The Payoff - Stories of Sobriety

Mike Van Meter spent almost 20 years in the FBI. Before that he worked as a police officer in Washington, D.C., following a career flying helicopters in the military. However, this decorated pilot was grounded by addiction, and today, almost 10 years sober, he shares his story to help other addicts. https://vanmeterwellnesssolutions.com/wp/about/ https://vanmeterwellnesssolutions.com/wp/podcasts/...

Pete guests on The Great Man Within with Dominick Quartuccio and Bryan Stacy. Pete Sousa runs The Payoff with Pete Podcast, 100+ episodes of athletes, celebrities, and public figures who are recovering alcoholics How alcohol often starts off as a superpower, and the line where it turns into kryptonite Pete shares stories of professional athletes who played games drunk and high The humbling path to...

Amanda Marino is a certified recovery and life coach and a certified intervention professional but most importantly she’s more than 15 years sober. She suffered unspeakable trauma as a kid and started drinking and using pretty early in life. Before Amanda’s usage got out of control, she worked as an actress and model. Now she uses some of those skills serving as an expert on A&E’s new show Dig...

Charlie Engle is a legendary ultra-marathon runner. He has won or placed in some of the world's most challenging races. In 2007, Matt Damon produced and narrated Running the Sahara. It's a film about Engle and his successful bid to become the first person to run across the Sahara Desert. Before all of that though, Charlie’s addiction almost killed him. But now he wears it as a badge of honor, a se...

Leigh Steinberg is probably the most notable agent in the history of sports. He's often credited with being the real-life inspiration for the movie Jerry Maguire. He really doesn't really want to talk about movies or his star-studded roster of clients over the years - from Troy Aikman to Pat Mahomes. What he wants to talk about is being sober for more than a decade and how he did it. It's an incre...

Chris Brown is an Emmy-nominated journalist and the winner of more than 10 Associated Press awards for his anchoring and reporting. Chris has also battled alcohol addiction for as long as he can remember. While professional success in news and politics has illuminated his outsides, his alcoholism has dimmed his internal fame. Two months sober, Chris uses laughter and tears to share what it's like...

Col. Dan flew 159 combat missions in Vietnam, where he cheated death almost every day. However, a decorated career as a fighter pilot didn’t excuse him from the grips of alcoholism. Sober today more than 30-years, his legacy is flying higher than ever, in the history books and through his work with other alcoholics. This is an amazing story for any addict looking to put down a drink or a drug or f...

Doug Overton scratched and clawed his way to 12 seasons playing in the NBA, followed by a career coaching with the Sixers and Nets. But at 46 years old he took a season off to spend time back at home, while his daughter finished up her final year of high school. That's when Doug smoked his first joint. What followed was six years of abuse, denial, and a couple of highly publicized run-ins with pol...

Jim Hecht 's ability to create magic on the screen has led to great success for him as a screenwriter. However, mired in addiction more than 20-years ago, the odds of getting sober probably may have seemed like even more of a longshot than sustaining a career in Hollywood. Jim is the co-creator, writer, and executive producer of the wildly successful  Winning Time  on HBO . But his biggest victory...

Chris Therien's NHL career spanned 12 years and 764 games. He was a guy you could count on bringing 100% every night on the ice, but all the while Chris was counting on drinking, especially late in his career. The tragic death of his sister, coupled with the pressures of NHL hockey led him to rock bottom in 2006. That's when he checked into Caron Treatment Center with a blood alcohol level of 0.63...

Hilary Phelps is a renaissance woman, who brings light to the world in so many different ways.  She’s an author, a public relations guru, a photographer, a triathlete, and a mom – just to name a few things. However, as Hilary will tell you, making all of that possible is her more than 15 years of sobriety. In college, her dinking cast a shadow on her elite swimming skills and interpersonal and emo...

Dan O"Toole is one of the biggest names in Canadian sports broadcasting, so big he was lured to Los Angeles by FOX Sports to be one of the faces of its new network in 2013. Dan ended up back in Canada on its version of SportsCenter, still one of the most celebrated personalities in the country. But he ended up in rehab in February of 2021, after getting laid off. Now, more than a year sober, Dan u...

He's a former heavyweight boxer, an author, a motivational speaker, a military man and his IQ has been recorded as high as 150. Ed is also an alcoholic with a message of incredible hope. Get ready to get educated and to enjoy a compelling podcast with Pete and the former heavyweight, dubbed 'Black Magic". https://edlatimore.com/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Learn...

Pete goes on Shane Ramer's That Sober Guy Podcast to share his story. @thatsoberguypodcast https://www.quitdrinkingdude.com https://www.thatsoberguy.com/work-with-shane Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privac...

Shane Ramer is the founder and host of ‘That Sober Guy Podcast’. Starting in 2014, it’s known as one of the top recovery pods out there. Shane’s life as a kid in the Bay Area saw him succeed on and off the baseball diamond but then he started getting high and drunk. All of a sudden drugs and alcohol became the number one priority in his life, as he moshed his way through the punk rock scene. Shane...

At one point, every morning Murph told himself he wasn’t going to drink and every night the bottles stacked up. He says that’s why he considerers the fact he doesn’t want to drink today a miracle. This guy was a great hoops player but he turned down playing for a major D-1 program because his life was already unmanageable at 19. We’ve got a real alcoholic on our hands, who wears life like a loose...

If you need a pick-me-up, this pod is for you. Kevin E is a force of nature and his story of addiction and recovery is shocking before it's totally inspiring. He goes to any length to help people, in and out of recovery, and it's clearly having a positive impact on him. YouTube: https://youtu.be/2bK9pCSkeLQ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Learn more about your ad cho...

Mike Gminski was the seventh pick in the NBA Draft in 1980, after an all-American career at Duke. He averaged almost 12 points a game over a 14-year NBA career, where he says alcohol abuse really wasn't an issue. But then life threw some haymakers at the G-Man and he used drinking and drugs to cope. On July 13, 2020, Gminski's son Noah and his ex-wife drove him to Florida, where former teammate Ja...

Harry Cunnane has written two books on recovery and works tirelessly to break the stigma of addiction; a stigma that kept him sick and almost killed him. Nearly 10 years sober, Harry bottomed outright as his mother, Madeleine Dean, was launching a successful run for Pennsylvania State Representative. His amazing story features a harrowing addiction to opioids but, most importantly, his inspiring r...

Vance Johnson endured life in an abusive household as a kid and drifted into a life of alcohol and drug addiction as an adult. On the outside life looked perfect. He was a young NFL star with charisma and charm on a team that played in three Super Bowls. But while the lights were bright on the exterior the darkness crept in internally. Countless overdoses failed marriages and suicide attempts prec...

Nate Amor performs in front of sold-out arenas as one of the lead performers in the Trans-Siberian Orchestra. But it’s the high he chased off the stage that’s led to a long battle against alcohol and benzodiazepines. There’s a reason he performed in front of almost 750,000 fans over the 2021 holiday season with the TSO. But most importantly, there’s a reason he can help addicts out of the wilderne...

Ritch Shydner rode the comedy boom in the 1980s to stardom, thanks to his dysfunctional childhood and quick wit. He became a regular on The Tonight Show when seven million people a night used to watch. Ritch also appeared in hit TV shows and movies But his biggest role came when he beat addiction in 1985 and got sober. http://www.ritchshydner.com/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone....

Thomas “Hollywood” Henderson was one of the best young players in the NFL. By the time he was 25 years old, he’d made the Pro Bowl and played in three Super Bowls (winning one) on America’s Team the Dallas Cowboys. But as his career evolved so did his addiction to cocaine. It started hanging out in Los Angeles with Richard Pryor and Marvin Gaye and ended with a love for crack and finally big troub...

Musician and actor Wes Cunningham returns to celebrate the one year anniversary of The Payoff and to talk about his last year, where he got away from what he did to get sober and descended into a dark time. Wes shares this experience and how he turned it around and got back on the beam. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone...

Rob Koebel appeared to have it all but as he racked up Emmy Awards and his career in TV News soared, he was spiraling into the depths of alcoholism. Then his ex-wife, a current CNN anchor, wrote a book that chronicled Rob’s behavior in addiction and triggered and event that led to an epic bottom. Today, Rob is nearly 10-years sober and is a staple in the Southern California recovery community and...