What happens when decades of pushing harder finally collide with a body and brain that can no longer keep up? In this episode of MyPOTSPodcast, former professional football player and men’s health advocate Mike Moosbrugger joins Dr. Joseph Schneider to tell the deeply personal story of his neurological and physical decline—and the long road back.
From repeated head impacts and severe brain fog to digestive dysfunction, insomnia, dramatic weight loss, functional neurological rehabilitation, and rebuilding his identity outside football, Mike shares what it was like to become the patient after a lifetime of being the athlete.
Together, he and Dr. Schneider explore the gut-brain connection, neuroplasticity, recovery, sleep, self-advocacy, men’s health, and why healing sometimes begins by having the courage to ask for help.
Podcast Episode
From Football and CTE Concerns to Recovery: Mike “Moose” Moosbrugger’s Brain Health Journey
For most of his life, Mike “Moose” Moosbrugger knew how to push.
At 6-foot-7 and more than 290 pounds during his playing years, Mike built much of his early identity around football.
He played at the Division I collegiate level and later professionally.
As an offensive lineman, contact wasn’t an occasional part of the game.
It was the game.
Play after play.
Practice after practice.
Season after season.
Mike says he began playing football around age nine and continued until approximately age 25 or 26.
Years later, however, he found himself confronting an entirely different challenge.
His body and brain were no longer responding the way they once had.
What followed became one of the hardest battles of his life.
When the Athlete Becomes the Patient
Mike’s story isn’t simply about football.
It’s about what can happen when symptoms accumulate slowly enough that they’re easy to explain away.
Brain fog might be blamed on poor sleep.
Forgetting something might be blamed on stress.
Fatigue might be blamed on working too hard.
Until eventually, something changes.
For Mike, that change became dramatic.
He describes already experiencing symptoms he associated with his history of concussions when another bout of COVID preceded a major deterioration in his health.
His appetite disappeared.
Then his sleep began deteriorating.
Eventually, Mike says he went nearly two months with profound insomnia.
When he tried to close his eyes, he describes experiencing intense surges of adrenaline-like symptoms and a racing heart that forced him to keep moving.
At night, he says he sometimes walked for miles because he couldn’t settle down enough to sleep.
Something was clearly wrong.
Looking Beyond the Brain
Initially, Mike says much of the attention was directed toward his brain.
But he became increasingly convinced that another part of his health needed attention:
his gastrointestinal system.
Mike describes being diagnosed with significant gastrointestinal dysfunction and believes inflammation involving his gut played an important role in his broader health crisis.
That experience fundamentally changed the way he thinks about neurological recovery.
The gastrointestinal tract, immune system, metabolism, and nervous system communicate through multiple biological pathways—often collectively discussed as the gut-brain axis.
For Mike, addressing his gastrointestinal health became an important part of stabilizing his overall condition before he felt capable of tackling intensive neurological rehabilitation.
His story shouldn’t be interpreted to mean that every concussion or neurological condition is caused by “leaky gut.”
Instead, it illustrates why complicated neurological patients sometimes require clinicians to look beyond the brain alone.
A 60-Pound Warning Sign
Eventually, Mike’s condition became impossible to dismiss.
He says that during approximately two months of his illness, he lost nearly 60 pounds, much of which he describes as muscle mass.
For a former professional offensive lineman, the physical transformation was extraordinary.
He became emaciated.
People who had known him as a powerful athlete barely recognized the person they were seeing.
Mike sought specialized gastrointestinal care and says that addressing those problems became an important turning point.
Only after stabilizing that part of his health did he feel ready to begin the neurological work that followed at Hope Brain Center.
Brain Fog Is More Than Forgetfulness
Dr. Schneider understands one of Mike’s most frustrating symptoms personally:
brain fog.
Both men describe what it feels like when tasks that once happened automatically suddenly require enormous mental effort.
Someone tells you their name.
Sixty seconds later, it’s gone.
You’re having a conversation, but while the other person is on sentence four, you’re still trying to process sentence one.
You drive somewhere you’ve visited hundreds of times.
Suddenly, you don’t know how to get home.
Mike describes becoming dependent on navigation systems for familiar routes.
Dr. Schneider shares a similar experience from his own neurological recovery.
These aren’t simply frustrating moments.
When they repeatedly interfere with everyday life, they can affect independence, confidence, relationships, work, and identity.
The Culture of “Just Push Harder”
Mike spent much of his life in a culture where pushing through discomfort was rewarded.
If another athlete was resting, you worked.
If something hurt, you kept going.
If you spent too much time in the training room, you risked being perceived as someone who couldn’t play.
That mentality can produce extraordinary athletic performance.
But Mike believes it can also teach athletes to ignore signals that deserve attention.
He and Dr. Schneider discuss the balance between the sympathetic nervous system—the familiar “fight or flight” side of autonomic regulation—and processes associated with rest, digestion, and recovery.
Training creates stress.
Recovery is when the body has the opportunity to adapt to that stress.
Mike now believes sleep, nutrition, recovery, and asking for help deserve the same seriousness athletes give to training.
Asking for Help Isn’t Weakness
This may be one of the most important messages in the entire episode.
Athletes are trained to be tough.
Men, in particular, may grow up hearing messages about handling problems themselves.
Mike believes that mindset prevented him—and potentially many others—from seeking help earlier.
Today, his message is very different:
Asking for help isn’t weakness.
It’s information.
A dietitian may know something you don’t.
A trainer may notice something you’ve missed.
A physician may identify a medical issue you can’t see.
A neurological assessment may uncover deficits that aren’t obvious during ordinary daily activities.
Mike repeatedly returns to the importance of becoming an advocate for your own health.
If you know something is wrong, keep asking questions.
When Injury Takes Away Your Identity
Brain injury doesn’t only affect neurological function.
It can affect identity.
Dr. Schneider talks about working with talented young athletes whose lives suddenly change after an injury.
One day they’re the best player on the team.
The next, they’re watching from the sidelines.
Mike understands that transition.
He describes the extraordinary validation that comes with performing in a stadium.
You make a play and thousands of people react.
Then eventually the playing career ends.
And it becomes quiet.
For athletes whose identities have been tied to performance since childhood, that transition can be psychologically difficult even without an injury.
Add neurological symptoms, chronic illness, or uncertainty about whether you’ll ever perform again, and the emotional burden can become enormous.
Mike’s advice to athletes is simple but powerful:
Football is something you get to do. It isn’t who you are.
The Invisible Side of Brain Injury
A torn ACL is visible.
People see the brace.
They see the crutches.
They understand why you’re struggling.
Neurological problems can be very different.
Someone can look physically healthy while fighting an exhausting internal battle.
Mike discusses how his social circle became dramatically smaller during the worst part of his illness.
Some friends didn’t know what to say.
Others found it difficult to see someone they had always viewed as powerful suddenly become so sick.
That isolation created another challenge.
Mike had to learn not only how to recover physically but also how to process changing relationships, disappointment, anger, and eventually forgiveness.
Why Mike Talks About Forgiveness
Forgiveness might seem like an unusual topic in an episode about brain health.
For Mike, it became part of recovery.
When you’re seriously ill and people disappear, bitterness can build quickly.
Why weren’t they there?
Why didn’t they call?
Why couldn’t they understand?
Mike eventually realized that holding onto those feelings was hurting him.
He also came to recognize that other people may have been dealing with struggles he couldn’t see.
His conclusion isn’t that every damaged relationship must be restored.
It’s that forgiveness can sometimes be something you do for yourself.
Physical recovery and emotional recovery don’t always happen on the same timeline.
Both matter.
First Reduce the Noise. Then Retrain the Brain.
Once Mike’s broader health had stabilized, the next stage involved neurological rehabilitation.
Dr. Schneider describes the functional neurological approach as identifying areas of neurological weakness and providing targeted stimulation intended to promote adaptation.
Mike has a much less technical analogy.
He describes his brain as feeling like a rolled-up extension cord.
Everything seemed tangled and compressed.
Rehabilitation felt like slowly creating space and teaching the system to function more efficiently again.
The scientific concept behind neurological adaptation is neuroplasticity—the nervous system’s capacity to change in response to experience and stimulation.
But neuroplasticity doesn’t mean one treatment instantly “rewires” a damaged brain.
Mike emphasizes repeatedly that his progress was gradual.
Sometimes Other People Notice Recovery First
One of Mike’s most encouraging observations is that patients may not be the first people to recognize improvement.
When you’re living inside the recovery process every day, progress can feel painfully slow.
You remember everything you still can’t do.
Family, friends, and coworkers may notice something different.
You’re navigating without GPS again.
You’re adapting when plans change.
You’re remembering conversations.
You’re getting through a day without needing every minute rigidly scheduled.
Those small changes can represent meaningful improvements in everyday function.
Mike says the people around him began noticing them before he did.
Why Neurological Rehabilitation Can Be Exhausting
Mike had spent years doing things that were physically difficult.
Football practices.
Strength training.
Competition.
Yet he describes the beginning of neurological rehabilitation as a different kind of exhaustion.
After treatment, he sometimes reached the end of the day without enough mental energy for conversation, problem-solving, or even paying bills.
He needed quiet.
Dr. Schneider describes recovery as requiring courage.
Performance training often provides quick feedback.
Lift more weight.
Run faster.
Win the game.
Neurological recovery may provide much slower feedback.
That makes persistence difficult—but important.
“We Don’t Guess. We Test.”
Mike identifies another aspect of Hope Brain Center that resonated strongly with him:
objective measurement.
He remembers completing his first neurological assessment and discovering abnormalities in areas he didn’t even realize were impaired.
Some findings made sense.
Others surprised him.
For Dr. Schneider, this reflects a principle that became especially important following his own stroke:
Test. Treat. Retest.
The goal is to establish objective information about neurological function, introduce an intervention, and then reassess rather than relying entirely on assumptions or subjective impressions.
If the data don’t move in the expected direction, the strategy may need to change.
Dr. Adam Klotzek and the Power of Explaining the “Why”
Mike also discusses working with Dr. Adam Klotzek, who collaborates with Dr. Schneider at Hope Brain Center.
One thing Mike particularly values about both doctors is their ability to translate complicated neuroscience into language patients can understand.
That’s important when the patient is already experiencing brain fog.
Neurology can become overwhelming very quickly.
Mike says he didn’t necessarily need to understand every technical detail.
But as an athlete, he needed to understand one thing:
Why are we doing this?
Once he understood the purpose, he could commit to the process.
Men’s Health: Why Mike’s Mission Expanded
Mike’s recovery journey also connects directly with his work in men’s health.
Today, he is involved with GameDay Men’s Health, where his work focuses on men’s health, hormone evaluation, longevity, and lifestyle.
His interest is personal.
He believes too many men wait until something is seriously wrong before seeking medical attention.
That fits a broader pattern seen in health-care research: men tend to use preventive and routine medical services less frequently than women.
Mike wants to change the culture from:
“I’ll go when something is wrong.”
to:
“I want to understand what’s happening before it becomes a crisis.”
Hormones Are Data, Not a Guess
Mike and Dr. Schneider also discuss hormone health, particularly testosterone.
Mike says his clinics are seeing younger men presenting with symptoms such as low energy, reduced motivation, and poor performance, and that laboratory testing sometimes identifies hormonal abnormalities.
The important principle here isn’t that testosterone therapy is the answer for every tired or unmotivated man.
It isn’t.
Fatigue, depression, low motivation, sexual symptoms, and reduced performance can have many causes.
Instead, Mike returns to the same philosophy he appreciates in neurological care:
Don’t guess. Test.
Hormone evaluation and treatment should be medically supervised and based on an individual’s symptoms, history, examination, and appropriate laboratory testing.
There Is a Difference Between Recovery and a Quick Fix
Mike doesn’t describe his recovery as miraculous.
He describes it as work.
Session by session.
Decision by decision.
Slow improvement followed by more work.
That’s important because patients with chronic neurological symptoms can become vulnerable to promises of instant cures.
Mike’s experience was the opposite.
He needed different practitioners at different stages.
He needed gastrointestinal care.
He needed neurological rehabilitation.
He needed lifestyle changes.
He needed sleep.
He needed support.
And he needed patience.
As Mike puts it during the conversation:
“Rome wasn’t built in a day, but it didn’t fall in a day either.”
Recovery takes time.
Can We Help Athletes Before They Become Patients?
Toward the end of the episode, Mike shifts the conversation from recovery to prevention.
What if athletes didn’t wait until decades after their playing careers to start thinking about brain health?
He believes off-season periods could provide opportunities to pay closer attention to recovery, sleep, nutrition, neurological symptoms, and overall health.
A 16-year-old athlete isn’t thinking about how today’s decisions may affect life at 35 or 45.
Coaches, parents, trainers, and clinicians can help provide that longer perspective.
Preventive care cannot guarantee that an athlete will avoid concussion, CTE, or later neurological disease.
But creating a culture where athletes report symptoms, receive appropriate medical evaluation, prioritize recovery, and don’t treat asking for help as weakness is an important place to start.
From Professional Athlete to Health Advocate
Mike Moosbrugger’s life after football has taken him into entrepreneurship, coaching, motivational speaking, and men’s health advocacy.
But his personal health crisis added another dimension.
He knows what it feels like to look healthy while knowing something is deeply wrong.
He knows what it feels like to lose cognitive abilities that once seemed automatic.
He knows what it feels like when friends disappear.
And he knows what it’s like to wonder whether you’re ever going to feel like yourself again.
That’s why he talks about it.
If his experience helps someone else ask for help sooner, advocate for themselves more effectively, or realize that recovery may require persistence, he believes the suffering can serve a purpose.
Real Stories. Real Science. Real Hope.
This episode of MyPOTSPodcast isn’t a promise that every person with a history of concussion will follow Mike’s path.
It isn’t proof that every neurological symptom begins in the gut.
And it isn’t a claim that one treatment can reverse the effects of years of head trauma.
It is something arguably more useful:
one patient’s story of refusing to stop looking for answers.
Mike’s experience reinforces the importance of examining the whole clinical picture, measuring neurological function, addressing relevant medical and metabolic factors, respecting recovery, and finding practitioners willing to listen.
Most importantly, it challenges one of the oldest ideas in sports:
That asking for help makes you weak.
Mike’s experience suggests the opposite.
Sometimes asking for help is where the comeback begins.
Ready to Take the Next Step?
If you or someone you love is experiencing persistent symptoms after concussion or head injury, brain fog, dizziness, balance problems, cognitive changes, POTS, dysautonomia, or other neurological symptoms, Hope Brain Center offers comprehensive neurological assessment and individualized rehabilitation.
Dr. Joseph Schneider and the Hope Brain Center team use objective neurological testing to better understand how different areas of the nervous system are functioning and to develop a rehabilitation plan around the individual patient.
Start With a Discovery Call
📞 Call Hope Brain Center: (610) 652-4732
📅 Book Online:
https://hopebraincenter.com/book/
Hope Brain Center
6 Dickinson Dr, Suite 310, Building 300
Chadds Ford, PA 19317
You don’t have to figure out the next step alone. Start with a conversation.
Ready to Take the Next Step?
Book a consultation with Hope Brain Center to learn more about our approach to concussion, traumatic brain injury, POTS, dysautonomia and complex neurological rehabilitation.
Our Location:
6 Dickinson Dr, Suite 310, Building 300
Chadds Ford, PA 19317
Frequently Asked Questions
Who is Mike “Moose” Moosbrugger?
Mike Moosbrugger is a former Division I and professional football player, entrepreneur, coach, motivational speaker, and men’s health advocate. His own experience with repeated head impacts and a later serious health crisis led him to become increasingly outspoken about brain health, recovery, and the importance of asking for help.
What is CTE?
Chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE, is a neurodegenerative disease associated with exposure to repeated head impacts. It can currently only be definitively diagnosed after death, so persistent symptoms in a living former athlete should not automatically be labeled CTE.
Does every concussion cause CTE?
No. A history of concussion or repetitive head impacts does not mean a person will necessarily develop CTE. Researchers continue to study the relationship between cumulative head-impact exposure and long-term neurological outcomes.
What is the gut-brain axis?
The gut-brain axis refers to the complex, bidirectional communication between the gastrointestinal system and the nervous system. This communication involves neural, immune, endocrine, and metabolic pathways.
Can a concussion cause digestive problems?
Gastrointestinal and autonomic symptoms can occur alongside neurological illness, and researchers continue to investigate relationships between brain injury, autonomic regulation, inflammation, and the gut. Mike discusses this topic primarily through the lens of his own experience.
What is neuroplasticity?
Neuroplasticity is the nervous system’s ability to change and adapt in response to experience and stimulation. It is an important biological principle underlying many neurological rehabilitation strategies.
Why does brain injury cause brain fog?
Cognitive difficulties after brain injury can involve problems with attention, memory, processing speed, sleep, fatigue, and other neurological functions. “Brain fog” is an informal term patients often use to describe these experiences.
Why does Hope Brain Center retest patients?
Dr. Schneider emphasizes testing and retesting because objective measurements can help clinicians evaluate neurological function and determine whether a rehabilitation strategy is producing the intended response.
Can testosterone treat brain injury?
Testosterone is not a general treatment for brain injury. Mike and Dr. Schneider discuss hormone health as a separate component of Mike’s work in men’s health. Suspected hormone deficiency requires appropriate medical evaluation and laboratory testing.
Why is sleep important for athletes and neurological recovery?
Sleep contributes to physical recovery, cognitive performance, emotional regulation, and numerous physiological processes. Mike believes athletes should treat sleep and recovery as seriously as they treat training.
What should an athlete do after a head injury?
A suspected concussion or significant head injury should be evaluated appropriately by a qualified healthcare professional. Athletes should report symptoms rather than attempting to hide them simply to remain in competition.
How can I schedule a consultation?
Contact Hope Brain Center in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania to schedule a consultation and learn whether comprehensive neurological evaluation and rehabilitation may be appropriate for your symptoms.
📞 Call Hope Brain Center: +1 (610) 652-4732
📅 Book Your Free Discovery Call: Book Your Consultation
Hope Brain & Body Recovery Center
6 Dickinson Dr, Suite 310, Chadds Ford, PA 19317
Visit https://hopebraincenter.com/book/ to learn more about comprehensive neurological rehabilitation and request a personalized consultation.
Transcript
00:00
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Hello, I’m Dr. Joe Schneider, and this is my Pods podcast. And I have a special guest today that has gone through treatment in our office, Mike Moosberger. Probably one of the nicest football players I’ve ever met. Right. The guy’s just got a sweetheart, and he has his tenacity about him that few patients have the tenacity to kind of get his life back. So he can kind of just like perform in life and do the things that, you know, he can always do. Now, Mike’s been a football player, Right. College level, professional level. And so we’re great to have him was great to treat him and to get to know him on. On a personal level. And so we’re going to go through what you’ve been through.
00:54
Mike Moosbrugger.
Yeah.
00:55
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Okay. Which is a really important story, especially because of. You had a teammate of yours that had committed suicide. All right. And when you. When you have someone that, you know, personally commit suicide, it is a. A knife that stabbed you right in the heart. And it’s very difficult to get to understand that. And so I did a piece earlier because I had a friend that did most of the construction in the office for us. Yeah. And he shot himself last week. And just really, I’ll tell you what, just takes you by surprise and sad. But this is the state of cte, right?
01:45
Mike Moosbrugger.
Absolutely.
01:46
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy. So I’m gonna let you take it from there and see where you want to go with it, because you got a lot of ways to go with this.
01:52
Mike Moosbrugger.
Yeah, it’s. You know, when you look at ct, you look at any sort of head trauma. Right, Doc? It’s part and parcel to playing football. It’s just one of those things that happens where I think many people, and I’ve had the ability to meet people in here and the other places that have got treatment. People don’t realize that something as benign as like a minor car accident in their twenties can elicit very similar responses years and years down the road. Right. So it doesn’t have to always be someone who is just a high level athlete that’s dealing with. With that trauma. Right. It is. There is a direct correlation with head trauma that goes into gut trauma, which ultimately was. Was my problem. Right.
02:31
Mike Moosbrugger.
So if you look at kind of the history of my career, you know, I started playing football at the age of like nine and played until I was 25, 26 as an offensive lineman. So every play you’re hitting someone. Right. There’s just no break from those things. And what nobody really tells you when you deal with a head injury, I’ve come to learn now, even after all these years, is that whenever you have a head injury, you begin to lose gut function within about 24 hours. And if you don’t fix the gut, you’re not going to be able to fix the brain.
03:02
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
03:02
Mike Moosbrugger.
And that’s what ultimately happened to me. About a year and a half ago, I had already had, you know, some symptoms of CT from the concussions, things like that, which had caused a disease called leaky gut. Right. And it was manageable. It wasn’t something I was really noticing on a day to day basis. And then I got a bout of COVID again. I was sick for about three days, Doc. And after those three days, when I say the floodgates open, I mean the floodgates opened.
03:30
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah, we’re finding the same thing, that there are triggers. Right. So you have your initial injury and it kind of percolates. Would you say that?
03:39
Mike Moosbrugger.
Yeah.
03:39
Dr. Joseph Schneider
And then over the years, little things like happen, like you can have a hit your head on a cabinet or you can have Covid, or you might have a fall, or you have my fender bender or something like that. And it kind of accelerates it as each of those events start to happen.
04:00
Mike Moosbrugger.
Yeah, it for sure was that case. I started to notice initially, really around Thanksgiving where I just. My appetite was really down, I wasn’t able to eat much. Then my sleep started to deteriorate and then it got to the point where, I mean, it was so bad I didn’t sleep for almost two months. When I said didn’t sleep, I mean, literally up walking all night, about 11 miles a night. I closed my eyes for five minutes and I would get this massive dump of adrenaline and norepinephrine. My heart rate would skyrocket and I had to continuously keep moving. And we tried everything, right. First it was. They tried the sedation pills, which I walked right through. They did nothing for me except make matters worse. Looking at the brain. The brain, the brain. But never at the root cause.
04:45
Mike Moosbrugger.
And ultimately we found out what the root cause was. The root cause was the leaky gut in conjunction with the inflammation.
04:51
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right, the inflammation, the brain.
04:53
Mike Moosbrugger.
So. So for me.
04:54
Dr. Joseph Schneider
So let’s stop for a second. So when you have leaky gut, you have a barrier that has been compromised.
05:02
Mike Moosbrugger.
Absolutely.
05:03
Dr. Joseph Schneider
And it’s inflamed. So you have tight junctions with the cells and they break open and then food rushes into your body and you don’t know how to handle it, except for having an immune response to that.
05:13
Mike Moosbrugger.
You have a toxic soup that kind of is just going through the body. When you have that. Right. The blood brain barrier breaks down, too.
05:19
Dr. Joseph Schneider
The blood barrier breaks down too. Same thing. So blood brain barriers, tight junctions, and then all of a sudden, they split apart. And now you got a leaky brain and a leaky gut going on at the same time.
05:30
Mike Moosbrugger.
Yep. And it’s just. Just this massive amount of inflammation that’s finding places to go. It’s coming from the stomach, it’s going into the brain, which causes a whole litany of neurological issues.
05:40
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yes.
05:40
Mike Moosbrugger.
POTS to dysautonomia, to everything in between, which on the surface they look like that’s the case, but it’s really a byproduct of coming back down into the gut.
05:50
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah. So for me and my stroke, the worst symptom of a leaky brain was brain fog.
05:58
Mike Moosbrugger.
Oh, yeah.
05:59
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Like the fog. It’s like. Like you get up every day. It’s like you can’t get through the fog.
06:04
Mike Moosbrugger.
Nope.
06:05
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right. And it takes a massive amount of energy to get through the fog.
06:09
Mike Moosbrugger.
So much. And that’s what I think people. People don’t realize is something as benign as meeting someone and trying to remember their name 60 seconds later. It’s like an act of God to get that out. You just can’t do it.
06:20
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Or. Yeah. Or even following their conversation. Right. So they’re on sentence number four, and you’re trying to figure out that first.
06:27
Mike Moosbrugger.
The first sentence. Right. And then piece together everything that’s happened.
06:30
Dr. Joseph Schneider
And they look at you. It’s like, are you connected? You’re not connected. Right. And then.
06:33
Mike Moosbrugger.
And then it’s the frustration of, you know, you just heard it, but you can’t. You just can’t process it. Right. The things that you used to be able to do. You know, in my case, it was the use of my navigation system. Just getting lost. I mean, everywhere. Places that I’d been a hundred times, Doc. Right. I could do the back of my hand. I literally couldn’t remember how to get there or get home from there.
06:53
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah. So my wife and I had an incident where were driving, and I got lost. Right. So I got lost. I didn’t want to admit I was lost. And she said, are you lost? I’m like, no. Should I use gps? No, I could do this. Well, I went through the loop about six times, right?
07:11
Mike Moosbrugger.
Yep. And she was so aggravated.
07:13
Dr. Joseph Schneider
And I said, okay, use gbs. Because, like, I don’t know where I’m at.
07:17
Mike Moosbrugger.
It’s a wonderful tool, but those are the things. And you initially, you know, as it starts, you kind of don’t, you don’t really notice it, right. You chalk it up to I didn’t sleep well the night before or some other factor. And what it really is, it’s the degradation of that, those mental processes, right. Because of the information, because of the lack of quality sleep to kind of clear out the glymphatic system and to give yourself that reset. Yeah, it’s just that vicious cycle that just keeps going and going.
07:44
Dr. Joseph Schneider
So you have a breakdown in your gut, you have a breakdown in your blood, brain barrier, you’re stuck in an inflammatory mode that you can’t figure out, can’t get out of. Right? And it’s, it gets to a point where it’s like, man, there, I got, there’s something that got to happen or I’m not going to be around too long.
08:01
Mike Moosbrugger.
No, I mean, it gotten to the point. I mean, for me, I literally. The leaky gut got so bad, in the course of about two months, I lost almost 60 pounds of muscle just wasting away. I had a specific form of strap, I had a specific form of yeast attacking my heart and brain. I mean, I was six months from my inside shutting down and that’s it. Which I had no clue of. Right. I mean, I had to go to a specialist in Mississippi who, you know, that really kind of got me on the track with getting my gut fixed. And he said once we fix the gut, then you can start to work on the neurological stuff, which.
08:33
Dr. Joseph Schneider
And then you came here and we.
08:34
Mike Moosbrugger.
Came back here and worked on that and we started our process for sure.
08:38
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Pretty cool actually. Like really cool. And so let’s go back to playing football, right? So with all the football, hockey players and so forth and so on. I mean even people that, you know are in school and they’re serious about school and they’re always like, you know, getting five hours sleep at night. It seems that in our society more than anything else, reward a high sympathetic state, for sure. Always being like a high sympathetic state. Always performing, always being ready to perform, always training hard. They’re always this and this and that parasympathetic system, right. Which is our rest digest system. We ignore it actually, because we think we rest and digest. Then I’m not going to be like the super player.
09:33
Mike Moosbrugger.
Right, right. It’s the, it’s, it really becomes a law of depreciating returns and no One, it’s starting to get better nowadays. But no one really talked about that. Where you think I read on that, Doc, it was just, you work, that’s it. You just outwork everybody. The more you do, somebody else is resting. While they’re resting, you need to be working.
09:51
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah.
09:52
Mike Moosbrugger.
And, you know, when your body doesn’t recover, that’s ultimately when we get better. It sounds great to be in the gym, and it sounds great to do all those workouts and other things. However, you know, that’s when you’re breaking your body down. You’re actually getting better when you take that rest, you eat, you sleep.
10:07
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
10:08
Mike Moosbrugger.
You get out of that. You get out of that one nervous system track, and you push forward into the other. So that’s really. That’s really where the differences happen. But we live in that society, whether it’s sports, whether it’s work. Right. It’s push, push.
10:25
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah. Our greatest success is when we push ourselves to the limit. Right. Exact limit. Exactly.
10:33
Mike Moosbrugger.
The crazy part. So if we’re going to sleep for, you know, a third of our lives, we never put any emphasis on that.
10:38
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
10:39
Mike Moosbrugger.
Optimizing that sleep being as good as we are at our career or our hobbies or things like that. Right. There’s so many times I look at and I see, boy, those are just terrible sleep habits. No one. Do you feel terrible?
10:50
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah. Well, when you’re competing at a high level. Right. Are there support systems that are in place that would help you do that?
11:05
Mike Moosbrugger.
There are. And I think, you know, one of the big things that, you know, speaking from an athlete, the next athlete standpoint, one of the things I think we all struggle with, both male and female, is the perception of asking for help is seen as kind of a sign of weakness.
11:19
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
11:20
Mike Moosbrugger.
When it really isn’t. But, you know, the ones that can do that and take advantage of dietitians, team doctors, trainers, and things like that may know more than you do or may say, oh, well, okay, this here’s an easy way we can. We can fix what you’re feeling. A lot of it truly does come from a place of ego, Doc, where people just, you know, I remember I was taught, like, being in the training room, that’s a bad sign. You don’t want to be in the training room because you’re in the training room, you’re not going to play. Right. So we just avoid it. Yeah. And we. We set things up and we go through it. I mean, even in my. My current business that we work in, helping with men’s health, I mean, 82% of men don’t make their own doctor’s appointments.
11:59
Mike Moosbrugger.
So think about that. I mean, we just, we’re not going to go until we absolutely have to. We don’t go for checkups. We don’t, we don’t do those things. Right. We’re more likely to take our car in for an oil change than we are to go, you know, get that heart pain looked at or whatever the case may be. So some of it I think is societal. Some of it I think is personal. But you know, I learned particularly in this arena, if you ask for help, there’s plenty of people that are willing to help for sure. I mean, this is, this is a, this is a problem. I think the perception is people, they get frustrated with traditional western medicine just kind of focusing on symptoms, right. And they lose trust. But you have to be an advocate for yourself.
12:37
Mike Moosbrugger.
I say this often, you know, I know I was certainly for myself and just kind of keep digging till I came back, found you, found Dr. K. The other ones that I worked with that have helped me recover and get back to where I was. But it’s really a byproduct as much as all those assets are out there. You do have to advocate for yourself, right? Because the system is set up as such. There’s help, but you got to ask for it, right?
13:00
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Well, you know, there’s a real fear. Like I’ve treated a lot of young athletes, okay, kids that are top of the class, sure, they’re the best on the team. You know, they’re the go to person, right. And so when they get an injury, the conversations I’ve had with them was my life is gone. Yeah, my life is gone.
13:23
Mike Moosbrugger.
Yeah.
13:24
Dr. Joseph Schneider
That is like even for a young athlete or for an adult, right? It’s, it’s really kind of a sad thing.
13:31
Mike Moosbrugger.
It’s terrible.
13:33
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Mean I’m not the best my class anymore. Am I ever going to get it back? I’m not, you know, the best athlete anymore. And so the reason we got into a center like this was to help kids at first to kind of really get their life back, right.
13:50
Mike Moosbrugger.
It’s, it’s, I think my statistic on this is correct now. You know, suicide is the second leading cause of death amongst collegiate athletes. And that’s really a byproduct now of, it’s a loss of identity. It happens to all of us. Whenever you’re done playing, right? When you, when you’ve done something your whole life, you’ve identified as the best. The best athlete in your class. Now you’re injured. You’re not that you’ve identified as well. You know, I’ve always been the football player. Well, now you’re. You get to retire and move on and do something else. So it’s like, what do. What are we? And I’ve always told my athletes, as I’ve coached over the years, remember, this is just something that you get to do. It’s not who you are. It’s something you get to do.
14:31
Mike Moosbrugger.
And it’s going to end for everybody at some point. It ends for the great Tom Brady. Right. He’s no longer a football player. Now he’s an owner and a broadcaster. But it is that identity process, even if it’s for a short term, someone’s injured for a season. I see young people and even, you know, professional athletes. It’s a very depressive state because it’s. It’s everything you’ve always done. It’s what you want to do. Your identity’s tied up into it. And then the thought of that being gone, it’s a really scary thing.
14:58
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Well, you know, you talked about it at the last day when you’re leaving. Right. And when you talked about it, you. That really hit me, the statements that you were making. I’m on the field, you make a play, you do something great. And the whole. This whole stadium is like, bomb your hand. I was like, what?
15:17
Mike Moosbrugger.
Right, right. There’s few. There’s few better feelings. You can elicit that response from thousands of people. Yeah. Something that you did. It’s tremendous. It’s an energy that’s hard to put into words.
15:27
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah. And then when that’s gone, right at the end of.
15:30
Mike Moosbrugger.
It’s just quiet.
15:31
Dr. Joseph Schneider
It’s quiet.
15:32
Mike Moosbrugger.
No one’s. No one’s cheering for you like that in the office.
15:34
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
15:35
Mike Moosbrugger.
No one’s screaming like that in the cubicle. You brush your teeth this morning.
15:38
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah, exactly. Right.
15:41
Mike Moosbrugger.
So you don’t get that. And it is like a drug. I mean, it’s a wonderful validation.
15:46
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah. From.
15:47
Mike Moosbrugger.
From other people. And then when it goes quiet, you’re left. Almost all of us are left with that loud voice that’s in our head.
15:54
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
15:54
Mike Moosbrugger.
And that’s. It’s usually the one we shouldn’t listen to.
15:56
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right. Yeah.
15:57
Mike Moosbrugger.
The soft voice is the one we want to listen to.
15:59
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah, exactly.
15:59
Mike Moosbrugger.
It’s just that loud one there all the time.
16:02
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right. Yeah. Well, you know what I’m so glad about is that these are the subtle things that we’re talking about that you’re figuring out you.
16:10
Mike Moosbrugger.
Yeah.
16:10
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
16:11
Mike Moosbrugger.
Yes, sir.
16:12
Dr. Joseph Schneider
And so you’re a giving guy, right? Very much. You’re a caretaker. Right. So I mean, I, I foresee that career wise and personally that you’re going to be an influencer.
16:26
Mike Moosbrugger.
Yeah. I mean, this, this stuff really. And I’ve said it, the other thing I said in the last day, like I, I suffered badly with this and I, I don’t want other people to have to suffer unnecessarily.
16:36
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right? Yeah.
16:37
Mike Moosbrugger.
I already paid the dummy tax for you. Right. Like I’ve suffered enough. Right. So if anyone’s listening to this, I would tell them to be an advocate for themselves and to trust your gut too. I mean, we, when people are sick, there’s so much information that comes all over the place, but we know our bodies well and you know, if something is wrong. So it’s just a matter of finding the right physician who, who will listen to you and understand right interest, alignment, and you will get better. It’s not going to be easy, but you absolutely will get better. But you do have to find someone who will listen.
17:12
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
17:12
Mike Moosbrugger.
Who will understand the things that you’re going through and correct some of the misgivings that you might be having as well. I think that’s an important piece as well, right? I mean, you and I have a relationship as such. You know, we talk very openly with one another and I think that’s one of the reasons why I was able to make the progress that I was able to make.
17:28
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
17:29
Mike Moosbrugger.
So that’s a big piece for people. Right. And for me, it does mean a lot to me to be able to share this experience with other people. Because otherwise I think it’s. What was the point? Right?
17:39
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah.
17:39
Mike Moosbrugger.
What was the point?
17:41
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Well, also, when you get sick or you’re not performing well, your inner circle lessens. It gets less and less. Right. And the people that you can trust gets really less.
17:55
Mike Moosbrugger.
Right?
17:55
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Very much because they don’t know how to deal with you. It’s not like they want to do something like that, but they can’t handle your pain.
18:02
Mike Moosbrugger.
It was, is that correct too? Yeah, it really was. It’s very shocking. And I’m a guy, I’ve got a big role decks. I know a lot of people, unfortunately, a lot of good friends. But when I got really sick and it was bad, that circle got really, really small. And I think for many it was kind of practicing Avoidance.
18:23
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
18:23
Mike Moosbrugger.
They weren’t used to seeing me like that. The reality of it, of how quickly I sort of disintegrated and was emaciated in the way I was looking and the way I was feeling, it was just kind of, you know, people didn’t want to. Didn’t want to see it, they didn’t want to deal with it.
18:36
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
18:37
Mike Moosbrugger.
And that can elicit a whole nother set of problems when you’re going through that, because then you get bitter and you get annoyed and it’s like, well, I’m going through the worst time of my life and I. No one’s here.
18:47
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
18:48
Mike Moosbrugger.
So that’s why I tell people it’s so important to be an advocate for yourself. You know, I’ve talked about it too, with others. If you’re going through something and you just need someone who understands, like, I, I really get it. So I’m happy to chat. I’m happy to talk. I tell people all the time, reach out and message or at least listen, because I do get where you’re coming from. Right. And we can talk about. If you’re having some of the feelings like I was feeling, we can talk about that too.
19:11
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah. But then there comes a point where, when you get better, can you forgive? Right.
19:18
Mike Moosbrugger.
That’s the biggest thing.
19:19
Dr. Joseph Schneider
That’s the biggest thing. Can you forgive and can you re. Establish your. That relationship? Can that relate to be re. Established or is the forgiveness enough?
19:31
Mike Moosbrugger.
And I think it’s. Each one of those cases is going to have to be an individual case. Right. I think forgiveness for sure is a must because that’s really something we’re doing for ourselves. We think it’s for the people, but it’s. It’s not. That’s kind of like drinking your own poison.
19:46
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah.
19:46
Mike Moosbrugger.
You don’t want to do that. Let it, let it go. Whatever the case may have been, whether that individual wasn’t around as much as you thought he or she should have been, maybe they had their own things going through. Right. I try to not judge because we never fully understand what someone’s dealing with.
20:01
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah.
20:02
Mike Moosbrugger.
Particularly when you’re talking about the brain and those types of things. Those aren’t. It’s not like you tear an ACL riddock where people see you on crutches and you’ve got this big brace on. A lot of times those demons and those struggles are in people that look incredibly healthy or they look okay.
20:16
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
20:17
Mike Moosbrugger.
Or you might notice like one little subtle change, but they might really Truly be suffering badly. And I think for people again, going back to forgiveness, if people can take a look at their. Their situation and realize, you know, it’s just a lesson. It doesn’t have to be a life sentence.
20:37
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
20:37
Mike Moosbrugger.
Unless we make it one.
20:38
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
20:39
Mike Moosbrugger.
Forgiving and letting go some of those relationships that may have been the universe doing you a favor and removing those people from your life. Right. And opening the door for something new.
20:48
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah, exactly.
20:49
Mike Moosbrugger.
So sometimes there’s a habit of. We go through those challenging times just because there needs to be a little bit of a cleansing kind of take place in our life and we’re weren’t able to do it on our own. So the universe will do it for us.
21:00
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
21:01
Mike Moosbrugger.
But I think there’s, you know, you got to take that on kind of a case by case basis.
21:04
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Exactly.
21:05
Mike Moosbrugger.
Which is what I’ve. Which is what I’ve done.
21:07
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Okay. All right, cool. So. So let’s talk about. We talked about leaky gut inflammation. And then most of the stuff that we do in our office is a functional neurological. Yeah, Right. So it’s stimulating certain areas of the brain that just are weak. They’re not where they should be. And then as we bring up those centers, the. They plasticize. Right. More interconnections, more axons, more neurons and the whole thing. So that when you’re done, you got a stronger brain. Yep. Okay, so take care of the inflammation and then rebuild. Yeah, Right. Okay. So now the brain can be rebuilt. Now, I think there’s a lot of argument in the industry whether that can happen or not. All right?
22:02
Mike Moosbrugger.
There’s. There’s a lot. I mean, I, I have a lot to say about that because I’ve lived it. Right. I mean, I look at where I was in February and in March to where I’m at today, and I know the work we did together and I did with your staff and you know, it’s. It’s documented progress here. Right. And the two things that I did, which, you know, we had to fix were we fixed my stomach and then we started to fix the neuroplasticity. Right. I mean, you know, my brain was kind of like a rolled up extension cord. It wasn’t done properly. Right. All those, all those synapses were too tight, the junctions were too tight. I needed some kind of spacing in there in order to get things to fire properly. And I can legitimately feel it. It’s a process for sure.
22:47
Mike Moosbrugger.
It’s just not something you come and do One session and you’re better.
22:50
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right? Exactly.
22:51
Mike Moosbrugger.
But when you work at it, you’ll start to see. And what I tell anyone who asks me, the people around you notice before you do. Right. I tend to be a hard judge of myself. I think most people are. But the individuals around me, people I work with, friends and family, they notice it first. First. Right. And then you’ll begin to notice just things that you used to do that now you don’t have to do.
23:15
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
23:15
Mike Moosbrugger.
You don’t have to use your navigation system as much. You’re able to do things like, just out of pocket that you normally wouldn’t do. Like at my peak, when I was really bad, I had to be extremely regimented to even think about getting through my day because otherwise I’d forget everything, Doc. Right. I wouldn’t be able to get anything done. Versus now I find myself, I’m just much more fluid, kind of much more. Right.
23:40
Dr. Joseph Schneider
And it came to my mind, right.
23:41
Mike Moosbrugger.
If something’s off, it just. I just adapt and go right into the next thing. It doesn’t get me. At that point where you’re stuck almost in this paralysis where you’re like, okay, it’s out of context. What do I do?
23:54
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah.
23:54
Mike Moosbrugger.
And that’s what happens with people with brain trauma a lot, where you just kind of get stuck and it. And it’s easy to get stuck in the wood like that.
24:02
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah. Well, you know what? Coming back is not easy. No come back is real struggle. And you said to me that those first week or two was like almost crushing for you.
24:17
Mike Moosbrugger.
I was shocked. I mean, it’s one, you know, having played again the game rather at a high level and having done things very challenging physical things and, you know, challenging mental things.
24:29
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
24:30
Mike Moosbrugger.
And those sorts of things. I mean, I was just shocked my first week or two. By the time I, I got home at the end of the day. I mean, it just, I couldn’t have any more conversations. I couldn’t problem solve, I couldn’t. I couldn’t sit down to think about paying bills, all those things. Like, I just needed kind of quiet and just needed to like, let. Let my brain be turned off without too much activity because I could just feel. I could feel it being overwhelmed.
24:58
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right, right.
24:59
Mike Moosbrugger.
I could feel it being overwhelmed. It was just the exhaustion. I’ve never felt a mental exhaustion like that.
25:04
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Like that. Yeah, it’s reorganized. The brain’s reorganized. It takes a lot of energy to reorganize Right. Because you’re rebuilding. It’s. It’s really a building process, which is kind of fascinating about, like, computers. They’re hardwired. Right, right. But our brain’s not. You know, I mean, the brain is this dynamic organism that’s constantly changing all. All the time. And so, I mean, I always say that recovery is about courage.
25:31
Mike Moosbrugger.
Yeah, It’s a great way to put it, doctor.
25:33
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah, for sure. You mean it’s. It’s hard and recovery is harder than training for performance.
25:43
Mike Moosbrugger.
It is, yeah. Yeah.
25:44
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Okay. Yeah. Because then, like, when you can train for performance, then you can really kind of like, figure out how you’re navigating your world, both, like, mentally, emotionally, socially, physically, the whole thing. And then it becomes like a flow more efficient for you.
26:04
Mike Moosbrugger.
And I think in performance, too, you get. You get quicker dopamine hits, you get quicker validations than you do in recovery. Recovery, it’s. It’s always slower.
26:14
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Always slower. Yeah.
26:15
Mike Moosbrugger.
So it’s easier to get frustrated. It’s easier to think, well, this isn’t working. Right. Rome wasn’t built in a day, but it didn’t fall in a day either. Right. So everyone forgets that.
26:24
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
26:25
Mike Moosbrugger.
It takes. It takes both.
26:27
Dr. Joseph Schneider
It takes time. It takes time, effort, courage. But, you know, at the end of the day. Right. With a successful program, it really motivates us with each person that. That we have coming through the office. It’s a learning experience too, right?
26:46
Mike Moosbrugger.
Yeah.
26:46
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Because everybody’s different. And then the other thing is that I was practicing by myself, and then I snuck up on Dr. Klossic. Right. I wanted him for about a year and a half, but I didn’t tell him about it.
27:00
Mike Moosbrugger.
Yep.
27:00
Dr. Joseph Schneider
And so Dr. K has probably been my best acquisition. And really, we got a partnership going right now.
27:10
Mike Moosbrugger.
It’s a beautiful thing.
27:12
Dr. Joseph Schneider
He’s been an educator, he’s been a practitioner. He’s got his master’s degrees in neuroscience. He’s written papers and whole thing. And so. And he’s just a real human being. He’s just a real, like, really great guy.
27:27
Mike Moosbrugger.
As easy going as they come. And he’s like you, doc, you guys. The ability to take really complex neurological issues and kind of break them down in the layman’s terms so that everyone can understand. It can be. Certainly whenever you’re dealing with brain fog, you’re dealing with a neurological injury. A lot of this can be overwhelming.
27:45
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
27:46
Mike Moosbrugger.
But yourself, Dr. K, your staff, you do a good job of break it down to where it’s. It’s Bite sized pieces. And you can understand, this is why we’re doing this. And I think maybe some of that’s the athlete in me. But for me, as long as I understood the why, the how was kind of irrelevant to me. Just, this is what we have to do. This is the why. Like, Mike, you need to do this and this is going to make you better. Okay, let’s do it.
28:09
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah. And then the last piece that I want to cover is that you’re a gift. You’re a real gift. Right. You’re a gift to our office and. Or gift to have God bringing you to us. Right. I feel like God’s that does that.
28:27
Mike Moosbrugger.
Yeah, yeah. He brought me back to you to heal me, Doc.
28:29
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah, exactly. And then vice versa. You know, every person gets healed. We get to heal in a certain way as we go forward too.
28:37
Mike Moosbrugger.
Without question.
28:37
Dr. Joseph Schneider
All right.
28:38
Mike Moosbrugger.
It’s. And this is one again for me, I’m so passionate about it because I know how many people suffer with this and I, I also know that they’re looking for answers and they’re just not exactly sure where to go. Right. So that suffering is going to be unnecessarily elongated. Right. I mean, there. I think when you’re dealing with types of things that I’ve dealt with that a lot of your patients do it. There’s a couple of just simple things you can do up front. First and foremost, I would say, come in here, have an assessment done. Numbers don’t lie, right? Data doesn’t lie.
29:08
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Data doesn’t lie. Right.
29:09
Mike Moosbrugger.
Doesn’t lie.
29:10
Dr. Joseph Schneider
We’re database. We’re definitely database.
29:12
Mike Moosbrugger.
Those numbers don’t have feelings. They’re. They’re just. They, they are what they are. Right. And you’ll see, it’s. It’s surprising. I mean, I was surprised when I went through my first assessment. Some things I’m like, okay, I’m not surprised. And other things, I completely bombed. And I was stunned, right. Because it was. There were things I hadn’t done before and I didn’t even realize they were off. So I think that’s the first step. And then second. I said it earlier, but I’ll repeat it again, is you gotta advocate for yourself. Right. If you’re, if you’re at a place where you’re not getting the treatment that you need, it’s okay, go elsewhere.
29:45
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah, right. Yeah.
29:46
Mike Moosbrugger.
Go out and find the tree beat you need because.
29:47
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Exactly.
29:48
Mike Moosbrugger.
There’s plenty of folks out there that do want to help.
29:50
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Well, yeah. And like, let’s cover the medication. Right.
29:55
Mike Moosbrugger.
That’s a biggie.
29:57
Dr. Joseph Schneider
So I’m not anti medication.
29:59
Mike Moosbrugger.
Right.
30:00
Dr. Joseph Schneider
But I want medication that a patient’s taking to be at the lowest dose, the lowest number, and to kind of replace them with other nutritional, like leaky gut, things like that, getting that repaired. Nutritional and functional neurological solutions.
30:23
Mike Moosbrugger.
Yeah. I think oftentimes again, when we’re in this, you know, Western medicine, it’s really about looking at a symptom and treating that symptom and just kind of going down the checklist. You know, when you look at my case, the medications that they put me on to treat the symptoms of what I was dealing with, they exasperated our problem, doc.
30:40
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
30:41
Mike Moosbrugger.
They made it, they made it worse. They made the neurological recovery for me. They elongated that because, you know, there’s always a give and take with these things. So, yes, we’re looking at fixing this symptom, but it’s going to have this side effect.
30:53
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
30:53
Mike Moosbrugger.
And then you have to look at that. What I found in this journey to your point. If we can get the body into a place where it’s sort of operating the way that it should, where it’s harmonious, right. We can give it the intrinsic factors that it needs, it will heal itself, right? Yeah. It’s a process. Right. Like everything. But you do have to give it what we need. So many times we’re quick to look at a pill rather than look at diet, for example, which is a huge, huge role in all of this and how people eat the things they put into their body. I mean, there’s all sorts of endocrine disruptors and all sorts of things in society right now that are harming people.
31:32
Mike Moosbrugger.
But if you can give it the basic nutrients that it needs, you can give it again, the basic intrinsic facts it needs. You’ll need far less medication. Like you, I’m a fan when it’s needed. But it’s also something. If we break our ankle, we don’t wear a cast forever, right? We wear cast.
31:47
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Exactly.
31:48
Mike Moosbrugger.
Yeah. So many of these things were made just to be like a cast and then you’re supposed to go off them versus we’ve got people that stay on them for years and years. Years.
31:56
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Well, you are in the healthcare market.
31:59
Mike Moosbrugger.
Yes.
31:59
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right. All right, so let’s talk about that.
32:02
Mike Moosbrugger.
Yeah. So, you know, myself, my partners, we have Game Day Men’s Health, which is a hormone optimization and longevity clinic where I can tell you we are seeing the biggest epidemic right now in testosterone Both in men and in women, but particularly in men. I mean, young men coming in the age of 30 years old, they’re doing everything right, working out, they’re trying to get their sleep. They just don’t have enough gas in the tank. And we run their blood work and we’re seeing these numbers that in history you haven’t seen numbers.
32:33
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
32:35
Mike Moosbrugger.
The total testosterone is so low, it’s. They’re not even able to function. And what many don’t realize, you know, all these things you’ve heard about testosterone and how bad it is for us, it’s nonsense, right? It’s now, no, it’s cardiovascular protective. It’s heart protective. It’s, it’s great.
32:51
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Well, they’re afraid of strong men, right? So, like the whole idea in society is strong men are abusive. That’s right.
32:58
Mike Moosbrugger.
That’s right.
32:59
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Well, it’s not true.
33:00
Mike Moosbrugger.
It’s not.
33:00
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Strong men, a strong man. It’s not abusive.
33:03
Mike Moosbrugger.
Correct. You’ll find, you know, even if you look at the data, I mean, all these things, you know, higher levels of testosterone will actually cause people to be calm.
33:12
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
33:12
Mike Moosbrugger.
It’s. That’s, that’s not what causes that. That over aggression progression and those types of things. This is a, this is unique balance between. And I always talk about this, there’s normal and in range, which I think are some of the most dangerous words in medical.
33:26
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah.
33:26
Mike Moosbrugger.
And then there’s optimal. In range and optimal are two very different things. Right. So like, even when we do our neurological testing here, someone could be in range but not optimal.
33:35
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
33:36
Mike Moosbrugger.
So that’s really what we focus on. And the thing that I talk about in the clinics often, though, docs, much like we talk about in here, you know, this is not even. As we optimize your hormones, it’s not a magic shot. You’re gonna have to take some onus and do some things on your own. We’re gonna have to make some lifestyle changes. We may have to change how we’re going to eat. We may have to change up this or that, but it’s an investment in your health and it’s an investment in yourself. So from those standpoints, I don’t, you know, it’s great to have a 401k and all those things, but if you’re not here, what good does it to you? Right?
34:07
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah. Years ago, the, it was 52:1 testosterone to estrogen in men. Right. Now it’s like as low as 12 to 11 or something. Yeah.
34:22
Mike Moosbrugger.
I mean, if we go back to Our fathers, our grandparents. I mean, their average testosterone, you know, was somewhere around 700.
34:29
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
34:29
Mike Moosbrugger.
Nowadays we’re talking mid threes to fours. That’s a massive, massive difference. And you look at the change in diet, right? Statins became a big thing. Well, you need cholesterol in order to have optimized hormones, Right. So no one talks about that. So there’s all these medicines that have come out that have dampened total testosterone production and hormone efficacy, whether it’s, you know, statins, whether it’s SSRIs, right. People stay on them for years when. Now the research says serotonin really doesn’t even have anything to do with depression. Right. So it’s oftentimes we see that in the clinic as well, where I have a gentleman come in and, you know, my primary care just started me on this because I’ve been feeling down and I think that’s wonderful.
35:12
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
35:12
Mike Moosbrugger.
However did you do blood work before you did that? Because, you know, you might be feeling down and unmotivated and depressed because your.
35:19
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Testosterone a little low.
35:21
Mike Moosbrugger.
Right. If we get that up, then, you know, watching, you know, four to six weeks, you’re gonna, that’s gonna be gone. You’re going to be motivated, you’re going to. All those feel good emotions are going to come back. So I, I think, you know, the big thing, one of the things that I love about your practice and we do, similar to mine at game days, we don’t guess. We test. Because data doesn’t lie.
35:40
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah, exactly. Right. We don’t guess. We test. We test a lot.
35:45
Mike Moosbrugger.
Yes, we do. Yes, we do.
35:46
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Just a lot. Then we retest. Then we retest, and we’re like, oh, we got it wrong. Let’s do another. Something different.
35:52
Mike Moosbrugger.
True. But again, it’s the only way to really codify that. Hey, it’s working. We’re on the right track.
35:57
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah, exactly. Exactly.
35:59
Mike Moosbrugger.
You can’t guess what this.
36:00
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah, you know, it’s like, well, you always thought you were very intuitive or very intelligent because you could guess. Right. Most of the time. Right. But I mean, that turned out just to be stupidity in the long run. So, you know, well, after my stroke, I lost all my businesses. I lost everything. It was like a million dollars of debt. And thankfully for Dr. Yannick, she loved me enough that she was going to stick with me. But. So it was really crazy. But when I was going through my own recovery, right. That’s what I decided. I said, I have to test. I Have to know what’s going on. I have to know which areas of the brain that I really want to bring back. Right. Because, you know, you have strengths. Right.
36:51
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Sometimes you’re just going to rely on your strengths and forget about the weaknesses. But I mean, I really had to go back and swallow, you know, the whole, whole pill to make sure that, you know, I was doing the right thing by myself. Right. Sure. I guess it’s selfish that I came up with this center, but it’s really kind of turned out for me. So now we’re. I have a dedication and a passion to acquire whatever technology is necessary. Whatever technology is state of the art. Right. Because a lot of times state of the art doesn’t really become common knowledge until years later it doesn’t. So we want to be on that cutting edge. That’s why we brought Dr. K in. Because he’s cutting edge. Right, Exactly. And it was like I always realized that I really couldn’t do it all myself too.
37:43
Mike Moosbrugger.
So, yeah, it’s a big, that’s a big piece.
37:45
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah. And you know, like in your business, you have meetings, right. And so what your purpose of the meeting is to make sure that we’re all aligned. Right. And we’re all aligned and we’re going the direction so that we can catch all the things that are coming out through research, through clinical trials and so forth that are going to help the patient and the person that you’re dealing with.
38:09
Mike Moosbrugger.
We’re fortunate. I mean, in today’s world of modern medicine, there’s a lot of things we don’t like. But then, you know, we can’t not look at all the beautiful things that are happening as well, like Peptides. You know, I’m a firm believer that’s the future of personalized medication right there. They’re very efficacious. They do a lot of really good things for people, can help kind of get people off some of the medications that they’ve been on that are probably unnecessary. And you talked about being selfish. And I think one of the reasons that your center does so well, I firmly believe this. Before we can be selfless, we have to be selfish because you can’t give what we don’t have.
38:46
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Right.
38:47
Mike Moosbrugger.
So you took your own struggles and trauma and you put it into this place to come up with a step by step program of, okay, this isn’t just a practice in theory, this is a practice in practicality. I went through this, I did it. And you know, for me, that’s one of the things that carries a lot of weight is when someone, you know has taken something they’ve overcome and they’ve dealt with and they understand that process. Right. It’s not just something. Well, you know, Doc’s not going to learn this in the book. You read about it? Nope. You read about it. You also lived it. You fixed yourself doing this. That to me is a huge differentiating factor.
39:23
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Yeah. The other thing is why does God do that?
39:29
Mike Moosbrugger.
Listen, I was gonna ask you the same. I figured you got a better connection with him.
39:32
Dr. Joseph Schneider
What is he doing? Right.
39:34
Mike Moosbrugger.
Right. It’s like we could have done this without so much suffering.
39:37
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Exactly.
39:37
Mike Moosbrugger.
I don’t know, maybe we could, maybe not. Right. We wouldn’t have the same amount of perspective, I guess, or be open to help as many people maybe taking it for granted.
39:45
Dr. Joseph Schneider
But he left us here so that we could get together and to create a new effect for health going forward. Okay.
39:55
Mike Moosbrugger.
Yeah, for sure. It’s, it’s a big problem. I think. You know anyone that plays a sport, I would be an advocate of, of doing, you know, your program in the off season. I just think it’s prophylactically you can help yourself so far down the line. You know, especially in high school kids, they don’t, they’re not thinking about 30, 40 years old at that point. You don’t, your mind can’t even get out that, that far. However, the decisions that you’re making at 16, 17 and 18, they can affect, and they likely will affect you when you’re 35.
40:25
Dr. Joseph Schneider
35. Yeah, right, exactly.
40:27
Mike Moosbrugger.
So it’s just about getting information out there, sharing information, people making sure that, you know, people understand that it’s, there’s things you can do right. And it’s not, we’re not asking a huge life altering shift in order to do these things right. It’s, it’s really a couple of simple things you can do in the off season to help take care of yourself, Reset the gut and give yourself the break that it needs. And like I said, the body, you and I are living proof the body will heal.
40:52
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Exactly. If you want to need now look them up. Right. Game day, Philadelphia.
40:57
Mike Moosbrugger.
Game day, Philadelphia. Newtown. We’re in Philadelphia where we’ve got 23 of these open across PA in Jersey. So for me this is, this is a passion. Anything health long related, obviously, you know, leaky gut and concussions are a big one for me. Fan of the clinic, always happy to do anything I can to help you guys grow the business and be an advocate for you because I wouldn’t be here without you. I appreciate you.
41:23
Dr. Joseph Schneider
And then click on the link above if you want a consult, call with us and able to put you through our program that gets your life back. That’s what it is. It’s all about getting your life back and having relationships and family and friends and enjoying your life and not only working hard, but enjoying it also.
41:41
Mike Moosbrugger.
Yeah. And I think the last thing I would say, it’s for anybody who wants to look at this and click that link. You know, you, you will find hope here. It’s not cliche. I know a lot of times it feels like this is sort of a mountain that can’t be overcome. But step by step, session by session, you will see the improvement coming down here. Buy into it. This is one. Whatever you put into it is what you going to get out of it. So I would tell you, attack it and you’ll get better soon.
42:05
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Super. Well, thank you and thank you for watching.
42:08
Mike Moosbrugger.
Thanks.
42:09
Dr. Joseph Schneider
Thank you. Bye.
42:10
Mike Moosbrugger.
Bye.
