#45: Greg Sands - From Skid Row to Major Benefactor: Victory Over Addiction

Once trapped in the cycle of crack cocaine addiction on the notorious streets of Skid Row, Greg Sands' story is one of extraordinary redemption. This episode takes you through Greg’s intense struggles with addiction, the life-altering realization in federal prison, and his ambitious steps towards recovery that led to monumental success in business and philanthropy. Hear how Greg's commitment to change not only transformed his life but also made him a cornerstone in the fight against addiction, inspiring countless others with his dedication to giving back. This narrative will challenge perceptions and inspire hope in the hearts of those touched by addiction. 

If you have been praying for a ministry you align with to support financially, we are a non-profit with the mission of spreading the Hope and Love that Jesus Christ entrusted us. -
https://www.patreon.com/FortitudePodcast

Transcript

Hello Fortitude audience! And again welcome to season two. We are super excited to be kicking off season two with a couple episodes already in in the queue right? They're already... That's right. Yeah. Season two. Sitting here with my amazing husband Amos. Thanks for being here again Amos and showing up. I'm happy to be here. And today in our studio we have Greg Sands and we are so pumped to hear Greg today. So Greg thank you for joining us and just your willingness to share your story today. You're very welcome. So Greg you... I don't... Are you originally from Sioux Falls? I don't think we've... No I I went to Aberdeen when I was about 15 from Minneapolis and then my parents were up in my mother not my father. I never met my father but my mother was up in Aberdeen and so I stayed with her until I was about 17. Then as a drywaller I just traveled around the country for the next 12 or 13 years working. Oh okay. So your beginning career started being a drywaller? In Rapid City. Yep. And then you are the owner of one of the largest. So tell me how how did you stay in that world or what what gave you the drive? Well the... I think the misconception today about tradesmen is when I was a young man a tradesman or truck driver was looked upon with reverence and pride. And then it shifted over the last 20 or 30 years to where people would look down their nose at a truck driver or construction worker. Then maybe in the last five years now it's kind of swinging back because we're seeing you know people that work for us they're living in new houses with new trucks and new boats and they're doing really well. And it's a great job because as a tradesman you can get work anywhere and that's what I did. And I've been blessed to be surrounded by so many great people. Today our company is 100% employee-owned ESOP which was took me several years to get that done but I'm very proud of that because of many reasons. One is all of all of my money is going to stay in Sioux Falls instead of selling to an M&A firm or a P&E firm where all the money would exit. All my money is going to stay here and all of my employees 10 years from today they're going to own 100% of the company. I'm going to own zero and they didn't pay a penny for the company. And so that's going to make some of them very very comfortable in their retirement. And me and my wife feel ecstatic about that and you know I own several different businesses but the baby is Sands Wall Systems. And my wife and I you know worked extremely hard to get that going. When you say wife and I so let's talk a little bit about who Greg is because your legacy I mean it is I mean I've known of you I've heard of you for over a decade I moved here in 2009 and it was within like three years that I started to hear of this Greg Sands guy. Not your story that we're going to talk about today but just your legacy in our community is beautiful and it's bright and what you have done and who you continue to be and and show everyone around you is it's it's a wonderful thing. So if I can just toot your horn a little bit because I know you're a very humble guy but for our audience who has never never met you they don't know you what would you who are you Greg? Well it's hard to explain that without sounding a little pompous but I'm a guy who grew up with an extremely loving mother and when I was a year old my father abandoned us she moved to Rapid City there's two kids my brother and myself and then she was in Rapid for a second after Fargo I was born in Fargo then she moved to Minneapolis south side of Minneapolis it was in a dysfunctional relationship she got out of that relationship and then her father my grandfather from Britain South Dakota moved her to Aberdeen South Dakota when I was 14 or 15 and because of the dysfunctional relationship you know that created pain in my life from the violent beatings and stuff like that and my mother was trying to protect us and and then she would get beaten so you know all of us are dealt this different hand in life and that was the hand that I was dealt and when she got away from him and grandpa got us over to Britain you know things got better my mom my whole life my mother worked two or three jobs a week to put food and clothing on the for us I never went a day in my life hungry I never went a day in my life without clean clothes when I was a young man in Minneapolis I wouldn't see my mother a lot and it was me and my brother who were both incorrigible and because she was working to feed us you know and and then in Minneapolis you know at that young age and there's gangs and there's we lived on the south side of Minneapolis and and then you're in pain so you turn to drugs and so I started using drugs in my teens and when I got when I left Minneapolis and came to Aberdeen South Dakota I was ahead of my class you know because I was I was good student I was bored but I was I was good particularly in math and so when I got over here I only went to high school for a couple weeks and I tested out and so then I immediately went to work and I left Aberdeen moved to Rapid City my friend got me a job as a drywaller taught me the trade then I left Rapid City and went to Denver my addictions just kept getting worse and worse and I lived in Breckenridge and Winter Park and Denver and was skiing and doing construction and drinking and drugging and and and then in the mid 80s moved to Los Angeles to the you know I thought that that's where my life would change the golden state and the addiction just progressed they came out with crack cocaine which is the most addictive substance on the planet and I got addicted to it spent two or three years down on skid row in LA and I wasn't living in a cardboard box but I was looking at them and I was there every day and you know at three o'clock in the morning and one night I pull in there to get some cocaine and a Colombian guy comes up to me and ask what I want and I say 40 worth and he takes off and then another black guy came up to me and said what do you want and I said 40 worth and he goes I got it right here so I bought it from him then the Colombian guy came back and started and immediately reached through my window of my car put my car in park at the same time there's another guy coming in the right side of my car reaching into all my pockets and they were searching the whole car and I was just frozen and this guy was poking me in the chest with his knife saying you know he wanted his 40 dollars and then this really big guy off to the my left screamed what the hell's going on here he was apparently in charge of everything and he came over I told him what had happened he said you know you're an idiot you don't tell this guy to go get it and then buy it from this other guy so what you're going to do is you're going to give this guy some for free this guy's going to leave and this guy's going to give you your keys back for your car because they took the keys for the car so you're now you're stranded in skid row at three o'clock in the morning and and you're the hostage you know and so I got out of that. Were you so scared Greg were you just or were you in a point where that you're just numb and it was like whatever or were you fearful? I was back there the next day buying more. Okay. Yeah because even the times I've overdosed you know just hitting the ground from an overdose and waking up and seeing the scrapes on my face from hitting the ground so hard and then the first thing you do is more drugs you know because you're you know you're powerless over your addiction at that point you your your choice to use has been taken away from you years and years ago and you know some people get sentenced to prison you know I got saved when I went to prison and I didn't know it at first because everything in my life was somebody else's fault you know was someone else's fault I was in prison I'm entitled to this you know addicts some reason have this sense of entitlement and expectations on others which is where I was at then and and then I had a moment of clarity when I was in federal prison. What year did you go to prison? 89. Okay. The two years and got out in 91. So you were in in LA in the 80s and then and then from there straight to prison in California? So I was in California left California 87 came back to live with my mother was there two years in Aberdeen 87 to 89 got arrested in 89 sentenced to 10 years won my case on appeal got resentenced to 30 months and then which a 30-month sentence is 24 because you get about six months good time and then I when I left federal prison I came to suit I had a choice between Aberdeen county jail or the glory house halfway house where I had came to the glory house when I was in court and under uh it's I don't know surveillance is the right word under well they're doing a pre-sentence investigation so you're under investigation I guess surveillance would be accurate. Do you share what you went to prison for? Yeah I went to prison for conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute 173 grams of cocaine uh today if I was arrested for that I I don't know what would happen I'm not gonna I'm glad I don't have to worry about it but back then in 1987 the senate and congress were trying to change all the laws and and put out these extremely harsh penalties for drug uh it was the you know I can give more time than you I can give more time than you and that's how politicians were getting elected as part of the thing I think but we didn't know what we were doing so they felt more time and then they like crack cocaine for instance in the federal guidelines when I got sentenced crack was 100 to 1 so 100 grams of powder that cost we'll just say uh 7 000 or one gram of crack which costs 80 bucks same sentence in prison wow and it was targeted you know to the communities that were heavily involved in the crack which were our minority communities around the nation and and then uh it was 100 to 1 and then when Obama got in he changed it to 18 to 1 so still today if you get arrested with 100 of crack or 100 of powdered cocaine the federal sentencing guidelines is 18 times as harsh for crack as it is for powder okay and wow I'd have no idea and is it is that a is do you have an opinion on that is that I believe that there needs to be a real spread because uh I think you could snort coke a couple times and not have it ruin your life yeah I think if you smoke crack a couple of times you're going to end up in a cardboard box yeah it's really addictive yeah I've heard that so prison you go into prison what was that moment like for you when you're like did that feel like the lowest of low yeah moment when you got but okay so there's a great story about that we have to wrap out on the end of the about the BOP plane okay okay I'll tell you one side of it now um so Con Air is the Bureau of Prisons Transit 737 or whatever it is and you go in there and change in shackles and I was in Sioux Falls South Dakota it was cold they take you out of the van and they line you up out on the tarmac you're surrounded by U.S. Marshals with shotguns they search you again and you're freezing because you're in a t-shirt it and if it's 30 below zero you're in a t-shirt and it wasn't but it was cold it was very cold and you get searched you go onto the plane the plane flies all over the United States at the end of the day it stops in El Reno Oklahoma which is the distribution network for the Bureau of Prisons so my first night in prison was in El Reno Oklahoma it's just like you see on tv four or five tiers of steel bars and screaming 24/7 at the night time it's constant screams of terror and hollering and guys communicating with each other and my first couple days there in that cell block the cells were all full and what they call the people that first get into prison they call them transits because you're in transit you don't have any money you don't have any commissary you don't have any clothing you have what's on your back and that's it and so when you first get there you're on a cot outside of the cells and they had the cots about eight inches from each other going all the way around this cell block so there was about 200 cots that and for those 200 of us that were on cots there's one bathroom that we share a cell that they leave open and that's where I that night my first night in prison I still remember it vividly I was laying on a bunk and I looked up and there was windows up there and there was some windows that were you know the little nine by sixteen window or whatever size it is broken out and it was snowing and the snow was coming through and trickling down on to where we were sleeping and and I was scared to death and I was crying and you know to myself yeah and because you don't can't do it in public or you'll get beaten down and yeah it was just an extremely violent environment oh that the the screaming my whole body there's the goosebumps of exactly what you see people wonder all the time is it the same is it the same what you see in the movies because a lot isn't a lot isn't but that was okay and and um I mean that's the place where they put Timothy McVeigh that's a really bad prison you know and it's in it's a transit facility so that you could be there three days or three months and you know I got lucky because when I went there I met a guy from South Dakota who would uh put get me cigarettes and ice cream from commissary and then my mom would send him to him when when I left you know because otherwise you're just stranded with nothing so you before before prison I just I think through the the process because when we we're doing prison ministry Greg with Pastor Al Peratt who's also on our on our podcast uh you know we're in prison and we're we're meeting some of the neatest neatest guys the neatest people and who who have life and it was one night that they don't remember and they woke up next to a dead body and now they have life in prison and their whole world has changed and you think about the moments that you are leading up to because there's no difference in me and the people behind bars either I just didn't get caught from drinking and driving or I just I didn't hurt someone you know thank you lord for the guardian angels that were constantly hovering you know yeah but I there there's a moment right where you're like this could be the end this this could be the end you went through being stabbed well which I would love for you to talk about that a little bit but like being in prison it's like that the addiction pulls you so far in that you get to the point where you know it's possibly the end and yet we still continue it still continue to use yeah yeah and when I finally stopped I was about three months from my release date because I used throughout my whole incarceration and when I finally stopped it was because in the federal system if you get a dirty ua you get an automatic nine months extra onto your sentence and I was 90 days from walking out and I didn't want that to happen so then you were able to stop it's able to stop for 90 days then my plan when I got out you know the I was in Fort Worth Texas they take a shuttle from the prison to the airport and then I was going to go into the bar have a couple of drinks and by the time I flew up to the glory house and they breath tested me I would blow clean I knew that from when I was on work release up in Aberdeen because I would drink in the morning blow at five o'clock at night and blow clean and because you know the addict will manipulate every situation they can to find ways and means to get more yeah and but the staying staying getting clean in prison for that three months was really good and then I got on the shuttle went to the airport went straight to the bar and through God's grace and a divine intervention ordered a diet coke and flew to the glory house and and I was on fire you know I was very I already had planned that I was going to get off paper two and a half years early that I was going to get a presidential pardon as soon as possible and I had made plans for all these things while I was still incarcerated and then all those things happened I got off paper two and a half years early I got the presidential pardon pardon in 01 from Clinton and that was a great day when that happened that was beautiful yeah I've heard it's a Pastor Al with Obama how Pastor Al got a got a pardon from him yeah he's my Al's my good friend yeah yeah we talked about you a lot yeah so you get out of prison and were you done did you do you do you can like done drinking then done drugs after you got out of prison yeah like done done well I had I went to social drinking for one day and then was in a blackout within about two hours yeah and then that was about then since then I've been in in active recovery for 33 years yeah amazing you lived it all the way to skid row I mean that's the addiction the drinking the gambling the smoking all there's a lot of people who when I speak will say I just have I have no idea what that would be like I because our because the way our brains are wired differently like we learned when I was in treatment how you could hook a normal person up and you could hook a person with addiction up exact sign exact same line drip of alcohol or whatever it is and our brains yours and mine light up so different compared to the normal person and just the wiring then the neuroscience behind it is just it's fascinating to me so yeah the way that we continue this downward spiral spiral regardless of the outcome how how pulled we are that's so the to cut it off people don't get that they're like how can you just go from that to then just being done so what do you believe it was redemption from God or do you believe it was like you were scared into it like I ain't ever going back to prison I think fear is healthy I'll start with that I had a moment of clarity when I was incarcerated that I was involved the reason I was in prison was my fault and period and that I was an addict and and after having that moment of clarity probably 12 or 15 months into my 24-month stint you know I was looking back at my life and the wreckage of my past was a big big pile and so that was sobering and but also what happened the miracle was I'm three months from getting out and I've stopped using any substances and my brain starts functioning at a much higher level than when you're doing crack and alcohol right your brain works better without the crack amazing yeah so anyways I come to Sioux Falls I go to the glory house they make me get a job at the Shoppers News for five and a quarter an hour folding newspapers for minimum wage and it how the statement went was you start tomorrow at two o'clock or you go back to prison and that's how it was there 30 some years ago and there wasn't a lot of jobs and it was nice to the guy from the Shoppers News to hire us you know it really was and I met a guy there he just folded the newspapers across the thing from me I figured he'd go back to prison he didn't and down the street there was a guy hired there was a drywall project down the street so I walked down there applied got hired and worked for him for three months and I was underpaid so I went and got a better job and then at that better job where I was making journeyman scale at the time like I should I met a guy and we partnered up for about three years three or four probably four and then we split off and it was a great separation you know because I had all my own tools he had all his own we were just splitting checks there wasn't any corporation or anything I just had a different vision than he did and and then I started sans wall systems as we know it today and I'd say you know the addiction was always there and but because of God's grace and the miracle of recovery in my own hard work and having a rock star for a partner in my wife you know I mean we were just killing it and for us you know we really were and then my mom was dying and so she's up in Aberdeen we're going back and forth they'd call me on Thursday and say she's not going to make it through the weekend up there we'd zip it was the first time in my life I could ever buy a new vehicle I had bought a new vehicle so I had good transportation to drive icy South Dakota roads in the winter time at night right because you're going up to see your mother's gonna die you're gonna you're driving through anything to get there and I checked in at super 8 and I was walking into my room it was room number 111 and as soon as I looked at the number I knew that she was going to die and that was about 11 o'clock at night about 12 or 1 o'clock we went into the ER Pam and myself and my mother popped up out of bed she was in a coma and talked to us for about 15 minutes she went back into a coma and then she would die the next day but or maybe two days later anyways that was God's gift to us was you know mom popping up and talking to us and and then the last day I saw her alive I looked at the clock I was parking in the cul-de-sac and it was 11 11 I ran in to see her and and visited her and then and then that was last time I saw her alive and I buried her well then she died like on Thursday and Friday I was supposed to go to Chicago to her narcotics anonymous convention and you know I didn't have any money my sponsor had told me you know save ten dollars a week Greg for and you can go to that thing for 600 bucks or something and I saved and I had money and I had a plane ticket and and Pam said just go ahead and go and I flew I fly to Chicago there's 20,000 people there from NA I know one guy from Sioux Falls and I find him within two minutes he carries me throughout the whole weekend I reconnect with an old friend of mine who's been in recovery for you know 15 years by then and one of my old hardcore youth and buddies and then I come back from Chicago I bury my mother at 11 11 South Main so now I start seeing this correlation with the number 11 in my life and the package was sent to 1100 blah blah blah well the last zero had a little tail on it that made it look like a six and that's what so an eighth inch of ink set this whole thing into motion because it went to 1106 is where the guy delivered it to instead of one one zero zero the package and so all this started over that little what was the package cocaine yeah yeah so this was and that's what sent you to prison that's what I went to prison for yeah oh whoa yeah and and then um you know my mother I mean the greatest gift I've been given is that I was clean when my mom died you know that was really a big one right I was going to go back to that about your mother because as you were going through all of that and you're she's a single mom doing the best and it sounds like she was doing really well like she was doing everything she could to provide and then she started to see you as her son slipping into a direction that she probably really hoped and prayed you wouldn't go yeah um but I can tell that you really love your mom like your mom sounds amazing and so in those moments of did you feel like you were I mean did you just do a really good job at hiding it or did she know and did you feel the disappointment or what was her response to you as you were slipping into that I'd say well because I was gone I would just come home for Christmas you know I was trapped I was in California or wherever right before the arrest of course I was in California I would come home every year for Christmas and then one year I missed and the year I missed she had a nervous breakdown and which I regret to this day that I didn't make it that year but um you know I did as good as I could with the you know fighting the disease I had and you know and back then everyone thought it was a moral deficiency not a disease and you know I would come home for Christmas and buy her a nice Black Hills gold broach or something and and I was making pretty good money you know out in LA I was you know I would go to work for a company and in a matter of weeks I would be one of their top guys and uh totally in over my head but very comfortable there and so my mother she accepted what was happening to me um it was certainly shame for me and um and she kept sending me money when I was in prison she sent me 90 a month to live on and when I got out my grandmother borrowed me 2500 to buy a car what I bought that I bought for 1500 and then I spent about 400 on tools hand tools and stuff and three or 400 on clothing and I had a couple hundred bucks left and that's what I started started with man and then the feds federal bureau prisons gave me my 50 start over money too thank you jesus for the cheeseburger oh man and you sorry did you have something I just wanted I just want to clarify what started this whole thing which was that that package I mean that done to prison was that package bent for you or was it yes takenly it was meant for you went to the wrong house went to the wrong house got sent back to California opened it and went yeah FBI opened it in California where is this coming from where was it supposed to go to yeah then that that's how that happened so then the package goes back to California the FBI then opens it re-ships it re-notifies me that it's there and my friend went out to pick it up and it was the FBI agents dressed up as FedEx agents and they arrest him yeah and I told him if you get arrested you can turn me in and and uh and he did and and I uh oh it's a mess oh you I thought you'd just go back there yeah you just went back to the place because that um because you knew it was coming and when you know it's coming you're looking for it and when you knew it didn't show up on time did you start to worry well actually when he went out to pick it up I drove a couple miles behind him went past the facility did a u-turn and came back and when I was coming back the FBI had him on the ground yeah so then I knew and then I just left town called my attorney uh who's a good guy and um and then my attorney called him at like five o'clock that night and said Greg they look looking he called them and me and said they want you to turn in turn yourself in I'll walk in with you tomorrow and we'll bond out tomorrow and you won't have to go into jail and so he did that for me and but it was just a delay yeah yeah the inevitable what um you had a plan for when you got out to go to the bar and and get a drink real you know and I'd been obsessing on that every night for months you said through divine intervention that you ordered a diet coke yeah how did that happen well you know I had been making poor decisions most of my life I've been gifted with some skill sets that not everybody has and um and God just had other plans for me because I had been thinking about that drink every night for several months and I knew that I could have it and not get caught and then it was just through divine intervention that I walked up and ordered the diet coke and you know there's been multiple times in my life that through divine intervention I've been saved car accidents overdoses um many many times many times over the last 30 years since I've gotten clean when did that decision change along that path when you got out was it was did it change and when you walked into the bar did it change before you got to the bar no it changed at the bar right as the words were coming out of your mouth as the words were coming out of my mouth what a what a blessing yeah that was just right then and there God said no this is what you're gonna say what do you attribute to that was that did you have a relationship with Christ at that at that time oh yeah okay I've always had a relationship with God and I've always loved God I my at times my faith has lacked and it's it's a that I have no confusion the reason that I am not incarcerated dead or living under a bridge is because of God's grace and the miracle of recovery and my own hard work I've worked really hard my wife has worked really hard I quit going to organized 12-step meetings about 16 17 years ago and but without a doubt you know the 12-step fellowship saved my life and and I believe that they're a great avenue for hundreds of thousands of people to seek help and they're proven that they work because it works for me and I was the guy that they all said would never make it you're coming back that's what my friend said the guys I was incarcerated with my probation officers nobody really thought I maybe my my new probation officers probably thought I could make it but and I made it yeah yeah yeah you did what one of the things that I learned through through Heather's addiction before she was in recovery that was that I thought she could just stop that was my thing because I could stop at things and I've got a good amount of self-control and so I was I was frustrated when she wouldn't stop just stop yeah wrecking your life doesn't make sense to me yeah discipline yeah what can you say to the person who's in that same scenario that they think that their loved one who's causing all this pain can just stop well if you I think a a good analogy is if that person that is confused about how can you just stop or why can't you just stop the the reality is the the addict's power over that substance if it's alcohol drugs coke it doesn't matter it's all the it's the same minutia but their their choice to use has been gone when when they're in full-blown wrath of addiction their choice to use is gone it's it's the obsession and compulsion have taken over I believe addiction is a three-pronged stool it's caused by the hereditary gene that's passed from father to son it's caused by an environmental breakdown you're in dysfunctional hostile toxic environment or whatever and then it's also accompanied with a spiritual breakdown there's some sort of spiritual breakdown and so what I'm doing through the Mayo Clinic and through Sanford research is working on the genomics of addiction which is a program that in essence in layman's terms to knock it down to a level where Greg could understand it it's basically going in taking out the gene of an addict mutating it putting it back in and curing that that piece of addiction that physiological piece and I believe it'll happen in my lifetime wow and uh and so then now if you can get rid of that part of it you know that's a big part of it that a the obsessive compulsive part of it that addictive that's that's what's bred into us and if you can get rid of that and then you're just working on the environment and the uh spiritual spiritual you know and I always say to people I don't care where you go if you go to AA, NA, church all three any combination of the two whatever works for you if it's working for you that's what you should be doing yeah you know and I try and I really try not to judge others for their programs building community in your sobriety is I think the hugest key to like just having people surround you that know you understand you that you can be fully fully honest with and you can dig into the nitty-gritty because where we get the the most hung up and what I'm hearing is it's the here here we are and we're the person with the addiction and we feel shame we feel alone we feel all these things and so we go there we go to alone we go into the shame and the mental space and we're in it all the time and so we don't want to be around people because we don't want them to notice or or get any clue but when we're out with people and we're able to be open there's that there's a freedom I feel like the shackles come off when you can just be open and honest with the the you're like you're what I mean I have like my top 12 you know or top top 10 people that I'm like you are my ride or die you're my person that I am going to call if I'm in that moment because I don't have a sponsor and didn't do the 12 step and people will ask me I did and I did it in when I was in treatment up until five the fifth step but I've never done the full and people like how do you do you go to AA do you do this I'm like I I surround myself with people that will hold my feet to the fire and talk about it openly stand on stages and openly talk about I can't walk into a local grocery store and walk out with anything without someone probably going hey oh heather heather like because I just am so open about it so there's a lot of moments that I've we all recover differently but I think having that solid couple core people in your life is really important yeah don't you agree yeah absolutely I've always had them so Pam you guys met obviously outside of no Pam and I met at AA okay that first year when you're not supposed to have any relationships yeah that's a big no no yeah so you she's never seen you drunk no like she's only seen Greg sober yeah oh that's kind of cool I mean just it was after after thank you Pam first but we both relapsed we met each other at AA and then she continued to drink for a little bit and then I relapsed and then right after I relapsed I was meeting my sponsor at Germel's where she worked on there on Minnesota oh here in here in Sioux Falls South Dakota okay and I went in and asked her for a extra thick milkshake that annoyed her and and I laughed I was telling my sponsor about my relapse and well it's one important thing about the question my sponsor asked me why did you drink Greg and I said because I wanted to yeah and he said you know I'm so glad to hear that and some all these other bs excuses I've heard of why I you know it's because you wanted to and that's what it was and anyways Pam Pam and I met there and then we're we're kind of bouncing around a little bit from fellowship to fellowship and then we kind of locked in with with Narcotics Anonymous and it's a wonderful group it's helped it saved my life through God's grace miracle of recovery and my own hard work you know I showed up I show up to everything I never miss me yeah yeah you very rarely yeah you very rarely do I miss a meeting if I miss a meeting is because it's not on my calendar yeah we just talked about that I will show up and I'll show up early usually but you got to make sure it's on my calendar for me to show up so Greg your um our time is it's crazy how fast it goes as as we end with this and your story and your because this is a beautiful story of redemption because not only is it a story of recovery redemption hard work all the things that you've put in the lives you've touched I mean you started your own drywall company and isn't it is is it nationally or is it is it global you have a few different things we're the last year top line revenue we are the 33rd largest in America okay in the industry yeah which there's a lot because every building needs drywall well no it's the steel studs oh it's the steel studs and we we now have a factory where we manufacture our own steel studs so we are to a certain degree our own supply chain systems yes sans wall systems and so having that factory was a total game changer and it also I mean it's positioning that company for such success as I exit the company we have a new factory where we were that some of the first guys in the nation that were rolling their own studs and in our customers notice that and they say we want you to do this job for us not anyone else we just want you guys here and but we have to be competitive we have to be if they negotiate a job to our company with that comes a very high expectation we have to hit those marks and we do every time are you talking of of deadlines time deadlines of quality workmanship yeah deadlines and the quality has to be there and and we try to beat the deadlines you know and get them if we can get them in a 30 days earlier than our competitor could that's real money to those guys you know if they can open that building one month earlier and we had something to do with that you know on a big 30 million dollar building that we're doing you know their rent for one month is a big number yeah and we're getting them in a month earlier and so there's some value in that and you know practicing these principles in all of our affairs is something that I learned from being in recovery that I carried over into my business and we just have the golden rule that we treat people like we want to be treated and we're honest with I mean there's people that send us two checks for the same job you know and and we send them back of course yeah but they call us and like well thank you so much you're gonna do my work for the rest of my life honesty it's amazing and all I had to do is head integrity oh man well Greg tell me as we close up what is you did mention that we can go a few minutes over here because you mentioned the BOP plane so I wanted to get back to that and then your your wife just can you share you and Pam have been through a lot you are here a little bit you go down in California you're you're living a legacy like when you look back on all of this and you share what what you've gone through and then you get that moment where you're sitting with your beautiful bride and you're thinking back on everything what are what are just a couple of those moments when you look at Pam that you just go man I'm so grateful we did this as a couple because you say yeah that was last night we had that conversation you know and we really grateful that we of course quit drinking and taking drugs but after that very grateful to have quit smoking and to have quit gambling and to have gotten healthier and you know she's the wind in my sail and you know I uh since getting inducted into the hall of fame I I went back and listened to some of my friends that got inducted and listened to their speeches and every every person says I am never would have been where I'm at in my life without my spouse yeah every person and and it's very true for me because Pam is a closer she's very focused she's um she's just awesome and I'm so blessed because one of the things that happens when you you know I've had a lot of sunlight put on me and so she's in the shadow and she says no I'm not in the shadow I'm in the sunlight and she is and she is the sunlight itself at some times and I don't you know people so I I'll tell you a quick story so I win or get inducted into this hall of fame it's a big deal and somewhere it hit some sort of national media and I don't know or somehow this this guy on the east coast hears about it calls me up he had been incarcerated with me it's the only guy that I remember and he calls me and we're talking he congratulates me he tells me a little bit about his life and and I'm just talking that I went to this restaurant on the way home and had a really bad steak and it was tough I was just sharing this story this really famous restaurant I went to in San in Amarillo Texas and then I get this text the next day that he's upset that I was bragging about eating steak every night and I'm like dude I wasn't I'm just sharing with you what my life is you know that one night I had steak and it was really good and the next night it sucked I wasn't bragging about that that I'm just sharing a little part of my journey and but what happens because of the success is people they get blinded by the success I've had because and because I haven't changed I'm the same person with the same beliefs with the same desires and and what Pam and I want to do is just be of service to God and others and right now we're getting ready to take a year off because once you know getting through that esop those are punishing yeah you know and it took 18 months and then at the end the last five months it's it's a full court press and it's intense and you know I need time off for my mental health and my physical health and I've started golfing now that's been a wonderful gift for me I just picked it up during COVID and because I never had time to learn how to golf when I was working yeah because it takes so much time I'm trying to get Amos to we're trying to golf a little bit more too because he it's a great hobby it is it's good time good bonding time together a couple of things I want to say before we close um there's lots of opportunities in our community to lift up this sector of our population the the addicts the incarcerated people and we have to have a coalition and I'm working on trying to put something together like that and um it's a it's a ambitious plan statewide and uh and I have great friends that are willing to help with it but we're in a beautiful community that supports the people in needs you look around here this is a beautiful community that we live in yeah it's a lot of love here yep there sure is in Sioux Falls South Dakota for those who are not from around here it really is and we hear it often Greg we hear we hear a lot of people say some there's something in Sioux Falls there's something different with what y'all got going on and even just I mean South Dakota in general it's it's really beautiful where we live people care a lot about each other yeah um so I'd love to hear more about that coalition you got going on as we continue to move forward in this we're we're really focused on changing the stigma of it um coming from the side of someone who hasn't experienced what addiction really is like and someone who has and then how we come together as a family and husband and wife and and help others through that because we get a lot of calls from a lot of couples that will say how how how are you doing it how'd you do it and first and foremost is we can't do it with judgment because we don't know what the other person is is walking through um so thank you for hitting that piece of the world that needs a lot more direction and understanding because the education piece is the best once we start educating people a little bit more I got did you were you taught what I because I wasn't taught growing up and that's the thing that's a really it's like I wasn't taught what an alcoholic like you might want to watch out for this you might want to watch out for that you might want to think about this differently you know no there was no education no so I think that I think that's where I get excited the most is is the education piece on helping people understand what we're what we're wired like because it's unique so but just design an app that it's kind of like playing a game that'll teach that to a kid on their phone and we'll have something yeah no kidding well Greg thank you thank you Pam for borrowing Greg to us for a little bit today and just sharing both of your stories and um just you've done a lot of wonderful things and you continue to so in your year off I'm excited to see what you what you have your brain has come up with after because I know that our brains don't really shut off so taking a year off it might be hard might be but you guys will have so much time so thank you for your time today Greg you're very welcome thank you it's nice meeting you both thank you so much for listening we want to change lives through this podcast and if you want to support this podcast or our guests please see the links below for our patreon and giving links and like and subscribe and also share our podcast as much as possible thank you