432 A Navy Seal's Story of Sobriety After Shame, Secrets, and Addiction
432 A Navy Seal's Story of Sobriety After Shame, Secrets, and Addiction

The One Day At A Time Recovery Podcast

Former Navy SEAL Dr Tony Dice shares how childhood trauma, a high-risk career and meth addiction tore his life apart, and how treatment and 12-step recovery helped him rebuild. His story highlights gratitude, structure and honesty as core tools, especially for high performers who may be struggling behind a successful façade.

InspiringHonestInformativeMotivationalSupportive

54:14•28 May 2026

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From Navy SEAL to Sober Scholar: Dr Tony Dice on Shame, Meth and Finding Gratitude

Episode Overview

Gratitude practised as daily action (“a grateful alcoholic will not drink”) is central to Dr Dice’s long-term sobriety.
High performers often cling to work identity and adrenaline in ways that can hide or fuel addiction and emotional pain.
Early recovery can be extremely restless, so practical tools like crocheting or colouring can help people stay in their seats and actually hear the message.
Consistent routines—meetings, physical activity, sponsoring and being sponsored—help maintain recovery after the initial crisis passes.
The 12 steps align closely with established therapeutic models, offering a structured, accessible path for deep personal change.

“My whole life I had trained to be a hero and I couldn’t do that anymore.”

What remarkable journeys have people faced head-on against addiction? This conversation with Dr Tony Dice, a former Navy SEAL turned PhD and author, shows just how far someone can fall—and how much life there can be on the other side of meth, shame, and secrets. The chat centres on Dr Dice’s story from isolated childhood with an alcoholic father, to high-adrenaline careers in firefighting, EMS, law enforcement ambitions and the SEAL teams, where drinking felt almost “issued” as standard kit.

He shares wild, darkly funny SEAL-era antics, but doesn’t gloss over how addiction eventually cost him his military identity and nearly his family. The turning point comes with a harrowing moment during the H1N1 scare, when he’s too deep in a three‑day meth binge to pick up the phone and collect his sick toddler from daycare. “My whole life I had trained to be a hero and I couldn’t do that anymore,” he says.

That moment of spiritual collapse led him into treatment, where he literally sold his car to pay for more days in rehab rather than walk away.

You’ll hear about his early twitchy days in recovery, from crocheting through meetings just to stay seated, to the mantra that anchors his sobriety: “A grateful alcoholic will not drink.” He talks about building daily routines—meetings, running, heavy lifting, calling his sponsor—and about the “holistic change model” he identified in 12-step work, linking the steps to recognised therapeutic frameworks.

This episode has a special focus on high performers: military, first responders, and ambitious professionals whose work identities and adrenaline habits can quietly mask addiction and emotional pain. If you’ve ever wondered whether success is covering up something you don’t want to feel, this story might hit closer to home than you expect. Could gratitude, honesty and a bit of humour be the first steps towards a different kind of strength?

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