George: hello everyone this is George speaking and I’m here with Dave and we’re doing a follow-up on Dave‘s first interview which we just had a look at and it was done in August 2023 and today we are 30 December 2025 so we’ve got two years worth of follow-up so g’day Dave Dave: how are you going George? George: excellent, so we’ve got a list here of new things that Dave wants to cover so you might hear a synthetic voice in the background that’ll be my mobile phone talking to me because I’m Vision impaired and I’ve got the list on my mobile phone and we’re gonna start with the intro which we’re doing now and then we’re gonna start with, Dave wants to talk about an organisation called Rosies that Dave was involved in for a long time That he didn’t cover in the first interview we did. So Dave what is Rosie’s? Dave: Rosies is Rosies friends to the street helps a lot of people on the street and it’s not just people who are living on the street. It’s people I guess that have no real Home and no one to talk to. I was involved in that for many years and I certainly found I got a lot out of being involved in it George: and how does it help people? What does it actually do? Dave: the idea about Rosies is to create a family like atmosphere for people who feel that they Have no people to go and talk to, having a cup of coffee with them and just talking with them for a few hours on the street George: so you would go out on the street so what would you do on your day that you had a shift to do with Rosies? Run through for us you would leave Home then what Dave: you would leave Home, when I was not a team leader. I didn’t have that many responsibilities but I was a team leader from 2010 to 2022 when I finished up. You would turn up there as team leader to put the coffee on and if we had food to give out that got donated I would prepare that And read through the notes that the last person had experienced and any of the issues which were on the streets so you could inform your team members of what was going to happen and then just go out for two hours and talk to whomever turned up. George: so there was a premises or a location somewhere and was it the same location all the time? Dave: there was a building that we worked out of that changed from time to time. We had a few issues with the Catholic Church so we had to change to a different church so that was usually a fixed place that we prepared from George: so the community would know that Rosies is at this location at this time of the week Dave: we’d also get things prepared and go to a designated place that the council had told us that we could work from George: and that would change from time to time? Dave: that did change from time to time When we worked out if we’re at a place but there wasn’t that many people there we would move to different places. Like we moved to the train station at Beenleigh and that was successful for a fairly long time and then in the later stages we worked out of one of the churches And that worked well for a few years. George: so that was a setup where people with in the community that wanted some ware to go where they could sit down & talk with someone, that’s what it was, was it? Dave: yeh that’s the situation, I certainly learnt a great deal during my sixteen years or what ever it was at Rosies. George: explain that to us a bit what did you learn? Dave: Well I guess people can quite easily fall off the wagon, for what ever reason, they have a brake up with their family & find themselves on the street, or in different situations people find themselves where they feel they don’t have a lot of people to talk to & you just go along & listen to them, its not about giving people advise its basically listening to them, making sure they have a family like atmosphere. George: That’s excellent, so its given them somewhere to go to & have a sympathetic ear Dave: yeh that’s right George: you said you were a team leader from 2010, how long were you with Rosies for? Dave: I think it was around sixteen years George: that’s a big commitment Dave: that was a big part of my life, towards the end when I was starting to have a few issues, I realised I was just hearing the same stories week after week, you had some people that had moved on, there are some people that have been crushed by life that much that I guess haven’t got the skills to move on, I finally resonated with myself that in a first world country we should look after those people but I just needed to move onto something else. I would encourage people to do that for a bit because you really learn a lot & its very good for personal development. George: & its giving someone who has no one an opportunity to have someone to talk to about what’s going on for them Dave: yeh that’s right George: now I’m just grabbing my phone, is there anything else you want to cover with Rosies? Dave: at the end like all these organisations it got a little bit political but you just got to except that in life & you move on I guess George: yeh that’s it & if you find that if you are unable to do what you want to do there then its time to move on, is that what you found was it? Dave: yeh & I got a little bit frustrated at the end that I was hearing the same stories week after week. Rosies is about creating a family not about getting people to move on so I guess that was an issue with me & I realised I needed to move on & do something else. George: tell us about surf life saving? Dave: that was a strange one, I think about 2013 just after my father died, we were keen to get my daughter involved in Nippers in Tugun, so she started Nippers & did that for a few years & at the end of the first season my sister said there is a number of people asking do you want to do the course to become a serf life saver? Without thinking about it very much I said ok, it was an amazing course, I learnt a hell of a lot out of that, I was a surf life saver for nine years, I wanted to do ten but I ran out of puff after nine. It was really good, I spent a lot of time with my brother who was the patrol leader, I learnt a lot of what the life savers do. George: I remember you saying to me that there were times where, there would be a crew of four of you protecting that beach & it would be you & your Brother Shane & your sister Dave: yeh my sister Kerry & brother in law Mark George: so all the life savers on that shift on that day protecting that beach were all family, that is so cool. So what did you learn from that what was the best thing that stands out to you the most from that Dave: you had to do the swim every year so there was a reason for me to stay fit enough to do the swim just in case you had to go out and do a rescue the other thing that I found quite enjoyable is the surf ski and all the Intricacies about that, Also the surf boat as a young fella I never thought that I would ever learn those sort of skills. There were a lot of people that had better surf skills than me cause I only usually went down to the beach once a month certainly the people that live near the beach had better skills than me but it was very enjoyable. It was something I never thought I would do but I’m really glad I got the opportunity to do it. It’s also got a lot of public relations that you have to deal with the public and deal with publicity issues George: And what’s that like because people are down the beach to have fun you’d expect they’re in a good headspace you would think Dave: most of the time you didn’t get trouble occasionally you had people that had issues but you can’t help that George: you said that was nine years that you volunteered Dave: yeah that was enough I thought George: now we’ve got on here landmark explain to us what landmark is Dave: Landmark is a course that I did when I was at a fairly low time, while I was going through a few issues in my life at work and that sort of thing a friend of mine who runs the charity sheltered by Grace, Jason Loakes he invited me to have a coffee it was quite out of the blue so I thought you aren’t trying to sell me something are you? and he said no just come and have a cup of coffee at the local coffee shop and anyway we had a cup of coffee and I started going through a few of the issues that I had and he said I know I told you I didn’t want to sell you anything but there’s this course that I think that would be great for you and it was the landmark course and it was something I did over a period of a few months. The basis of the course is that life is empty and meaningless and you need to go out and create a purpose for your life which inspired me to do a lot of things and I went and gave a lot of talks to schools about what had happened to me and some of the schools said it was quite inspirational and that led on to more talks that I did at my work, such as the all abilities group at work and that was very interesting. The landmark that kind of changed my life it put me on a trajectory where I thought that I have to do something in life. After I had written a book I started to get a bit stale because I thought well what’s next and that gave me some purpose to then get out and do something for life and tell people about my experiences and hopefully through doing that that would help people to get through a few of their issues George: the philosophy is that your life is whatever you want to make it Dave: that’s it, it doesn’t matter what happens to you in life you can always move on there are plenty of people that can’t move on because of issues that they have like mental issues that they have but it doesn’t really matter what happens to you, you can move on George: I have a saying it’s not what happens it’s how you handle it Dave: yep whatever happens to you in life bad things are gonna happen during life and often you have no control over that but you have 100 percent on how you control that George: so who runs the landmark course Dave: landmark is an organization it’s made up of a lot of volunteers who get involved I chose not to do that I still benefited a lot from the landmark course George: So if somebody wanted to get involved in the landmark course that they would just Google up landmark Dave: yeah I guess so it’s not for everyone and some people don’t get anything out of it but I did get quite a bit out of it George: I think too it depends on where you’re at, at that time where you can do something at one point in your life and get nothing from it and then do it again in a few years down the track and you get everything there is to get from it because you’re ready for it I guess Dave: yeah that’s right I guess and I hit that at exactly the right time George: it’s funny how things work out sometimes it doesn’t happen until you’re ready for it. So tell us about the physical changes you experienced at your age of 55 Dave: I wouldn’t have imagined at 53 when I started to workout a few of these issues that it would actually improve I thought everything was backwards as in you deteriorated as you got older I found that the first issue I found out was that about iron I’d been giving blood for about over 10 years I’d never been knocked back from giving blood because my iron level was OK but then my iron levels started to deteriorate a little bit there may have been some issues because of that your iron level it really affects your Haemoglobin and your breathing so you feel very depleted when your iron levels are low and for females because they reproduce they are looked at constantly but for many males many doctors don’t test you for iron I went through three GPS that didn’t and I asked why don’t you and they said it’s just not common enough George: I remember you saying to me that you were donating blood for ten years then one day they knocked you back Dave: They said to me that your iron level has always been a little bit low but not enough to knock you back and it would have been quite helpful if they had told me 10 years ago that your iron levels low but it’s still okay for us to take your blood So why don’t you go and get it checked by your GP George: So just recently you went to donate blood and on that day they said to you we cannot take your blood today because your iron levels are too low Dave: Yeah and they gave me a letter to take to my doctor And I said to the doctor what can I do about this today and he just said go and take some iron tablets and then eventually after a couple of months of taking the iron tablets I had the same tests and my iron was now fine and just how amazing how much it helps you breathe and the difference that it made George: it’s amazing how you find out we’re on that day when you were donating blood that they had said to you your iron levels were normally low but not low enough for them to reject you and you said on that day well how come I didn’t know about this and they thought well isn’t your GP telling you the iron levels are low and so there was just a massive confusion about how come I need to find out about this from the Red Cross that I suffer from low iron levels where I go to the GP all the time. Dave: Well I have those tests every two years so you’d think they’d pick it up but the doctors weren’t testing me for iron George: so when you said to the doctor how come I didn’t know about this the doctor said well I don’t test mails for iron levels because generally it’s not an issue Dave: I did a little bit of research on this and apparently this is from the Internet only 3% of males have low iron but that still works out 500,000 Australian males so that’s filling the Melbourne Cricket Ground five times George: So now that you know you discovered at that time that your iron levels were low describe once you went on to the supplements once you started taking the iron supplements what difference did it make to you Dave: It’s just amazing the energy levels so much higher you breathe a lot easier I don’t blame any GP because they’re not told to test for it they can only go with the system George: so what was happening for you was you were going through life feeling tired feeling depleted which is also sort of tired and from what you’ve said and you’re breathing got better. That’s amazing in that you can go through it for so long without knowing. Can I digress just for a second I know someone who had a building accident they fell off a scaffold and injured their hand very badly and had to go in for microsurgery and so on and they discovered that this person was mid 40s and they discovered that they had a hard issue and that the doctor said to him how long have you known about your heart issue and he said what heart issue and they said well one side of your heart is double the size of the other side and they said didn’t you realize that when you were going through your life You didn’t have the same amount of energy as other people and you wouldn’t have been able to keep up as a child with the other children and he said to them all I thought I just wasn’t as fit as them And if they hadn’t discovered it at that time he could have died within a year or so it was that serious a condition Dave: One of the last seasons I did in Surf Life saving, I always started to do a few laps so I was fit enough to do the swim after I did the first lot of laps I was terribly depleted after that and I thought I’m unfit but it really wasn’t that I was unfit it was that my iron levels were that low, you can always work on your fitness but I had another issue there George: so you had an underlying issue that you didn’t know about, it’s turned out that it’s genetic Because now you & your brother Shane know your brother Shane suffers from The same issue & he wasn’t aware of this either. Dave: I’m pretty sure that my father at the end of his life he had told a mate of his that he felt stuffed but I have no evidence of this but it wouldn’t surprise me that this came from my father’s side and my father suffered from the same thing I talked to my brother Shane about it and he went and got tested and he found that he had the same George: so now you’re just taking the tablets you get from the chemist and you haven’t had an iron infusion Dave: I haven’t had that yet I’m still not satisfied with it but I’m still working on it and I can investigate it further now George: and what a way to find out through the Red Cross, so low haemoglobin that’s what we’re talking about with the iron so it would be beneficial for everybody to go and be tested for low iron Dave: I’ve since found out about people who have high iron and they then need to get the blood taken out of them I would be sure that there are a fair amount of people out there that have low iron but don’t know about it and all they gotta do is go to the GP and get a blood test done and make sure they’re testing your iron levels and it’s very easy to cure because you just take on tablets that you get from the pharmacy you don’t need a script George: and to finally find out at this stage of your life Dave: yep I’ve had a few bizarre couple of years George: Tell us about Pilates Dave: I was at the physio and he said the only way you’re gonna get your back moving is if you do Pilates, and they did Pilates at the physio at Beenleigh, so I’ve been doing that now for about two years and that’s been amazing in the changes that it’s made also as everyone gets a bit older they need to do a little bit of weight training or just to keep their muscles going after 40 years old you get something called sarcopenia which is a loss of muscle and I should say at this point I’m not a qualified medical person so you should get checked out and don’t take that advice that I’ve given you as gospel. This is just what I found out during my life and just from my wanderings. So after 40 you tend to lose the muscles and your muscle mass so you need to keep doing stuff just to be able to keep enjoying life. A lot of the exercise that I do now I just body weight training like push ups, stuff like that and different holds that I’ve worked out, a lot of the information that I’ve got is from YouTube and then I go and run it past the physio and then she tweaks it and then tells me which way to do things. A lot of the muscles I’ve found over the last couple of months I’ve been working on my glute muscles and my back muscles and just doing my hamstrings a lot more. In western society we tend to sit a lot and our glutes get very tight and that causes a lot of issues with your back and that sort of thing George: what you were saying to me before is by stretching those muscles and by allowing them to become more elastic so then they’re not as tight as they were before you were saying to me that you’re feeling now the best you felt in a long time Dave: 2013 because of this issue that’s when I remember it happening that my back really tightened up and I put that down to that I’ve spent a lot of my life sitting down so that’s caused the muscles to tighten and it’s particularly an issue for me because when you have a brain injury your muscles tend to tighten but I believe a lot of people could benefit from just moving and doing a bit of exercise George: and those exercises you’re talking about are things that you can do at home Dave: that’s right you don’t need to go to a gym you just need to do the stretches properly and that sort of thing and that’s made a massive difference George: It comes back to that saying that the simplest things are the best Dave: I’ve heard them say That if There was a pill you could prescribe that gave you the benefits of exercising it would be over Prescribed, Because everybody would want it George: That’s because we’re lazy, well I speak for myself I’m lazy, if I had the choice of either going and doing exercise for half an hour or pulling something apart or doing something fixing something I would take that I’ve never been good at exercising Dave: Well it’s good that you’ve now got Maggie Because now you need to exercise George: Maggie that Dave is referring to is my new seeing eye dog so now I do need to walk every day with her and it’s a great thing, So it gives me that focus that that’s what I need to do is take the girl for a walk each day and it’s a great thing. Tell us about karate that sort of Segway’s into that Dave: I’ve had a break from karate at different times I started back in 2007 Sinead my eldest daughter she wanted to start karate So I went there as a parent And I looked at it and I thought that’s gotta be beneficial for me. It wasn’t as easy as it seemed but if you persist in it it’s amazing the benefits of it. I can’t think of anything else that stretches your body out as much with the kicks you’re doing and that sort of thing I probably should be further along than what I am but I treated as something that I need to do to keep going at the fitness level that I am George: so when you say that you should be further along than what you are it depends on the reason you’re doing it for you can go there and say I want to achieve three belts a year or you can say I don’t care how many belts I get as long as I get the physical exercise from it that I want to get Dave: yep I suppose that’s the conclusion that I come to and the reason that I go to karate is that I want to keep the physical level that I’m at the moment George: I know a young fella who’s around twenty four and he’s been doing boxing now for around eighteen months and he’s never been in the ring he has no interest in getting in the ring he’s only doing it for the physical exercise and the coach there is happy with that so doesn’t pressure him to get into the ring and he’s loving it he’s loving the exercise that he’s getting from it. Dave: The type of karate that I do is shorin-ryu it’s a Japanese form of karate and they do what’s called carters which is little segments of movements that you do and that you have to learn and you need to have to put your feet in Certain places and punch at certain times so it’s developing new neural pathways so I really benefit from it because if you’re developing new neural pathways you’re one step ahead of a lot of people George: how long have you been doing the karate for Dave: as I said I started back in 2007 and I had a break for a while at different times at the time I had a few knocks and I didn’t realize that I was low in iron so I had a while off because of that issue and of course I had a bit of time off over COVID I promised my physio that I would go back to Karate and so far I’ve been doing it now once a week for a couple of years now George: you’ve touched on exactly where I was going so karate before you knew you had low iron and now karate after you have got your iron back up what’s the difference Dave: I guess I’ve got a lot more energy George: So can you feel that when you’re in the karate lesson that you’ve got more energy to give during the lesson now? Dave: When I didn’t know about the iron issue I certainly had a lot less energy And some of the tablets I take for example for cholesterol may deplete your iron level and I didn’t know that either George: So now you know both you and your brother Shane suffer from the same thing as in high cholesterol and low iron so that’s a genetic thing and that makes it so much more important for people to go and have a blood test done just to see what the levels are at because they can tell so much now just from a simple blood test And get one done every couple of years And make sure it’s a full blood test to make sure that everything in the body is running the way that it’s meant to be. Can you tell us now about the Hopkins center Dave: Now the Hopkins Center is something which I’ve been involved in for probably six or so months it’s all about resilience for people who have had an accident and helping them to be able to come back George: I know nothing about it getting from what you just said then is the Hopkins center set up for people that have been through a traumatic physical injury and helping them recover from that Dave: I’m still learning about it I’ve been to a few functions one at South Bank where I met a few people and then I went to another day at the Princess Alexandra Hospital that was enjoyable and they also have the Hopkins hour every month and they’re just going through new strategies that they can use and different methods George: Do you want to tell people why you got involved with the Hopkins center do you want to tell the people about the foot mobilization Dave: Probably that would be for another time, There’s a professor that I became involved with Tim Garrity and I went and saw him a few weeks ago just about how I could be involved in the Hopkins Center and we’ll see how it goes he was suggesting though I could be involved in many different ways as someone who has lived experience because they’re often looking for people who have lived experience and have been through it and have been through their traumatic injury and have come out the other side they may have some ideas of different strategies that people could use George: Like he said you would be a good example of that because of the way you fought through as we learned in your first podcast that you had to struggle through to get through to where you are now and you had to start that at the age of fourteen and the end result of that is where you’re at now and that’s a Continuing journey since then In that it is a continuous journey Dave: Actually through some management study I did a few years ago I learned about the different personality types and how my personality type actually helped me through just to keep going and have a bit more resilience my personality type is good at the long game where other personality types have other things that they’re good at where I’m particularly good at resilience Which I think I have shown in life George: Do you think that is because that’s the situation you’re in so that’s how you had to become so your personality develops because of the situation you’re in Dave: I think that there may have been some of that in it but also the people I had around me such as my parents helped me through that situation it was I guess that I had lots of things and lots of people that I could lean on during my recovery and I’m sure that helped me a great deal George: We’re at the end of the list of topics that you wrote that you wanted to cover in this podcast is there anything that you want to add to that now Dave: No I think that’s about enough for today we will have a few more interviews in the near future hopefully there’ll be some more information about the Hopkins Institute coming up but we might leave it there for today George: We did broach the foot mobilization so we should tell the listeners to keep checking back on the website because you will do a podcast in the future on foot mobilization and what it is. Ok thank you David Dave: thank you