Mike Gabler On Winning "Survivor" & Donating $1M Prize To Charity

The Team Never Quit podcast is sponsored by Navy Federal Credit Union. Partner up with Navy Federal Credit Union to pay down credit card debt. Learn more at NavyFederal.com. On the new era of Survivor, you either find it, win it, or you just don't eat. I went into the game at 200 pounds and I came out at 165. I got a 9-1-3 that just tower here. I'm starting to run for you. Who is Never Quit? Who is Never Quit? Who is Never Quit Radio? All right everybody, welcome back to the TNGU podcast. I'm your host, Marcus LaTrell. Every week it's my job to fire you up, to ignite the legend inside of you, and to push you to your greatness. Join me every week as I take you into my briefing room with some of the most hard-charging people on the planet. They're going to show you how to embrace the fuck of life, teach you the values of working your ass off, and charge through whatever life throws at you. This is the Team Never Quit podcast. Don't fuckle up, Buttercup. All right ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to another episode of Team Never Quit podcast. Thank you all for listening, watching, viewing, and subscribing. If you haven't yet, please show your support by hitting that like button, checking us out on social media at Team Never Quit. Before we get into this show today, let's get to our Patreon question of the day, which is, what is something that you do that makes you feel like an old person? I feel like that's directed. I feel like an old person every day, and I just love my decisions. How about whenever you squint at the check when it comes and you're in a dark restaurant like a dad used to do, and now you're like, I'm not trying to figure out the tip, I'm trying to see the numbers. Yeah, yeah. So I've noticed some of the guys in my crew having to do that, and I haven't made fun of them yet, so I've survived that one. I think that's what happens, as the guys, if you make fun of your boy, your dad doing that, shazam, and I'm talking to you, but I make that grunt noise when I stand up now. Everyone had to bend over to pick something up. The first time that came out, I thought it was like, well, no, it just can't be right. But then when it shows up, I was like, I think that's how you know you've made it over there. I think that's how you know, that's right. I have a lot of them, but mine, I think the biggest is just getting out of bed in the morning, and I have to like roll my ankles in. I have to stretch a little bit, yeah. I have to stretch a little bit before I actually stand up. How about you, Jay? No, it's definitely the big vices. Oh, yes. The arms get longer. It'll get longer. That's right. I think hangovers would probably be mine. Well, that is self-induced in your 25th almost. Oh, it's not a hangover yet, son. Yeah. Trust me. What's your past 40 then? That's what we're done with that. That's what we're done with. All you got right now is just a reminder of a kick-ass time you have. Hangovers reserved for the old dudes that keep on trying to do that. The day gets hung over from the last one, right? You're just like, what up? That's a fact. That's a fact. That is so enjoy. Oh my gosh. Well, today we've got a great guest for you guys today. Mike Gabler is an American Heart Valve Specialist who participated in thousands of surgeries. He is also a television personality best known for competing and winning the 40th of the American reality TV competition series, Survivor. And he's the second oldest player to ever win. And he also did something really awesome with the money that you will get into. Welcome to the show, Mike. Hey, thanks so much, Hunter. I appreciate you. Glad to be here. And you got somebody with you. Let's introduce them. And I've got my brother-in-law, Justin Caldwell here, ninth generation Texan, sitting with his cowboy boots on right next to me. That's the only reason. That's why we're here. That's the only reason. That's why we have him in there. No, that's right. He's also my rod. It's my red neck motivation. That's right. What is it? Uber couldn't find the whole. Yeah, JT's got a hillbilly hype man. Yeah. Here, everything's always there to motivate you no matter what's going on. Man, you can do it. Go. You know what I'm talking about? It is great to have. You've got that much spice underneath you. Yeah. All right. So the Survivor thing is cool. It was really amazing. So, you know, I've been a big fan of the show the whole time we've been watching since 2000. It came out. And it was just a novel show at the time because they take, you know, 18, 20 strangers. They drop them off on a beach and everybody's got to kind of figure out, close on your back so you don't have supplies or anything. And then you have to kind of figure out, you know, where you're going to sleep, what you're going to eat, what you're going to drink. And while you're also socially trying to figure out each other because it's a game of attrition where at the end of, you know, 42 or 28 days, there used to be a longer season, 42 days, and they'd give you rice and beans a little bit, not a lot. But now they've got the last few seasons, they've moved into this new era where they give you nothing at all and it's 28 days long. And that's the one I was competing in. And, but it's just an amazing social experiment because you want to have- Oh, I get what just happened there. That was a shot at the other crew for not having as hard as you. I like that. I did, man. And I want to ask just real fast. So the guys that you went through that with, if y'all came back together as a team, I know I'm competing against each other's one thing. So if you had to come together and compete with each other, well, you think that would make that makes you a better team? It really did. The hardship really did for just because, you know, so when we first got on my season, season 43, we, 18 of us show up, we were divided into three tribes of six and we land on the beach. You just look at everybody. You're kind of like, oh my gosh, I'm, I'm Gabler, you're whoever and you know, we all kind of meet everybody. And then we immediately start figuring out where we're going. And then we would get together once a day. And as a tribe, we would compete in these amazing obstacles. They were as big as a football field and you'd be like, okay, Marcus, you're going to do that you're going to climb up the net, you know, the net melody. We're going to, you're going to go through the tunnel of mud and all this other stuff. And we just, it was really hard, but it was like anything else. It's hard. It was fun. I mean, I think everybody on Survivor likes type two fun because that's what it was. And we all became very close because, you know, at night, it would rain and freezing rain and we're just sitting in there just all huddled together and minute to minute, waiting for the sun to come up to dry off. And everybody became really close. And to this day, we left all our machetes on the beach. We're all friends to this day. I've got Owen and his fiance are coming out to Idaho to visit us in June. And I can't wait to see him. I can't wait to see my friend. It's been almost a year. It will have been a year by the time I see him again. And I can't wait to show him kind of where, you know, I'm from and what I'm doing and all that kind of stuff. So it's been a really special experience. That's awesome. So it's a different kind of friendship now. It's a different kind of friendship because we went through something. Talk about that. That's, you hear it all the time and people don't like to go through suffering. They don't like to go through pain. Well, man, if you're born into this world, that's kind of part of it. It's in fact. And it's only that because you haven't gotten into it yet. It's a great point, Marcus. And you know, Owen was with me on day one because he was part of my bokot tribe and we met on day one and he was with me at the very end of the game. We lasted the entire game together. And you know, we went through all kinds of, we would go to the well together to get water. We'd fill up this cast iron pot. We finally won a cast iron pot and a flint. So we had to boil our water because you didn't want to get all the organisms, any other stuff. So we would go, me and him, he was called like the lovable curmudgeon because he was like Charlie Brown kind of a guy and we would walk with this big old cast iron pot, fill it up, ladle out the water and the well and we'd walk back trying not to spill it, take a fire, boil it, let it cool, drink it. And you know, we did everything together. You know, I remember we'd see hermit crabs walking on the beach and Ellie was on the tribe and Ellie said, you know, can we eat hermit crabs? I'm like, I think you can, but I don't think most people do. Three days later, we're eating hermit crabs. Oh my God, are you eating meat in a hermit crab? There's not much, but it's better than nothing. We ended up eating some crazy stuff because, you know, on the new era of survivor, they don't, you either find it, win it or you just don't eat. And I went into the game at 200 pounds and I came out at 165. So, think about that. Like we set up our team, when you set up, man, each guy's got his own position. And that's like, you got a skill set. Yes. That's why that's how one person doesn't become more important than the other. Yes. But then what happens if one goes down? You know, that's how you had to cross rate had to be, right? It's exactly. We did. We did the same thing. People were, you know, some people would go gather wood, some people would go gather. We we had we had that's what assignments. But people did, everybody was cross trained to do their things, but we did have a team mentality where everybody was out there and, you know, the ladies would get snails and and hermit crabs. Well, we would get firewood and get the fire going or get the water and we would rotate. Everybody did everybody's job. But we, but people were better. Ellie and Janine were amazing at getting, you know, getting the crabs and getting the snails off the rocks every time because every nature's bounty would, you know, we'd pick all those snails off the rocks at night. And then in the morning, the tide would come back in and then when tide go back out, there would be more snails there. So that's what we would eat. And they weren't like the big old fat, escargoes, snails and the garlic butter. They were like little beauty buttons and we would just boil them up. And it's funny when you're really hungry, you could take you just were like, you could taste the fat and you could you got you. We were getting something from it. It what we were getting something from it. We would eat all kinds of stuff. But the weirdest thing I think we ate out there, there was a big guy probably about your size Marcus named Ryan. And Ryan was he's like part of Aquaman. He would go out in the ocean and fish and just, you know, I'd go out in the ocean for a couple hours and come back with, you know, three four inch fish and Ryan would come back with like 15 fish. Oh my gosh. He was just a beast. And one day he came back coming out of the water with a clam literally applied two foot by like it was, it was this big. Oh my gosh. Massive clam. He pulled out of the ocean. So we got a fire going put the clam down on there because it was, you know, it wouldn't open its mouth. So we, it once it cooked, it popped open and inside the clam there was these two, they're probably as big as like a 12 ounce filet mignon like these two big cylinder things that were white and they tasted just like a scallop. They were like, they were delicious. And then there was all this green good around it. And of course, I'm like, well, anybody going to eat the green good and they're like, no, all you gabler, all you. So I tried to, I tried, I started eating the green stuff and if anybody's listening and you're eating the clam, do not eat the green stuff. It's kind of like they're good. So yeah, you don't want to eat that, but the, the white parts where they hold their shell together, it was really good. Oh my gosh. Is there anybody there telling you if something's poisonous or not? So before the game starts, you actually, this is something nobody really knows is, we, we, because of COVID was going on at the time, we flew to LA, we quarantined for three days in our room. We were not allowed to leave our hotel room. So we're kind of like in, in a little box and you get a knock on the door and there's your breakfast, there's your lunch and then you get your dinner and you couldn't leave the room. They had hall monitors because we weren't allowed to interact with each other because they wanted us to be on the beach the first time we met and they're filming it because if it's not filmed, it doesn't happen. So they would, they were really, really sure we could, no communication at all. And then we, one day it was on Sunday, they collected our cell phones, took our watches and we all met in the lobby, we're all wearing masks still. So I'm trying to do like happy eyes, like, you know, I'm like, you know, like, you know, it's like psychopaths, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. If everyone's got masks on and you know, I'm kind of a, you know, I'm kind of a bigger guy with tattoos. I got a beard and, you know, and my resting face is kind of, you know, kind of be a little bit, you know, like intense. So I'm trying to be like my daughters, I've got two daughters. They were, they were coaching me up like, okay, Papa, you need to be friendly. You need to be friendly. So I was wearing a tie-dye shirt. Oh my gosh. Because what's more friendly than tie-dye nothing. And I have friendly eyes, tie-dye shirt and looking at kind of everybody, we got on the plane and we all had handlers with us. So we had next to me, there was, there was a, a do brought next to me and then Mike is from Chicago and everybody had their own handler. So you couldn't talk on the plane, we're all there, 14 hours over to Fiji, land, get in a bus, go to this resort called the Ponderosa and we're driving in there like, oh, this looks pretty nice. This looks like a pretty nice resort. And it was called the Anchorage Resort, which I remember because I cover, I work in Alaska. So I'm like, Anchorage is a good omen. Good omen now. I see Anchorage Resort and we get off the bus. We got our backpacks on and we start kind of marching in a row. We still don't want to talk to each other. And we go through the resort and I'm like looking at the rooms and there's some big villas and cool things, I'm like, oh, this is awesome. We keep walking, go past the room, now we're just in rooms. Now we go past it and then we go on the trail and the jungle. And it's, by the way, it's 105 degrees with 95% humidity and we're, and I was snowing in Idaho when I left. So I'm just dying, I'm sweating like crazy. And if we're walking up there and we get to this, this other trail, this, this big switch back going all the way up to this bald mountain and we get up there and there's 20 tents lined up. And I was tent number six, MG, we were all in your initials. So like ML is your tent and you go there and I remember looking at this, this 20 row tent in this big jungle with steam coming out and just coming back down, clouds and mosquitoes, just biting your face, your hands. And I'm just going, oh my goodness, what have I gotten into here? So we zipped open the tent, billowed out like even more heat. We had 15 minutes to put all our stuff in there and then they ring a bell and you kind of go down to the child line and you sit at tables across from like six feet away from each other and then they would call you. And this is a long way of answering your question about do they tell you things? So you, they go, MG, you're next and I get up and I go walk, you know, 100 feet, but where they, nobody else could see me. And there was a ranger there, a fajean ranger that would tell you, this is fire coil, coral, take a look at this. Do not touch this. And you know, you couldn't take notes, you just had to mentally take notes and they would show you, this is a cassava. This, these are in the ground. This is a root. You can find these to eat and they would show you things and you spent about an hour with the ranger going through what not to do and what to do. And I probably got most of it in my head, maybe half of it, just enough to be dangerous enough. I knew snakes were bad. Sea snakes are bad. So I got that. I remember a certain thing. He was like, yeah, the half and half. Like, oh, yeah, that's right. That's right. So, and the beginning of the game was actually so difficult. The pregame was so hard that they, they marched just around everywhere just to try to see, I think the switchback thing was to see how our knees would do if we could actually scurry up and they did a swim test for us to be sure we could actually swim and everything we said we, we could do. But one kid was on there, I'd say kid who's probably 30, looked like he was in really good shape, but poor guy, I guess he had had some heat problems and passed out a couple of times, so one of the alternates got to come in and play the game. Yeah, wow. Yeah. And it was, so it was 18 of us made the game, but they brought 20 to pre, pregame. And one of the alternates named Gio, he lives in Florida now, but he was in Austin. He, he got to join the game at the last second. Oh my gosh, that's exciting. So you've got people just waiting like on standby? On standby, because you know, I mean, what was really cool about season 43 is everybody on that season was a fan of the show. Like everybody was a true fan. It was probably more than that by now. It's like studied. Yeah, it's like with the USC man, it's like you're, you're training for that particular fighter now. Absolutely right, Marcus. And Owen was one of the guys. In fact, he knew every, he studied everything. It's a chessboard man. It gets freaking good at it. Chessboard, he was so, he could even tell when we would get tree mail, you know, it would say like, it would be a riddle. It would be like, you know, bring your, bring your towels and bring your heart because you're going to jump off of something and somebody's going home and I can't do riddles, obviously. They would always rhyme, but mine doesn't. So, but it's go poetry. Yeah, I'm not poetry. I listen to Metallica and Slayer. But it's like he, so Owen knew all these things. I was bringing the tree mail. I'm like, what do you think, dude? What do you think? He's like, I think this is the one where we're in the cage and the tide, the tides coming up and I'm like, really? That sounds terrible. So terrifying. Sure. Like he was excited. He was excited. Oh, it was like, oh, I've always wanted to do this one. This is like one, one, the ones they've only done this three times and literally it's when you're in a cage and you're, the tide starts coming up and it's whoever lasts the longest in the tide and Owen and Carla, they ended up, well, I'll tell you that and say, but so I'm in there. I've got a big nose and one of the things that Owen knew to do that I didn't know was you got to pinch your nose because every time the tide would come up, you'd hope you'd take a breath and the tide would come up and you have like five seconds and then the tide would go back down, but my nostrils would fill up with a couple of ounces of water. And the only way to clear them was kind of to gulp the water and then you take your breath and then the tide would come up again, gulp your water, come back, take a breath and after about 15 minutes, my stomach was full of seawater. So I had to tap out. I tapped out there and Sammy tapped out right after me and I went and hurled a bunch of seawater up. They got a part of it on camera. And then Owen though, who was laying there, and Carla had their noses pinched and they actually lasted for three and a half hours. Oh my gosh. The tide went up all the way and then started going back down. So they actually broke the challenge and beat the tide, which I didn't think was possible. And they, I mean, it just shows you like don't limit your mind on what you think you can or can't do. And they, but if you're always going to bail out of a challenge early, that was the one to go down on. It's because it was three and a half hours and they got out of there. They were freezing because you know, three and a half hours in the ocean, you know, better than probably anybody is cold. Oh my gosh. So if someone's putting themselves in a position where, I mean, they could die with this show, with the producers or whoever pull you out. Yes, ma'am. They had, they had safety divers below us in that particular one. They always had a medical crew on standby because, you know, people got, we were always banged up and bug bit. Yeah. And the first week, speaking of bugs, when you first come from civilization where you're fed and cared for, and you go into such a harsh place like that and you're sweating all your minerals and salts and things are coming out and the bugs loved us the first week, which was a buffet. It was a buffet, a bug buffet. I had bug bites on my bug bites on my bug bites and they would just, you know, in your sunburned, you're dehydrated, you're starving, you're sleep deprived, you're a little freaked out. The first few days. Pissed off probably. And a little grumpy. Yeah. That's just five. That comes with that whole combo you just talked about. Yes. There's no Snickers. There's no nothing. How about that? No, no. Where was the Snickers when you need one? No. Actually. Oh my. But it was, it was really a punch in the face, but after you, after about a week, you start assimilating and then you're with your, your friends. You're competing against each other, but you're also with your tribe. And even when we had divisions within our tribe, as, because the game goes on, you vote people out and you trust becomes an issue. When we, when it came to competing against the other tribes, we would all pull together. Uh, Bock is strong. We would just battle. And it was, I hadn't been on a team sport in 30 years. And it was so fun. I forgot how much fun it was to be on a team sport. Isn't that great? It was so fun. There's no other feeling like it. I'm going to have to do something again to do that because it was so fun just to look over and you know, you're, you're, whether you're pulling a giant box of coconuts or whatever we were doing, a climbing over the, you're pulling each other up through the rope ladders and going across stuff. And I remember there was a, we had this, uh, lady named Jean, and she's, itty bitty. She's really small. And Ellie, uh, and Ellie, Ellie would get this look on her face when we would be in these, in these challenges. And you know, Sammy's a big boy. Owen's a big guy. I'm reasonable, but the one you didn't want to mess with was either Ellie or Jeanine. They would be fiery and they would remember one time, like an aunt, uh, we were supposed to pick up boxes and hand them to the, the, the quote unquote big guys and we were going to hand them up and Ellie picked up this giant box and would just, was so much adrenaline and energy and just goes, move. And I just dove out of the way because she was coming through. And I don't know. I just, and I think that's why to your point, we just all really bonded and, and our friends of this day. Support from today's episode comes from IHerb. IHerb offers the best curated selections of wellness products at the best value. And for a limited time, our listeners can get an exclusive offer of 22% off their entire order. Just go to IHerb.com and use our promo code TNQ to get 22% off. Recently I started taking the Alpha brain and fish oil products for my herb and have noticed a serious spike in my daily energy. I feel way more alive, more healthy and just on top of the world and you could too, just by checking out their website. They have everything from everyday vitamins, fish oils to proteins, even over to skincare and makeup and you can even get spices on there. With over 24 million authentic reviews and 1.3 million 5 star ratings, IHerb has helped over 11 million customers find the best products for them. It's time to get your health in check with IHerb. Our listeners get 22% off your first order when you use code TNQ at IHerb.com. That's 22% off your first order at IHerb.com with promo code TNQ. Choose IHerb because wellness matters. We're going to have to start like a Boise softball league or something for you. I'm going to have your survivor tribes have your own little league. Maybe so. There you go. Compete against the heck. Take it to the freaking court or something like that. That would be funny. Okay, so let's take it back to like where did you come from and give us a little backstory on who you are, where you came from, all that. You bet you. So my father, my parents are from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. My father was in the military and then in a war. He was in the army. Like Pencil, like steel country? Steel country. Big time. My granddaddy was a- Like Steelers country. Oh, Steelers. Terrible towel. Terrible, I have a terrible towel. Buried in the ground in the reclining room. Pittsburgh Steelers fan. Because I've seen them. Big time. You know them. One of the best teammates is a huge. They're great. They're intense. They're real people. You got to know how to deal with them. They're real intense. So hard to steal. When I was five, my dad got it was in oil. So we moved to Houston. And it was not easy in the love you blew Oilers days. Being in Houston, Texas, wearing a, wearing a stealer. I was a little schooler, man. Oh, yeah. But, you know, you kind of, whatever your dad yells at the TV or cheers for is kind of what you cheer for. So we became Steelers fans. That's right. On this island in Houston where we would even go to Oilers games in the afterdome and we would be wearing our yellow and black. And you know Houston is such an awesome sports town because everybody, you know, everybody's pretty cheeky with each other, but it's all friendly and cool. And we just, you know, it would be a nonstop kind of like, you know, we'd be getting heckled but in a fun way of fighting without. Yeah, it was fun. It was really cool. It was really cool. And then once we got to Houston, we, we, I lived in Kingwood and it's in Northeast Houston. And then we moved overseas for a little while. We moved over to Saudi Arabia when I was in middle school and then we moved back to Houston. Oh, Saudi Arabia was amazing. It's great, right? It was amazing. Great people had a great time. We were over there. You know, you go back in the mid 80s, like 84, 85. So it was before internet. So people were very, cultures were still very strong. You could see like, like you'd see some of the Arab guys walking around in their Thob and Gutra with a Michael Jackson glove. How about that? It was so, yeah, it's so amazing. How about that? It was so crazy. People, when you hear the names of the Middle East, people automatically think desert and that's not what it is. Yeah, right. There's all kinds of stuff over there. All kinds of stuff. And we would go, we were invited to a couple of, you know, my dad was a, you know, pretty high, I rank a guy, I guess, in a Ramco, Saudi Ramco's who he worked for. So he would get invited out to like some shake houses and things like that. We used to go. And I remember we would go there and my mother and sister would disappear. We'd say, okay, well, we'll see you tonight because they would go off with the women and we would go off with the men and we would sit down and, you know, they would bring in a goat on a, on a bed of rice and, you know, we'd have drank the Arabic tea and it was just, and we'd play chess. It was just so cool. And one time it would be in a kid, that's probably at a grand stage. This one guy had a stuffed Cobra fighting a mongas. I thought it was so cool. I'm like, oh, that's so cool. And it is cool. And it is cool. It is cool. You like it. You like it today. But in Arab culture, if you like something, they're inclined to give it to you. That's what I'm saying. You don't say they're the, and they're the best barters on the planet. Absolutely. They can talk you in or out of anything, man. I had the most. With a smile. With a smile. Make you want to do it. Yes. And you're like, take it. Take it. I was like, what happened? I sent you over here to get. I was like, oh, no, man. The guy was so smooth. He just freaking, I don't know what happened. I don't know what happened. I did it. I did it. My parent, my, I had it with me until we got back together that evening. Because when they kind of united the family, like my mom and sister were with the ladies. We were with the men. And when we got back together to leave, I'm holding this mongus. And I think my mom was like, we're not putting that in the house anywhere. Because obviously we'd have to put it in a prominent place in the house. I was going to say, because they put that on you. And like, hey, this is a big thing. My friend in my family, this has been a token. And you're like, oh, shit. You probably just got it out of some damn garage, right? But you, I mean, you got to be on a pedestal. It has to be. In case they come over. Yes. My friend, I see. That's a thing. 30 years later, they could show up at Houston. And we'd have to have the mom who was on a pedal to the middle of the dining room. They'll pass that shit down in their family. It would have to be. Like my great, great, grandpa that told me about the gift. Yes, yes. So my mom took, well, look at that. It was like, thank you so much. And my mom gave me the look. She had the look, right? So you had to look like you better release that snake right now because it's not going in the house. So we gave it back. But we had a great time over there. And then we moved back to Texas. I went to undergraduate at Stephen F. Austin up in Nacodoches. Lumberjack. Lumberjack, Axiom Jacks. And then we went to, after that, working Houston and Dallas, Austin and around. And then married an amazing woman. She just got her PhD at the time from U of H. So we moved over to Australia where she was going to be a guest lecturer for a year. We were at Bond University and Australia was so kick-ass. Where at in Australia? It's on the Gold Coast. Oh, I know it. Gold Coast. The best. The best. I mean, Hawaii on still. I almost didn't come back. We almost didn't either. We almost, we wanted to have our children in the United States. Can everyone stand far to get down there? Oh. It's a long way down there. Gorgeous. People are cool. Good beer. People. See, that's the only reason why I can't go down there. Real quick. I wanted to ask, did a Ramco have a compound for y'all women? Yes. So one of my dad's best friends was at that compound and that, at that time period. No way. Really? Yeah. And I can't, for the life, we have his photo album in August. You're going to find out what small the world is here. That'll be crazy if they know each other. When we're done, I want to get that photo album and get his last name because it's not coming to me right now. It's Randy something, but I mean, because he left the company that my dad and him worked at and he went to work for a Ramco and then they sent him to Saudi Arabia. And this would have been like 87, 88, 89, like in that timeframe. We were, I think we were backed by 87. Okay. I think we were backed by 80. Maybe 80, I have to do the math again. It's been a long time. Mom and dad are still alive. I was with them over the weekend. Yeah. Folks are still alive. My dad's been, you know, he's 80, he's made 82 in a couple months and his health's been challenging. So we're, we're going to make sure that, you know, I'm just spending more time. So I was up there this weekend having a lot of good food. Mom made my, so my mother's, my mother's side of the family is Syrian and my dad's size, like German Irish. So we, my mother made a kibby, kibby balls, which is like basically their lamb or beef with bulger wheat and garlic and you just, they're like little meatballs. Ah, I know what that I've had that before. I'm sure you've had it before. It's so good. So, I'm going to have to see if your dad knows him because that would be crazy. He used to mail me letters from Saudi Arabia and send pictures of the compound. It was a small compound and people knew everybody. So I mean, it was Dajaran in a Ramco, Saudi Ramco. Yeah. And we were there. It was really an amazing experience as a child to be able to go, you know, traverse the world because, you know, we went to Europe on the way there. We went over to China. We went, I mean, I was, I was still on the Great Wall when I was in middle school. Oh my gosh. And that was back when, like I couldn't believe the Olympics when they were in, in China and you're looking at Shanghai because when I was there, it was like the colonial three-story, four-story buildings. And then it's like massive, but everybody was running around like on bikes. Everybody had bikes. There were no cars. China was very different in the 80s versus now. Oh no. My cousin went as a missionary kid. By herself, her parents sent her to China in the late 80s. Oh my goodness. Yeah. And they duct taped Bibles to her torso. Oh sure. Yeah. And then put multiple dresses over her and sent her with strangers. That is, that is risky. That is, that Cajun, Cajun, I'm prariting. Yeah. It's like Mr. Gogig, I'm a Spartan bro. Like, I hope you make it back. Yeah. Oh my goodness. They sent her with her, they sent her with other adults and sent her into rural China. That's what I'm married into here in that. Yeah. Hunter only was real tough. You're a lot crazy. I can't believe we do the guys. It's so crazy. It's so crazy. You know, but it was, it was like such a really cool experience because, you know, when you travel around the world, you realize what a small place it is and how, how, you know, similar people are, right? People are at core, right? I mean, they're different, but they're at core and we made a lot of good friends, even to this day. In fact, one of my friends, my best friend in middle school in Saudi Arabia, his name's Hytham Assoon and Hytham's kind of unusual. What do you call him? We call him Hytham because if he's, Hytham, because it's just like, you know, it's, it's an unusual name even for over there. I've never heard anybody else ever named Hytham. Okay. So that's a thing. Must be like, man, is that a family name? It's like, nah, it's even weird over there. Yeah, it was, it's an unusual. Yeah. It was a straight. So, so, so fast. So, this is before internet, before all this other stuff. And when we got to high school, my folks moved us back to the United States. So, you know, at the, I think in eighth grade, we moved back. But Hytham went off to boarding school. We saw each other once or twice. Like we went to AstroWorld. He came visit me in Houston, went down to AstroWorld when that was still there. And then he, we just kind of lost each other because, you know, there's no internet. How great is AstroWorld? AstroWorld was the best. The Texas cyclone, baby. That was, that was, that was, that was one of the best rollercoasters ever. I feel like Texas gave us so many opportunities, even Houston to kill ourselves. And at the same time, we got through. It's making us great human beings, you know, to send out into the world. If that mark is there. Splashtown was there. Splashtown. And it had a, a, water world. Water world. Next to it. Well, there was, right next to it was WaterWorld. That's right. And there was a spot we found in the fence where you could get through to a water world. Inside knowledge for you city kids who had that, because when we came in, we would always hear about the secret gate. There was a play to get through. There was like a fence you could get through. It was like, WaterWorld was on the other side. So we would go to AstroWorld, sneak into WaterWorld, do our thing and get back into Africa. Why dropped off that edge one time? That was the edge, right? It was, they were that sucker that. Oh, I'm scared. The mess. That might have been a team guy, I mean. So, okay, as a team guy, you did the edge, right? Which is where you, it shoots you up in the air. It pushes you out with a siren and it drops you at like, you think you're going to go. You think you're dead. Yeah. When you come off the deal a little bit, I didn't, I was like, I don't want to, I'm going to leave you back down, take me back to the jeans. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. So did that have any, did you like that or would that also scare you? No. Oh, that's a big misconception with me. I still get those, those feelings. So that is interesting. Yeah, I still get them. This accomplished Navy SEAL. Yeah. Decorate Navy SEAL. Jumping on airplanes, doing all, like, I'm scared of the rides as we are. That's a real thing. Like, I still get that, that feeling is I just know what to do with it now. I've labeled it differently. Yeah. Tell us about, tell me about that. Like, how do you label it differently? That was different. That was real different for me having to mislabel one of my glands and what it does. Because everyone else around you says with the fear and supposed to back you down, well, that was me activating into that realm, that reality and it runs on a different fuel than my calm down fuel. Interesting. So I had to feel like, you know, we grew up as like super, super heroes and superpowers and stuff like that. You always talk about something. I'm a bigger man. Yeah. And I'm a bigger man with that. So when I would feel that activating into me, I would just assume that something, that would be my spidey sense. So then I would be like, okay, I'm on guard. Interesting. But I mean, it's still there. It's still there. You can switch it. I flipped the script and it taught me to deal with, we can't believe what did to me. Well, I think that's what's interesting because what you're saying, if I'm hearing it right, is you have the same responses that, because there's going to be like normal non-military people look at seals as like, oh, they're just different people completely. They don't, they just have a different, they don't, they don't have fear like we do, but you do. We do. We are. We're completely different. And the problem you'll find with us is like that fear, the normally will back you off, the harder you hit is like the Hulk. So the harder we're going to go to you, we'll actually will die. I see. Like you'll kill us out. Because it's just, man, you can tell me hit me if I go down, I'm going to get back up. Right. Because you don't get hit and get weak. You get hit and get harder. Strong. You just keep coming. You just keep coming. You can't even bite it. If you condition it, just right. Like if you try and throw too much weight on it, you'll crush it. It's not designed for that. It's slow, it's smooth, smooth, it's fast, right? Uh-huh. And I ask my athletes sometimes like, if I put a pound of weight on you, you could just do that. If I put a pound of weight for a week, and then I just added a pound every other week, you wouldn't even, I can get you. Don't even know it. I'll send you your hand. You have no idea what I can do. Yeah. You're just walking to the refrigerator and you get a... Most people don't take the time. They want it right now. But the body's not designed for that. Yeah. Because I think we're all into the instant gratification thing. Everybody wants it now and wants it perfect and all that stuff. But you know... And that's great. You've got to earn it. I mean, I think that that's the whole thing. And even like the survivor show, it was way harder than I thought it was. And I wasn't sure when you got out there, are they really not going to feed you? Is there really no place for the bathroom? We went... That's one of the questions I always get. It's like, where did you go to the bathroom? All of us went to the bathroom in the ocean. So the... There's always time the camera people wouldn't film you. You'd say you're going to a 10 one or a 10 two and you need to go to the ocean. A 10 one, we'd go on the bushes sometimes, but 10 two out in the ocean. You didn't eat much so you didn't go much. But you... It was so weird. Like... People can't fathom what that means. Your body will automatically drop into it. It just... Your body is trash into it. It just does. It was weird. Yeah. It was just... So you're out there floating in the water. And the most beautiful fajean water you've ever seen. Just gorgeous. I mean, like you've seen on the show if you watched it. It's like so pretty. And you're out there floating around. You're like, all right, well, this is so weird, but you just got... It was what you did. And you just kind of got used to it was your thing. And everybody did it. We got used to the tides. So you would be having conversations on like day three with, you know, Janine and Ellie. You're like... It gets back in the day how they came up with title charts. Baby, they... Bathroom schedule. You had to know where it was going. Yeah, where are you doing? It's my time to go to Bathroom. Yeah, it's like, okay. This is the time. But one day I was out there and my daughters made me promise before I went out there, do not make it on the show. Okay? And they're like, Papa, do not do that. I'm like, okay, I promise I won't. So survivor, they pick your clothes too. So you send a big box of your clothes that you want to wear and they pick whatever they want you to wear or what you... So you don't know what you're going to get. And one day when we're in the pre-camp, the pre-game, you know, they get you up at all hours at the night. You're standing in those little tents. It's so hot and uncomfortable sleeping at night. I used to get my shirt all wet, my t-shirt, sleep naked in there. And I just put my wet shirt, a t-shirt on me, because it was the only way I'd be cool enough to go to sleep. And then one day, like three in the morning, Ding Ding Ding Ding, they get you up, you go down the child line and they hand you a bag. The wardrobe hands you a bag. And that's what you're going to wear. And I was like, oh my gosh, I can't wait to see what they gave me. I hope I got my lucky shirt. I'm like, oh, it's here. My pain. I have my lucky... So I got... I was really happy with my gear. You put all your stuff on and out the door you go. And that's it. You see everybody in there. And that's when you kind of see the personalities too, because you're like, okay, they've got that on. Or they've got this. You kind of get to kind of... Oh, that tells a story. It does tell a story. It does. Absolutely. Oh my gosh. Okay. So to bring us back, we were in Australia. Yes. You were... Is that how we get into that hole? Yeah. I know. So Australia. It always does that too. Australia, you don't... Down under for a reason. With Steve Irwin. So, yes. My wife's teaching at Bond University. We go down there and I've always been fascinated with nature shows. And my parents always watch the mutual little host of stuff. I know that's... Nobody knows what that is anymore, but it was way back in the day. And I love fierce creatures. I've always like sharks, alligators, snakes, crocodiles, whatever. So obviously, at the time we were there, Steve Irwin was just getting discovered by a discovery channel. It's important to find him. Somebody found him. It was starting to film him. But at the time, he lived in a little muddy, paddock farm place up in Beerwa, which is about an hour north of Brisbane on the road. Great name. Beerwa. Yeah. We have to Australia. What do they do there? Beerwa. Yeah. So we drove up there. And I didn't have a job. My wife was teaching at the university and... I was a trophy husband. That's what I like to say. That was my job. That's trouble. So I'm glad this is on radio. Because you can... But we would go... I went up there and I met Steve Irwin. I wanted to interview you for a job to feed the crocodiles. And he was nice enough to come out and meet me, shake my hand. Terry came out to his amazing wife. We had a wonderful conversation just like when I met you guys today. Really nice. And then I was like, hey, I want to feed the crocodiles. And he took one look at me and he said, you know, you would feed the crocodiles. You would feed them your arm. And then you yourself. Because if you didn't grow up with these things, you don't. And he went into this whole... He spent a lot of time with me actually. And he was like, see, a lot of your thumb. That's how big their brain is. Even though they're gigantic. And there's this biggest crocodile that he got, he rescued. And it's out of his paddock. It was called Aco. And it was about 22 feet long. And it literally, it's back was about almost three feet high laying on its stomach on the ground. And it was about four foot wide and 22 feet long. And crocodiles can strike half the length of their body. So if you're within 11 feet of the shore, Aco, you're in range of Aco, which is mind-blowing. I mean, a massive dinosaur. And you know, and all you would see in the water were like pea-sized bubbles, little tiny bubbles. And Steve Irwin knew exactly where he was based on the bubbles. He knew which end it was. He knew where it was. And I mean, he grew up with these things. He played with them when he was a little kid. His dad taught him Bob, Bob Irwin. And Steve taught his children until he passed. But just a remarkable guy really changed the world. He left his imprint on the world. And I was blessed and grateful to meet him. And we've been fans of his ever since. It was a wonderful time. Guys, do you feel like it's harder to get in shape and stay that way? Our sponsor, Nugenics Total Tea, is offering a complimentary bottle when you text 231-231 and our keyword teen queue. If you're struggling to find energy throughout the day, just know that you're not alone. Ones are made everywhere experience a drop in their testosterone levels as they get older, leaving them feeling drained and unmotivated. If you want more energy to counter the physical effects of aging, Nugenics Total Tea, Test Ostrum Booster, with Test Affin, will help you turn back the clock, re-energize your workouts, and get you those great results you really want to see at the gym. Now get a complimentary bottle of Nugenics Total Tea when you text 231-231 with keyword T-N-Q. Text now and get a bottle of Nugenics Thermo, their most powerful fat incinerator ever, with key ingredients to help you get back in shape fast, absolutely free. Text 231-231 and our keyword T-N-Q. 231-231 keyword T-N-Q. Texting enrolls you in the recurring messages, consensus not required to purchase, and text a message and data reads may apply. Text So, from Australia, where did y'all go? Well, after Australia, we wanted to have our children in the United States. We almost stayed down there. We almost stayed because we loved Australia. The people were amazing. We still have friends to this day that live down in Australia. I feel like they don't give up on you. They tell Australians it's like a rash with us. Once you get them, hey, we're friends for life. You're in, you're in. I've got friends down there. I found out a funny story. One New Year's Day was with a buddy of mine named Richie. Richie's whole family played rugby, and he was like six, seven, pretty big guy. His family number was number seven. So we woke up New Year's Day after what we said we woke up. We probably were still up New Year's Day morning, and there's a tattoo place. We're like, let's go get a tattoo. I'm like, all right. So, I went and got a little shark on my back, a little shark. And being a typical American, they draw it on. I'm looking in the mirror. I'm like, you know, I think I'd like it about a centimeter higher. And I just kind of moved it a couple times. And Australians are really chill out, right? They're like, oh, just whatever. You do it, mate. You got it. So, they held Richie's turn. I was like a total pain. I moved them all around and make sure it's in the right spot. So Richie gets down there. He's like, hey, I made up like a Japanese number seven, and it looks like this. And he had a picture of it. So he showed it to the tattoo artist and looks at me and he's like, go to work and the tattoo artist stencils in on. He's like, you want to see it? Like your friend here that thought 25 times, he's like, no, mate, I'm good. Just aren't going. So he's going and tattooing on the Richie's back. And Richie's looking at me like, how's it going? I'm like, looks great. The tattoo guy is like beaming with pride because it looks awesome. And then it gets done and he hands Richie the mirror and Richie looks at the mirror on his back and his face goes sheet white. It was upside down because there's Japanese. I don't know what it would look like, but luckily a Japanese number seven kind of looks like an L. So upside down kind of looked like a seven and he got kind of lucky. So the next time I go down there, we were joking, he's going to get to upside down number eight because you can't mess it up. Oh my gosh. How funny. That is crazy. There's some good ones. Like you get online and looking some of the tattoos that people have gotten where the you can tell some of the artists got pissed at whoever was on the table. Hook them up. Everyone to piss that dude off or a female. You don't want to piss your. No, you want to be. I love my artist. Our name is Darshan Nut. I'm going to see her on Saturday to finish my my forearm sleeve and she's been fantastic. And you know, when you see it, I know you've got a lot of work done. You if it's the same artist, you've spent a lot of time with them. So in our community, you can't go to him. His name is nobody. That's his name. So when people like, where do you get? Who does your anger? Like nobody. Nobody. You can't walk in. You have to go earn your paint. It's called war paint. So earn your paint. He'll all the team guys that went out and our generation, like you hear these battles that our guys got in and then it would make his way to him and he would draw up in his mind when he said what he saw. Really? And then you would get a call from him. He'd like it's time to go see nobody. So he'd fly out there. That's amazing. And when you walk out, I had no idea. And then when I showed up in there, he had it all laid, it had paper like this. It came over. He's like, this is what we're going to do. I was kind of looking. I'm like, you're nobody? He's like, yes. And yeah, I spent a lot of time with him. Oh my gosh. The Wizard of Oz, he's like, you can just peek behind the curtain to see the wizard. Never paid one dime. And he draws stuff. He draws it all up and puts it on you and then you leave. That's so cool. That is amazing. I never knew that. That is amazing. He's real top secret in our community. He obviously made that. Yeah, no, that's awesome. That's cool. It's really cool. Yeah, it is good. Okay, so you're back to America. Okay, back to America. We had our beautiful daughters. I got working at the time. I was doing advertising when I came back because I didn't know exactly what I was going to do. And I just was kind of lost a little bit and didn't know really, I'm like, you know, the meaning of life, what am I really doing in here and everything? I felt like I wanted to kind of, not that there's anything wrong with advertising. It's great. But it's like, I just was like, I wanted to do something more direct with people and a friend of mine is a roommate, Ned. He was a nurse. All I knew about Ned is he could do a great keg stand. But Ned, they had to got hired. Their guys are fun to have around. They're always fun to have around. It was always good to have around. I have one of them. I have one of them. Yeah, that's right. So Ned would, Ned one day was talking to me and I was like, you know, I'm going to lamenting kind of like, yeah, you know, I don't know what I'm doing or whatever. He goes, okay, but come with me, man. You might like this. So we got hired out of the hospital to work for an orthopedic company doing Nip and knee and hip replacements. Keg stand guy. Keg stand guy. That's the guy you want for that. That's the guy you want. And it was amazing. So one day he goes, come with me right with me one day. So I remember I met him at 3.30 in the morning. We drove out to college station to St. Joseph Hospital. And I watched a bilateral knee replacement, which was like, you know, the surgery I work in now, it's like very elegant, very, you know, there's like two tiny little holes in the groin and you know, you go home the next day, there's no incisions type thing. This is like building a deck out of human parts, you know, it's like, or the big surgery was like, oh my God. I just love that thing. Yeah. And I'm the, and I'm the type of guy that like I have to like lay down if I'm going to give blood. I got, you know, I'm not needles are no problem with you, but it's somehow given blood gives me the willies. But I can watch a surgery and do it, cause they had a chair for me because they don't know how you're going to react when you see a surgery. And I was just fascinated. And I was like, that's what I'm getting into that somehow. And I didn't have a medical background. I just had, I did get a master's when I was down at, I did go to school at Bond University in Australia down there, post grad, but it wasn't medical related. And at the time I was like, you know, we're in Houston. My father was in oil, working at a Ramcoat. And I was, you know, I'm like, well, I'm going to get into medical device cause like Ned and medical device is infinite, right? There's, there's every single thing that is in a medical hospital. Somebody makes it, somebody sells it and somebody teaches doctors and nurses how to use it and stuff like that. So it took me a year or two. I got in there and, you know, the harder you worked, the luckier you get, I worked hard. I was a full time guy during the day. I was a full time student at night. I went to anatomy classes, went to training classes, everything I could do. And some of the doctors in the med center, Dr. Alan Lumsen, Zonko Krasier, Bizmajik, Biz Wojik Carr, they're still there now. They're legends, legends. And they pulled me under their wing and I worked for, you know, they brought me in and there was this new brand new technology called EVAR, endovascular inurism repair, where to fix an abdominal aortic aneurysm, normally they would have to cut it open, you know, and then work on that, but now they can go in through the groin and put a, basically, a covered stent. So the blood goes through the aneurysm, through the tube, depressurizes the sac. That's super cool. So that was, but it was, you know, kind of a high risk in the beginning because technology when it's new, it's always that way. But you were putting these large catheters through the legs and we had, you know, the complications and things that I learned from these amazing doctors and clinicians and nurses and texts that showed me. And then in 2011, this brand new technology called TAVR, trans aortic valve replacement, came out and let me go back to the EVAR thing. So in EVAR, we work very closely with our docs and Dr. Allen Lumsen is the chief at Methodist right now, was going to get a new partner joining him. And with a very close team that we work with in the operating room. So I was like, well, who is the doctor coming in? I want to know their name because, you know, if you're joining us, if I'm going to, I want to know them. He goes, his name is Hytham Hasoon. No way. Way. Oh my God. I'm like, Hytham, that's what I go. Is he a tall? I find a lot of them walking around. Yeah. He talked about that earlier. Yes. And I'm like a tall Lebanese guy. And he's like, yeah, he goes, he's a Johns Hopkins. I go, give me his cell phone right now. Let's call him. So we call up, I haven't talked to the guy. I didn't even know. So think about it. Endobascular surgery, I go into medicine, which is infinite, goes into vascular surgery. Again, pretty big goes into endobascular surgery, specializes in EVAR. I go into medical device, infinite, get into vascular surgery, endobascular surgery, EVAR. So I call him up immediately. I know it's his voice. It's like, you don't talk to you right now. I'm like, I recognize your voice. I'm like, he's like, hello? I'm like, hey, bro, it's Gabler. And he's like, no way. I'm like, nope. I'm about to blow your mind. I'm your rep. Oh my God. It was just like crazy. So then, Hytham I reconnected and we've been best friends ever since. We just got back from Vegas. We were there for the Super Bowl for his birthday just like weeks ago. And so that was amazing. And then this new thing called Taver Transaortic Bow Replacement was coming out. It's coming to Edwards Life Sciences. So I moved over to that and it's been a miraculous. In fact, that's part of the reason why I'm here with you guys today because we've taken care of so many patients, many of them were veterans. And one of the patients that I was not, I didn't personally take care of, but our team did. His name is Lester Tenney. He's since passed, but Lester Tenney was a World War II hero who survived the baton death march. And in fact, if you back up a little bit, so Lester knew that the winds of war were blown in the late 1930s. So he volunteered, joined the army, joined the tank corps, got stationed in the Philippines and was going to be done with his four years of service by January 1942. Well December 7, 1941, Japanese Bon Pearl Harbor, and we were in the war and he got stuck down there. They fought to the last bullet and the last food, they had nothing left and they were still ready to fight on. And Lester was very firm about telling me that about 20 times. Like we did not, we were ordered to surrender because it would have been a slaughter otherwise. But the Japanese did not, it was culturally was different. So they, he went on a 70, the baton death march was 75 miles through the jungle. No, no, no water, no food. If you collapsed, bad things happened to you. You, you were, you were killed. So Lester, and I asked Lester about it. I was like, I got to meet Lester. I knew Lester for, for many years, but Lester, I was like, how did you do that attitude wise? He's like, I would look to the next bend in the road and I would just tell myself to get there and I'd go to the next bend and I'd get there. 75 miles later he got to his prison camp where he was there for several years and he thought about his wife because he got married right before he went on this, before he enlisted and married his sweetheart. And then he was taken on a slave ship to Japan where he works as a slave laborer for two years and was, was almost done. He almost expired there. It was down to about a hundred pounds. And he witnessed with his own eyes because his slave laborer camp was across the harbor from Hiroshima and he saw the, the atomic bomb of his own eyes. He writes about it in his book. Lester wrote two books. One book was called My Hitch in Hell about his experiences at POW as a, as a, as a fighter, POW and then coming back and then he wrote another one called The Curves Remember about PTS. And Lester was in, had a heart condition, he was about 86 years old and the Japanese government had offered a, to fly over the remaining veterans for formal apology to Japan. But Lester didn't have the health to do it. So Lester being Lester isn't going to take no for an answer. So he got research and clickety-clack online and he found the scripts at, at, at the trial for sapien heart bouts, transcatheter heart bouts. And he qualified and he got his heart fixed. But this was experimental. It was a trial at the time, went over to Japan, got his apology, came back, went to the FDA in Congress with us and petitioned for this technology because it worked so well. And 800,000 hearts later, it's still going, it's on our, on our fifth generation and Lester, Lester lived seven more years with his heart valve. And he got to know Lester for seven more years. And he was, he's a great man and one of the reasons on Survivor, I think it's episode seven, I was on an endurance challenge where you have to hold on tight. Like I would have used that chain thing. It would have been good for me. I've just changed all that. But I have pretty strong forearms and I was holding on. And the first couple of minutes of it was really painful and I was just like, Oh gosh, the record for it in the 22 year season was, was 25 minutes. So I'm holding on with my good buddy Cody and everybody else had knocked out by that point, everybody tapped out and Cody was hanging on tight. I'm like, Cody, hang on man. You know, we've been like 10 minutes in here now and our arms are shaking and I was, you know, I'm like, Oh my gosh, I don't know if I'm going to be able to go. And I started tapping in to Jeff, Jeff probes to ask me, he goes, Gabe, but what are you thinking about? And I go, I'm thinking about our heroes thinking about Lester, Tenny, our patients and thinking about, you know, veterans and instantly pain went away. I just got like my spirit exploded. And then you'll see me on the show holding on with one arm, shaking a little bit of blood back in my fingers, pointing at Cody. We went past 25 minutes, 30 minutes, 35 minutes, 45 minutes. Cody finally let go and I was still hanging on. And we broke the all time record for that. And that was my first individual immunity win, but it's, it's, it's probably how we got here today and I will, we'll toast Lester to that because without Lester, I don't know that I would have, you know, without Lester, with Taver, without, with survivor, the veterans here. So it's, it's an amazing world that God's planned for us and God brought us together. That's so cool. Wow. Yeah, man, you harnessed one of them warriors. Yeah. Yeah. That's right. Sucker gets you right. Got me right. I did a, I started doing a minute for everybody. I was like, this next minute is for my, my Navy SEAL buddies that went to high, I went to high school with us next minutes for my furry face son, my dog, Texas. I did a minute for Idaho, a minute for Alaska, a minute for, so I just kept doing things like that. And it's amazing when you, you know, there's a book I read years ago called Man's Search for Meaning by Victor Frankel. Have you ever read that? It's awesome. It's, so he was a Holocaust survivor and he was in Auschwitz and he was, he was a psychologist before he went in there. And you lost his family, lost, you know, went through, we could talk for hours about Victor Frankel, but he, what he, he survived the Holocaust and he wrote a book about logo therapy and what he called it logo therapy. And he said, I do know, I know exactly what you're talking about, though. Man can survive anything and woman if you can find meaning in your suffering. And you know, like right now if you put a flame under my, under my buddy Justin's hand here, you're going to move it away because you're going to ouch. But if that was for your son, you'd burn your hand off. So it was by me kind of channeling our heroes and things that were important to me. It gave me strength beyond my strength, you know, that's awesome. That's why our women are so powerful. That's a, that's a fact. That's right. My love. So when you did survivor, when did you decide that you were going to give your winnings away? If you went. What a great question. So the first thing, you know, I was, I love the show. So I'm a big fan and I always told my wife and kids before I turned 50, I'm going to apply for the show. So it's like 49 and 10 months. And my wife's like, if you're going to do this thing about turning 50 next, we're going to a couple months, you better go. So who's the oldest still? Is Rudy hold that? Rudy's the oldest. 72. Still right. Oh, yeah. 72. Because he's a badass. That's 20 years from now. He's one of ours. He's not enough to get Rudy was a seal. Oh, yeah. He's one of the original seals. He's like, I'm freaking nice to you, man. You only going to take his spot here. I want you from the grave. Dude, Rudy is 72. I can't even imagine. He's my, he's mean. That's, he was the real deal. Like real. Real. Yeah. And even Rudy on the show, you know, people like building the huts and doing stuff. Rudy just go sleeping the bushes. He didn't care. He covered. He can't come take her stuff. He was a, he was a bad. Our master. Little mass cheese man. He could have been a head of him. He could have been. Yeah, it was Rudy's the oldest ever. I think we could still go back to the team and just be like the master chief. Yeah. And he was, he was team two. Like, oh, there's a big debate on who the first seal team was because of the time change. Team two got it. It's on the east coast. Oh, yeah, we got all kinds of ravaries in our houses. It's like Hogwarts. It's like Hogwarts in there. You can't even believe it. That's the hint of stuff we don't tell anybody about really, but sure. And then you got those bad asses from each command who the reputations come off of. Oh, yeah. As the culture, it's the culture. They lead the culture. They lead it. I can't. They started it and then they haunt us if you don't keep that going up and then it crosses over because we, we interrupt. So you got the greeny beanies over there and some of our boys work together. We've got some great ops that you just know. Usually, you don't hear about them. If you walk in, they'll be painted on the wall or something. People, it's like the past downs. Like the Native Americans do it. They just, you don't want to mess up, man. Yeah. Yeah. Story, legends and stories. That's right. That's right. So Rudy is a legend. So if it's, yeah. He's a survivor legend. He's a seal legend. Yeah. That's pretty legendary right there. He's a double legend. All around legend. Okay. So that's when you decided we're talking about you giving your. So I put together my video, send it in and I made it for friends and family to be fun. It's like, if you Google give VHS. Bro, do VHS? It was not VHS. Man, I could have done it that way. That got you recognized quick. Can you imagine I had a big old VHS take the camcorder and I'm like, Hey, Jim, that would have been hilarious. Come on. I mean, if you and I were sitting there and one of them came sliding across, you'd be like, that would be hilarious. Who sent this? That would be hilarious. So we sent that in and of course they called me back and they're like, you know, I thought it was a spam call because you know, you keep getting like this three one. Oh, number keeps calling me and I'm like, I'm not listening to messages and it's like, Hey, but this is a survivor calls back. And I'm like, which one of my buddies, wives is this calling me and pulling my leg or something and they sure enough it's survivor. I call them and how do you verify that? Because I mean, just what you just said makes sense. They're like, man, whatever. You got a bunch of jokers you hang out with, right? Like you can't believe. I can't even them under that. So you think we're crazy. The next generation is even worse. Oh, yeah. We got some good ones. Oh, yeah. So I was like, there's no way. But I called her back and her name was Deanna and I called her back and she's a dear friend obviously and she's like, Hey, we love your video. We want you to try to get out of your fire. So by the time they selected me to go on, my wife, I've got my wife on my roommates from college, his name is Muzzy and he was a veteran. And we were like, you know, if you went, you're not going to win. You're not going to win number one. First, you're not going to win. But if you do win, what do you do with the money? We were like, well, maybe we'll do something funny. Like get a zappling and throw cupcakes at the city for whatever. We're just making jokes. And then we do that too. We can't believe it. Yeah. So I know you all do. You know, we do. So then he was like, you know, what if you do something important for the money and Joanna, my wife was like, yeah, that why don't you do something important with the money? We've been blessed. You know, I've got a great career and yeah, we got two daughters going to college. We could you ever could use money. And I was like, and then we started talking to go, you know, what's important? And you know, veterans are a big part of my father, Robert Gabler and my uncles, my one of my uncles was a CB in Vietnam. And my other one, my other my uncle Fred guard the team of the unknown soldiers. So I mean, I have a really, really, Fred, she have, Fred, she have. And we're going to wear without the sea. These guys legit and the sea. Seby's went with you guys. The tomb guards are legit stuff. Like really, it's hard to get that. What's your dad do in the army? He was a green beret. He was in the reserves, green beret reserves. And he only got out because I was born. My mother was pregnant with me because his team was going back and my granddad for also Fred, she had grabbed my dad basically by the scruff of the snack and said, you know, your child's going to be born in three months. You need to stay here with my daughter now and raise your family. And you know, that was, that's all the more reason why we'll talk about some charities and a little bit why some of my choices are what they are because to take care of veterans families or the fallen. But so that's what he did. And then, so we were talking with Joanna and my buddy Muzzy about what to do with the winnings. If we want it, we said, okay, veterans charities. So I go on the show, Joanna, I don't talk to her for six weeks because that's, you know, radio silent. I come back, you know, about 35 pounds light and I'm super skinny. She's me at the airport. And, you know, we shed a tear to, she never, I've never been that small since she met me because I was, I was smaller than I was in high school when I got back. And, you know, so, you know, we shed a tear and I'm like, she's like, did you win? She signed all the stuff that I did. So I only could tell like a couple people. And one of them was, obviously my wife. So I'm like, I won. She's like, oh my God. And I go, I hope you're okay with what we talked about because I did that too. Oh my gosh. She was. And also just thinking about doing something bigger than yourself drove me on those cold nights, hot days, hungry days, all those kind of things because I wasn't just trying to win for me. I was trying to win for a patient population and a group that I care deeply about. And that's kind of how it all came about. And we were, then I had to sit on that for six months because I couldn't tell it until the last show was airing. So you go through this big experience, you can't talk about it. The only people I told was my wife. And I told my parents because my father's not been in great health and I wanted to be sure that he knew what was going to go. Because I donated the money and his name and wanted to make sure he knew about those things. And it was remarkable. And we were at Justin's house. Justin and Susan, my sister hosted us for the finale, sat on the couch right between his parents and my parents. They were in the catbird seat and it was unreal, man. It is. It was unreal. It is. It's powerful. How about that, huh? It was, you know, we didn't say much, but it was just- How long did you take it? Come on, the ass kickin'. I'm still coming off it a little bit, to be honest. I just, I mean, cause some of it, you know, when you're really hungry, you eat all of your fat, you eat all your muscle, you start eating your muscle and then you start to pull from places in your body. And some of the, like, like, I threw my back out when I got back. I kind of herniated a little bit of a disc, not on the show, but when I got back. And it didn't rupture, just herniated it, but I had, like, some numbness down my leg, pursuit with painful at first. That was something like right when I got kind of got back. But I think the spinal column is, all the fluid is fat. So your body kind of pulls and I'm the doctor of the orthopedic I was talking with, said that, well, you know, your, your discs are a little bit compressed. So I've been doing yoga and stretching and I've gone to a chiropractor to kind of get and doing all my PT and stuff too to get back. So hard for me to get into that damn routine. I got to do that too, man. The stretching part. Why is that? What is that? You know, I read, um, I mean, like, I really have a tough time getting into that part of it. Yeah. And I have two markets. And the reason is because when we go to work out, if you're not throwing weight, not working out. Yeah. And the other time doing that other stuff, that got drilled in. Yeah. Stretching is like, okay, that's what I do. And then I work out. I always stretch out if I get hurt. Why would I tell you? Right. Then you stretch it out, you know, and also always been very flexible. Like my, my, my, what I'm like, he. He, yeah, his flexibility is off the charts without stretching. Wow. It's working the same way. Mm hmm. Wow. But he, they also did a real bust up now though. They did martial arts as kids in all the way up until, I mean, just a few years ago. So they always had that like, that leg movement and the other day, man. So I'm feeling like punk, but what happened? I don't know. You just got some swelling in there. No, I tore my, my meniscus. He has to have surgery on April's. Jumping tall building a suit. Yeah. Yeah. Jumping jumping out of your track. That was a game fight. And then I got my shark. And then. Yeah. You were wrestling with Joe Rogan. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I saw Jody kick my ass and then it hit a, it hit a something. Make up some story that's better than with the original. I know. It's like, it's like stepping out of the bath wrong. You're like, that's, that's what we all know. That's probably what happened. But I ask people all the time and they're like, uh, I'm like, bro, you gotta have something on the hook for that. Like immediately the catches people. That's an icebreaker too. That's right. Cause as you take that injury and someone asks you a question, if you throw something out and they're not ready for it, probably make them laugh. It's, yes. And then they'll be like, tell me more. That's right. That's right. So I've been, you know, I read, um, David Goggins's book can't hurt me. You can't, you can't hurt that guy. He's unreal. And that's what I had to grow up with. Yeah. People are like, what a motivates you. How did you get the, do you, I have the same people to motivate me to motivate you all. David Goggins, Jacco, that's who I had to come up with around and under. Did you, do we whip Jacco? I knew them the whole, my whole career and their reputations perceived them. Yeah. And Goggins. They're all very close friends. That's amazing. I know. What cool group of, aren't they? It's so cool. They're just assholes, right? Oh, yeah. Well, yeah, yeah. Way to be so cool guys. Yeah. Good for you. You see how quickly Marcus turned that around from cool guys, the, oh, you're so good. Yeah. You got to throw a dig. Yeah. You got a total at the end, man. I'll slide that in there quick, man. I am a team guy. Boy, it's a movie, boys. Boy, it's a movie, boys. So how cool is it that your wife agreed to give that money away? Because that's a huge chunk of change to just be coming in. So for her to pay that off on the backside, I don't like she got a vacation or something. Yeah. Yeah. If you slide a middle way, she's going to be like, well, and you were gone for all that time. She's amazing. Yeah. That's awesome. We're past that point. She's unicorn status. She's unicorn status. She's unicorn status. That's what we talked about. Yeah. So at what point did you realize which charities you were going to donate to? So I had talked to some of my veteran buddies about things that had helped them with, you know, PTS and traumatic brain injury, suicide epidemic, all the above, right? So I started researching them when I got back in June. And I put together a short list of about 30 that's now about 10, 15 maybe. And one of the ones is the Special Operations Warrior Foundation that takes care of the children of fallen Special Operations folks like Delta, seals, Rangers, Green Brays, all the above. And that was important to me because like I said, my father, my granddad, got my dad, you know, kept him home. And a lot of his friends went and some of them didn't come back, right? Or came back with, I mean, I remember one kid, I was probably five years old and good-looking blonde guy. And you know, prosthetics back in the 70s were ridiculous, right? So he had like a hook, a mannequin, right? Like mannequin hands. Yeah, it was like he literally had a hook. He had a hook and he came over to the house and I was like, what is like, you know, my mother's reading Peter Pan to me at bedtime with a hook. And I'm like, why does your friend have a hook's hand? Of course, kids say the damnest things, right? And he was a really cool guy. I don't remember who his name was, but he was just in, that was, that stayed with me too. And then I reached out to, well, Ben Drybergen was also one survivor. He was one season 35 and Ben was a Marine and he was in Fallujah and other places and he had very serious PTS. In fact, they were burning bamboo logs on the beach and bamboo has these air pockets in it when they get hot. They pop really loud and Ben was walking around one morning and all of a sudden this log just goes, boom! And you know, Ben just, you know, as you do, right? He just jumped down and just, you know, they did a confessional with Ben talking about it. And when I was watching Ben as a fan, I was like, you talked about how important, you know, to help out veterans, PTS and suicide prevention. And he mentioned a charity that he was involved with, which is called Veterans Exploring Treatment Solutions. And Marcus Capone is the Navy Seal and his wife Amber, they started a foundation because Marcus had tried everything. The end of the VA, they gave him basically Ambien and whatever else and it just, it wasn't, nothing was working. And he was just, couldn't talk about it. He was just, had so much to deal with and was, you know, suicidal himself. And he got, he was like, nothing's working. And one of his friends told him about ayahuasca and he went down and it changed him profoundly and allowed him to get back to himself. And so that is an organization we're absolutely going to be supporting. I've become friends, you know, loosely with those guys just talking and I look forward to work with them. In fact, we just, so when I got back to, when the game ended, I had six months until the finale and during that time we were debating whether we should start either a foundation or a fund. A foundation takes a lot of work to run and it was something where, you know, people could donate to it. There's benefits to it and things. There's so many great foundations out there like Amber and Marques' and others that we decided to create a direct access fund, a DAF. And we created that in the fall last year and then the money when it was given to us in late December, we rolled it right into the DAF. So the million dollars got parked in there, which was very important because if I would have taken the million dollars, I would have had to pay 350 taxes. By putting it into the DAF, minimal taxes, maximal donations, which was very important. So Joanna helped me find out, she not only agreed to this and helped come up with the idea, but she helped me navigate this DAF and that's where the money's parked and we're starting to cut checks out just now. And I'll keep you guys posted on where they go. But those are two of the organizations and there's, there's every one of them is fantastic and I wish I had, you know, I'm out going on like a dozen more shows and win because there's so many great groups to give to. We love the compones. We love the compones. That's from the right spot. Yeah, fantastic. And do you agree, you like those two? Yes. Okay. You just mentioned to the right spot. Awesome. You'll be fine. They're good there. So those names you threw out are locked legit. Yeah, both of them. It's right away. Yeah. Specifically, like we know the compones very well. Do you really? And yeah, they do do a lot of amazing work. Wonderful. Well, I'm really excited. I haven't met them. I've just talked to Amber and Marcus on the phone a couple times and we text every once while and I'm feeling once we start working together here. You have fun with us. You're going to love them. Oh, good. Well, Amber seems like a sweetheart. She's really cool. She's awesome. Yeah, that's great. Yeah. If you ever need help, you can't miss that sucker. You want to? These big two? Just like that. Oh, these guys so big. I thought I was regular. I don't like the shortest guy in the room. And my first couple of teams, I was a small guy. Amazing. There's something in that era that we came through that was in the water. In the water. Yeah, we love the compones. Yeah, if you ever need help vetting any organizations too, I've been through. Oh, okay. Everybody sends us information about what's legit. I love that. Thank you, Melody. You appreciate that. She's the compass on that. You bet. Okay. That's a good deal. I've got hunters' details. So I'll send you the list of what I've got. And you just tell me if you like them all. Well, thank you for doing this and for sharing your story. It was so much fun. It went by like a blink. I mean, that was just like, I don't know, it just seems like you guys are just the easiest growing people. My average brother. I've actually got a question as well. So you said you'd break in that one record earlier in the game. And I know that you actually also broke another one starting the fastest fire. Yes, sir. Is there any other ones that you broke? I did. I've got a few records. So I've got, I'm the second oldest player to ever win in 52. The oldest player to win was 57. It's Bob from season 17. And I'm the oldest player in the new era. Again, I got to take that little jab. I got it, man. Oh, and I know that's why it's there. I got, let's see, I got that one. I got the record for fire. I broke the all-time record for fire by about 50 seconds, which, you know, 20 years, 42 seasons. And I was on the 43rd season. And all through the season, I couldn't make fire. But then I had to do this contest. And bam, I kept it. I kind of kept it under my, because, you know, in Survivor, it's a game of if you're too good, Marcus is a great swimmer. It's like, mmm, swimming contest at the end. Maybe we got a good read. Yeah, right. Absolutely. So I kind of kept it under my hat a little bit. Nice. And then it was time to do fire. And it was like, if Joanne and I talked about it, she was, because, you know, wardrobe came out, you know, we're getting ready to go. And making fires one thing, like making fire in your house, in your yard or whatever is one thing. I'm an outdoors guy. I'm out in the mountains all the time. Love it. But making fire in front of a wall of cameras with Jeff Probst, 10 feet away, is a little different. And it was just so crazy, because I got up there. I wore my same challenge outfit that I wore, which was my, like, Reno 911 short shorts, my long sleeve camouflage shirt. And I just, I got the fire going. And Joanna told me, like, if you get to the end, you got to make fire to win. It goes, don't forget, you can cut your beard off if we need more tender to get in there. And I almost, and I was like, that had been hardcore. But it would be crazy. It would be hard. I actually thought, if you'd have been like, oh, but then I, but then I have a fire. I thought about it. But I was like, drop the mic. Do you know how you should have some hair on some other mode? Yeah. Give me a timmy. Get a fire on the summer movie. There you go. Right there. Go down. Don't showboat. Don't be like that guy that, you know, the Enzo, you know, who gets the interception. He's on the one yard line about to score the winning Dutch and they swaddened out the ball out. I was like, just focus, win. Don't do anything else. And, and it was kind of a tricky one because, you know, like we mentioned, we all got very close with each other on the island. And my good buddy, Jesse, is who I had to go battle fire against Jesse's story. He's amazing too. He was a, you know, grew up hard on the streets of LA. Was in a gang, was in juvenile home and decided to turn his life around. And he ended up getting into Berkeley. He had kind of a spatial tattoos removed and things. There's a charity that takes care of that. Then he went to Duke, got a PhD, two amazing families, married his high school sweetheart. And he was right next to me making fire. And on, on the in survivor, usually you vote people out the tribe does where it's like, it's a, it's like a silent vote. And all of a sudden we're like, I'm sorry, Melody, the tribe is spoken. You're, you're out. And it's, it's, it's a bummer and it's sad. But when I was with Jesse, like I beat him one on one and he was my good friend. I respect his story and everything else. And it was, it was kind of a weird, that was, that was one that kind of took a little bit of processing because, you know, and I, in fact, when I, when I, when the fire burnt the rope, he was really, you know, down on himself at that point. And I grabbed him and just kind of gave him a big hug and pulled him up and I'm like, dude, you're, we're all proud of you. Families proud of you because we all were and they are. And, but that was cool, you know, so the fire was, was one of them. And I think there was, there may have been one or two out there too, but the, the grip challenge, the fire challenge, second oldest and oldest. And there's probably one or two out there. I don't know. But it was, it was good. It was an amazing season. Super fun. Aww, so fun. So there's nothing to keep you unmotivated. It's like, cause you know how it is when you're out there and there's only only, the only thing to do is just the only thing to do. Yes. So about that time when that rubs in, they, cause they get you just enough to get pissed at it. Like, hey, yes, right. And then it goes smashing in there. And then it goes smashing in there. Hey, I'll attack. That's right. Exactly right. I figured. Exactly right. I know that routine. Yes. Yeah. It's, it's desired. It's very well-desired to strip you down and. It teaches you the, the bare necessity. It does. It does. The discipline part, if you got that, you can have anything. It's just out the discipline part and you try to teach them everything else. They won't get anything. Discipline is the key. That's the key to everything, right? Yeah. So what's next for you? Wow. This year I'm back. So I love what I do. I absolutely love what I do. That's one of the things I thought about on the beach too. And you know, I reflected. I wanted to go, my goal is going on the show where threefold in this order. I wanted to have a good showing for my friends and family. So people would be happy with my performance. I wanted to go deep into myself because it's a great opportunity when you're putting yourself out there, whether you're David Goggin's running a hundred miles or whatever. When you go deep into yourself, big things can happen. And sometimes you have to push yourself really hard to do that. And I got to do that experience. And then I wanted to win. And I was able to do all three of those. So now that I'm back, I work, I'm flying back to Boise tonight. And I've got four, four hearts tomorrow with an amazing heart team at St. Alphonse's Hospital. And I've got three more at St. Luke's on Thursday, Friday in the office. This year I'm going to do nothing more than get back into really good shape. And I would love to do another survivor. I'd love to do survivor Australia. But you have to go back after winning. Don't they pull you all back? If they haven't called me back, but I'm ready to go. I'm ready to go. I'm ready to go. Imagine they do that. I know they do. And you mentioned Rudy, who's another hero. And he did that at 72. God willing, I would be honored to play at 72. Y'all need to do it like the Mr. Universe competition to where like, hey, this guy's got this many wins. He's the president of the island. You know what I'm talking about? There's one dude who's put it down. Yeah. So far I just have one point. That show. Oh dude, because then you got your primes in there. Oh yeah. Oh yeah buddy. Well if they do some kind of an all-star thing or whatever, who knows? So survivor Jeff Probst is franchise getting around the world. So there's a Greek survivor. There's a French, there's a Scandinavian survivor called like, wake up tomorrow. It's like whatever. And then there's Australia survivor, which is, you know, with my Australia history, I love Australians. I just love Australia. I love Australia. So good. I would be open. They haven't invited me. But I would be willing. And then Sammy, who was the youngest guy on my tribe. He was 19 years old. Me and him, we went fishing together. He's one of my closest guys out there from day one. Sammy and I have told about talking about doing the amazing race together because we're a funny combination. Oh, how fun. And maybe we'll do that. So I love doing these shows. It's been a lot of fun. I love my real life. I love the reality life. If I'm blessed to be asked to do something again, you betcha. I'll be, I'm just trying to get ready for it right now. So can people donate to your DAF? They can't. Thank you for asking. What I will do is once I, you know, veterans exploring treatment solutions is one of the charities and foundations, special operations, warrior foundations, another one. I'll put a list out of the ones that I have sent money to as I do it. In fact, maybe I'll just start doing that on Instagram and Twitter. I'm on those two. I'm just, I'm new to all this stuff. And how can people find you on this? I'm at Gabler Mike on Instagram. And I think I'm Gabler one Mike on Twitter. But I've got the blue flags on both of them. Okay. And I've got a picture of me wearing a bone necklace covered in mud. So you'll know which ones me when you find it. But yeah, I'm going to, I'll post those, the charity stuff. And what I also want to do is what I want to talk to Amber and Marcus about is I don't just want to, you know, send in money and never see you again. I want to be as involved as I can. If I can help, if I can be of service, please let me know. And I want to be involved to do things with my community and our country that I can. Maybe you should go down and do a treatment and speak for it yourself. And you know, I've never done that. I've been to Burning Man. So I've done mushrooms, but I, you know, but I had all the above, but I haven't done the Iowa Oscar, but you never know. You never know. I never made Burning Man. Maybe we could do Burning Man together. We'll do. We'll see. My crew in the eye, we'll talk about that the other day. Really? Yeah. We might have to bring you with us. We might have to bring you with us. I've run across some people that go there and say, I know about it, but I've never, I won't speak on it because I've never been there. You know, it's an eight hour drive from my house. So you flop to Boise. Yeah. We have caravan on down. We'll get our tribe together and you grab any crew you want and we'll have a fun time. I truly love our country and the stuff that we do. Meet the guys. There's some hidden stuff in there that people just do. It's amazing. It's so amazing. Get back in and get the vein and the artery going. Keep this place going so you can go do that stuff. Yes. The difference between us is almost what makes it perfect. It does. That's what's so great about America is we're just, and you know, we kind of lost our way a little bit recently, but we're coming back in together. I mean, at core, we're all together. We're all Americans. Yeah, we don't lose our way. We're switching to a new one. Right. That's a transition we all go through. Yes. That's our superpower as well. Like anybody who's outside of this doesn't have any idea what goes on inside this thing. That's right. That's right. You can't even explain it. Yeah, it's a family. It's a family. And that's why you can't be like, what the hell is wrong? What the hell is wrong? I don't know. It's like any family. We just are. Yeah. We got our things, but it's a family. We got our things. It's a fucking family. I ain't playing off of it. Well said. I like that. I know. Thank you for coming on our show. Thank you for having me. Thank you guys so much. Great episode. It's awesome. Thank you all for listening in. We'll see you next week on the Team Never Put podcast. ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪♪