Latest / To All the Men I've Tolerated Before / Intergenerational Trauma, Grief, and Impossible Beauty Standards

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Intergenerational Trauma, Grief, and Impossible Beauty Standards · To All the Men I've Tolerated Before

• 0:21
  Speaker 1: Hey, tolerators, this is to all the men I've tolerated before.
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: With Na Lee Katona, your weekly look at everyday misogyny. Today,
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: we are welcoming Susan Leu two team tolerator. Susan has
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: recently released her memoir The Manicurist Daughter, which tells her
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: life story about being a daughter and the aftermath of
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: losing her mother after she underwent a Tommy Talk. Susan
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: is here to tell us more about her story and
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: how misogyny played a role in her in her mother's
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: story and the aftermath of the Tommy Talk and her
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: mother passing away. Welcome to the show, Susan, and thank
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: you so much for wanting to share this story, because
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: there's so much do it. So I'm just gonna let
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: you introduce yourself a little bit.
• 1:08
  Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, Natalie, thanks for having me. I mean,
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: there's just so much misogyny. It's just like it's overflowing
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: with misogyny. So glad I can give you a dose
• 1:17
  Speaker 2: of it today. I'm a Vietnamese American author, playwright, and performer.
• 1:21
  Speaker 2: And you know I never meant to tell my family
• 1:25
  Speaker 2: tragedy out loud because I was forbidden to speak about it,
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: and this all goes down. When I'm eleven years old,
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: my mom goes in for a tummy tuck, the narrowing
• 1:34
  Speaker 2: of her nostrils, and a chin and plant. She thinks
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: she's going to come home the next day with her
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: beautiful new body. Two hours into the operation, she loses
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: oxygen to her brain. The surgeon waits fourteen minutes before
• 1:50
  Speaker 2: he makes a nine to one one call, and it's
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: after four minutes without oxygen that you have permanent brain damage.
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: She goes into a coma. Five days later, she flat lined.
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: The next two decades, my family has never spoken of
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: her or what happened to her ever again. And it
• 2:08
  Speaker 2: was about a year after she died. We were trying
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: to sue the lawyer the doctor. He didn't have medical
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: malpractice insurance. We found out he was on probation at
• 2:18
  Speaker 2: the time, had nineteen lawsuits against him, actively advertised to
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: the Vietnamese refugee community. He's white, he practices in San Francisco.
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: This is all happening in nineteen ninety six, and he
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: walks away, never paying my family a dine, which.
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: The layers upon layers upon layers of it, because I
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: think I think one of the things that hit me
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: the most when I was watching your show, your special.
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: What are we calling it.
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: It's a one woman's show. It's a solo theatrical show.
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: It's called one hundred and forty Pounds How Beauty Killed
• 2:54
  Speaker 2: My Mother. I played fifteen characters in sixty five minutes
• 2:58
  Speaker 2: where I'm telling you the whole of what happened with
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: humor and heartbreak, and I.
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: Think when I was watching it, I was like, oh,
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: my goodness, the light. Your mother was a person who
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: brought beauty to people's lives through the manic curius and
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: the nail slan and all of it, and was ingrained
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: in the beauty world. And then it was the beauty
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: world that ended her life. And then the misogyny of
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: the beauty industry just weaving through all of our stories.
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: Because I am also a child who may have been
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: eating birthday cake one day and like an elder came
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: over her shoulder to be like, do you know how
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: much sugar in that? Is in that? And then my
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: defiant little ass looked at my cousin and went, go
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: get me another slice.
• 3:46
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so eating is so complicated. I mean, like a
• 3:49
  Speaker 2: year after my mom died. I was going for a
• 3:51
  Speaker 2: second bowl of rice, and my dad and my aunts
• 3:53
  Speaker 2: were like, whoaha, whoa, whoa, whoa stop, Like, if you
• 3:56
  Speaker 2: eat too much, you're gonna get sat and no one's
• 3:59
  Speaker 2: going ever love you. You're no one's gonna marry you.
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: You're gonna dialogue. And I'm like twelve at this point,
• 4:04
  Speaker 2: you know, And it's so complicated because food is this
• 4:07
  Speaker 2: device that can emotionally soothe. Food is the device to
• 4:11
  Speaker 2: show approval to your elders for making your favorite. Food
• 4:16
  Speaker 2: is also a way to control and also to remind you,
• 4:19
  Speaker 2: like however much you eat is going to determine your worthiness.
• 4:24
  Speaker 2: It's so complicated, and as Vietnamese Americans, we do not
• 4:27
  Speaker 2: show our emotions with hugs or kind words. We show
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: it through food. We really do. That is our love language.
• 4:35
  Speaker 2: And so that's why all of this is so fraught.
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: You know, my mother dies from a botched tummy tuck,
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: and yet throughout my childhood and after she passes, and
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: even when I'm eventually pregnant and becoming a mother, i
• 4:49
  Speaker 2: am my family's punching bag. And I'm constantly body shamed
• 4:52
  Speaker 2: because there's so much fear attached to if you are
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: bit if you are there therefore then ugly, then you
• 4:59
  Speaker 2: are worthy And it doesn't matter that my mom died
• 5:03
  Speaker 2: from a tummy tuck.
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: Yeah. And I think what also really touches me about
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: your story is when we think of our mothers as
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: people who also had to live under these systematic, awful
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: systems instead of just like our mothers who like I,
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: I offer up a lot of forgiveness to my mom
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: and my aunts and my grandmothers all the time because
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: I'm like, well, shit, I'm having a hard time in
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: twenty twenty four being a woman and juggling beauty standards
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: and whether or not I like myself and what does
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: my disordered eating lookal like? And we have so many
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: tools against me and all of the things that I
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: struggle with. And then I look at my grandmother who
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: couldn't own a credit card without my grandfather's permission, and
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: I'm like, oh, how were you going to pay for
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: therapy if you really wanted to go?
• 5:59
  Speaker 2: Oh? Yeah, not at all, not your choice, I know.
• 6:02
  Speaker 2: Can you imagine? I mean, like we're in this era
• 6:04
  Speaker 2: of like body positivity and plus size models and even
• 6:08
  Speaker 2: just talking about fat shaming, like we're allowed to talk
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: about fat shaming and in body shaming. Sorry, and yet
• 6:16
  Speaker 2: I have body dysmorphia. Oh yeah, I've been doing therapy.
• 6:20
  Speaker 2: I think maybe like almost two decades now, on and off,
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: and let like I still struggle with dysmoria.
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: And I think I think like the biggest lesson of
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: all is I'm always going to struggle with this body dysmorphia. Currently,
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: I have like wiped my face from social media just
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: because I kinda hate the way that I look. It's
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: not like I'm like, well, I don't have makeup on, well,
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: this t shirt fits a little tight well, and it's
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: like I'm never camera ready. And a year and a
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: half ago, I was making tiktoks, rolling out of bed.
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: I was flapping my stomach all over the place to
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: like watch my TikTok for a year and a half ago,
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: and to now go, at what point did holiday depression
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: become just like slop become like well, I don't deserve
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: to be seen anymore because my body isn't anything that
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: I want it to be anymore. It's it's a ride.
• 7:17
  Speaker 2: What was the response like when you would share those videos,
• 7:20
  Speaker 2: like the community responded, how did you feel about it
• 7:22
  Speaker 2: at the time.
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: You know, I don't really have a huge following on TikTok,
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: and I believe that because I'm not well. We know this,
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: We know that TikTok has someone has looked into the
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: TikTok algorithm and has actually put out that like, if
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: you're not perfectly sized and perfectly made up, and if
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: you're talking about fun topics like racism, misogyny, capitalism, killing
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: people and all of it, that they're like, ooh, one
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: hundred and fifty people tops are going to see you
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: like if you're lucky. So I get suppressed a lot,
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: But I when it comes to people who are close
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: to me or whatever, no one has just because like
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: I've had a rough couple of years, and I think
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: I have had a rough time becoming more at home
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: in my body after I let my depression just put
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: me on the couch for two years, and no one's
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: like come up to be like, hey, namily really letting
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: it go now, aren't we And they are, Well, I
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: do get I do get mean comments on the internet
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: because men exist on the Internet and all of the
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: box are mail coded, so I do get things like
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: do you think you're pretty enough to be this picky
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: about how a man treats you, and it's like, yeah, honestly,
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: I do.
• 8:48
  Speaker 2: So the internet is a very fascinating and cool place.
• 8:51
  Speaker 2: I did a TEDx talk called how to Make Peace
• 8:54
  Speaker 2: with Your Belly Fat, and I'm talking about how I
• 8:57
  Speaker 2: went to a sweat lodge and my ancestors slept around
• 9:00
  Speaker 2: and they were like, we're not here to cabble you.
• 9:03
  Speaker 2: We want you to know that when you hte your body,
• 9:05
  Speaker 2: you're actually hitting where you come from. Right, you were
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: hating the DNA and the gift that we have given you, right,
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: and and what and then what right? So it's it's
• 9:17
  Speaker 2: this reflection of like me trying to really address my
• 9:19
  Speaker 2: own body image issues by thinking about my ancestral heritage
• 9:24
  Speaker 2: instead of just thinking I'm so lazy, I need to
• 9:27
  Speaker 2: go to the gym more and so. And I think
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: there was a big unlocking for me to think about
• 9:33
  Speaker 2: that and to think about the way my body is structured.
• 9:36
  Speaker 2: It's actually a cookie cutter imprint of my mother's body.
• 9:40
  Speaker 2: But also like our bodies were formed by the conditions
• 9:43
  Speaker 2: that we were in. So my families used to toil
• 9:47
  Speaker 2: in rice patties. That's why we got large calves, you know,
• 9:51
  Speaker 2: like our bodies are formed by the conditions that we're
• 9:54
  Speaker 2: in and where we're from. And so for me that
• 9:56
  Speaker 2: was it was helpful for me just to think about
• 9:59
  Speaker 2: it that way instead of there's some kind of moral
• 10:02
  Speaker 2: adjudgment of how I look. And so I do this
• 10:07
  Speaker 2: TEDx talk. It's really transformational for the women in the audience,
• 10:10
  Speaker 2: and Ted selected it to be featured on their website.
• 10:15
  Speaker 2: And then I got all these male comments that were like,
• 10:18
  Speaker 2: you should just eat some salad, you should just go
• 10:21
  Speaker 2: to the gym, and it's just all this you should
• 10:24
  Speaker 2: and if you actually listen to the talk, you're gonna
• 10:26
  Speaker 2: hear that actually, I do go to the gym a lot.
• 10:28
  Speaker 2: I do eat a lot of salf like and that
• 10:30
  Speaker 2: it's also right and the fact that they're just saying
• 10:32
  Speaker 2: these comments reinforces why it's the struggle for women to
• 10:36
  Speaker 2: live in their bodies into practice self love and self
• 10:39
  Speaker 2: acceptance because we are it's it's there's bullets always flying,
• 10:45
  Speaker 2: no matter what the effort is or where our moral
• 10:49
  Speaker 2: stationing is. So I just I think that was just
• 10:52
  Speaker 2: like so indicative of why I needed to share that.
• 10:56
  Speaker 2: But then also like there was hundreds of moments of
• 11:00
  Speaker 2: just trolls, like making so many judgments about my life
• 11:06
  Speaker 2: without actually listening to the topic. And then it was
• 11:09
  Speaker 2: just it felt pretty unsafe to be vulnerable in that way,
• 11:14
  Speaker 2: and I didn't expect that in the comments section at all.
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: Yeah, when I was very dutiful and committed to my
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: yoga practice, I had a doctor be in shock when
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: I told her I did yoga every day I had.
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: I have told the story at nauseum at some point,
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: so welcome new listeners to this very old story of
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: the one time I got fat shaped by a doctor.
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: I had gone in because I had felt something in
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: my breast. She gave me the roughest breast exam I've
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: ever had, and I was sore for days after. And
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: then afterwards she said, I can't believe you would worry
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: about this after this soon after your menstrual cycle. Your
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: period does weird things to your boobs. First time ever
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: hearing that. And also if you worked out more, it
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: would really help with that. And I said, okay, well,
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: I try to do yoga three times a week and
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: cardio twice a week, so should that flip flop? And
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: she just looked at me, and I was like, yeah,
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: I'm unemployed currently due to a pandemic. We can't go anywhere.
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: All I'm doing is yoga and Dance Dance Revolution on
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: my Wii. Like it's that's all what are you doing?
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: That's all I'm doing? Yeah, and I and I also
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: thought back to the commercial that you played during your
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: One Woman Show where it's like your mother was getting
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: all of these like body whatever the opposite of an
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: affirmation is, but all of these messages about her body,
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: and it was as simple and we I mean, and
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: it happens today too. But you're just watching your favorite
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: TV show and then you get a targeted ad for
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: weight watchers and you're like, oh, should I I've already
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: measured my cheese? Should I go back to doing that?
• 13:05
  Speaker 2: Right? Yeah? I mean, the what we consume feeds are brain,
• 13:10
  Speaker 2: you know. And what you're referring to is on on
• 13:13
  Speaker 2: Sundays on the weekends when our nail salon would open
• 13:16
  Speaker 2: a few hours later, our family would gather and watch
• 13:19
  Speaker 2: Paris by Night, which was like a variety show would
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: Vietnamese stars, and in the middle of that show would
• 13:27
  Speaker 2: be an ad for this plastic surgery clinic in Houston, Texas,
• 13:31
  Speaker 2: and the woman would she was a past beauty pageant winner,
• 13:35
  Speaker 2: and she's lying on her side pool side wearing a
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: bathing suit, a one piece based suit, but also nylon
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: clear nylon stockings. So you see this like horizontal shot
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: of her body, and then she's basically talking about her
• 13:49
  Speaker 2: plastic surgery clinic, and then we cut back to the show,
• 13:53
  Speaker 2: you know, and you're kind of sitting there being like,
• 13:55
  Speaker 2: she looks hot, she's beautiful, and she's one of the
• 13:59
  Speaker 2: main sponsors of the show Pairs by Night, and so
• 14:01
  Speaker 2: they'll always cut to her in the audience and she'll
• 14:03
  Speaker 2: wave and she's got a beautiful new nose, and Guinase
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: women watch, we know that her body looks good in
• 14:10
  Speaker 2: a traditional Guinamese outpit called al yai. And the thing
• 14:14
  Speaker 2: is is, whenever other performers would come on stage, she
• 14:19
  Speaker 2: were just like a little bit bigger, you know, like
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: if you're not like petite, like a double zero, you're
• 14:24
  Speaker 2: not gonna look that good in an al yai. And
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: then my aunt's and mom would kind of just be like, oh,
• 14:30
  Speaker 2: she got fat. She'll probably get kicked off the show,
• 14:32
  Speaker 2: you know, like it's not just I look at Cosmo
• 14:37
  Speaker 2: covers and it makes me feel bad and I know
• 14:40
  Speaker 2: their airbrush, but whatever, my eyes start still telling me
• 14:42
  Speaker 2: I should look like that. It's more like, within our
• 14:45
  Speaker 2: sacred community, we are judging each other and reinforcing to
• 14:49
  Speaker 2: each other what is right and what is wrong. And
• 14:52
  Speaker 2: I think that's kind of the most painful part is like,
• 14:54
  Speaker 2: as a little girl, I'm just sitting there going like,
• 14:57
  Speaker 2: that is right, that is wrong, belongs, that does not right,
• 15:02
  Speaker 2: and I put myself in that does not belong category.
• 15:06
  Speaker 2: And so after my mom died and they were like,
• 15:08
  Speaker 2: you know, no one's gonna love you if you're too fat,
• 15:10
  Speaker 2: And I gotta tell you at the time, I was
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: never obese. Growing up. I was born in America and
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: had access to milk and nutrition, whereas my brothers were
• 15:21
  Speaker 2: born in post Vietnam War. My sister was born in
• 15:24
  Speaker 2: a Malaysian refugee camp. You can imagine that there's gonna
• 15:27
  Speaker 2: be different circumstances related to nutrition. And so I was
• 15:31
  Speaker 2: the big kid in the family. I was always too much,
• 15:34
  Speaker 2: even though it wasn't like my BMI has always been
• 15:37
  Speaker 2: in the gray zone where it's like, oh, you might
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: be a born inline candidate, you know, but it wasn't
• 15:41
  Speaker 2: like either direction. But that was already too much, And
• 15:46
  Speaker 2: so for a long time, I actually I always wanted
• 15:49
  Speaker 2: some type of prince to whisk me away and save me.
• 15:53
  Speaker 2: But I actually never believed I would get married. I
• 15:55
  Speaker 2: never believed I would become a mother because I actually
• 15:58
  Speaker 2: thought I was so so terrifyingly ugly that no one
• 16:01
  Speaker 2: would ever love me, right, because those messages run deep. Yeah,
• 16:06
  Speaker 2: and it's so hard to undo them.
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: It's so hard to undo them. I when I would
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: swipe on dating apps, I'd be like, lower your standards
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: a little bit, nad lyid Like you have curves, you
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: also have a loud ass mouth, like all of these
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: things that women will tell you, like, you know, Natalie
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: meant like humility, Like have you ever thought about being quieter?
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: And I'm like, not one day ever. Also not the
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: type of woman I ever grew up around. And you
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: all are married, Like, were you guys faking being silent
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: people right up until you got to the altar? Which
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: may have happened.
• 16:44
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I think you'll get discovered at some point, yeah,
• 16:47
  Speaker 2: like of who you really are? So why why take it.
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: In the beginning why fake it in the beginning. There's
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: also such a theme of the weight of silence to
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: your story because of the fact that we went to
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: a funeral and then we never talked about it again,
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: so you've never had And it's hard because I feel
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: like this is also something that's happened between my mom
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: and my aunts and stuff where we've never had the
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: cathartic aha conversation where it's like, oh, we were all
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: fucked by this, right, Like we were all fucked by
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: beauty standards, we were all fucked by patriarchy or whatever.
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: Like they're still in survival mode. I'm still in survival mode.
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: We're never having the conversation. We have snippets of it,
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: but you had resounding silence on your end.
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: It's nuts, you know, Like my mother was the pillar
• 17:43
  Speaker 2: of our family. We had two nail salons. We were
• 17:46
  Speaker 2: thirteen people in a four bedroom house, and she was
• 17:49
  Speaker 2: our leader. And then one day, poof, she's gone. And
• 17:53
  Speaker 2: it's been almost three decades, it's been twenty eight years,
• 17:56
  Speaker 2: and my family has never had a conversation about her
• 18:01
  Speaker 2: death or about what she meant to us. If my
• 18:05
  Speaker 2: family is okay or not okay, and I've had my
• 18:09
  Speaker 2: two siblings, Wendy and King. They're they're very supportive of
• 18:12
  Speaker 2: the work I do. Now in the beginning they weren't.
• 18:15
  Speaker 2: And they've come to do like like my post show
• 18:19
  Speaker 2: discussions for my play and my book, and we can
• 18:23
  Speaker 2: talk about me and the art I create, but we
• 18:27
  Speaker 2: cannot talk about mom and how they're doing with it.
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: We cannot use the F word, which is feelings. And
• 18:34
  Speaker 2: we can have public conversations about the work I do,
• 18:38
  Speaker 2: but we have still not had a private conversation. And
• 18:43
  Speaker 2: I've brought it up, and man is their pushback. This
• 18:46
  Speaker 2: summer I brought it up and they were just it
• 18:48
  Speaker 2: was just like damn, like no, And I'm and you know,
• 18:52
  Speaker 2: I after becoming a mother, I feel like I've developed
• 18:58
  Speaker 2: a lot more compassion from family and also recognize that
• 19:02
  Speaker 2: this is this is the best that they're showing up
• 19:04
  Speaker 2: as you know, and and I recognize that all humans
• 19:07
  Speaker 2: have demons, all humans are processing their stuff whether they
• 19:12
  Speaker 2: know how or not, and whatever that they're showing up
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: as this is, this is what they have capacity for.
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: And so for me, it's like I used to think
• 19:23
  Speaker 2: that they were withholding information from me. I thought they
• 19:25
  Speaker 2: were trying to be mean to me, and now I
• 19:29
  Speaker 2: realize that they are just actually protecting themselves. Yeah, And
• 19:34
  Speaker 2: with that turn in that thinking and making depersonalizing it right,
• 19:39
  Speaker 2: making it less about me, I can love them in
• 19:45
  Speaker 2: a better way. And also I've got to do my
• 19:50
  Speaker 2: own ceiling and have my own closure about my mom
• 19:52
  Speaker 2: for me, because because I can't control them, right, But
• 19:57
  Speaker 2: also I know that it's not about me.
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: No, So I also had to come to that distinction.
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: My grandmother passed away when I was either fifteen going
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: on sixteen or sixteen going on seventeen, Like Maria van
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: Trapp can write a whole song about it when I
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: figure out which one it is. But and my grandmother
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: clearly had some sort of depression or anxiety or whatever.
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: And when I was in college trying to figure out, like,
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: what's going on with my brain that makes it so
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: I stop functioning every once in a while or whatever,
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: and my parents were in a bad place, and I
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: was just like calling my aunt and I'm like, wouldn't
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: it just be easier if we knew if we had depression, anxiety,
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: bipolar order? Like, I don't care what it is, I
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: just want to be able to communicate to a doctor
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: that like, my little quirks are hereditary and my aunt
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: god lover just went and I guess we'll never know
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: right right, So it does. It's like a loneliness of
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: being the wallbreaker, of being like, well, I guess I'll
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: be the one that goes to therapy. I'll be the
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: one that tells the doctor. I don't know what suicide
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: ideation looks like, but here are three examples. Do you
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: think that's it? And like telling people, telling people in
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: my family like, yeah, I'm on antidepressants, I go, why
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: do you think all of a sudden I normaled out?
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: Like and I got a baseline of functioning back, or
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: I think I have some sort of attention deaf is it?
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: And doctors aren't going to believe me, and I guess
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: neither are you. So we're just gonna cope with it
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: with a lot of crafts and a lot of weird
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: food stuff and that's what we're going to do. So yeah,
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: it is just one of those things where you think, like,
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: wanted it just be happier or better if we just
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: all talked about it at Thanksgiving and they're like, no, oh,
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: thank you, though, Yeah.
• 22:03
  Speaker 2: I mean, I think for that generation, there is so
• 22:05
  Speaker 2: much stigma around mental health. Like I bless the gen
• 22:09
  Speaker 2: Z generation because they really normalize it and they try
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: to talk about it. But for that generation, in my
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: father's generation, they again attribute it to a moral a
• 22:24
  Speaker 2: moral thing that they lack, or a moral thing like
• 22:26
  Speaker 2: it's like it's in my control and I can't fix it.
• 22:30
  Speaker 2: It's my fault, right or my gosh, that is so
• 22:33
  Speaker 2: much shame to put your dirty laundry out there and
• 22:37
  Speaker 2: you and this is embarrassing. You're embarrassing us, right, Like
• 22:41
  Speaker 2: it's all of that. And yet if we do not
• 22:45
  Speaker 2: get diagnosed, if we do not get more information to
• 22:48
  Speaker 2: understand what is chemically going on in our brain, and
• 22:51
  Speaker 2: then there's this next generation and then they fill out
• 22:54
  Speaker 2: a form, this is what's your family history? You know,
• 22:56
  Speaker 2: Like for me, I don't have much to fill out
• 22:59
  Speaker 2: in family history because there were not a lot of
• 23:02
  Speaker 2: doctors in the rural area that my parents grew up in,
• 23:06
  Speaker 2: and so my grandparents did not know what was going on,
• 23:09
  Speaker 2: like it was so lucky, lucky if they even had
• 23:11
  Speaker 2: a nurse come once a month to the village. Right,
• 23:14
  Speaker 2: So part of the not knowing actually impacts future generations,
• 23:20
  Speaker 2: And it's kind of like, how can we see mental
• 23:23
  Speaker 2: health not as a moral failing, but as just simply
• 23:29
  Speaker 2: more information for me to make better decisions?
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly, because again it's like I'm thinking about me,
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: I'm thinking about future people. What if we all figured
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: out what was going in our brain? Wouldn't that make
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: Christmas a little bit easier? I guess not, Like, but yeah,
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: it is. It's just one of those things where like
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: I feel the impact of generations to come, and I
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: guess it's fine if you don't. But then don't be
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: surprised when I'm the person that's like going to doctors
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: saying what's up and starting the family history over.
• 24:03
  Speaker 2: Right, you're doing the labor around it. But but like,
• 24:06
  Speaker 2: I mean, recognize this. If I told you, hey, I
• 24:09
  Speaker 2: have a physical health element, I have these kidney stones
• 24:13
  Speaker 2: or whatever, I have liver cancer, you and be like, well,
• 24:17
  Speaker 2: you deserve it, it's all correctly, Oh that's your fault,
• 24:21
  Speaker 2: you know, Like it would be like more like, oh
• 24:22
  Speaker 2: my god, what are you gonna do about it? How's
• 24:25
  Speaker 2: that treatment going? Hey? You know, maybe you shouldn't eat
• 24:28
  Speaker 2: that or whatever, Like I know you should, I know,
• 24:30
  Speaker 2: you love cheese, Susan, but I'm just reminding you that
• 24:35
  Speaker 2: you told me you didn't want to eat it anymore,
• 24:36
  Speaker 2: you know, or whatever? Like, what does support really look like?
• 24:39
  Speaker 2: And the way we treat physical health versus mental health
• 24:44
  Speaker 2: is starkly different, it is.
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: Let's talk about this doctor and how patriarchy just really
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: protected him for years upon years and all of that.
• 24:58
  Speaker 2: I mean, one, he he was on probation, And did
• 25:02
  Speaker 2: you know when you're on probation when he operated on
• 25:04
  Speaker 2: my mom? When you're on probation, you don't have to
• 25:06
  Speaker 2: tell your patients you're on probation. You can do all
• 25:08
  Speaker 2: the same procedures.
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: What's the point? What's the point of being on probation?
• 25:12
  Speaker 2: Then it's some point. So he was on probation, he
• 25:15
  Speaker 2: was negligent in terms of killing my mom, my mother,
• 25:19
  Speaker 2: he didn't have malpractice insurance, walked away without paying my
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: family that he doesn't have his license for two years,
• 25:26
  Speaker 2: he comes back to practice, and then he's on probation
• 25:29
  Speaker 2: until he dies. What is the point of probation?
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: Yeah?
• 25:35
  Speaker 2: Right, if your patients actually have no idea, like they
• 25:37
  Speaker 2: can't make a different decision. This is nineteen ninety six.
• 25:40
  Speaker 2: This is before Google, you know, this is before that
• 25:43
  Speaker 2: there was something that of a database that you could
• 25:45
  Speaker 2: look up people's status. Right But even now, even now
• 25:50
  Speaker 2: with all the access to information we have, we just
• 25:53
  Speaker 2: consume cat videos, you know what I mean, Like we're
• 25:55
  Speaker 2: not actually using it to actually question am I safe
• 25:59
  Speaker 2: or not? Because there's so much built in with you
• 26:02
  Speaker 2: are a white male doctor, you're practicing this should be
• 26:06
  Speaker 2: safe when she was walking in a trap.
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: Exactly, and he is something that you can point to
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: and be like, this is how misogyny creates evil in
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: the world, because I mean, he also made a ridiculously
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: awful call with the waiting fourteen minutes and will never
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: know if it was pride, if it was because he
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: knew he was on probation, if it was all of it.
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: But it's like burious on them. Do we get like
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: clear cut examples of like see misogyny's evil That he
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: was praying on women who were already being preyed upon
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: by a society that was driven by beauty, and he
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: knew that they wouldn't have the tools or the access
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: to find better doctors to look into his practice to whatever,
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: and that they desperately wanted something and he's a predator.
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: That's what we call a predator.
• 27:06
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean he had nineteen losses against him, right,
• 27:09
  Speaker 2: he had already named several women's breasts and bodies. But
• 27:15
  Speaker 2: besides that, the institution allowed him to keep practicing. So
• 27:20
  Speaker 2: then we can look at the California Medical Board. Well,
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: who's on the board actually more doctors, insurance lobbying groups,
• 27:25
  Speaker 2: you know, like it's just like who is being protected here?
• 27:30
  Speaker 2: And then there's another thing too, which is at the
• 27:34
  Speaker 2: time medical malpractice cats in California, the value of your
• 27:38
  Speaker 2: life if you died from medical malpractices the quarter million
• 27:41
  Speaker 2: dollars irregardless of you're, how old you were, your lifetime earnings.
• 27:46
  Speaker 2: And so what that did is it meant that lawyers
• 27:49
  Speaker 2: had less of incentive to represent you and bad Apple
• 27:53
  Speaker 2: doctors had less of an incentive to be accountable. And
• 27:57
  Speaker 2: this value of your life was in place since nineteen
• 28:01
  Speaker 2: seventy five and never change, It never adjusted to inflation.
• 28:05
  Speaker 2: So when my mom dies in nineteen ninety six, her
• 28:07
  Speaker 2: value to her life is still two hundred and fifty k.
• 28:10
  Speaker 2: And so you know, when I was trying to aventure
• 28:12
  Speaker 2: my mother's death and I was trying to track down
• 28:14
  Speaker 2: the plastic surgeon, and I found out he died. I
• 28:20
  Speaker 2: decided to help change this law, and two years ago
• 28:24
  Speaker 2: eighty thirty five passed and it's adjusting to inflation to
• 28:28
  Speaker 2: one point three million dollars, right, I mean overall compared
• 28:31
  Speaker 2: to other states, that's still really low. But it's about
• 28:33
  Speaker 2: changing the systemic incentives or for actors to change, because
• 28:38
  Speaker 2: I can't just say like, hey, you hurt people, you
• 28:40
  Speaker 2: should just stop being mean, you know, like that, I
• 28:44
  Speaker 2: can't politely ask and someone's like, oh my god, that's
• 28:47
  Speaker 2: a great idea, I will, you know, Like, it's like
• 28:49
  Speaker 2: we need to also systematically change the incentives so that
• 28:53
  Speaker 2: people behave differently. And so for me, I'm just like, Okay,
• 28:57
  Speaker 2: I can be sad about my mother's death, but what
• 29:00
  Speaker 2: am I going to do about it? And how is
• 29:01
  Speaker 2: that going to impact other low income BIPOP women who
• 29:04
  Speaker 2: aren't going to be represented by lawyers?
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: Right?
• 29:07
  Speaker 2: So that's how I avenged my mother's death.
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: I mean, yes, hell, yes, I don't even have like
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: a follow up point to that. Yeah. No, that's exactly
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: how you fight the system, because you're right, it's like,
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: you know, the doctor was terrible, but forget the doctor.
• 29:23
  Speaker 1: The entire operation was terrible, and I mean, you know,
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: my mother says some shit, But on Sunday she did
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: warn us against like she's like, you have to really
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: think about who was paying for that medical study, because
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: the medical study will just follow the money. And it's like,
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: I'll tell you whatever you need to be told, now,
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: mind you. I was talking about a Gray's Anatomy plot
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: point I was convinced, I'm all in yeah. I was
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: talking about how Meredith Gray was trying to solve Alzheimer's
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: and she found out that they had to reroute the
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: way that they were going to solve it. And Catherine Webber,
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: who I believe should just be done, she said, no,
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: we told the investors we were going through the brain.
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: You can't go through the stomach or the liver or whatever.
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: Fake science was happening on Grey's Anatomy. And Meredith was like,
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: just tell them we've changed our mind. And she's like, no,
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: that's not how investors work. And I brought this up
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: when like the Elizabeth Holmes stuff all went down to
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: when I was like, why does a Texas type oil
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: tycoon get to tell me how medicine works? Just because
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: he made a lot of money in oil. So yeah,
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: my mom was like, you really have to think about it,
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: because misogyny's best friend is capitalism, and it does drive
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: the type of care that we receive, the type of
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: representation we receive, and all of it. I know.
• 30:57
  Speaker 2: I was like, I was like mic drop, Yeah, I mean, yeah, massogyny, money.
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: Misogyny money. Who knew. I knew, and you knew because
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: you say it right away in the show. You're like,
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: I had never considered things like capitalism and misogyny and
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: all of it. I was like, yeah, me either. Until
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: I was twenty eight and just really pissed off.
• 31:17
  Speaker 2: Right, it's so interesting. Oh well, I just wanted to say, like,
• 31:21
  Speaker 2: when I was a little kid, I the world was
• 31:24
  Speaker 2: my oyster. I thought I could be anything I wanted
• 31:27
  Speaker 2: to be. I'm like, why are all these feminists so angry?
• 31:30
  Speaker 2: Like gosh, you guys must have a chip on your shoulder.
• 31:33
  Speaker 2: And then as I got older and I was like,
• 31:35
  Speaker 2: oh my god, this is totally messed up. Like I
• 31:39
  Speaker 2: was living in my girl scout world, a total empowerment
• 31:42
  Speaker 2: and I'm glad I got to be in that bubble
• 31:44
  Speaker 2: as long as I could. But then college post college,
• 31:48
  Speaker 2: I was like, oh, now I get why everyone's so angry. Yeah, right,
• 31:54
  Speaker 2: like and that religion and big bisiness can make decisions
• 31:58
  Speaker 2: about women's bodies.
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: Yeah, oh, also based just on money and what they
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: feel like that day, I it's well, And we talked
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: about it on one of our Taylor's Swift episodes about
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: the Tortured Poets Department. My friend brought up a point
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: that like literally rapped me to my core, and I
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: think I still think about it late at night where
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: she goes because I talk about how as women in society,
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: we keep being told that we're safe and everything's fine
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: and like everything's working out our way and like people
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: are looking out for us and it's okay even though
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: everything's our fault. But I was also never afforded the
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: luxury of like feeling safe. And then my friend doubles
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: down on that and goes, yeah, I mean every time
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: we played like we were witches or princesses or empowered
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: or whatever, it was make believe, and I was like,
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: it was what she goes, It was us just playing pretend.
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: And then we grew up one day and where is
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: my library with the with the ladder that goes from
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: one side of the room to the other, and it's like, oh,
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: that's right, that was made up.
• 33:11
  Speaker 2: Wait are you talking about Bell from Beating the Beast?
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: Of course I am. It's because I'm reading a book
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: about a woman who gave up being and beauty and
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: the beast for a litany of abusive man reason and
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: so she's right here on my mind. Yeah. But yeah,
• 33:30
  Speaker 1: it's one of those things where it's like every time
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: I felt like I could do it all, I was
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: capable of being anything or whatever, it was in this
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: very curted kind of designed way, like girl Scouts, where
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: it's like I'm being fed that message even though everything
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: around me would say the contrary.
• 33:52
  Speaker 2: Well, I mean, at the end of the day, it's like,
• 33:54
  Speaker 2: if you want to have your Bell fantasy, you have
• 33:57
  Speaker 2: to be financially independent, you know. And then so it's
• 34:00
  Speaker 2: like we're getting the negative messaging okay, okay, And then
• 34:02
  Speaker 2: it's like I have to consciously repeat positive messages to myself,
• 34:07
  Speaker 2: Like when I'm driving, I'm like Susan, it's time for
• 34:09
  Speaker 2: self talk time, you know, because if I don't really
• 34:14
  Speaker 2: take control of that narrative, the dominant narrative will always
• 34:17
  Speaker 2: penetrate literally literally right. So it's like we have to
• 34:21
  Speaker 2: be very conscientious of the thought set are dominating our
• 34:25
  Speaker 2: brain so that we can transform our reality. It actually
• 34:28
  Speaker 2: can be better, but we have to also acknowledge the
• 34:32
  Speaker 2: system in which we're working in was not designed for us.
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: No, yeah, and exactly, it's like the self talk is
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: so important, and I'm so glad that you brought that
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: up because it's a good thing that we didn't meet
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: like I'm gonna say last summer, but it was probably
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: more recent and it was this past summer. But like
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: when I was just so ingrained in Okay, even if
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: I have money, I'm a woman, so I'm not doning
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: eating my money to the right place or I'm not
• 35:02
  Speaker 1: doing the right stuff with it. And like all of
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: the media and all of the TikTok and all of
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: the comments on my body or my brain or what
• 35:09
  Speaker 1: I was capable of, and I was just such in
• 35:14
  Speaker 1: a dark place. And then one day I was like,
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: I have to just decide that when I enjoy something,
• 35:21
  Speaker 1: I enjoy something, and I get to do that, like
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: I to get to have joy and get to have
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: a break from us because it's hard. Yeah, it's totally hard.
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: I I feel like I had derived so much of
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: my worthiness from my body, and because I have not
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: lost another twenty pounds to be in the like Helpy
• 35:44
  Speaker 1: BMI index, that I was worthless or that like I
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: could do more, I could try harder, you know, more
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: and more and more and more more. And I've been
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: trying to cultivate this practice where at night I hold
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: onto my belly that when I'm trying to go sleep,
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: and I go, where was.
• 36:03
  Speaker 2: My deepest joy today? When did I actually really feel
• 36:06
  Speaker 2: that joy instead of the anxiety and the worrying and
• 36:09
  Speaker 2: the chronic shooting on myself like, oh, I should have
• 36:12
  Speaker 2: done that, I should I should have done this. And
• 36:15
  Speaker 2: when I when I can actually lock down on the
• 36:17
  Speaker 2: moment that brought me the most joy today, I go, Susan,
• 36:23
  Speaker 2: you can give that more to yourself during this week,
• 36:27
  Speaker 2: during this weekend. What kind of time block do you
• 36:29
  Speaker 2: want to put on your calendar so you get more
• 36:32
  Speaker 2: of that? And you know, one of my joys is
• 36:34
  Speaker 2: cleaning and clearing out clutter. And when I get to
• 36:37
  Speaker 2: throw it away or don't get it, I feel so
• 36:41
  Speaker 2: good and I'm like, Susan, that's weird, but you can
• 36:45
  Speaker 2: do more of that, you know, like there's there's more
• 36:48
  Speaker 2: to declutter. And so even though it's like media wise,
• 36:52
  Speaker 2: I should think drinking a glass of rose should make
• 36:55
  Speaker 2: me feel really joyful, and I'm like, actually, it doesn't
• 36:58
  Speaker 2: look like. Actually, just like taking a trunk load of
• 37:03
  Speaker 2: stuff to Goodwill makes me feel so good, I can
• 37:08
  Speaker 2: have more of that. I will have more of that.
• 37:11
  Speaker 2: Or having really beautiful, deep vulnerable conversations with a girlfriend
• 37:16
  Speaker 2: at a cafe and really holding her in her grief
• 37:18
  Speaker 2: while her because her mother just passed away, and giving
• 37:20
  Speaker 2: her extra chautaque mushrooms that I had right and just
• 37:23
  Speaker 2: holding space for her. I felt really good in that moment. Cool,
• 37:27
  Speaker 2: Who's my friend date next week? Allow myself, like I
• 37:30
  Speaker 2: need to allow myself the space to reflect what is
• 37:33
  Speaker 2: bringing me joy, and then second, keep feeding myself that No.
• 37:39
  Speaker 1: I love that. That's so important because my new strategy
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: has been tracking the times I said no to something
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: that I knew I wasn't going to want to do.
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: The latest being on Sunday, I had weird food things
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: and we were at the zoo with my nephew, and
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: everything that I had eaten that day tasted weird I
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: didn't like it, and by the time it was time
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: for my sister to order us dinner, my body had
• 38:07
  Speaker 1: been like, we're done with food today. It's betrayed us
• 38:10
  Speaker 1: one too many times. And usually this would send me
• 38:13
  Speaker 1: into a spiral, because again, food is attached to love,
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: It's attached to a lot of feelines, and you don't
• 38:19
  Speaker 1: always get to say no to food when someone else
• 38:22
  Speaker 1: is providing it.
• 38:22
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: I had to choke down a lot of angel food
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: cake as a kid because someone made it for my
• 38:29
  Speaker 1: birthday and no one cared that I didn't like it.
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: So I'm just sitting in the car and we're driving,
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: and the entire drive home all I can think about
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: is like, how am I getting out of eating something?
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: And I'm like envisioning myself being like, well, just order
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: fajidas and take two bites of your fajidas, and then
• 38:47
  Speaker 1: I'm like no, Like the whole thought of eating is
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: disgusting at this point, and I'm just like racking my brain.
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: We pull into the restaurant so my sister can place
• 38:56
  Speaker 1: the pickup order and she just looks at me and
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: she goes, well, what do you want? And I was like,
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: you know what, I can't do it today. And I
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: was like, food is done for me today. I go,
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: I'm going to eat something really plain before my recording,
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: so my stomach's like not in a jumble while I'm
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: trying to work, and I just got in a oh okay.
• 39:17
  Speaker 1: And then they went in and they ordered their own food,
• 39:20
  Speaker 1: and that was beautiful in it of itself. But so
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: often I've heard, well, now I can't eat because you're
• 39:26
  Speaker 1: not eating. Why why eat something? Oh, now, we're all
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: just going to be awkward. And what ended up happening
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: is my mother and my brother in law and my
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: sister got to eat their Mexican food. And I was
• 39:39
  Speaker 1: the person who's just like hun out with my nephew,
• 39:42
  Speaker 1: so he wasn't so he was busy because he's a toddler.
• 39:46
  Speaker 1: And they got to actually eat and visit with one another.
• 39:49
  Speaker 1: So I'm an American hero, is what I'm saying. Thank
• 39:52
  Speaker 1: goodness for my disorder to eating.
• 39:55
  Speaker 2: But it's so fascinating, like all of this spiraling in
• 39:59
  Speaker 2: your like all of the mind share that is taken
• 40:03
  Speaker 2: up when we think, when I am not going to
• 40:06
  Speaker 2: go with the group harmony, I have ruined things. My God,
• 40:10
  Speaker 2: I'm gonna get this judgment. Oh, all this blowback because
• 40:13
  Speaker 2: in the past we have done that blowback, right, so
• 40:16
  Speaker 2: it's it's coming from a place of real experience. And
• 40:19
  Speaker 2: yet when you finally were able to flex that muscle
• 40:22
  Speaker 2: of like, actually this is my no, it wasn't a
• 40:25
  Speaker 2: big deal.
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: It wasn't a big deal.
• 40:27
  Speaker 2: But it was a big deal in the brain. And
• 40:29
  Speaker 2: that is still reality, right, that still is your energy
• 40:33
  Speaker 2: and like the fear, right, But the question is, give
• 40:35
  Speaker 2: me to the core of that fear, Like what did
• 40:37
  Speaker 2: you think, Like what is the fear?
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: I think, for me, the fear because it's so much
• 40:47
  Speaker 1: to do with my mom and my sister and our dynamic.
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: I think at that point it was like we had
• 40:53
  Speaker 1: the perfect day. My sister kept re like kept speaking
• 40:57
  Speaker 1: for my nephew because he's a toddler who can't speak,
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: so like he'd smile or giggle or something, and she'd
• 41:02
  Speaker 1: be like, yeah, I'm just out with my three best gals.
• 41:06
  Speaker 1: And then all of a sudden, like Aunt Nanny was
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: gonna be like one of the best gals. Like, all
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: of a sudden, like Aunt Nannie's right. Aunt Nanny's just
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: trying to like I've been told a lot as a kid,
• 41:17
  Speaker 1: like what are you just seeking attention? What are you
• 41:20
  Speaker 1: being dramatic about today? Like why does everything have to
• 41:24
  Speaker 1: be about you all the time? And it's like, I
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: literally just don't want to put three fried beans in
• 41:29
  Speaker 1: my mouth today. Everything is disgusting. Like I'm still doing
• 41:32
  Speaker 1: the same food bullshit days later. I just get into
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: these zones where I eat to function, but not because
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: I'm liking it. So it's literally like what's going to
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: fill me up and go down the easiest? Because I
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: can't with food right now. And I've tried to be
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: so honest with my family about like I have weird
• 41:51
  Speaker 1: food stuff and even like take it a step further
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: to be like, here's an example of why I might
• 41:57
  Speaker 1: have weird food stuff, and because it like delves into
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: our past or something, someone actually has to be like,
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: that's not why you would have weird food. Stop stop it.
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: I feel proud of you.
• 42:11
  Speaker 2: I feel proud of you that you honored your body.
• 42:14
  Speaker 2: Thank you. No, because it's hard to do. It's hard
• 42:17
  Speaker 2: to break with the family harmony. And at the end
• 42:20
  Speaker 2: of the day, this is about do I belong or
• 42:22
  Speaker 2: do I not belong? Right and for you to keep
• 42:27
  Speaker 2: choosing you. It's some there's friction there, but there's also
• 42:32
  Speaker 2: power for you as you keep flexing that muscle, because
• 42:35
  Speaker 2: your body will be like, thank you, thank you so much, Natalie,
• 42:40
  Speaker 2: thank you for listening. Right, And then the next day
• 42:43
  Speaker 2: you get stronger. The next day you get stronger, and
• 42:44
  Speaker 2: you give your body what it needs so that you
• 42:47
  Speaker 2: can actually live your best life.
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: Well, thank you.
• 42:51
  Speaker 2: I'm proud of you.
• 42:52
  Speaker 1: Listen. I'm proud of you, and I'm proud to know you.
• 42:56
  Speaker 1: Because you also got put into a position a lot
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: where you were hearing a lot of no's, a lot
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: of like put it away, no one once sat brought
• 43:06
  Speaker 1: up all of it, and you found a way to
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: honor this. I don't want to say absence, but you
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: were feeling so much like untethered grief, and you were like,
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: I have to process this too, I like deserve to
• 43:21
  Speaker 1: process this, and you kept being told that you weren't.
• 43:26
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, I mean like I was always like, hey, guys,
• 43:28
  Speaker 2: do you have any memories of Ma, Like can you
• 43:31
  Speaker 2: tell me anything about what happened on her last day?
• 43:33
  Speaker 2: And everyone's like, you're living in the past. You know,
• 43:36
  Speaker 2: you needn't let it go and and I abide it.
• 43:40
  Speaker 2: I obeyed the tribe. And then the question is is
• 43:44
  Speaker 2: what did it get me? And it led me without
• 43:47
  Speaker 2: a lot of closure, and so on the brink of motherhood.
• 43:50
  Speaker 2: I was like, you know, I can't be come a
• 43:52
  Speaker 2: mom find out nowhere myself and if you're not gonna talk,
• 43:55
  Speaker 2: I'm gonna go figure it out. So that's why I
• 43:57
  Speaker 2: tracked down the plastic surgeon I listed to help us Chandler's.
• 44:01
  Speaker 2: I read thousands of pages of depositions. I went back
• 44:03
  Speaker 2: to Beetna on several times, and every time I learned
• 44:05
  Speaker 2: something new, I put it on stage in a one
• 44:09
  Speaker 2: woman's show for me to process in real real time
• 44:13
  Speaker 2: why is even going on?
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: Right?
• 44:16
  Speaker 2: And the iteration of that art became eventually the one
• 44:19
  Speaker 2: woman's show One hundred and forty Pounds of Beauty killed
• 44:21
  Speaker 2: my mother, and but it was cathartic for me. It
• 44:24
  Speaker 2: was a way for me to heal because that's my family.
• 44:28
  Speaker 2: Was like they put their stack in the ground, and
• 44:29
  Speaker 2: I was like, you know what, I'm I'm an adult
• 44:31
  Speaker 2: know I'm gonna put mine.
• 44:32
  Speaker 1: In Yeah, And it's so empowering. Also, I kind of
• 44:36
  Speaker 1: want to talk about the spirit channeling.
• 44:38
  Speaker 2: Okay, go for it.
• 44:40
  Speaker 1: It's so cool. It was one of my favorite parts
• 44:43
  Speaker 1: of your show because you got it was like you
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: got all the answers that you needed from your mom
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: in that scene and she was able to communicate directly
• 44:54
  Speaker 1: to you. I fully believe that my grandmother haunts me,
• 44:58
  Speaker 1: and I've asked family members before. I'm like, Hi, does
• 45:01
  Speaker 1: anyone else smell grandma peck smoke when you're like really stressed,
• 45:06
  Speaker 1: or like really sad, or maybe you're just having a
• 45:09
  Speaker 1: normal day, and then all of a sudden, you're like grandma.
• 45:12
  Speaker 1: And my aunts and my cousins have been like, no,
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: why are you keeping grandmother from a beautiful afterlife by
• 45:22
  Speaker 1: needing her attention as an adult? And I was like,
• 45:25
  Speaker 1: and finally my one aunt did go, well, Nenly, maybe
• 45:29
  Speaker 1: she's checking in on you because you're the only one
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: of us who lives alone, Like you're the independent granddaughter
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: who's kind of always making it your own way. You
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: live the furthest away, so she just pops in on you.
• 45:42
  Speaker 1: She's like, that's really nice. Pick a different word that
• 45:45
  Speaker 1: isn't haunt.
• 45:46
  Speaker 2: Hey, that's a good reframe, right, because and also I
• 45:49
  Speaker 2: like that aunt right, because the other ones are a
• 45:52
  Speaker 2: blaming right or making it your fault, and then there's
• 45:55
  Speaker 2: another one being like, wow, but what if it's coming
• 45:57
  Speaker 2: from a place of love?
• 45:58
  Speaker 1: Yeah? Yeah, because I think I had even self talked
• 46:02
  Speaker 1: my way into like, oh, I disappointed Grandma again. So
• 46:05
  Speaker 1: she had to like blow cigarette smoke in my face
• 46:08
  Speaker 1: to let me know I was doing a bad job.
• 46:11
  Speaker 1: And my aunt was like, why does that have to
• 46:13
  Speaker 1: be it? Why are you always doing a bad job? Like, yeah,
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: my mom and my aunt have done some real healing
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: on how bilchore. I had to reframe my brain. My
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: mother no longer lets me call myself a loser or
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: a mistake baby or like hers her lost child. I
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: was like, you know, I'm just your mess kid, and
• 46:32
  Speaker 1: she's like, no, you're my kid who has decided that
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: you live a life that you want to live. And
• 46:38
  Speaker 1: that's beautiful.
• 46:39
  Speaker 2: How sweet that you have a mother that speaks to
• 46:42
  Speaker 2: you in that way.
• 46:43
  Speaker 1: I know it took a while. It took until we
• 46:46
  Speaker 1: were thirty five. I was thirty five. She's not the
• 46:48
  Speaker 1: same age as me. That would be weird, but yeah,
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: but I loved the spirit channeling and I loved that
• 46:56
  Speaker 1: it was already ingrained in your culture, so it was
• 46:59
  Speaker 1: something natural that you would be drawn too. Because I
• 47:02
  Speaker 1: love stuff like that, because we should be able to
• 47:06
  Speaker 1: still learn through our ancestors and through our guides like that.
• 47:12
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I grew up with spirit channeling. My
• 47:15
  Speaker 2: father used to spirit channel He's extremely introverted, never wants
• 47:19
  Speaker 2: to be the center of attention, but there were moments
• 47:21
  Speaker 2: in my childhood where it would happen and we would
• 47:23
  Speaker 2: form a circle around him and hold space and see
• 47:26
  Speaker 2: what messages he had to bring from the afterlife. And
• 47:31
  Speaker 2: it's throughout my book that my mother comes to affirm
• 47:35
  Speaker 2: what I'm doing and encourage me to keep going. She
• 47:38
  Speaker 2: makes a visit to me. But also there is psychic Cindy,
• 47:42
  Speaker 2: there's Uncle number nine. And it's through these mediums that
• 47:48
  Speaker 2: I get clues on what to do next. And I
• 47:50
  Speaker 2: will say for the record to everyone out there who's like,
• 47:52
  Speaker 2: m h, yeah, whatever, really is that if you were
• 47:56
  Speaker 2: ever in a position to speak to a medium, go
• 48:00
  Speaker 2: confirm some information so you don't spend like that hour
• 48:04
  Speaker 2: like wasting away doubting, but you can with like good
• 48:08
  Speaker 2: faith know what they're saying is true and that you're
• 48:10
  Speaker 2: getting a message from the other side. So instead of saying, like, oh,
• 48:13
  Speaker 2: my God, is that my mother there? Does she love me?
• 48:16
  Speaker 2: You know, like, hey, calm, people will play to your emotions.
• 48:20
  Speaker 2: But if you can ask some specific questions, Hey, I'm
• 48:24
  Speaker 2: my twentieth birthday, what happened? What was the weird thing
• 48:28
  Speaker 2: that happened? Right? If you can ask specific things that
• 48:30
  Speaker 2: only specific that only that person would know. Or to
• 48:33
  Speaker 2: my grandmother, she had said what my brother's favorite soup
• 48:36
  Speaker 2: was that she made for him. It's not Thu guys okay,
• 48:39
  Speaker 2: it's a very specific Chinese Vietnamese soup that she would
• 48:43
  Speaker 2: make for him, you know. And it was like, when
• 48:45
  Speaker 2: I get messages like that that confirm the other that
• 48:48
  Speaker 2: they're on the other side, And I don't think this
• 48:50
  Speaker 2: person's just manipulating me, right, Like we're human.
• 48:53
  Speaker 1: I get it.
• 48:54
  Speaker 2: There's there's there's people who manipulate out there, and that's fine, right,
• 48:57
  Speaker 2: that's their profession. But go find the people who are
• 49:01
  Speaker 2: authentic and have the gift and if you can find
• 49:04
  Speaker 2: that person, validate their gift. Take that time to receive
• 49:10
  Speaker 2: the message on the other side.
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and hopefully I have trained Team Tolerator to lean
• 49:15
  Speaker 1: into the wo woo and the spiritualism and things like that.
• 49:19
  Speaker 1: We just interviewed my good friend, the Buffalo medium herself, Aaron,
• 49:26
  Speaker 1: and we talked about witchcraft and our experiences with like
• 49:30
  Speaker 1: dabbling in the craft and all of it. And it's
• 49:33
  Speaker 1: just one of those things where it's like anything that
• 49:35
  Speaker 1: makes you feel closer to your loved ones or to
• 49:38
  Speaker 1: nature or to the literal universe that you're making an
• 49:43
  Speaker 1: impact on, run with it.
• 49:46
  Speaker 2: I think as hums, we all want to be seen,
• 49:50
  Speaker 2: safe and celebrated. If you can fill that emptiness inside
• 49:56
  Speaker 2: of you with the knowing of what you need to know,
• 49:59
  Speaker 2: then that is beautiful, right. And I mean, look, people
• 50:02
  Speaker 2: are consuming very toxic things all the time. What if
• 50:06
  Speaker 2: you consumed a message that made you feel complete?
• 50:10
  Speaker 1: Yeah? I mean, will I be watching three hours worth
• 50:13
  Speaker 1: of Love Is Blind tomorrow? Absolutely all?
• 50:17
  Speaker 2: You know what makes you whole? Girl, You know what
• 50:19
  Speaker 2: makes you whole?
• 50:21
  Speaker 1: But will I also tune myself up to my cat
• 50:26
  Speaker 1: and see if she llet on my chest and we
• 50:28
  Speaker 1: can meditate that way together?
• 50:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah?
• 50:30
  Speaker 1: I will, because yeah, you're right so often And I
• 50:35
  Speaker 1: think part of the reason I started meditating and actually
• 50:38
  Speaker 1: looking at my spiritual impact on the world is because
• 50:43
  Speaker 1: I was so sick of Christianity and Catholicism asking me
• 50:49
  Speaker 1: to abide by them or make good by them or
• 50:53
  Speaker 1: impress them. And I was like, I want this to
• 50:56
  Speaker 1: be mine, actually, and I was sick of the constant
• 51:00
  Speaker 1: seeking of external validation, which I think is I think
• 51:07
  Speaker 1: external like that need the constant chasing to be better,
• 51:12
  Speaker 1: to do better, to get someone to tell you, hey,
• 51:14
  Speaker 1: you're doing a great job. Like that's a tool that
• 51:18
  Speaker 1: capitalism and misogyny has just preyed upon forever.
• 51:23
  Speaker 2: I feel like you've just been with me. Even the
• 51:25
  Speaker 2: last three months I've been. I've been I've been like
• 51:28
  Speaker 2: kind of down with myself, like going like oh my god,
• 51:31
  Speaker 2: Like why didn't you get on this bestseller list? Why
• 51:34
  Speaker 2: aren't you longlisted for this? Like oh my god, you know,
• 51:37
  Speaker 2: and it's just like on and on, and I'm like, Wow,
• 51:40
  Speaker 2: this really like sucks the air out of the room.
• 51:42
  Speaker 2: Because there's a part of the critical mind that has
• 51:47
  Speaker 2: pushed me, that has helped me with my ambitious achievements. Okay,
• 51:51
  Speaker 2: but then it's like there's also part of that that's debilitating.
• 51:54
  Speaker 2: It makes me feel small, makes me paralyzed, makes me
• 51:58
  Speaker 2: just like give up, right, And I'm just like, but why?
• 52:02
  Speaker 2: And I kept telling my girlfriend, I'm like, I'm just
• 52:05
  Speaker 2: not productive enough. And I heard myself say that many
• 52:09
  Speaker 2: times and I was like, whew, what is that like?
• 52:13
  Speaker 2: Because then my girlfriend was like, Susan, You're the most
• 52:16
  Speaker 2: productive person I know, so what does that make me? Oh?
• 52:19
  Speaker 2: And right when she said that, I was like, oh
• 52:21
  Speaker 2: my god, you know this is not an knocked on you.
• 52:23
  Speaker 2: But then I was like, oh shit, it is so relative.
• 52:26
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 52:27
  Speaker 2: And also, when is anything enough? What gold star am
• 52:33
  Speaker 2: I waiting for?
• 52:34
  Speaker 1: I'd love to know. I'd love to know when enough
• 52:37
  Speaker 1: is enough because I now today I'm in a whole
• 52:41
  Speaker 1: new mind space. But not I mean, it was a
• 52:44
  Speaker 1: week from Monday. So last Monday I had a meltdown.
• 52:47
  Speaker 1: I had a cry all day, take myself to the
• 52:50
  Speaker 1: bed meltdown because my father and I got into a
• 52:54
  Speaker 1: disagreement and he literally said, I've worked so hard for
• 52:59
  Speaker 1: my life to be this nice and blah blah blah,
• 53:03
  Speaker 1: and he was acting like I was a direct upfront
• 53:06
  Speaker 1: to this nice life that he had built. And you know,
• 53:09
  Speaker 1: I've been going through it since the pandemic, spiritually, financially,
• 53:14
  Speaker 1: mentally all of it. And I said, well, Dad, sometimes
• 53:19
  Speaker 1: you work really hard and you look around and your
• 53:21
  Speaker 1: life's a fucking mess. So then what? And then I
• 53:25
  Speaker 1: just marched upstairs to have the rest of my day
• 53:27
  Speaker 1: be spent screaming to my best friend on the phone
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: and in tears because I'm like, so, then what what
• 53:32
  Speaker 1: if I worked really hard and I look around and
• 53:35
  Speaker 1: I'm like, oh shit, disaster? What now?
• 53:38
  Speaker 2: Yeah? Yeah, I think it's I've been trying to really
• 53:42
  Speaker 2: be mindful of the things I feed into my brain.
• 53:45
  Speaker 2: And I got to tell you when I when I
• 53:47
  Speaker 2: have too much time to scroll on Instagram, no bueno, dude, Like,
• 53:51
  Speaker 2: so no bueno, because it's like the comparison is endless,
• 53:55
  Speaker 2: and there's like and there's no there's no finish line,
• 53:58
  Speaker 2: there's no how to do we get to a place
• 54:01
  Speaker 2: where we know that we can realize that we make
• 54:04
  Speaker 2: our own rules and we're actually we are creating those rules,
• 54:06
  Speaker 2: and we're actually saying we're the marker of saying we
• 54:09
  Speaker 2: did it or we didn't do it right. And and
• 54:12
  Speaker 2: that's just what I've been sitting and grappling with, which
• 54:14
  Speaker 2: is Susan, did you know you can rewrite the rules, Susan,
• 54:18
  Speaker 2: what are your values? Because I'm actually trying to measure
• 54:22
  Speaker 2: myself up against the patriarchy's values. And then I'm like,
• 54:27
  Speaker 2: I've fallen short. I'm not actually motivating, Like I'm not
• 54:30
  Speaker 2: motivated by it, but somehow I keep measuring myself by it.
• 54:34
  Speaker 2: I don't actually value it, and yet I have you
• 54:37
  Speaker 2: valuated my worthiness to this? And so I'm really I'm
• 54:40
  Speaker 2: trying to steer the ship like rewrote the Titanic right now.
• 54:45
  Speaker 2: I've been reading this book called The Way of Integrity
• 54:47
  Speaker 2: by Martha Beck, and it's just been transformational for me
• 54:51
  Speaker 2: to be like She's like, you want to be happy,
• 54:53
  Speaker 2: stop lying to yourself every type of lie, every type
• 54:56
  Speaker 2: of lie. All right, you hate your job? Great, you're
• 54:59
  Speaker 2: lying out of it, you know, like you do you like?
• 55:03
  Speaker 2: And one of the lies I kept telling myself was
• 55:05
  Speaker 2: like I'm just not measuring it up, like I suck,
• 55:08
  Speaker 2: Like why did I become an artist? Like I'm no
• 55:11
  Speaker 2: good at it, you know. And it's like she goes,
• 55:15
  Speaker 2: is that really true? Is that really really true? Give
• 55:18
  Speaker 2: me more evidence that that's completely one hundred percent true.
• 55:22
  Speaker 2: And then finally I go, well, I guess you know,
• 55:24
  Speaker 2: because I'm like, I'm worthless, I don't have any value all.
• 55:27
  Speaker 2: And then she's like is that really true? And I'm like, okay, well,
• 55:30
  Speaker 2: I guess some people write me notes that they liked
• 55:32
  Speaker 2: the book, you know, And it's just like I have
• 55:35
  Speaker 2: to go through this sing being like, who is the
• 55:37
  Speaker 2: dominant voice here in this entire narrative? And is it true?
• 55:42
  Speaker 2: And can I stop lying to myself? And can I
• 55:45
  Speaker 2: rewrite the rules of what my values are and then
• 55:48
  Speaker 2: measure myself against that each day.
• 55:51
  Speaker 1: I just finished, for the first time ever, a pilot
• 55:55
  Speaker 1: script for a television show, for the first time ever,
• 55:58
  Speaker 1: finished a draft of it. Even I went through and
• 56:00
  Speaker 1: read that draft to make edits like. I was like,
• 56:03
  Speaker 1: read what came out of my brain you, And I
• 56:09
  Speaker 1: was really proud of myself right up until I walked
• 56:11
  Speaker 1: out of my bedroom. Because this is how I asked
• 56:13
  Speaker 1: for feedback on my script from trusted friends who love me.
• 56:16
  Speaker 1: I'm like, hey, so, I uh, like it's no big deal,
• 56:21
  Speaker 1: like it no big deal, like and again like fitting
• 56:23
  Speaker 1: in wherever you can, because like, no big deal, no
• 56:26
  Speaker 1: one even cares about this, Like there's not a competition.
• 56:30
  Speaker 1: ABC is not calling me, Like, no pressure at all
• 56:33
  Speaker 1: on you. But like, if you wanted to read my
• 56:36
  Speaker 1: script and tell me parts that you liked in parts
• 56:38
  Speaker 1: that you didn't, again, real chill. If you just want
• 56:40
  Speaker 1: to read it for fun to make fun of me
• 56:42
  Speaker 1: behind my back, do that too. I don't care. Like
• 56:45
  Speaker 1: here it is, I'm just gonna add you to the
• 56:47
  Speaker 1: Google doc. Like I'm just gonna add you to the
• 56:50
  Speaker 1: Google doc. Okay, thank you. And it's that idea and
• 56:53
  Speaker 1: God to be a creative in the world of Instagram
• 56:58
  Speaker 1: and TikTok and all of it where it seems like,
• 57:02
  Speaker 1: oh they got that really big guest for their podcast.
• 57:05
  Speaker 1: Could never be me. Oh she finished a script and
• 57:09
  Speaker 1: it's an amazing idea, could never be me?
• 57:11
  Speaker 2: Like, ugh, it's it's quite daunting.
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: You know.
• 57:16
  Speaker 2: Did I get a million plays? You know? Do I
• 57:18
  Speaker 2: have a million subscribers, million, billion, bazillion? And And I've
• 57:22
  Speaker 2: been really trying to reroute that and say, Susan, follow
• 57:26
  Speaker 2: the fun.
• 57:27
  Speaker 1: Is it fun?
• 57:29
  Speaker 2: Then go follow it?
• 57:30
  Speaker 1: Right?
• 57:30
  Speaker 2: If not, don't do it. And my girlfriend was like
• 57:32
  Speaker 2: Susan in the words of Adrian and me Brown, small
• 57:37
  Speaker 2: is all in your small orbit this like make sure
• 57:41
  Speaker 2: that all the nodes are feeling strong and tight and
• 57:44
  Speaker 2: good here, because then it will it'll continue to ripple.
• 57:49
  Speaker 2: But if it's not feeling good in the here and now,
• 57:52
  Speaker 2: in the in the sphere of influence that we do have,
• 57:55
  Speaker 2: you got to check that, how are you lying to yourself?
• 57:58
  Speaker 1: Right?
• 57:59
  Speaker 2: So I I get overwhelmed with social media, and I've
• 58:05
  Speaker 2: been down on myself. And that's why I know have
• 58:08
  Speaker 2: I have an iPhone and so I had my husband
• 58:10
  Speaker 2: program it so that I can only be on Instagram
• 58:12
  Speaker 2: for fifteen minutes and then kicks me out and he
• 58:14
  Speaker 2: has to punch in a code. Takes tend time because
• 58:17
  Speaker 2: I can't control myself. That tool is designed for me
• 58:21
  Speaker 2: to keep getting more dopamine hits and scrolling. Right, But
• 58:24
  Speaker 2: the more time I spend on it, the smaller I feel.
• 58:26
  Speaker 2: So I know that, So now I have to like
• 58:29
  Speaker 2: hack that right, so I spend less time, but also
• 58:34
  Speaker 2: follow the fun. Just keep following the fun.
• 58:37
  Speaker 1: No, I love that. Follow the fun should be on
• 58:40
  Speaker 1: a T shirt and should be the way that people
• 58:46
  Speaker 1: live their lives. Because usually when I get petty and
• 58:50
  Speaker 1: jealous of like something, I'll just comment the something on
• 58:54
  Speaker 1: the post that's like really nice, like hey, this is
• 58:57
  Speaker 1: freaking awesome for you. Thank you, Oh my god, good
• 59:00
  Speaker 1: for you, girl, and like just be like and see
• 59:03
  Speaker 1: And that makes me a good Internet friend because it
• 59:07
  Speaker 1: doesn't need to spread from my nasty little insecure brain
• 59:11
  Speaker 1: today to the general internet.
• 59:15
  Speaker 2: Correct. And if you're consuming information that makes you feel
• 59:19
  Speaker 2: like a nasty little brain, mute, mm hmm, just mute,
• 59:24
  Speaker 2: just stop it. Just stop feeding yourself that Susan should
• 59:27
  Speaker 2: not eat cheese. Stop eating cheese, Susan one like, but
• 59:30
  Speaker 2: I don't want to nibble, and it's like, okay, then mute. Yeah,
• 59:34
  Speaker 2: you'll get a nibble somewhere else, right, But like, if
• 59:36
  Speaker 2: it's not serving you, redesign it, turn the steering wheel
• 59:43
  Speaker 2: and get to a place that it is going to
• 59:45
  Speaker 2: serve you. You got one life to live, baby.
• 59:48
  Speaker 1: You're so fucking cool. This is something new that I've
• 59:52
  Speaker 1: introduced into the podcast where at the middle I just
• 59:55
  Speaker 1: become or at the tail end, I become very flustered,
• 59:58
  Speaker 1: and then I'm like, I get to know the fucking
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 1: coolest people. What kind of life is this that I live?
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 2: You're cool?
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 1: Shut up me me. I didn't even walk the dog today,
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 1: even though I told her I would, like, hopefully I'm
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 1: doing it after this if it's not writing. But yeah, no,
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 1: I think I try to tell people this all the time.
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 1: It's like, listen, decentering men and misogyny and capitalism and
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 1: what not. Is it fun? No, No, route reroute redirect
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 1: all the fun. Yeah. But do I look at all
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 1: of the work that I did decentering all of that,
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 1: and is it fun now getting to actually create the
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 1: rules of the society that I myself want to live in. Yeah?
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 1: It eventually got to the point where it's like, oh,
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 1: I'll just make the choices that are good for me.
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 1: What about that?
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 2: Mm. I always love to wrap up by encouraging people
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 2: to live like they're mortal. You know. I think oftentimes
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 2: we would like, we're immortal. You' I'm not gonna get
• 1:01:12
  Speaker 2: We'll get to it later. Oh yeah, that does bother me.
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 2: But whatever. Later, there's always this later. And I think
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 2: what my mother's death has taught me, because she died
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 2: at thirty eight years old, is that we don't know
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 2: when we're gonna die. We don't know how much time
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 2: is left, so we should live like we're mortal. We
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 2: should be intentional about what we put into our brains.
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 2: The people we let into our orbit. And yes, the
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 2: the heat is we don't eat.
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 1: Well. You just moved us into our ending closing out
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 1: without even waiting for me to do it. So that's
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 1: your life. Lesson everybody, Susan, Do you have a manifestation
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 1: that you would like to share with the general collective?
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 2: Manifestation like something I want to have happened, or like
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 2: what I just want to energetically put out into the world.
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 1: It can be both. It could be either or.
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 2: Okay, I'm gonna live in the guessing and the world.
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 2: But my first manifestation is I'm a multi hyphenate storyteller.
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 2: And I've done theater, I've done book and one day, y'all,
• 1:02:17
  Speaker 2: I want you to see me on film and TV. Oh,
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 2: I want you to see me in tiny and big
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 2: screen and medium size screen. Okay, So that's my hope,
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 2: is that I can continue to tell stories and inspire
• 1:02:30
  Speaker 2: other people across mediums. Yeah, And the manifestation and what
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 2: I want to eminate for everyone here is this series
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 2: of affirmations that I read in the Way of Integrity
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 2: that I was so struck by that I started writing
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 2: over and over again on index cards, and I started
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 2: giving it out at the latest artist residency I was
• 1:02:51
  Speaker 2: at because I was like, this is my meditation for
• 1:02:54
  Speaker 2: me to know this, and I want all the listeners
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 2: out there to know this. It's called I called it
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 2: the honest truth. You are infinitely worthy, you are infinitely precious.
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 2: You have always been enough, you will always be enough.
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 2: There is no place you don't belong. You are lovable,
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 2: you are loved, you are loved.
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna cry, so I'm not adding in my own
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 1: manifestation that was several. Also, do you say out loud
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 1: once a day about the I want to see me
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 1: on big screen small screens, and I want to always
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 1: be telling stories because literally I manifest my future career
• 1:03:45
  Speaker 1: in comedy just by telling friends all the time. I'm
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 1: going to be on dropout TV one day and all
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 1: of those people are going to be my friend and
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 1: they're like, okay, Nadly, and I'm like, that's right, affirm that, Okay,
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 1: you up on that. You gotta say it out loud,
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 1: and I'm gonna.
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 2: Say it out loud. I'm gonna be on film and TV.
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 2: I am a film and TV star, I'm a media local,
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 2: a showrunner. I say it aloud, even if it's just
• 1:04:14
  Speaker 2: to my cat. I'm like, Penelope, isn't it gonna be
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 2: so fucking cool when I'm an improv star on Dropout
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 2: TV and.
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 1: It's you we get to watch me be on Dimension
• 1:04:24
  Speaker 1: twenty rolling dice and slaying dragons. That's gonna be so
• 1:04:28
  Speaker 1: fucking cool. Look at Brendan Lee Mulligan, our future friend,
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 1: and I just call people future.
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 2: Friends and you're like, Penelope, you agree, blink.
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's right, I'm okay. And that's how cats tell
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 1: you that they love you. They slow blink at you.
• 1:04:42
  Speaker 1: Did you know that?
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 2: No? I didn't know that.
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's how you can trick well. When my cat
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 1: was having like behavioral issues and I would have to
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 1: like trick her into being calm, you can slow blink
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 1: at cats to be like, you're safe, I love you,
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 1: everything's fine, to help them come down to it's very grounding.
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 2: I'll try that with my four year old sons.
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 1: Yeah, honestly, like I'll try that with my husband. Are
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 1: you grounded yet? You know? Oh my gosh, do you
• 1:05:15
  Speaker 1: know what's kind of grounding for my one and a
• 1:05:17
  Speaker 1: half year old nephew is had shoulders, knees and toes
• 1:05:20
  Speaker 1: because you have to touch all the parts of your body,
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 1: so all of a sudden, he can't be upset anymore
• 1:05:25
  Speaker 1: because he's accidentally grounding himself.
• 1:05:29
  Speaker 2: If only all of us adults did that.
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 1: Too, honestly, maybe I'll start. Maybe I'll like, I'll just
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 1: get real batship upset and just be like shoulders toes.
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 2: You know, I should just take over the pa at
• 1:05:44
  Speaker 2: the Whole Foods and be like, hey, there's a sail
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 2: on Aisle seven and you want your prime discount?
• 1:05:53
  Speaker 1: He yes, yeah, whatever you gotta do, deep breathing headshoulders,
• 1:06:03
  Speaker 1: kneeds and toes, watching copious amounts of reality television like
• 1:06:08
  Speaker 1: it's all bliss, It's all love. Susan, thank you so
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 1: much for being here today.
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 2: Thanks for having me make sure.
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 1: Everyone knows what I'm going to put into the show.
• 1:06:22
  Speaker 1: Notes with links, because I'd never make anything hard for anyone.
• 1:06:26
  Speaker 1: But where can they find you plug all of your
• 1:06:29
  Speaker 1: cool work?
• 1:06:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah? On Instagram at Susan lu l Ieu. I have
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 2: a podcast called Model Minority Moms. So at Model Minorty Moms.
• 1:06:38
  Speaker 2: If you go to my website Susan luet Me, you
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 2: can stream one hundred and forty pounds and of course,
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 2: of course I want you to buy my book, and
• 1:06:45
  Speaker 2: I do the audiobook. It was an Apple must listen
• 1:06:48
  Speaker 2: to the Month and Lemonada a book pick as well.
• 1:06:51
  Speaker 2: So please, if you need a good crime, if you
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 2: want to release all over yourself, get the medicare daughter.
• 1:07:01
  Speaker 1: You gotta. You have to because on Team Tolerator we
• 1:07:04
  Speaker 1: support women told stories, women's stories in all facets, shapes
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 1: and forms, and you have to do it. That's what
• 1:07:13
  Speaker 1: I said. It's in the show notes, like support your
• 1:07:16
  Speaker 1: local library if you have to, because that also helps authors.
• 1:07:20
  Speaker 1: I've heard.
• 1:07:22
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I think the more holds there on
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 2: the book, then the libraryll be like, oh we should
• 1:07:27
  Speaker 2: buy more.
• 1:07:27
  Speaker 1: So exactly help. Yeah, sure, do whatever you gotta do
• 1:07:32
  Speaker 1: and hold on. I'm wasn't going to do my own plugs.
• 1:07:37
  Speaker 1: I was just gonna end the episode. You can find
• 1:07:41
  Speaker 1: us at ben I've Tolerated pod on Instagram. You can
• 1:07:44
  Speaker 1: find me on Instagram at nalie k one two four
• 1:07:47
  Speaker 1: and on TikTok where all of those people are trying
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 1: to tell me that I'm not pretty to open my mouth.
• 1:07:52
  Speaker 1: So what if you got on there and argued with
• 1:07:55
  Speaker 1: them for me? If that grounded you or made you
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 1: feel better for that day. We're on YouTube at too
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 1: All the Men I've tolerated before, and Patreon, where you
• 1:08:03
  Speaker 1: can find blog posts, the Misogyny Meltdown, Anteam tolerator check ins,
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 1: and a whole lot of other bonus content. And remember, tolerators,
• 1:08:13
  Speaker 1: you don't have to smile through anything you're tolerating, including
• 1:08:17
  Speaker 1: a lot of messaging about your body that makes you
• 1:08:21
  Speaker 1: really fucking sad and confused. Smiles are for joy.