#106 – Don Cummins

Don’s Story

Don Cummins is an author, transformational speaker, and coach.

Don suffered for decades with the effects of trauma and addiction. These issues resulted in homelessness, damaged relationships, depression and anxiety, and unemployability. Don was repeatedly committed to mental health institutions and experienced extreme incarceration and isolation, having served over twenty years in prison for bank robberies.

One day, Don had an awakening to his inherent goodness and value. He saw that he was not a horrible person. He saw that he deserved to recover and that he was worth the hard work it would take to do so. So he embarked on a path of recovery, transforming his life in ways that had seemed impossible, experiencing success in relationships, business, leadership and helping others recover.

Don’s story is detailed in The Prison Within: A Memoir of Breaking Free. 

When he’s not hanging out with his family or working on a project, Don’s usually riding his bike or playing guitar.

We’re excited to share Don’s story with you today. Let’s do this! 

Episode Resources

• Podcast Episodes by Topic | lionrock.life/podcast-episodes-by-topic
• The Prison Within: A Memoir of Breaking Free | Available on Amazon
• “Little Tree” | A song written by Don after meeting his wife | YouTube

Connect with Don Cummins

• Don’s Website | don-cummins.com
• Instagram | @don_cummins
• Facebook | @DonCumminsLive

Connect with Us at The Courage to Change

• Podcast Website | lionrock.life/couragetochangepodcast
• Podcast Instagram | @couragetochange_podcast
• Podcast Facebook | @thecouragetochangepodcast
• Podcast Email | podcast@lionrock.life

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Episode Transcript

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Coming up on this episode of The Courage to Change.

Don Cummins:

I had this idea that I was supposed to go into this bank and it was like my destiny, and there’s going to be this teller waiting for me. And they’re going to give me the money and I’m going to go and some of it I can use for what I want, some of it there’s going to be some… This is insane. I thought there would be some code in the money.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Hello, beautiful people. Welcome to The Courage to Change, a recovery podcast. If you’re here for the first time, thanks for coming. If you’re here for the 106th time, yes, we are on episode 106. Thanks for coming back. Today we have Don Cummins, who is an author, transformational speaker and coach. Don suffered for decades with the effects of trauma and addiction. These issues resulted in homelessness, damaged relationships, depression and anxiety and unemployability. Don was repeatedly committed to mental health institutions and experienced extreme incarceration and isolation, having served over 20 years in prison for bank robberies. One day, Don had awakened to his inherent goodness and value, he saw that he was not a horrible person, he saw that he deserved to recover and that he was worth the hard work it would take to do so. So he embarked on a path of recovery, transforming his life in ways that had seemed impossible, experiencing success in relationships, business, leadership and helping others recover.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Don’s story is detailed in his new book, The Prison Within: A Memoir of Breaking Free. When he’s not hanging out with his family or working on a project, Don’s usually riding his bike or playing his guitar. Oh, Don. Mr. Don. Don, the bank robber Don, what a story. Man, this guy. He’s just been through it been through the wringer. And it’s crazy how it starts with him being this happy go lucky kid and in the neighborhood at three and four years old. And I guess some people in his neighborhood decided that he needed to be toughened up a bit. And the story of how that happens and what that does to him at four years old, really, when you hear what the difference… How quickly he changed and his personality changed. And then the result of that over years and years this compounding different scenarios of trauma. By the time that Don was 15 years old, he had been arrested 32 times. And he remembers that because that’s when, at 16 he was sentenced to his first long stint in prison for two years.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

And then his story today is just really incredible. Right now he’s actually living in an RV with his family, his wife and two kids and they’re traveling the country and it’s just a really incredible story. So without further ado, I give you Don Cummins. All right, Episode 106. Let’s do this.

Christiana:

You are listening to The Courage to Change, a recovery podcast. We’re a community of recovering people who have overcomed the odds and found the courage to change. Each week, we share stories of recovery from substance abuse, eating disorders, grief and loss, childhood trauma and other life changing experiences. Come join us no matter where you are on your recovery journey.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Don, thank you so much for being here. We have started season three with a new tradition, which is the worst haircut photo. So you have this picture, it’s your arrest picture from arrest date of 12/7/1991.

Don Cummins:

Yep, I remember that one.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

I bet. Tell me what’s going on in this photo. What’s your life like right in this photo?

Don Cummins:

Okay, so I had just been arrested in Orlando and I was at the Orlando County Jail being booked in. And I was on the run from the cops for a bank robbery that I committed in Tampa Bay. And to get out of if there were all around my motel room, the motel I was staying at and they were looking for me and so I had some hair dye ready and I dyed it really quick.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Okay, I was going to say, I was going to say this looks like some freshly black hair dye. Okay.

Don Cummins:

It is. It’s pretty crazy looking. So I hitchhiked to Orlando to make my getaway and was at the laundromat when the cops rolled up on me and asked me if I was me. And I said, no. I made up a name and said I was with a local band, and we’re playing out. And I set out like out with a Canadian accent to lend some authenticity to it. But they already knew it was me. Someone had turned me in for 1,000 bucks. And so that was that.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

The hair is very fair [inaudible 00:05:44], because you had the hair before you had the dye?

Don Cummins:

Yeah.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Were you in a band?

Don Cummins:

I had been in a few that time, when I got out. I had just gotten out of federal prison the year before. I stayed clean a little while, and I wound up getting into a band and doing some drugs after a show. And that was it. And that’s how I wound up with some black hair in Orlando.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

On the run.

Don Cummins:

Yep. And about to spend the next 15 years in prison.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Oh, my god. There are so many things to your story that I relate to believe it or not. It’s so funny how we can be from… have totally different circumstances, age and yet, drugs and alcohol bring us to similar places, right? They tear everyone’s life down and in certain types of ways for people. And especially as a young person becoming a ward of the state and that kind of thing. Those are not normal things that happen to normal kids and in normal families. That’s the stuff that happens when you’re drinking and using. And that happened to you when you were what? 13?

Don Cummins:

Yes, when I was 13, I was put away for the first time.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Right. And that’s when you became a ward of the state. But as happens with many of us a lot of this started with trauma. Right?

Don Cummins:

Yes it did.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

You want to talk to us a little bit about that, because I think a lot of people listening can relate to that story.

Don Cummins:

Yeah, sure. It’s funny, but when I first came into recovery, and I look back at my life, I came from the perfect family in my mind. I came from a line of people who were so awesome, and they are. I love my family. But I didn’t look realistically at it because I had blocked so many things out. My parents used when I was young, and I was exposed to some things I shouldn’t have been. I was abused by a family friend when I was really young, like probably four, three or four. And it wasn’t sexual abuse, at least to my recollection, it wasn’t. But my father told me later that that neighbor had complained that I was so happy go lucky that he needed to teach me to be tough. And my memories of that are being just scared out of my mind and threatened with death and all this heavy machinery in a basement. I was terrorized and after that my personality… I believe in retrospect and talking my family I… It changed, I had nightmares of the scenario in nightly.

Don Cummins:

My personality changed and I became reserved and I had a posture of fear toward the world, I believe. I wasn’t this happy go lucky anymore.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Yeah, I guess it worked.

Don Cummins:

Yeah, yeah, it worked. I got toughened up.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Yeah, jeez.

Don Cummins:

We had a family friend later on, that committed suicide right in front of me when I was nine. And Billy, he was doing a lot of drugs around that time, got paranoid and thought the government was after him. And we went fishing one night and he did it violently, not with a gun, but he pulled out a huge book knife and dove upon it in the shallow water while we were fishing.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

And you’re nine, you’re nine and you don’t know that he’s on drugs?

Don Cummins:

Yeah, I didn’t know any of that. I knew my parents smoked pot and I was really curious and I was waiting for the next chance I could get to try some. But yeah, I’ll never forget when I saw what he had done and my dad and Billy’s brother Kip picked him up out of the water. And he was bleeding and he locked eyes with me. I wound up getting in the truck while my dad called up the paramedics and I remember looking in the rear-view mirror, telling myself with tears running down my face, Donnie, you can make it through this. You can just smile and get through this. And so I did and my tears went away. I was just able to shut that off in the moment. And that’s my story. In a way, my ability to feel emotion and to process that in a way that honors the truth and my truth was really damaged, my trust.

Don Cummins:

I never thought about it this way until much later. But my security was really not there anymore. My parents meant well, but my dad never discussed that with me.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

That incident?

Don Cummins:

Yeah.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Yeah, that was going to be my next question. What was the conversation that happened after that?

Don Cummins:

There was none. A couple months later, I asked him why, why daddy, why? He told me, “Well, we’ll talk about that later.” And later came quite a few months later and it was a little too late. He said, Billy was drugs, and he got ill and he was paranoid and thought people were after him. And he was doing a lot of meth and stuff like that. By that time, I had already come up with my own narrative that, in my mind, it was funny how we do that, if we don’t have an answer, we’ll find one. As crazy as it is, in my story, Billy was a hero. That he was going through something I didn’t know what it was. But he took some extreme action to do something that he knew he needed to do in the moment. And that’s one hell of a guy, to do something that crazy. I know, that’s a really crazy way to look it.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

No, no, it’s not. You’re 10 year and you come up with your own narrative. It’s actually the optimistic side of the narrative.

Don Cummins:

Yeah. Yeah. So I learned to do that well. We moved back down to Florida. We move back and forth from Florida to New York for the first 10 years of my life, 11 or 12 times. And so we moved for the final time back down to Florida. And it was right after we got to Florida, when I got high the first time. When I started to get high, when I got high, for the first time, I felt connected. I was with some friends outside of the Safety Harbor Middle School where they get together at this tree and get high before school. And they looked and dressed like what my parents used to. My parents they had started going to church and they got clean. And on one level, I felt like I was going back. And it was familiar to me that it was something that I could relate to. The way they talked and dressed and everything.

Don Cummins:

And so my life went downhill almost immediately, I began skipping school. I would run away from home and sneak out my window at night and hang out with older kids and stuff like that. And it got so bad that I was arrested a couple times for public intoxication at the age of 11, and 12.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

So just to get the timeline, nine, the friend commits suicide in front of you, 10 you get high and by 15 you’d been arrested 32 times?

Don Cummins:

Yes. Yes. That’s correct.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

So when you say it got bad immediately, you went to work right away?

Don Cummins:

I did.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Because five years, 32 times you’re putting up some good numbers.

Don Cummins:

Yes, yes. I put them up well. The thing that happened that brought a lot of that on, I didn’t just go out and start committing crime, and that wasn’t my goal. And I just wanted to get high and to be left alone. I had become a real trouble at home. I had a younger brother and younger sister and they saw what I was doing, and I’m running away from home and skipping school and getting arrested for stuff. And I got expelled from two schools for possession of drugs. One day my mom told me we’re going to go to another school, and I got one picked out for you.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

I know where that’s going.

Don Cummins:

Yeah, yeah. And the next thing I know, I’m in a room with a couple of older kids who told me, I’ve just been committed to straight incorporated, a inpatient drug program for teens.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

What state? Was it in Florida?

Don Cummins:

It was. It was in Tampa Bay.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Okay.

Don Cummins:

That was like an abandonment for me, and I didn’t believe it. It was like a punch in the gut. And so I wanted to get straight. I wanted to get clean. I wanted to go back home and somehow not use anymore. And this is the first time that I ever thought about life without drugs. It just never occurred to me. I had I stopped playing baseball and I stopped playing my guitar, and all I wanted to do was get high. I was thinking well, maybe baseball and they guitar, it sounds pretty good right now.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Right. Yep.

Don Cummins:

But I could not stand to be in this program where I had to look at myself and talk about things like honesty and all these principles and stuff like that. And it was an abusive program as well. They deprived you of food and sleep. I began running away from there. And I ran away a total of 10 times from that place. And when I run away, I come back and they gang up at me in a room and kick you and all that stuff. I stole a car to get away from there. And that’s what started my involvement in the juvenile justice system in a serious way. So basically when I left home at 13, I was put in that drug program and I really never went home to live again as a teenager. [crosstalk 00:15:54].

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Yeah, I relate to that.

Don Cummins:

Yeah.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Yeah. And I went to a program at 16 in Utah and emotionally abusive, and the whole thing. And it’s interesting to hear how long they’ve been doing this, if you’re under age, what they do? You’ve talked about being preyed on by older men. Was that in the program?

Don Cummins:

No, that was when I would run away from the program. I knew I couldn’t go home, because they would bring me back to the program. I was just on the street and I’m 13. I felt so much guilt and shame over those episodes at that time that I just blocked it out in my mind. And I thought that there was something… I thought it was my fault, and I’m a guy, and therefore somehow I’m supposed to be in control of this situation, yet it happened. And it didn’t enter my mind. Hey, you’re 13 and this guy’s 45 that maybe it’s his fault. And maybe it’s not a matter of… I just didn’t think that way.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Did you see, or have you come into contact with other people who have that story? Who were young boys on the street, looking for drugs and similar things have happened? Is that something you’ve heard about?

Don Cummins:

Yes. Yeah, I have. In general terms, I haven’t had a… Other guys that I’ve talked to, yes. But it’s still not something that’s talked about a lot. When you’re young and you’re on the street, the story is that for young people on the street, especially males, that you’re tough, and stuff like you use your wits, and you use your strength, and your power to get what you need to get. And it doesn’t include anything like that, because that would make you weak. At least in my experience that’s the narrative a lot of young men who go through that adopt. But yes, and that’s very common. I believe and I know from my experience personally and in talking other people that, yeah, that’s a thing. And it has to be dealt with at some point, shame and the guilt and all that. Yeah.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

I think that’s a really good point that has to be dealt with at some point. That’s a really good point to add to it, which is, you can’t ignore your way out of that stuff. You can’t ignore your way out of those memories. To me what I’m hearing is, you had compounding trauma, right?

Don Cummins:

Yes.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

This just compounding, it starts off with this scared street at 4:00 situation. And then it’s just this compounding trauma. And when you’re running away from the trauma that’s going on at the program, you’re picking it up on the street, and that’s compounding and compounding, right? So it’s just getting worse.

Don Cummins:

Definitely. Yes, yeah. There I am at 13, 14 and 15. By 15 I was arrested 32 times. And I know that it was 32 times because I kept count myself, but also a judge kept repeating it, “I can’t believe 32 times son.” And that judge sentenced me to two years in adult prison when I had just turned 16. And that was for running away from state reformatory and jumping the fence and stealing a car and causing a massive pile up on the highway, on I-75 in Florida. I got in some trouble. And so that was my first stint in prison.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

And how is that being 16?

Don Cummins:

That was by then I had learned to put on that face and be tough. And put off that image that don’t mess with me. The first thing I did, because I was petrified when I went in. And so the first thing I did is I shaved my head bald, because I thought that that would project that I’m hardcore and all this. But I found ways to adapt. The first thing I did is I found a music, a band there. And in every prison pretty much there’s at the chapel, there’s a group of guys that play music for the services. And some prisons have an actual band where you can play what you want. But generally, there you have a bunch of guys that don’t want to be in the chapel, but that’s the only place they can get to a set of drums or a bass or [crosstalk 00:20:42]. I would go there and I could play. I found a way of making friends and a way of getting protected, and a way of feeling I had some security there.

Don Cummins:

So music was not only a way for me to feel a connection with something much larger than myself, but it was also a way to survive. That’s what I would do. I had friends pretty quickly there, and don’t mess with that guy, he’s part of a band and he’s good. And so that’s what I did. My time there was pretty easy. After that… generally when it comes to violence and stuff like that my time was generally been pretty easy there. I’ve had incidences like anyone else, but the biggest thing that sticks out to me through the lens of recovery, when I look back is how cold I was able to become. Because the things that I witnessed, and I saw around me I was able to, based upon my disconnection with my emotions, I was able to just shut things off. I suffered from an inability to empathize and inability to really connect with other people. And it was just compounded, like I mentioned. They say that being incarcerated long term is traumatic in and of itself. Just because of the continuous-

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Oh, yeah. All the things you see.

Don Cummins:

Yeah, and the noise level and then your-

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Oh, interesting.

Don Cummins:

… always fearful, even if there’s not a situation happening immediately in front of you. It’s always a potential for violence.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Hyper vigilance.

Don Cummins:

Yeah, hyper vigilance. And it has an effect after years and years.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

It’s interesting because the disconnection that you talk about as part of what you did, it reminds me very much of the same thing you did to find protection and get the band, go into the band in the chapel, which is, that’s just survival. You can’t survive in those scenarios if you react to all the stimuli, the painful stimuli that you witness. You just won’t survive. When you talk about being disconnected, I think, yeah, what else would you do? You can’t be connected to every person’s plight that walks in the door, every fight or injury that happens, you wouldn’t last, you can’t survive. And so it makes complete sense to me that, that would be the case. Plus, when you think about the disconnection that you started with, as a kid, like the scared straight thing and then going back to the suicide and not talking about that. All of that is setting you up for that mentality of I just can’t go there.

Don Cummins:

Yeah, yeah. Definitely.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

So you get out of prison but you start the cycle of drugs, but you get to crack and shooting heroin. How did you go quickly from… because before, it sounds like you were using pot and alcohol and then when you got out you went hardcore drugs? What was the evolution there?

Don Cummins:

Well, when I got out at 17, from that, almost 18. The people that I fell in with, they were just doing more than that. There was, cocaine was available. And the crack, I didn’t start doing crack yet right at that point, but cocaine… I wanted to shoot drugs. I just heard all about it, and I just said, man, I can’t wait till I meet someone who’s got a needle and some dope, because I’m going to try it. But when I first got out, I made a half ass effort to not do any of that. I told myself, well, I’m going to get out and I’m going to get a job. And I’m going to meet some people and get into a band and who knows what’ll happen, and my life will be good now, because that’s all that I need is just to be free and to have a job and have some friends. Really what I wanted underneath that was to be connected with people. But I didn’t know how to do that and I didn’t know how to talk to people. I felt different.

Don Cummins:

And that’s the one thing prison does. In any type of isolation, really, but it makes you feel subhuman. And especially knowing that I’ve been put there for something that’s bad, I am a bad person. And so these other people out here, they are not bad like I am, and that’s the mentality. And so, anyway, I didn’t last for long. I didn’t know how to deal with my emotions. And so I sought out drugs and got high. And so I started doing cocaine and I wound up hitchhiking to California when I turned 18, and I brought an acoustic guitar with me, and I was going to make it big. But really, I was running away because I had done somebody’s cocaine. I’d done a bunch of it and did a few bad deals with people and I had to get away. I didn’t think about that, I just thought I’m going to be a rock star. That’s why I’m going there, so I did. And I landed in Los Angeles in 1984.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Okay. And at the time were you addicted to cocaine?

Don Cummins:

I was. I was just snorting it. But it was in Los Angeles when I started doing crack. And on and off. For the next few years, I was back to Florida, LA, Florida, LA. And things would get so bad out there and I’ll be homeless and on the street and sick. And I would hitchhike back to Florida and move in with my parents for a few weeks until they kicked me out. And that was like the cycle. My behavior was just unacceptable. I became a liability for the family. They just couldn’t tolerate that. And I would go back to LA and I’m going to make another stab at it. This time, I’m really going to do well. That was my cycle pretty much. And the last time was really off the chain because that’s when I wound up robbing a bank for the first time.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Stay tuned to hear more in just a moment.

Christiana:

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Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

So, okay, how does the thought… Obviously, I’m sure it was a bit different in the ’80s as well. But how does the thought of I’m going to rob a bank and that’s a good idea come to be? I’m going to get away with it. Because growing up for me, no one got away with robbing a bank. There were so many other things you could do, it just wasn’t it… it didn’t occur to many people just because you couldn’t get away with it. How did you know that people got away with it? What was the thought process around I’m going to rob a bank?

Don Cummins:

Yeah, it’s complex. There was this aspect to me that I was a thrill seeker, and I had done some crime. There was part of me that enjoyed being chased by the police. I got a rush off of it. And I had thought about robbing banks before. I knew that if you pass them a note they’ll hand you the money, it’s a matter of policy and that’s where the money is, at the bank, right? It just seemed like a straightforward conclusion.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Right. Cut out the middleman.

Don Cummins:

Yeah, yeah. All those middlemen. The dynamic that played up with me wasn’t just that, when I went in, I had always been up for several days. And it’s odd but the paranoia and the delusion would set in. And after a few years of smoking crack, the way that I was. And the same thing almost that I understand, Billy, the one who committed suicide in front of me, began to happen to me. I would get high and almost immediately, I thought that the FBI was after me. I thought that people were watching me. And I started hearing voices in my head. And this would only happen when I had been up, after a lot of heavy cocaine use. Or I might go to sleep or whatever, after a few days and I would wake up in the first or second hit, and I was right back there again.

Don Cummins:

I had this idea that I was supposed to go into this bank and it was like my destiny, and there’s going to be this teller waiting for me. And they’re going to give me the money and I’m going to go and some of it, I can use for what I want, some of it there’s going to be some… This is insane, I thought there would be some code in the money. And that’s just… God. Anyway-

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

They sentence you to four years?

Don Cummins:

Yes. They sentenced me to four years in the federal system. Ironically I did my federal time, at FCI, Phoenix and Black Canyon, just not too far from where I am right now. They had a band room there that was not in the chapel. And so what I did is I went down there and I met some people down there and fell in with them. And I got a thrash metal band called Ill Repute. And all of us were bank robbers, all four of us. And we were truly hardcore. And we did our time like that. We just played music and play guitar all the time, and talked about how when we got out, we’re going to make it big. Reality was I didn’t like reality. Reality? I vote no on that. I would always go for a fantasy that made me feel good to think about and to dream about and to avoid, why in the hell I’m at a Federal Correctional Institution, serving four years for bank robbery.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

That must have felt unreal.

Don Cummins:

Yeah. Yeah. It was so unreal, that I’m not going to even deal with that. And not that I wasn’t talented, or that the other guys weren’t. But you just normally don’t get successful in any industry when you’re an addict on that level. And doing the things that I was doing. Eventually, I get out and I went back to Tampa Bay, and my parents let me come home. I was really glad to finally go home, and I was going to stay clean. And that was my intention. And me and my brother, were going to get into a band, he plays drums, and we’re going to start something great. And we made a start at that. But as we were talking about earlier, I wound up joining some other band that already had gigs and I started getting high. And within a matter of months, I was doing the same thing. And I committed six bank robberies in the Tampa Bay area. And I got sentenced to a total of 22 years as a habitual offender in the Florida Department of Corrections.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

So wait, did you get away with any of the bank robberies? Or was it a period of time and then they got the string of them?

Don Cummins:

There was a period of time and they… statute limitations and all that. I don’t know. They arrested me for quite a few bank robberies. And it’s possible that it might have been more. Pretty much they arrested me for everything that I-

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

That they would catch you after a string of them?

Don Cummins:

Yes. Yeah. I got you. Yes, I did get away. I got away till the next one, and them till the next, and then till the next one and finally.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Okay. And then they would string them all together, more or less?

Don Cummins:

Yeah. So if there were six or seven, then I would be charged with seven.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Got it. Okay. Okay.

Don Cummins:

That’s how I wind up in Orlando with some really bad hair.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

All of that is to say that that’s how I ended up in Orlando. Okay. So you get sentenced to 22 years, but serve 15?

Don Cummins:

Yes. I was sentenced as a habitual offender, but I was allowed to earn some gain time they call it, and get out somewhat early. I did good, I behaved myself and I stayed out of trouble. I got in some more bands, but it was different this time, because I was confronted with something that I never really given a lot of thought before to. And that was, what the hell am I doing here? You would think that you would take a look at that much, much sooner. But after the judge sentenced me to 22 years, and I was in my cell-

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

You got some time to think.

Don Cummins:

Yeah, yeah. A whole lot of time. And it was like a ton of bricks on my shoulders. And I know, it’s cliche, but that’s really what it felt like and I just felt crushed. I’m 23 and they just sentenced me to 22 years and that’s freaking crazy. This is not normal. This is not normal. And I just couldn’t… what the hell is wrong with? I didn’t know what the solution was. And I didn’t even know if it’s a little bit too late for a solution now. 22 years, geez, man. But I started looking and I got into religion for quite some time and devoted to studying and learning. I went over… I learned Greek, and I learned Hebrew, and I started learning Latin. And I’m going to read the original languages, the stuff was written in. My grandmother who was pretty… she’s a woman of faith, I guess, you could say, and very [inaudible 00:36:43].

Don Cummins:

She paid for some correspondence courses for me. And I went to Bible College via the mail correspondence, and did really well got straight A’s. I learned that I had potential to, I had some aptitude, and I could learn things and score out and do really well, and I felt good about that. And aside from all the religious stuff and… I did that for seven years. I didn’t listen to any rock and roll. I didn’t do [crosstalk 00:37:12].

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Oh, my god.

Don Cummins:

Yeah, I know. That was crazy. And so I was just really trying to be as straight and narrow as I could.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Opposite direction.

Don Cummins:

Yeah, yeah. I was totally standoffish to the general population. And I have this. At some point, I just had this… and I had a philosophy and worldview that was just explained everything so neatly, everything was buttoned up. I’m this way, because I was born to be a sinner, but now I’m okay because I believe that a certain thing happened in history, 2000… whatever. And so that makes me… And now I just have to learn to defend this belief. That’s why I’m studying so I can…

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Wait, was this in prison or out of prison?

Don Cummins:

It was in prison.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

In prison.

Don Cummins:

Okay. Okay. Yeah.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

You do that for seven years and then where was the change of a heart… rock and roll got too enticing?

Don Cummins:

Something like that. Actually, well, that came back in the picture. But I was just sitting in my cell one day. I started thinking about some of the stuff that I’ve been reading. I read the Bible, I read the Quran. I read whatever. For me I just realized, man, whatever it is, is and I don’t know how everything is all about. What am I doing? I’m just spinning my wheels trying to figure all this stuff out. And I don’t know what to think about anything anymore. And I just lost my faith. And so I said, crap, man, I’m at the East unit at the Florida State Prison but in the West unit, they have a band room and we don’t have it over here. I complained of chest pains, because they had a medical unit over there. And so they transfer me to the medical unit on the other side and boom I’m playing in the band again, and I feel halfway good. And I wound up there, and that’s in the middle of my prison sentence. I already had seven in and make some friends over there.

Don Cummins:

It was a difficult time because I had gone through this major shift in how I thought and I thought I knew everything, and then I didn’t. The thing was, I never took a look at me. I was looking for an external answer to stuff to make sense of everything. And I fell back in some things that I had been taught and pick that up. And, ultimately, it wasn’t helpful to me. It just at some levels it was good and then some levels that made me a jerk probably, and then in some other levels, it was… It helped me. It got me educated in some ways, which was great. I’ve read the dictionary.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Yeah, no. It sounds like there was definitely value. You went in at 23 and you got out at 39?

Don Cummins:

Yes, I did.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

And what was the craziest thing that had… I’ve heard different stories about, people they went in before automatic flushing toilets, and they came out and they went to a bathroom and the toilet flushed on them and they flipped out. They didn’t know what was happening. Or things like that. You come out and back into the world, what was one of the craziest adjustments?

Don Cummins:

There was this new thing when I got out and it was called the internet.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

That’ll do it.

Don Cummins:

Yeah. There were cell phones too. And now some people had… They weren’t called cell phones, really, I don’t think but every once in a great while when I have been out full time before that, I would see somebody, some business person in a car with this huge phone with this huge antenna sticking out of it, and I thought that was the government or something. I didn’t know who that was. But those phones are not for everyday people. We got modern really quick and there was all this technology out there. In the last year or two before I got out, I started reading up on it because I thought I could know about what’s going on here. It didn’t really help much. Okay, I know there’s a thing called HTML, but what does that tell me?

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Right. Right. Right.

Don Cummins:

So yeah, that was a major shock. Just everything had changed.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Were you introduced to any recovery in prison?

Don Cummins:

I think I went to one. I went to one 12 step meeting because I wanted to get out of the cellblock and the building.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Okay.

Don Cummins:

There was some guy that came in and he shared with us, but I was not into relating or looking for the things that I had in common with people. I was always looking for the things that were different.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Right. Okay.

Don Cummins:

[crosstalk 00:42:04] me and he was… had a lifestyle that I didn’t even think about having. I just was glad to drink the coffee and [crosstalk 00:42:11].

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Got it. Okay, and then you get out and you start drinking and using again and rob another bank?

Don Cummins:

Yes. There was a little bit of a process to that. When I was younger, my parents didn’t have a whole lot. And they shared a used car, my mom cleaned houses. And anyway, when I got out, they had done really well, my dad had worked the same place and they… Anyway, they had a house, a rental house in Safety Harbor. And they let me stay there, and they’re cheap. And they had a lot of regrets about how things had gone for me, and they wanted to help me and give me the best possible chance to succeed, so I got set up. I had a place to stay, I had a vehicle, I had a laptop and didn’t know how to use it yet. But I had that. I had a cell phone and I had everything that I needed to go out and find a job. And they bought me a year membership to the Safety Harbor spa, which overlooks Tampa Bay and the giveaway vacations there and, I don’t know, we’re all fortunate or whatever. I thought that I had it made and I’m just going to take advantage of this.

Don Cummins:

And so I get out and I’m working now and I found a job and I thought I had it together because I got a car and a place to stay and I get this and that. I didn’t get any of that stuff myself but I just thought that I’m just like everybody else. But the fear and the sense of being different than everybody crept in over the next month or so. I would go shopping and I’ll be so aware of how I think… I would be like, I’m not a normal person. I might look like a normal person and I’m just shopping like a normal person shops, but I’m not a normal person. And when people are looking at me they know that. And I didn’t want to let my co workers know me. I would tell them no when they said, hey, want to go out with us this Friday night? I said no. I can’t do, I have plans, because I didn’t want them to know, I just get out of prison for 15 years for bank robbery.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

I can imagine why.

Don Cummins:

Yeah. I tried dating online and that did not work for me at all because I always one off spilling my guts before we met and then that was that about what I had been through. And I really just wanted to connect but I didn’t know how and I was scared. I started to suffer. And so I did, I started smoking weed again, I started drinking. For me it was just a matter of time before I started smoking crack again and I did. I got arrested for possession of cocaine. I wound up beating that charge because I actually was set up, it was a plant. I didn’t really have any cocaine in my car, but I was looking for some. And the officer probably thought that he was-

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

You had a cocoa plant in your car?

Don Cummins:

No, no, no. I was looking for-

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Oh, they planted. Sorry.

Don Cummins:

Yeah. I just drive around with cocoa plants. I’m waiting… yeah.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Well, the reason that isn’t the craziest thing is it for a while, I was in my drunken high whatever stupor, I was looking for a cocoa plant, because apparently I thought I was going to do something with it, I don’t know what. So I was like, oh, you had a cocoa plant? Anyway, that’s embarrassing.

Don Cummins:

No. [inaudible 00:45:47] cocoa plants around, and I knew about it. I’ve been right with you. So anyway, I was set up, I didn’t really have any cocaine in the car, but I’m sure the officer had ran my tag and he knew who… I got to get this guy off the streets. And so I wound up beating the charge. And my dad hired me a lawyer, actually, and I never had a lawyer before I always had a public defender. I beat it. And I robbed a bank a week later, after I got [inaudible 00:46:17]. Yeah, and the whole year leading up to the trial was just one train wreck after another. A really crazy story. And anyway, this time they saw that, wait a minute there’s something wrong with this guy. We got him in the booking station, he’s talking about federal agents and all this stuff, and I’m all wigged out.

Don Cummins:

I wound up getting committed to a mental health facility. It was kind of a, not an outpatient program. But I was free and that I lived in a supervised apartments. And I would have to go somewhere during the day and do book work and classwork and interact in group meetings and stuff like that. And it was just pending trial. It’s like it wasn’t over with the bank robbery charging. But they would take us to meetings. And that was my first exposure, real exposure to recovery is going to those meetings.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

What do you think the mental health program they would take you to, were they NA, AA? What type of 12 step meetings did you go to?

Don Cummins:

Those two, and they would rotate it.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Okay.

Don Cummins:

We would go to those and I could felt like I could relate with a lot of people on certain levels, but I just really wasn’t ready. And I would still go on binges and wake up in mental hospitals. I would wake up on the street sometimes. Things got really, really crazy because I had the safety net of being at the mental health place, but I kept absconding from there and getting in trouble. And I would swear to myself, I wasn’t going to use again and then sure enough, I would. And then there it goes Don for a week.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

I’m surprised they didn’t put you in jail at that point.

Don Cummins:

Yeah. Well, I the police somehow… Yeah, I know. There are so many incidences that are just mind boggling, just near misses with it. Cops didn’t put one and one together and find out, oh, that’s him. They had computers and everything, I don’t know. But I guess they just weren’t all interconnected with the agencies or whatever. Yeah, I was in and out. I got to the point where they did kick me out of that program. But they allowed me to… I had progressed. They found another program for me that was similar to that one, but this one program would not take me anymore. And another one did and I was on assistance. I was on SSI, which is a form of disability because of my mental state. Here I am 45 in 2011, I’m on disability for my mental state. I’ve got this horrible history and I’ve got a bank robbery charge hanging over my head. And I’ve never had a low like I did during this time.

Don Cummins:

And I thought there was no hope for me, that I’m a horrible person and that, my whole reason to be here is just to be an example of what not to do. If there’s any reason for me to be here, that’s it and it’s a warning. It was really a horrible feeling. And I made a few attempts at suicide that didn’t turn out well. I really, really was in a bad place. And the feelings, the thing knowing now is all the feelings that I’ve stuffed in that I had disregarded and I had been disconnected from, they were still there. They were deep within in my body. They were part of me. I had never dealt with that. It was starting to pop out here or there, I just couldn’t hold it in. And it was like the dam was about to break. And as strong as I had been, as hard as I had tried, I just couldn’t deal with it no more. And it was just too much for me. And that was when I had a breakthrough.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

It’s always darkest before dawn. Yes. How did you… so your sobriety date is March 22 of 2013.

Don Cummins:

Yes.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

What happens for you to get sober?

Don Cummins:

My first stretch of sobriety was about 15 months. And so in 2011, I was at a recovery meeting and they were talking about being self centered and self centered fear. And I don’t know why, but I just stopped listening to them because it made me think of some things and I questioned why was I afraid? And am I afraid and… I don’t know. It was like a domino effect, and I saw that I had been afraid of all my life, afraid all my life and disconnected and why, what is it that I’m afraid of? And I realized that I thought… I never consciously thought I was a horrible person. It’s not like I thought I’m so horrible, but I realized that underneath it all that’s what it was. And I asked myself, well, what am I? Am I really horrible? It was something out of a, I don’t know, a book. I had a spiritual awakening.

Don Cummins:

I saw that I was just as good as anybody else. I saw that I was a good person, and I deserve a good life, regardless of all that shit that I went through. And that I was worth fighting for. And that there was a life left for me.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Yeah.

Don Cummins:

Although, it didn’t look like it. When I talked about it, I still get really emotional, because I had been through so much, I had caused myself to suffer so much. I had been on a campaign of self abuse. I finally saw that I didn’t deserve that. Before that they told me to call somebody if I think I’m going to use. And I was never able to do that because it was like the full moon had come out and I was the Wolf Man. These thoughts of getting high would just take over me and my body would react, and my stomach would flip, and my knees would buckle, and I would have to take a shit. That’s how bad it would get. And I couldn’t say no to that. But after I saw that, I saw that I was worth it. It gave me a space when that feeling came over me again, I didn’t just react, I actually picked up a phone and call somebody. And that was the beginning of my recovery journey.

Don Cummins:

And it was the beginning of really knowing through experience that all I had to do is recognize that I’m connected with other people, that I am good enough and to reach out my hand for help. And there is something healing about that. There is in and of itself. I got a voicemail, the first time I made that call, and it didn’t matter. The fact was that I reached out for help. And it strengthened me. And I saw that it worked. I kept doing that, and I started to put a life together. And I started doing some work, working with a sponsor, looking at things in my history and dealing with that. And it was a crazy time. I was at the homeless shelter when this occurred. And I would take the bus to go see my sponsor and to go to different meetings.

Don Cummins:

I got a set of friends that we helped each other and they helped me and I felt like I got them and they got me. And they didn’t care that I’d been in prison all those years. I can talk about that. I could talk about this crazy shit that goes on in my head sometimes. I started to feel safe. And that safety and that connection is what created the room to start to recover. And yeah, it was really… yeah.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

It’s incredible what feeling safe can do. It’s interesting how the thread throughout your story that I hear is you did not feel safe and over and over again, it was shown to you that you weren’t safe. And even when you were doing the things to perpetuate that there’s no question that, again, the trauma was compounding but also the behavior was compounding. But I do hear a lot of the thread of safety and how when you felt safe and funny enough you have this case hanging over your head, you’re in a homeless shelter, for all intents and purposes, not the safest situation. But it’s when we feel safe that we have permission to recover.

Don Cummins:

Yeah, yeah. Exactly. That’s how it played out. I talked about the things that I went through, religion and spirituality and prison and all that. And I’ve always been there in a way, what’s my purpose? And what’s my meaning? And why am I here? I want to matter. And I want to do something that matters that will affect things positively, affect people positively. And I’ve always had that in me. I started to feel like I was getting in the groove as far as that goes. I’m finally going to start feeling that I’m fitting in somewhere, and that this whole… everything’s good. And safety again, that’s part of that. Knowing where I fit in.

Don Cummins:

During that time there was just so much going on in terms of my status, and what’s going to happen with me and this and that. And I kept being reminded, I just need to focus on staying clean, and recovering, and everything else will work itself out. Trust the process. I also believe that there was something to this process that went beyond my understanding, something bigger than me. And I was starting to hook into something that was kind and loving and cared for me. And that was a big help for me to believe that. I saw evidence of that unfolding in my life. Right in the beginning of the homeless shelter is when I met my wife. Yeah.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Do tell.

Don Cummins:

Yeah.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

You also got a job at a local software company that makes bank software, which I also think is hilarious. But yes, tell me how you met your wife, were you in the homeless shelter when you went met your wife?

Don Cummins:

I was. I was there. And I went to a meeting on the beach and everybody was sitting in a circle, and there was one space right next to me. And I look up and she comes walking around this, there’s this dune, the sand dune there, and then she sits down next to me, and she… I said, “Hi, I’m Don,” she said, “I’m Bree.” And I just felt in my heart that wow, this is for me. And this whole… I want to experience connection, I want to experience love. I know it sounds really crazy, but I just knew in my heart, this is the… after I heard her speak, I just felt like I got her. And my sponsor told me, on the way back from that meeting that familiar feeling. Usually, that’s our unconscious part of us they’re seeking out the same type of partner that’s unhealthy for us and… as in codependency. And I thought he was full of shit, because I had never really had any type of relationships with women to speak of and so I’m a clean slate and no baggage at all here.

Don Cummins:

And anyway, we didn’t… we were friends at first, but over the next few months, that changed. And everybody was warning us, don’t do that, don’t do that, you’re going to wreck yourself. It was tough learning how to be in a relationship when I was so green when it came to that. But I put my recovery first, and we both did. And she had just got her treatment herself. And she’s got her own story, so anyway that… During this time I did, I got a job doing software development. First I went back to school, and I took some courses. And the short version is that we got married a year and a half later and she got pregnant and I wasn’t done with school and we’re running a $600 a month house that had just looked like it was about to fall over. And things were rough and I’m still on disability. It was tough and so… I thought that the only way that I could get a good job was to get that degree first.

Don Cummins:

And because with my history, I need something on paper that says okay, this guy is okay despite all of that. But necessity, my wife’s pregnant and I got to get a job that pays more than this telemarketing gig that I’m doing. And plus at that job they spoke badly to us, this is the only place you guys can work with histories like yours. You better be glad that you’re here. And I was like, screw that. And she’s pregnant and I’m out of here and I left on the spot and I went I found this job, an entry level software development job for a company that does make financial services software that serves banks too. I started there and I started applying the principles that I’ve been learning about being honest, me being vulnerable, just being myself with the people that I was working with and they liked me. I would go talk to my sponsor about some of the crazy thoughts in my head, they hate me and they don’t like me, and this and that. And I’m so different from them, and this is not going to work.

Don Cummins:

And he would redirect me and talk me off the ledge, and I would just keep showing up. And to make a long story short, we did really well there and I wounded becoming the director of software development, and we have offices in Europe, and over here and over there and across… and I have a team of 30 people that I’m managing and leading. It’s mind boggling that I wind up in this situation. And I didn’t just wind up at it, I grew into that. Developed relationships with people and kept my word. And I learned that I had something to offer. And when we would hire someone new, it’s like they knew so much more than me about software, and they were sharp.

Don Cummins:

I would have to go Google stuff afterwards to see what they were talking about after the interview. But I just focused on trying to help people and be successful. And I want to [crosstalk 01:01:31] permanent. I have two children and became a homeowner. Yeah, so I want to put the life, a family and being connected and being successful. And for a guy like me that’s amazing, you know?

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Yeah, yeah. I was talking about that recently. How, sometimes I have twin four year old boys and a minivan and a husband and a dog and all this stuff and how sometimes that normalcy can feel daunting, because it’s so normal, right?

Don Cummins:

Yeah.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Then I realized that normal is extraordinary for me. The ordinary is extraordinary for a person like me, because that’s not what happens to most of us. And that’s what it sounds to me with you it’s, this software job to some people that’s, yeah, that’s what I went to school for. But for people like you and me this stuff is extraordinary. That normal living is really just unreal for us.

Don Cummins:

Yeah. Yeah, totally. I get that. It was. Yeah, go ahead. Sorry.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Oh, sorry. Go ahead. When did you decide to write a book with your story? The Prison Within, that just came out, right?

Don Cummins:

Yes. Yeah, that came out in November, November 2020. I just knew that I wanted to tell my story. What led up to it was I began writing and I was going to write a book and I was just toying with it, doing a little writing here and there. But what was happening in my life at that time was I had become fearful. I had a house and a couple of cars and my wife is part of different moms groups, and my wife is a yoga teacher too. We just got our yoga friends. I didn’t want them or my neighbors to know about me, because I’m just the guy, the successful guy down the street and I got self conscious all over again. As I became normal, I don’t want you to know that I’m really not normal.

Don Cummins:

A lot of that crept right back up. And at work, only a few people at work knew my history, a couple guys that I work with closely and got to know and they really looked up to me for what I’ve been through and still yet there I was, but the company didn’t know. And our business partners sure as hell didn’t know, I thought.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Turns out they don’t do background checks, I guess?

Don Cummins:

Well, I got in at an early time when a lot that wasn’t a big thing, and I proved my value. They figured out a way to… and they trusted me. They knew I wasn’t going to do anything with my access to things, and I wouldn’t. Anyway, I was afraid that my work as a whole would find out, our business partners, I would get fired. And what kind of person would that make me? I would be a horrible guy to have made it this far and then everything goes to crap, and what kind of dad does that? I was going through all this and my company invited me to speak at a high school graduation ceremony not for graduating for the school year but for a particular program that my company sponsored. And it was pairing students with tutors to help improve their grades, and they will get paid at the end of the 12 week tutoring session, cash award for completing it. It was called Paid for Grades and the owner asked me to speak and to do the keynote.

Don Cummins:

And so I did. I got a lot out of doing that and I was glad that I was able to tell part of my story, but I kept it really vanilla. I didn’t talk about the insanity and the prison. I left a lot of stuff out. But over the next year, I started speaking at homeless shelters and places like that. And I knew that’s what I wanted to do. So I began writing and writing with intention to do this. And so I decided I was going to come out. Facebook, I said, I’m coming out of the closet everybody, I’m going to tell you something, I made it public and everything, and I told my whole story. I thought I was afraid when I walked into work the next day, because I thought that people would want to look me in the eye, but the response was overwhelming. That people were honored to know somebody like me who had been through that and here I am, and they would have never guessed it. And, wow, man, that’s incredible. That’s amazing.

Don Cummins:

And I was able to take my two worlds because I had been starting to live a double life and make it one and it felt so good to just be transparent about who I am, what I’ve been through and where I’m going. And the book came out last year. So that’s what led up to that. My purpose for the book was to… I learned that I could write too. I got a little help with some coaching and worked with a couple editors, and they would go over what I wrote and then give me some feedback. But I did write it and it turns out it’s well reviewed, and it’s a page turner.

Don Cummins:

But the important thing to me about it is it talks about that inward journey, and tells the story that I’m explaining here in detail. I want people to know that there’s hope and that they do have purpose and they do have meaning. And it’s a matter of self forgiveness and connection, and all those things that we’ve been talking about. I feel like I was able to really… Feel like that’s one of the greatest things I’ve ever done in my life is write that book. Yeah, I was able to do that. And I a very happy and grateful. Yeah.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

And now you are currently in an RV, and you’re in Tucson, and what do you guys… you’re with your family traveling?

Don Cummins:

Yes.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

What’s that look like?

Don Cummins:

Well, I realize that both my wife and I, she does yoga for recovery and teaches yoga. I do some speaking and there’s the book and I do some coaching. So I wanted to do that full time. And my wife wanted to do her thing, continue doing that as well. And it was hard having a full time job and doing that too. It becomes a side thing. We started from scratch all over again. It’s not really from scratch. No, we’re not in that upside down house with the [inaudible 01:08:32]. But I quit my job. And we sold our house and I got an RV and a truck, and fifth wheel. And we are traveling throughout the United States right now.

Don Cummins:

And I’m supporting the book and doing some speaking and creating things to help people. And she’s doing the same and we’re homeschooling our children and showing them America. And it’s hard. And it’s crazy. And it gets really insane sometimes. It’s a journey and it’s learning but it’s incredible. And I’m so grateful that this is what recovery has done for me, it gave me the choice to be able to do this. I could have stayed and I can go back today if I want. That’s the type of relationship that I have with my employers. Today I have a lot of choices. And I am so grateful for that. And then I have some self acceptance and I can be there for other people today to be connected.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

I love that. I love that. And I like that we’re ending on choices, that you have choices today because… When we’re starting off talking about your story, it doesn’t start off with a lot of choices, it starts off with… Your story starts off and continues on until pretty mid life. Not a lot of choices but choices being made for you. And I love that today you have a lot of choices and that recovery has given you choices because I relate to that a lot. Recovery has given me a lot of choices and addiction put me in a lot of scenarios that took those choices away.

Don Cummins:

Yeah, yeah. I’m so glad we’re here.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Yeah, me too. Me too. And then our kids get to have a different experience hopefully and raised with more choices than we had.

Don Cummins:

Yeah, yeah, definitely.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Thank you so much for coming on the show, Don. I really, really appreciate it. Where can people find you and your book?

Don Cummins:

Well, the book, The Prison Within: A Memoir of Breaking Free, it’s on Amazon, Barnes & Noble. And if you Google that, or if you Google my name, Don Cummins, C-U-M-M-I-N-S, and it’s all right there. My website is don-cummins.com but there’s a hyphen between the Don and the Cummins. But there, it’s all there. Social, my Insta, my Facebook and all of that.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Awesome. Awesome. Well, we’ll put all that information out and we look forward, I look forward to hearing about more of this trip that you’re on as you go on it. And I hope your book continues to be wildly successful.

Don Cummins:

Yes. Thank you so much. Thank you for having me on. It’s my pleasure. And I’m very grateful to share this time with you.

Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

Thank you. Thanks so much.

Christiana:

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