Tim Medvetz
speaker
173 appearances
1 recordings
1 series
first heard Apr 2025
last heard Apr 2025
Tim Medvetz’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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Appearances
We're Out of Time · How Tim Medvetz Turned Pain Into Purpose | The Heroes Project · 22 Apr 2025
podcast
The doc's saying, I don't know if we can save your foot. I'm like in shock, obviously, right? I'm going to have to amputate your foot. I basically shattered everything from my L1 to L5. My complete back has been put back together. I'm sitting in my apartment and I'm doped up. The sun comes through the blinds and the lights hit the bookcase. And it was Into Thin Air by John Krakauer.
I just was obsessed with this book. What was the book about? It's about the 96... commercial disaster on Everest. And I just couldn't put this book down. I wake up, I'm all sweaty. I look down, I see the book. I'm like, that's it. I'm done. I'm going to go climb Everest. I met this kid, Keith, stepped on an IED, missing his leg well above the knee.
And I was just like, hey, you want to go climb a mountain? He's like, I got no leg, man. I'm like, no, no, no. We'll figure it out, man. We can do this. And then we started training, fast forward, and he just wants to turn around and quit. And I'm like, just give me like just 30 more steps and we'll turn around, we'll go home. He's like, that's it, I'm done. And I go, look over your shoulder.
And he turns around and he looks over and he goes, is that what I think it is? I said, yeah. He got to the summit and he threw his arms up and he's screaming and he's yelling.
Tim Medvets. Yes. That's... Med Vets. It's weird. The veteran. I know, it's strange. It's meant to be. It's meant to be. So, man.
It's not my stage name either, by the way. Really? I'm not an actor. I don't have a headshot. And that is my real birth name.
You talked about hitting rock bottom after your accident. Was addiction ever part of that chapter? And what was your turning point?
Uh, no, addiction was not in the picture, but I guess we got to kind of rewind the tape a little bit. When I was 15 years old, I probably grew up in a small town, suburbia in New Jersey. Um, I could see from the highest point in our town, I could see New York city. It always kind of drew me. Um, and then probably 12 o'clock, 12 years old, smoked my first joint.
And then that just sent me onto a path of, multiple arrests, simple assaults, destruction of property, theft, fake identification, possession of drugs, intended to distribute, probably about 12 arrests by time I was 15.
No, how old are you now? Now I'm 52. Okay, so you missed the whole Quaalude thing. Yeah, that was before my time.
Yeah. For sure. But... You know, get in front of the judge. Judge basically looks at, you know, I've been arrested 12 times by the time I was 15 years old. You got a problem, kid. Like, this is it. I'm putting the brakes. You got two choices. You're going two years in juvie or you're going to go to a rehab, a lockdown facility. And so, of course, I took the lockdown facility rehab.
Next thing you know, I got police escorted to Newark Airport, got on a plane to Cleveland, Ohio, checked in, had a policeman and a rep from the hospital escort me to there. I'll never forget. I walked in there with the clothes on my back, right from jail, clothes on my back and a carton of Newport cigarettes. Walked in, the doors slammed, and that was it. It was called St.
Luke's, and it was in Cleveland, Ohio. It was right down the street from the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. And after two months, 60 days lockdown, I got out. Then I had to go to a six-month outpatient program in Summit, New Jersey. I had to go to meetings. I had to get piss tests from the probation officer. I had to get my meeting signed off.
Did you ever figure out that you could sign off on your own meetings? I didn't. Back then it was, yeah. We had pagers back then, you know, so things were a little different then. And then after, you know, the whole year of that 12 months, went to my last meeting. They signed off on it. I walked out of the meeting, called my buddy, picked me up in his Z28 Camaro.
Actually, it was an IROC, an IROC Z. Picked me up. We bought an eighth of weed. I took my easy widers. I rolled up a joint. And that was it. And I never looked back. And for me, it was, you know, there's two things going to happen to you the minute you start using again. You're going to end up in jail or you're going to die because you have a disease. Something didn't really like click with that.
Someone's telling me that for every single day for a year. And so I never really bought into that. What I did buy into is that I needed a kick in the ass. I needed somebody to pump the brakes. I needed somebody to slow me down. And that's exactly what that did. And so that judge literally saved my life.
I don't know where I would have went after that, but I knew that the path I was on, I needed a kick in the ass. And rehab and the outpatient halfway house and the meetings, all of that, 100% saved my life.
Okay, but hold on a second. Let's go back. You said that the minute you got out of your court-ordered juvenile rehab... that you immediately got in the car and scored.
Bought an eighth of skunk weed and a pack of Easy Whiters and rolled up a joint in his IROC in New Jersey, listened to Vanilla Ice, rolled it up.
Okay, we'll keep the Vanilla Ice between us. What about the, but where did it take you there? You got out, you started smoking weed, and how did it escalate from there?
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