The holidays are supposed to be about gratitude, family, and togetherness — but for a lot of people, they’re the hardest time of the year.

In this episode of Broken-ish, we strip away the Hallmark version of Thanksgiving and talk about the reality no one wants to post about: loneliness, addiction, incarceration, homelessness, and the quiet pain that spikes when the days get shorter and the world gets louder.

We share personal stories from foster care, jail cells, solitary confinement, and moments so small they almost get missed — moments that literally changed lives. This is a conversation about holding two truths at once: deep gratitude and deep suffering.

If you’ve ever felt alone during the holidays… this one’s for you.

The mental health system is broken-ish—and we’ve felt the weight of it for years. In this episode, we talk honestly about burnout, deaths of despair, and why fighting the system felt like swinging in a dream.

But we also share the shift that changed everything: choosing curiosity, partnering with communities, and building real solutions from within a fractured system.

From Western Colorado to the birth of Ava Health, this is a story of purpose, alignment, and the sparks of hope that are already catching fire.

Welcome to Broken-ish. Where we hold heartbreak and hope at the same time—and still take a swing.

From surfboards to boardrooms, he had it all — talent, drive, and the dream of going pro. But when addiction wiped out his surfing career, he found himself homeless on the streets of Colorado. What came next was a transformation no one saw coming: from panhandling for booze money to working in investment banking, earning an MBA, and building behavioral-health programs that change lives. This episode dives deep into resilience, purpose, and the wild detours that lead us exactly where we’re meant to be. The story of Ava Health's CFO David Purinton