SPEAKER_01 0:00

Good day. This is Dr. Janet Priceharps from Mindpilot. Today we have an amazing guest. He's been a good friend of mine for many years. He has a wealth of information. His name is Dr. Joe Martin, and I'm going to let him tell you a little bit about himself, and then we're going to start talking about health.

SPEAKER_00 0:22

Awesome, awesome. Well, thank you so much for inviting me. I really appreciated any opportunity that I can get out some information that I've gained over the years from military service to, you know, becoming a doctor with a focus on health and wellness. I love the opportunity to do that. A little bit of background on myself for the audience. I'm originally from New York, grew up in a small town outside New York City. Typical average Joe, you know, the name is Joe Martin. I mean, you can't get much more average than that, you know, 5'11, 200-pound guy. But uh started off as a small guy. I was a very athletic when I was a kid, but I would consider myself a B athlete. I wasn't one of those guys that's uh, you know, gets invited to all the football parties and all that type of stuff. I wasn't on the A team, you know, as a B guy. Uh graduated high school about 5'5, you know, 150 pounds, joined the military service. Because at the time my grades weren't exactly the best. I found out later on in my life, had a little learning disability, dyslexia. But um again, this is gonna kind of pave the foundation of you know who I am. So it was mainly perseverance to kind of gut through it. I knew that um I wasn't gonna be going to any Division I, you know, as a big soccer player, Division I guy, lucky to be a D three. And at the time in my life, I was thinking, thinking, if anybody knows me, me being an accountant is what I was gonna go to school for, but uh definitely did not do that. So the military was uh something that came across. I had uh two relatives that was uh were in the uh arm oh no, excuse me, Marine Corps and uh Navy. So I figured that would be the best route, young guy, see the world a little bit, you know, with the Navy. And uh so I joined it at 18 right out of high school. And the career began with just a regular Navy type of guy, and uh my first duty station was in the Subic Bay, Philippines, and this was 1978, 78, 79, you know, it's been a minute. And um I saw these guys running around on the on the base there. They had these what they call UDTs, these short little, you know, shorts on, no shirts, and these guys were running around in the gym all day long. And you know, I had a at the time I had an administrative job, and I'm like, what are these guys doing? It's like, man, I want to do that. You know, so I kind of pulled one of these guys aside in the in in the Philippine gym on the base, and uh these guys said they were seals. And I'm like, what do you guys do? Uh, you know, we just kind of run and swim and jump out of planes all day long and just have a lot of fun and shoot weapons. I'm like, man, I want to do that. You know, so they kind of helped me prep, and uh, you know, prepping is just getting to BUDS, which is basic underwater demolition SEAL training in Coronado, California. And uh 1979, um, 79, 79, 80, um, 79, that um, you know, I did qualify and I went, it was in class 112. We started off with about 60 guys, and by the end of the training, nine of us originals graduated. And uh that then built, you know, that you have the dyslexia, the learning disability as a high school kid, you know, you're trying to persevere. And uh going through the SEAL team was one of those things where you just learned to never quit. And uh now, do I think that everybody that goes through BUDS at one point in their nine months of training think that they're gonna quit? Um yes, I I think so. And I was at that mode or point in my career um in going through BUDS, I had that feeling too. It was before Hell Week, too. It was one of those things of a lean guy, low body fat, and the water's always cold in San Diego, and you had to earn your wetsuit. And uh so with that being said, we had to swim, and um first without the wetsuit was a mild swim. We would do that every week in the beginning and went on to two miles as you progressed throughout the training and um came out of the water like a bunch of people one day was you know unseasonally cold and they came up, you know, hypothermic. So the safety boats pulled a handful of guys out, threw you in the shower, warmed you up, but you didn't own your wetsuit because you didn't complete the mile swim. So obviously it's just a mind game the whole time. And I went into the first phase, there's three phases of of uh buds, first phase instructor John Hall, remember the name, you know, as it was just yesterday. He had passed away actually in a SEAL team training operation years later. But John Hall was like, man, I see what you're doing so far. You know, you're a squared away guy, you're a good leader, you know, people like you. I think you can do this. But I kind of walked out of that room and uh out onto the grinder, the cement area, ready to ring the bell. But my class at the time, they took the bell off the wall and it was like, nah, you ain't quit, you're not quitting. So you had a team that helped you out there from the beginning. And uh one of the guys said, Hey, listen, the guys that didn't uh make it, you know, with the with the swim because of a health issue, hypothermia type of you know, symptoms, that you guys didn't wear the wetsuit. Just got to complete the mile swim. So we go marching from the Coronado side to the Navy base side, go marching out there, we have our wetsuits and whatever. And then the lead instructor, who's an officer or lieutenant, was like, you know, what are you guys doing wear the wetsuits? You guys didn't earn that wetsuit. You know, if you want to get in there, you want to be a seal, you gotta jump in the water, you gotta swim that mile like everybody did the other day. It seemed like everybody was looking at me. Uh, there goes Joe. You know, Joe's gonna quit now. But I got in the water and it was like myself and who I was paired up with that day, man, we're the first ones out of the water. I mean, I probably swam so fast. But it's funny because I think if you talk to, you know, SEALs along the way and if there is times when they feel that there are times when they're gonna quit, everybody has a different moment. Mine was that time with the cold water. Hell week came not too long after that. And to be honest, I did not have half the problem with Hell Week as I did with that cold water that day. So everybody has that moment, I think, that foundation where you're at the bottom of the barrel mentally to where you you start building a foundation, you know, on that. And I think as a human being, uh the SEAL team training made me just a stronger person, a persevere, uh, the no-quit attitude, um, and uh, you know, just to kind of always always have a half glass full type of concept as opposed to half glass empty. And a lot of times people in life, they they give up too quickly. You know what I mean? When we were in training, um, I kind of had this mindset to myself and I just kind of invented it on my own, figuring it out that the instructors are there to teach you, but the instructors also have a job. The instructors meet in an office before they come out and hammer us. When they're in their office, they go, okay, what are we gonna do today? How are we gonna beat these guys up? Where are our breaks? Where's our lunch breaks? They have an itinerary. So if you know they have an itinerary and you can get through each episode, each evolution, it's not you don't think about the whole day. You think about each evolution, each half hour, each ten minutes, each one second, whatever it is, and just to tell yourself, I'm gonna get through this, I'm gonna get through this. So it may be flutter kicks for hours, it may be in the soft sand run, it may be you know getting soaking wet with log PT in the w in the in the ocean. You just gotta tell yourself, I know the instructor's gotta take a break. I know the instructor's gotta go to lunch, I know the instructors have to go home, right? I know we have to have lunch, I know we have to f to feed us and give us a break between. So if you get through each uh evolution, life kind of works that way too. When things get stressed along the way, don't look at all the paperwork, say, for example, on your desk, take one file at a time and complete it. If you look at the big picture all the time, you get inundated by by stress. You're like, oh, I can't do it, and that's how people quit. So I would talk to some of the other other um uh trainees and I said, just just get through today. And I just became, I think, a better leader and it just kind of transferred me in my my career as a SEAL and you know, getting out and going to school and becoming a chiropractor and things like that that I just teach people, you just gotta take one day at a time. Because the motto in the SEAL team um, you know, is the only easy day was yesterday. Because it's already gone. Each day has its own difficulties and problems. Then you look back, you go, but yesterday was really hard. Not really compared to today, right? But then when today ends, tomorrow begins, and the now today doesn't seem so bad. So if we can just get through and like tell a lot of people when I've when I've lectured al along all all over the world, actually, to be honest, is telling people you gotta take a day by day, whether it's a somebody from AA, whether it's a person from PTSD, uh, things of that nature, you gotta just little by little take each day and each moment at a time. Don't look at it like, how am I gonna get through the end of the week? Because you're gonna fail. You gotta get through each day, each whether it's some people it's minute by minute, some people it's hour by hour, some people it's day by day. So I did I did six years in the military, you know, got out. Um I wasn't in when there was a lot of stuff going on. I was in during Grenada, our platoon didn't go on the island, um, deployed a bunch of times, been to a ton of schools in my time in the service. So I think I was very, very fortunate to have been a pretty active SEAL when I was in, even though I wasn't in during wartime. Um but when I did get out, I was very, very interested in the fitness and nutrition, obviously being a SEAL. Um and a lot of the guys in the SEAL team, they go into this, that type of field, the healthcare field. Some guys will go into weapons, some guys will go into um more of the marina type stuff with boats. Uh, some guys will be like instructors for parachuting schools and things like that. Mine was definitely in the fitness and nutrition. Went to uh Temple University in Philadelphia with my undergraduate education in exercise science and a minor in nutrition. Um and then after that, I felt that I needed to go further to be able to do better work. Um sometimes with an exercise physiology background, you have to go on for some sort of higher education because it's basically a glorified, you know, athletic trainer. Um, and unless you get a really good gig, the pay isn't that well. So uh looked into some sort of a medical field and chiropractic just fit with me because it was very mechanical and it seemed very militaristic. It's like, you know, you get to get people loosened up, you kind of figure out the problem, you know, you get them squared away, you you uh working on the musculoskeletal aspect. Um, and then I had the nutrition and fitness background, and so it seemed like it fit well for me. And I've been uh in practice now for yikes, don't even want to say the number on the on the microphone, but thirty I'm in my 36th year of doing it. And um, you know, I maintain the type of fitness level that I try to educate the people that I talk to. Where you gotta walk to walk. You have to have the appearance, uh, in my opinion, that you know, when you do, you're the epitome of what you're trying to present to people for them to follow. You know, it's that old, you know, the cliche of the doctor, you know, telling to stop smoking cigarettes to the patient, and the guy's got an ashtray on his desk. You know what I mean? So I'm definitely that guy that walks the walk. I'm I tell people all the time I'm I'm a 90-10 guy. 90% of the time I'm you know eating really, really well. Uh people that know me, they go, what does Doc eat? Tuna fish and rice. Um, but every once in a while I'll I'll do you know a pizza and a beer. But if people maintain 80-20, 80% of the time, I think the longevity of of people's lives would be a lot better. You know, so been in practice that long. I own a place in uh Fresno, California. It's called Doc's Gym, where we have strength and conditioning, we have nutrition, we have the chiropractic, we work with military first responders, uh getting these guys and gals ready and maintained, you know, throughout their career. So that's kind of like from high school to today, while we're sitting here, kind of what I do.

SPEAKER_01 12:36

So this podcast primarily focuses on first responders. If you could give them some tips of where to start, what would you tell them?

SPEAKER_00 12:45

So we've done a lot of work, I've done a lot of work over probably the last 15 years uh with a lot of the first responders and starting them from the academy prep, you know, prep program, which we provide at uh at Doc's Gym. Uh the young guys and gals, we get them ready physically and mentally to get to their prospective academy, whether it's the you know, SOs, whether it's uh correctional officers, uh we also do work with the firefighters and any uh um uh city municipal, Fresno, Clovis, Madeira, you know, PD departments that all kind of maintain the same academy program. Um the biggest thing what we do is we set the foundation the mental first. As much as people think that it's physical, um, you know, physical is going to be important, nutrition is gonna be important, hydration is gonna be important, but the mental aspect, if you get out of a vehicle and you you have a leg bail and all of a sudden you mentally freeze, I don't care how good a shape you're in, how you've hydrated, how you made to maintain your diet, if you mentally don't have the foundation, um then usually, you know, problems ensue. You know, so I think the biggest thing is as we're training them physically wise, you know, we gotta try to get in their heads along the way, um, like like a like a boot camp style type of thing. You know, nothing crazy. But um I think the mental getting trained mentally or uh getting mentally strong, I think would be the biggest foundation first before the these uh uh first responders get into their business.

SPEAKER_01 14:15

Aaron Ross Powell You know, I was talking to um deputy the other day, and he said that he was concerned about how many law enforcement officers die, you know, four or five years after retirement. If you could tell them where to start on a regimen, uh maybe they've now got 10 years in, what would you tell them to start doing?

SPEAKER_00 14:39

Aaron Powell You know, it's a great question. And um, you know, obviously if they've been 10 years in, you know, that's 10 years past an academy, and I try to tell people the beginning of the stage is showing up for an academy prep, right? When you're a young buck. And um the academy prep is just the beginning. And once you get done in class up at an academy, you think that you're done. But it's not, you're just starting there. Once you get done with the academy and you get your badge, you get to a department, you finish with as a trainee, and you got on your own, your own patrol, then the game starts. So I would recommend obviously you can't get people to go backwards in years, but if we first started with those folks along the way, the young bucks, and just telling them from there to maintain a good, you know, diet and nutrition and things like that, the the the older guys and gals uh say 10 years in, the biggest thing what I would do is get an assessment, uh physical assessment, you know, check your body fat, check your so say for example, you know, they're 35, 40 years old, maybe they've been in 10, 15 years. Those are really good times just as human beings to check your heart rate, to check your blood pressure, have your cholesterol done, all these types of things. Because also, too, is cortisol is what is stress in the body. And first responders have way more cortisol running around in their system than an average person sitting at a desk as an accountant. Not saying that's not stressful at times, but nothing compared to law enforcement. So if somebody's at that age, uh, they obviously can't go back 10 years, you know, getting out of the academy. But what I would do is, you know, get a good physical workup by a medical doctor with blood and everything like that to see where your foundation is. And obviously, these people 10, 15 years in, they also have mirrors, right? And they know what the body, body looks like and they know what they should look like. You know, and it's one of those things, if you want to throw Brad Pitt up on your mirror to go, this is what this is what I'd like to be like, hey man, God bless you, you know, go for it, and at least you have a goal, you know, striving towards. You know what I mean? Uh I've always told people joking around, speaking with this type of stuff, I'd love to, I'd love to be like the rock. Well, you know, I'm not six foot four and I don't weigh 270 pounds. I'm never gonna be that way. So trying to put that on the mirror and tell myself, this is what I'm gonna be like when I grow up. You know, it's not gonna happen. You have to have realistic goals. Um, but those 10-year, 15-year-old guys and gals along the way, is then once you get that foundation set, um, and also too, is your hormones change. Um, I'm a big proponent in uh peptides and hormone replacements and and attitudes that those types of things, you need testosterone in your body to make cholesterol. Um and the same with estrogen um in a male's body and estrogen in a female's body, and vice versa, testosterone with women. Those balances are super, super important to allow the body to function. And then from there is telling yourself, okay, if I look in the mirror and I feel like I need to lose a couple pounds to stay within limits of safety and whatnot, is uh cardiovascular first. Uh keep that heart moving, get into some, you know, some uh walking. I tell people if if the first thing you can do and you don't like doing anything else, go walk, right? Get a mile in a day for a week, get two miles in for the next week, and progressively go from there. Then you want to get into some resistance training. Okay. Now you don't have to walk, you can get on a bike, you can get on a rower, you can get on what they call the skier, it looks like a cross-country ski machine. But then there would be some resistance training because as a police officer that's way more strenuous than it is, again, in an accountant desk, desk jockey. So what happens is you sit sit in a vehicle perpendicular all the time, and then you have all this weight on your on your body with all the gear that it puts a lot of axial compression, you know, up and down pressure on your body, which kind of taxes the marshmallows, you know, the discs in your body. And what it does is it shortens your muscles, shortens the hip flexors, stretches out the glute muscles. You try to do a quick leg bail, and it's like that proverbial, you know, sniper where a hamstring is pulled, you know, and then Johnny's on the ground, he can't get over the fence. So, you know, the people in those, those 40 to 45 age group, flexibility is super important, you know, whether it's a yoga class, whether it's getting a massage, uh, things of that nature, those are uh, you know, definitely certainly those are things that I would definitely recommend for those people in that age group.

SPEAKER_01 19:03

So I know that you shared one time with me that, you know, everything you've been through with your health, that it's made a huge difference because you have all your life kept up with your eating and your exercise and all of that. So you're 45, you're 15 years into a career, you haven't exercised in 10 years, and you're on night shift and you eat uh at 711. Yeah, yeah, at 7-11.

SPEAKER_00 19:33

You get the slim gyms and the and a big gulp. I mean you're lucky to add cheese for a little bit of fat, which would be the best thing you know. But uh yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:43

So where would they start with diet? Because obviously they're they're probably not just gonna go to tuna and rice. So w what could they start with?

SPEAKER_00 19:52

Aaron Ross Powell That's my curse. You know, tuna and rice, but you know. But but so great question, another great question is um when I lecture to a lot of people, and I've used this term over the years, and uh you know, a p people steal this from me, and this is great, you know. Um what what do they say? Imitation, the gr imitation is the greatest form of flattery, right? So when people imitate you, you're like you may say, hey, they're making fun of me. No, they're imitating you because it's it's flattering because they remember what you said. So something we'll put onto this podcast too, and people have heard this before, I use the term better bad. Okay. It's all bad. Right. But what's the better bad? Right? And so if we were to educate some of the people on that night shift, whatever you're gonna unless you pack a lunch with tuna fish and rice, it's all bad. So what would we try to do to make it better bad? So some of the suggestions say if you didn't have to pack something and you didn't want the tuna fish and rice, which is totally understandable. The stuff that's more snack available, right? And if you do get a break where you can find a microwave and things like that, yeah, maybe you have some chicken, some you know, mashed potatoes or chicken and some uh rice or whatever in a in a in a um a Tupperware, you know, in your little cooler that's sitting next to your, you know, your your passenger seat, things like that. And some people can find those, you know, they know that typical 7-Eleven they can stop at, they can use the microwave, uh, things of that nature, and that can definitely help. Um, but also twos if you're that guy that doesn't or gal that doesn't pack the lunch, you know, the sensible things, the better bad, right? That you have like uh the mixed nuts, um, you know, the uh a juice that has cane sugar as opposed to corn syrup. We can always go into that whole concept later, but cane sugar is better for your body. It's still sugar, but it's better than the the k the um uh corn syrup, which is not that great for your body. Um juices and water, you know, like I said, with the cane sugar is better. Um you know, it's it's just tough stuff like it like on that if you gotta bring stuff, uh cheese, like if you're getting um um cheese string, some nuts, um nuts and the berries, the raisins, you know, blueberries, things like that, uh trail mix type stuff is really good. But if you can pack a sensible, you know, mashed potatoes, a little bit of chicken, and some vegetables, and you get that microwaveable aspect where you can pull into a 7-Eleven or somewhere, that will give you the officers that capability to do that, that would be the next thing. If you had to do the fast food type concept, then I go into the real the better bat. Okay. So if you had to tell yourself, um, and we don't have a video and you know Jan is nodding her head here right now, if you had to say pick Taco Bell, Chipotle, Burger King, what of the three would you possibly pick? Right, of the better bat. Chipotle is probably the better choice. You know, you can see them right there in the back, they're kind of cooking up the food right there. See, and it's it's pretty how they cook it, we don't know, but at least I'm seeing them cooking something. You know, and it has a little bit of rice, you can put vegetables, you know, salad on the bottom, a little bit of rice on top. The beans are very good for you, both sets of beans, the black beans and the pinto beans. Um, you can put either chicken or grilled steak. Um, I stay away from the sour cream. Not that that's terribly bad, but I just not a sour cream guy. Guacamole or or avocados are really good fats for you. And then, you know, just water or you know, adding an electrolyte into your water, um, that would be the fast food. Because some of those other processed food, fast food places are just not great. So we're picking the better bad. Um let's see, um El Pollo Loco, if you were to pick from there, then say, for example, we're going to go to a place and a pollo loco would be middle of the road, Chipotle, I still think is better. But if you had to look at the menu, right, and you said, Oh, Chipotle is the only place I can go, right? So what I would probably do is they have kind of a bowl like Chipotle as a double chicken. You know, it's kind of crazy where I know all these menus off the top of my head, you know, because I get asked all the time. But you could do a double bowl where they have the rice and the beans and the avocado, actually avocado slices, and they have some sort of cabbage with it and things like it, which is decent. Um, I would pick that over a burrito. You know what I mean? Because they have the sour cream and things like that. They have the tortilla, which I don't take the tortilla or the chips. You know, I don't need that type of oil-based food. Um also, too, is one of the best things is you know some of the fast food restaurants that you see a piece of chicken like McDonald's, I personally don't think it's it's chicken at all. And there's stuff that shows out there that it's not. And they put these little grill lines, which you know, basically it's like a like a press, like you'd be pressing your laundry, and they press lines in it to make it look like grilled chicken. But you know, at El Pollo Loco, if you get a chicken breast, you got bones on it. So at some point the thing was running around on the ground, right? The McDonald's one, I don't even know if it's real. You know what I mean? So if that's the case, maybe a two-piece meal, say for example, and you really, really want to tighten it down, there's less fat in the breast than it is in the thigh and the leg. But you go, Doc, man, the thigh and leg tastes really good. Okay, that's fine. You know, you're you're doing better than McDonald's. So I'm not gonna argue with you on a thigh or a leg. You know what I mean? But at least you know that's a real chicken. You know what I mean? So that's where I would I would have the meals if I was to talking to people on the midnight shifts, try to do the better bad. Some of the places are not open that late. Um, what you can do before your shift, you can hit there, put your Tupperware, buy your meal, put it in your little cooler with you know, with some ice in it, and then as the shift goes on, when you do take your break, you can pull into like a 7-Eleven and use their microwave. You know, so don't say, well, that you know, give me an give me an excuse. Well, the places aren't open at midnight when I, you know, uh in the middle of my shift. Most likely that would be a swing shift, most likely. So you could buy it, put it in your in your little tote bag, you know, the cooler, and then you know, keep it for later. Uh the midnight shifts or whatever, you definitely have to plan something to take with you because a lot of things are not open at all. So that would probably be the recommendation is always use the term better bad. And if you even if you pull into the nastiest place you can possibly imagine, look at the menu and go, what would Doc eat on this? What would be the better bad? You know what I mean? And then try to pick that, you know? So that'd be kind of my recommendation there.

SPEAKER_01 26:19

So I tell guys if they're working mids about three in the morning with that circadian rhythm shift, that's when a lot of them start getting really sleepy. And I, over the years, I'm gonna make sure I'm doing the right thing, I tell them, grab a protein shake, keep protein shakes with you, not high sugar protein shakes, because some of them they may taste good, but they have 40 grams of sugar in them. But um, because that'll lift you up and get you through the rest of your shift, uh, is that I I think I think that's a that's a great idea.

SPEAKER_00 26:51

And you know, the biggest thing with these guys is you gotta stay hydrated, you know what I mean? And when you don't get deh when you do get dehydrated, a lot of times you have a tendency to just kind of like want to doze off. Um also too is with that because you know your rhythm's often, and especially the guys that go on the first, you know, the midnight, you know, the with into early in the morning, is when they're the new ones on ship that takes a little while. So, you know, get park in a safe area, get out of the vehicle, you know, walk around the circle, get that cold air into your body, you know, if even if you have to do that every hour to get you through, and and you you'll eventually change your rhythm, you know, to be fine. But it's that first probably uh for argument's sake, we'll say the first month. Um get out of the vehicle when you can, because obviously things are a lot quieter, so you can have it, you can do that. So if you do park and then all of a sudden feel like you're dozing, get up out of your chair, you know, get out of the vehicle and um and you know, walk around the vehicle a couple of times, stretch your legs out, get the get the body, you know, do a couple body squats to get that heart pumping again so it gets to the brain to kind of get it stimulated to go, okay, I'm I still got to be active here. You know what I mean? That would probably be the best recommendation for there. Just stay as active as you can. You know, don't put on don't put on the the heater, you know, in the in the uh in the wintertime or the the air conditioning in the in the summertime, and all of a sudden you're definitely dozing off. Just kind of keep moving as much as you can throughout your shift, especially in the mid in the midnight shifts.

SPEAKER_01 28:15

So don't reach for a monster, which is a good thing.

SPEAKER_00 28:18

But yeah, oh my god, those are I tell you what, um you know, and we'll we can talk about my health issues in a little bit too, but uh that's the worst thing for you. Man, it's worse for your heart. I mean, over time, it's just terrible, terrible, terrible. You know, I'd rather you drink the what I call them the Mexican Cokes, the glass Cokes, because it has cane sugar as opposed to corn syrup. That's the better bad. Yeah, I'd rather you drink one of those who give you a little bit of caffeine as opposed to the monsters that have so many chemicals in there to find out are just so bad for your heart over time. And there's enough stress as as a police officer as it is, with with all the you know the adrenaline going and the cortisol, that affects the heart enough as it is, let alone you add, you know, fuel to the fire.

SPEAKER_01 29:01

Yeah, I've worked with guys and I know you have too that are drinking three or four a day, and I'm like, you're not gonna have any kidneys left. Oh my god, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:09

It just it just is really, really just terrible on the internal body. And it's almost like you better if if you are and you go, Doc, I can't do anything about it right now, listen, okay, then whatever monster drink you have, you better drink three glasses of water or cups or whatever bottles of water, better have that stowed. I mean, you're gonna be peeing like a racehorse throughout your shift, but at least it's gonna keep the kidneys a l again, better bad. If you can't get the guy or gal off it, say, listen, every one that you drink, drink three glasses of uh or bottles of water before you have your next one. I mean, you know, sometimes we have to do that. We just gotta give them compromises, you know what I mean? And that's okay. Like I don't mind compromises, you know, just over time. And then you have to um be able to then take a break here and there to where make sure you take your leave, make sure you take your sick time, make sure you take these times, and it's just a it's a mental reboot where a lot of these guys and gals, they don't take time off. You know what I mean? They don't take a sick leave, they don't take a and yeah, and they take the vacation to or or whatever they try to sell back, you know, at the end of the end of their career, which is perfectly fine. But then what happens is if you know you have health problems along the way, you can't even use your time that you save for all these years. So um I recommend people to try to I should take my own medicine, but take my take as much time as I should either. But that would be my recommendation is try to as much as you can. If that's sick leave, you're you're adding up and you have an extra day, take that mental break day. You're not sick, you're just taking a mental break day. You know, go to the lake, ground yourself, put your feet in the water, you know, mentally reboot yourself. So um, you know, from from that point of view, um, you know, got to take a break once in a while.

SPEAKER_01 30:52

So I'm sure the guys that follow this podcast are sick of me talking about it. So I'm gonna ask you to talk about it. Sleep. Ugh.

SPEAKER_00 31:01

Man, I tell you what, yeah. It it is, you know, it's the nemesis for law and law enforcement. Um, because you know, they're just what happens is too, you may be on a day shift, but the adrenal is is high. Then when you get that dump, you want the caffeine to keep you up. But if you don't have that caffeine, what happens is the body gets tired, right? So you have to maintain, you know, the recommendation is between six and eight hours of sleep. I try to get eight as much as I possibly can. Um, you know, but also too is um they've shown studies too, the little 10-minute little nap here and there, if you're on patrol and you have two, two guys and gals on shifts, and then you know they can park you know next to each other, it's kind of low. Hey man, you take 10, I take 10, you follow radio, I'd follow radio. And as far as I'm as as I know, those are things that work well and the department doesn't mind because that's a safety mechanism. Because if you have somebody out there that all of a sudden falls asleep, you know, it's it's can be terrible because depending on the areas of the city you're at, then you become vulnerable if you don't have a partner. You know what I mean? So uh the sleep is so important, you know, from your hormone levels, from your stress levels to cardiovascular-wise, um, you know, sleep, sleep, sleep, sleep, sleep is so important, along with the hydration. Um, so if you can get between six and eight um the best you can, I think uh most people would do okay. When you start pulling into the fours and the fives and you're missing your sleep along the way, um you just have to know if you're on a shift that is not conducive for a lot of sleep, you gotta try to force it as much as you can. And those parts of your career, as you're, you know, building your career in seniority, there's those times that the family has to understand that too. Um, you know, and that's it's a team, it's a team effort. Being a police officer, your family, it's almost like a you know, a baseball team, football team, or whatever. Everybody's gotta understand whose ever whichever spouse is the police officer, guy or gal, that there's certain times when you know, mom's at home, needs to sleep, and she's the officer, dad's at home, he needs to sleep, that the uh you know, opposing spouse has to make sure the kids, you know, are are are understanding that dad needs a couple hours of sleep before he goes on shift. You know what I mean? And also, too, as the officer, you can't be Superman all the time or superwoman all the time and go, no, I can live on four hours of sleep because I got to be there for the soccer, I gotta be there for the football, the cheerleading, or whatever the case may be. Yes, you know, try to do the best you can, but your ultimate safe uh the ultimate safety is yourself because you want to have longevity with your children. You know, and that's one of the biggest things that I that I chat with the guys and gals, you know, that in the law enforcement is got you got to take care of yourself. And believe me, I'm worse, I'm just as bad as everybody else. You know, that's why I can talk about this now because I sometimes don't do that either. You know what I mean? And people, you know, if there was people that knew me or sitting around this round table right now, you know, they'd be getting on me. It's like, doc, you do you do the same as I do. Yes, I do. You know, do as I say, not as I do, right? Isn't that the concept? You know what I mean? Hey, I'm the doctor, I know better. You know, well, you're not following your own instructions. Well, you know, don't worry about me, you just worry about yourself. I'm gonna I'm gonna tell you how to take care of yourself. But yes, again, sleep is so, so, so important.

SPEAKER_01 34:19

And I think the point you made about taking the vacations, taking the time off, even if you take one day off and you go fishing, you know, just let your system cool down because they're always running so hot. And I know um I work with a lot of police, but I also work with a lot of fire. And, you know, if they're at a slower station, it's not big that big a deal because they're getting, you know, some pretty decent sleep. They get a nap in the afternoon or whatever, but they get busy stations and they have a 48-hour shift and they're getting an hour here, 30 minutes there, 15 minutes there, and then they're just thrashed when they get home.

SPEAKER_00 34:58

And so well, that's that's it's so so important that you say that because you know you're talking about the intermittent sleep pattern, right? So they get a call at, you know, we'll we'll we'll joke with the firefighters, you know, the cat's caught in the tree at midnight. Right. You know what I mean? And the parents can eat the cat down. Right. So the guys, guys gotta go out, they gotta take care of the cat, whatever it is, but then they go back, but then all of a sudden, there was a time where some of the guys and gals were asleep, but the whole the whole bus has got to go, you know, the whole you know, department's getting, you know, um uh engines gotta go. And then when they come back, everybody's gonna try to get back to that REM sleep. So they're staying above REM REM being the good point where you start to heal the body. But if you never dump into the REM, you're really not getting full sleep. So if you say I got eight hours within a certain period of time, but you had three calls, you know what I mean? You there's no restful sleep in there. You know, nowadays we got we got Garmin's, we got Apple phone phones, and we have everything that can catch our sleep and to give us ideas, which great, great mechanisms so we do know when we're not following what you know what we're talking about on the podcast. Um, so those things would be really, really good to have too. Some people can dump into REM pretty quickly because they know how to pass out. Um, I think military guys uh and first responders are very, very good at that because we're go, go, go, you know, um organizations that when you just lay your head down, you can go to sleep right away. I am that guy, you know, from the military service. I can just lay my head down at the end of the day, boom, I'm out. Um but uh yes, so those intermittent sleep patterns, you've got to try to do the best you can, you know, to let your body fall asleep and get a good couple hours of rest because it's super important. You may say you got eight hours, but it's you know, an in and out with calls, um that's not as restful as you like. So again, the time off when you can get a break where you can, like you said, go fishing or go throw your feet in a lake or something, um, it definitely reboots you know mentally. And I need to do that more myself too.

SPEAKER_01 37:04

Okay, I'll call you. You call me on that. Yes, exactly.

SPEAKER_00 37:08

Scrolling. Yes. What do you think about scrolling? Um geez, you know, humans, we all geez. The thing that you never look up, right? When the when your phone says to you that tells you it will pop up on something, maybe an alert or something, how many hours you're on your phone, I scroll right past that. You don't want to know. I do not want to know, you know, what what it is. Um if we can, you know, if we can as a society just back off that a little bit, uh, because there's so much stuff out there. It's uh entertainment, information. I'm a huge podcast guy. I'm a huge uh you know listener of you know just religious podcasts too. You know, I'm really intrigued with that. Um, you know, motivational speakers, you know, and it's a little two-minute, three-minute thing, but then you're scrolling with a bunch of them, and then the body never really gets a chance to kind of chill out. Um so I try to, you know, as much as I can, you know, put the phone down. Um when I'm with patients uh during the day, it's actually fairly decent because I'm just running and gunning. Um but I do make up for it at nighttime sometimes. So I gotta kind of, you know, put it away. I try not to when I get ready to hit the rack, um, I try to put the phone down and I don't scroll when I'm in bed. Um I don't do that because I'll be up till, you know, I have that type A personality. I be scrolling until three o'clock in the morning. So once I hit the rack, I put the phone down, turn it off, turn it to silence, and the alarm goes off the next morning. Yeah, so try to try to curb that as much as we can. If you curbed it, you'd still be surprised at how much you still if you said I'm gonna cut it 50%, it's still a shizload of time. We're on the phone. So, you know, if if we can prevent that along the way, um, that definitely helps you out mentally.

SPEAKER_01 38:54

Is there anything else that I I didn't ask you that you'd like to make sure that they hear from you today?

SPEAKER_00 38:59

Yeah, one of the things is more on the personal side, you know, just to let people know is um, you know, everybody is dealt a set of cards when they're born, right? And we got to play the card, you know, that play that round the best we can. And it doesn't make a difference sometimes, too, is is no matter how well you play your deck of cards, you know what I mean, or the cards that are dealt, there's still what we call genetics, right? And that's just nipping at your butt like a chihuahua right on your back, on your heels, right? So when we talk about the stuff that we talked about today, um, you know, as far as sleep patterns, diet, uh, stress levels, sleep patterns, uh, the mental capacity and things like that, these are all big, huge components of how to stay healthy. But also, too, is as close as you can stay to perfection in all those things, diet, nutrition, sleep, and et cetera, that's gonna do a great job. But if you let yourself go and you're not dealt exactly the best set of cards, you're just kind of behind the eight ball. You know, and just a quick you know, quick comment on myself. You know, I feel I'm turning what I'm 65 years old, you know, I've been in the fitness industry for, you know, probably 40 years, considering undergraduate school, military, and whatever. Um, and if it was on a video, I'd I'd look pretty good for my age. But I've had six stents put in over ten years. I've had a triple bypass and had another stent put in a couple weeks ago to kind of shore up the bypass. And, you know, 5'11, 200 pounds, hardly any body fat, um, no cholesterol problem, no heart, you know heart heart, you know, heart condition, main mm obviously you got a condition in the heart, but nothing that's done from diets, smoking cigarettes, alcohol, um um uh drugs and things of that nature, which taxes people's body in itself. And I'm the guy that's the epitome of doing everything right because I walk the walk. When I present out there to the public, you know, people go, Man, that guy looks pretty good for 65 years old. Yeah, because I walked the walk. But guess what? I still had a freaking bypass. I still had six, seven stents in. Imagine if I I well, the imagination would be I would not be sitting here today if I wasn't the guy that was in halfway decent shape, or the normal people probably wouldn't be here, right? So I'm trying to tell people normal, you know, and you know, normal people, you gotta stay healthy. The people that let themselves go here and there, just to try just a little bit better to get there to that 90-10. If you're at 6040, try to get to 70-30. You know, nobody's saying you gotta flip over your whole life, the table of your life, and flip it over and change it in one fell swoop because it's not gonna happen. It's that SEAL team mentality. You have to take each evolution at a time. You don't look at the whole starting SEAL team training to nine months later graduation, you'll never make it. Right? So if you want to change your lifestyle, you want to get more fit, more healthy, more mentally fit, you got to do it day by day. Each day pick something and get better. Each day pick something and get better. You know what I mean? You know, whether it's the food you eat, whether it's the water you drink, whether it's the alcohol you drink, whether it's the soft drinks you drink, whether it's a mental aspect of it, you know, each day picks out, okay, I'm gonna do this today. It's almost like, you know, which has got a great concept is, you know, um, AA, right? To day one, day two, day three, the same thing we should be doing with our life's fitness. You know, day one. Do I really, really, really need that extra, you know, blah, blah, blah? Probably not. You know, I haven't really, but I deserve this. You know, you're gonna battle with yourself like tennis. It volleys back and forth. And then some days you win, you know, some days you lose. You just hope that you're winning most of the time. And if you do, I think people's lifestyles will change. And I think we can make society a little bit healthier.

SPEAKER_01 43:10

Aaron Powell So I know you've done a lot of training over time. If a department wanted to hire you to come in and set up a wellness program for them, for instance, would you do that?

SPEAKER_00 43:22

Oh, yeah. Oh no, we get we've definitely done that before. Um, and it's even uh where we do the lower lower level officers where we you know teach them that uh teach them you know a program or we get with the upper level officers and things of that nature to give them in the program which can be then implemented by you know it's just a hierarchy. Um but I personally think it's so important because yes, the health point of view, but then if we're talking to more of the uh say lieutenant, lieutenants and above, um they're into the monetary aspect and the safety aspect and all that. So it's like The safety aspect goes into the monetary because if Johnny or Sally gets in an issue physically, they're on workers' comp and nobody everybody hates that word, workers' comp, because then it costs the department money. It costs the state money, you know what I mean, and things of that nature. So if we can implement some sort of health and wellness programs within departments along the way, fire department, police department, you know, first responders, and whatever, what's going to happen is we're going to lengthen the mortality rate of our of our law enforcement officers. And what I mean by that is the studies show that if somebody retires at the age of 55, if they get to 60, they beat the average because there's a five-year mortality rate after retirement, which is the silliest thing in the world for our city, for our officers. They put this time and effort into their careers, and then, you know, a lot of them get a five-year, you know, grace after that. That's just unacceptable in my mind. You know what I mean? People should be getting into their 80s and 90s, you know what I mean, God willing. And um, I think it can be done if throughout their course of their 20 years or 20 some odd years, that they're maintaining some s level of you don't have to look like Arnold Schwarzenegger did back in the day. We're not talking about that. We're just talking, you know, common sense fitness, uh, common sense body fat ratio to muscle mass. You know what I mean? And if we can do that and we let the upper level people know that it financially it's gonna make sense to put in a program because you the um the return ROI return on investment is gonna be huge for the city because their workers' comp claims are gonna go down and their what they call the mod, the modification, where what's their premium, is gonna be a lot less with less workers out. You know what I mean? So I think we could provide from the top down and then from the bottom up. Um each program would be a little bit different. One would be where, you know, the young bucks uh and gals along the way would be more the fitness to teach them what they're what they're doing. The guys that are at the upper level executive, you know, order from a lieutenants and above, obviously want to talk to them about staying in shape too, because they're the ones getting ready to retire. But they're the ones that handle the finance to make sure that things are uh being able to be purchased like a program. Uh we're able to monitor those guys and gals are ready to monitor how many people are injured, injured or what the percentage of injuries are, how we've decreased there, so those folks can keep, you know, basically the bean counters on on what's going on from the numbers and the financial what it costs to the city and the state. You know. So how would they get a hold of you, Joe? Um, the but probably the best way to get a hold of me is uh my emails that probably is the easiest. It's doc D O C as in Doctor, Doc Joe Joe Martin at gmail.com. And then we can just, you know, talk to each individual departments and things like that to see what they're what they're looking for. Because every department is going to be different, right? You know, you got guys up in the mountains, you got guys down in the valleys, you got, you know, uh the bigger departments, you got smaller departments, and it would just basically be um um tailored to what they're looking for. And also, too, it's where the department would say, listen, we have a high workers' comp. Well, then what you do is you evaluate those workers' comp. That's what we would do. We'd evaluate those. Are they back pain? Are they neck pain? Are they shoulder pain? Are this and that? Is it the gear they're carrying and and is the where they're carrying their gear? Is it the boots they're wearing? Is it the way they're getting out of their vehicles? It's almost like it's kind of like a back safety class. You know what I mean? And that's kind of like, you know, the the word we'd use, you know, back safety along with our our nutrition and fitness and mental aspect of it. But we want to make sure, because most of the officers probably go out biomechanically, right? You know, as opposed to the others, uh, because everything is kind of hinged around the biomechanics of the body, then things deteriorate from there.

SPEAKER_01 47:57

Wow, wonderful. Thank you so much for coming on today. I just think the world of you, and you're just an amazing man, and I'm so glad you're still here talking to us today. And it's because literally he's taken care of himself. He'd be long gone.

SPEAKER_00 48:14

Yeah, yeah. And and I and I I tell you, it's one of those things where, you know, the good Lord definitely uh, you know, is has got me here for these type of things, these podcasts to let people know is like, hey, listen, man, the the longevity is so possible for so many people. But we we and even with myself, you know, I'm totally still motivated to go, hey, listen, it's no big deal. It's it's a it's a hiccup, you know. Big man upstairs has got way more work for me to do because, you know, I feel I'm here now to make sure that, you know, our law enforcement, military, and things like that, they understand what's going on life-wise, science-wise, mental-wise, um, to give people that longevity where some people, if they don't get the information, they they may leave this earth way earlier than they should. And hopefully with some of the material that I can provide, you know, we're gonna prevent a lot of that.

SPEAKER_01 49:03

I sure hope so.

SPEAKER_00 49:04

Yeah, so thank you very much. I really appreciate the opportunity. And uh, like you said, if anybody has any questions uh for me, any type of programs, it's uh docjo martin at gmail.com. Um and there's a phone number if you need it to call, it's uh 559-299-2301 is the office, and you can always get a hold of me there too. Perfect. Oh, thank you so much.

SPEAKER_01 49:27

Absolutely. Well, thank you folks for joining us. Don't forget to subscribe and don't forget you have the right to have a happy life. You have the right to feel good. So I hope you enjoyed this episode. You take care. This is Dr. Janet from Mind Pilot.