Aaron Hale is a former U.S. Army veteran who served as an Explosive Ordinance Disposal Tech in the United States Army. In 2011, he lost his sight and later his hearing due to an IED blast in Afghanistan. He is now a motivational speaker, a real estate investor, and an advocate for veterans.
00:07:18.980So what they would do, because there's no other metal except just the thin, like, the lamp cord wire, the connecting it all.
00:07:27.180So what they would do is they would kind of fairly, they run the battery out around like a mud wall or just off to the, you know, just set it off a little bit.
00:07:37.500And I don't know how they did this, but I stepped on the pressure plate, and I did not get touched virtually unscathed from the neck down.
00:07:53.400The blast hit me right in the head, and I'm guessing that's because somebody had not, instead of offsetting the battery, or maybe they offset the battery,
00:08:07.380but they also offset the pressure plate and didn't put it on, on top of the charge.
00:08:13.060So it must have been just off to the side, and the hard pack earth just kind of channeled it, and the blast hit me from the side.
00:08:22.980And what happened was it kind of crushed my face a little bit.
00:08:26.960It took both of my eyes, gone, and it blew up my eardrums, but I still had some, you know, just hearing.
00:08:34.940I still had my hearing at the time, and it cracked my skull.
00:08:39.500So I was actually leaking spinal fluid right out my house.
00:08:44.840So they medevaced me back to Kandahar.
00:08:48.760Within 48 hours, I was at Walter Reed, and yeah, I got some pretty good TBI.
00:08:56.340I was knocked silly, but I was actually conscious up until the point they got me on the medevac chopper.
00:19:48.520They, your positivity and negativity are, are, are magnified by the circles you're in.
00:19:56.040And I had this amazing family and I had this amazing tribe of service members, wounded,
00:20:03.880I don't like saying wounded warriors, I like recalibrated carnivores or re-engineered experts.
00:20:10.860But I had these, I had this support system immediately that it was, it was impossible for me to fail.
00:20:21.100So, in fact, I would, I would, I felt ashamed of myself if I didn't try my best.
00:20:28.940Because it became one of those things where it was my ethical and moral imperative to actually be and do my best.
00:20:38.900And I realized that it was always the imperative as a, as a, as a, as a son, as a brother, as a husband, as a father, as a soldier and a EOD tech, a EOD team leader.
00:20:55.300All of these roles, all of these hats that I wear, that I am responsible, not just for my own life, but I'm responsible for others and to others.
00:21:36.500No, I was, I was, I was feeling trapped, right?
00:21:41.720And there's, it's not like you go from one side to the other.
00:21:48.640You find joy and happiness and you never go back.
00:21:52.380There's this frustration with this condition or, you know, your situation.
00:21:57.620It pops up all the time and there are so many times when you kind of waver between the growth mindset and the fixed mindset and you trip back and forth.
00:22:11.400So, I would get into these sad, you know, depressed moments in my life since then.
00:22:19.880But there's never been a time where I said there's, I didn't think there was a better, you know, solution, a better way out.
00:22:33.160Man, I'm going to take a pause from the conversation very quickly.
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00:24:21.720I think we just had a little bit of delay or something happening, so go ahead.
00:24:24.740Yeah, what I was saying was that for those who have made that awful sacrifice, that awful decision to commit suicide, I think I have said in the past that I've never considered it, but I can understand it.
00:24:46.680I don't believe that it was the right answer, but I understand.
00:25:14.360It sounds like you had a good support team around you, which I do want to get into, but I was really curious about something else you said.
00:25:19.960You were talking about when your body loses one of its senses, and you lost that sense immediately.
00:25:26.160How did your body react in a positive way?
00:25:30.020Did you feel like that you had and have since developed a greater sense of touch, for example, or, you know, like, has your body responded in a positive way, and what has that been like, that process and that journey?
00:25:52.520So, in fact, you know, part of the blast actually affected my sense of smell, which is linked to your sense of taste.
00:26:01.400And I'm like, yeah, I'm losing all my senses.
00:26:03.540My sharpest sense is my sense of humor.
00:26:06.900But I'm going to have to—if I need to find directions, I'm going to have to get down on the ground and lick the concrete.
00:26:12.360But the truth is, yes, you do—it's funny.
00:26:22.560For one, when you lose a sense, you just—you pay attention to the other ones a lot more.
00:26:29.200And I've had other guests, a blind guest who was like a sommelier and, you know, a food chemistry guy because he has this excellent sense of taste, right?
00:30:42.240Oh, that's, that's, did the meningitis or the bacterial, the bacteria, the infection itself, or not the infection, but the bacteria enter through that crack in your skull?
00:31:35.820And your story reminds me of a lot of his story as well.
00:31:39.360Well, when I decided that I wasn't going to feel sorry for myself and I was going to take charge of my life again.
00:31:45.220And this was back in, you know, at the hospital after losing my eyesight.
00:31:50.160As soon as I could figure out how to use the voiceover, the text-to-speech phone and computer, I was on the internet searching blind plus run, blind plus climb, blind plus outside, whatever.
00:32:04.960And a couple of names kept popping up, one of them being Eric Weyenmaier.
00:32:08.940And he's the first blind person to climb Mount Everest.
00:33:36.300But it wasn't until joining the Army, switching over to EOD, and I'd have to be fit to wear that bomb suit and do a physically demanding job that I started getting better.
00:33:54.400But I was still running for PT, not really working out.
00:34:00.320It wasn't until after the blast when it was more of a complete terror, fear of being stuck, being boxed in by my condition.
00:34:13.200Stuck on the couch, maybe crawling into a bottle of booze or pills or something.
00:36:26.840When you started to run for the first time, what was that like?
00:36:29.600The first time after you sustained your injuries, because I imagine just walking around in your house was probably relatively scary, let alone running down the road.
00:36:40.520Did you have somebody that you were next to?
00:37:59.420And I needed to get ready for this mountain climbing thing I just signed up for.
00:38:03.540So, stepping out, I found there was an Air Force officer who volunteered.
00:38:11.420I was actually staying at the Fisher House, which is kind of, you know, like the Ronald McDonald House for the military, while I still had treatments at the hospital.
00:38:20.680And he would come by, and we couldn't—like, how do we do this?
00:39:39.020And it's definitely going through some iterations.
00:39:41.240But I'll tell you what, after, you know, getting over the whole embarrassment of the whole bouncing back and forth accordion thing, it was.
00:40:51.020I'll hold one end of a tether, and my guide will hold the other end.
00:40:55.040And it's, you know, only a couple inches separation.
00:40:57.300And, yeah, we'll just run side by side.
00:41:00.300And I get all my cues from that tether, and I can just have a conversation with, like, any other set of, you know, pair of runners down the road.
00:41:11.120But for longer runs—we discovered this a couple years ago.
00:41:18.280In 2023, I was invited to run Badwater 135.
00:41:25.160And two days before the race, the race director says, you can't run side by side.
00:41:50.660And there are about half a dozen police, law enforcement agencies all making sure that they don't break the rules.
00:41:59.320And there's no stepping over the white line.
00:42:02.160So that leaves about a foot and a half.
00:42:07.160So on the fly, we had to come up with a whole new method for guiding.
00:42:11.760Because the only method for going single file with that tether is for, you know, my guide to kind of take that tether and hide it behind her back, like a kid hiding a lollipop from somebody, you know?
00:43:34.000And here's the most amazing part is that over a decade of running side by side with that tether and me keeping kind of a stiff arm with that 90 degree elbow, trying to hold the tether and, you know, pay attention to the cues.
00:43:50.940I've kind of developed knots and arthritis in my shoulder.
00:43:54.420And it's been, it's become really painful.
00:43:56.280And I was dreading having to do that over this ultra marathon.
00:44:02.880And the pain of that would be worse than any pain in my legs or my feet or whatever.
00:44:07.640And what happened was this, these trekking poles that were basically more or less attached to my guide's hips moved like horizontal pistons.
00:44:18.940And I got to swing my arms again for basically, for the first time in over a decade.
00:44:24.060And it was, it was like cheating for me.
00:44:26.720And so I started off even better than I thought I would.
00:44:38.880You probably almost wonder why you had never done that before, I imagine, you know, because you said that was relatively, what, the last couple of years you discovered that system?
00:44:50.260I don't know if anybody else does that, but it was completely new.
00:44:55.860It was like, it was separately invented by me and my team.
00:45:01.840I don't, like literally, like it seems like something simple that others would do, but there are so many different methods that, you know, other blind runners have figured out.
00:45:14.900Some, and there's, you know, of course there's gradients, there's levels to being blind.
00:45:19.020There's what I call, what I call blind.
00:45:22.780And then there's that legal blindness or visual impairment.
00:45:27.600So I think the, you know, the Boston Athletic Association that runs, you know, the Boston Marathon, they have five different categories for blind runner or something like that.
00:45:38.660Anyways, some people that have enough sight, they have their guides just wear a brightly colored shirt and they chase the color.
00:46:03.260I'm interested, you know, I think part of the, part of the draw and joy of running is to be able to be in a new place, to see new surroundings, to take in the environment.
00:46:15.620So, you know, you don't have the luxury of being able to see around you or see new places or experience that way.
00:46:22.420So how do you experience those things when you're running and what other joy do you find that somebody who maybe does have the capability of seeing all around them might overlook?
00:46:34.040Oh, you know, that is definitely, you know, a downside.
00:46:40.500I've heard that Death Valley National Park is a beautiful place.
00:46:44.860And I love seeing other runners and, you know, that grimace or smile of collective misery.
00:46:55.420But I had an incredible team and we had 42 hours to chat about this or that.
00:47:06.660And there were definitely times where, you know, the middle of the night where, you know, my guides, you know, we had quiet and peace that you don't find where there are screens, right?
00:47:20.260So there was this, there's this ghost town called Darwin.
00:47:25.720And it's definitely a lull in the race because it's pretty flat there.
00:47:31.260And we were going right through the middle of the night and it's super quiet.
00:47:35.760And my guide and I actually figured, you know, kind of, Kathy, she and I kind of ran out of stuff to say.
00:48:11.920I'm really curious about the trust that's built.
00:48:14.240And that's one question that I really, I really thought about when I was talking with Eric as well is just the immense amount of trust that you would have to have in your guide.
00:48:22.360Kathy, I think he said is, is, is her name.
00:48:24.760And I'm sure the same is true if you're climbing a mountain peak.
00:48:28.660I'm very curious about the trust that you guys build.
00:48:31.720How do you develop that trust, number one?
00:48:33.860And are there things that you're paying attention to, especially if there's a new person in your group that might inhibit or hinder some of the trust building process?
00:48:44.240Well, first, they, I've got one end of the tether, they've got the other.
00:48:50.500If I go down, you're coming with me, buddy.
00:48:56.760I think, I don't know if it's just my nature or if it's, yeah, maybe it's the military thing where you've got to trust those others in uniform to do their role.
00:49:13.120Even though you may have never met them before.
00:49:16.340They're supporting, you know, units, elements.
00:49:20.680You have no idea, but you see the uniform and, you know, they're professionals.
00:49:26.120And I took that kind of trust to, you know, the rest of my life and said, listen, I am uncertain of what might happen ahead.
00:49:39.880But I'm going to expect the absolute best from you, and I hope you do the same for me.
00:49:49.840Expect that even though you're afraid of me being blind and deaf and having lost my balance, that I can do things like climb a mountain or run a marathon.
00:50:05.440And I'm going to expect that you, despite maybe having never guided a blind person before, are just going to stay alert and learn and do your absolute best.
00:50:19.400And if it turns out that either of us falter, I'm just going to check that off to a learning experience.
00:50:46.780Well, when the bacteria took my hearing, it also took my sense of balance, the vestibular balance.
00:50:52.020It's all right there in that inner ear.
00:50:54.740And so I came home in a wheelchair that second time.
00:50:59.720And I was sitting at the breakfast bar, my counter in the kitchen.
00:51:05.480I had to hold on to the countertop because I would fall right off the stool.
00:51:09.460And I had to hold on to the towel rack by the bathroom if I didn't want to fall off the toilet.
00:51:19.720So, yeah, and even the sense of, you know, the feeling when you lean back in a chair and you're just on that teetering between falling forward and falling backward, but you don't know which way you're going.
00:51:52.000I would dream like I was falling and I'd jump right out of bed.
00:51:55.800So, yeah, when I came home and I wanted to get back to, you know, what I'd learned for the last four years of being blind, both, all that stuff, all the accessibility tools were all text-to-speech.
00:53:32.940And so, it was just a huge, it was a huge kick in the butt.
00:53:41.040Another reality check that I had to figure out.
00:53:44.180So, I would take the trekking poles that I'd previously used in the mountains and I started using them like this daddy long leg crab walk thing.
00:53:55.660Like, there were half crutches, half antennae in front of me just to get out to the mailbox and back.
00:54:03.100And then, and then, I wouldn't be exhausted.
00:55:27.980So, you're, you've figured out ways to adapt your body has in order to address the balance issues.
00:55:34.400So, those issues are still there, but you've got workarounds that have helped you overcome that, it sounds like.
00:55:38.360Yeah, we have three different ways that we get our balance.
00:55:42.240One is that vestibular, the inner ear gyro.
00:55:46.200One is through visually seeing ourselves in relation to the world.
00:55:51.820That's why people get sick on roller coasters and, like, jets when they do the, you know, loops and stuff, is because it screws with their sense of balance.
00:58:34.700And then, you know, a year later, when I finally got my hearing back with this implant, I was listening to you guys again.
00:58:41.300And, it inspired me to start, you know, my own show not too long ago, when I finally figured out how to get the technology to work and hired somebody to figure it out.
00:58:52.720No, but, you know, since then, you know, I'm running more.
00:58:58.800I'm signed up for, I'm registered for the Route 66 Ultramarathon, 140 miles in Arizona.
00:59:19.960And, we've got rentals in a couple different states.
00:59:23.640And, all this stuff, I just, I like doing this stuff because I want to achieve, I want to show my three sons that, you know, you can't use these setbacks as excuses.
00:59:39.680So, I got to keep showing them examples, showing them of how I can't use this ever as an excuse.
00:59:49.960And, so, the most recent thing is, you know, a blind guy, a blind deaf guy with a podcast called Point of Impact.
01:00:03.120So, it's my way of, similar in nature to you and Larry's, is showing, showing people how they can, you know, get out of a rut, get overcome challenge.
01:00:20.220But, not just that, it's becoming your best self that, so you can give your best and make that impact.
01:00:27.220And, one of the most important things, one of the most important drivers of all of this is something, some, I don't even know.
01:00:37.940There's probably a meme I read on Facebook, but it said, you know, someday the story of your struggle might be the blueprint for someone else's survival.
01:00:47.520And, boom, that hit me right in the chest.