all these strengths of feat and speak to kids and break things with his head?"

Tana Amen: That's funny. [crosstalk 00:08:33] That's so funny.

Jill Chambers: It was super coincidence [crosstalk 00:08:38] this guy got all excited, I got all excited. Very quickly we were able to get an appointment with you and of course I ran downstairs like, "Michael, Michael, Michael, you have to talk with this guy, he knows you."

Michael Peterson: So funny.

Jill Chambers: It was just a fun series of beautiful coincidences that happened on purpose.

Tana Amen: That's so great. Yeah, if you believe in coincidence, right? Which we don't. That's awesome.

Dr. Daniel Amen: So then what happened? So you came and-

Michael Peterson: Yeah, we came. Really the sales pitch that Jill gave me to me was we're going to go to do this so that we can equip ourselves per our protocol of not talking about things that we haven't experienced. We're going to equip ourselves to help veterans. So that's the reason why we went. Of course I had no idea at that point really that there was a greater, deeper and more profound life changing reason for me.

Tana Amen: I love that.

Jill Chambers: Actually, while we were there, I think I was in my second day and I did this thing again, I said, "Boy, I sure would like to meet Dr. Daniel Amen." [crosstalk 00:09:40] I'd really like to meet him in person. I wish that could happen.

I called your secretary again, a beautiful woman whose name I don't remember, I should, I've been doing memory rescue but [crosstalk 00:09:53] I called her and I asked her, "Is it possible?"

She couldn't have been sweeter and she said, "I'm so sorry, he's up in San Francisco and he won't be back until Saturday and you guys are done on Friday." Well, I tried.

Daniel, within 30 minutes she called me back and she said, "Weirdest thing, Daniel just called me and said he's cutting his trip short and he's coming home. You can meet him on Friday." And that's how we met you. I don't know if you even knew that, but that's exactly how we met you because I asked if we could just meet you in person. There, you have the story.

Tana Amen: That's so cool.

Dr. Daniel Amen: Then we fell in love with each other, I remember that. But how did the evaluation change your life?

Jill Chambers: You take that first or-

Michael Peterson: You go first.

Jill Chambers: For me I love the fact that you all and your team were able to identify that I actually did have a post-traumatic experience. You showed me the triangle and just so much more interesting things that you could tell from that what was going on from my brain SPECT imaging. One of the key things that you taught me is that after we met, and you looked at my brain scan, you asked me how my bone density was, had I ever had a bone density test? I thought, okay, no but I'm sure I'm fine. I get lots of sun, I'm doing calcium, I'm good to go and I work out. I'm good.

And you challenged me, you said, "Yeah, you know what? Do me a favor and go ahead and just get this bone density test." Okay, I went to [inaudible 00:11:27], got it done. I was literally on the verge of osteoporosis. I would have never in a million years even wanted to get that test-

Dr. Daniel Amen: You'd had your yearly physical and they said, "You're fine."

Jill Chambers: Of course [crosstalk 00:11:40]

Tana Amen: They don't check for all that stuff. See, we check for stuff people don't check for.

Jill Chambers: I know.

Dr. Daniel Amen: I remember on the outside your brain looked super healthy, because you do a lot of the right things, but on the inside … It's this thing we call the diamond pattern, where your emotional brain is, wow, really busy. And then I went, where's the trauma? Because I didn't actually know about the connection with you and 9/11.

Tana Amen: Yeah, I hated that question.

Dr. Daniel Amen: Talk about that a little bit. And we see that a lot, people actually don't say, "Look, I'm really struggling with these symptoms or that."

Tana Amen: Especially when you're someone like her who's this colonel and she's tough. It only shows on the brain scan.

Dr. Daniel Amen: Yeah, but after your 11th funeral you're not tough anymore, right?

Jill Chambers: Right.

Dr. Daniel Amen: So tell just a little bit of that story.

Jill Chambers: Sure. Obviously I didn't realize that I had post traumatic stress. You know how it is in the army, just [crosstalk 00:12:44] I did for nine years. But over that period of time I was able and had a pretty interesting job of trying to figure out what was going on with our service members and why were they coming back with not physical wounds but more the invisible wounds. So that started leading me down the road of there are some problems here it seems that we actually need to talk about. For me personally, it didn't involve me, I was too busy taking care of everybody else and thinking about that.

Before we met you, Daniel, and once I got out I started doing things I realized that pharmaceuticals weren't the way because I was seeing what was happening with our service members. Granted some need those, I get that, I'm not discounting that, but they don't need all of them. I've actually learned that.

So I began just, okay, how can I get past these nightmares and stressing out about airplanes and just a lot of emotional stuff? And I started doing guided imagery and neural feedback and bio feedback. So that was really an interesting thing, and Daniel, you've talked about this now too, is post traumatic growth. In really a three month time period I was so happy that my nightmares … I haven't had a nightmare since August of 2009, I'd mark them on my calendar just to know, Because I've learned ways to actually do some good coping skills along with good nutrition, activity and good sleep.

Dr. Daniel Amen: Just so our listeners know, tell them a little bit about what happened on 9/11.

Jill Chambers: For me, personally, being in the Pentagon that was-

Tana Amen: You were in the Pentagon. Wait, back up. You were in the Pentagon on 9/11?

Jill Chambers: Yes.

Tana Amen: And you didn't think you had PTSD?

Jill Chambers: No.

Tana Amen: Okay, go ahead.

Michael Peterson: Of course you slept for two hours a night for seven years after that.

Tana Amen: Dear Lord, okay, go ahead. Sorry.

Michael Peterson: You just get up and go.

Jill Chambers: You're busy [crosstalk 00:14:47]

Michael Peterson: It should be noted that Jill, when I met her, she made caffeine nervous.

Tana Amen: I get that, but-

Michael Peterson: A real high energy person. So for her to sleep two hours a night I think she probably looked and said, "It's just a function of who I am." [crosstalk 00:15:07]

Dr. Daniel Amen: So, you were in the Pentagon, obviously you survived, but that was … What was that day like for you?

Jill Chambers: It was quite traumatic. We saw everything that was happening with the towers, that was New York, we're fine, everything's okay. And I remember one of the cooks for the … I was actually military secretary to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the time. And the cooks worked across the hall and they reported to me. All these young cooks started coming in because we had a TV in our office. Several of them said, "Man, you know these things happen in threes." Both towers had been hit at this time. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And right after I was finishing my last yeah, yeah, all of the sudden one of my service members who worked for me, Sergeant Lobo, stood up and she had the phone in her hand and she said, "My god, something just happened to Mildred." Mildred was actually a woman who worked in the Pentagon but in a different section. What do you mean something just happened to Mildred? She said, "Everything just went silent and everything's gone."

Tana Amen: No.

Jill Chambers: Then it was just everything was immediate at that point. People are rushing by our doors. Where I was located we didn't even hear anything, we just saw the rush of people and then my other sergeant, Senior Master Sergeant Brown, said, "Alright, we need to lock up everything." He's a security guy, too. We need to lock up everything that's out. At that point it's like forget the lockup, we need to go. The three of us got out of the building, because we were very close to … We were on the E ring so we could get out, and as soon as we stepped out you could literally lift your hand up and touch that black smoke.

Michael Peterson: You had to go back in though and find the rest of your team [crosstalk 00:16:50] that wasn't the end of it.

Jill Chambers: Part of our jobs, the three of us, the military secretary team, we're responsible for the 300 people that work directly for the chairman. So that means all people that were in the different offices, whether in public affairs, the history office, the legal guys-

Dr. Daniel Amen: So now you go back in the building while this is all going on, looking. Then what happened with the funerals? That was part of the trauma too for you.

Jill Chambers: Where the plane hit was on, for me anyway, the [inaudible 00:17:22] general corps side. I call it that because that was the ring where … I'm the [inaudible 00:17:25] general corps officer, so a lot of my friends that I grew up with over the years from lieutenant times were over there. I think there were 23 or 24 service military members that I knew personally that I grew up with.

Dr. Daniel Amen: That [inaudible 00:17:40].

Jill Chambers: That were lost that day. And then funeral start. [crosstalk 00:17:47]

Tana Amen: I don't even want to ask too many of those questions but-

Jill Chambers: No, that's okay, I don't mind. I'm fine.

Tana Amen: You had to go back in and find your friends. Were those some of the friends you ended up finding?

Jill Chambers: No, we were on the side where the plane didn't hit. It was just smoky and it was just chaotic. Trying to get 25,000 people out of a building at one time and you can do that at 5:00 on a good day but not when a plane hits.

Tana Amen: Right, that's craziness.

Jill Chambers: Then trying to recognize the people. Okay, you belong to us. And, Daniel, you know this in the army, we all have evacuation routes and we're all supposed to participate in exercises so we know where to gather. Now being on the joint staff, when you go into another three or four star general officer and say, "Okay, we're practicing today, we need to get you to go out." It's been check the block. It really was. And the secretaries, they're not going to go out because the boss didn't go out. So a lot of people honestly didn't know.

And we knew that. We knew every time we had to do … Every quarter [inaudible 00:18:52] do they know where to go? Really we felt incredibly responsible now. Okay, this is the real deal. The great news we did, we found everybody, all 300 that we needed to find, we got them to where they needed to be. And then, of course, later on during the day we were able to get … There was bus transportation, all that stuff to get people home.

Michael Peterson: I think it's, to me, one of those things you can overlook easily, what happened the next day?

Tana Amen: Yeah, exactly.

Michael Peterson: When they said to you, everybody basically said, "Okay, we're going back to work tomorrow." [crosstalk 00:19:29]

Tana Amen: People don't think about stuff like that. Life goes on. But it doesn't just go on.

Michael Peterson: Right. It was just put your game face on and go back to work. Seven years later, when she hadn't slept for seven years, she realized that something was wrong.

Tana Amen: But you made a good point. The funerals start and it just keeps going and going.

Jill Chambers: Exactly. I think I made seven of them and then thought, okay, for everybody else who's my friend I know where you are, I can call on you any time, things are good, I just can't do this anymore. It was incredibly draining. So I stopped. And I felt okay about that, I didn't feel any remorse about not going back to any funerals. But still it was just stressful.

And the Pentagon was quiet for the longest time, for weeks and weeks and weeks, people were just like zombies walking down the hall. You were just in lock step motion and doing everything that you knew how to do by habit. It was a very surreal thing.

Everything that happened at the Pentagon, even my daughter said, "This is exactly the kind of movies that your mother would never let you go to."

Tana Amen: Right. [crosstalk 00:20:40] Isn't it true? That's so true.

Jill Chambers: I couldn't even get through "Wizard of Oz" when I was a kid.

Tana Amen: Right.

Dr. Daniel Amen: That's hysterical, we just talked about [crosstalk 00:20:50]

Tana Amen: I think it's a terrible movie, he loves it. Anyway, it's a whole other story.

Michael Peterson: I love it too.

Tana Amen: No, it's terrible. It's a terrible movie.

Dr. Daniel Amen: So we see you in 2013, which is 12 years after this horrific event, and even though the nightmares are gone and you're doing much better, it's still imprinted on your brain. But, and this is the thing nobody talks about, is by really engaging in brain healthy habits, it can help heal it over time.

So I just remember looking at it, and you're like, "No, I'm fine."

And I'm like, "Well, there's something there still."

And I want to hear how that turns out. But then I saw Michael and I'm like, "Michael, what did you do to your brain?" And then Michael tells me about his-

Tana Amen: He shows me this picture and I'm like, "Who does that? Who does that with their head? What is that?"

Dr. Daniel Amen: When Tana and I wrote "The Brain Warriors Way," and then we filmed our PBS special, "Brain Fit: 50 Ways to Grow Your Brain," Michael allows us to tell his story.

Tana Amen: Everybody in the audience gasped.

Dr. Daniel Amen: So talk to us, Michael, about what you were doing with your head.

Michael Peterson: The first indication that I was having brain function problems was the fact that I would break bricks with my head.

Tana Amen: That you even [crosstalk 00:22:31] indication that he was having brain function problems is that he started to break bricks with his head.

Michael Peterson: Yeah, what's your first clue? There it is.

Tana Amen: Right.

Dr. Daniel Amen: How did that come about?

Michael Peterson: You asked me to contemplate before Jill shared how this had changed my life. What occurred to me is there's a saying that we grow up a lot with that says you can't change your past. You can never change your past. I was just thinking about your question and I realized in a really interesting and powerful way you can change your past and how my brain scan changed my past was it created a reframe for me [crosstalk 00:23:24] I judged myself and my past behaviors.

This was six years ago now that we came to see you. I was in my early 50s, and I had a good bit of life that I had lived, and there were things in my life that had happened to me and things that I had done that I felt bad about and I didn't quite know how to process all of that. My only real paradigm, the most prominent paradigm that I had for making those evaluations on myself and judgments on myself, was the spiritual paradigm. It was a paradigm I grew up with. I saw myself in many ways as having had some failures. I felt bad about my life.

I remember sitting in your office, Daniel, and I remember you telling me that if I had a broken leg I wouldn't feel like a moral failure because I walked with a limp. And you shared with me the stories of people who had come to your office and come to understand that when you have a brain injury it makes it almost impossible to not have certain things that show up in your life that are behaviorally related.

So, for me, as I heard you tell that story about the people that sit in your office and understand for the first time that they've had a brain injury, and suddenly they had a reframe where they realize the odds of them not having those challenges in their life were slim to none and, as Jill says, slim's out of town.

Tana Amen: I love that.

Michael Peterson: For me it changed my past. In that moment as I sat there in your office and started to cry a little bit, I had a new paradigm by which I could look at myself and say, "I've been having some problems in my life because I've had a brain injury, not because I'm a moral failure.

Tana Amen: This is powerful.

Michael Peterson: That was very healing for me. That began to be a real healing process for me.

And then I think the second way that brain scan and everything that's followed since has changed my life is it's changed many of my behaviors. It's changed my health behaviors, it's changed my sleep, it's changed how I look at exercise, it's changed how I look at nutrition. So I've made some profound changes.

I found out I had sleep apnea after I was with you. You said, "You ought to go get a sleep test." I found out I was completely stopping breathing up to 27 times an hour. I was 50 pounds overweight.

But I'm not those things anymore. I sleep good now, my weight's back to where it's a healthy weight for me. And I'm more careful about my exercise routine. So it's changed my behaviors.

Then the third change really that if I had to encapsulate all of this that's come about as a result, I feel more like the person I always thought I was. There's more joy, there's more happiness. I'm less impulsive. I'm more thoughtful before I make decisions and do things in my life. I got to tell you, that makes me so happy.

Jill Chambers: Me too.

Tana Amen: That's awesome.

Michael Peterson: You can't change your past. Well, in some ways you can. And in a sense you can really change your destiny.

Tana Amen: I love this.

Michael Peterson: At the time that I had met Jill, I had both my dads were dead before they were 60. I didn't look at the future and see a long life. And now I look forward and I see that I have a real opportunity to have a vibrant, long, healthy life. So it's changed my perception about what's possible for my future.

Tana Amen: I love it.

Michael Peterson: Thank you.

Dr. Daniel Amen: We also did before and after scans. So what we didn't say is Michael holds some record about being able to break bricks with his skull. And he was part of a group that went to inspire teenagers and he found he had this gift where he could actually break things with his head.

Tana Amen: So, let me get this straight, you were inspiring teenagers to break bricks with their heads? No-

Michael Peterson: We were using that as a hook to get their attention.

Tana Amen: Okay, hold on, I want to back up because I'm teasing you. First of all, I want to thank both of you for sharing those stories because both of those stories were not only incredibly powerful, but they're very personal. When people like you who are very powerful people, successful people, share stories like that, it grabs people's attention because it's hard to share stories like that. And I want to thank you both so much.

Michael, what you said, it's just so many people's story. We can forgive people for being in accidents or doing things but we don't understand when people struggle with this moral dilemma or whatever is going on in their lives and they do things that are not explainable. And what you just said was just so beautiful and so powerful. And thank you for sharing that. That was just perfect. I love what you said about reframe.

Michael Peterson: I wondered, should I share this or not?

Tana Amen: Yes.

Michael Peterson: It is personal stuff. But I realized there's probably a lot of people watching this podcast who are wondering if they're the only one. And you're not.

Tana Amen: Yes.

Michael Peterson: And it's okay to say, "I had a challenge and it was because I had some struggles with my brain." And I can get help and you can get help. And that's why I'm willing to share that because I know there's people that need help.

Tana Amen: And I can tell you I know for a fact that people say, "If someone like that can do it, I can too." I know they do and I know they've told you that.

So when you share a story like that it inspires people because they're like, "Wait, if someone like that that's that successful has struggled and they can do it then I can do it too."

Same, Jill. People look at you and they're like, "Wow, she's so powerful. She's so successful." A female colonel, that's a big deal. For women especially looking at that, that's a big deal.

I have this soft spot, I'm a sucker for soldiers, I just am. I don't think we treat our-

Dr. Daniel Amen: Especially me.

Tana Amen: Especially you. No, I do, I collect them. I drive him crazy, I collect them. I took my daughter on a survival trip recently to teach survival skills. Stupid, we slept out in the wilderness and built our own shelter and had to start fires with nothing. He's like, "Don't I take good care of you? Why do you do this stuff?" But it's just something I do.

Anyway, the guy teaching it, he was a veteran who was just severely hurt and damaged and had severe PTSD, and he was just a product of that system that didn't work. And so I collect these guys and I call Daniel and I'm like, "We're taking care of this kid."

He's like, "Okay, what am I supposed to say?" So I do this because I have a soft spot for it.

So when you guys tell these stories about hope and healing, people listen and they're like, "If they can do it, I can do it." Thank you.

Jill Chambers: I love that you do that though, that's a beautiful soul. Thank you.

Tana Amen: So I want to thank you both again for opening up like you have and in our next segment, Michael, I want to talk to you about how all of this has affected your creativity. You as well, Jill. And I want to talk about how it's affected your relationship together, all these changes. So, stay with us.

Dr. Daniel Amen: Thank you for listening to the Brain Warriors Way podcast. Go to iTunes and leave a review and you'll automatically be entered into a drawing to get a free signed copy of "The Brain Warrior's Way" and "The Brain Warrior's Way" cookbook we give away every month.