Forget the Fear, Bring It Up and Talk about Testicular Cancer, Men’s Health

Bryan Stacy faced a testicular cancer and sexually transmitted infection diagnosis on the same day. A man in his early 30s, Bryan found his life soon changed with surgery, chemo and recovery for three months at his parents’ house. The testicular cancer experience led him to look at his life and what he wanted out of it. He left his job with Accenture in Washington, D.C., moved to New York City, and founded two successful businesses as a creator of tech to help people feel safe and help men feel comfortable talking about their general health and sexual health. With those two businesses behind him, Bryan Stacy now has another business in development.

In this episode, here are the four sections of Bryan's story.

01:06 - The Testicular Cancer Journey
25:22 -  Back to Work
33:34  -  Now an Entrepreneur
43:58  -  Advice to Consider

Enjoy this episode of Don't Give Up on Testicular Cancer from the Max Mallory Foundation.

Transcript

00:00.00
Joyce Lofstrom 
Hi, this is Joyce, and with me today is Bryan Stacy. He’s a testicular cancer survivor who was diagnosed in 2011 with testicular cancer and a sexually transmitted infection at the same time. That diagnosis led him to a new path from consulting with Accenture and working with the FBI to becoming an entrepreneur. Bryan is co-founder and CEO of the Vaheala, a coronavirus testing and tracking protocol for groups and being an award-winning company whose mission was to redefine perceptions of sexual health, confidence and wellness through digital solutions. So he has a lot to tell us about his success as an entrepreneur and he will also share his testicular cancer journey and how he works with men across the country to help them become the great man within. So, Bryan. Thanks so much for joining me.

00:53.53
Bryan Stacy
Yeah, so happy to be here. I feel like in the ten plus years since my diagnosis, I had a lot of different hats that I've worn so I'm excited to to dive into what's relevant here today.

01:06.50
Joyce Lofstrom
I think we all want to hear about some of those hats. But why don't we just start with your testicular cancer story? Tell us what happened and when and anything you want to share.

01:17.36
Bryan Stacy
Sure, so I'm from Chicago originally, and I had spent some time out in DC. I was living in DC, working as a consultant with the FBI and really living a pretty like fun life, and you know, working in corporate America doing stuff at the FBI. My workout game was on point and just kind of living a normal single guy life in his early 30s, and I started to notice just a little bit of a dull pain, and it wasn't all the time. It was just every once in a while I noticed it, especially when I was doing the row machine at the at the gym, and I told myself what I think probably a lot of guys tell themselves. I mean, there's a lot of guys that have testicular pain of some sort--but don't have testicular cancer and I certainly hadn't that prior and I just thought it wasn't a big deal. It would go away. The difference with this one is that it came back with a more regular occurrence, whether I was driving, or working out, or kind of sitting there typing away at the office. And I continued to deny that something was going on. I started to have an inkling that hey, this is something that's not normal, or like what I've had before. But I had all kinds of denial around it. So, I had gone home to Chicago. I spent some time with my family over Thanksgiving. I was there Thursday, Friday, through the weekend, and when I arrived back in DC on Tuesday morning, I had a conversation with a friend of mine completely unrelated to testicular cancer; but he happened to be a urologist and when I told him--he was the one person I told and I opened up to and I said, hey this thing's been going on. He said, how long's it been going on? I said, about three months, but I think it's going to go away and he said: why didn't you contact me sooner?

03:06.83 Joyce Lofstrom
Ok.

3:21.60 Bryan Stacy

And we're getting you to see a doctor today--and even that, a friend who is a doctor, especially a urologist, telling me I need to go see a doctor right away--even then I said, now you know I just put my suit on I'm getting ready to go into work. I don't think I I don't need to go in, I think this is probably fine. Or I gave him that ‘I'll do it later’ and he insisted that I go that day. So he set me up with one of his buddies that worked in the area. I was diagnosed that Tuesday and I had surgery on Thursday--so that was quite a shock to the system.

03:51.76 Joyce Lofstrom

Oh my, wow, two days. But it's good you had that friend. So, did you just have surgery, chemo? Just anything you can share about your treatment.

03:58.51 Bryan Stacy Right.

Well, I think that the first shock is when I went in and he said, 'hey we think based on what it feels like down there, it feels very much like testicular cancer. We're gonna do a little bit of blood work. But we're also gonna prep you or get you into surgery, or plan for surgery.' He said, 'there's a few things that you need to do prior going to surgery. So number one is, we want you to go to a sperm bank,' and I thought that was really interesting. So why? Why would I have to go to that? And he told me that yes, most guys have two testicles and they both produce sperm, but you don't always know if both are working. He said, 'we want you to make a deposit for the reason is after you have surgery we might take out the one nut that's actually working and you'll become sterile after that.' He's like, 'hopefully that's not the case but it's a bit of an insurance policy.'

So I said okay, that sounds good and when is surgery. He said surgery is Thursday and I said, well tell me about this surgery. You know, you just kind of go in through the sack and pull my nut out like you just take a piece of it out? How do you do this thing? And I was shocked when he said actually we go in from the top…

11:39.18 Joyce Lofstrom Yes.

11:46.57 Bryan Stacy

…to keep my sperm frozen. But it has felt like a really good insurance policy ever since, and what you don't know is there are several hurdles that a guy will go through to know if he's sterile or not--so the first one is just the sperm bank itself and not knowing. You know, what's your motility like, what's your volume like, with how many sperm do you actually have; how many are good, so that's the first one. The next one is, you do the surgery and after the surgery you don't know if you're still producing sperm or not and then if you go through chemo if that's the next round that you go through.

12:19.60 Joyce Lofstrom Right.

12:25.15 Bryan Stacy

That can be a huge hurdle too, because that could fry your one good nut, if you will, and for guys that that elect the surgery, the RPLND, which is they basically put a zipper in the front of your body. They pull all your lymph nodes. There's actually sperm risk to that too, and they call it, what is it? Retro…? I can't remember the exact word, but basically it's where it messes with the direction of your sperm, and as weird as this sounds--instead of the sperm going out where it can be useful, it actually just shoots into the bladder, and that can happen during the orchiectomy--which is where they take out the testicle--or it can happen in the RPLND surgery. So there are several [ways] and also if you do chemo, you don't know if the sperm's going to come back for about a year.

13:01.76 Joyce Lofstrom

Ok.

13:20.61 Bryan Stacy

So, there's a pretty good amount of waiting time when you go through a procedure like this, to figure out like, are you sterile or are you not sterile?

13:27.24 Joyce Lofstrom

Wow, that's a lot of very good, detailed information and I didn't realize it took a year for it to come back. So, I like what you said too about just having your sperm frozen as an insurance policy; that's important.

13:43.38 Bryan Stacy

Yeah, it definitely made me feel like I had options and you know, I mentioned these different hurdles. I had a very good friend of mine who also, you know, he I had--I’ll talk about this in a bit--but I had several people reach out to me after I went through this with pain and the nuts.

13:45.31 Joyce Lofstrom

Right, right.

14:02.98 Bryan Stacy

And in all those cases I said, hey look, like it doesn't sound like you have what I had, but go see a doctor. That's the best thing you could possibly do right now--have that. I'm not a medical professional. Go get that good advice. Of my best friends reached out to me and he described a very similar situation to what I had. It turns out that he did have testicular cancer and when he went into the sperm bank right before surgery, just like I did, he found out that that he was shooting blanks the entire time.

14:34.40 Joyce Lofstrom
Oh wow.

14:37.50
Bryan Stacy

And so that's you know if you think about the different levels of trauma associated with going through a procedure like this, you know there's not only the sexual and physical side of things. But there's also like the identity and emotional side of things.

14:50.80 Joyce Lofstrom
Yes.

14:53.38
Bryan Stacy

He was newly married and that was something that he had to talk about with his wife. You know, just as going through cancer as well. So, the sperm thing is something that that isn't thought about too much. Now what I thought a lot about was sexual performance, and I had a lot of questions for the doctor about sexual performance, and at that time I was single and I was enjoying singlehood, and a lot of my identity was really wrapped around my sexuality and sex--and the thought that went through my mind is like, wow, like what if I can't perform. And that was the word I use, and I use that right now on purpose. But if I can't perform, what does that mean, like who am I, and so this diagnosis really sent me into an existential spiral--

15:38.63 Joyce Lofstrom 
Ah, right.

15:48.00 Bryan Stacy

--after I got through the initial, you know, physical trauma and surgery.

15:50.88 Joyce Lofstrom

So that's very true. You know, I think that's a good point, that many men may not even want to talk about. So I'm glad that you said that, as well about your experience. What did you learn about yourself during this process, maybe something you didn't know?

16:09.10 
Bryan Stacy

Oh my gosh. I think going through it was simply that it was just, get through it but I learned, I think,

There were a few big lessons. I had been living a life of, everything's good, everything's all like, having fun, no problems, and the last thing I would ever want to do to any other human was show a level of weakness. Now I played sports growing up and that was that drumbeat was in my head--and this was really the one time in my life where I didn't really have a choice--I was going to be leaving work for about three months to go through chemo. People are going to be wondering where I went, and a friend of mine did a really beautiful thing for me right before I went into to start the chemotherapy. She bought me, and this is a little bit prior to Facebook and definitely prior to Instagram, and so she bought me a URL--because I had made a joke about having one big nut.

17:29.11 
Joyce Lofstrom 
But ok.

17:31.66
Bryan Stacy
And she said, if you want, I attach it to Tumblr, and you can just write about your experience. And so this is the one time in my life that I wrote publicly but talked about this this very vulnerable situation that I was in, and a lot of people may describe that as weakness.

17:50.20
Bryan Stacy

I think the biggest lesson that came throughout all of this is that some things that we call weakness, some things that we're maybe even not proud of, are the things that really connect us. Because what happened after I started writing is, I had all these people reach out to me and ask me questions and I had never felt that level of connection.

Certainly, with guys before, I realized I didn't have. I had guy friends, but we didn't have I would say super-deep relationships and for those existing friends and for people I hadn't met before, all of a sudden, like we had something to like really connect on and they came to me with a genuine questions.

18:09.75
Joyce Lofstrom
Ok, ok.

18:26.73
Bryan Stacy
I saw my entire relationships shift as I went through testicular cancer and openly talked about it. So there's a lot more that came out of this experience, but that was a huge one, and something that serves me to this day.

18:38.74
Joyce Lofstrom

You know, Bryan, I think what you said about your friend buying the URL, I mean that is such a unique gift, but a relevant gift, and yeah it was a different timeframe in terms of the web. But I love that idea. I think that's just such a creative but useful gift and you used it.

18:59.73
Bryan Stacy 
It was. It was. Really, it was really cathartic for me too. I'm not suggesting that anyone, and if you know you have somebody in your life that's going through testicular cancer, that it's the perfect gift. But it was great for me at that time.

19:13.23 Joyce Lofstrom
 Yes.

19:15.80 Bryan Stacy
 Because what it did is as I went through chemo, and maybe we'll talk about this in more detail, but it's 8 hours a day sitting there with a needle in your arm, not feeling great, and this another gift recommendation, I got a lot of books and movies.

19:28.54 Joyce Lofstrom
Ok.

19:33.49 Bryan Stacy
Which makes a lot of sense, because you're sitting around a long period of time. But I had so much brain fog that I had a really hard time concentrating on anything like a book or even a movie, even a TV show, and so what that website and the blog did for me is it gave me something to do.

19:41.31
Joyce Lofstrom
Right.

19:51.42 
Bryan Stacy

[I could] reflect and produce and create and [it] put me into that creative state, even while I was going through it, and I could share my story in real time, and for me that was hugely cathartic; I could, I can go still, every once in a while I still go back to that site. And I look at how I and I can think about how I felt at the time what I was going through: some of the concerns I had and so that's a gift that that she gave me that changed not just my life. But I still have people reaching out to me that go to that site to understand what is the overall experience like. So that was a really beautiful thing for me now, if I said that books and movies weren't a good gift. A good gift that I did get was a video game and I forget what game system I had at the time but somebody gave me some video games, and that captured enough of my attention and had to be action oriented enough, unlike a book or a movie, that I ended up spending a lot of time playing a video game. So that was that was super helpful too as I went through the process.

20:56.58
Joyce Lofstrom
You know, Max through his seven months, he started to come up with a video game idea that he could create. His major was, you know, media arts and game development, and he never finished it but that was one way I know he spent time, was thinking about how he could create a video game about testicular cancer.

21:17.47
Bryan Stacy
Yeah, I love that and it's not surprising to hear, because when we get into that that creative energy it gives us some self-efficacy that we have some sort of you know, say,aAbout what's going on with us when our bodies aren't really agreeing with life as we know it at the time. So I think like one of the one of the best things that I was encouraged to do through my friend, was to create, and it sounds like Max found that that similar thread.

21:36.27
Joyce Lofstrom
Right? You kind of touched on this: you mentioned you grew up playing sports, being an athlete, and you know we talked about I guess our Midwestern background. I'm from Kansas City and went to Mizzou; you're from Chicago went to Iowa and played baseball. Anything you can talk about from the perspective of an athlete, with your testicular cancer diagnosis?

22:18.33

Bryan Stacy

Yeah, there were 2 identities that I held; now if you would have asked me ten years ago if these were my identities I would have said you're crazy. So this is after doing some reflection on where I was at in life. 

22:29.24
Joyce Lofstrom

Ok, yeah.

22:33.35

Bryan Stacy

But there were really 2 identities that came out of that time period of my life. The first one you just mentioned, this athlete kind of identity. The second identity I had was I grew up Christian, and that was that was the religion in which my grandfather was a pastor.  And I went to church every week, went to a grade school that was a Lutheran grade school, and so I would say that I had these 2 really strong identities. both of which in this case were not helpful.

23:06.81

Joyce Lofstrom
Oh, ok.

23:09.40

Bryan Stacy

I think when it came to, we'll talk about athletics first, there is an invincibility that comes with the feeling of playing sports at a high level. and that because I take care of my body, these sort of things like, wouldn't cancer like [at] the age of 30 come on, like no, that's not even something that would have crossed my mind; and there is a kind of grin and bear it or get through it sort of mentality and I didn't know, but at the time I was doing a lot of that in my life, and when it came to the feeling of the my nut hurting or the idea of going to a doctor, that felt weak and I know after talking to guys in the last 10 years about the situation they've been through, I know that's a pervasive and I would even say toxic masculinity, a trait, that we can do it on our own.

In our group we actually call it lone wolfing, and I think for all the beautiful things that athletics can bring, all of the good things I did take out of athletics, that one's not. None of them. This idea that that we're invincible, that we don't need a doctor. We don't need help from some from other people; that's something that I had to bust up. and so that that certainly came from my upbringing and athletics when it comes to Christianity. So this is a whole other element and the reason that in my belief is what is in part like why,  why testicular cancer was brought to me; why this was part of my life and at least how I make meaning of it is, I had all kinds of shame wrapped around sex, right? The the  going teaching when it came to Christianity is no sex before marriage, and so any kind of sexual pleasure or sex or intercourse itself, like would feel shameful in some way. So, the idea of going to a doctor admitting that.  

25:02.62 
Joyce Lofstrom

Yes.

25:20.50

Bryan Stacy

That yes, I've been sexually active and maybe it came from there. I had no idea that was a no-go too, because this was just a thing that we didn't talk about and by thing that we didn't talk about, I didn't talk about with my parents, I didn't talk about my friends, I didn't talk about it with anybody with any kind of regularity. I would do it. And most of the time, I would be drunk, when I'm doing it so I could kind of get outside of my head. And that's something we can talk about here in a bit. But I think these identities, these  forces like really put me in a spot where I'm like I'm good, I don't need to talk about this with anybody.  

25:36.51
Joyce Lofstrom

Right? 

25:52.93

Bryan Stacy

And that could have been really detrimental if I didn't have a friend that really pushed me pushed me through those 2 barriers. 

25:56.91

Joyce Lofstrom

You know you are absolutely right on both of those topics; it could be a whole ‘nother podcast to get into the shamefulness and guilt connected with religion. I grew up Catholic and understand exactly what you're talking about. So I'll just say I'm really glad you had someone that could help you at least get to the doctor and that sounds like, as you said, we'll talk about some other I guess discoveries and things that you you've been able to help yourself and others with so thanks for going into that. I appreciate that, Bryan.

26:32.32

Bryan Stacy

Yeah, absolutely.

26:35.84

Joyce Lofstrom

So now let's kind of transition to what you're doing now as an entrepreneur. You have your company you founded in 2019 and you also before that introduced another company called Beam and they deal with health in different ways. So, I'm going to just step back and ask you to talk about these companies and your history as an entrepreneur. Anything that you want to share with us because you have such interesting companies, successful companies, and I just I want to hear about them.

27:14.28

Bryan Stacy

I'll take us back to after chemo. I went to Chicago and stayed at my parents' house as I was going through chemotherapy and man that was, that brought me closer to my parents and I have so much appreciation for that time period of my life. Because at the age of then 31, when else are you going to spend three months with your parents and have them take care of you? So that was such a blessing in disguise, being able to spend time with them.

27:32.45 Joyce Lofstrom

Right, right.

27:42.71

Bryan Stacy

But after chemo, I've got a nice bald head and it's time to go back to work. Physically I'm feeling at probably 40% of what I was feeling prior to chemo. I was still in pretty rough shape, had gained a ton of weight through that through the process. But I arrived back in DC and I'm feeling a little bit lost when I get back to DC. Totally not sure why. But at that moment my boss said hey, I'm going a happy hour today, do you want to go with? I said yeah, great, and so the story I told myself when he asked me that, it's like you know, like maybe this is my path, this whole consulting thing, and so the people that were at that were at that happy hour was my boss his boss and his boss. There' are 3 levels of guys above me at Accenture.

[It’s] a huge company, I think we got 400,000 employees there, and this was like the number 3 guy, right? That was it, he was a top dog there, and so we get to the bar. We're at happy hour and the top guy asked kind of kind of a question I'd never been asked before, certainly not at a work happy hour, but he asked if we had a spirit animal.

28:56.45
Joyce Lofstrom

If you had a spirit animal?

28:56.95

Bryan Stacy

And I thought a really strange question. Yeah, he asked if we had ever thought about a spirit animal for ourselves. And yeah, the idea of like some animal that that you know their spirit aligns to like who we are and I’m like, wow, like what a strange question that I wasn't ready for.

29:16.94

Bryan Stacy

And so he went on, he described his spirit animal and his spirit animal was a bald eagle and he's like you know we're here in Washington DC. This is where I work and I feel like I have great vision and I like the vantage point of the sky. So like my spirit animal  is a bald eagle. I was like wow, that's a pretty good one. It's a pretty good spirit animal so that the next guy goes right? The next guy says yeah, he's like, “I would definitely be a lion. He's king of the jungle. No real predators.”

Like, but more importantly [he said] I have my team here that I work with, and I consider that my pride, and he's like so yeah, the king of the jungle makes sense. So that's getting closer to me now. My boss is up next but I'm like man like okay so king of the jungle, a pretty good one too.  

30:10.47

Bryan Stacy

Then my boss goes, and I'm at this point I'm trying to listen, but I'm also like, I've never thought about a freaking spirit animal, like what in the world am I going to say?  So my boss goes and says he'd be a Shark. He's like, because sharks, they never stop moving. They're super healthy. Never have cancer which apparently is a shark thing-- and I thought very rude at the moment, especially with the guy that just went through cancer--but he said he said shark and he said the same thing like a predator, and so now it gets to me and I'm like, oh my gosh,  we have basically the king of the sky, the king of the jungle, the king of the ocean like already taken—like, what am I going to say?  And I to this day I can't say like why this came to me but what I blurted out was “jellyfish.”

31:00.39 Joyce Lofstrom  

Oh! 

31:03.37

Bryan Stacy

I was horrified when I said jellyfish. I didn't know why I said it. My boss tried to help me recover. He’s like, oh, like that man of war jellyfish that you know kills surfers and they're huge. And I was like no man, have you ever seen those little tiny jellyfish, I'm not even sure how they survive. He's like “oh.” And so these other guys are looking at me like I'm a little bit crazy, and I'm so embarrassed. I'm starting to come to now, and I'm so embarrassed. I took a one more sip of my beer. I put it down on the table and said, I've got a ton of work to do today. I really appreciate the invite.

But I had to get out of here because I just didn't want to face being there after telling them I was a jellyfish,.

31:46.26

Joyce Lofstrom
Okay.

31:55.76

Bryan Stacy

And so on my walk home, about a 10 minute walk home, I was like why the F did you say jellyfish, like what is wrong with you? I really beat myself up: like what is wrong with you, why would you say jellyfish? And as I continued on my walk, I was like, you know what? It’s because it's true--I feel like a jellyfish right now. I feel like I'm not in control. I'm just out drifting in the ocean, saying just yes to things that come by as opposed to having any real direction in my life. And so I tell that story because that was the one time of my life I started to ask some bigger questions. You know, I asked myself like if I had a billion dollars, what would I do with it? Didn't really have a great answer. You know, the classic things came to my mind, like I buy an island, I do this, but like I realized that I didn't really…I was just in the rat race. I was on the hamster wheel, if you will, trying to move up the corporate ladder, and didn't really know what I wanted in life. That moment really kicked off for me an entire journey, and I don't know if I would have got there without going through the testicular cancer experience, because after going through that, I wanted something more, like what “could be” you know?

33:05.71

Joyce Lofstrom

Right.  

33:11.32

Bryan Stacy

Cancer is fairly curable, but obviously, Max and a multitude of other guys didn't make it through that; and so we start to look at what life is and what we do between the lines of birth and death and why are we actually here. You know, the things I learned and how it changed me is, it really changed my perception of like what we're doing here. What our opportunities are, what does it mean to like really live versus just kind of be in existence. So that was really the big kickoff point for me.  From there I started to try and answer some of those questions, and at that point in my time I was working on a side project for Accenture for a digital app for law enforcement and I decided this was the next thing I wanted to do. I saw this wave coming of digital products coming to market. And so, I end up leaving Accenture federal services. I moved to New York City from DC and I became part of Accenture digital, which was just kicking off. So that  really started me down the path of understanding like what is it like to create a digital product. And where some of the ideas came from for my next businesses.

34:27.15

Joyce Lofstrom

That's a great story, and you know, timing is everything--just the fact that you went to that happy hour and that question came out from from the head guy and kind of made you think. I mean, I think gives us all pause in a way, because I was just thinking back  when I had cancer; I was 25 and I was in Chicago, too, and I remember I was a food editor and a restaurant critic for the Daily Herald, a suburban newspaper.  I was going to quit. It was like, oh, I just can't do this anymore. And this nurse said, you know, just wait. You know, give yourself some time. But eventually I wound up going home to Kansas City. It's very interesting, the kind of introspective approach on it [having cancer]. So you also host a podcast? And I love the name of that podcast, The Great Man Within. Can you talk about your podcast?

35:35.27

Bryan Stacy

Yeah, absolutely. So the podcast, as you mentioned, is called The Great Man Within and we have several leaders, authors that that we like to pull from; one guy you may have heard his name, Napoleon Hill.

35:50.69

Joyce Lofstrom

Ok, yes.

35:52.82 

Bryan Stacy 

And Napoleon Hill is really famous for a single book called Think and Grow Rich; what he's most famous for, but he wrote another book that's a little bit less known and it's called Outwitting the Devil. And in Outwitting the Devil, he gives his definition of hell. His definition of hell is the day that we're on our deathbed and we look back at our lives and we know that we left chips in the table. All the ‘what ifs,’ all the ‘like, man, if I would have done that, if I would have done this’ and we look at that and say like that that. Could be a life of existence if you will, but while we're here on earth, while we're between those lines of birth and death, what do we really want? And so in our podcast we start to explore what are those things that that we want and what are the structures to put in place to get there? And we've got not just the podcast, but we've got a few different masterminds that meet up in person. We've got a digital mastermind and a Facebook group and it's all guys asking these bigger questions and seeing how that impacts all of them: at the relationship level, at the professional level, at the performance level. [It] has been a true gift and really just an extension of what I was doing before, related to testicular cancer, because as I said, I didn't have deep relationships with men prior to me going through testicular cancer. And when I started talking to guys about my experiences and about their experiences, I started to see a lot of similarities. A lot of similar fears. And this work that we do now is really no different than that, and so it's figuring out how to break through those some, most of the time,  self-imposed barriers to doing what we want and being okay with that.

37:47.52

Joyce Lofstrom

You know, you've hit on so many important topics and I think that's a question I ask myself all the time, you know, what do I really want?  What do I do now? My career and after, roughly 45 years in public relations. And I think it's a question we ask throughout our lives, you know, and I think what you do, though, to bring men together to really talk about it and be able to ask and perhaps answer that question: it's so important to being happy in life.

38:23.11

Bryan Stacy

Yeah, yeah.

38:24.74

Joyce Lofstrom

So it is you know and a lot of people never ask the question so you had a quote. Yeah, go ahead and go ahead. Well I was just going to call out one of your quotes on your website which is, “People do their best work when they feel safe.” Would you talk about that with me?

38:43.74

Bryan Stacy

Yeah, so I think in order to talk about Vaheala, let me let me go back to my first company, which was which was Beam Health and what happened is, when I moved to New York, and I started working in in the digital technologies and figuring out how to build websites and apps and whatnot. I linked back up with my friend who's that urologist and I said you know something, I've noticed with guys, what a hard time they have talking about their sexual health and sexual experiences--and I only noticed that because I went through testicular cancer, and I had a friend who was a special agent at the FBI. I was only a month back in DC after I went through chemotherapy and we're in a meeting and he pulls me outside the meeting: “Hey, Brian I got to ask you a question.” And he's like, “you know, my right nut has been hurting me and I was I wondering if you could take a look at it. And I said, “listen I'm not a doctor, and I'm definitely not going to look at your nuts in the hallway of the FBI building. But I do think you should go see a doctor, now. The reality is that you're 55 years old, your chances are pretty low that it's testicular cancer. It's more of a young man's cancer. Ah, no offense. You know I'm not saying you're old, I'm saying you're not, you're old enough to not have to testicular cancer--but go get it checked out.” And so, I thought it was so interesting that here's this special agent that is at almost at retirement age for a special agent that is pulling me, a consultant, that he doesn't really know him, to the side at his work to look at his nuts. Like, man, if this guy doesn't have somebody to talk to about this kind of stuff, like I'm the safest person to talk to, we got some real problems. So fast forwarding back to New York here, and I hooked up with my urologist friend and I said, there's got to be a better way to do this.

40:31.20

Joyce Lofstrom

Right? Yes.

40:42.64

Bryan Stacy

I waited three months between the time of feeling symptoms to the time of actually getting checked out--that could have been a really detrimental three months--and I know there's other guys out there and you've probably talked to a lot of them, Joyce,  that waited a lot longer than that and well why is it that way? Why are we so afraid to talk about it? And I started exploring that.

40:54.27

Joyce Lofstrom

Yes, you're right.

41:02.58

Bryan Stacy

We decided that especially for guys that have such a hard time—um, most women so take care of their sexual health when they start their period, right? They have to have those conversations with a gynecologist. Most guys don't talk to a doctor about their sexual health until they're 40, about 45, and they have to do their prostate [test] or a  colonoscopy, and so we like say, we want to change that. So what we created is a company that focused on sexual health using telemedicine and diagnostics. We focused a lot on STDs--and gave people a place to talk to doctors, to feel comfortable to get tested, get diagnosed and then share their results easily with partners if they wanted to.  Now this is before the days of really good EMRs and where test results were more readily available. And what we started to notice is that people just prior to having sex,  that they didn't talk about these sort of things; and so that was the company that we started, and what we learned is that yes like when we reduce friction to care, more people are going to get checked out. Interestingly most of our clients for that company were not heterosexual men. They were either men who have sex with men and the reason they were our clients is they wanted to get PREP, which is a preventative pill for HIV.

42:30.24

Joyce Lofstrom

Right.

42:33.14

Bryan Stacy

And they have to get tested every three months in order to take that, and women who were kind of in between gynecologists, or didn't want to go see somebody in person, and so that was the majority of our clients. So we learned a few things from that now. We also learned what a good business model is, and what a bad business model is,  because that business we ended up closing down about 3 years after we started it.

We didn't really find the right business model for it. We took those learnings and when COVID hit we created Vaheala which is the company that you were asking about, and what we saw happening was, the pandemic was happening but people still had to work and similar to some of the research we did in the sexual health space. People were really afraid to be in groups, but we needed some people to work in groups, whether it was factories or airlines or what have you, and so what we realized that when people feel safe, they are at their best. This is socially--in a relationship

And so what we attempted to do was more than just let's test people but let's let other people know that other people around them have been tested, have been vaccinated,  have taken a health survey, have done all the things the protocols that a company has laid out for their employees. And so that's what we've been doing for the last year now,  is helping companies create these custom protocols that work for their situation and their employees, and helping them execute and communicate that. So that's where that's where that company came from, and on the heels of the of the sexual health company.

44:11.10

Joyce Lofstrom

And your timing--I mean, people do need that and yeah, the whole question goes back in person to work or not? And now the new variant that's come out here; we are in what? July of 2022 and there's another variant. So, I think that would give people so much peace of mind, I would say. And I have friends who, and my son [John-Mark], I mean, he goes to work every day in person. He works in health care. There is a great fear about what's next with this virus.

44:53.62

Bryan Stacy

Yeah, it has been certainly a health and social experiment of the greatest order and I wish I had some sort of barometer to say like what's next for this thing I think we're we're doing a better job of learning how to live with it.

45:10.74

Joyce Lofstrom

Um, yes.

45:13.70

Bryan Stacy

And hopefully it doesn't get more, or you know, worse variant if you will, but yeah, it's it's certainly an interesting time to be in digital health care.

45:17.27

Joyce Lofstrom

I know, I know.

45:24.65

Joyce Lofstrom

So, you kind of talked about this. But what advice do you have for other listeners? A young man who might think they have testicular cancer, or anybody going through treatment, just from your experience? What advice do you have?

45:37.89

Bryan Stacy

Oh man, I think we hit on this already. It's like, don't be afraid to discuss this with somebody. You know, find the person that you feel safe with, that also has some level of expertise. You know, be the doctor or friend, whoever may be and just ask the question.  When my friend asked me about his situation, and I was able to say like, hey man,  like I think you are showing similar symptoms. What I said, go get checked out, that was the push he needed. I'm not a doctor; I didn't know much. Yes, I went through the experience, but then he was able to go get the help that he needed. And I feel good about that. I say one of those things in life that I feel good about, I think about every once in a while. So, if you think that you you may have something, absolutely, 100%,  go get it checked out.

There's no downside and if you got if you got to game yourself a little bit, then maybe when you talk to your urologist or your doctor, maybe ask them about some of the other sexual health stuff that you've got going on. You know, related to performance or desires or interests or anything else; it might be a good time to double dip there a little bit. But I think that's the biggest thing: is that because you're not alone. You're not the only one that's out there that has gone through this. It's not something I notice in myself and in a lot of guys I talk to. It's almost like if you don't look in the box then then the bad thing won't happen. And I'm here to tell you that's false thinking and this is true for me feeling testicular cancer. This is really true when it comes to STD testing;  like some guys just don't want to know and I understand that's scary, but it's a really dangerous place to play. So, think about taking ownership.

47:21.16

Joyce Lofstrom

Right.

47:30.68

Bryan Stacy

Over our health ownership, over where we're at. It can go a long way in in providing a happy healthy life.

47:36.94

Joyce Lofstrom

So, what's next for you, Brian? Anything you want to share your businesses, about you, just what's on the horizon for you?

47:45.32

Bryan Stacy

Yeah, I'm really excited about the next project that I'm working on. I've now run companies that have been in the infectious disease space, right? STDs and coronavirus.  But the work that I do with the men's groups and on the podcast and in our masterminds, I think that sort of work is the baseline level of stuff to move our lives from a place of existence to thriving. The next company that we're putting together is,  we're looking at all of the different paths that we've seen guys go on, the challenges that they've taken on, and I can give you an example. About in the beginning of 2022, we had 900 guys across the world sign up for what was called a pushup challenge. Pushup challenge was in sixty days to be able to do pushups, but secretly, and what we didn't tell people, is that it wasn't just a physical pushup challenge. This was really a mental health challenge. The pushup [challenge] was just the trojan horse, if you will, to get guys in to do it, and challenge themselves and over a sixty day period every single day.  It was pushups that made sense, because it was a pushup challenge, but we also read a book together callef Breathr by James Nestor--to teach us how to breathe. We as humans are horrible breathers. We're not taught, really, how to breathe.

49:11.10

Joyce Lofstrom

Yes.

49:14.32

Bryan Stacy

And so, when doing pushups, or just doing life, it's a really important thing. We also had meditations or some sort of other mental health challenge on other days, and so putting together custom programs like that for guys to go on these journeys together. I'm really focused on the health and wellness and betterment space. That's what I'm focused on next. So, I'm excited to be moving on. I'm hopefully going to move on,  hopefully coronavirus goes away, and I'll be moving into this health and wellness space.

49:37.67

Joyce Lofstrom

Right.

49:43.59

Joyce Lofstrom

You know, this idea of you had, 900 men who came together for this challenge, it speaks to the value of a group. What am I trying to say is, motivation or not pure pressure, but just being together with like-minded or other men to do something together. I think that's so important.

50:15.69

Joyce Lofstrom

And the other thing I wanted to ask you to share is how can people find you, find your your podcast or the services. The things that you are doing.

50:23.70

Bryan Stacy

Great. Yeah, you know I'm so glad you brought up the group part of this because it's huge. We find that guys often start in this space on their own. They're reading a book. They're listening to a podcast because it's safe. They're learning a little bit and it's safe and it's great. It's an amazing place to start. But what we talk about is that on your own,  this sort of like personal development is slower. It's shallow and it's incomplete. Great place to start, but it's slower.. With a group, it's deeper. It's faster and it's connective and so we see guys go from hey, I had a thought about this book, and then moving into a group setting. Where they're working towards, maybe even a similar sort of goal or at least other guys know that they're moving towards something. We see their lives absolutely take off, and so that group that the social motivation, if you will, is absolutely huge if you really want to move forward. S  that's a huge plus for a lot of the the group stuff that we do. Where you can find me is, I am on Instagram, @BryinTheory, that's really the best spot to get me right now. I haven't been super active on social media, as we've been doing some of the coronavirus stuff. But as we move into the health and men’s space, we'll be picking it up, big time.

51:53.83

Joyce Lofstrom

Ok in my last question, a fun question. What song when you hear it, you just have to sing along?

52:02.56

Bryan Stacy

Oh man, so like there's a lot of things that I'm not good at in life, but the thing I'm worst at in life is knowing lyrics to songs and I really want to be a good singer of songs. 

So often I just make lyrics up as they come along. I was with my fiance in the car a couple weeks ago and I was in a a singalong mood and she said great like what song do you want I sing along to? I said, I don't really know, like just kind of pick one that you think I would know. And she tried different songs; I didn't know the words to any of them, so she put wheels on the bus go around and around and that one I knew so it's not what I would pick but at least I know the lyrics. Ah yeah.

52:45.55

Joyce Lofstrom

Ah, ah, right? Ok all right I like that. Well, I really appreciate your time and just sharing so much with me and for our listeners, Brian, I really hope you'll come back sometime down the road and tell us more about what you're doing. I think your success, but also your the reason behind everything that you do, is to help others and I  just really appreciate all of that.

53:17.53

Bryan Stacy

Joyce, thanks for doing this and giving me an opportunity here to tell my story. I haven't been so involved in the testicular cancer community, and I know it's such an important thing. So, I know I know your heart is here and I so appreciate that you're doing this and getting the word out. So thank you for today.

53:33.86

Joyce Lofstrom

You're welcome. Thanks, Brian.

53:39.70

Bryan Stacy

Thank you.

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