Dr. Dan: Hello and welcome to another episode of Beyond the Arches. I’m your host, Dr. Dan. Today we have a special guest—a patient of ours—Justin. Hello, Justin. Welcome. Justin: Hi, Dr. Dan. Thanks for having me. Dr. Dan: Thanks for coming on. So, let’s just jump in right away. We’re going to feature your life—your experience as a patient, where you came from, how you got here, all of that. Why don’t you give us your background? I know you’re a soccer coach, etc., but why don’t you dig into that a little bit? Justin: Sure. Well, it’s nice to be back in Florida. I grew up here, a couple hours up the coast in the Merritt Island area. Both my parents were Space Center people. I went to high school at Merritt Island High School and played college soccer at Radford University in Virginia. I had a little bit of a pro career—not the most. Dr. Dan: Where in Virginia is Radford University? Justin: Radford. Southwest Virginia. Dr. Dan: Oh, Radford. Southwest Virginia—right next to Virginia Tech. Justin: Yeah. Right across the New River. Dr. Dan: I went to VCU for a year of my residency. In that year, I went on two mission trips to Wise County, Virginia, where we took teeth out all day. So I’ve been in that area quite a few times. Justin: Yeah, I would imagine that part of rural southwest Virginia—particularly back when I was there—there was a big gap in dental coverage. Big needs, for sure. Dr. Dan: So you ended up there how? Justin: Soccer scholarship. And I did so well academically there that after three years they told me to leave because I failed out. It’s okay—I’ll jump ahead and say I have a master’s degree now from NYU. Everything’s okay. I wasn’t ready to be a student back then. I was a soccer player. I played for a team a few hours up the road from here called the Orlando Lions, who are now Orlando City in Major League Soccer. This was before that league existed. And then I played in England for a team called Boreham Wood FC. Dr. Dan: Very cool. Justin: Anyone who watches Welcome to Wrexham would probably know Boreham Wood because those teams play occasionally. Dr. Dan: I’m more Ted Lasso–level educated. Tell me what it was like living in Europe playing a professional sport. Justin: It was all three—neat, overwhelming, and exhausting. It was a dream of mine. Growing up, I was infatuated with the idea of playing in England, and Americans didn’t really do that back then. One connection from the Orlando Lions set me up with the manager at Boreham Wood. They said, “Fly over, we’ll find you a place to live, and we’ll see how good you are.” The day I arrived, I called them to let them know my plane had landed, and they said, “Good. We’ll come pick you up for training.” I got off a seven-hour international flight and went straight to training. It was a job. It wasn’t having fun with your friends kicking a ball around. Teammates were paying mortgages based on whether you won or lost. Everyone was on a win bonus. Salaries weren’t huge—it was the late ’80s—but it was one of the best things I ever did for my development as a player and as a person. I lived just outside London and wandered the city a lot—museums, parks, bookstores. It was mostly good, but plagued by the stress of trying to make it. I kept a journal that later became a book—a record of daily anxieties: Am I good enough? Will I get signed? Will I get a work permit? Dr. Dan: What would surprise most people about that lifestyle? Justin: How encompassing it is. People think you train 9–11 and then relax. No—you’re managing your body all day. Resting, stretching, thinking about the game obsessively. It devours your life. I think that contributed to me burning out early. I played my last game at 28. Dr. Dan: When you were living—when you were journaling and such when you were playing—did you live with another player? Did you live with anyone else or were you on your own? Justin: Not quite on my own. I rented a room in a house from a local family. So, nothing to do with another soccer— Dr. Dan: So you didn’t have that sort of— Justin: The team did the connection. They set it up and so I rented it. It’s actually really nice. Top floor of a house in a really nice neighborhood. And only two different times did the house get broken into when I was there. Only twice. One time they came into my bedroom. Dr. Dan: Oh, wow. In the middle of the night? Justin: Yeah. Dr. Dan: Wow. That’s wild. Justin: Luckily, it was a couple of young kids thinking that no one was there. And when I realized what was going on, I just sort of yelled. They—they ran out. I think they were as scared as I was. Dr. Dan: That’s incredible. I’m glad you’re okay. Justin: Thank you. Dr. Dan: Did—was soccer your only sport when you were growing up? Like was it the only thing that you could think of? Was it the only thing that you did, or were you also involved in baseball and swimming and started with football? Justin: Started with football. But I wanted to be a wide receiver. And if you know anything about pee-wee football, they don’t—nobody throws, right? So I’m like 10 years old, 11 years old and I’m running out. Nobody throws it because they can’t—they can’t throw—and I’m running these out patterns and hitch and goes and things like that and like it’s a run play and my job was just to drag a defensive player away. Yeah. And it was really frustrating and then I saw friends of mine playing soccer and I realized well the goalkeeper gets to catch the ball. You know that’s his actual job. You stand in the goal and they shoot and you try to make the save and so I got drawn to that position for that reason. Dr. Dan: Is that what position you played? Justin: That’s it. Yeah. I was a goalkeeper. Dr. Dan: Wow. Goalie was always—I played a little bit of soccer when I was a kid and goalie was probably the hardest for me to understand how you could play that because it seemed so big at the time. I guess I was probably 13 or 14. Just seemed too big of a task with too many lols in between. And what’s funny is I played catcher my whole life. My entire life revolved around baseball and catching until I was up till college. And you would think like, “oh well, the guy loves to catch things, so he’d love to be goalie.” Justin: Well, you’re right, though, because a catcher is involved every pitch. Every pitch and you’re calling the game, you know, and every— So goalkeeping is… I kind of equate goalkeeping to sailing because sailing is for anyone that’s ever had a sailboat, a good sailing replicator would be to stand in a freezing cold shower tearing up $100 bills and then have someone come along and scare you every now and then. And goalkeeping is sort of like there’s long periods where you say you’re really not involved in the game, but you’re aware that you could be catastrophically involved at any moment. You know, you could make a terrible decision and misplay a ball and cost your team the game and that did happen over, you know, a year 's career. I had a couple of days like that and that’s not fun. Dr. Dan: No. At all. No. What’s—give us a top memory from that period of time either college or playing pro. Justin: Sure. I have one I always go to. When I played for the Orlando Lions, we did a preseason tour of Scotland the summer of 1988. And so it was to get ready for our season, but the season in Europe had already begun. So we played these games. They were just exhibition games, but the teams made a big deal out of it because it was very rare for an American side to come over. So we played Glasgow Celtic—were very big, very famous club in Scotland, won the European Cup in 1967. We played St. Marin, a smaller team also in Glasgow. That’s where I played my first game. I didn’t play the Celtic game, but I played against St. Marin. Played really well. Next, we played Aberdine, also another big team. Played well against them. And then the final game was this team, Dunfermline Athletic. Dunfermline Athletic were in the second tier, the second division of the Scottish League at the time. Dr. Dan: This is over a period of how many days? Justin: About three weeks. Dr. Dan: Okay. Justin: Yeah. And because they were the smaller of the teams, they made a bigger deal out of the fact that this American team was coming to play them. So they—I wouldn’t say they packed the stadium because it probably held you know 28 30,000 or so but it was mostly full and I started that game and what they call terracing behind the goal that I was in. There’s no seats. The fans just stand and they are absolutely masked in there and they’re singing the whole time. And for a kid who grew up in the, you know, in the 70s in Florida dreaming of that kind of thing, that kind of atmosphere, which doesn’t exist in this country, and it sort of does now, but it certainly didn’t then, that actually happened. It was unbelievable. But it got even better because I was splitting halves with another goalkeeper who just happened to be my boyhood hero, a guy named Winston DuBose, who played for the Tampa Bay Rowdies, who’s about 10 years older than me. And I played the first half of that game, Winston played the second half. The game ended 2-2 and they decided they wanted a winner. So, they were going to have a penalty kick shootout back at the end. I had played in the first half. And Winston being this supremely professional gentleman approached me and the manager and said, “Justin started the game. He should get to go back in for the penalties.” So, um, I was amazed by that and we, uh, me and the other the Dunman goalkeeper went jogging down to that goal and, um, I gave the fans a, you know, bit of an overhead clap as you do, usually to your own supporters, thinking they might like give me the Raz back or whatever, but they all returned it. That whole bank of thousands of people just just clapped back like that. And then uh, and then I saved the first two penalty kicks and we won. Dr. Dan: Wow. That’s—that’s a great memory. Justin: It was a good memory. Dr. Dan: Absolutely. Yeah. How did that then turn into coaching and the rest of your career? But how—what was that transition? What did you do for that transition? Justin: Well, the problem I had— that trip confirmed to me that I was good enough to do it. I would have been found out playing against teams of that level if I wasn’t good enough to do it. And so it confirmed to me that I could do it. However, unfortunately, I could not get a European work permit. It was very very restrictive back then. I think it’s loosened up somewhat now, but if you didn’t have—if you hadn’t played full games for the US national team, which I had not, you really couldn’t get a work permit in order to play in those countries. And so, um, it didn’t really go anywhere. So, I went back to Bromwood, which was in England in a lower level. And now you’re talking about playing in front of a few hundred people for $50 a week. Um, you know, so sort of like single A ball at best. Dr. Dan: Sure. Rookie league ball maybe. Justin: Yeah. And I still enjoyed it. It was still a good level, but I realized it was somewhat unsustainable. I got to be about 26, 27, didn’t have a college degree. And I had to start thinking a little bit more long term. So, a friend of mine had gotten a head coaching job at a university in North Carolina at Elon University. He said, “Hey, listen. If you come here as my assistant coach, we’ll pay for your degree. You can finish your degree and coach and you know get a degree free and clear with no debt.” And so that’s what I did. Dr. Dan: Wow. Justin: Yeah. Dr. Dan: And was coaching something you had really ever thought about before that? It—you know I know you said that you proved to yourself you could do it and that that was part of it, but what was it about coaching that kind of drew you to that life? Particularly goalkeeper coaching because it didn’t exist when I was a kid. So, I had to figure it out on myself by myself. I watched like I mentioned Winston DuBose. I watched him playing for the Tampa Bay Rowdies on old channel WTOG channel 44 out of Tampa. and that’s sort of how I figured out how to play. I didn’t have any mentors. There was no one with any experience. No one had ever played at a high level. Winston’s generation was the first generation of American pros. And so I kind of realized I don’t want anyone else to go through that, you know, I want to help because when I was in England, I had unbelievable coaching. You know, I was at the pro level at Dunfermline and at Bormwood, I had mentors as older goalkeepers and coaches that really helped me understand the position. Just like I would equate it to catching the footwork that’s needed to get up to try to make a throw at second base. Yeah, it has to be learned, you know, and there’s a million things like that with goalkeeping and I realized, well, I have some of this information. It would be kind of a shame if I just sort of, you know, took a job in accounting and it died with me. I’d like to sort of share it. And so that’s fantastic. Justin: Yeah. Dr. Dan: So, when you were making that transition, did you have to kind of learn your teaching style and all that because, you know, you hadn’t been teaching before. Um, did you have to develop your style at that point and that's what the majority of the work was at that time? Justin: Yeah, I think the big learning curve for me is that one size does not fit all. So, some athletes and I would imagine academically some students like to be taught and are effective learners in one way and others in another way. So, some are visual learners, some want to be sort of really sternly encouraged if not yelled at. Others needed a more gentle approach and it just took a little time for me to find out the most effective way to learn what was going to work the best for each individual athlete and really that was getting to know them a little bit on a personal basis. My default was to sort of be standoffish and official and professional and business-like and then I learned particularly with college age kids, they have to kind of know that you care about them and their success as a person first. Sure. Before they will really invest their attention in you. Mhm. So that was my learning curve. Dr. Dan: Yeah. The the audience is your your message I’m sure as you were just discussing similar to me in that if you’re teaching or training somebody on anything. So if I do a consult with a person my message is always changing depending on who the person is. Not not the message, the way I deliver, the delivery is is always different. So, if you start to come in and ask me specific scientific questions, very nitty-gritty, I’m going to cater my statements and my discussion and consult you versus, you know, I have other patients that I’m just trying to keep their attention. So, I’ll just try to be more entertaining or you know. So, I understand that it's interesting how humans work, how you have to just cater it if you’re in any sort of training position. You you have the knowledge and you want somebody else to know it. That that message always has to go through a filter and it’s constantly getting tweaked and changed. Justin: Sure. Dr. Dan: pretty fascinating. So, you started your first coaching job at Elon M and then walked me through how you got to this last job. Justin: Let’s see. So, I did about seven or eight years at Elon. Then I got an itch to do what I'd been writing the whole time. I remember I I I mentioned that I journaled when I was in England and that sort of sparked something in me that that demonstrated that I had an interest in writing and I got more serious about it and I started turning those journals into a non-fiction book about the soccer career and then I began to write fiction. I started sending short stories out to magazines and getting them published. And I decided I wanted to do an MFA in creative writing so that I could potentially teach writing one day because the one thing about coaching soccer, particularly coaching goalkeepers, is a little bit hard on the body and it’s something I wasn’t sure I wanted to do until I was 60 years old. Well, here we are. I’m doing it. But so I went to NYU because if you’re going to get a graduate degree, you might as well get the maximum amount of debt that exists in the world. And that’s that’s NYU. had an amazing experience there. I absolutely love New York City. I lived there for seven years. Probably would have stayed if the rent was, you know, doable. But that was my sort of break away from a little bit of time away from coaching. But I missed it and I played again. I was getting into my 40s then and I joined a team in the Gotham League and played. I had real fun. I mean, that was great, great fun because now I’m not burdened with the expectations of, you know, using it to make a living and worried about my teammates making their living and all that kind of thing. I just had fun. I really enjoyed it. During that time, a good friend of mine got the head coach job at an ACC school and said, you know, how’d you like to come here and be the goalkeeper coach here? And I gave that a little bit of thought and based on how the rent situation was in New York City compared to Raleigh. Absolutely. Um, I thought, “Yeah, this is the thing to do.” And, and I’ll tell you something, New York probably has a few more open spaces to play and places to play as well, for sure. Um, and better for the golf game, you know. Um, sure. But I will and maybe this is a good transition, but between Elon and New York City is when the teeth things started to go not so great for me because I was living on a small college coaching salary and then I was living on a graduate student salary and I had sort of like dental work from the 80s when I was a high school kid that started to fail. And you would know a lot more about this than I would, but it seems to me based on the technology that you guys have now, I know it didn't exist back then. So, there must have been some degree of hunting that they were doing in there and and and like trying to find decay and trying to get the right spots and all that. And there is a level of technology that goes into say like a root canal. Mhm. A root canal 40 years ago doesn’t even look the same as—well, it does look the same, but in terms of the procedure and the ability to get the bad stuff out, it doesn't even make sense compared to even when I was in school, right? So, it has advanced. Dr. Dan: I would say the biggest advancement is more is less about the traditional like taking out cavities and things like that. It’s all done sort of the same way, but the materials have changed. Okay. So, things are a little bit longer and longer. We’ve lost some of the accuracy in terms of almost like the hand skills that go into getting a good impression, a good representation back in the day was incredible. The work was a lot, we’ll say, better fitting. Now the accuracy is there and you have to have the right digital equipment to extract that information properly. It’s a little bit less about the tech, the hand skills of the person doing it and more about the tech that’s sort of going into cutting the crown or or shaping the stuff. Justin: Yeah. Well, we probably had a combination of a couple of things, but so some things started going bad. 10 years ago or so, I had a root canal I had done sometime in the early 90s or mid 90s just sort of crumbled away to nothing. I don’t remember what I was eating, but just boom, broke. Now I have no teeth there. No pain because it was a root canal, so there was no nerve. But then I, you know, tried to keep up and I did these patch jobs and I got a three-tooth bridge that you may remember cuz you just took it out. Dr. Dan: I do remember it. Justin: Yeah, it was pretty good there. Dr. Dan: Oh, good. Well, he did a good job then. But there was no shortage of glue that day. Justin: No shortage of glue. All right. Because I was sort of itinerant, you know, too because I moved around in between some of these gigs. I mean, I make it sound like all these years at Elon, all these years in New York City, but I went and lived in Key West for a couple of years, which is awesome. Incredible time. Great place. I highly recommend it to anyone. Dr. Dan: Did you have so much bad weather built up in your European days that you just had to get so many days built back up in a row of good good weather? Justin: Can I tell you a funny story? When I came home from England the first time, my mom picked me up at the airport and she said, “Go to the beach.” She said, and she used these words. She said, “You look jaundest.” I was pale and bags under my eyes and everything. Dr. Dan: Yeah. You were outside every day playing soccer. Justin: I know, but in 42° free gray, drizzly weather and everything. So, she said, “Go to the beach.” That was actually a big motivating factor to go down there. You grew up in Florida. I’d never been down to the Keys. Dr. Dan: Yeah. I've actually never been down there. Justin: And I just decided I need to go all the way down and really detox for the you know the stress of playing that position. Dr. Dan: And how long were you down there? Justin: I was down there three different times for a year each time. Dr. Dan: Wow. Justin: The problem I had down there is making a living. You have to just sort of work a service industry job. It’s sort of tough to go from professional athlete to bellboy at a resort hotel. Which is what I did. I finally found the perfect job the last time I was there. I worked at the Key West Aquarium giving tours and feeding all the animals and hand feeding turtles and things and that was I think I was 39 then and I think that was a great way to spend the last year in my 30s. Dr. Dan: What a place that is. Justin: Amazing. Dr. Dan: Yeah. Yeah. I clearly miss you. That would be a dumb question. Justin: I’d do that again. Yeah. Yeah. Dr. Dan: Um, okay. So, now, uh, you live in North Carolina. And, um, I know that you recently have kind of gotten into different hobbies. Tell me about your hobbies and how you fell into those, not fell. How did you find those or or pick those as your hobbies? Justin: I I kind of so co when co shut us down I was at state school at the ACC school and we got shut down and I had all this time and I have this little project car Toyota MR2 and I never liked the finish on it and I just thought I’d always thought I I bet I could paint a car. I bet I could just do that. Like it’s really small. How hard can it be? It's very, very hard. But I had time. I wouldn’t even try it. I watched lots of YouTube videos. Tons. and I painted it and it came out amazing. And that was five years ago and it looks great to this day. And so then I had friends who would get like a dinged up fender and I’d say, “Let’s go to a junkyard and get another fender and I’ll paint it.” And so, you know, they would do that and I would paint it. And then my wife worked at a physical therapy clinic and there was an older patient there who didn’t really have any family in the area and she had the front of her car sort of caved in and we wanted to help out and so I went to a junkyard and bought a fender and a hood and painted it and put it on there and wow. And I really enjoy doing that because it’s funny as you start getting older. Um, there's this really neat thing about taking something old and making it new again. Um, that feels really satisfying and you can almost internalize it, make it personal. Like when I work on my MR2, which is a 93, I replace the steering rack and I was like, “Wow, this thing’s in terrible shape. Makes sense. I'm 33 years old.” And I’d think, “Geez, I’m 58.” Um, so, um, you know, now I met a guy and I’m he’s got a, um, a Lotus Europa with the worst paint job you’ve ever seen, just all gouged up. Dr. Dan: And does he have a story on this paint job? Justin: Yeah, the um, you know, for people who don’t know, Lotus is a small specialty high-end car maker in England, but in the 60s and 70s, they made much more inexpensive almost-kit cars. The Europa was one of those fiberglass bodies and they went through a period where they weren’t very valuable and you could pick one up for a couple thousand dollars and then people would butcher them and so somebody took it to Mako and I’m not here to slander Mako. Those guys actually know how to spray paint a car but they will not do any prep work on it. So if you bring a car in that is like you drive through a puddle on the way there and there’s mud on the car, they’ll just paint right over that mud. Dr. Dan: Wow. Justin: And that’s what this car looks like. And so when I get back to, you know, after we’re all done here and I’m back in North Carolina, I’m going to spend a couple of weeks stripping that down and giving it the life it deserves. Dr. Dan: Do you fully nerd out on equipment and things? Like do you have a space to now do you have a space to sort of do these type projects? Do you have like a barn or like a storage unit or Justin: I don’t have the space I’d like to have. I do have a big covered patio that, you know, we’re lucky and we live on a lake and it faces the lake and it’s a really nice place to work and it’s a great head space for me. A lot of people don’t like working on cars, doing body work because it’s so repetitive. I mean, you have to sand. I'll sand the car down seven or eight different times. Dr. Dan: Wow. Justin: But I find that therapeutic. Um, and I like being able to see progress when I do this kind of manual labor because it doesn’t really require any of the higher functions of my brain. I’m not sure how much capacity I have anyway. So, it's nice to just, you know, be able to rely on the real basic stuff. Dr. Dan: In the limited time that I have gotten to know you, I can tell you you have plenty of mental faculties. Justin: Well, the other thing is writing. So, I, you know, I eventually turned those journals into a non-fiction, a memoir of my time playing overseas, a book called Small Time, a life in the Football Wilderness. And then in 2023 I published a novel called Thunder from a Clear Blue Sky. I gave a copy of the girl to the office office staff today. So you guys have a copy, but um Dr. Dan: Absolutely. Justin: and it's highly surreal. So I don’t know, you know, my wonderful Midwestern mother-in-law and her book club read it last summer and then I met with them and they had questions. Dr. Dan: Were you able to answer them all? Justin: sort of, but I mean they just didn’t, you know, they had a hard time with the premise and they didn’t really understand why anyone would write a book where, you know, the things that happened in it. And so it was a hoot though. Dr. Dan: I love that. Yeah, that must have been pretty fun. Justin: It was fun. Dr. Dan: So, um, now tell me about how you found Done In One and and also maybe more or less just a full arch, like how did you learn that this was something that you were going to need yourself? Did you do your homework? Did a dentist sit you down and look you straight in the eye and say you need to do something? What was that part of the beginning part of your journey? Justin: Yeah, so the three tooth bridge that you saw, things weren’t so bad then. But when that dentist did that job for me, he saw in his X-rays there were problems coming, especially in the lower arch. He said, “You got a lot of these gum level fillings.” That's where my teeth really went bad. I got these cavities along the gum line. And I remember a tech one time telling me when the doctor was out of ear shot, this won’t last. She said, “Just so you know.” Wow. There’s like stress on this, you know, when you have a cavity on the biting surface, then it, you know, it'll last basically. But when it’s on the side, just because of the biting forces, there’s flex and things like that. And these pop out eventually, you know, it just might not last on you. Dr. Dan: I don’t know if this applies to you, so I’m going to cut you off again. I don’t know if this applies to you, but I was thinking about it yesterday when we were speaking. We see and again this may not be applicable to you but if I see we’ll say a triathlete right high level triathlete there are a lot of them that are in the tiptopest best shape of all time that have pretty wild tooth decay and these big massive problems and basically what it comes from is they breathe in and out of their mouth pretty heavy all the time so their saliva is evaporated they’re not doing the job that it should. And they also consume most of their energy and their hydration and things cons. But they also take it over periods of time, right? They're in a 7-hour half iron man. In those seven hours, they’re going to be constantly hitting with energy drinks and, you know, protein gummies and whatnot. So, I don’t know if that applies to you at all, but I I was thinking that as as I was looking back to your teeth and sort of the problems that you were facing, it didn’t there’s got to be some sort of answer that kind of gives a little bit more of a clear picture. And I was wondering if I was going to ask you today if you thought that that contributed to that kind of higher level you’re on Gatorade and stuff quite frequently. Justin: It’s so funny you say that because I’d never made that connection, but I think there’s probably a direct correlation there. Mhm. I made it a point of pride to maintain the same body I had as a professional athlete that I have today. Everything still works the same. My knees, hips, ankles, all my joints are the same. I can still play a little bit. I've replaced soccer with tennis. I played competitive league tennis. I’m a 40 USDA player, which isn’t bad for my age. Um, but yeah, like so we do camps all summer, five or six weeks of soccer camp where you’re just sucking down Gatorade constantly. And um, and then also I am a little bit more of a soda hound than anybody should be. Um, and I’m sort of using this as a wakeup call. Dr. Dan: Yeah. Justin: I don’t drink coffee and so my wife calls soda my children’s coffee. and I’m using this as a wakeup call to move away from it and I’ve replaced it with a protein shake in the mornings. But you mentioned like did someone set me straight or was there a wakeup call? Yeah, the dentist that did that three tooth bridge said there's a lot going on in there that I can see. A lot of these fillings that you have along the gum line are loose. They have decay behind them. And in some cases, the tooth’s going to go bad and need a root canal. I’m amazed it hasn’t happened yet. It looks like the decay is into the nerve pulp. And if you can imagine a tree that’s been half chopped down from one side, you just don’t have any strength in there now. And these teeth are going to start breaking on you and never has a person been so right because it was an amazingly fast process. That would have been I think that was right before CO I had that bridge done and in the first couple of years of CO it seemed like every couple of months I’d be eating something and a chunk of tooth would break off in my mouth. I’d be eating something soft and suddenly I had something hard in my mouth. And so that can only happen so many times before you have to stop living in denial. Dr. Dan: Yeah. Justin: So I then started looking into it. I knew and he oh so he worked up he’s like well here’s what it would cost I’ll give you an estimate for me to fix everything and I think that was something around $23,000 and he even said this is not necessarily the way to go because this is mostly patches and fixes and you probably need replacement teeth. You probably need implants for most of these. Um, so then I thought, well, you know, was that jarring emotionally or or had that sort of had you already been beaten down sort of enough that it was just water under the bridge? A little bit more of the same. It was almost soothing in a way. It was almost like telling me you the worst has happened. It has come to this. So now let's do what it takes to fix it, you know? Mhm. And I’m not afraid of needles. I’m not afraid of dentists. All those years with this stuff started going bad. It started going bad because I couldn’t really afford to do as much as I should have done. So, I really wanted to have an opportunity like this. I just wasn’t in the position to do it. And you’re not alone. Dr. Dan: I know. I know. Justin: I wish everybody could do it. It's already here. I’m only dating. Well, we’ll get to that. I know it’s life-changing, but so I did start looking into it and then it just gets easier. Then you have a few months where nothing happens and then there’s no pain. And that there’s almost one of the concerning things for me was like a tooth would break and there wasn’t any pain. You would think if a tooth broke off at the gum line gum line, you’d feel it, but I guess the nerve was already dead. Dr. Dan: Yeah. just like you, the body, it more or less kind of just says, “Well, this is it. This is it.” I mean, there’s a scientific reason behind it, but Justin: Okay. Interesting. Um, a few months would go by, nothing would happen, and I would just sort of easily live in denial for a while. Um, but then there was just, you know, there was one too many. Um, and then and then I would get abscesses, you know, because obviously there’s active infection and an abscess is a level of pain that doesn’t really let you function. Whatever you’re supposed to be doing that day or if you’re trying to sleep or whatever, you’re not that. And so it was really just about a month ago or maybe six weeks ago that I sort of told my wife like, you know, we’re finally in a little bit of a decent place financially. We'd both been out of work for a little bit of time, but then both got back and got jobs and everything was okay. And I felt just racked with guilt, which is another thing I wonder if that holds people back. Dr. Dan: Oh, absolutely. Where they’re like they feel like they did this to themselves. They brought this on themselves and now if they have a partner, they’re implicating their partner’s finances into this. Justin: Well, she knew without me telling her that I’d had these problems and been in pain and everything, and she said, “Let’s do it. Let’s get it done.” So obviously the internet’s a wonderful resource which is funny to interrupt you yet again. So you just brought up I. I know I wonder if that’s a big hold back for people or whatnot and I would say yes it is. And invariably every time the partner or the spouse is always like no fix it please. We'll both get second jobs you know because they want their partner. The reason why they’re with you is they want you to live a full healthy amazing life. Dr. Dan: Sure. Justin: And but you would hold yourself back from that because you didn’t want to burden the relationship. So that’s right. It happens very frequently. Dr. Dan: Yeah. Justin: Well, I started doing research on fullmouth restoration. So I learned about allon four. Seemed like it was the industry standard. There’s others as you know. Um Dr. Dan: Oh yeah. Yeah. Lots and lots of others. Justin: Yeah. And then people go abroad. People go places where their initial cost is less and I thought about that. never really seriously considered that because I want to sort of have an wherever I get this done, I want there to be an ongoing relationship for follow-ups and things like that. Dr. Dan: Yeah. Responsibility. Justin: Yeah. And then I also and then there’s also I guess what I would call big box outlets that do it. Yeah. You know, a couple name brand ones that like to advertise on TV and do big campaigns. And I knew I didn’t want that because I know that decisions there are made at the highest level by people that are not in your profession. They’re accountants and they’re they’re you know, they’re they’re people who are in charge of whatever the stock prices and things like that. And I didn’t just not want that experience. I didn’t want an impersonal just another number kind of thing. but what really swayed me to do and one was word of mouth. Then when I reached out I thought of the Instagram ad and was invited to join the Facebook group. I started talking to a lot of nice people there. But then there was one particular person on a Reddit thread and it was in a thread about getting all four done and she was insistent. She said, “No one has researched this more than me. I have dedicated almost a whole year of my life to it. I’ve looked into the backgrounds of all the people involved. I have looked with microscopic forensic evidence for anything negative and I cannot find anything.” and and so that's where I went and I had a wonderful experience and that was Paige Mening. She told me that I could use her name. That's awesome. She’s been my mentor throughout this the last couple of weeks. We’ve been chatting a lot on Reddit and she’s helped me prepare and given me a lot of, you know, good information about what to expect. and I think she’s a good example of how word of mouth for something like this, it’s so intensely personal and intimate. You’re in Dr. Dan: Absolutely. Justin: You know, you’re you’re in my mouth and extracting these teeth and and and putting them for me as well. I have to experience it. Dr. Dan: Yeah, I know. Justin: So, that’s what I was looking for. I was looking for some people that would and everybody says this, but but I got talking to Paige a lot in particular, but everybody says that they feel like, you know, that that that everyone is only concerned about their the state of their their mouth and their well-being and their health and their comfort level while they’re there. And again, I consider myself fortunate that I’m not squeamish and I’m not claustrophobic, but that doesn't really come into play in this process. Um, not really afraid of needles. I just never really had the financial opportunity to do it. And we only were able to do it due to some family generosity and good timing. you guys are running a special and we play we paid you know cash didn’t finance it and that why that helped also. and you know my experience was a little different than Paige’s. She said oh you’ll you won’t remember the procedure at all. The Halcion will just say you'll basically be knocked out and then you’ll go back to the hotel and you’ll sleep all day and you’ll sleep all night. That was not me. Which is fine. I was not in any pain during the procedure. I mean, you were there with me and I was you don’t feel a thing, right? Um, and I think that the Halcion does enough where you’re not, you know, you were definitely relaxed and I wasn’t worried about any of the things you hear, you know, because you obviously have to. I'm just I don’t know how you get teeth out of the human head. I just especially care very carefully, you know, which is like half of them were broken like the gum line. And so I was sort of having fun going, can I feel the moment of extraction? You can’t. You can’t. You can’t. I’ve never had anyone say that. Justin: No. Like I was really trying to figure out like when are they done with that tooth and moving on to another tooth? When am I going to feel a little sense of pressure or release as a tooth comes out? I never did. Dr. Dan: So since you bring this up, I've said it before, but I've I've I've really enjoyed taking teeth out. The first tooth I took out was sort of where all my passion sort of just came in came to light and it was after the first tooth and trying to explain it to you cuz you'll probably never take a tooth out has been sort of difficult and I've I've found what I think is the best example that you can relate to. The feeling for me when a tooth finally gives up that I enjoy my work and the way that I do it is the feedback is essentially when you twist an Oreo and it comes apart. That's the exact feeling. Oh wow. like like maybe a little bit more intense, but that's you there's a moment where it just like releases from the other side of the cookie and that's when you know the rest of it's gone or that it's coming out and that's that's just so that people can understand that's what the other side feels like. Justin: Well, and that's I would say that's probably that's the tactile sensation. There must also be this emotional satisfaction because that tooth has to come out and you can move to the next one cuz it's bad, right? But you're like helping somebody because that's a tooth that has to come out. I mean this was I mean my teeth were bad. They were in bad shape. It was unhealthy for them to be in my mouth, you know, and it's Dr. Dan: Yeah. No holds bar. You were in pretty bad shape for sure. Justin: Yeah. And just as we were talking about the multiffactorial, right? So you had bringing in the partner along for the financial ride. You had the things that had to go right to get that behind you. You had to find us. There's so many things that go into this whole process. Picking the right person, picking the right team, finding somebody that can give you feedback. When I sit here and talk to you or I just came this morning, I just came from a meeting with my admin team. When you hear about everything, it almost feels like the person that runs the show here, it almost feels like it's a miracle that anybody ever gets across the finish line just because what speaks to you is not going to be the same as what speaks to the next person that I have on this podcast. Like every single patient has their like holdbacks. It's not Yeah. It's not like you know if you're manufacturing shorts and the trend is longer ones like oh well we just make longer ones right and nobody has any real emotional holdbacks on what shorts they wear and this is a very interesting product if you will where you kind of have to cater to everyone or or get the biggest catcher mitt that will make as many people happy regardless of what their background is. Justin: Sure. Dr. Dan: And for me, I've found that that little niche isn't being the biggest or the loudest or the most expensive or least expensive. It's been putting together something that's kind of quality and making you know that you're taking care of the entire way through. Whether it be for the surgery, whether or not you remember it, whether it be the teeth, whether or not you have to go through many times many versions, etc. Long term, do you have a problem? Who will take care of it? Having that sort of soup to nut sort of answer is a little bit like a Mac, right? You just kind of turn it on and it works. Yeah. Some people like to tinker and that's fine. There's other other products for that, but being sort of a Mac where you kind of know what the environment is and it's predictable all the way through your use has been what we've tried to strive to kind of come together. Justin: Well, you use the word miracle and to me it feels like one. I should give one more shout out and that's I have an amazing boss. Beverly Bianca, the head coach at North Carolina Wesley. Justin: Well, you use the word miracle and to me it feels like one. I should give one more shout out and that's I have an amazing boss. Beverly Bianca, the head coach at North Carolina Wesley where I coach now. I told her about this. I told her the situation I was in. She said, "Go take as long as you need. Get down there. Get it done." and you know, so many things have to fall in line. The holes of the Swiss cheese have to line up so perfectly. That's insane for this to happen. I am sitting here talking with you now still still kind of in disbelief that I've actually done it. Dr. Dan: Well, why? Well, let's talk specifically. The big reveal of this podcast is that how long ago was it that you had surgery? Justin: Two days ago. Dr. Dan: Two days ago. Yeah. Monday morning. What time were you? Justin: Which I wasn't even morning. It was afternoon. I was at 12 12:30 or 12, I think. Dr. Dan: Yeah. So, we're 48 51 hours away from Yep. from surgical surgical time. And we just had this whole podcast and talked about it. And your boss is going to be mad now. She said, "Take all the time you need. You're going to be gone for another week and you're done." I'm just kidding. Um, but walk me through I think it's awesome that you know it's a variable experience, right? You're a very healthy person. You're very fit. Obviously, that's the majority of what we've kind of talked about. So, you're a little bit unique in how well you've healed, but in terms of you you also are one of the ones that sort of hit the home run in terms of the teeth that you wanted in the teeth, too. So, you're actually done until the finished ones go in. Correct. Justin: That's right. Yeah. Dr. Dan: Yeah. Yeah. So, congratulations. You're pretty much done. Justin: Yeah. Well, and again, Nadia is absolutely amazing. She is. Um, everyone that you have is amazing, but uh, Paige in particular had a great experience with Nadia and she's like, "Get Nadia." So, I made sure I made sure to get Nadia. And Nadia was um, she's kind of an artist, you know, she she's got the aesthetic side of it down and she Dr. Dan: Did you know that she started as my surgical assistant? Justin: I did. She said that. Yeah. Dr. Dan: Yeah. Yeah. I can see the satisfaction of that, but I also get why she does, you know, what she does now. But, yeah. I know I mean Monday to today you know I financially I know is a burden for some people. I know people are afraid of pain. I didn't really have any pain whatsoever in the process and I'll say again that the Halcion didn't really have the effect on me that I think it is meant to have on most people. Dr. Dan: Well actually my whole position whether a person doesn't remember anything or whether they do my intention with the Union is to make it so that you're comfortable enough feel taken care of and aren't hard to manage both from the surgical side and just from your own fear. Okay. And as long as it can get to that point, then it's no problem. Which so far is, you know, other than the three or four cases I did under IV sedation back when I did that, which didn't go well and I hated it and it was not safe and not good for the patient. When I made that switch, you know, for the last, we'll call it 6,000 cases. I have not had one, whether they remember or don't remember that ever went through a bad scenario, right? Everyone comes out of it whether it was they remember or don't kind of like it was fine. What's the big deal? That's sort of I mean you were there for mine and I feel like I wasn't fussy. I was there. Justin: Yeah. I don't remember being twitchy or fussy. Dr. Dan: No, you were great. Justin: Yeah. Yeah. So, I then, you know, I then thought, well, maybe I'll go back to the hotel and I'll be tired and I'll sleep. I was actually kind of wired and I was probably hyper fixated on bleeding and controlling that. And so I was changing out my gauze really regularly. Um, and that just kept me up and down. I probably should, if I was going to recommend to anybody, I would say don't worry about the hotel sheets that much, you know, just they're used to it by now. Throw a towel down and lie there and do what you got to do. I kept sort of getting up and changing the gauze and everything. But by seven or eight o'clock that evening you know the bleeding backed way off and and you were telling me you were a little bit concerned psychologically of having to go without the teeth and that wasn't a big effect and you were you were you expressed gratitude that you didn't have teeth because you were able to manage and focus just on that. Justin: Yeah. I see now going through the process, you I don't think I don't see how you could that first night. You have to be able to, you know, manage the bleeding and have the gauze there and and let the gums do whatever they're going to do without, you know, a pro I'm not going to be able to say that prosthesis in place. And it's funny because when I woke up, I got a decent night's sleep and I woke up Tuesday and I definitely had swelling. The gums themselves at that point were swollen and I thought, gosh, they're probably gonna send me back home and say, "Nah, we can't we can't do we can't put the teeth in yet. You have too much swelling." Naughty was like, "No, it's fine. It's perfect. The teeth will actually sort of shape the gums." Yes. And once they went in, that was the end of the feeling like the gums were swollen and that was the end of any bleeding as far as I could tell. And you and I chatted after that and I couldn't get over how normal I felt. Dr. Dan: Yeah. You know, that's my favorite thing. I say it all the time. My favorite thing about doing this procedure the way that we do is the limited amount of time that I have to put you through regular dentistry and the amount of time that I get to know you, right? Like it could have been me and it could have been Dr. Lax if I had just walked on and Dr. Relax didn't have something else to do. You could have been there for 25 more minutes with her. Mhm. Getting to know you and having the opportunity that you know you were willing to come on this and we found that out through that. That's where that's where it really shows off the efficiency and that we've done what we want to do. Getting to know the patient the majority of the time that you're in the office more than like getting the teeth done is sort of a sign to me that we're getting where we want to go in terms of what we're providing. And so if you take your time that you've been in the office this week, then you had about two hours for surgery day and then an hour the first morning and then you came back in the afternoon, correct? Justin: That same afternoon. Nice. Dr. Dan: And was that 30 minutes or so? Justin: Yeah. Yeah. Dr. Dan: So, we're at 3 and 1/2 hours. And then this morning was not even an hour, maybe 40 minutes. Justin: Yeah. Dr. Dan: So, 4 and 1/2 hours. Yeah. And then putting the teeth in will probably be another we'll call it hour by the time you high five everybody and everybody gets to oo and ah and and all of that. And you get to say how much nicer those zirconia feel. Right. So, your sounds are amazing. I'm sitting here listening as close as a person can listen and I can't catch a lot. You might be feeling like you're caught up on a couple words here and there. I would tell you that most of that is going to even be worked out from the smoothness of the zirconia. Justin: Nice. Dr. Dan: And it's almost kind of funny that the change that you'll feel in changing from the temps to the zirconia, you're going to essentially be blown over at the difference to the point that you'll say I'm sure I can't believe anyone ever had to wait for 3 months. And that still blows me away that we used to have people wear that plastic temporarily for three months with the discomfort that they didn't know that they were in. But once you sit them in the zirconia, it's like how would I have possibly lived for 3 months with this? Justin: For 6 months some places I looked into. Dr. Dan: Yeah. Yeah. And so that's sort of the value is getting something that's predictable and what you wanted, but also giving you an experience and new people, new friends down in Florida that you can call and rely on to help, but do it in this like a limited window in this without compromising any of your results. We didn't have to overwhelm you with dentistry. I'm sure that when you were on your way down here, the only thing you were thinking about is how much dentistry you were going to get stuck with, but it was only done in a week. Justin: Yeah. Or it was only a week, so you could get over it. But look how little dentistry you've really had to be exposed to. I think it's really cool. I think probably for anyone whose primary source of hesitation is the amount of dentistry because some people are just not comfortable in a chair or afraid of needles or afraid of pain. it. Um, the human mind is capable of imagining any scenario as so much worse than it turns out to be. And I mean, I've lost count of the number of things like I had an endoscopy done, you know, 20 years ago or so, and they're like, "We're going to put this tube down your stomach and you're going to be awake for it." And I was horrified by that for weeks leading up to it. And then via the miracle of medication, it's as if it didn't happen. Um, but even things sometimes that you're not medicated for, even things that you're really afraid of and really worried about, um, it's probably some sort of evolutionary thing that our mind does to sort of brace ourselves and prepare ourselves for the worst protection. Yeah. Dr. Dan: Yeah. Justin: Yeah. And it just doesn't turn out to be that way. In fact, I'm already in a in a funny sort of way, I'm already sort of mourning this being o, you know, I'm glad I'm glad I have another 5 days until my permanence like because I I'm enjoying being around all everybody that's that's making this miracle change in my life. and again, so fun. You know, you were in there and you saw them. You saw more of my teeth than I have for the last year because another protection thing that people that kicks in when your teeth start to get this bad is you avoid looking at them. Um, and you make it worse because of that. You sometimes don't brush them because you know they're lost cause and I don't and I don't want to even look at them tonight. I'm just going to go to bed. Um, or I would do it briefly or in the dark or or whatever. But you know, again, it was an avoidance sort of thing. And I'm still in a position of disbelief that that's over, you know, that I've been able to sort of you guys have hit the re switch, you know, the reset button for me. I've got Everybody goes through life with regrets. And there's not many where you actually get to fix it, you know, right? And like I I can't fix that student loan I have from NYU, but you this one is fixed, you know, in I'm sure it'd be better that a person just keep perfectly healthy teeth their entire life. I didn't do that. Okay. So now taking that as red, what can we do about it? Well, this and it's spectacular. Yeah, it's very very rewarding. Dr. Dan: I could sit here all day and talk to you. You're very fascinating. Your story is unbelievably awesome and I have no doubt that everyone's going to really enjoy it and I'm sure you'll have to pay it forward as Paige did for you. Justin: I absolutely will be reached out too. I will for sure. I've got a couple of good friends. You know, I know we're wrapping up, but real quick, I confided in friends that I was going to do this and the reaction was sort of 5050. The people with good teeth were like, "Oh gosh, that sounds horrible." And then I had others say, "Please tell me exactly what that's like, and I think I might want to do that." My tennis buddy, Tony Oats, I know for a fact, wants to do it. I've got another friend that I think has had, you know, done the same kind of chasing problems and getting these short-term patches and solutions. I think he wants to do it, too. So, I'm I'm Dr. Dan: We love Word of Mouse. That's the way it's going to be. Justin: Yeah. so ready to go and understand things. They have a resource to reach out to a partner to lean on. It's amazing. Y Dr. Dan: Did you join the lifetime warranty? Justin: I did not. Dr. Dan: Okay. I didn't. Yeah. Yeah. So, two years. I got the two-year. Yeah. Walk me through real quick. I know we just tried to wrap up, but like walk me through what your rationale or what's your line of thinking like? Why did you choose that versus lifetime warranty? And by the way, we have it set up completely so that the decision, whatever decision you make, I'm not sitting here judging you. I really don't care at all. It's just two different routes that we wanted to be able to offer to people, right? And so most feel the pressure to go down in their lifetime. So now that you have just found that out, I would love to understand your rationale. Meaning I'm questioning you on it, but not like why didn't you? Right. Justin: It was well there were some financial you know limitations and considerations and so I guess that's one. Also I'm really old and probably you know I don't need a lifetime. I'm kidding. But yeah I think probably it was probably just just that just I think you'll be fine. Right. Dr. Dan: This is not again I want to be very very clear. The way that it's set up is not to push you into one direction. Mhm. It's here's two awesome options. Pick what you want. You may not pick it because you don't want to pay for it, you want to get clean somewhere more local to you and don't want to have to make the priority to come down and essentially have paid for one in one place and one in another. Justin: Yeah, totally fine. Dr. Dan: And there really isn't any reason why anything would happen in two years or why anything would go south. If you're going to take care of it, it's going to be fine. I'm just curious to know what the rationale was. So, you know, there's obviously financial considerations, financial, not even just as it goes for what you're getting, right? Um, which I would say that we're pretty good at value play in terms of what we're offering if you do want to make the priority to come down, but there's also the financial consideration of coming down and such. Justin: Sure, that plays into it as well. Yeah. Um, it's all just like getting teeth, it's a big big decision. Dr. Dan: Yeah. But no, we are very happy to welcome you into the Done In One community and family and are very grateful for all the help that you've been to us by doing this and will be in the future as our advocate. So, I've really appreciated our time, Justin, and I think everybody that's going to be listening is going to enjoy it as well. Justin: It's been my pleasure. It's been an amazing experience, and I would say to anybody that's considering it, do it. Maybe at the end of this we'll tag a little video from your final delivery, too. Dr. Dan: Oh, great. Yeah, that'd be fun. Yeah, we'll tag a little video. Excellent. So, awesome. Thank you so much, Justin. Justin: You're welcome. Thanks, Dr. Dr. Dan: Awesome. We'll see you Monday or Tuesday. Justin: Tuesday. Dr. Dan: All right. We'll see you Tuesday. Justin: Tuesday. Yeah. Dr. Dan: Great. Happy 4th. Justin: Thank you. You, too. Dr. Dan: All right.