- 2 years ago
Survivor 46_ Randen On His Medical Evacuation, Alliance w_ Venus & Parvati Comme
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00:00 The obvious problem is that Will can't do that
00:03 with the kind of assessment he can do out here.
00:05 You need an MRI.
00:06 And so, Randon, for those reasons,
00:10 out of just being very cautious about your health,
00:13 we are pulling you from the game.
00:15 - Randon, it is so great to talk to you,
00:19 but such a bummer to see you go so soon
00:21 and in the way that you did.
00:23 Before we get into it, how are you feeling
00:25 and how is your health?
00:26 - Good question.
00:27 I am feeling great.
00:28 I've had quite a while of time to heal.
00:30 I did therapy.
00:32 It was a very humbling experience, I would say.
00:35 Very scary, very, a flood of emotions, competitive,
00:39 and you want to stay in the game.
00:41 But health-wise, I'm in a good space.
00:44 Thank you for asking.
00:45 - That is so good to hear.
00:46 Now, you said a flood of emotions.
00:48 What were the different layers of emotions going on?
00:50 I have to imagine that was a tough moment
00:51 when Jeff says you have to be pulled from the game.
00:54 - Yeah, I mean, they were going to have to drag me out
00:56 'cause I was going to,
00:57 I was willing to do a challenge swimming in a circle
01:00 if I had, with one good arm.
01:01 I mean, it was like really,
01:03 I just did not want to quit.
01:05 It was hard.
01:06 I didn't feel like,
01:08 I knew something serious was happening,
01:09 so I kind of, I have accepted at that point,
01:12 I have to be rational.
01:13 I can't jeopardize my health.
01:17 So it was hard for me to accept.
01:20 It was hard for me to understand why sleeping,
01:25 why the swelling on my back was pressing against,
01:28 you know, how'd that happen.
01:29 And it's just a series of events
01:32 that you just cannot predict.
01:33 You can train for many things in Survivor,
01:36 but you cannot train for that.
01:38 So it was hard for me to accept.
01:41 I'm not going to lie.
01:41 It's a moment that really humbled me
01:43 mentally and physically.
01:44 - Ever since you woke up with that pinched nerve,
01:47 were you worried that this could be the end result?
01:50 At what point did you realize
01:51 this might be really happening?
01:53 - Well, the night before the storm,
01:55 I had pretty severe headaches
01:58 and I felt like a lightning,
02:00 like I felt very confused.
02:03 Like I didn't know where I was,
02:05 but I was trying to sleep
02:07 and I understood that I was being monitored.
02:09 So I'm like trying to hold myself together,
02:11 like Randy, don't show weakness, don't show weakness.
02:13 But when I got up and I had this massive migraine
02:17 and I couldn't move my head like this,
02:19 if you notice, and when you see it,
02:20 I'm not moving my head because I'm in pain,
02:22 but I'm not trying to show my tribe that.
02:24 And then once I couldn't, had no feeling in my arm,
02:27 I just, I knew in my head that there was no possible way
02:30 that they were going to allow me to continue like this.
02:32 - The last time we see you, they're taking you away.
02:34 You have an MRI scheduled for the next morning.
02:37 So how did that go?
02:38 And what has your recovery been like since?
02:40 - That was a nightmare for me mentally,
02:43 because I'm like, oh my God,
02:45 like I'm having an emergency MRI.
02:47 They immediately rushed me to this hospital.
02:51 They tell me that a helicopter's on standby to Australia
02:54 for emergency surgery if the pressure is,
02:58 if the swelling is pressing against the disc rather.
03:02 And it was scary because I'm like, oh my God,
03:05 I could be paralyzed.
03:06 Like, who wants to have back surgery?
03:09 I mean, the spine is something that you cannot fix
03:12 for the most part, right?
03:13 It takes, you know, so I was mortified,
03:15 but I can tell you, even up until that point,
03:17 I was still like, I would have made the merge.
03:19 You know, I was like, I was really kind of confused.
03:22 I was very, very confused.
03:24 And I say this a lot in my head,
03:26 that it was up until the point where I got into the MRI
03:29 and I was inside the tube.
03:30 It was like an inside MRI
03:32 where I started to reflect on myself and I'm like,
03:34 okay, the game needs to step aside now.
03:36 Like, I might, you know, this might be something serious.
03:39 And they, it hit me when they told me,
03:41 if you get on the helicopter, we're gonna call your wife.
03:43 And I'm like, oh snap.
03:45 It just, it clicked me out of the game immediately.
03:48 I was like, okay, this is serious.
03:49 Thank God, because there were like a couple of neurologists
03:52 on a Zoom call or some kind of,
03:54 and they were all chiming in and I was hearing that
03:57 as I was getting the MRI done.
03:58 It was kind of scary.
03:59 - What ended up being the result of the MRI?
04:02 - Ooh, yeah, so I, the test came out
04:05 that the swelling was not touching the disc
04:08 to where the point where it was gonna be affected.
04:10 And then my arm just had complete,
04:13 it just needed a lot of time
04:15 because of the pinched nerve on the bottom.
04:16 So it was a double whammy.
04:18 And essentially what they did was that
04:20 they put me in therapy, they gave me anti-inflammatories,
04:23 and they felt like the anti-inflammatories
04:25 would work really quickly to stop the swelling
04:28 for that hump on my back.
04:29 And it worked.
04:30 I mean, it took me days and days to heal up.
04:34 And then it took me months to get my arm fully back.
04:37 You'll see in the exit, you'll see me wave,
04:39 but I still, I had no arm strength, no hand strength.
04:42 So that took me months.
04:44 And I was working with my personal doctor
04:46 and we were able to get that finally back up
04:48 to where I'm normal and comparable on both hands.
04:51 - As we're seeing you go,
04:53 Venus says, "Oh no, he's leaving
04:55 with an advantage in his pocket."
04:57 And I think just the fandom collectively was like,
04:59 "Oh, I wish he had a chance to give it to her,
05:02 give it to someone or do something."
05:04 Did that go through your mind at the time?
05:06 Would you have had a chance to
05:07 and would you have wanted to?
05:09 - Yes.
05:10 So I was gonna give my advantage,
05:12 my Beware advantage to Venus, 100%.
05:14 I felt like, you know, I go for the underdogs in the game.
05:18 I respected her game.
05:19 She had mentioned why she was playing the game.
05:21 I thought it was incredibly impactful.
05:23 And I felt like they were,
05:25 my other tribe mates had no threats.
05:26 I mean, they were not under any circumstances
05:29 to be voted out, in my opinion.
05:30 And I thought, you know, so I was like,
05:31 "I'm gonna give it to the underdog."
05:34 You know, and I was trying,
05:37 I was struggling to give it to her
05:38 because this has never been done before, actually,
05:41 where you give somebody a Beware advantage.
05:42 I had to ask, I was asking,
05:43 I was like, "I need to give it."
05:44 But the problem was, I didn't know how to,
05:46 I thought I had to physically give it to her in my hand,
05:50 you know, 'cause she couldn't get it herself.
05:51 So throughout that whole time,
05:53 I am like trying to get to my blazer to get it out.
05:56 But I just couldn't get there, I would say.
05:58 I couldn't get there,
05:59 but I had full intentions of giving it to her
06:02 because I felt like she deserved it up in that point
06:05 based on how her game was as compared to my tribe mates.
06:08 - In terms of how the rules go,
06:10 did you have to give it to her with your hand
06:12 or could she like have snuck it out of your pocket?
06:13 What did you find out?
06:14 - So I found out that I did have to give it to her,
06:17 but I could have given it to her
06:19 up until the point where I get evac'd.
06:22 And I did not know that.
06:23 I didn't, I had no, nobody, I was never briefed.
06:25 I mean, this is kind of uncharted territory.
06:27 But what I wanted to do is go to my blazer, get it, right,
06:32 before I see this boat.
06:34 Like as soon as I saw the boat, I am trying to go there,
06:37 but it just, the forces of the universe.
06:40 And I was gonna slip it to her,
06:42 like kind of like a, you know, like that.
06:44 I was not going to do it obviously.
06:46 Like I could have done it obvious,
06:47 but I didn't have it on me.
06:49 I mean, it was in my blazer in camp.
06:51 So, but that was my full intentions at that time.
06:53 I will not mince words.
06:56 I was gonna give it to her.
06:57 - It was so interesting to watch your journey with Venus
06:59 because you start out comparing her to Parvati,
07:01 not sure you wanna work with her.
07:02 And then suddenly, like the next episode,
07:04 you're telling her about your advantage.
07:06 You've decided like, I wanna put my trust in one person
07:08 and this is the person I wanna put my trust into.
07:11 At what point did you make that realization
07:13 that this is someone I wanna work with, not work against?
07:16 - Yeah, so in the beginning, she was playing,
07:18 Venus was playing very, very aggressive.
07:19 Like, I mean, I was like, hey, my name is Randon.
07:21 She was like flipping a rock.
07:22 I'm looking for an advantage or an idol.
07:24 I'm like, whoa.
07:25 I'm like, you know, Venus is very, very aggressive
07:27 in the beginning.
07:28 So I didn't really understand what that was
07:30 in the beginning of the game.
07:31 Everybody's trying to like hyper social,
07:33 like you're like trying to understand each other,
07:34 telling people details about you.
07:36 Like, oh, you know, when I was three and I'm like,
07:37 I just met you.
07:38 Like, what is happening?
07:39 So it had to do with her why of playing the game
07:44 that kind of changed my position.
07:46 She told me why she was playing the game
07:47 and I related so much to it,
07:48 couldn't really go into details about that.
07:50 I just, I really respected why she was playing the game
07:54 and I couldn't tell her that.
07:55 So I was like, all right, look,
07:56 that changed my whole view on you.
07:58 Now I don't see you as like a super hyper aggressive player
08:02 and the Parvati light comment
08:03 was nothing superficial by the way.
08:05 That was a test for Soda.
08:07 I set up a troll to test Soda
08:09 because I wanted to bond with Soda first,
08:12 but Soda was like selling real estate to everybody
08:15 so quickly and aggressively that I couldn't really understand.
08:18 I'm like, Soda, come over here.
08:20 So I'm like, hey, I'm gonna set up something
08:21 that from the only person from Canada,
08:23 I know we said it, we introduced ourselves
08:25 and I was like, oh, she might be playing
08:28 like a Parvati light type game.
08:29 And I said, you know, it was like more like a gameplay thing
08:32 and then what happened?
08:33 It came right back to me.
08:34 And at that point, I knew I could not trust Soda
08:36 with anything because she would just immediately.
08:38 So then I shift my focus to the other tribe mates
08:41 and I ended up with Venus
08:42 because Tevin and Hunter already had a solid foundation.
08:46 Liz was hovering around them.
08:47 It was really hard to get to Liz at that point.
08:49 She's playing Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous
08:51 and I love her for that 'cause it works.
08:53 You know, it does work because you just go with the flow.
08:57 And with Venus, we're very alike
09:01 with the way we're over analytical thinkers,
09:03 if that makes sense.
09:04 We like suss everything out too much to our disadvantage.
09:07 So I felt like it was beneficial at that point to trust her
09:10 and say, hey, listen, we can make this game work.
09:13 We can't make it obvious that we're working together
09:14 because people think we hate each other,
09:16 but it can be an advantage if we get to merge
09:19 because then we can feed each other information
09:21 from both sides 'cause nobody will suspect me
09:23 like working with you at all.
09:24 So I felt like it was an advantage for both of us.
09:26 It was a win-win.
09:27 - Interesting.
09:28 So you feed Soda this comment
09:30 and then it gets back to Venus.
09:32 Did you guys kind of work that out once you aligned?
09:36 - Oh yeah.
09:36 - Did she call you out for that?
09:38 - Yeah, she came up to me and she was like,
09:39 oh yeah, what about that Parmody light comment?
09:41 I was like, listen, it was a troll.
09:44 It had nothing to do with anything superficial.
09:46 It's game.
09:47 This is a game.
09:48 You know what I mean?
09:49 So you have to understand, you told me you're from Canada.
09:51 I know you're gonna like one of the best goats
09:53 of all time in Canada.
09:55 So I needed something to suss out.
09:57 I don't know anything about anybody else but that.
09:59 I don't have a bullet list of anything else.
10:01 So she laughed it off.
10:03 She took it as a compliment, which thank God,
10:05 because I told her, Parmody's a goat,
10:07 but I don't think you're one-to-one with Parmody.
10:09 I can't, you're way too early in the game,
10:11 but it was really to suss out.
10:13 And I would say to get Soda,
10:14 to find out if I can trust Soda.
10:16 And at that point I told her that I am not gonna be aligning
10:19 with Soda at all for the rest of the game
10:21 because she can't pass.
10:22 At that point she couldn't pass that basic test.
10:24 Everybody else did, but she did not.
10:27 And that's where I've said, okay,
10:29 you take Soda off my back
10:31 and I will go to Tevin and try to have Tevin
10:34 more focused on voting out Soda than you.
10:37 Because Tevin at that point was kind of like,
10:40 you know, more concerned about Venus at that point,
10:42 as you saw in one of the clips.
10:44 You know, he wasn't really aligned.
10:45 So I was like, I'm gonna work Tevin.
10:47 You work Soda, keep Soda off my back.
10:49 But Soda is the target, you know?
10:51 And that's kind of like where he was.
10:53 - Okay, so yeah, 'cause we see you talking
10:55 in this last episode, you're talking about Hunter,
10:58 you're talking about Tevin.
10:59 Would you and Venus have ideally wanted to target Soda
11:03 if you guys had gone to tribal council as a six?
11:06 Or who was the top person at your two minds
11:09 that you would have wanted to take aim at?
11:11 - 100%, I was, and I love Soda.
11:14 She's like a sister, you know, but we're playing a game.
11:16 And in the game, I was gonna vote,
11:19 I was trying to convince everybody to vote Soda
11:21 because it does a lot of things for my gameplay.
11:23 Number one, it prevents Venus from trying to set up
11:27 some kind of a woman's alliance
11:28 when she mentioned jokingly one time.
11:30 And, you know, so I was like, okay,
11:32 I need to keep my numbers.
11:33 I need to make sure that I'm aware socially
11:36 of what's happening because I've,
11:37 nobody's never mentioned that but her.
11:39 So I was like, okay, you're my friend.
11:40 Like, I trust you, but you're revealing things to me,
11:43 but I don't know how serious you are
11:45 about doing these things.
11:46 So I was like, okay, so that removing Soda
11:48 puts a check on that.
11:49 Also, it keeps our alliance strong
11:52 because now you can't go to Soda, right?
11:55 You completely remove her out of the picture.
11:57 Now we have to figure things out with other elements.
12:00 And Tevin, I felt like would've,
12:03 I think me and Tevin,
12:04 Tevin and I had an understanding
12:05 that we were gonna go Soda,
12:07 but he didn't confirm,
12:08 but he understood my point about hyper-social gameplay.
12:12 And I said, Tevin, there can only be one.
12:15 There can only be one.
12:16 And I was like, Tevin,
12:17 I think I was making good headway with Tevin.
12:21 And I think Soda, I think Venus was doing a good job
12:24 kind of working Soda's mind a little bit
12:26 with that dynamic between them.
12:28 Couldn't have backfired 100%,
12:30 but I didn't play Survivor not to take risks.
12:32 I had to take the risk.
12:33 I think we would've voted Soda out.
12:35 - Now, we've seen a lot of people
12:37 who were medically evacuated out of the game
12:39 come back in future seasons.
12:40 Is that something that you're hoping for?
12:43 - Ooh, wow.
12:44 You know, I cannot say that I would say
12:48 that it doesn't scare the heck out of me
12:49 to play that game again.
12:51 I would say that I would play it.
12:53 I would have to talk to my wife.
12:54 Would have to have the utmost sit down with me
12:57 because it's a very serious thing.
12:59 I can tell you one thing though.
13:00 I would jump at the chance,
13:02 but I would be sleeping on sand.
13:04 I'm gonna take the Tika method.
13:06 What I saw when they were playing,
13:08 they always slept on the sand.
13:09 And Hunter kept on telling me about that.
13:12 And I just did not heed his words,
13:14 but I would jump at the notion to play again.
13:18 'Cause I learned from my mistakes.
13:19 I would just play a very, very different game
13:22 in terms of like taking care of myself
13:24 and not just like doing everything
13:27 that I wanted to do physically and mentally.
13:29 Mentally and physically, I was exhausted.
13:31 So I would jump at the chance again,
13:33 but I would take care of my mental
13:34 and do things not so risk,
13:37 you know, averse with my body if I were to do it again.
13:41 - Is there anything you would do different strategically?
13:43 - It's really hard.
13:46 So I would say that in the beginning,
13:49 I probably would not invoke the name of a goat.
13:51 Who played the game before.
13:53 'Cause let me tell you,
13:55 the army that followed that on social was insane.
13:59 It was insane.
13:59 You cannot invoke Parvati's name.
14:01 And I actually, I didn't message Parvati.
14:02 And I said, "Hey, listen, it was a troll.
14:04 "I shall not, I bow down to the queen."
14:07 You know, but I definitely felt like
14:09 people needed to understand that
14:11 I didn't have a lot of information.
14:12 I needed a troll.
14:13 So I would say I would not invoke one of those names again,
14:15 because Lord have mercy,
14:17 that army was serious on my tag stories.
14:20 It was serious.
14:21 I would say that, that's one thing.
14:22 I would say I'd be very cautious of doing that
14:24 because people may not understand the context
14:26 of what I'm doing.
14:26 They may take it to a place where I'm like,
14:28 "What are you talking about?"
14:30 It's nothing superficial.
14:30 It's a game.
14:31 It's a game tactic.
14:32 And it worked for me.
14:34 (upbeat music)
14:36 (upbeat music)
14:39 (upbeat music)
14:42 (upbeat music)
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