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I think it's actually still kind of hard for me to talk about but I am down to go there your Square chin makes me feel
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safe [Music]
00:00:12
what's our mission Penny the conversation starts on a horn field and
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Rural Illinois being a queer feminine child is hard there was sexual abuse and
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there was bullying but all that trauma came back into the most self-destructive era I've had my face and a plate of coke
00:00:30
then I discovered zuck's work I got HIV I put myself in so many really dangerous situations someone pulled a gun on you
00:00:36
take me into that movement the startup hairdresser and now your
00:00:41
name is on the Marquee of Radio City your schedule's been crazy how are you feeling great fall and at the same time
00:00:47
it really frustrated I just see so much transphobic garbage all over the place people really think that there's little
00:00:52
kids going to school as a boy and coming home as a girl this is really serious and so this has been a really hard time
00:00:58
and I think being a public figure who is constantly expected to be a ray of sunshine it can be challenging but why
00:01:04
I've been able to get to where I am is like because I think I'm resilient I have been able to sit with a lot of
00:01:10
Shame and like a lot of heartbreak and still be joyful can you talk about your trauma without becoming your trauma
00:01:18
do I get to ask the question of the next person yes and also they'll be turned into cards that people will play with their families and stuff so it can't be
00:01:25
what's the [ __ ] thing you've ever done Jonathan Van ness's Story is an
00:01:30
impossible Story coming from a place of sexual abuse sex work depression and
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despair to becoming the leader in his industry The Story You're about to hear is not
00:01:43
only hilarious because that is what Jonathan is but it's also the evidence that you might need that passion and
00:01:49
resilience will take you to the place that you want to go to this conversation is going to make you laugh it's one of
00:01:56
the more real conversations I've ever had with anyone on this podcast because Jonathan doesn't hold back his story is
00:02:03
heart-wrenching it is unthinkable and it's incredibly important
00:02:09
over the last couple of months there's been this huge rise in the conversation around trans rights and there's been a
00:02:15
huge rise in transphobia you've probably seen it today I'm going to ask him about that
00:02:21
where has it come from what is the truth and if you're someone like me that feels quite uncomfortable
00:02:28
about the narratives we're seeing in the world what can we do about it how can we help
00:02:34
it's time to have that uncomfortable conversation [Music]
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one of them yes where do we need to begin this conversation
00:02:49
to understand you the conversation starts on a corn field and Rural Illinois
00:02:57
in the late 80s darling what happens next oh
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um well I went to school my I come from a broadcasting family and like a family of journalists I grew up my mom uh
00:03:11
worked in the local newspaper and advertising and my dad worked in the TV station uh so that's kind of where it
00:03:18
started I was born in 1987. I think that was like another really interesting time
00:03:24
in queer history and what was to come for the next few years um being that it was like the height of
00:03:30
the height of the AIDS crisis and I think understanding not understanding that but
00:03:35
um being a very queer uh effeminate small child in that time
00:03:42
um there was so much like anti-queer vitriol then um which I didn't like know that's what it was called but I felt it and it's so
00:03:49
it's interesting being like this age now and having like this Renaissance not in the Beyonce way of like such anti-queer
00:03:55
sentiment you're five years old when your parents separate um
00:04:01
what's that like for you I actually just had a joke about this in my new um set my first reaction was like can I
00:04:09
have the ring like my brothers are really devastated I just was like all about that diamond like I've always
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loved jewelry I was like oh my God that would look great with my geodes so I didn't really understand like any sort
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of like emotional implication from like my parents divorce um love my dad love my mom but I was
00:04:26
like I kind of I think I was like maybe too young to fully understand I do think that It ultimately set me on like um
00:04:34
like my stepdad and I I my mom started dating him when I was like six and I write a lot about him in
00:04:41
my first book over the top um his name was Steve and so ultimately he taught me so much about what it is to be a good
00:04:46
person what it is to have integrity what it is to ask for help um he had been sober for 28 years when he died in 2012
00:04:52
and he was like and me and my dad are both really important to me but Steve and my dad like were a really good
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um you know role models in my life in a lot of ways and but it took me like from
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like six to like 16 to like like Steve uh but then I
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eventually like really you know loved Stephen appreciated him so much for all the things that he taught me
00:05:17
oh thank you stay out for context the shoulder thing is uh do you want to explain Jonathan yes it's
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like this gorgeous like little like tube dress honey and what it can give you is this like turtleneck moment but that's giving me too much restriction it is
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pride so we need the shoulder out because it's really like this issiniaki moment that's like the shoulders meant
00:05:35
to Peekaboo is that easy yeah that's beautiful pretty right yeah I want to screaming the microphone I just get so
00:05:41
excited talking about dresses so he's just told us to what contingent on this interview was us letting him
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know whatever the the Izzy mizaki number just slides a little too high we've got to remind him to slide it down so if we
00:05:53
say shoulder that's what we mean um how did you get on with your peers when you're that age did you feel like
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you fit fitted in per se no no um but I did have some really good friends and some people who I I think I
00:06:06
know I knew really early that friendship was really important so I always had like some really close friends
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um but a lot of times I think there was like you know quite a bit of like widespread bullying but I think that
00:06:20
that really hit a fever pitch like more like you know like sixth grade like post
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sixth grade like maybe pre that there was like little murmurings and like a little bit of weirdness but I think kids are like
00:06:32
so young at that age that they're not really like or at least in my case it wasn't like that horrific
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um bullying wise at the time it was more like post sixth grade I feel like but also it's like so funny I just noticed
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this like part of me that's like like being 36 and still talking about it like I feel like because I have
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processed so much of it and I've worked so hard on letting go of a lot of that and um
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so like for me it doesn't really hold a lot of like like Brittany Brown she talks about like
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you know can you talk about your trauma without becoming your trauma and I think in like
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I think it's actually still kind of hard for me to talk about like I have this like harder part that kind of comes up
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and it's like oh like I just don't like going there but I am down to go there your Square
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chin makes me feel safe but yeah you know what I'm saying well you you take me there you take me to where you want
00:07:24
to go because I I am in my own experience only black kid in an all-white school I grew up in Devon in
00:07:29
the southwest which is like the countryside so I remember the feelings of just const because it's a small town as well and you're different this
00:07:36
constant feeling of almost a constant state of like my body was always in fight or flight almost just
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like subtly and I read I read hints of that in your story but please do tell me
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um what your experience was no that totally that absolutely resonates I think I also write a lot about like this
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idea that like um like a lot of like joy and like happiness can coexist with grief and
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like shame like these emotions don't necessarily like invalidate each other so even though I did have
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um a lot of hardships and there was abuse and there was bullying and there was a lot of othering like I think
00:08:10
that's why I'm still so obsessed with figure skating and gymnastics like when figure skating and gymnastics was on the TV I was the happiest person of all time
00:08:17
like none of the other things mattered so I think those kind of moments of like escapism like were these really healing
00:08:25
moments why even now as an adult like those types of things are so exciting for me and I'm just like so into it because it I think it like it strikes at
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like that core memory of like just being really into something else um which I'm glad I'm still into that
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even though I'm like more into my life now than I was and obviously like I did get out of there and I did like you know
00:08:44
a lot of my dreams came true The escapism Well in that situation what were you escaping from
00:08:50
feeling like really I mean it was like I said a really queer kid and a very like ciset world so my hometown is like my
00:08:58
family was like quite well known in my hometown and I was really like unabashedly myself and so there was a
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lot of like feedback from that as I got older so that I think that was like a lot of
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and I also was you know abused I'm Survivor of sexual abuse so there was
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like like I would hear about like other kids and like you know whether it was like poverty or like see it on the news
00:09:21
like kids or like even just like kids at school like you know there's like kids at school who like clearly are going
00:09:26
through it and like do not have the access to the resources that you have um but meanwhile I was like definitely
00:09:33
having people call me [ __ ] definitely being sexually abused um and I remember thinking like oh I'm glad I don't have
00:09:38
it as bad as like you know so it's like it's interesting how like our perspective like is like
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just so funny like when you're a kid you just don't have anything to compare it to but looking back to it on it I'm like I think I'm my little inner child and
00:09:53
like all the things that my nickname growing up was Jack like what he went through and I'm like oh my God honey that was like so intense
00:10:01
you know like just growing up like there and like having yeah it's intense
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you've been really open about um the incident of sexual abuse that you've experienced and how that had a
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sort of a skating impact on the rest of your life is there a point where you where someone around you highlights the
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significance of that to you at that age no I think that the problem with unlike
00:10:24
sexual abuse is so many and I you know I don't like blame anyone for this because
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it's just like what happens that there's such this like an um insistence on like like
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not talking about it you know like like don't let anyone find out and I understand that because like you like
00:10:42
it's like you just don't want people to find out like whether it's like bringing shame on the church or bringing shame on
00:10:49
like why didn't anyone prevent this so it's like it I don't think it was like I think we just all wanted to like just
00:10:57
get through it and I don't think any like there's so much shame and stigma tied up in sexual abuse that I think
00:11:03
when it happens you're but at the same time like my mom was really wanted to
00:11:09
deal with things like in a very head-on way and like really when it was like therapy like we gotta get like once she
00:11:14
knew she was like [ __ ] like God like but then there was like other forces and like other people and you know our lives
00:11:21
that were like I don't think and whether that was like church leaders or other people that were like I don't think that's really you know like what happens
00:11:27
if you talk like does you really want your kid to be like you know so they're in essentially like small rural spaces
00:11:34
and I think that's part of what makes me so angry when we think about um you know when people say you know the
00:11:39
trans people are you know groomers or drag queens or like all this idea like queer people or groomers like there is
00:11:46
so much sexual abuse in churches there's so much sexual abuse in rural communities in urban communities and all
00:11:51
the communities and when you look at the statistics most often it is like a man that you know it is like a man in the
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family A man in the church a friend of the family it's someone that you know it's like not random queer people
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um and I just think part of why we have these like Fantastical ideas of like these threats
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to our kids is because of the thing that I was just speaking about that like we don't talk about what really happens because we want to keep it private and
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we want to keep things really inside and so when you're like um when you're
00:12:23
drawing like it just it makes it and also it's like this like smoke and mirrors thing when you're saying that
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it's one thing it's like gaslighting really from this whole other thing which
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in this case is like the pervasive sexual abuse in churches in um you know
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in families and communities that is just so you know not spoken about and we're
00:12:46
over here talking about drag queens and trans people you said that your mother was very um
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proactive with going to therapy and things like that which is an incredible thing yeah so for the time so especially
00:12:58
because even now that's quite seen as being quite a progressive thing to do but but back then when you're 16 years
00:13:05
old for that to be one of the first sort of suggestions to take you to therapy seems to be honey I was in therapy when I was five I remember like my parents
00:13:11
got divorced like I remember like being in therapy when I was so little that like I had to like look up at my mom like this like holding her hand you know
00:13:17
what I'm saying like because then they got divorced we went to like family therapy so like therapy was always very normalized for me and my mom
00:13:25
um it was just like one of the things I just am so grateful to her for that she like normalized therapy like
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thank God I don't think I'd be alive without if she hadn't done that what about if I'd ask that 16 year old
00:13:36
version of you what are you gonna do when you're older I always knew I wanted to do hair right like but I think my family was like you need to go to
00:13:42
college so I was like maybe I was like I'll be a lawyer or something but then I was like girl you can't be a lawyer you're gonna I love doing hair I think I
00:13:48
knew I wanted to do hair yeah yeah I I think about my teenage years and I think I didn't know
00:13:55
the impact I use the word formative at the start I didn't know how I'd been formed until I was an adult and I saw
00:14:02
like patterns playing out what were the prints sort of that left on you from your earliest years that
00:14:08
stayed with you as an adult I think my fur like I went I think one
00:14:14
of my big first phases of like wanting to understand
00:14:20
more about like uh like my trauma or like my story it was like Eckhart Tolle
00:14:25
and a new Earth and the Power of Now and like 2008 or nine it was like when Oprah was
00:14:31
talking about him and then I was like who's this that cartoli honey and then I read The Power of Now And A New Earth and I was like
00:14:37
hmm you go I don't have an ego what's he talking about and I was like oh that's like the story that we tell ourselves I
00:14:42
was like so like my stories that I'm like this like gay kid from this little town and I was like abused and like this
00:14:48
and that I love cheer and I loved it like really I'm like The Observer of that like I'm not really that I'm like
00:14:54
this like that was like when I started to learn about like what meditation was and what Stillness was and um that really gave me a lot of healing
00:15:02
and kind of like Clarity and then I uh that didn't last that long because I did eventually get addicted to math like not
00:15:09
that long after that so but thank God I had that introduction to that sort of
00:15:15
healing at that time because I was able to come back to it so that and then I think so then my stepdad got really sick
00:15:21
the one I was talking about earlier um Steve he was diagnosed with cancer in like 2009 and I was really far away I
00:15:28
was like living in La they were in Illinois and I was in a really um
00:15:34
you know difficult working situation I was like in my first serious relationship and
00:15:40
then all of those um all that trauma manifesting itself was came back in terms of like
00:15:47
um my sexual compulsivity so I'm like in love for the first time and I just like was having such a hard time like in my
00:15:52
first relationship like just cheating Non-Stop and being like Oh like which I talk a lot about in my first book
00:15:58
um and so that was when I was like okay I really need help like I don't know like so I'd had that versatile
00:16:04
introduction to Healing with like Eckhart you know solo 2122 then Steve
00:16:09
gets sick he ultimately dies and then it's after that that I'm like really need help and that's like when I get
00:16:15
into therapy that's when I um start to get into 12 step myself uh which I I
00:16:21
think being a non-binary queen anything that's too much this or that it's like so sobriety was like oh I just like I want to be totally sober but I did get a
00:16:27
lot of healing there um so I'm kind of a harm reduction Queen but so all through my 20s I think and I
00:16:33
don't think that we ever get to a place as much as I wish that we would where you're just like ah dealt with my trauma
00:16:38
it's like in a box and I never have to look at it again I never have to deal with it again and I think it's interesting the ways that your
00:16:43
circumstances change and then your trauma or your you know that baggage or your ego is like is Eckhart refers to it
00:16:51
will like manifest itself in different ways but I hope that we get or I hope I get better at um
00:16:57
like not identifying with the trauma or the ego like when it's like being a nightmare even though that's like also a
00:17:03
constant struggle like ask my husband like where the [ __ ] is my eyeliner you
00:17:09
went to um university right first semester you dropped out like I did why
00:17:15
did you drop out I got really bad grades and then I got addicted to drugs and then I realized that I wanted to be a
00:17:20
hairdresser so what was I gonna waste all that time and money for was University or college I think they
00:17:26
call it in the US um the first time you got addicted to drugs was that the first
00:17:31
time you started to seriously sort of experiment with drugs [Music] um does weed count
00:17:37
then no yes yes then it was like it's not to we but that was the first time that I ever did like
00:17:43
really intense drugs you're away from this the small town the issues of your your teen years at that
00:17:50
point so what was um what was that context and environment like well my mom was so right she was like
00:17:57
honey you're too young and I was like get [ __ ] I'm leaving and honey I was so too young like I just immediately
00:18:03
just had my face and a plate of coke like the first time I saw cocaine I was like like the first time I was like saw like
00:18:09
I was like that's ecstasy give me six um and the next thing I knew you know because like you like my parents got me
00:18:16
like that like thing that you get at University like the little like campus like card for the food so they're like your food's paid for your dorms paid for
00:18:23
like you really don't need very much money honey like so like my mom gave me like 300 a month because like everything else was paid for right like what else
00:18:29
could you [ __ ] mean like I didn't have to work like because like they did everything right like so cool right like
00:18:35
so but I was like well how am I supposed to get all messed up on drugs all the time if I only have three hundred
00:18:41
dollars like that math isn't working so right like it's like that's like two
00:18:46
days you know if you're really going out with your friends um so then I just was like then I discovered like sex work and then I was
00:18:53
like oh next thing I knew I was like pulling tricks to like um get drugs so that I could do more
00:18:59
drugs and then after doing that for a few months I was like and I dropped out of college like
00:19:04
through that um I was like um because my mama cut me off by then I was
00:19:09
like Mommy um I'm so sorry I'm like literally selling my body like I feel scared like can you just put some money
00:19:14
in the checking account like I'll drive the car home I'll be like I'll just come I'll I'll be back in three days can you just
00:19:20
I'm scared and she was like Jesus yes this is my baby and so she did them poor Mom right
00:19:26
um and so she did that cutely though like right before that I found this kitten in the hood of a car
00:19:33
um who was my first cat bugged the first and honest to God I write about him too like he really gave me like the will to
00:19:41
like not be a sex worker and because at first it was like for funsies for to
00:19:47
just get drugs for partying right then once I got cut off it was like no like I don't want to go back home and like show
00:19:53
that I [ __ ] up so I just need to like figure it out but like that was really not where I wanted to be it wasn't like
00:19:59
I was like doing sex work from a place of empowerment I was doing it from like a place of like deep trauma like wanting
00:20:06
validation trying to support a drug habit like it was not a good place for like an 18 year old to be I was like
00:20:12
really it was really like I put myself in so many really dangerous situations someone pulled a gun on you right yeah
00:20:17
it was really like a really really dangerous situations um and so yeah that was like I mean I
00:20:23
look back at some of the things that happened and I honestly can't believe that I made it
00:20:28
because it was really like so touch and go in a
00:20:34
lot of situations like one little thing different and it could have like so many situations but that's true of anyone but
00:20:40
it was really you know traumatizing but so I find this little cat and I realize
00:20:45
when I find this little cat I was like I want this I want to raise this little cat he was like this like little black
00:20:51
cat in the hood of this car and um but that really was like so super healing
00:20:56
for me and I think that started like I'm such a little like animal parent I have like five cats and three dogs now with
00:21:02
my husband and that I really think it was just like such a huge like Turning Point like just like falling like just
00:21:09
falling in love with like cats and dogs they're just like so healing finding a little cat in the boot of a car seems to
00:21:15
be trivial but it's not is it because really what I heard there is in a moment where you were in a bit of a desperate
00:21:22
situation that cat gave you a reason and a purpose yeah no it's a meaning yes and
00:21:27
then it has continued to be like a huge source of like joy and like grounding like in my life that is like really
00:21:33
so not trivial like really really was a huge Turning Point quick one before we get back to this episode just give me 30
00:21:39
seconds of your time two things I wanted to say the first thing is a huge thank you for listening
00:21:44
and tuning into the show week after week means the world to all of us and this really is a dream that we absolutely never had and couldn't have imagined
00:21:51
getting to this place secondly it's a dream where we feel like we're only just getting started and if
00:21:56
you enjoy what we do here please join the 24 of people who watch this channel regularly and have hit the Subscribe
00:22:03
button means more than I can say and if you hit that subscribe button here's a promise I'm going to make to you I'm
00:22:09
gonna do everything in my power to make this show as good as I can now and into the future we're going to deliver the
00:22:15
guests that you want me to speak to and we're going to continue to keep doing all of the things you love about the show
00:22:21
thank you thank you so much back to the episode so if you go to her school yeah where did you go la the Aveda Institute
00:22:28
at Minneapolis or Minneapolis yeah and how did that go for you cute I got
00:22:33
better there I got better there and then I um and then I moved back to Arizona
00:22:38
after I finished school so I only lived there for about a year um in my mind I felt like my first
00:22:43
experience in Arizona because that's where I went to college was like this failure and I really wanted to like go back and do better and like not have it
00:22:50
be a failure um and so I moved back and then that was like a really cute time like I got to
00:22:57
like I like worked before myself the first time I had like my own chair at a salon um and that made me kind of feel like
00:23:02
responsible for like the first time and like I turned 21 in that time and then after a few years of that I was like I
00:23:08
felt like I couldn't really cut myself out of a paper bag like I felt like I was in a good hairdresser all I knew how
00:23:13
to do was like chunky Kelly Clarkson highlights like Circa light Breakaway 2004 you know what I'm saying so then I
00:23:19
wanted to move to L.A and work at a really good salon and have a devil worse product experience so I did so then I
00:23:24
moved to LA and then that's when I like really like figured out how to do better hair because I got a good job at
00:23:30
assisting at a salon that was really good and how were you doing at that time how are you doing on a personal level
00:23:35
yeah yeah like 22 years old yeah like I think it was it was I think I was like
00:23:41
handling the move to LA pretty well up until my step dad got sick and then that's when it was like and then and
00:23:47
then like my little like healing era came to like a screeching halt also the relationship it was like
00:23:54
falling in love and my stepdad's diagnosis like together like yeah much
00:24:00
all my trauma got triggered in was bad
00:24:06
was was there something in in hindsight that you think could have been done to stop the stepdad's illness situation
00:24:13
resulting in destructive Behavior was there was there was there therapy needed or a conversation or was there it was a
00:24:19
lack of a support network or something that could have kind of caught you in a moment where you were you were falling Without Really knowing you were falling
00:24:27
no well I don't think so because I I realized that I was like doing things sexually at that time that like I
00:24:33
regretted and like I didn't feel good about myself afterwards and that's how I was kind of like oh I think this is like a problem and then
00:24:40
um and that also kind of started happening like right after I met like my like my first love and so and I told him
00:24:46
about it I was honest with him I got help um so he knew I got a therapist at that
00:24:52
time but like ultimately like I wasn't ready to to deal with it and so no I think
00:25:02
that was kind of an interesting lesson of like you can have all the support in the world but if you're not ready to like sit with your stuff like nothing's
00:25:09
gonna move you but um he it wasn't until he left me and uh
00:25:16
Steve died that I and I got HIV that I was like okay I really want to like not do this
00:25:24
anymore and that was when I ultimately like was able to get better but I needed to really I did it with a lot of support
00:25:31
but I needed to hit rock bottom and then get the support
00:25:36
I hear that a lot you know I hear this I remember approaching
00:25:41
um I've got a friend who was in the public Spotlight and I was trying to figure out how I could help them because they clearly were aren't R in a
00:25:49
difficult situation so I approached their management and said what can I do to be a supportive in this situation
00:25:54
their management said to me we've been here quite a few times and in fact until the person wants to make a change
00:26:01
um they won't and often we have to let the person hit rock bottom before change
00:26:07
will happen and I remember at first hearing that being really uncomfortable with that the idea that you have to kind
00:26:14
of let someone get there on their own and even if the route to there is downward first before it's up it feels
00:26:21
really hard to accept I guess especially when you love the person do you think that's true yeah
00:26:27
yeah but my subject always said you know like not every like well he this is like all
00:26:33
12-step like well-known 12-step phraseology but like every bottom has a basement so I can always get worse and
00:26:39
also like you don't have to ride the elevator to the bottom so like not every like like everyone's Rock bottoms like look different
00:26:45
like it doesn't mean that you have to like oh yeah it doesn't mean someone's gonna like bite it necessarily I mean they might but
00:26:51
um some people are just like oh I got like a DUI and that was enough okay other people are like
00:26:58
you know yeah everyone's bottom looks different some people don't survive their bottoms yeah
00:27:04
sex addiction something we don't talk about enough we we talk about drug addiction alcohol addiction we even talk
00:27:12
about social media addiction and Screen addiction but having a conversation about sex addiction seems to be
00:27:18
um harder than all of the aforementioned forms of addiction I remember having Terry Crews on the podcast
00:27:23
um when we're in LA and him telling me that he had a porn addiction um and it was just during his life on
00:27:30
the surface someone might find it hard to understand how something like that can destroy one's life
00:27:35
um you you talk about having a sex addiction and going on a sex addiction course I believe when you were during
00:27:42
that time when you roughly around you the LA time what impact was it having on your life and your relationships what's
00:27:48
interesting because I think if if I'm correct I think like sexual sex addiction
00:27:54
like is not like a recognized addiction and like the DSD whatever DSM yeah DSM
00:28:01
um but it's whereas like you know other ones are um
00:28:06
so the effects I was having on my life was like obviously I got HIV and but even before that like I was already like
00:28:11
going to meetings and I'd already been to rehab twice before I got HIV so
00:28:17
um like a sex rehab no they were like well one was one had like a sex uh like
00:28:24
a sexual compulsivity like course like within the program and then the other one that I went to I found like an outpatient that that did that work so I
00:28:31
could like I went there like you know during the day from like this other rehab I had to be like in a you know
00:28:36
resourceful Queen um But ultimately it's like a process
00:28:42
addiction you know whether it's like gambling food like sex it's like a it was like a process
00:28:48
addiction so the way that um it was affecting my life was like just you know doing things that I regretted
00:28:54
um I describe a lot of like disassociative Behavior like this like inability to like just get off like
00:29:01
couldn't get off the phone couldn't stop cruising like I just felt like I wasn't like in control of like I wasn't in
00:29:08
control like so if you were to say like and you know in part speaker like ifs it would like like that firefighter was
00:29:14
like so Blended in my driver's seat like I couldn't I couldn't get centered self like into the goddamn car when you say
00:29:21
cruising you mean you were like searching yeah it's like a queer a queer term for like what like gays do when
00:29:26
you're like yeah whether it's like you're cruising on grinder or you're like in a bath house or like whatever you're doing
00:29:33
can you tell me about that Journey so at some point you realize that you've got sexual compulsivity
00:29:40
at some point it becomes a problem in your life and you lose your partner in this case and there's you know you realize that you've lost control of that
00:29:46
and then at some point you get to a stage of healing where you become aware and you understand where the origin of
00:29:52
this sexual compulsivity that third Point understanding the origins of that sexual compulsivity
00:29:58
when was that and how did that happen well you know it's interesting I think it's it's um that reminds me of this thing that
00:30:05
this one guy in rehab said he said like not knowing why he was an alcoholic is not what made
00:30:13
him crazy it was needing to know why he was an alcoholic is what made him crazy
00:30:18
um so I think it's a lot and and that was actually a huge disappointment for me and I think we put way too much emphasis on like trying to like
00:30:24
understand your origin story because like once I understood my origin story and it was like really clear as day and
00:30:30
like I'd done all my work and I'd done like all this processing and like all the memories came back and like I already had all the memories but then
00:30:36
like there was just certain things that I was able to connect and like really understand very clearly
00:30:41
um I was still left with the scarring and I was still left with the patterns like I still once I knew it wasn't like
00:30:46
I was like ah well now I don't want to [ __ ] 20 strangers anymore like it wasn't like that like all of
00:30:53
that pattern and all of that like you know feels insecure wants validation won't
00:30:59
stop till they get the validation then they feel insecure again for doing the thing and then it like it's just a cycle
00:31:05
that like repeats itself all the time and we talk about that in sexual compulsivity it's like the trigger and then like the trigger to do the thing
00:31:11
and then you start cruising for the thing and then you do the thing and then the shame from the thing just makes you
00:31:16
go right back into it so it's just this like cycle so um really it was just like understanding
00:31:23
through so much like repetition of hurting myself like there's like oh I
00:31:29
don't really want to do this I don't feel better after I do this like I think I'm going to but then I don't and
00:31:34
um so it was really just like through continually like really hurting myself and then going back to therapy like
00:31:39
falling off the horse getting back on like and also like meth use has a huge part to do with this for a lot of queer
00:31:45
people at least and I mean there are straight people as well but I think it's probably like lesser numbers um because of like you know the whole
00:31:51
like meth and sex like scene which is you know quite prevalent in queer communities
00:31:57
um so it was not quite prevalent but it's like relevant it happens and so I think once the further away that I was
00:32:03
able to get from meth the easier it was for me to heal from because also it's like and I talk a lot about this in my
00:32:10
new show fun and [ __ ] it's like um sexuality isn't bad like sexuality is good
00:32:16
um expressing her sexuality is good it's lack of uh it's lack of consent it's abuse population it's doing things that
00:32:23
you regret those are the things that are not good um but you know decoupling that like
00:32:28
kind of understanding that and understanding like are you doing this because you have a trauma response and so you're doing this or you're doing
00:32:34
this because you really really want to do it so there's like a whole you know conversation about like sex positivity
00:32:39
to be had here too um and you know a lot of people are really opposed to the idea of sexual
00:32:45
compulsivity or sex addiction because they're like that's really not sex positive and maybe it's you know XYZ or
00:32:51
whatever but for me I think it's way more important to recognize that like in my case it was I didn't feel good and
00:32:58
now I feel better and I know a lot of people like myself who were able to like you know come more into a space of healing and more into a space of like
00:33:04
balance with their like sexual self so um but again just like anything that's
00:33:11
never like all the way just like done and dusted like you're always in conversation with yourself and with your
00:33:18
trauma and and your behavior and like how you want to regulate that or Express that it would also be your Mist to say
00:33:23
like I mean I I already had a lot of healing prior to meeting my husband and I think that's part of like why I even
00:33:29
like met him you know universally speaking anyway because I had done that work but having a husband who I can be
00:33:35
open with and honest with and who you know doesn't judge me for the things that I've been through and he can like create a safe space for you know to hold
00:33:42
my stuff with me is really helpful as well I was just chatting to some friends this
00:33:48
um this weekend Friday about how we I was trying to figure out because one of my the the people that I was with
00:33:55
the three of them they're all single um they're seeking not to be single and I was I was saying to them that I found
00:34:02
the right person in my life when I was not necessarily the the completed
00:34:08
version of myself but I had to do a lot of work to even find that jigsaw piece that matched
00:34:13
me as a different shaped jigsaw piece like I had to do a lot of work and I wasn't all the way there because I do
00:34:19
feel like you go on a journey with that partner but you have to kind of be aiming in the same direction at least so
00:34:24
I guess my question to you this is a bit of a tangent is do you what do you think about that about like the the season
00:34:30
where we find the the right person how much work do we have to do on ourselves
00:34:36
to be ready when we meet that person um there's this other type of therapy
00:34:42
that I love called pact therapy which stands for like the psychobiological approach to couples therapy which was um
00:34:48
invented by Dr stantatken so he created pact therapy and so
00:34:54
he talks about an insecure functioning relationship and a secure functioning relationship so earlier when I was thinking about my mom and my stepdad I
00:35:00
was like that secure functioning relationship my first relationship was an insecure functioning relationship with my first partner that in
00:35:07
conjunction with like my stepdad's illness and then just being like 24 and 25
00:35:12
out of my window of Tolerance could not handle firefighters were activated all
00:35:17
[ __ ] up you know like my life kind of so that's that so but Stan says that you can an insecure functioning relationship
00:35:24
can turn into a function a secure functioning one if both parties want it
00:35:29
if they're both willing to like work on themselves work on the relationship and also Stan says that like a lot of
00:35:35
um Brokenness or like trauma in oneself can actually really be healed through that sort of like couple's therapy so I
00:35:42
don't know if you really have to be like a more that whole thing of like two fully formed circles need to make the chain because like if you're a
00:35:48
fragmented how are you like you're gonna make a [ __ ] up so I think I think we actually it pisses me off when people
00:35:53
get too much into that like relational expert stuff because like just like we all have our own experience like every
00:35:58
relationship has its own experience so we can like pull from some like you know um what's that called like uh
00:36:07
like we can pull from some like data of or like but like not real day like just like oratory like data of just people
00:36:13
talking about it and telling us things and well my friend this and my friend that but like ultimately I think that like there is there's like a different
00:36:20
path for everyone to find like their relationship and whether or not it starts and I also think even in my
00:36:25
marriage like I feel like we've had moments that we got married after like six months like in the middle of a [ __ ] pandemic like it was you know it
00:36:31
was wow it was a weird time you know because we just started saying I love you and then borders shut down and then
00:36:37
I was like if we want to keep I don't know if I can just not get [ __ ] by you for like years in like a respiratory
00:36:42
pandemic like I like you know like I think I need you to like get over here but he was British and I'm American and
00:36:49
so we just were like let's see what happens and then once you get to the end of that FDA Visa or whatever it's like
00:36:55
you either gotta get married and so it wasn't the way I think either of us ever imagined that like we would get married
00:37:01
but like we are so happy I'm so glad that we did we've learned so much about each other we're like it's like
00:37:07
I'm so happy that we did but like when I was little I don't know if I was like imagining they would like I'd get
00:37:12
married like a backyard like with only a judge because like you know no one's
00:37:18
family could be there because there's no you know what I mean so Something Beautiful about that though it was amazing and I'm like so happy that we
00:37:24
did it but I just think everyone can have like a different like approach and just because you've had this or that or that like everyone just has like their
00:37:31
own way and I think that's like cool movies [ __ ] us up there didn't they yeah they really do you know it's expectation
00:37:37
expectation expectation and then that kills happiness and makes us confuse real with you know I don't know some of
00:37:44
the [ __ ] and hmm that's a really great answer it's a really great answer we do we try
00:37:51
and work out the perfect formula for things too much in life but there is really no Perfection when you're dealing
00:37:56
with such complex organisms yes forming complex relationships so
00:38:01
you moved to is it St Louis yeah St Louis yeah St Louis when you were 25
00:38:07
what was that about why did you leave it alone um wanted to be closer than my stepdad
00:38:13
and so uh yeah that was my and also because I was like couldn't stop
00:38:19
I was like La is why I can't stop doing drugs and having sex with strangers even though I love this person so much like
00:38:24
let's and then unfortunately as my stepdad always said no matter where you go there you are so obviously leaving La
00:38:30
didn't fix anything and then he actually passed away like three weeks after we left LA and got to St Louis so it was
00:38:38
like bad on bad and then I really really
00:38:43
freaked out like then I was that was like the most self-destructive era take me into that moment
00:38:51
well one two fine it's in the book
00:38:57
yeah I read I read um I read I read that that was a very difficult time for you
00:39:02
um because I also think that like we don't need to like I don't need to like War
00:39:07
Story which is like what we call it in rehab like when you talk about like the worst thing I mean there's a way that
00:39:13
you can do it like with respect and like not speak you know it's like I was doing this much things in these drugs and but
00:39:18
like I also you know in protecting my energy like I've been on an international tour
00:39:23
for 10 days like I've given myself so much into like my new show like which has been I'm so proud of it's like my
00:39:29
third like hour of Comedy but like I'm not all the way in a space where like I want to speak to that part in my
00:39:36
life right now so I'm just going to set a really loving boundary so I don't really want to chat about it that's fine I respect that thanks honey what do him
00:39:42
if I if I when's the next significant moment in your life then so you that Stephen is his name Steve Steve passes
00:39:50
away um causes a series of issues in your life um you move back to LA did you ever
00:39:58
think TV and media would be part of your not in this way no and how exciting that
00:40:04
that like it was such like a curveball but no I mean I just was like accidentally telling a really talented
00:40:10
producer um an actress and comedian friend of mine uh who is a client about Game of
00:40:15
Thrones and I was like have you seen this show it's like this and it's that like I did a little impromptu recap of it as I was like doing her hair and when
00:40:22
I was done she was like that's a series and so then we did Gay of Thrones that was like December of 12 and then the
00:40:29
next year we started doing gay of Thrones that like March and then
00:40:35
um The Game of Thrones came out and it's going to be like one episode but then we got Alfie Allen for our second episode and then Funny or Die was like keep
00:40:41
doing this and so then I went really from being like a hairdresser to learning on the job how to be a
00:40:48
performer how to like improv how to deliver scripted lines how to write how
00:40:53
to produce I mean I was writing and producing and didn't even know that that's what I was doing because I was doing it on the job
00:40:59
so like I like I just learned like this whole new skill set kind of like over the years like for like three months a
00:41:06
year like I would do Gay of Thrones and I just like kind of slow and then after doing Game of Thrones for two years I
00:41:12
was like oh this is so fun I want to do this more and so then that's when I started my podcast getting curious
00:41:17
and then I did I got to like learn how to produce that and learn how to research for that and book clients for
00:41:23
that I mean I think I did like the first 50 episodes with like myself and a sound engineer but I was like booking at myself like it was like it was like I
00:41:31
was like just learning like all these things that I had never really done and so then I really started to get like
00:41:37
stung by that bee and I was like I want to do this more and I always have loved doing hair but I was like I want to be I
00:41:42
want to write more I want to be more on camera I want to like I want to do this more often and then in 2018 the queer
00:41:47
eye or it was actually not 18 it was 2017. I read that the reboot was happening and they were casting for it
00:41:53
and I was like like this is what I've been waiting for
00:41:58
like this is the vehicle like I always loved queer eye growing up my grandparents and I would watch it together it was like
00:42:04
I'm ready and then I I went to that audition and that audition was literally
00:42:10
like the scene in Mean Girls when they're all at the fountain and everyone's like tackling each other
00:42:17
um it was like that except for everyone's like being really sweet and I remember like this one creator of the
00:42:22
show like his eyes like I said this like funny thing and I was like okay you need to be like you are on Gay of
00:42:29
Thrones all times like you need to be on 15 and you just say [ __ ] one-liners
00:42:34
all the time like just be the funniest you have ever even thought about being for the next 48 hours capiche like
00:42:40
that's what I was saying like in my head and I did like I was just like and I just was like so on
00:42:47
why you you know I think so I I hope not me darling well I have my suspicions but I
00:42:54
for you to you know it wasn't just an audition even the stuff you were doing with um was it funny or die wasn't it
00:43:00
the the channel back then yeah Game of Thrones yeah yeah um do you ever pause and think
00:43:07
like what is it about you that made you really successful in Game of Thrones and
00:43:14
then really successful in queer eye what is it about you in your own assessment
00:43:20
I don't know really I really don't because I think it could have been a million people I think that I have I
00:43:27
think I'm resilient I think that I have been told no so many
00:43:33
times and didn't turn around and go back I like found a different way I think
00:43:38
that's really important we've got resilience but you know just from meeting you now you have a remarkable
00:43:44
talent for wit and humor you're very funny and you have a very Unforgettable
00:43:51
personality you're like you're unbelievable energy and no I'm no but I'm I'm you know no
00:43:57
thank you no but you know something I can't do what you do and I've only met you for like I don't know an hour or so and I can't be I'm not as
00:44:05
hilarious and witty and I don't know I don't I can't almost describe it that
00:44:11
some people just have like a really engaging personality and you have that
00:44:16
you have that like energy that's a huge part of it surely your success
00:44:22
um because you're in you know especially on TV and now I don't know I really don't like I see people like I have I
00:44:28
know people that make me laugh that I think are way funnier than me like way funnier way more witty way more
00:44:34
like Unforgettable personalities but like I think that a lot of the people who I'm thinking of like had some
00:44:41
message from the like in their lives where like they were like either or like their moment hasn't happened yet it's
00:44:48
one of the two yeah yeah um but I think for a lot of people like maybe like backed away or like we're like I don't want to like because like I
00:44:54
because actually in retrospect like I really it's not just I think that like oh I didn't chase my dream I actually really did Chase this like with gay of
00:45:01
Thrones you know like I like I wanted more than gay after I mean Game of Thrones started in 2013 and I didn't
00:45:07
book queer eye until 2017 and then there was no knowing if queer I was going to work or not until like 2018. so I mean
00:45:14
2013 was 10 years ago like I've been at this for a long time um and so and there was like so many
00:45:21
setbacks like so many setbacks through that time your authentic self I've sat here with a lot
00:45:27
of people in TV and TV and media can often make us it can incentivize us to
00:45:32
become a cat like not character but like and I sat here with Jake Humphries in a wonderful lady called Fern cotton who a
00:45:37
TV yeah so Fern told me on on the podcast that she spent 10 years as a TV
00:45:42
presenter and she I think realized at some point that she was living outside
00:45:48
of herself and at least um she wasn't able to reflect the full array of her who she was
00:45:54
um and that resulted in panic attacks and other sort of psychological issues she had um
00:45:59
and it's and it's made and now she's so successful doing happy place where she's able to be herself so this conversation
00:46:05
around or like being your authentic self being the the pathway to your greatest success
00:46:11
what is your take on that this idea of like showing up as yourself regardless
00:46:16
of The Temptations or disincentivizations or incentivizations to be something else how important to
00:46:21
you has been being yourself regardless
00:46:27
even like because I I totally understand but even that feels like um
00:46:33
I don't think like what is like all the way authentic well it's like all the way yourself because I always get leery when
00:46:39
we're like because like if if the alternative is like I don't think that there's a such thing as a vegan like all
00:46:44
the way yourself or not yourself at all so I think it's like a spectrum like
00:46:50
everything is kind of really much more like a spectrum than it is like a binary like choice so and like when you were
00:46:56
saying with Fern it was like you know she's like a TV presenter but she couldn't show like the fullness of herself so like that's why I wrote over the top because I and I and I think in
00:47:03
love that's where I say like or no it's an over the top I say like I love an episode of queer eye just as much as the next person but if I can't tell you my
00:47:09
full truth and tell you who I really am then like I can't help other people like me and I actually can't even be myself
00:47:15
and then the whole Crux of over the top is and what I ask in the book is like would you still want to have a selfie
00:47:20
with me like would you still love me if you knew my whole story and so that's you know and then I say and love that
00:47:27
story that the resounding answer that I got from so many people was yes you know I do still love you
00:47:33
um and like in most cases it was like even more so but were there Parts
00:47:39
um I think we always have parts of ourselves that are informed by external factors like if I didn't get feedback
00:47:45
from people when I go like when I say something funny that that if I didn't
00:47:50
get positive feedback from that would I still be making all those jokes
00:47:55
like so does that mean I'm not really you know what I'm saying like every every way that we show up in the world is because of like our socialization our
00:48:03
relationships like our communities like I don't think that that makes you like it's really like your relationship with
00:48:08
your self and I don't think that like I don't think there's like authentic and like inauthentic
00:48:14
there's like there's like sometimes I'm more like this because of this this thing and sometimes I'm more like that
00:48:19
because of that thing you know what I mean perfect makes perfect sense that's so interesting but it is the
00:48:25
truth and you know I think is actually more authentic is like being able to like speak to what you're actually
00:48:31
feeling like in the moment like I feel like earlier when we were saying like um like I literally caught myself I was
00:48:37
like oh like you know brene Brown says can you talk about your trauma without becoming your trauma and I was like literally laying that up because I was
00:48:43
feeling vulnerable with you I was and I didn't like it so I was like oh yeah I totally can like I can totally speak and it like doesn't really hurt me because I
00:48:48
don't really want to talk about it that much because it's like but then it's like actually that was really a protector part that was coming up because I didn't want to talk about it
00:48:55
and I felt like I was gonna become my trauma like because I am a little tired and I am a little run down like after
00:49:01
the last two weeks like I've worked my [ __ ] ass off for these last two weeks and another thing that's interesting that I don't really want to talk about
00:49:06
but when I was originally supposed to when we were going to do this the last time I had like a really close family member die super young super out of the
00:49:14
blue like which we don't but she got strep throat and died in four days my sister-in-law and so that's why I wasn't
00:49:21
in the United Kingdom which I also didn't ever talk about publicly because it's like not anything I wanted to talk about but like it's I think really what
00:49:30
being authentic is is Having the courage and like the vulnerability to say like this is what I'm going through like this
00:49:36
is like actually the thought that I actually had in my head like when I was about to try to lie to you like this is really what it was and like for me it's
00:49:42
like sometimes it's like if you come up to me for a selfie and like especially on that day like with Leslie my
00:49:48
sister-in-law like I wasn't taking selfies it wasn't in a good mood when my
00:49:54
cat fell out of a window and you asked me for a selfie I wasn't gonna take a selfie and sometimes I'll be like yeah like
00:50:00
let's just like let's do it but then sometimes but you know normally if my life is okay and I'm not going through like some horrific trauma that's not the
00:50:06
energy I give you when you want a selfie I'm like yeah girl like it's like let's do it but sometimes I'm not always like that and so I think that's really what's
00:50:12
authentic is saying that like just because you always see me like or the two episodes of queer eye that you saw being five years ago and you remember me
00:50:18
saying some funny quippy things what's really authentic is me being able to be like that's not always who I am and there's actually like a fuller
00:50:24
picture there it's like that is like what authentic is but there is there have been moments like where I was
00:50:29
probably like totally someone asking for yourself and it's like sure girl let's do it on the inside I was like I want to die
00:50:35
like I don't feel good I feel awful and then the expectation of someone that
00:50:40
I need to perform that for them constantly no matter what's going on
00:50:46
that [ __ ] wears me out which is why I can't do it all the time so like that's
00:50:53
yeah I like I just think authenticity is like this like buzzword that we use when like really what it is is like are you
00:51:00
willing to like be open about like what you need
00:51:06
like what your experience is like what someone's like expecting of you regardless of how the external world
00:51:11
might respond positively or negatively to that yeah gosh then if that is the definition of
00:51:19
authenticity it's even harder than I thought because authenticity is it's often portrayed as just like like being
00:51:24
being your personality what's in all being that you know if my personality is slightly weird in certain ways being
00:51:29
that regardless of company but in the definition you've described there it's like boundaries and like
00:51:36
staying true to myself regardless of the consequences of that externally which is as you say I have tied days I have days
00:51:42
when I'm in a bad mood when I'm when I need some space where I don't want anyone to talk to me and on those days
00:51:47
expressing that is authenticity yeah yeah I love that my girlfriend came upstairs yesterday when I was having a
00:51:53
shower and she said to me that she tried the heel protein shake which lives on my fridge over there and she said it's amazing low calories you get your 20 odd
00:52:01
grams of protein you get your 26 vitamins and minerals and it's nutritionally complete in the protein space there's lots of things but it's
00:52:07
hard to find something that is nice especially when consumed just with water and that is nutritionally complete if
00:52:13
you haven't tried the heel protein product do give it a try The Salted Caramel one if you put some ice cubes in
00:52:20
it and you put it in a blender and you try it is as good as pretty much any
00:52:25
milkshake on the market just mixed with water it's been a game changer for me because I'm trying to drop my calorie
00:52:30
intake and I'm trying to be a little bit more healthy with my diet so this is where he all fits in my life thank you
00:52:35
heal for making a product that I actually like The Salted Caramel is my favorite I've got the banana one here which is the one my girlfriend likes but
00:52:41
for me salted caramel is the one how are you feeling now yeah you know
00:52:48
your schedule's been crazy you've been doing a lot of work lately yeah how are you feeling um
00:52:54
look I feel I feel really
00:53:02
grateful and at the same time I feel really frustrated
00:53:08
um and that's the best way I can explain it right now I'm going through a lot of grief I just lost my sister-in-law two months
00:53:14
ago watching my nephews like grow up you know dealing with unimaginable grief
00:53:20
I'm watching my brother deal with unimaginable loss um
00:53:25
so talking about you know how I'm feeling and it's just this has been a really hard
00:53:30
time and I think balancing your private life with being a public figure who is constantly expected to be
00:53:37
a ray of [ __ ] Sunshine no matter what is going on it can be challenging
00:53:45
um so
00:53:52
I love my hairline I love what I get to do with gbn hair I love that I get to be a comedian I love that when
00:54:00
I want to like do a show I can like there's people that want to come see my comedy like comedy has been so healing
00:54:07
for me and it's like one place in my career where I get to be irreverent and I get to like I feel like I'm the most myself on stage I think that's like the
00:54:14
most accurate and unfiltered like version of who I am is like on stage but I think like any artist when you like
00:54:20
like I just been burning the candle at both ends for the last like 10 days so
00:54:25
like in this very moment in my life like actually this particular moment I feel
00:54:31
frustrated and grieving um
00:54:36
when I zoom out a little bit and give voice to that frustration and now I can like sit with this or like longer than
00:54:41
actually tell like give a larger answer um I feel
00:54:48
like actually it's the same I feel grateful
00:54:54
and frustrated like Dylan Mulvaney is a really good friend of mine I love her so much I like watch what's happened to her in the press for the last few months I'm
00:55:00
like so frustrated I just see so much like just absolute garbage like just
00:55:06
transphobic garbage all over the place I see really not very many folks
00:55:13
really interrogating their beliefs around their transphobia interrogating like where are they getting their
00:55:18
information um and then even understanding like our transphobia
00:55:24
that we experience in our culture is like really truly rooted and like white supremacy and colonialism and this
00:55:31
conversation goes back like 400 years and so that's like a really big systemic thing but then living in a state where
00:55:37
like this woman literally just lost her life because this guy thought that she looked
00:55:44
queer like there are kids that like like their families are like moving like
00:55:50
they can't like they can't they like their kids are like if they have already started their transition and they're
00:55:55
like if they're you know 16 year old and they're a sophomore in high school and they've been living
00:56:00
and their gender identity since they were like a five-year-old kid they've been on puberty blockers uh when they
00:56:06
were you know little they had a concert of doctors and their family who cares about them and loves them deeply help
00:56:11
them transition um because if they didn't transition in some cases not all cases but some cases like these kids will have such intense
00:56:18
gender dysphoria that they can commit suicide they can do things that can truly never be reversed and so we have
00:56:25
these people making these hyperbolic claims about protecting children um and about you know protecting
00:56:30
children from making irreversible decisions uh bathrooms fairness and sports all these things when like trans
00:56:36
people make up like at most like two percent of the population like gun violence is out of control
00:56:41
education's out of control like people don't have access to the food to the healthcare I mean my book's been banned
00:56:47
like my book like peanut goes for the gold like they were talking about banning I mean like this is really
00:56:52
serious and so like it's just frustrating I'm grateful but I think to
00:56:58
like have had a lot of my dreams come true like I said in earlier but then in this like environment of like where you
00:57:05
feel like oh my God like if one person decides that like something that I said or did they can like I mean you
00:57:10
literally because so much of the transphobia that we read about like when you read like if you read an article about what happened to Dylan
00:57:17
um like the way that people just speak about trans people and non-binary people like the quotations the the inferred
00:57:26
like threats or like not believing that we are who we say that we are and but then like how that actually has
00:57:32
like been taken farther now to like revoking Health Care like you know limiting Access to Health Care calling
00:57:38
Healthcare child abuse um it's just really frustrating because it's such like a gigantic conversation
00:57:44
that there's a lot of nuance and a lot of people have been exposed to misinformation and disinformation don't
00:57:50
really understand and so then and then I'm in this position of like like how do I balance like what I'm
00:57:56
seeing happening to friends and people who I love and then like running a business and trying to grow my business
00:58:02
and then with this backdrop of all this [ __ ] up [ __ ] it's hard
00:58:08
so I'm like you know I'm grateful like and I'm also like a hairdresser who loves doing hair like I love good
00:58:14
products like I'm someone who in my 20s like I would overdraft my checking account to get the shampoo and
00:58:19
conditioner that I wanted like I because I know when your hair feels good like when you feel good about how you look like you just feel so much better and I
00:58:26
would literally choose like products over food all the time in my 20s and so I wanted to make products that are clean
00:58:32
and But ultimately like more than clean like I really wanted to make products that work really really well that don't
00:58:38
cost like a hundred dollars for a shampoo and conditioner like I just wanted to make really highly functional products that work on people's hair the
00:58:44
hairdressers love and that people love that they can actually afford and I'm so passionate about it but like there's a
00:58:50
lot of things that I can't even think about the cool things that I've done because I'm like literally like if you read comments
00:58:56
right now but like who cares about a comment I don't really care about comments I care about like what's happened in my state like in Texas like
00:59:03
I mean they're like like this like drag band that was just passed like I'm performing in Texas in Austin in
00:59:09
December like I have to make sure like there used to be able to be like now in this show fun and [ __ ] I wouldn't want
00:59:15
kids there anyway it was like an adult show but like it is like
00:59:21
there is like I'm like there was there was a lot they were talking about that would like just force people to wear
00:59:26
clothes of their like biological sex in public
00:59:32
that I didn't pass or there's a conversation around it the way that we're like trending and heading and any
00:59:37
time where you like talk about like limiting a whole group's ability to like you know access like information
00:59:43
Healthcare education or just like their exposure to public under the guise of like protecting kids like historically
00:59:50
we've really seen that a lot of times like against so many marginalized groups
00:59:55
so I think any time when that starts happening we all really need to be super leery especially because like sex abuse
01:00:01
is such a huge issue and it is happening in families and in churches and it's happening in schools um I'll tell you
01:00:08
where it's not happening is it drag queen brunch okay it's not happening there
01:00:13
um it's not happening in healthcare clinics well maybe it could be in some places like I don't you know
01:00:19
but really it's like it is not happening in gender affirming care anything happening at drag queen branches um it's
01:00:25
he's a dentist or you know some doctor might put you under some those things happen with these crazy [ __ ] CIS head
01:00:30
doctors who you find out where like you know impregnating their [ __ ] patients or like that is what it's like maybe
01:00:35
that but like in gender affirming care and in drag queen brunch it's not child abuse why why where's this because I've
01:00:41
noticed this what feels like quite a tectonic shift um in
01:00:47
transphobic narratives over the last couple of months in particular it seems to have been this this ground
01:00:53
and I can't figure out where it's come from I was saying to this too earlier on but if I don't know where it's come from
01:00:59
I don't really know part of it is conservative thing tanks so when Biden won in 2020
01:01:05
um and we saw this in Virginia because the Virginia House of delegates uh it by
01:01:12
one vote State Republican and then because they have off uh cycle elections and Virginia has told 2019 it flips back
01:01:19
to or flips to Democrats and then 2021 it reverses again and goes back to Republicans and the issue that they
01:01:27
really use there was bathrooms and trans rights because the democratic-controlled
01:01:32
uh legislator in that 19 session had done some things on trans rights and they threw these conservative think
01:01:38
tanks because a lot of times Virginia because it has off years like they use that as like a Bellwether to like test things like just on both sides like
01:01:45
Democrats and Republicans but they were throwing everything at the wall they're abortion hell no they don't want that that's not going well for them right now
01:01:51
because most people support the right to abortion so for Republicans like that's not a winning thing right now but the
01:01:57
thing that in gay marriage that's not really a huge thing anymore because most people support gay marriage but when they threw trans rights
01:02:05
when they through biological males competing against women in sports robbing you know your sweet pretty
01:02:11
little white girl of her you know hard-earned sporting opportunities that stuck
01:02:17
that stuck hardcore that got people [ __ ] circling the wagons honey so
01:02:24
um that is when we really started to see and when you were like oh just in these last three months it has not just been
01:02:30
these last three months that's because of the way that elections work and because we just had a midterm election in November of last year and then they
01:02:36
don't take office until January and then it takes months and months for things to get through committee and stuff all of this [ __ ] has been in the works
01:02:43
we've all been talking about this if you look at my getting curious that was canceled on Netflix last [ __ ] year
01:02:48
there's a whole episode about this and it's it talks about the anti-drag bills up until 2022. as compared to that time
01:02:55
we have four times more at that time and the graph was like this so it isn't new and it just takes a
01:03:01
minute but um I think another thing that we're seeing is that like you know how you were saying like oh the lion or like
01:03:07
the the thing of like the Tigers coming for you run away from the tiger so that's like negativity bias versus like
01:03:12
positive positive bias that's why a story of like someone getting murdered or someone getting abused is gonna go
01:03:18
way farther than like you know the good news network story you know it's your negativity bias so that's the other
01:03:24
thing is that like because we have so much fear-mongering around trans issues right now
01:03:29
um that's also part of like why like it feels like it's going so much farther
01:03:34
because people really are actually thinking that people really think that there's like little kids going and getting hysterectomies like going to
01:03:40
school as a boy and coming home as a girl having like full you know what I mean like people actually have been convinced that like there's little teeny
01:03:46
children who are making you know permanent medical decisions with no parental supervision with no medical
01:03:53
supervision people really think that's true another huge issue that we're up against right now is that there's so
01:03:58
much distance from information around like the fact that actually like biological sex is in and of itself a
01:04:06
spectrum like that's not even a binary like do you know what intersex is
01:04:11
do I yeah no I don't so that's the i in lgbtqia there is like six intersex uh
01:04:17
there's six my friend Alicia Roth Weigel is an amazing intersex activist her book is coming out it's called inverse cowgirl she also just helped produce a
01:04:24
movie that just came out that is called everybody but statistics show that up to two percent I've interviewed her I'm
01:04:30
getting curious if you ever want to listen to it but up to two percent of our population is entering you should actually have her on this podcast
01:04:35
because she's [ __ ] major but two percent of our population is intersex we don't test everyone that's born for
01:04:42
what our chromosomes are so there's xx and then there's X Y but then there's also a variation that's x x y there's
01:04:48
also some there's like these multiple variations there's six main ones that qualify someone as intersex
01:04:54
um and so what happens is and is it like if a kid is born intersex doctors they
01:05:00
don't even Mark that down like they will take the kid they talk to the parent and they say like whatever the genitalia most appears as they're in literally one
01:05:08
thing that I have learned and have been told is like doctors will literally say it's easier to dig a hole than build a
01:05:14
pole so most people that are born intersex they will make into someone that looks biologically female but these
01:05:21
people will have to take hormones for their entire life they have to have gender they have to have genital surgery like on their genitals when they are
01:05:27
babies I'm talking like operate on their genitals when they're babies and then when they're kids and then they have to wear expanders when they're kids like
01:05:33
their parents have to teach them how to wear expanders so they will have a vagina that looks like other people's vaginas so kids currently up to two
01:05:40
percent of people now when you say that to transphobes they'll say like oh well actually that study was wrong and it's
01:05:46
only 0.02 people it's not two percent it's it's 0.2 and either way
01:05:52
two percent of the population of seven billion that's hundreds of millions of
01:05:57
people who have intersex characteristics of 0.2 that's still millions and
01:06:03
millions of people with intersex characteristics and there's a lot of people who look like they're men who are
01:06:08
actually walking around here with xxy chromosomes a lot of men who can't have kids it's actually because they have
01:06:14
they are intersex so intersex people exist all over the place like intersex
01:06:20
is a real thing the idea of biological sex being a binary isn't even true and if you talk to biologists they will tell
01:06:27
you exactly what I'm telling you and it's interesting in a lot of these anti-trans bills for kids intersex kids
01:06:33
are specifically carved out so in these bills it says you can't commit no General mutilation no hormones
01:06:41
your kid must be the the biological sex that they were born unless they are intersex
01:06:47
and then we must do genital surgery we must prescribe hormones we must enforce
01:06:53
the binary so that's and if you think I'm being hyperbolic right now not you or just
01:06:58
anyone watching like do this research look up what intersex is because can I ask you a really important
01:07:04
question uh that I've been I've been mulling over in my head and I'm going to be I think there'll be a lot of people that are mulling this question in their head which is how can I be a and I'm not
01:07:12
even sure if this is the right word but how can I be a better Ally um I think everyone needs to realize uh
01:07:18
I think the Ally talk is a little bit garbage because it Ally implies that
01:07:25
like this doesn't affect me but because I care about you I'm gonna fight against this yeah but actually these Tran this
01:07:30
transphobia affects everyone like it affects everyone um it affects cisgender women because
01:07:35
like even now like there's little girls who like they're wanting to like there's this like little girls soccer team in
01:07:40
Utah where this one team beat the other team and the K the parents of the kids who got beaten accused the other girls
01:07:46
of being transgender and they were like that's why they got beaten so like as we start to like incentivize you know
01:07:52
checking kids genitals and checking like to make sure that you're who you say you are and like and really like villainize
01:07:58
this idea of transness it starts like it's going to affect everyone like so if it doesn't affect you now it's like we
01:08:05
already lost our right to reproductive health care because the right to reproductive Health Care in the United States goes hand in hand with its bodily
01:08:10
autonomy so whether you're talking about determining what your body does reproductively or determining what your body does as far as your gender
01:08:16
expression like they go hand in hand and it's all about control so that control affects everyone so I think we need to
01:08:22
like allyship I think is like oh like I'm gonna do this like even though it doesn't affect me I'm gonna be your ally at least that's how I feel about it like
01:08:28
that's like how when I think of it but really it's like we need people to understand that like if you're white racism it doesn't affect you in the same
01:08:36
way that it does for a person of color but you shouldn't be like I'm gonna do you a solid and be an ally you should do
01:08:43
what you should be you should be in that fight because in Injustice anywhere is an injustice everywhere and it will
01:08:48
affect you and actually the racism and the transphobia and the homophobia and the misogyny and the um the way that we
01:08:55
are like so like don't talk about disabled people and and what they need or people with disabilities in the
01:09:02
disabled Community is like all this does is like keeps money in the most powerful
01:09:07
people the most powerful people's hands like we all need to really come together like like to me it's like the corporate
01:09:13
greed like that's really what is like causing so much of this and then like corporate greed because so much of that
01:09:19
is like made by Republicans they're like look over here it's trans people look
01:09:24
over here it's gay people look over here it's it's um it's food stamps like they're being lazy like that's why those
01:09:30
people are being lazy these people don't even work these people are [ __ ] crazy with their Tran their their kids are
01:09:36
running around like you know what I mean so it's just a lot of like smoke mirrors now as far as hair care or obsessive JV and hair is definitely gorgeous can I
01:09:42
just say can I just say on this um your team said to me before you arrived they said we've we've worked with a few people but nobody's ever been so deeply
01:09:48
obsessed in the product and been authentically obsessed in the product as you have so I've went through and I've
01:09:54
had a little sample of all of them they are the most Exquisite exquisitely smelling products I've ever wonderful of
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um ingesting nasally um well done I heard this is breaking records thanks
01:10:06
um pre-wash cup oil is amazing well I think for me I really love formulas I love formulas that work on all hair
01:10:12
types um so for us I'm really big on like the amount of product like if your hair is
01:10:17
finer in density you're going to use a little bit less if your hair is quite thick in density like a lot of hair per square inch you're going to use a little
01:10:23
bit more um that's an amazing heat protectant right there that has niacinamide and charged lemon protein in it so it's it
01:10:29
has no holes that's amazing for people who just like want to put a little bit of nourishment in their hair um but it also has great heat protection
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even if you don't style your hair with a blow dryer or a curling iron you're still experiencing heat from your body
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heat in the Sun so it's just a great hair hydrator um but no hold if you wanted for you if
01:10:45
you wanted to like bring out your waves a little bit we don't have any air dry cream in there but uh it's over there yeah air dry cream you could like put on
01:10:52
your waves when your hair is wet and then like run your little like I saw it's the foam uh no it's a cream air dry
01:10:58
cream but you can like really like take that out with like a little like your little wave brush and really just like get like bring out your waves um you
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could do like a sponge roller with that um I love our little air dry cream it's
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great for textured hair it's really great for like 18 through 4C that's on damage that's great for anyone who's got like highlights heat damage swimming a
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lot you sold me and I'm I can't wait I hope you love it we'll send something to you and your partner oh we've got a huge
01:11:21
bag here thank you so much you're so welcome we have a closing tradition where the last guest leaves a question for this yes who's your next one who's
01:11:27
your next one what about your life do you think is abnormal and why oh okay um
01:11:33
[Music] maybe like my five cats three dogs and
01:11:38
seven chickens and that's like maybe more animals than most people have but I get so much joy from my family and I
01:11:45
don't know if I really want human babies I love my fur babies so maybe that's that's I think why it's my life is so
01:11:50
fun do I get to ask the question the next person yes but do I get to know who the next person is I said to ask a random question of someone I don't even
01:11:56
know yes and also they'll be turned into cards that people will play with their families and stuff oh [ __ ] so it can't
01:12:01
be what's the [ __ ] thing you've ever done all right
01:12:07
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you got to the end of this podcast whenever someone gets to the end of this podcast I feel like I owe them a greater debt of gratitude because that means you
01:13:28
listen to the whole thing and hopefully that suggests that you enjoyed it if you are at the end and you enjoyed this
01:13:34
podcast could you do me a little bit of a favor and hit that subscribe button that's one of the clearest indicators we
01:13:40
have that this episode was a good episode and we look at that on all of the episodes to see which episodes generated the most subscribers
01:13:45
thank you so much and I'll see you again next time
