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The HeadRush Podcast with Paul Frase takes you inside the reality of Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE) through the lens of football and rodeo. With firsthand experience in one of the most punishing sports, Paul shares stories, the lasting effects of head trauma, and the fight for awareness and support.
This is the HeadRush Podcast with Paul Frase and Corey Berry.
Paul Frase:Welcome to the HeadRush Podcast. I'm Paul Frase, and I played eleven years in the NFL. And our
Corey Berry:co host NFL.
Paul Frase:They not for long. And our co host, Corey Berry, rode professional rodeo for nine years. At the HeadRush Podcast, we talk about everything related to brain trauma and brain health and wellness. We focus on traumatic injury traumatic brain injury sustained through repeated head impacts, RHIs, and repeated blast exposure, RBE, for our men and women who serve in the armed forces. We talk about traumatic encephalopathy syndrome and chronic traumatic encephalopathy.
Paul Frase:And we cover how traumatic brain injuries can and will cause mental health issues, or brain health issues, as our friend Doctor. Amen expressed. Brain health issues such as depression, addiction, lack of executive function, memory loss, even suicide ideation, as well as degenerative neurological issues. Our mantra is how to cope and find hope, and we focus our energy in finding therapies and sharing hope through education and by raising awareness. And please like, share, subscribe.
Paul Frase:Do everything that will help our algorithms and help us share the news of the dangers of repeated head impacts. Corey?
Corey Berry:Comment. Do a review. If you like us, like us. If you don't like us, don't like us. But either way, let us know what you think.
Corey Berry:Our next guest, I gotta say, has something in common with you, but we'll get to that.
George Visger:Okay.
Corey Berry:Our next guest is for all my San Francisco peeps that when the niners were the niners before the the kneeling and then all the political b s, when the forty niners were the forty niners, our next guest is George Visger. George Visger attended the University of Colorado on a football scholarship, majored in fisheries biology, and played in the nineteen seventy seven orange bowl. He was a three year starter as a defensive tackle selected in the sixth round by the New York Jets in 1980. What round were you selected in?
Paul Frase:Sixth round. I I was the either the one hundred and forty sixth pick or one hundred and forty ninth. George, do you remember what you were? What round?
George Visger:Believe it or not, I was the hundred and forty ninth.
Paul Frase:What round was that? That was in the sixth round. Right?
George Visger:Sixth round. The hundred and forty ninth pick.
Paul Frase:Yeah. So we were either the same exact pick, eight years apart. I'm a little bit younger, but I have less hair and it's gray a lot more gray. But
Corey Berry:yeah. So that's what you guys got in common. We're both in the 146 Jets, something
Paul Frase:jets, jets, but anyway.
Corey Berry:Both by the jets.
George Visger:But but you actually you actually lasted and played.
Paul Frase:Well, you you you went we you went on to bigger and better things at the forty nine on the West Coast instead of New York. So yeah. Yeah. We Oh, yeah.
George Visger:Yeah. Then he
Corey Berry:played with the 49ers for two years.
Paul Frase:Mhmm.
Corey Berry:Back and I'm talking about we're talking Joe Montana. We're talking Jerry Rice, we're talking
George Visger:No. No. No. No. No.
George Visger:This is pre rice. Oh, this even? This is pre rice. This is back in the macaroni days, man. There was no rice.
Corey Berry:Was when you played, Durant.
Paul Frase:Ronnie Lott already with you guys or no?
George Visger:Ronnie Lott's rookie year. '81 was the year Dwight Clark made the catch, the famous catch.
Corey Berry:I remember that.
George Visger:The catch. This was the year that that Dan Bunz made the stop on the goal line. Really, that was the play that won the game for us. People don't realize that. This was the very beginning.
George Visger:So my rookie year in '80, I think we were, like, seven and nine or eight and eight. We were mediocre. And in '81, we came out of nowhere and went, you know, fourteen and two and playoff games and Super Bowl. So that yeah. That was that was it.
Paul Frase:That's pretty cool.
Corey Berry:So two years and then sustained a concussion against the Cowboys, yet played the entire game by clearing his clearing his head with smelling salts. Early in the in the following nineteen eighty one Super Bowl season, George developed hydrocephalus.
George Visger:Hydrocephalus. Yep. Hydrocephalus.
Corey Berry:Water on the brain and underwent three emergency VP shunt brain surgeries in eight months and was given last rights at age 23.
Paul Frase:Yeah. Okay. That that's worrisome. But okay. So and and the the we we have to go on.
Paul Frase:After a multiyear work comp legal battle to get his hospital bills paid for, he returned to school in 1986 to complete a biology degree. George survived five emergency brain surgeries during a ten month period while enrolled in chemistry, physics, and pre calc courses. And despite developing dyslexia and major short term memory deficits, he earned a bachelor of science in biological conservation and a minor in social science in 1990 and began a career as a wildlife biologist. In 1994, he survived a ninth brain surgery. Returning to his wildlife work just a few weeks later, he taught in high school in biology and algebra and chemistry for three years before returning to work as a biologist in 1999.
Paul Frase:And he founded Visger and Associates Inc, Environmental Consulting in 2003 and the Visger Group Traumatic Brain Injury Consulting in 2010. George has been
Corey Berry:And you can get that at www.visgergroup.org.
Paul Frase:He's been on just about every network imaginable. He's he's okay. He the outside the lines, the media through the out The US, England, Germany, and Brazil, and, consulted directly with doctor Rich Allen Bogan, cochair of the NFL Head, Neck, and Spine Group Spine Injury Group on rule changes to reduce TBI in football. And as many as you had nine surgeries, nine brain surgeries, and you were very well equipped and knowledgeable to to do some of that work for with doctor Ellen Bogen. So thank you for kinda getting the ball started ball rolling with, TBI and, you know, being very active in the NFL.
Corey Berry:What kind of rule changes did you make back in them days?
George Visger:You know what? If you Google Sports Digest got a whole so when when Rich Ellenbogen first got hired as the head of the the mild traumatic brain injury group for the NFL, I had discovered not long before that, a year so early, I discovered Dave Perry's blog, and and Dave was an all pro defensive tackle with the Raiders and then had this blog going, and I had no idea that there were other guys like me out there. I thought I was just this anomaly. So I discovered this this blog, and it's like, holy cow, there's all kinds of us out there that have just been destroyed, discarded, thrown to the garbage, scrambling, losing their minds, their homes. So anyway, I start posting a bunch, and then I see and the the NFL finally fired their doctor, Cassin, who was just he was a whore.
George Visger:And they hired this doctor, Rich Ellenbogen. Well, I don't know Ellenbogen from squat. And so I post this letter to him on Dave Pear's blog, not knowing he would ever read it. I wrote, dear doctor Ellen Bogen, I pray to God you're a man of of character, and you do the right thing, and you're not another paid whore by the NFL owners. I said, or you'll have blood on your hands like these other criminals will.
George Visger:And I went on to list a bunch of guys I played against, you know, Mike Webster, Justin Strokes, some of these guys that end up dying of CT. And I said, I I I said, I hope you're a man of character and do the right thing. About a day or two later, get a phone call. And I was not with no one in the NFL. You know?
George Visger:I'm just one of these blue collar kids, you know, you know, scratching to make a a roster. About a day later or two, I get a phone call. I answer the phone. This is George. I hear this.
George Visger:George, this is doctor Rich Allen Bogan. And I say, what the f do you want? And I get into his ass pretty good. Anyway, and then he's he's fumbling, but when I hang up on him. Day later, he calls me back again.
George Visger:George, this is this is doctor. Go, what the hell do want now? And he starts going on. He says, I've been reading up on you. You you've had nine brain surgeries.
George Visger:You completed a biology degree during brain surgery, fourth, blah blah blah blah. He goes, you're an environmental consultant. He says, it's a miracle what you're doing. He says he had personally, you know, implanted hundreds of these shunts. And he says, you realize we have a fifty percent failure rate with shunts?
George Visger:And I said, well, eight of my nine have failed. And he says, no. No. One out of two people that have had one never returned to full cognitive functioning. He says, it's it's amazing what you're doing.
George Visger:So now we're warming up a little bit and having a decent conversation, hang up. Next day, call me again, and now we're first name. He goes, George, this is Rich. He said, I'm gonna give you a week. He said, in ten days, I'm meeting with the NFL rules committee, and I want you to write suggestions on how to reduce brain injuries in football.
George Visger:He goes, I'm gonna present them to the NFL rules committee. I sent him four pages, and Sports Digest got ahold of them. You can Google the Visger rules Sports Digest. I believe it was 2010, and you can go through all these suggestions I made. You go, oh, number four, they implemented seven years ago.
George Visger:Number number nine, that was two years ago. You can go down the line see more and more and more that have been implemented every year. Everything from hitting defenseless players, you know, leading with the head. I have I have things in there, like, everybody on prophylactic levels of omega three fish oils. Simple.
George Visger:Simple. How simple is that? Put a hyperbaric oxygen chamber in everyone in every locker room. So you were I've had
Paul Frase:You wrote that how many years ago, and you were already up on omega threes and hyperbaric and other, therapies?
George Visger:Google, that article probably came out in 2010 or '11. Right. Probably '11 maybe. Just Google Sports Digest, The Visger Rules. That's the name of the article.
Paul Frase:Corey Corey actually, he says quite a bit on this podcast that these players, football players, what what the minimum wage, even if you're undrafted, you make the squad your rookie year, what is it, $8,850,000, something like that. Why don't you have a hyperbaric in your house? Right. Gallons and gallons, you were just saying you you you were working with a doctor sending you gallons of omega threes.
Corey Berry:Why not have red light therapy? Why not have all this ill?
George Visger:I've done neurofilament therapy. Don't
Corey Berry:Do all of that, but you're the idiot.
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George Visger:Here's the thing with hyperbarics, Studies have shown if you're if you get into a chamber within twenty four hours of a concussion, the vast majority of people will return to full cognitive functioning within forty eight hours. So I wrote a letter to to Ellen Bogan. I said, give this to the owners. I said, I could put money in their pocket. And I'm not that I gave a damn about their money, but I said, for the cost of a chamber, at the back at the when I wrote this thing in 2010 or '11, whatever the average salary was, let's say it was let's just say it was a 100 and say, 160,000 a year, so $1,010,000 a week.
George Visger:Right? I mean, I don't know what it was, and I don't remember. But for the cost of one chamber, and if you have four guys with concussions that year and they all come back within two days instead of being out two to three weeks, you more than pay for your chamber right there.
Paul Frase:Mhmm. Yep. And and
George Visger:I said, and I don't really give a damn about putting money in the owner's pockets. I wanna see these guys being healthy when they get done. And here's another thing too. I I pulled up at one time the it was like, I don't know, one of the big airlines was upgrading all their Boeing seven seven twenty sevens. They were giving them away.
George Visger:K? There was like a 115 of these things. I I told them, you can take one of these Boeings, cut the wings off, park it on your practice facility. You could have meetings in there under pressure, guys breathing, pure oxygen, getting treatment, meetings, whatever you wanna do every single day for the cost of what? Parking it and and and refurbishing it?
Paul Frase:Have you
George Visger:I mean, they were Boeing was giving away a whole bunch of them years ago.
Paul Frase:Do you have you seen Aviv? It's a it's a company over near the villages in South Florida or Central Florida. They have it's a it's a they have a tank almost like a fuse fuselage of a plane
George Visger:Yep.
Paul Frase:And you can sit by, like, 18 people in it.
George Visger:Yeah. They have they have multi place chambers. I've done I've done some of those, and I've done mainly the single. But in the multi place, it gets cheaper and cheaper to treat guys too. You know?
George Visger:I I was down at Eplinger Clinic twice for a week. Ricky Williams had put on a program quite a few years ago, and he brought in the first year. Brought in, like, seven or eight of us, you know, beat up former players for a week of intensive cranial sacral therapy, right, at the Eplinger. And then and then the second year he did it, I was the only guy that brought back, probably because I needed more help than anybody. But we did two years down there, a week each year of we had anywhere from two to to four cranial sacral therapists on us at once for up to seven hours a day.
George Visger:It was pretty amazing intensive stuff, but they also up on they also do hyperbarics and stuff. We weren't we weren't undergoing that while we were there. But it's it's a simple way, a simple fix for plus it treats every cell in your body.
Paul Frase:Mhmm.
George Visger:It increases mitochondrial activity up to, like, 800%. And your mitochondria in each cell, those are like the little engines in each cell. They produce ATP, which is the gasoline that every cell in your body runs off. Little battery pack. When you get a concussion, your mitochondria gets stunned.
George Visger:And one of the problems is you don't produce all the ATP you were before. It drops way down. So hyperbaric, well, if if nothing cranks that those juices up, you get you get ATP being formed, your brain your neurons can start functioning again. It creates new neuronal growth, which they didn't think was possible. It just it it is a bazillion benefits for no side effects.
George Visger:You you're breathing oxygen is what you're doing.
Paul Frase:Yeah, Absolutely. Yeah, there's a lot of studies that are proven, the clinical trials, peer reviewed, it works. It has a great effect on the body and the brain. Yep.
Corey Berry:I got to say, I got a brain thing happening right now, and I'm stuck on a rabbit hole.
Paul Frase:Okay.
Corey Berry:And I wanna talk about NFL pay. Yeah? Because you brought up how they make 800,000.
Paul Frase:I think it's more than that for the It
George Visger:is more than that now.
Corey Berry:Right. But
Paul Frase:now George, can you imagine? Hold on.
Corey Berry:On. Hold on. Let me get there.
Paul Frase:Hold play one play. They're just Hold on. Okay.
Corey Berry:Hold on. Before I lose my Go. My rabbit hole problem, you both were drafted sixth round about the same draft eight years apart.
George Visger:Yes.
Corey Berry:So I'm gonna break this down to everyone that thinks NFL players are rich and make millions. Let's break this down.
George Visger:Oh, yeah.
Corey Berry:George, do you remember what your first contract was when you got drafted?
George Visger:Absolutely. I signed for a $15,000 signing bonus, of which I cleared 10, and I took seven of that, and I bought my sister-in-law a brand new car while I drove my '73 Chevy long bed step side my rookie year in '80 because my brother had just started the business. They had three small kids. They lost their car. So I bought them a car.
George Visger:So $15,000 signing bonus, and I signed a three year contract with the jets, which, Paul, you and I both know they mean nothing. I mean, it's all paper.
Paul Frase:One way. One way contract.
George Visger:So my contract was 35,000 for the first year, 45 for the second. And had I survived three years in the NFL, I would have made $65,000.
Paul Frase:Nice. Alright. Well Now eight years later Eight years later.
Corey Berry:Were when you got drafted, what were you? I
Paul Frase:I $25,000 signing bonus, and I bought a Chevrolet celebrity because I knew I could handle the payments if I didn't make the team.
Corey Berry:There you go. Exactly.
Paul Frase:What what we have
George Visger:your first year's what was your salary?
Paul Frase:$55,000. And There you go. And I ended up starting eight games. And you know that the next year, you know that they didn't pay me more just because I started. You I still had to Oh,
George Visger:no. Yeah. They're not gonna say, hey.
Corey Berry:You had a
George Visger:great year. We're gonna bump you up. Oh, no.
Paul Frase:No. No. Okay. I had the most, tackles on the defensive line my second year, but I still had a third year in my contract. It was 55, 70, and I think it went up to 85.
Paul Frase:So I was in the big big time, my third year. So anyway But that's it. That's
George Visger:eight years.
Corey Berry:People making 750,000 or more their rookie year after signing bonus. Now, the people that are suffering like George and Paul and all these people that's even Alden Smith, don't think made that much money who just recently passed away. Plus your buddy just recently passed away. I saw it on Facebook, a guy that you played with in Colorado, was it? That he just died, George?
George Visger:Oh, yeah.
Paul Frase:Was was it your year?
George Visger:Oh, oh, oh, I'm sorry. Yeah. Thank you. Tom Perry.
Paul Frase:Tom Perry.
George Visger:So so Tom Perry, he was a senior my sophomore year, an absolute freaking creature. Good guy. He was six three two back this was big for a linebacker back then. Almost two he was, like, two thirty nine, ran, a four, five forty, literally was about 8% body fat. I mean, just one of these creatures.
George Visger:Looked like a mister universe type guy. Right? Big we're playing Nebraska in 1970. It was a seventy seven or seventy eight, either my sophomore year or rookie year. And and I've got I've got I've got pictures of he and I on the making a tackle.
George Visger:So he gets dinged early in the game and comes out one play, goes back in, finishes the game with us, which we lost. We were playing in Lincoln. We're in the showers, showering up after the game. Tom flops over in the in the convulsions on the floor. Wow.
George Visger:Team Doc wrecking you know, he's everyone back up back up and and Tom's just convulsing. Our team doc recognizes what was going on, gets one of the the equipment guys to bring him a drill that they drilled our helmets with. No. No. Doc Brown drills a hole in his skull.
Paul Frase:No way.
George Visger:Blood shoots out several inches. They rush him into the hospital in in Lincoln, two and a half hour brain surgery. They don't have a neurosurgeon there, but they relieve the pressure, then they fly him to Omaha or somewhere, just like another eight hour surgery, and then had two more brains, had three brain surgery next three days to stop bleeds. K? So and then Tom went on.
George Visger:Of course, he never played after that. He went on to finish his bachelor's, earn a master's, earn a PhD, taught, counseled for many years, and then we we reconnected a few years ago at one of our orange ball reunions back in Colorado. And he was starting to well, he was starting to struggle, and I kept in touch with him for a long time. You know? And then so ever since then, he's been almost daily, was texting, calling, asking me questions, and and I could tell he was really struggling.
George Visger:You know? And gosh darn. I mean, just two weeks ago? And he'd been just, like, pepper me daily, multiple day times a day with the same questions. And he was he wanted to file a work comp case.
George Visger:I was trying to explain to him, Tom, you wasn't this wasn't a work. And he was going on and on. Anyway, two or three weeks ago, he has a psych psychotic event. He loses it. He he ends up in jail under a 72 hour psych watch in Colorado Springs.
George Visger:Somehow he breaks out in the cell, punches out two cocks, runs down 10 flights of stairs. The next thing I know, I get a call from from oh, gosh. Darn it. I've been talking to the guy for weeks. Again, I can't pull names out sometimes.
George Visger:Well, another one of our linebackers in that year who played and lives down in Bakersfield, California. So he calls me, Muxlow, Bill Muxlow. He says, hey, a teepee is in intensive care. I'm like, what? You know?
George Visger:Now he got it right now. He's in intensive care. And a couple hours later, Mux calls back. He says he's dead. I go, what what do you mean he's dead?
George Visger:He goes, that's all I've heard. He goes, that that he had he had a psychiatric breakdown. They they next thing you know, there was a a fight. He's in a tense and he died. TP's dead.
George Visger:PhD, sharp guy, hardworking. We have no idea what went on. But he knew he was struggling for the last few years, and I'm sure that had they studied his brain, I would be I guarantee you he had c t or has c t e. So we just lost him maybe two weeks ago. A week ago.
George Visger:Now you and frames are tough for me. Can't remember if it was last weekend or the weekend before truthfully. Mean, I have multiple stories. I'm sure you do too, Paul.
Paul Frase:Thoughts and prayers go out to you and the family.
Corey Berry:And Alden Smith's family and everything that happened. Speaking of Alden Smith's family Yeah. I wanna talk to you guys directly for just a second. I made a post the other day about Jason Whitlock who went on social media and stated that CTE is a joke, and Alden Smith was a drunk and a drug addict his whole life. He is a sports commentator, podcaster.
Corey Berry:He does fearless. I wanna just tell the Smith family, don't even look at him. Don't think about him. He's useless. He's an idiot.
Corey Berry:He's a moron. I've looked him up. He has no PhD. He has no acronyms at the end of his name. And I still welcome you to come on our podcast, Jason, and tell me that CTE is a joke.
Corey Berry:And I'll invite Chris Nowinski. I'll invite doctor Tanner. I'll invite the doctor from UCSF. I'll invite doctor Koffler. I'll invite all doctor Anne McKee, Robert Stern, all these great people, and you come on and tell all of us how much of a joke CTE is.
Corey Berry:I am suffering clinically, t e s, probable CTE, because of repeated head impacts and concussions. And I just one more time, I just wanna look at you and call you a flipping moron, dude. And you're welcome to come on anytime and talk about this. Thank you. One
George Visger:Don't tell Jason. Tell Jason that I would love to just give him a few forearm shivers, and then just kind of rattle his brain a little bit, and let's see what happens down the line.
Paul Frase:Exactly.
George Visger:Paul, I'm sure you'd like to toss
Paul Frase:a
George Visger:couple in
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Paul Frase:Take their free brain health assessment at tbihelpnow.org and discover if inflammation, not weakness, is holding you back. You're not broken, you're unbalanced, and balance can be restored. The fact of the matter is, you know, he's maybe this young man had drink problems and and, you know, drug. But the the fact of the matter is, which came first? And Yep.
Paul Frase:Hits, repeated head impacts can and will cause brain health. Brain health issues, period. Memory loss, addiction addiction is a big is a big thing. Repeated head impacts cause brain health issues, brain damage.
George Visger:And we all know that this isn't a catch all excuse for everyone because we all we all know there are some idiots out there. There's some dirtbag ball players or dirt, buddy. You know what I mean? Criminals and all that stuff. Right.
George Visger:But like you said, Paul, the fact that banging your head for however many I think he played twelve years or fourteen years total. Eleven years. Let me yeah. You know, we all know that it doesn't take a rocket scientist to to figure out that's probably not good for your brain. Exactly.
George Visger:So when if you do have an addictive personality and you are using here's here's a great here's a great point we can we can bring up. So after my first brain surgery, I was 22, 1981. I'm in I'm in intensive care in Stanford. It was September. I remember turning 23 in the hospital.
George Visger:Now I grew up We we drank a lot. I was growing up as a kid. You know what I mean? Sure. I was a great student.
George Visger:I was just I I was a good guy, but, you know, we we try and then so, you know, all through college, and that's what we did. And so as soon as I get out of the hospital, I mean, I go back to doing what we always did. You know, we we go have a couple cold ones at night. And all of a sudden, man, I get up in the morning, go to practice. No truck in front of my apartment.
George Visger:Now they had cut both my roommates before I got out of the hospital. So I'm living by myself now, and I'm driving in the facilities. They told me I could still play, so I'm working out on injured reserve during 81 season. And all of a sudden, some mornings I get up, and there's no truck in front of my apartment. And thinking, I'm calling people.
George Visger:Hey. Did you see me last night? Did I you know? And that she started hearing these stories. Yeah.
George Visger:You're at this bar, and you you punch this guy out. You threw a chair through the window, and I'm like, boom. You know? And I'd hit you right over the bar. No truck, and I keep calling people.
George Visger:Yeah. That other bar, and I I go over here to who would my truck would be parked. I'd have no idea how I got home. This happened a few times, and all of a sudden I start ending up in jail. I'd go out and have just a couple few beers, and next thing I know, it's five, six, seven hours later, and I'm standing in jail.
George Visger:I'm not passed out. I'm standing in jail with zero memory how I got there. One minute, I'm at the bar having a beer with with a buddy. Next minute, I'm looking around. I'm like, how in the hell did I get here?
George Visger:So I got arrested three times the first eight months after my brain surgery. Never been in trouble in my life. I go back to the neurosurgeon at Stanford, May '82. This is four months after the Super Bowl. This isn't like years later where I'm claiming, you know, I go see him May '82.
George Visger:And I said, hey, something has happened since your surgery. Oh, not for my surgery. It gets real defensive. I said, well, you know, I have a couple of beers now. I turn into the kind of guy that I freaking absolutely hate.
George Visger:I hate loud mouth punk bullies, and that's what I that's what I hear. I've turned into. He does a CT brain scan on me. He says, you look fine. I said, I'm leaving for Mexico tomorrow to go fishing with one of my older brothers and his wife.
George Visger:We're renting a little cabin on the beach, and we're gonna hang out a few days. He says, no problem. I go, what about drinking? No problem. We fly to Cabo the next day.
George Visger:I have one margarita dinner. I started getting pounding headaches. I tell my brother Mel and Nancy, I'm gonna head back to the bar, man. I'm not feeling good. Now they never told me that these shunts go out either.
George Visger:It's common. No. They told me I was good for life. I could keep playing football. I go back to to our little cabin.
George Visger:A few hours later, Mel and Nancy cut, and my last recollection were pounding headaches, ball of light in front of each eye like I had before my first surgery on projectile vomiting. And then my next recollection, sixteen, eighteen months later, so my brother comes into the apartment. I sit in his hotel, eyes dilated, incoherent. They're like, holy shit. My brother Mel calls my brother Bob in Sacramento.
George Visger:Both my older brothers college ball, and oldest brother Bob was ten years older. So he calls an orthopedic surgeon friend of his who calls a neurosurgeon friend. The neurosurgeon's telling doctor Cobb says, your friend is dying. He's in in Mexico. He shunts out.
George Visger:Get him home. They call anyway, finally, get me home. Two more brain surgeries, ten hours apart, give him last rights, but with a new surgeon. And my family tells them about my drinking issues. So right after my my second, third brain surgeries, again, this is four months after the Super Bowl, doctor Visgerian, my neurologist back then, had me drink two beers, and they did a EEG on me for brain waves just from and I was 60 back then.
George Visger:Two two beers did nothing, you know, at two seventy, whatever I weighed. Just from two beers, brain waves all over all over the screen. He says, you have brain seizures from alcohol. You can never drink again. I quit drinking and I had never had a problem.
George Visger:Wow. And I have diagnosed so many of my friends over the years. It's like, listen, brother. You have the exact same thing I do. When your wife tells you you're an asshole when you're drinking and your boss and your you know what?
George Visger:Your kids are you need to look in the mirror. You have brains. I have brain seizures from alcohol. What it is. Alcohol produces a short circuit in my brain.
George Visger:We all know so many guys, and the first thing they do when they're injured is they start self medicating. Right. You know, you you're not who you used to be. That's the was the hardest part for me. It was like, I was always this ball player, and all of a sudden, 23, and I'm I'm I'm bouncing at nights for $10 an hour, and I'm I'm working for my brother as a laborer on his construction company for $12 an hour.
George Visger:You know, I had no degree. I know qualifications. And I'm like, wait a minute, man. I was on a Super Bowl team and now shit, you know, and credit. I mean, it was a nightmare.
George Visger:So guys will turn to alcohol and drugs, which a lot of my guarantee you have brain seizures from it.
Paul Frase:Amen. It's it's a it's a fact that repeated head impacts and exactly what you you suffered. So it was actually brain seizures after just a couple of drinks. And they measured this.
George Visger:That was that was diagnosed scientifically.
Paul Frase:Exactly. Exactly. Well, so
Corey Berry:Well, they put me on seizure meds. And I went to the hospital several times and they couldn't find nothing wrong. They said you must have had a seizure, but I wasn't drinking or nothing, just having issues. And then when I got up here 2019 and I saw my neurologist, he goes, we gotta get you off these seizure meds. You're not having seizures.
Corey Berry:You've never had seizures. You got brain trauma. You need to get off these seizure meds. That's when they put me on the Nudexta and started me on a different path that I'm on now. But I was on seizure meds for probably seizure meds and Ambien Yep.
Corey Berry:Were my two bigs.
George Visger:So Now now, I have I have two different seizures. So I have grandma seizures that I'm on meds for, and then I have the brain seizures from alcohol. Mhmm. Those are two separate things. Brain seizures, I just start going and people don't know it, but things are short circuiting.
George Visger:You
Paul Frase:know? Right.
George Visger:All of a sudden, I'm looking around. I punch someone out, and then you're gonna think, man, Visgeries is getting really crazy. So I have two different types of seizures
Paul Frase:Right. Going I wanna I wanna get back to your you kind of your journey. So you you grew up in California. You you you played sports. You you were a super superstar in your you know?
Paul Frase:And and you get drafted by the jets, and then you end up playing for the forty niners. You were always a Pittsburgh Steeler fan, I hear.
George Visger:Yep. What?
Corey Berry:Yeah. In California. Grew up in California. So Hold it. Hold it.
Corey Berry:Where at in California?
George Visger:Stockton, California. North Northern Cal.
Corey Berry:I know exactly where Stockton is, and you were a Steelers fan in Stockton, California.
George Visger:So get this. So the seventies, so I started playing Pee Wee Pop Warner in 1970 for the best Stockton Bear Cubs. K? We're we're black and gold. We look just like the Steelers.
George Visger:And get this, one nine kids on my Pee Wee Pop Warner team, three of us signed NFL contracts in 1980. And our safety, Von Hayes went onto a major league baseball all star career. So we had four future professional athletes on this little 29 man spot of pipsqueak. So we always had the black and gold uniforms, and then and then I went to Stagg high school, and we were brown and gold, very similar. And I go to Colorado, we're black and gold.
George Visger:But I mean but as I was growing up, I mean and and the Steelers were the first guys to really start lifting weights. And in seventh grade, man, when I played Pee Wee, and my nickname was Clang. I was so skinny and not knee when I ran. The the the coaches said they could hear my knees clanging. But I started lifting weights religiously in in seventh grade.
George Visger:I want to play in the NFL. After three years of lifting, my freshman year, I'm six two one thirty two. K? That's after lifting for three years. But I mean, this and but the Steelers, man, those guys, Mike Webster, they'd have their their their shirts rolled up, big old guns.
George Visger:So I'm like, oh, yeah. These these dudes are the real deal. And and then what's crazy is when I was with the Jets, we played this we played Pittsburgh in a preseason game. And, you know, they were coming off their multi Super Bowl win, and I got a chance to line up right over my I I used to emulate. I my buddy, he would be John Cole, might be Mike Webster.
George Visger:We pretend like we were the the lineman. And I can remember line up over him thinking, god, man. He was, in this, I don't know, six fifteenth, sixteenth year. I'm thinking, God, I used to pretend like I was you. And here I'm lined up over you.
George Visger:And then in 2010, when that Jean Marie Laskas' article came out in GQ magazine, the game brain on a model's first 24 brains he studied. And the first one talked about was Mike Webster, and I'm reading about how he ended up. And that is what really pushed me over the edge to do everything I freaking possibly could to hold the effing NFL accountable for what was going on. I started reading about more and more of these guys, and I'm reaching out to O'Mallo. And I'm like, are you kidding?
George Visger:Mike Webster's son and I, we used to talk quite often. Garrett, good good guy. He he flat out told me stories. He says, George, my dad was the kindest, most loving family man you ever met. And when he started going downhill, then the family fell apart.
George Visger:But Garrett lived with his dad and took care of him. Garrett was like a young teen, if even that, taking care of his father. And he said sometimes his dad would call and say, I'm son, I'm trying to find my way home, but all I see are trees. He said one and Garrett said one time at a Thanksgiving dinner, you know, Mike Mike gets up from the table, walks over the microwave, opens it, urinates in it, shuts the door, sits back down. You know, just I mean, his mind was just being eaten up by CTE, and I heard firsthand stories from his son years ago when we were talking quite a bit.
George Visger:So this stuff, just all these stories just propelled me more and more of living. It's like these these freaking billionaires get away with all this crap because they just can't make enough money. They don't give a shit about the human carnage. So I probably got off track of what what you asked
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Corey Berry:Healing is possible. Your story isn't over, let's begin again with your brain.
Paul Frase:Tell us where your journey started with Doctor. Bennett Amalo. I know you have a fascinating story of you wanted to see him or talk to him and all of a sudden it happens. Tell us about
George Visger:So right then, I had just mentioned that article by Jean Marie Laskas that came on GQ Magazine. Right? So I have a small environmental consulting business back then. I'm working real late at night. I'm on my computer, and I get this this text from one of my Colorado teammates.
George Visger:And there there's, like, 12 or 12 or 14 of us, well, buffs from the seventies that still I mean, every day we get texts. I'm so so tight with some of these guys. It's amazing. And so I get I get a text from one of them. It just said, hey, this.
George Visger:Check out GQ magazine. The name of the article was the Game Brain, the NFL's cover up for brain injuries. And so as I tell people, as you could see looking at me, I don't read GQ magazine. And so I go to buy it. It was, a couple weeks later, and it was out of print.
George Visger:So I'm in my office. And when I was running my business back then, I mean, I was working. My last year, went out on disability. I averaged a hundred nine hours a week for fourteen months straight, Trying to keep things, you know, under control. So I'd be in my office working at midnight, one in the morning.
George Visger:I had to make writing reports. So when I finally pulled this article up one night and I printed it, I still have that exact article in my computer in my computer folder right now or carrier. I printed out as 24 pages long, and it starts off the first paragraph on a cold, still, foggy Pittsburgh day, young neuropathologist doctor Bennett O'Mallo arrives at the Allegheny coroner's office, and there on the slab was Mike Webster. And it says, unlike most males in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, doctor O'Mallo had no idea who Mike Webster was. And I'm reading the story about he did the study of Mike and all these guy, and I'm I'm writing notes.
George Visger:I copied this article. I'm writing note. I get done reading it that night, and I'm like, I gotta find this freaking O'Mallo. Again, I'm telling you guys, God has had his hand on me so many times on this journey. So when this article was written, Bennett was in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
George Visger:K? It just came out a couple months earlier, whenever it came out. So I I get online. I was just starting to learn how to use the computers, and I track him down. Where is he at?
George Visger:He's the head neuropathologist for San Joaquin County coroner's office, k, in Lodi, California, forty minutes from my office in Sacramento. Lodi High was our rivals when I played at Stagg High School in Stockton. I keep I I pull up I find his cell phone number. I dial it. I get this voice mail, and I get this very strong Nigerian accent.
George Visger:Yes. Hello. This is doctor Biren Amolo. Sorry. I can't take your call.
George Visger:And this is how he ends his voice mail, and I knew I had the right guy. He ends it with, and remember, God loves you.
Paul Frase:And
George Visger:I'm going, okay. This guy's gonna be legit. He's not and I leave him this voice. Doctor. Mom, Nick George Visger, that nine brain surgeon in NFL, blah blah blah blah.
George Visger:Calls me back within an hour. Yes, George. I'd love to meet with you, but I can't tonight. He says, I'm speaking at UC Davis Medical Center. And again, tell me God has not been all over me.
George Visger:He I go, what time are you done? He goes, I won't be done till 07:30 or whatever it was.
Paul Frase:How close how close was that to you? Close.
George Visger:Fifteen minutes from my office. Close. Fifteen minutes. He goes, I won't be done. I go, what time are you done?
George Visger:He goes, what it was? 07:30. I go, I'll see you at 07:35 in the lobby. We go to dinner that night. The restaurant closes.
George Visger:They they clean up. We're sitting there till midnight bouncing stories back and forth about what they did to him, did to me. And at one point, Bennett looks at me, and he'll talk about himself in the third sense. He says, why do they attack doctor O'Mallo? I said, I'll give you back then, was 9 billions what the NFL made.
George Visger:I said, I'll give you 9,000,000,000 reasons why, Bennett. I said, this is America. I said, these corporations don't give a shit about human carnage. It's all about money. And he looked at me, and he says, but don't they wanna know?
George Visger:They're killing their employees? I said, hell no. You're the worst thing in the world. You're the worst nightmare. And he could not grasp that.
George Visger:But from that day on, he and I have been shoulder to shoulder in this battle. He is we have spoken together at congressional hearings, at brain injury conferences. He wrote a a forward, an acknowledgment from my book. He's a good man. Bennett's a good man.
George Visger:Love him.
Paul Frase:Your your early interactions, you you you heard Bennett say, why do they try to hurt Bennett? Amalo, doctor Amalo. So so you're you're telling me that the NFL didn't jump on the research wagon and and help, find out, what, was killing their players?
George Visger:They ripped him to shreds. Read some of the things they said.
Corey Berry:Yeah. It's horrible.
George Visger:Oh, who's this freaking monkey swinging over from Africa telling us experts about brains? You know what I mean? I mean, Bennett has four freaking degrees, right? Including an MBA. Yeah.
George Visger:I mean, he's a neuropath. All he's a I couldn't even remember all the stuff he has. He's got multiple PhDs and a masters in business. I mean, the guy is brilliant, And he just could not grasp why they weren't coming to him like a hero going, oh my gosh. You're saving all these lives.
George Visger:Tell I will tell you this. When the movie concussion came out, I knew the story personally, and that was spot on. In fact, Bennett helped produce it. And in fact, in the movie, they showed Justin Strelzik's actual suicide. Mhmm.
George Visger:That accident That's the actual dashcam.
Paul Frase:When they crossed the median?
George Visger:Yep. That was the cops dashcam. I had seen that years before the movie came out.
Corey Berry:Yeah. I just got done watching it again. It's on Netflix now. Yeah. Such a devastating movie.
Corey Berry:And, what they did to Amalo just wasn't right. But we all know what it all boils down to is dollars and cents and
Paul Frase:No. No. There's no cents in that whatsoever.
Corey Berry:Exactly. And so now you've written a book, George. Tell us about it and when we can expect its release.
George Visger:It's titled Facing Giants, My thirty eight Year Battle. So when I was originally injured in '81, and, you know, all the brain surgeries and seizures and the it took me thirty eight years to settle my work comp case. Over the years, I beat the the Fort Davis work comp carrier travelers in five work comp hearings. I had to beat them. Eight work comp appeals and three times they took me clear to the California Court of Appeals just to keep me from getting into doctor prescribed treatments.
George Visger:It has been a knockdown as if it wasn't hard enough battling to stay alive, battling to finish degrees, with my memory, to hang on to my business, battling to take care of my family. Then and then on top of this, I've been in a legal battle for four decades, where I was. And so finally and then and then in two so when the brand a brain injury lawsuit came out in 2011. So Jason Lukasevich, who filed the first suit, was friends with Bennett back in Pittsburgh. And and Jason was just a a a warrior attorney for a big, huge firm, young guy, and he and Bennett were good friends.
George Visger:And he saw what they're doing to Bennett. So clear back in '11, maybe, '10. A lot of stuff happened for me in '10 and '11 after that article came out. So I get a phone call from this Jason in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Introduces himself.
George Visger:He says, we're looking to a potential, you know, class action suit against the NFL on brain injury. I said, I'm your freaking guy to talk to. So he flies out from Pittsburgh with an attorney associate that he brought from Motley Rice. So Motley Rice settled the multibillion dollar big tobacco suit years ago. I mean, they are worth billions.
George Visger:One of the biggest law firms, I guess, in the world. I mean, they're huge. And like Jason told me, the the company worked for Persky White and Goldberg, Persky and White. He said, we're not big enough to take take them on, so we're trying to team up with some. So these guys fly.
George Visger:They wanna talk to me. And again, I was a nobody. I've got and and I've got my little environmental consulting business. I'm renting a trailer as my office. I'd like three other biologists working for me, you know, just scrum.
George Visger:These guys fly out from Pittsburgh, fly to San Francisco, drive up to my office in Sacramento, meet with me for two and a half hours, and then leave. I'm going, wow. That's weird. So next day, Jason Leccevich, and God bless you, Jason. I call him my brother.
George Visger:He also wrote a forward for my book. He calls me the next day, and he he says, let me tell you what's going on, George. He explains to me their their their firm isn't big enough to take on the NFL, so they're trying to team up with this Persky white I mean, mean, with Motley Rice, he settled big tobacco. And Jason told me this, I never forgot. He says, but I tell you this, George, whether these guys team up with us or not, he says, I will find somebody to file this suit with.
George Visger:It's the right thing to do. And I said, Jason, I will stand with you sold shoulder to shoulder. I said, I will fight these assholes because they have destroyed lives. Few weeks go by, get a phone call from this guy from Motley Rice. I can't remember his name nor do I even care.
George Visger:He says, well, George, after months of review and all the big bosses, this is what he tells me. Motley Rice, one of the biggest law firms in the world, says, we don't think we have what it takes to take on the six hundred pound NFL gorilla. And I said, f you, pussies. I said, I'll do it myself. I called up Jason.
George Visger:He says, George, I'm gonna find someone. And Jason Lukasevich, even though all these big firms take claim for for filing and settling the suit, Jason Lukasevich filed the very first suit with 55 of us. And on the twenty second, they didn't play enough on the original brain injury filing. Not this problem. I was one of seven guys.
George Visger:They flew back to the press club in Washington DC when they unveiled the suit. We had 249 media from all over the country in the world when Jason unveiled the suit. And he said we had a couple of hall of famers speaking. All I did was I got the podium. It was my turn.
George Visger:I had a picture of my spec scan from Amon's clinic, which shows all the holes in my brain. I said, here's my reality. I said nine NFL brain surgeries and zero NFL benefits. Do I need to say anything else? And I just sat down.
George Visger:And so Jason filed that first suit. And so I what I'm getting at, well, that suit finally and then, of course, I lost, but, you know, then we lost my house, my business, my kids, my family. I lost everything. You know, I'm living on floors for two and a half years at the clinic hyperbaric clinic. I'm sleeping in trailers.
George Visger:Finally, in 2017, that suit was won. And I don't know if you're if you're involved in it, Paul.
Paul Frase:Not not the original one. This episode of the HeadRush Podcast is brought to you by the Patrick Richa CTE Awareness Foundation. Their goal is to spread awareness about the dangers of RHI repetitive head impacts after losing their son Patrick to CTE. Sadly, there are too many like Patrick that have lost their families, jobs, and sometimes their lives. And this foundation is working hard to stop the devastation that can come from not protecting the brain.
Paul Frase:This foundation provides parents of school aged children with information about the dangers of sports, concussive sports, and activities which involve head trauma.
Corey Berry:They advertise on social media, print media, and billboards. Please follow them on Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok and share their ads with others. And please visit their website, stopcte.org, to find ways to help people recognize the disease if confronted with it in their family and how to prevent the suffering that can come to families when a brain is damaged. The website has medical forms to take to doctor's visits and advocacy letters if you want to help make change in your community. And their most recent campaign is geared up to help coaches build brain healthy teams.
Corey Berry:You can use the information on stopcte.org website to understand CTE, live with CTE and prevent CTE. Please visit. Thank you. And don't knock it, So stopcte.the
George Visger:way they had it structured was you had to be diagnosed with one of five ailments.
Paul Frase:Right.
George Visger:If you died by CTE, that paid up to 5,000,000. If you had Lou Gehrig's disease, that would pay up to 4,500,000, Parkinson's 4,000,000 at the sliding scale. And the bottom two were neurocognitive impairment two point zero, which is which is dementia, which is what I have, and the Latin lowest one was neurocognitive parent one point five, which is almost.
Corey Berry:You were
George Visger:with the way they had it set up. You needed five years to be vested in the NFL brain injury lawsuit, even though you only need four to be vested in the NFL, even though the average career was only 3.2 then. So I played two years in NFL, but the humorous part about this is that the year I had three brain surgeries did not count in the brain injury lawsuit because I was injured in preseason. So I only qualified for one zero five years, so I got 20% of what I qualify for. Still was gonna be a few 100,000.
George Visger:It was to get my family back into a home, you know, my my kids back together. Within a week of me being approved for my settlement, the travelers who were already into a multi decade battle on my work comp stuff, within a week, they swoop in like freaking flies to to to pile of crap. And they file a $615,000 lien on my NFL settlement, which was more I was even gonna get. So then we finally go to trial hearing in 2019, after thirty eight years of this craziness, it was to try to read and I had, you know, work comp knee and brain injury suit with the with the 49. So we were gonna try to in 2019, we go to this hearing.
George Visger:We're gonna try to remove the lien on my NFL suit and then settle my work comp claim, my brain injury needed once and for all. Done with it. Right? And that's where the the face of the giants, my thirty eight year battle. And then we go into this mediation hearing.
George Visger:The travelers send their top seven corporate big dogs. And again, tell me if I'm getting off track here.
Paul Frase:No. You're good. You're good.
George Visger:Okay. Good. Good. Because I will get rolling on things and just forget what to quote. And so they they send their top severed sever seven big corporate big dogs to fight little lonely.
George Visger:And I've got Jason Lukasiewicz there. He flew off from Pittsburgh with an associate friend of his, Mad Max Petruunya. I call him Mad Max because on the side when he's not an attorney, he's a wrestler. He's a professional wrestler, and he wrestles under the name, the gavel. Mhmm.
George Visger:And so we've got Mad Max and Jason from my NFL suit, and I've got Chris Asvar, my freaking warrior work comp attorney who beat them in all these hearings and over the years. Chris is just another one of my angels. And so we go head to head. So the the the media it's a mediation hearing. And if we don't settle it that day, they're taking me to a full blown jury trial four days later.
George Visger:A jury trial for work comp. Unheard of. Mhmm. But see, I have no idea. I was precedent setting.
George Visger:When I originally won my work comp case in '86, I was the very first NFL player ever won a case because I had to sue to get my second, third brain surgeries paid for. And then I didn't settle. I left my medical open, used voc rehab to go back to school, finish my biology degree. And until about 2010 or so, I was the only NFL player to ever want work on case. So they have fought me for decades.
George Visger:It's like, okay, if this girl's story gets out, we're screwed. If guys learn, they actually have benefits that we've been stealing from them from them, we are screwed. And so I have been so vocal over the years trying to get the word out. And so we're eight and a half hours since mediation hearing and trying to reduce the lien and settle. And all of a sudden, I guess the travelers wanted to go to dinner.
George Visger:And the judge comes back into my and I'm in one room with my attorneys and then the judge and my attorneys would go down the hall to the stink hole where the travelers were all holed up. And they'd, you know, hour or two down there, come back, and then this is what they did. It was back and forth all day. Right? 05:30 that night, judge comes into my room.
George Visger:He says, here's your latest offer. Slides me a piece of paper. I'm the back I'm I'm on the backside of this big conference table in this room just, you know, by myself. Slides me a piece of paper. I looked down.
George Visger:Now they want me to pay them $700,000. And I just I lost my mind. Yeah. I jumped out of my seat. I had my finger in his face.
George Visger:The judge, I said, f you and f them. I'm walking. I said, we're going to trial. And and I'm going on. Of course, there's a lot more Right.
George Visger:Speed ups going on. Mhmm. Yeah. And he's like, oh, no. So and I'm just going off on them and just I'll kick their asses.
George Visger:I don't give a shit. I said, I don't have anything. I said, I'll go down. I'll I'll give them all brain damage. I said, throw my ass in jail.
George Visger:I'll have a roof over my head and three squares a day. I don't give a shit anymore. I lost my family, my kids, my marriage, my home, my business. I said, I don't give a shit. And while I'm going off on them, everyone's trying to settle me down on the table before we went in, weeks before we had a private company write a life care plan for me.
George Visger:Now through Chris Asvar's multiple hearing wins, appeals wins, California court appeals wins, those were all good to get me into first time I did three days of in house treatment at Center for Neuroskills in Bakersfield in my mid to late fifties. Never had treatment. I'm showing improvement. They recommend a ninety days. Another year and a half of win another work comp hearing, appeal, appeal, California court of appeals.
George Visger:I do ninety days of in house treatment at Center for Neuroskills. Now I'm in Emeryville, closer to my family. Still showing improvement. Doctors recommend it a year. Now keep in mind, this is 1,500 a day.
George Visger:We're sticking it to the old flowers. You know? So they recommend a year. Another nuclear battle, Chris Asvar goes head to head with them. We beat them in a hearing, appeal, appeal, California Court of Appeals.
George Visger:I do a year there, which is where I met my beautiful wife now, Jennifer, another one of these blessings in my life because of this. And so only after that year, we sit down. They say, Visger is still showing improvement. He's freaking 16 years, 61 years old. He may need this forever.
George Visger:That brought them to the table finding me. So that's when we went into our mediation hearing in two thousand nineteen, October, and that's where they wanted me to pay him when I lost my mind. And I said, we'll go to trial. And they came back. Judge says, give me one more chance.
George Visger:And he went down the hall, and I wrote on the piece of paper what I what I wanted to do to him. And I said, read this to him. And he came back an hour later, and they folded their tents. They went from me asking me to pay them 700,000 to them paying me. I can't divulge numbers, but it's it's many figures.
Paul Frase:Right.
George Visger:And the judge came in and goes, here's their their offer. I looked at it. I tapped it. I said, this is supposed to be worth what my family went through for thirty eight years. He says, it's not perfect, but I think it's a good offer.
George Visger:And I looked and I'm tapping it. I said, so the lien's gone from NFL sub. He goes, yes. I said, this this 7 figures are supposed to be what we went through. You know, we're he says, yes.
George Visger:And I said, not even freaking close. Now everyone's thinking, shit. This crew wants to go to trial, which I didn't. I I would and I paused, and I just said, but I'm done fighting. I'm done.
George Visger:And it was like a million pounds left my shoulders and my vision cleared. And I'm like, I'm done. We punched it across the goal line and I'm done. I can think about things I wanna do, not things I have to do now. I mean, it's like this battle.
George Visger:And we walked out of that room, and Jennifer was on the hall all day waiting. And she came up, and me and her and Chris Asvar and Jason Likasevich and Mad Max Petrunia. You know, we walked out of that building, and I literally stepped outside and I looked around. I said, Jennifer. I said, oh my god.
George Visger:I said, could see again. I can literally I'm planning things I wanna do. I wanna hunts I wanna go on. You know, I'll get back into a home, see my do things with my kids. My I was so focused for so many years.
George Visger:It was just like I had to just keep my head down. And Paul, you'll you'll you'll know this. It's like just short, choppy steps, man. Just keep your head down, stick your face in numbers, and just grind. Mhmm.
George Visger:You know, I couldn't look up and think about what was going on. I just had to just keep pounding. And that moment, the shutters came off, and it was like, here's your life, George. And that's how my book you know what? It's a brand new life, man.
George Visger:It is most beautiful, blessed, and I was estranged from my kids for years. I had anger issues when we're homeless. No one wanted to be around me. Well, I got the most beautiful card from my daughter, Amanda, yesterday. The day before, I get this.
George Visger:Where is it? Oh my gosh. My daughter Stephanie sends me this manly, what there's a name for bouquet, but it's flowers made out of out of teriyaki jerky cut in the flowers, and they're on beef stick stocks. I'm like, and it's not even Father's Day yet. Well, kids send me these and it's just you know what?
George Visger:We have healed. Christie, my ex, and Jennifer, they FaceTime each other. Christie thanks Jennifer for being the greatest second mom to our kids. Jennifer thanks Christie for for giving her this well, the three greatest. We have great kids.
George Visger:My my children are amazing. I mean, this whole thing is healed beyond you could have written a script. You couldn't even written a script like this, and I've been blessed. God has blessed me, and I thank him. Every day I hit my knees, and I thank him.
George Visger:He has had his hand on me this whole journey. And so from here on, fourth quarter of life, whatever I say fourth quarter, Jennifer, no. No. It's just second half. I said, honey
Paul Frase:Well, we get we get I'm not gonna
George Visger:be I'm not gonna live the 104 years old.
Paul Frase:We we get the fourth quarter and and double overtime, George. Double overtime.
George Visger:That's it. You know? And so we're just getting started, When this book comes out, we're hitting the ground. I'm doing my talks again, my brain recovery talks, my motivational talks. I'm spreading the word.
George Visger:There's help for folks. Never give up, you know, keep pounding. And so this I'm I'm fired up. So We know
Paul Frase:through the years you've been through congressional hearings related to head trauma. We know that, one of your friends is Brandy Winans. She's a a dear friend of ours. She's actually on the Yes. Board of the HeadRush Foundation.
Paul Frase:Tell tell us briefly about this experience. We we've got just a few minutes left, and then we got a couple of questions to pack in. But your your your times with Brandy Winans and talking to in front of congress.
George Visger:So so back when I started really getting active, like, thousand ten or '11, I found Dave Pearce. I I met Brandy on Dave Pearce blog.
Paul Frase:Mhmm.
George Visger:You know? And I know her story with her husband, and she's been very vocal. And she and I, we've connected over the years. I've never met another one of these many teammates I have that I've never officially met. I consider a very good close friend even though we don't talk.
George Visger:You know? I mean, she's she's a warrior, and I think we just exchanged a text just within the last couple of days. She commented on something I commented on, and I said, hey. My sister warrior. You know?
George Visger:I hope things are going well. So we connected on this on our battle to hold the NFL accountable. What was your other question?
Paul Frase:Well, we're we're just we're kinda running through a couple things when and what we I wanted to get into your story about doctor Amen and what you told your son and your your your your wife about your son playing football. And what we do is bring awareness to parents and try to educate them about the dangers of repeated head impacts and how young brains at seven years old are not ready to strap on helmets and go out there and start beating their heads against their teammates.
George Visger:Wait. I mean, the brains, the neurons haven't even fully matured until you're in your early twenties. You know? So these young little guys, I mean, you look at them. The the helmets, the giant bobblehead, they can't their necks can't even hold the helmet up.
George Visger:Exactly. You know, that in itself is causing the brain to slosh even,
Paul Frase:you know? This episode of the HeadRush Podcast is brought to you by our personal doctor and team of doctors, doctor Mizelle De Mayo, and she's with the Paradise Behavioral Health. And we are in the
Corey Berry:Brain Well program, which is also part of the Millennium Health Center. Doctor Mark Gordon, you've seen him on Joe Rogan and even on our show, the HeadRush podcast, and hormones. And Michelle is awesome. We love her.
Paul Frase:She's she's our doctor of psychiatry. She works with the Mark Gordon program with the hormones, and and she adds her twist of genetics. It basically is melding two wonderful mediums together, and we're getting great help from doctor Mizelle De Mayo.
Corey Berry:So please check out her website at paradisebehavioral.com. She's Look up the Brain Well program. Get involved.
Paul Frase:She's sponsoring us. They're they're sponsoring us for the next year. So we are excited to to have them on board and and and shout the new the good news to everybody that is watching these broadcasts. So
Corey Berry:Is she helping you, Paul? Absolutely. She's helping me. So go check her out. Paradisebehavioralhealth.com.
Paul Frase:Well, we we could go on for for another hour, but we we can't.
George Visger:Oh, I know. When you asked me about Amon and my son.
Paul Frase:Yeah. Yeah. Exactly.
George Visger:Okay. So so back so going back to 2010 or '11, same thing that I write that everything happened for me then. I had doctor Amen had an NFL brain brain study going.
Paul Frase:Right.
George Visger:And and I couldn't even have I didn't have money to get down. That's why I contacted him, and I gave him my quick background. He says, George, he goes, we don't need you for a one day. He goes, we need you for a three day neuro cog evaluation. So we figured out we got travelers to pay if I remember correctly, maybe not.
George Visger:Maybe we're but anyway, so I took Christie, my wife at the time, and Jack was my youngest. Jack was, I don't know, nine or 10 or 11. And I wanted them to talk to the docs when I wasn't in the room because you guys know what it's like. You ask us how we're doing, I'm good. And the people around us are going, no, he's not.
George Visger:You know? Because we we were we have that warrior mentality. It's like, hey, we're just gonna battle through if I'm still standing. I'm still fighting. So I wanted them to talk to docs when I wasn't around.
George Visger:So after three days of just intense of neuro cog evaluation, Christy and I sit down with with doctor Willemeyer and doctor Amon. Willemeyer was running this clinic at the time. And and he just said, it's a miracle. He says that you can even walk or function. He says, with the amount of brain damage you have, my spec scans, there's huge holes in them, and he says, it's a miracle.
George Visger:And so he recommended hyperbaric, some leggings, that. So we're walking out of there after three days. Jack, my son's walking. Of course, think about it. Your dad played on, you know, championship Peewee Pop Warner, Pop Warner, Hall of Fame, high school teams, Orange Bowl, Super Bowl.
George Visger:I mean, the kid couldn't wait to play football, but I kept telling him, you're not playing in Pop Warner. Wait to get to high school. And so and and Chris was going, he's not gonna play. Said, yay. We don't even get to the truck.
George Visger:And Chris, he just says, Jack will never play football. He looked at me and I look at him. I said, son. I cannot argue with your mom. I said, look what it has done to our family.
George Visger:We've lost almost everything but ourselves and even that got fractured. I said, you will be I said, you have it, Jack. You have what it that it that you know what? That just gets things done. I said, no matter what you put your mind to, you're gonna be great, but you don't need to beat your brain about playing football.
George Visger:Kid, lettered in four sports in high school, scholar athlete, earned a degree in environmental technology. He got hired two and a years before he graduated, you know, and his brain works.
Paul Frase:Know? That's awesome. His brain works. Good.
George Visger:His brain works.
Corey Berry:Yep.
George Visger:You know? And he did all this without beating his brain up.
Paul Frase:Yep. Awesome. We love to leave our audience with a word of hope, George. Give us the title of your book one more time. Tell us when we can expect the release and give us a word of hope, please.
George Visger:Got it, brother. So my book is titled Facing Giants, My thirty eight Year Battle. It's about my thirty eight year legal battle to get my brain surgery paid for. And and I tell you what, it has a great ending. There's some dark, dark, dark times in it, but you know what?
George Visger:God was in control. And if you stay on the path and and and you know he's in control, he's not just gonna fix things for you and say, okay, you gotta do your part. But if you stay on the path, know he wants us to to to succeed and do everything you can, things will work out, I guarantee you. And sometimes it may not be what you think it's supposed to be. There are so many times I had plans and God just says, nope.
George Visger:Crack me on the head. You're not gonna be an NFL player. No. If you're not gonna do this, another brain surgery. No.
George Visger:No. No. So finally, okay. What do you want me to do? He says, I want you to work with people with brain injuries.
George Visger:So just stay positive. Do all you can. Don't take no for an answer. And and and remember, there's a reason they call it practicing medicine. They practice.
George Visger:They don't have all the answers and it's not some of them docs, it's not their fault. But I mean, just because a doc writes you prescription or tells you something does not mean it's it's cut in stone. Do your own investigations. Nowadays, you can go online and pull information on anything you want. And I when I'm going to doctor's appointments, I when I was single till I was mid to late thirties.
George Visger:So I would talk to my older brother who I work construction with, and and I'd say, what what's been going on with me last time I saw these docs? And he'd rattle off stuff, and I'd have my I'd have my notebook like I carry I carry these forty something years every day of my life. And I'd write down pointed questions. And I tell people, when you go in to see your doc, sit their butt down and have pointed questions already written out. And if they can't answer them, fire them.
George Visger:People forget. They work for us. Somehow this whole system is spun around to where, oh, doctor so and so is gonna see me and people are excited. Screw that. You're paying them.
George Visger:They better listen to you and have have answers for your questions. And if not, fire them, and there's a million people out there. Just keep going through till you find the right teammate to work with. And that's probably one of the biggest things I can tell. Never say never.
George Visger:Put in God's hands and and and educate yourself on whatever it is you're dealing with, and it'll work out. I'm living proof, man.
Paul Frase:Great. George, it's a pleasure to have you on. We're looking forward to your book. I wanna read that ending. I'm I'm really looking forward to that.
Paul Frase:And, God bless you. And and we we'd we'd like to lock arms with you and and take a stand with you. So
George Visger:Let's do it, man.
Paul Frase:Yep. Anything we can do
George Visger:Let me know how I can help you guys. I appreciate you have me on the show. Anything I can do to help support you guys and promote you, let me know.
Paul Frase:Absolutely. Thank you, George.
Corey Berry:Well and
George Visger:Appreciate it. God bless you both, brothers. Thank you.
Corey Berry:You too. Sorry. We got storm coming in, and I'm
Paul Frase:He's a little overstimulated, so we're we're gonna we're gonna have a nice quiet ride home, and I'm gonna try to drive sanely on these Dallas Freeways. So Careful. Thank you, George. Make sure you like, subscribe, share, everything you do to get the help us get the word out of the dangers of repeated head impacts. Thank you.
Paul Frase:Stay alert and stay alive.
Corey Berry:And again, just this is what it looks like to have brain injuries, people, and barometric and everything affect you. This is what RhIs bring. I've been tested for everything from that could possibly be why I get this way. And what everyone says is it's RHI, repeated head impacts is what causes me to be this way. And I am really off.
Corey Berry:So I just want you all to when you look at me, understand that when you put Johnny in a helmet at seven and at 21, he's getting hit. And at 30, you're looking at what it could be like. Or if you're putting Johnny on a mini pony at six and getting him bucking horses all the way through, this is what his life could be. And, you know, realize that this didn't happen in four years. This took forty years, thirty years.
Corey Berry:And just I want you to think about that. Thank you. And thank you, George. I appreciate you so much. Everything you've done, I wish this episode would've went better, but brain injuries do what brain injuries do and I'm not right.
Corey Berry:So I just wanna thank you all and thank you, Paul. And George, just thank you so much, sir. You're you're you're a brother.
George Visger:You guys.
Paul Frase:Yep. It's an awesome awesome
George Visger:Truly, I'm looking forward to teaming up with you guys any way I can help. You know?
Paul Frase:Thank you, George. And thank you, Corey, for being vulnerable vulnerable. And, George, thank you. It was a great episode. We're we're gonna do this again someday soon.
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