191. Hitting Rock Bottom | Retired Navy SEAL to Paramedic Fireman | Today Next Peak

Guy McDermott

Retired Navy SEAL Lieutenant Guy McDermott’s conversation in episode 191 on the Transition Drill Podcast is a profound exploration of trauma, resilience, and transformation—from surviving an unstable childhood to becoming a leader in one of the world’s most elite military units. After 24 years, McDermott transitioned from SEAL officer, into a post-military career as a firefighter and paramedic, he began to confront the suppressed emotional damage left unchecked for decades. That inner conflict, exacerbated by witnessing veteran suicide and his own growing anxiety, led him to the brink of taking his life. Through programs like Save A Warrior, and his current work with Next Peak and Project Restore Hope, McDermott has redefined the meaning of service. His story is a powerful reminder that military transition isn’t just about finding military veteran jobs or navigating life after service—it’s about healing, identity, and learning how to lead from the heart. His journey offers not just inspiration but a call to action for military veterans and first responders who are ready to stop surviving and start living with purpose, connection, and freedom.

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Raised in Southern California, McDermott’s formative years were shaped by instability. He grew up bouncing between parents—his father, a Vietnam veteran and long-serving LAPD officer, and his mother, who struggled to provide consistent housing and support. With no siblings and a name like “Guy,” he stood out early, often feeling isolated as he tried to make sense of his place in the world. By the time he reached high school, he’d lived in too many homes to count, rarely long enough to form lasting friendships or a community. But what adversity stole in stability, it built back in resilience. As he describes the trauma of those early years planted a seed—not one of victimhood, but of toughness. “I think back to being five or six,” McDermott said, “and things were happening that didn’t make me feel safe. That’s when my subconscious survival instinct kicked in.”

He learned to navigate fear by suppressing emotion. In a household defined by tension and unpredictability, feelings were a liability. What began as emotional survival eventually evolved into a mindset of discipline and self-reliance—skills that would serve him later in both military and life after service. But emotional isolation came at a cost. “I wasn’t just not feeling pain—I wasn’t feeling love either,” he admitted.

For many veterans, the call to serve is tied to patriotism or tradition. For McDermott, it was more complicated. His father had long encouraged him to join the Navy, but in typical adolescent rebellion, he initially resisted. “I wanted to have sovereignty,” he recalled. “The more he pushed, the more I said no.” But once the pressure stopped, he surprised even himself by walking into the recruiter’s office on his own. The Navy wasn’t his father’s dream anymore—it had become his own.

He began his military career as an air traffic controller, not as a SEAL. Like many who eventually take on elite roles, McDermott didn’t set out with a clear vision of becoming part of a special operations community. In fact, he almost left the military after eight years of enlisted service. During that time, he focused on his job and even started a for-profit business aimed at taking veterans on outdoor adventures—mountain biking, camping, and similar escapes. It was during one of those outings, while sitting around a campfire, that a SEAL master chief looked across the fire and told him, “You’d make a good SEAL.”

That offhand comment changed everything.

But getting there wasn’t easy. Even convincing his Navy detailer to release him from his existing rate was a struggle. “The only reason I’m letting you go is because you said you’d get out if I didn’t,” McDermott recalled the detailer saying. “You’ll be back.” That doubt only fueled him further. “He didn’t know me,” McDermott said. “He just added fuel to my fire.”And that’s how it often begins. Veteran transitions are rarely about clean slates—they’re forged in the fires of difficult beginnings, long before the uniform is ever worn. McDermott’s entry into the military was less about joining a team and more about proving to himself—and the world—that the adversity of his childhood didn’t define him. His early career wasn’t glamorous, and it wasn’t destined. It was shaped by raw will and a desire to control his environment after so many years of chaos. But if his childhood taught him anything, it was this: the standard you walk past is the standard you accept. And McDermott wasn’t going to walk past mediocrity—not in life, not in service, and not during the transition to whatever came next.

By this time, McDermott was 28—older than most of the candidates—and already carrying physical wear and tear. He fractured three ribs during early physical training, and despite battling pneumonia, he pushed through Hell Week without revealing his injuries. The stakes were too high. “If I even let the thought of quitting enter my mind, it was over,” he explained during his interview on the Transition Drill Podcast. That mindset—where quitting wasn’t just discouraged but psychologically unacceptable—defined his military transition from technician to warrior.

And yet, like so many military veterans, McDermott’s internal fight wasn’t just with the ocean or the obstacle course. It was with himself. The childhood adversity that had forged his mental toughness also buried emotions he didn’t yet know he needed. Survival meant shutting off feelings—pain, sadness, even love. That emotional armor would serve him in the Teams, but it came with a long-term cost.

McDermott successfully completed BUD/S, earned his trident, and joined the SEAL Teams. But he didn’t just want to wear the uniform—he wanted to lead. With encouragement from his spouse at the time, whose father had served as a Marine Corps officer, McDermott applied to the Navy’s Seaman-to-Admiral program. He was accepted, went through college on the government’s dime, and commissioned as an officer—becoming what’s known as a “Mustang,” someone who transitions from enlisted to officer ranks. “I didn’t have aspirations for admiral,” McDermott said. “But I wanted to serve the guys I once stood beside.” His leadership philosophy was clear: “You don’t work for me—I work for you.” In a culture where officers can sometimes become distant from the enlisted, McDermott’s approach was refreshing. As a prior-enlisted SEAL, he understood what his team needed, and he took pride in being a servant leader.

Still, the transition wasn’t seamless. Returning to the Teams after three years in college, McDermott found that the battlefield—and the tactics—had evolved. “The train doesn’t slow down,” he recalled. “I had bad habits from before, and I had to adapt fast.” Despite the challenge, his operational knowledge, emotional intelligence, and relentless mindset helped him bridge the gap. But the real challenge wasn’t on the battlefield. It was at home.

At 24 years of service, McDermott was faced with a choice. He could continue climbing the ranks, potentially taking on more senior roles with even greater distance from his family—or he could step away. He chose transition. Not because he was burned out from the mission, but because he could no longer ignore the sacrifice at home.

Leaving the Navy didn’t mean walking away from service. It meant redefining it. For McDermott, military transition wasn’t just a career change—it was an identity shift. Like many veterans facing life after service, he had to ask himself who he was without the uniform. The SEAL Teams had given him brotherhood, purpose, and structure—but they had also delayed his confrontation with deeply rooted trauma and emotional disconnection. Stepping away from the Navy meant facing those truths head-on. And so, McDermott’s transition out of the military wasn’t marked by fanfare or ceremony—it was marked by reflection. A desire to become whole again. A determination to be present for his family. A mission to serve, not with weapons and warfighting, but with mentorship, connection, and authenticity.

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When Lieutenant Guy McDermott retired from the Navy after 24 years, he wasn’t done serving—at least not in the traditional sense. Driven by a continued desire to help others, the military veteran set his sights on the fire service. For McDermott, becoming a firefighter and paramedic seemed like the next mission: one where he could still protect, still respond, still serve.

The transition from the SEAL Teams to the firehouse might seem like a natural step for a warrior. But the reality of military transition often hits harder than anticipated. In uniform, there is identity. There is structure. There is tribe. Without it, many veterans—especially those from elite communities like the SEAL Teams—find themselves drifting. At first, McDermott embraced his new role. After putting himself through a college fire academy, he was hired by Glendale Fire Department. He excelled in the high-tempo environment. The pace, the camaraderie, the mission—it all felt familiar. But as the years went on, cracks began to form. Assigned to a slower station and working as a paramedic, McDermott began to experience anxiety for the first time in his life. Pediatric medical calls, in particular, started to haunt him. As a father, every call felt personal.

The emotional toll began to surface in ways McDermott couldn’t ignore. “I started noticing the wheels coming off,” he said on the Transition Drill Podcast. “There were anxious moments. I didn’t feel aligned with what I was doing anymore.” Around the same time, a close friend and fellow SEAL—one of the most mentally tough men McDermott had ever known—took his own life. That loss devastated him. But it also triggered something darker: a mirror reflecting his own silent pain. The years of repressed emotion, high-functioning trauma, and unresolved shame began to swell.

It wasn’t long before McDermott found himself staring into the abyss. The warrior who had endured Hell Week with broken ribs and pneumonia, the officer who had led men in combat, and the first responder who had saved lives on the streets—was now contemplating ending his own. It’s the reality too many veterans and first responders live in silence. The weight of career change, loss of identity, and untreated trauma doesn't always show itself with loud alarms. Sometimes it creeps in slowly, wearing the face of exhaustion, isolation, or quiet despair.

What saved him wasn’t a rank, a badge, or a uniform. It was connection. It was community. And it was a brutal, beautiful decision to finally do the inner work. Through the nonprofit organization Save A Warrior, McDermott began a deep healing journey. He confronted the childhood trauma he had buried. He challenged the patterns of emotional survival that had once served him in combat but were now suffocating him in civilian life. He discovered that freedom wasn’t a constitutional concept—it was an internal condition.“I realized I was still in a prison,” he said. “Not behind bars, but inside my own heart.”

That awakening sparked something new. McDermott stepped fully into purpose with Next Peak, a nonprofit he co-founded to empower veterans and first responders through authentic community and emotional restoration. At Next Peak, the mission is simple but profound: help military veterans and their families return to wholeness. Not through handouts—but through empowerment, vulnerability, and love.

McDermott also joined forces with Project Restore Hope, a program built to help veterans and warriors reclaim their sense of purpose, freedom, and identity. Through retreats, coaching, and integrated healing experiences, McDermott now serves as a guide for others walking the same difficult road he once walked alone. “We went overseas to fight for freedom,” he said. “But the truth is, many of us came back without ever being free ourselves.”

His message is especially poignant for military veterans and first responders—those who serve the world while too often neglecting themselves. Police officers, firefighters, EMS personnel, airmen, Marines, soldiers, and sailors alike all face this challenge. The transition doesn’t end when the job does. It continues until you reclaim your voice, your heart, and your truth. Today, McDermott isn’t just surviving. He’s leading with love. He’s building new tribes based on connection, not trauma. And he’s showing others that the journey after the uniform ends can be the most powerful mission yet.

The go-to podcast for military veterans, police officers, firefighters, EMTs, and first responders preparing for life after service. Hosted by Paul Pantani—a retired law enforcement leader with 30+ years of experience—Transition Drill features candid conversations with veterans from every military branch, as well as law enforcement professionals navigating career change, retirement, and the transition to civilian life. Guests share stories of mental health, post-traumatic growth, job search strategies, and what it really takes to succeed after the uniform. Whether you're transitioning from policing, firefighting, or military service, this podcast will help you lead the next chapter with clarity and confidence.

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