In this conversation, we explore a caller's journey through challenges with communication, relationships, and personal struggles, including experiences with alcoholism, academic labels, bullying, and aggression. The caller reflects on past relationships, faith journey, loss of a sibling, and the impact of grief, guilt, and family dynamics on their beliefs and coping mechanisms. Discussion also touches on health risks, mourning processes, substance abuse, self-improvement, and the importance of empathy and support in navigating personal growth and positive change.Join the PREMIUM philosophy community on the web for free!NOW AVAILABLE FOR SUBSCRIBERS: MY NEW BOOK 'PEACEFUL PARENTING' - AND THE INTERACTIVE PEACEFUL PARENTING AI AND AUDIOBOOK!Also get the Truth About the French Revolution, the interactive multi-lingual philosophy AI trained on thousands of hours of my material, private livestreams, premium call in shows, the 22 Part History of Philosophers series and much more!See you soon!https://freedomain.locals.com/support/promo/UPB2022
So I contacted you because I seem to have a lot of issues communicating with people in general and just finding my way in the social world.
I'm finding a spouse.
Yeah.
No, yeah, here I am saying I can't hear you.
And so sorry about that.
I think we've sorted it out now, but okay.
How does it, how does it show up in your life?
What are the major issues you've noticed?
Well, um, I have just problems with like, just, I have no friendships.
Um, uh, I have no people where I can communicate with.
Uh, yeah.
And did you have friends when you were younger?
I did.
And what do you think changed over time?
Um, I think my, my, my, my attitude towards people, I did more and more people.
I just caught off.
No, no, I understand that you're speaking to fewer people now, but why do you think you did that?
Because I didn't like that version of myself.
I wanted to become something new.
I think that's why I did that.
All right.
So this all very abstract, if you can just tell me more practical things.
Was there something that happened with your former friendships?
Did they betray you, or did they move away, or did they get boring, or was there something more practical and tangible that happened with your former friends?
I mean, if I were to talk to your friends, your former friends, and say, why did this guy stop talking to you, or why did you stop talking to this guy, what would they say?
I think they would say, I just forgot about him, and he was not so important to me, so I just moved on.
Okay, and would you agree with that assessment of theirs?
Yeah.
I would agree with that.
Okay.
And so, what is it that made them boring to you?
Or not interesting?
No, they thought that I was boring, I think.
Oh, so you wanted to continue the friendships, but they stopped talking to you?
Well, it depends on which friendship.
Some people are cut off, but some people just stop talking to me and just stop hanging out with me.
So, yeah.
All right.
I'm not sure what to say at this point, because everything I say is not correct, or I don't get any more details.
Right, so I say, well, why did you stop seeing your friends?
He says, well, no, it was sometimes the other way around.
Okay, well, did you find them boring?
No, I think they found me boring.
Right, so you just keep flipping perspectives to the point where I can't get any facts?
Actually.
What was your longest friendship that ended?
I think... I think somewhat 20 years.
So the longest friendship you had is one year?
20.
Sorry?
20.
20 years?
Yeah, 20 years.
Okay, so the longest friendship you had was from 20 years.
And from what age to what age was that for you?
I think it was 10, 9 to 30.
Okay, 10 to 30, okay.
And what happened to that friendship?
I cut it off because I thought the person was too much degenerating, too much drinking and just not moving to positive things and keeping a certain level that I just don't
He had problems with his lever because of too much drinking.
So he was like a self-destructive alcoholic, right?
Yeah.
Okay.
And for how long had he been an alcoholic?
I think it started when he was 14 years old.
Same time that I started drinking, I think something like that.
14, 13 years old till now.
And how long have you been drinking for, as you said, about mid-teens?
I've been drinking from 14 till I would say 27, I've been drinking.
Okay, so you would have lost a lot of learning about social skills, right?
Yeah, because most of my social skills was when I was drunk.
Right, which isn't really social skills, right?
No.
Is that fair to say?
No, not at all.
Yeah, that's fair to say.
Alright.
So, why do you think you started drinking in your 14, 15 years of age?
Well, I remember the first time that we bought alcohol and I drank it and I felt totally free.
I didn't have any...
I didn't have any like, uh, boundaries.
So I could just, I just could talk to people if I wanted.
So it helped you with social anxiety.
Is that right?
Yeah.
And why do you think you had social anxiety?
Oh, I think I was afraid of people because they can attack me.
Attack you, okay.
Why do you think you had the idea that people would attack you?
Well, when I was a kid and I was at school, I was attacked because I had a problem with reading and they recognized that weakness and then they start bullying me.
And this is where I think.
Yeah.
So maybe you can tell me a little bit about your home life and then what happened at school.
So, uh, my own life.
So at first, uh, I grew up just, uh, with, with my mother and my father in a, in like a normal home.
So, uh, I, I went, I was, uh, at home until I was four, five years old.
And then I went to, uh, school.
And then at school they saw that I was not engaging with people that much.
For example, they said to me that the bell wasn't going and I was still outside.
All the children get that they need to go inside and I was still roaming outside doing things and I was not going inside.
And then later on they saw that I still had problems.
This was their observation.
And then they just kept me one year in school, one more year in the same class.
And then later on, when reading and writing started, they saw that I have problems with that.
So then they said, yeah, well, this is not good.
And then, yeah, I don't know what
That's where I... So, what happened with your reading issues?
Was it dyslexia or something else?
Have they been solved?
Yeah, I solved them now.
Now I solve them in later years.
From 26, I started reading.
And I noticed that once I read it, that was like a lot of fear.
But once I got over that fear,
I trained my mind to read better, and eventually I learned reading.
So I can read now.
It's still not optimal, but I can read.
So is it your belief that you got bullied because you had trouble reading?
I think, I think, I think I got, I think they picked on me because I was different.
In that moment, they saw that I was different than the other kids.
Well, the other, the other kids could, that's, that's where, where they- Well, no, no, hang on.
Different doesn't answer anything.
Because a kid who is very good at sports is also different, but he doesn't get bullied, right?
Yeah.
So I need to know, because I think you said, I could be wrong, but I think you said that you got bullied because you couldn't read.
Yeah, that's what I remember.
I remember the kid was giving everybody their work.
And the work had names on it and I had written my name on it and I could not read what was on it until he said you cannot read your own writing.
That's not why you were bullied.
Guaranteed.
You were not bullied because you couldn't read.
Okay.
Because you can't read.
You just needed extra help or resources or training or something, right?
Yeah.
Yeah, you were bullied because you had crappy parents.
Not because you couldn't read.
Because if you have good parents, what happens?
Right?
If you have difficulty in school, you're having trouble reading or something, and you have really good parents, what happens?
What do your good parents do?
And they will stand up for you and they will, they will make sure that it doesn't happen.
They will see it in your reactions.
I guess when they'll hire you a tutor, they will teach you how to read themselves.
I mean, did you get any help from your parents with your reading issues?
Uh, my, my mother and my father tried to, to teach me.
They tried and they say that that was impossible.
Well, did they hire somebody who was an expert?
They had, like, people in school that tried to teach me.
Outside of that, no.
Okay, so they didn't take you to a learning specialist to get you evaluated and figure out how you could read better, right?
Yeah, well, they did this.
They did this.
They tried to do that.
And so they did tests on me.
They did like an MRI scan.
And they saw that my brain neurotransmitters or something, they are too wide apart and information is traveling too slow or something.
This is why I cannot read.
I don't really know the science behind that, but did that mean that you being in a formal school setting wasn't good for you, right?
Yeah, I think that's what they concluded out of these tests.
Okay, so was it possible for them to homeschool?
I don't, my father don't believe in that kind of stuff.
Okay.
So that's not answering the question.
Was it possible?
Like, is it legal?
Like some places it's not, like Germany, you can't homeschool.
I don't know this.
I never met somebody who was homeschooled.
Okay.
All right.
So they tried to get you tutors.
They tried to get you evaluated, but it's, is it nothing worked?
Is that right?
Yeah, they just didn't find a solution or they didn't continue with the training scheme or something.
Okay.
This is all, I don't know.
This is sorry.
I don't know what's happening in this conversation.
I mean, you got evaluated, you got an MRI scan.
So I assume that there was some treatment or some approach that was going to try and help you read.
Isn't that right?
No, I don't think there was like, other than trying to constantly try to like sit with somebody and he has or she has like a cart and then they move the cart and then just trying to read what's on the paper.
Other than that, I cannot remember.
Sorry, I don't understand.
I don't know what moving a cart means.
Yeah, it was just a card.
They had a card and they move it on the papers and they just point out the words and then I just have to say the words and this is how they're trying to, trying to teach me how to read.
And they just did this process for many years.
Oh, so for many years you were in a training program to learn how to read, but it didn't work.
Is that right?
Yeah.
Oh okay, well then I could have been, I probably was completely wrong, and I'm sorry for saying that it was crappy parenting, because it sounds like your parents did get you into an expert training program, and they tried for years to teach you how to read, but it didn't work, right?
I don't know if expert is a good, expert is not, it was just a person at school that
If I was in the class, he'd just say, yeah, you have to go out of the class and then in this room, and then we start reading.
And that's it.
This was not like real special maths or something.
Okay.
Again, I'm really confused.
I thought that was this whole card thing that they tried to teach you how to read.
And now you're saying they just told you to go out of the room?
Yeah, that's how I remember it.
Like there was just a person, I was at the table and the person moved the card.
But my memory of this is not that great.
Okay.
So which was it?
Did you have training or were you just sent out of the class?
When I was sent out of the class, they trained me.
They're trying to train me.
Okay.
So there was a sort of special room that you went to with an expert who was trying to teach you how to read.
Yeah.
Okay, and this went on for years?
Yeah, this went on for years.
And then the... And you didn't make much... Sorry, is it the case that you didn't make much progress?
Yeah, I didn't make much progress.
I never... Once I had a certain level, I just didn't pass it.
What do you mean you didn't pass it?
Oh, you didn't get better?
No, it didn't get better.
And did your parents ever try any alternatives to what was happening at school?
Did they try to hire outside tutors or consultants or other kinds of experts?
Because clearly whatever was happening at the school wasn't working, right?
Yeah, it was not working.
I think they tried at first, but then they just gave up and then it was just accepted that this was going to be like this.
Not capable of reading.
Okay, so they recognized it wasn't working, they did a little bit of effort to try and hire someone else, and then they gave up and said, he's just not gonna read.
Yeah.
Now, was there any issue with your general intelligence?
In other words, were your parents or the school saying, and I'm not saying this is true of you as an adult, right, but as a child, were they saying something like, well he's just slow, he's just not smart?
Yeah, that's what they were saying.
I went to a school for people with low IQ.
Do you remember what your IQ was tested at as a child?
I don't know, but I think below 85.
Yeah, 85, 80, 85ish, so something 90 maybe.
Okay, got it, got it.
I don't know, would 90 put you in a special school?
I thought it would be 85 or below, I could be wrong, obviously I'm no expert in this area, but... Yeah, 85 is the standard, like 85 if you're below, if your IQ is below, then you go in a special school.
So, I guess they felt, your parents and the school authorities felt like, this kid's just not very sharp, so we'll, we're not gonna, you know, like we can't really teach him how to read if he's not very smart, or at least we can't teach him how to read very well, is that right?
Yeah, they give up on you, that's it, like, they accept that you're not that
And was there other things later in life that had you re-evaluate or think again about your intelligence?
I mean, did you do things later on in life that made you feel smarter?
Uh, not really.
Not really.
Okay.
And so, uh, what's your life?
I mean, I assume you're in your thirties at the moment.
You don't have to give me your exact age, but what's your life like at the moment?
What do you do with your time?
Well, my life at the moment is, uh, mainly work.
And with my free time, I go to church.
Much else than that, I don't do.
I listen sometimes, I listen to your shows and to other things I was trying to read and other than this, I don't have much activities.
Right.
Okay.
And what do you do for your work?
I'm an electrician.
I do electrical work.
And do you work for someone else or do you run your own business?
No, I worked for someone else.
Okay, got it, got it.
Okay, so, when you were bullied at school, what happened?
I think I became aggressive.
No, but what was done to you?
I don't remember exactly.
I just remember what my reaction was.
I do remember that.
I don't remember what... how they exactly bullied me.
Other than the kid was making fun of my writing.
Sorry, was making fun of your what?
My writing.
Your writing, okay.
Not to read my writing.
Okay.
And so you said you got aggressive.
What happened?
Yeah.
So I was in the schoolyard and these kids start, so he, he was like this boy had more people with them and they just start bullying me.
And then I just pushed them.
I pushed them all.
So one by one, I pushed them to the ground.
And they fell.
And then I realized I was stronger than them, physically.
Okay.
And how did you get into the drinking?
Well, the wrong friends, I think.
I was surrounded by people that had bad parents.
They didn't know better than to abuse substance, alcohol or drugs.
It was kind of natural for them and I just went with it.
They drank, so I drank also.
Okay.
And how bad did the drinking get for you?
Quite bad.
Not really extreme, but every weekend I was drunk.
When I was a teenager and when I was a young adult also.
So sometimes Friday and Saturday.
Mostly Friday I was drunk.
And how many drinks would you have in an evening?
I think so, like 10 to 20 beers and some fancy, it's like, uh, if it's like a strong, strong drink, then a vodka or something, some half glass vodka.
I guess sometimes I don't even realize how much.
Just forget what happened.
And this was starting from 14 or 15 years of age?
Yeah.
14, 13, something like that.
Oh, 13 even?
Yeah, it was possible.
And did your parents know that you drank?
No.
How could they not know?
Uh, well, they were, uh, they were, uh, my, my parents, I think, I think they were like, um, they were not there.
I think they were not there because of, uh, uh, they had, they had tragedy and they had like things going on, but that they could not control.
And my sister, I had a little sister and she died and, um,
Yeah, that took them away for a couple of years.
They were not there for a couple of years.
Gosh, what happened to your little sister?
She had a brain tumor.
Oh gosh, I'm sorry about that.
That's terrible.
Yeah, I don't feel sorry about that.
I'm sorry?
I don't feel anything about that.
What do you mean?
I mean, I know what you mean by, I don't feel anything, but how old were you when your sister died and how old was she?
So when she was born, it was, can I say, 2000.
And now when she died was 2004, I think.
So I was 24.
Oh, so she, and was she sick for quite a while before she died?
Yeah, two years she was sick, so two years they went to the hospital, chemotherapy, like this.
Right, and so she died at the age of four?
Yeah, she died at the age of four.
And I assume that you weren't particularly close to her?
I assume there was a fairly significant age gap?
Well, I was, I was, but I don't remember that well, but I remember, well, I was, I was, I was close to her, but I just don't remember, but I know that I was close to her.
And how old were you, sorry, how old were you when she died?
I was 24.
24, sorry, you did mention that, okay.
No, no, no, no, no, not 24.
But now I'm trying to think of, uh, uh, I think 12 or something or 11 when, when, when she died, I was 11 years old.
Oh yeah.
So I was, cause I was thinking it might be shortly before you started drinking, right?
Yeah.
It might be related, right?
I don't know that.
I don't know that either, I'm just saying.
Yeah.
It might be.
Okay, so, your parents, you said that they didn't, I mean, they didn't notice that you were going out and coming home drunk at the age of 13 or 14?
They didn't notice this?
Yeah, well, they know, they know, they did know, but I just, my mother, sometimes she's
Like, she said I should not do that, but I just did it.
I just did what I want.
And then I fight with her, but she had nothing to say.
For me, I just do what I want.
And your father, did he say anything about it?
My father, not really.
Not that much.
And when you were younger, if you did things your parents didn't like, they said it was bad or wrong, how would they deal with that?
Would they discipline you or what would happen?
I think they would shame me.
I think my mother would shame me.
Saying that I was not, no discipline, no hitting or something, no beating, that never happened to me.
But I think my mother would shame me saying that I was not good and this kind of things.
And your father?
My father, when my mother had no control over me, then my father would sometimes get mad.
But most of the discipline was by my mother.
And what would your father do when he got angry?
Uh, I, uh, uh, throw something at me or throw, throw a shoe at me or something like that.
Okay.
Uh, no, nothing like, like really, really bad.
Okay, and what would he say?
I don't remember that.
Okay.
So, you started drinking from 13 or 14, and did you say that you stopped at 27?
Did I have that right?
Yeah, 27.
I stopped at 26, 27.
Drinking like every weekend, I had some fallbacks, but that was like once in two months or something.
I was just partying and then after 28 something, I really stopped with everything, like drinking, smoking, all of it.
And was there something that happened that made you stop or was it just willpower?
No, the lifestyle was just bringing bad things in my life.
That was just not good.
Like what?
I had a bad girlfriend.
My life became just a mess after all this.
Okay, so let's talk a little bit about your dating life.
What's happened with your dating life since your, I guess, early to mid-teens?
I didn't know really, like, how to talk to women.
But I had a girlfriend when I was 12 years old.
And I was like, I just met her at some party of a friend of mine.
And, uh, we didn't really talk, but we just, uh, it was like, like puppy love.
And how old was she?
15 years old.
I think, uh, same age.
So you met your girlfriend at a party when you were 12 and she was 12.
Yeah.
But this wasn't a drinking party.
Is that right?
No, it was like a dislike.
This is like a other ethnicity.
So they had like these, these parties where they barbecue and then they start singing karaoke.
This kind of thing.
I'm getting an Asian vibe.
Asians.
I'm sorry?
Asians.
Asians.
Okay.
Got it.
Okay.
So it's quite surprising to me that an Asian family would let their daughter date at 12.
Depends on what kind of Asians, yeah.
Oh, do you mean like South Asians, like Indian Asians, or East Asians, like Japanese, Chinese?
These are South Asians.
Okay, so Indian, okay.
And that's not your ethnicity?
No, no.
No, it's not my ethnicity.
It's not my ethnicity, but you have to understand that, where I'm from.
The people that come there are like brides.
They are like brides.
The men from where I live, they take them out of other countries and they import them here.
Are you white?
Is that right?
Yeah, I'm white.
Okay.
So, you started dating the Indian girl when you were both 12, is that right?
Filipino.
Filipino, sorry.
Filipino girl.
Okay, good.
So you dated the Filipino girl when you were 12, and did your parents know you were dating the Filipino girl?
No.
But her family knew that she was dating you?
I think her family didn't care much.
Okay.
And did she end up drinking as well?
Later?
No, no, I didn't know her that well.
I just... I saw her two or three times, that was it.
Oh, so she's not a girlfriend then?
Well, it was like online, online chatting.
Oh, it was online?
Yeah, after that was online.
Okay, so she, I mean, if you only saw her two or three times, she's not really a girlfriend then, right?
No, no, she's not really a girlfriend.
It's like just the first, first thing, first woman I came across.
All right, so what happened after that for dating for you?
Then at 15, I had my first girlfriend, my real girlfriend.
Yeah, she was a girl that I know from my hometown.
And did you meet her at a party as well?
Yeah, I meet her at a, not a party, but that's like a party kind of, where, I don't know how to say this in English, like a fair.
It's like a, but like a shooting and fishing there and yeah.
Okay.
Um, did she drink as well or not so much?
Uh, at that time, uh, I, she, she didn't drunk, but she liked me because I was drunk.
Oh, she liked you because you were drunk.
Okay.
Yeah.
And did she end up drinking with you?
No.
She drank a little bit and not as much as me.
Okay.
And how long did you go out for?
I think a couple of months, like three, four months or something.
And how did it end?
I had a fight with a boy that she liked also.
And we had a fight and then she didn't like that.
Oh, so did she break up with you because you were fighting?
Yeah, I was fighting a boy that she also liked, and I was jealous, and then she broke up with me.
Okay.
And then what was the next dating thing?
After that, I had a girlfriend.
From there also a girlfriend from.
Yeah.
It was also a woman from yeah, but this is this one was when I was very young.
It was like 15 years old.
Sorry, I don't follow.
No, yeah, I get it that you don't follow.
I was 17 years old and then I had a girlfriend from.
From from she was half African, half white.
She lived alone with her mother.
That was my girlfriend for a while.
That's when you were 17?
Yeah.
Okay.
And how long did you go out with her?
A couple of weeks, I think.
No, a couple of weeks, okay.
And why did that end?
She didn't want to sleep with me.
Oh, so you broke up with her because she wouldn't sleep with you?
Yeah.
And she was your age, 17, as well?
No, I think she was 15, 16 years old, something.
Oh, so you wanted to sleep with the 15-year-old girl, but she wouldn't sleep with you, so you broke up with her?
Yeah.
I was 16, 17, something like that.
And when you think about that, when you think back on that, what do you think of it?
I think, uh, I think I was stupid to, to reason like that.
What do you mean?
I think it was inappropriate.
Like that was actually good for her.
It was good for her to say, at least I want to have a relationship with you before I want to be official boy and girlfriend.
And then, uh, then maybe you can sleep with me.
That's actually good.
I think about it now.
Yeah.
It was wise.
Yeah, it's cool.
Okay.
All right.
And then after that?
After that, uh, after that, I just start having like one night stands.
Uh, and these are at the parties?
Yeah.
Parties.
Okay.
So you like have sex at the party and then never see the girl again?
Yeah, but that was later.
It was like when I was 18 years old.
So I had the time that I had no girlfriend.
Okay.
And then when I was 18 years old, then I started partying and having sex with women and like this.
And how many times did you do the one night stand thing roughly?
20 times or something.
I don't know exactly the exact number.
Okay.
Did you ever get any diseases?
Did you ever get any diseases or any pregnancy scares or any stalkers or anything like that?
Yeah.
Uh, I don't have, don't know really diseases, but, uh, as far as I know, uh, yeah, I checked and there was no disease.
So, uh, pregnancy scares.
No.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
But that was later.
Oh, there was a pregnancy scare later?
Yeah.
I had a girlfriend and she's trying to say that she's pregnant, but she was trying to manipulate me like this, saying that she's pregnant.
Sorry, so what was your next girlfriend after the one night stand thing?
That was when I was 25.
So there's like a big gap between the 18, 20 and then 25.
Because I had a difficult time and I was kind of isolated.
So I was isolated from 20 till like 24.
What do you mean you were isolated?
How?
Well, when I was 18, 19 years old, I had a lot of fighting.
After a while, I got caught for that a couple of times.
And then I had a whole process.
They punished me with working stuff and I had a little prison sentence.
Not like three days in prison.
A little prison sentence, how long?
Like three days, and then another three days.
I never went to the real prison, but just a couple of days.
And was that for assault, is that right?
Assault, yeah, assault and trying, I don't know how to say it in English, but trying to
Uh, murder or I don't know how to say it in English.
Yeah.
I don't know if, if you, uh, I don't know how to say it in English.
But I'm pretty sure attempted murder is going to get you more than three days.
I got the sentence of like maximum working, working, uh, I got a sense of maximum working.
I'm not sure what maximum working means.
You mean you got the maximum sentence for whatever the crime was?
Yeah, so I had like a working sentence.
Okay.
But the most time you spent in jail was three days, is that right?
Yeah, three days.
Okay.
A couple of times.
Okay.
And this meant you were isolated, but how?
Well, they said to me that I have to go through a whole process, so I started doing the process, but I just was not interacting anymore with society or with people.
I just was on my own, mostly in my room.
And then I just do what I have to do.
I go to the working sentence.
I go to like a program to work on my aggression.
Uh, I go speak with, uh, with the people that check on me.
This went on for a couple of years.
Oh, so you did anger management courses.
You had a parole officer, the whole thing, right?
Yeah.
Okay.
Got it.
Yes.
And so you didn't really date during this process?
No.
Okay, got it.
So then 25, you get another girlfriend, is that right?
25, I got another girlfriend.
And you were still drinking at this time?
Yeah, I was drinking.
I met her at the club.
You met her at a club, okay.
And what happened with that relationship?
That relationship was very bad.
Go on.
Well, I met her at the club and she had a lot of money.
I didn't understand where the money was coming from, but I was happy that she was paying for everything.
And so I started a relationship with her and then she had an apartment and all that.
I was not really thinking about where everything was from.
Was she a prostitute?
Yeah, I was thinking something like a prostitute or maybe like a go-go dancer.
But really, I didn't know and I didn't care either also what it was.
My mindset at the time was a bit...
I don't know.
What I discovered was that she was married.
That had broken a very important institution in my life.
So she wasn't separated or she was still married?
Yeah, she was married.
Okay.
But she took you to her house, right?
To her apartment.
Where was her husband?
Working in some
Dubai or something.
Oh, her husband was overseas.
And was there no indication when you went to her house or her apartment, was there no indication that a man lived there?
Yeah, later on there was, but at first there were no pictures or anything.
No shaving implements in the bathroom?
No, she took care of that.
She all hid in that, I think.
Because the man was like away for like a couple of months.
And why, uh, how did you find out she was married?
I don't remember this.
You don't remember.
Okay.
And how long did that last for?
Three years.
Two years?
Three.
Three years?
You must have found out she was married at some point.
Yeah, I knew that she was married the second year.
So then I knew that she was married.
So for a whole year, you didn't know she was married?
Yeah, I know that she was married.
So the whole year her husband didn't come back or anything?
Yeah, she's very scheming.
Okay.
So then you continued to date her for two years after you knew she was married?
Yeah.
Why?
I think I have no values.
I think, uh, what's this?
I was, she was pretty, the sex was good.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Okay.
I don't want them on a lonely.
So you didn't want to be lonely.
Okay.
No.
And then what ended that relationship?
I just, I just, I just want, I thought it was terrible and I wanted to stop it.
I just said, this is not possible anymore and we need to stop it.
And I just said, this is it.
Yeah.
Okay.
And so this takes you to your mid to late twenties and then what happened?
I decided just to, to not, I decided just to, to, to, to stop with, with, with everything.
And just to focus on creating a better life for myself.
Yeah.
So you haven't dated since, is that right?
Yeah.
And what's your relationship like with your parents?
Did they try to help you out with any of this stuff in your twenties?
Did they say, you know, maybe you shouldn't date a married woman or anything like that?
My mother said that my mother was basically like, she said, well, it doesn't matter that much.
Your mother said it doesn't matter that much that you're dating a married woman.
Yeah.
But what I was shocked by, I was shocked.
I was like, what was her reasoning about this?
Uh, I think, uh, I don't know.
I think, I think she, she, I don't know.
I think she don't care or something like that.
Well, no, I get that.
But what's her... I mean, even if she wasn't moral about it, I mean, that's the kind of thing that would get a man killed.
I don't know.
I really don't know.
I don't know what, why she... This is a good question.
I don't know.
So you said, I'm dating a married woman.
Your mom said, that's fine.
It doesn't matter.
And that was the whole conversation?
What did your father say?
Not much.
Are they bad people?
No, not really.
Well, they're not good people.
If they don't care about you dating or being the side piece to a married woman, that's not good, is it?
No, that's not good.
I just don't think that they care much about what's going on with me.
Okay, so they're bad parents?
If they don't care what's going on with your life?
It looks like that.
Well, no, don't tell me what it looks like.
They're your parents.
I haven't met them.
I can only go by what you say.
If I'm saying something wrong, tell me, of course.
Well, I just remember that they, in comparison to my friends' parents, they were not bad.
So they, for example, my parents' friends, I had a lot of friends, single mothers and all that.
And they were just like, well, you can just smoke weed and all that.
And they said, I should not smoke weed.
I should not steal.
And that was with the other people, that didn't matter.
Oh, so because your parents said don't steal and don't do marijuana, but instead you drank like an alcoholic from 13 onwards and then you tried to half-threaten the half-black girl to have sex with you when you were 16 or 17 and she was 15, that makes your parents okay?
I didn't threaten her.
Well, no.
I mean, I said half-threat, right?
So you said, sleep with me or I'm breaking up with you?
No, no, no.
I didn't say it like this.
There was insight into all that.
Well, I'm sure she got the message because she said, I'm not sleeping with you.
And you said, well, we're breaking up then.
I didn't say we're going to break up.
I just didn't communicate with her anymore.
Well, that's even worse.
You just ghosted her?
Yeah.
Okay.
She went on with the live show.
I'm sorry?
She went just on with the live.
Well, she went on with her life, but she had that experience that you gave her.
Okay.
So what's your relationship like with your parents now?
I try not to communicate with them.
And why not?
Because I feel like it's a pattern.
I just feel afterwards, I feel very bad.
Oh, after you talked with them, you feel bad?
Yeah, I feel bad.
And why is that, do you think?
I try to think of something, I try to make them understand that life is just not good and I don't know why they don't care about that.
So what do you say to your parents about your life being not good?
I'll just give him the facts.
I'm not married.
My work is quite rough.
I don't have a future.
Not much.
I think the economy is bad.
These kind of things.
And what's rough about your work?
Well, my work is not that rough, but it's just, well, it's rough for them and their existence, or for their existence for my brother or my sister.
I just have better circumstances.
Sorry, I'm not quite sure I followed that.
If you could explain it again.
I think there was a bit of a lie.
What do you mean?
I think that my work is rough.
My work is not rough.
It's not that rough.
If I think about it.
Oh, it's not that rough?
No, no, no.
I'm just making up something.
That's fine.
So, your major issue is that you're not married?
My major issue is... Yeah, I'm not married.
I don't have... I have nothing.
When I go home, there's nothing.
It's like you don't have hobbies, right?
You just said you go to work and you go to church, right?
Yeah, I go to work, I go to church, and I have nothing to come home to.
I work for what?
Right, right.
No, I get that.
What's the purpose?
I mean, the man is supposed to work to provide for his family, right?
Yeah.
Now, how long have you been a Christian man for, or how long have you been religious for?
I was first
I've been Catholic since I was – my parents were Catholic, and when I was 12 or something, I could decide to not go to church anymore, and I just went to church.
And then when I was 26, 27, I started to get interested in Christianity again.
Oh, so from 12 to 27, you didn't go to church, right?
I didn't go to church, but I had a question.
If there's no afterlife or if there's no consequence to your actions, then why should you... I was wondering, why should you do good if there's no consequence to it?
If at the last, the only thing that can...
Prevent you from doing wrong.
And then everything that that's, that's prohibited by the law.
Why, why don't do it if it's beneficial to you?
Well, and even the law didn't prevent you from fighting, right?
Yeah.
It was, it was only when the law, uh, stopped me from fighting that I saw that it was wrong.
Because there are consequences to my behavior.
So, is it fair to say that you lost your faith around the time your sister died?
I mean, you lost your faith and you started drinking, right?
Well, the Christianity thing was just a ritual.
You just go to church when it's Christmas, when it's Passover.
That's when you go to church.
And then you see the preachers preaching stuff, but you don't understand what he's saying.
You see the pictures of Christianity on the wall.
Really, these values, these are just unconscious, mostly.
They are not really, like you will not really think about it.
It's not that they tell you the stories.
You kind of know the stories, but you don't know really the stories.
Oh, so you didn't go to like Sunday school or you didn't get educated as a child on Christianity?
No, it was more like a society thing.
Like a social thing.
Yeah, a social thing.
So you were not a strong believer even as a child, is that right?
Oh yeah, I was.
I was.
I had a cross.
I had a cross.
I was.
I believed in Jesus.
But then you lost that around the age of... Sorry, you lost that around the age of 12?
Yeah, I think so.
I think I lost it around drinking age.
And do you think that, I mean, it's pretty tough for Christians, or I guess anybody who's religious, to say, my sister was born, she was very cute, we were very close, at the age of two she got a brain cancer, and then she suffered
for two more years, and then she died at the age of four.
That's kind of tough to plug into God's plan, isn't it?
Well, I thought about it like this.
If heaven is better than Earth, then if you die, then you're actually in a better place, so I should not worry then.
Well, but that would make you want to die, wouldn't it?
Well, the thing is that you cannot die.
You cannot die.
No, no, no, I get that.
But then the best thing to be would be having a brain tumor, right?
Because it gets you out of this veil of fears and into heaven.
Yeah, if it's fast.
Well, but it wasn't for your sister, right?
It wasn't.
She was a little kid and she suffered.
And I assume that you prayed for her to get better, right?
Right?
Didn't you get on your knees and beg Jesus and beg God to heal your sister?
No.
You didn't?
Oh, come on.
Of course you did.
Of course you did.
You said you were very religious, right?
You really believed in Jesus?
So you would be told to pray and you would pray for your sister to get better, wouldn't you?
Yeah.
No, but I, I did.
I don't, I don't remember.
It was like, all this, this whole episode is just gone.
Well, logically, hang on, logically, you would pray for your sister to get better.
Whether you remember it or not, you were very religious, so you would pray morning and night, or at least at night, and you would pray your sister's dying for two years in the next room, or maybe the same room, I don't know, and you would pray to God, please, please,
Cure my sister.
Heal my sister.
I mean, I remember all of those prayers.
I grew up Christian and I would pray morning and night for people around me to be better and for me to be happier, right?
Please, God above, make my mother less violent.
Please, God above, heal my mother's brain.
Please, God above, bring my father back.
Please, God above, have me not be beaten.
Please, God above, help.
Right?
I think you had a worse childhood than me, so... I think you were more desperate for... You keep comparing, you say, well, my parents were better than my friend's parents, or maybe Steph had a worse childhood, but what I'm saying is that you pray to Almighty God to help your sister, right?
I didn't do that consciously at all, so... Okay, this can't be... Listen, brother, brother, my brother,
You were religious.
You believe in prayer.
Your sister is dying for two years, right?
Yeah.
You prayed for God to help your sister just as I prayed to God to help me.
And your sister suffered and died for two years.
And God did not help me.
And God did not help your sister, right?
So you lose your faith and you start drinking and hitting on girls and living kind of half like an animal, right?
For immediate pleasure.
Ah, hedonism.
Yeah.
Why not?
Why not?
Because God didn't listen and your sister died.
Yeah, I don't have any emotion around that.
Well, you are religious now, right?
You recovered your faith at 27, right?
Yeah.
So, you understand that you did pray for your sister.
To be healed, or your sister at least to not suffer as much, right?
Because I assume that the chemo was pretty brutal, right?
She was sick, she was bald, she had no energy.
Very brutal.
Yeah, so your sister suffered half-dying for years when she was just a little kid, right?
Yeah, yeah.
And your faith followed her into the ground.
The funeral was for your faith and her life.
And your hope.
So you're a religious man now?
What's the answer, religiously, as to why your sister suffered for years, died in agony as a little kid?
What's the answer?
Why?
Why would that happen?
Why would God not listen to your prayers to heal your sister?
Well, I think that God cannot interfere everywhere.
No, no.
God's all-powerful.
God can absolutely interfere.
That's the point of prayer.
Maybe my family's not really religious.
No, you said you were.
Yeah, we go to church, but maybe they had no connection with God.
No, no, we're not talking about your family, we're talking about you.
Are you saying that your sister was punished because your parents weren't religious enough?
Why would the innocent child be punished if the parents are not religious enough?
And why your sister and not you?
I mean, she was innocent, she was too!
Maybe if you don't pray and you don't really believe, then you can get easier sick.
Well, but she was two!
Yeah.
So it can't be her fault, right?
What's the answer?
I know it's a tough question, but what's the answer?
I think I know the answer that happened in your mind, but what's the answer from you in your 30s as to why God didn't save your sister, even though you and I'm sure your parents prayed to God as well, to Jesus, for salvation for your sister.
But she spent half her life in agony and died.
What I'm, what I'm really thinking is maybe, maybe, well, that's a bit, uh, I don't know whether I want to say that.
You can say it.
Just say whatever you want.
Maybe it's the sins of the, sins of generations or something.
Something that happened in generations before or somebody in the family did something bad.
And that's why.
Okay.
But why would God punish a child for the sins of someone else in the family?
The sins of someone else in the family, let's say that you had a really bad person in the family, their sin would cause them to go to hell, right?
I think their sin invites bad stuff.
No, no, but why would the child be punished?
Right, let's say, can you imagine there's a judge in the regular court system, right?
And the judge says,
Well, you killed a guy, you're a murderer, so we're gonna let you go free, but we're gonna inject brain tumors into this two-year-old little girl.
Would you agree with that sentence?
I don't know, because the girl has nothing to do with it.
Right, so help me understand.
Her fault.
Right.
Something happened to your mind, and it makes perfect sense to me, I say this with great sympathy,
You prayed for salvation for your sister and your sister died in agony having spent half her life in great pain.
And God did not provide you comfort even after your sister died because you said you felt nothing, right?
I didn't feel nothing.
And then you turned away from God because He wasn't answering your prayers.
So why didn't He answer your prayers?
You have an answer somewhere in you as to why God did not answer your prayers and save your sister.
And I think you lived out that answer from the age of 12 to 27.
You had 15 years of living out that answer.
Do you know what most interferes with our emotions?
Do you know the state of mind that most interferes with our emotions?
It's guilt.
How is that?
I'm sorry?
How is that?
Well, if your beloved dog dies, you feel very sad, and you cry, or you mourn, right?
But if you're the one who ran over your dog, you're going to have a tough time having the experience of sorrow, because you feel guilty.
So I thought that I was doing it.
I was making my sister sick.
Maybe you didn't believe strongly enough.
Maybe you didn't have enough faith.
Maybe you didn't pray in the right way.
You think it's like that?
Well, I don't know.
But you did become kind of amoral after your sister died.
Yeah, that's true.
Okay.
And you didn't grieve your sister dying.
Isn't that right?
I'm not blaming you.
I'm just trying to... I think that's what you said, right?
For me, it was like an act.
For me, it was like an act.
I cried, but I didn't feel really... Yeah, you didn't.
So why didn't you feel sorrow at your sister dying when you prayed for her to get better and God rejected your prayers?
Now, why does God reject a prayer?
Why does God say, I'm not going to give you what you want?
You don't live up to the standards?
Right.
You're not good enough, right?
So if you'd been better, if you'd prayed better, if you'd believed harder, if you'd had more faith, if you'd been more pious, if you'd been better, wouldn't God have been more likely to answer your prayers?
Yeah.
So God didn't save your sister because you weren't good enough, and that's why you couldn't mourn her, because it's kind of your fault.
And the guilt leads you to not be able to mourn your sister.
The guilt leads you to drink.
Because now you have a secret.
I killed my sister.
I wasn't good enough to save my sister.
I wasn't good enough to have my prayers answered.
You feel like crap.
You drink.
You become girl crazy.
You want to get laid.
You want to escape yourself.
You lose your faith.
You lose your joy.
You lose your connection with yourself and you become a pleasure seeking animal being hunted by guilt.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Well, I just wonder if I still have like a self, like I don't even know who I am anymore.
Well, I'll tell you what you're not.
You're not someone at all responsible for your sister getting sick and dying.
There was no prayer that could have saved your sister.
And you are in no way responsible for your sister getting sick and dying.
And I really, really hate that you ever got that idea at all.
I don't... I understand why.
I'm not blaming you.
You were a kid.
You know what I'm thinking?
I think my family kind of blamed me for
That.
All right, I'll hear that.
Well, I was always, I was always like, blaming for taking attention away from my sister.
So my sister was sick, so everybody has to like, give attention to her.
And I was always trying to get attention for myself.
Of course.
Perfectly natural.
And they got mad at you.
Yeah, they got mad at me.
They got mad at me.
Yeah.
Right.
When do you think you accepted that your sister was going to die?
Well, I was, I was at my aunt's house and, uh,
I went to, I was there, I slept over there, and I heard the telephone ring, and when she took the telephone and she said my mother's name repeatedly, and then I knew that it happened, that I knew that my sister died, and then from that moment I just accepted it.
No, no, before that, when did you really accept that?
Your sister was, I mean, almost certainly not going to survive, right?
Because she got more and more sick, right?
She got more and more sick, but eventually the chemo was over and there was hope that she would recover.
The tumor didn't kill her, it was the chemo.
The effects of the chemo damaged her immune system.
And she died of another sickness.
I don't know what, but she catched it, I think, on the beach.
And we went to the beach that day.
Oh, and she caught some illness at the beach, but she had no immune system left?
Yeah.
So she got the illness and she died from the illness.
Oh yeah, no, I very much remember getting lots of warnings when I was going through chemo that I really should take care to not get sick.
So it was not a smart thing to go to the beach.
Right.
And how long before she died did you go to the beach?
There was like, in my mind these two events are planned, but I think in reality there was some time in between it.
Like a couple of weeks maybe?
No, no, no.
It was the same.
It was the same day because after that, my, my, uh, my aunt took me to the house and I had to sleep over there.
And then the morning I went to the beach, uh, to the, to the swimming pool.
And then after that day, uh, I was two days there and then I wake up and then, uh, the telephone, yeah, ring.
And then, then it happened.
So it was like two days before.
So your sister was relatively healthy.
The tumor was gone.
But she had no immune system, and then your parents took your sister to the beach.
And then she got sick from something and died the next day.
Yes.
Gosh.
That's awful.
That's just terrible.
I mean, it's hard to imagine- That's life.
It's ha- Sorry, that's life?
What do you- That's life.
That's life.
That happens?
No, no, no.
What do you mean that's life?
That's your parent's choice.
I mean, I'm no doctor, but if your kid has no immune system, don't take your kid to the beach.
Because your kid has to rebuild her immune system.
That's very, what you're saying now, that's very tough.
I mean the beach is full of germs.
That's very harsh.
I mean you've got, you've got, you've got dead fish, you've got seaweed, you've got salt water, you've got like, there's crap everywhere, there's bird crap everywhere, like there's tons of germs at the beach, right?
Yes.
So if your kid has no immune system, don't you keep them home?
Until the immune system is built back up?
But what if they don't know, if they don't know that much, that they were not aware that the immune system was so... Maybe they were just happy that finally they were out of this time that's constantly going to the hospital.
I'm sorry, are you saying that your parents managed a chemotherapy kid for two years but didn't know that chemotherapy wrecked the immune system?
I don't know.
You do know!
Come on, you know!
Are you saying that the doctors would never have told your parents that chemotherapy harms the immune system?
Because there's ways of measuring the effectiveness of the immune system, isn't there?
Like there's literally blood tests you can get that measure the effectiveness of your immune system as far as, and this is vague memory from my chemo, right, but there's things that you can use, tests that you can say your immune system is functioning at such and such a level, right?
So you get like parameters?
Yeah, yeah, there are parameters that say here's your test and here's your number and here's the functionality of your immune system and so on, right?
And so after the last round of chemo, your parents would have been told she's got no immune system.
Maybe.
I don't know.
Maybe they forgot or something in the, in the hospital.
They tell them they forgot.
I don't know.
I don't know.
This is like a heavy, heavy.
I think to say, yeah, it's like maybe they didn't... Okay, I'm gonna not talk out of my butt here.
So, let me look this up.
Because I think I got tests when I was on chemo about my immune system functionality.
But again, it's been quite a while.
Thankfully.
Thankfully.
So let's look this up.
Okay.
All right.
Tests.
Measure.
Immune.
Oops.
Come on, give me my time back.
Immune.
Measure.
Immune system.
Let's see what we got here.
Yeah, antibody titer testing.
This test measures the levels of antibodies in the blood to determine if a person has been vaccinated for a specific pathogen immunoglobulin blood test.
The levels of immunoglobulin
To help diagnose different types of health conditions that may affect the immune system.
Blood tests, C-reactive protein tests, T-cell dependent pathway tests.
Yeah, so, yes, there is at-home blood testing, such as Mitra can test for 15 immunity biomarkers.
And I'm just going to throw in something else here, which is chemotherapy.
Again, this is going off my memory, right?
These tests can help diagnose primary immunodeficiency disorders, which are conditions where the immune system is impaired or absent.
So there are a whole bunch of tests.
There's blood tests, PD-L1 tests, biomarker tests, so yeah.
Yeah, so she would have been tested and they would have
They would have told your parents her level of immunofunctioning, for sure.
And they would have told your parents to keep your sister safe.
Keep your sister away from germs or germ-producing environments until... I mean, this happens with people who have AIDS, right?
Their immune system gets compromised and they have to stay away from virological or bacteriological environments, right?
So then my parents were careless?
Do you want to say that?
No, that's more than careless.
Careless is she happened to get out of the house while they were on the phone and she ate dirt and died from bacteria in the dirt.
That's careless.
Driving, packing up your sister and driving her to the beach and letting her play around on the beach to the point where she gets a deadly infection that kills her in 24 to 48 hours.
That's more than careless.
It could be that if you go through a lot of pain that you cannot think so clearly anymore.
That the whole process has so much damaged your ability to think that you cannot think clearly anymore.
Yeah, I have no idea what to say to that.
I just know that your parents had a moral responsibility to keep your sister safe, and she had no immune system and they took her to the beach.
You can make up any shit you want about why, that's what they did!
Yeah.
So who's responsible for your sister dying?
God?
Jesus?
You?
Her?
Fate?
Nature?
No!
Two people and two people only!
Don't you think that's a speculation, what you're doing now?
Well, what part of it is speculative?
Your parents absolutely knew that chemotherapy impairs the immune system, because they'd been dealing with it off and on for two years, right?
Yeah, they probably knew everything about it.
Okay.
They knew that your sister had low to no immune system because those blood tests would have been given to her after chemotherapy, and they would have been communicated to your parents.
So you think, like, you think, like, the guilt of my parents was shifted to me?
No, no, hang on, hang on.
You just said I was speculating, and maybe I am, but let's just go through the logic, right?
Your parents knew that your sister had compromised immune system, and they took her to the beach.
Yeah.
Now, what they could have done,
Since I assume that they hadn't taken her to the beach for a long time because she was sick.
So they could have... They could have phoned up a health line or their doctor and said, hey, we want to take this kid to the beach.
She's got no immune system.
Is that a good idea?
Or they could have looked it up online, right?
Yeah, that's true.
Right?
I mean, because they're responsible for all of this, right?
They're responsible for keeping, I mean, your sister's four.
She can't tell.
You're a kid.
You can't tell.
I can't tell either.
Yeah.
Okay.
Let's, let's try this.
Just out of curiosity, right?
I'm going to go, let me get my proper glasses here.
Cause I don't have my reading glasses.
So let's look this up.
And I know this was a while ago, but there was still an internet.
Back in the day, right?
2004?
Are there germs at the beach?
Let's see here.
Just a nice little simple search.
Yes!
There are germs at the beach!
The most common germs found in water are bacteria, viruses and parasites from human or animal feces.
Yep.
Sand and water samples from Hawaii and beaches found higher abundance of bacteria indicating fecal contamination, bugs such as E. coli, in the sand than in the water.
So there's more dangerous bacteria in the sand than there is in the water.
Here we go.
Beaches can be a germy playground.
Some playgrounds for vacationers are also hotspots of disease-causing microbes.
Grab a handful of sand on your next visit to the beach.
Feel the jagged edges of grains and the sticky moisture they leave behind on your skin.
Countless unseen microbes, bacteria, and algae live in that sand.
Yet the beach is a tough place to call home even for plants, animals, bacteria, and other organisms that evolved to live there.
So, yeah.
Alright.
I have no immune system.
Should.
I don't know what to say about that.
So who's responsible for taking your sister, who had no immune system, to the beach where there are tons of viruses and bacteria?
Yeah.
That was the action of my parents.
That was the action of your parents!
Uh, yeah.
Now, as to why they took your sister to the beach, we'll never know.
We'll never know.
No, I can ask them.
I can ask them.
Yes, you can ask them, but I wouldn't expect them to tell the truth.
They don't remember, I think.
Well, it doesn't matter.
But we know that it was their decision to take your sister to the beach, right?
It wasn't your decision.
It certainly wasn't your sister's decision.
So, you have a kid with no immune system, and you take her to Virus and Bacteria Central.
And she dies 24 hours later, is that right?
So, this poor kid survives a two-year brain tumor, and gets killed by your parents putting her in contact with sand.
This horrifying beyond words, just so you know.
I mean, it's not my sister and I'm just appalled.
And then you give up your God.
Give up your virtue.
Give up your sense of meaning.
Give up your self-esteem.
And rather than saying, my parents are responsible, you say,
I'm bad and there is no God.
Did your parents ever show any sense of guilt or remorse?
Oh my God, I can't believe we took her to the beach when she had no immune system and she died.
We feel so terrible.
That could be.
I don't, uh, that, that, uh, that that's a possibility that.
No, no, not as a possibility.
Did you ever see that?
Did they ever talk about that?
I don't remember this, uh, when they, when they, when they were like, uh, speaking about this.
Well, I don't, you, you would have remembered if they'd have said, we feel absolutely terrible.
We took her to the beach.
When she had no immune system, she got sick, had nothing to fight it with, and died.
Yeah, I think I remember that.
Well, they didn't tell you that, so in consequence, you blamed yourself.
Or God.
I think I blamed myself.
Right.
So, it's kind of like a two-for-one.
Child endangerment.
I don't understand 241.
Well, they put your sister at deadly risk of death, and they put you at deadly risk of nihilism.
Of self-hatred.
Of hedonism.
I feel guilty about this now.
What?
How do we get back to you feeling guilty about something now?
I feel guilty about this conversation because I feel like my parents, I should not make people think this way about my parents.
Maybe it's not true.
Sorry, what's not true?
Maybe I made a mistake with the times or something.
Maybe it wasn't like two days, but I'm not 100% certain.
Maybe it was a longer time frame.
So maybe it wasn't your parents taking your sister to the beach that caused the illness that killed her?
Yes.
Could be something else.
Okay.
But they did take your sister to the beach?
They took my sister to the beach and they saw like blue spots on her chest.
I just have to be certain about if it was.
I know this is kind of like a fault on my side, but if that's not right, then the causation is not correct.
Okay, so let's say it was a couple of days, not just a day.
Right?
Let's say it was a week between the beach visit and her death.
Does that solve the problem?
If the beach was the place where she got the germs and after that she became sick, and that was out of carelessness, then
Then there is certainly a responsibility by the caregivers who make the decision to bring the child to the beach.
Well, let's say that the beach had nothing to do with your sister's death, right?
Yeah, if that's the case, then it's not their fault, right?
Okay.
Let's say that the beach visit had absolutely nothing to do with your sister's death.
Yeah.
Well, they still took your sister with no immune system to the beach.
You think they feel guilty about that?
They know that or something?
They know that they were responsible for that?
See, you're asking me to read your parents' mind, which I can't do.
But we can deal with the facts.
Well, you have a certain... Your sister was immunocompromised and they took her to the beach.
We know that for sure, right?
Those are facts.
Those are the facts.
Now, even if, for whatever reason,
It wasn't the beach, right?
But we still know that your parents were taking your sister, who was immunocompromised, to germ-laden environments.
So maybe it wasn't the beach.
Maybe it was the zoo.
Maybe it was the bus.
Maybe it was the backyard.
Like, it doesn't matter!
They still were taking her to places where she could get sick!
Why do you think they were doing that, then?
Again, you're asking me to read their minds and it doesn't matter.
Because we can't ever get the facts.
It doesn't matter.
You're asking me what's written on the far side of the moon.
I don't know.
It doesn't matter.
But it sure as hell... Sorry, let me rephrase that.
It sure as heck wasn't your prayer or lack thereof.
And it certainly wasn't anything to do with you.
I cannot even reach that in my mind.
And your parents obviously knew that you were religious, right?
I don't think, yeah.
So your parents knew you were religious.
And one of the jobs of a parent is to make sure the child does not feel guilty for things beyond the child's control.
Right?
Does that make sense?
Yeah.
Yeah, that makes sense.
Right.
So, your parents, to be good parents, should have worked to make sure and say, listen, your sister died because she got sick.
Because she had no immune system.
And any germ could have killed her.
Did they ever have a conversation with you about the causality as to why your sister died?
What I know is that she had spots on her body, and those spots were an indication of the sickness of the immune system.
She got sick with something else, and that's how she died.
That's what they told me.
And they had kept her alive, obviously, when she was immune-compromised before from chemo, right?
For whatever portion of the two years, right?
Yeah, the doctors have kept her alive or trying to try to get rid of the tumor.
Right.
Right.
But your parents also, when your sister was immune-compromised, immunocompromised, your parents, either she hadn't gotten sick or they hadn't taken to someplace dangerous, right?
Can you say that again?
So, your parents, even though your sister was immunocompromised from chemo, for some portion of the two years, right?
She hadn't gotten sick, or maybe she had and they were able to, she was able to recover.
But your parents had kept your sister alive during the course of chemo, off and on, for whatever portion of the two years, right?
That was not really in their control, I think.
They did not know that she was alive or not.
I think that this was the doctors.
Well, no, but your sister came home, and your parents had to keep her away from germs, right, and viruses, when she was
Immunocompromised, right?
Yeah, if they understood that, then that was their job, to keep the germs away.
Right.
That was their responsibility.
Okay, so they were able, we assume, they were able to do that for some portion of these two years, right?
Yeah, probably, yeah.
Right.
And then, at a time when she's finished her last round of chemo, and the chemo was aggressive enough to kill the tumor, right?
Which means she was probably really compromised.
Again, I'm no doctor, but I would guess it's something like that, right?
Yeah, the chemo, the chemo was almost like, really damaged.
Sometimes I think that the chemo just killed her.
Well, I'm just going by what you said, right?
But it would have really damaged her immune system, I assume, right?
Yeah, that's what happened.
It's just got damaged too.
Yeah, because chemotherapy wrecks the immune system because it reduces the number of white blood cells.
Also, the bone marrow.
I don't know how bad it went, but... I mean, sometimes it takes months for the immune system to recover.
And during that time, you really have to... be careful about germ exposure.
That sound... I never thought about... I never thought about that.
And I never laid that connection.
What do you mean?
Well, well, that, that the, maybe the responsibility that maybe it was not a smart idea to, to, to bring her to beach.
That there was, that there was some kind, there was some, there was some kind of person actually responsible for what happened.
And maybe everybody knew that.
Right.
Right.
I mean, I'm no lawyer, but to me, in a truly rational free market legal system, if parents brought a kid with no immune system to the beach, I'd charge them.
With child endangerment.
To me, that would be indistinguishable from
Forcing a child to eat moldy food.
Well, my entire point here is not...
To throw your parents under the bus, but to get you out from under it.
Your family processed your sister's death in terrible ways.
Now, I have some real sympathy with that, because it's pretty hard to process a brutal experience like that.
Years of watching your child die is unbelievably awful.
Yeah, that's why I have a lot of difficulty with this accusation or however you say it.
Because I know how much my parents suffered.
Sure.
But their primary job, our primary obligation is to the living, right?
And something happened, I think something happened with you and your sister's death that ended up with you, right?
20 or more years later, struggling with meaning and love and connection and communication.
If you feel guilty for your sister's death, can you be loved?
If you feel that your prayers weren't answered because you didn't pray hard enough, or weren't good enough, or didn't ask in the right way.
I'm not saying this is at a conscious level, right?
Maybe this is all wrong, but I'm just looking for some causality here.
Yeah, I understand.
I think that people would not love somebody who is responsible for the killing of a child.
So I think it's hard for you to feel that you can be loved if you feel that you have something to do with your sister's death.
I don't know how that works, but I just wonder how that works then.
Sorry, I'm not sure if you finished your sentence there.
Hello?
I'm just thinking about what I want to say.
Oh no, that's fine.
I just wasn't sure if we got disconnected.
So, after your sister died, I'm not saying because of, right, but after your sister died, you began to drink.
You said that you drank because you had a burden, you had a distance, you didn't know how to talk to people, and drinking got rid of that, right?
Yeah.
I have that right.
Yes.
Yeah, yes.
You heard that right.
So what burden was drinking getting rid of?
And if you can't mourn your poor dead sister, which is a very sad, tragic, and awful tale.
If you can't mourn, it probably has something to do with guilt.
Have you seen your parents mourn your sister?
Or do you remember that happening?
That they deeply and strongly felt the sadness, the grief, the anger at the universe, all of the things that happens when we're processing grief.
I've seen that.
I've seen that.
And how did they help you mourn your sister?
Because they must have noticed that you were, you know, fake crying or you weren't really processing your sister's death.
I think they didn't notice that.
I think they didn't notice that.
Well, but they would have noticed, or they would have known, that it would have been very difficult for you that your sister had died, right?
Well, I was thinking of, like, when my sister died, I was thinking of things like, now I have something, you know, now I have something like my schoolmates.
That something happened to me, and I have an excuse to be bad.
And I was thinking, when she got buried, I was thinking, I want to see how they dig the grave.
These kind of things I was thinking.
I was thinking of the benefits.
Can you tell me more?
I was thinking of the benefits of her death.
So if she died, the problem in my school was that a lot of people had issues and sorry stories and then they get better treatment.
And so I realized that if I have a sorry story, then I get better treatment also.
So I saw a benefit in it.
Or maybe you wouldn't be bullied as much.
I had a reason to stand up for myself.
Well, and also, you know, the bullies would be like, Hey man, his sister just died.
Give him a break or whatever, right?
Yeah.
Okay.
So did your parents know that you didn't grieve for your sister?
Oh, they have no clue.
They have no clue.
I think they, they, they, they, they, they, they just, they,
They believed my acting.
They didn't pay much attention.
No, but did they ask you how you were doing and what you felt and what was going on for you?
I think I lied.
I think I just lied, but I cry, but I'm not really feeling sad.
I'm sorry.
So your parents did ask you how you were doing and they were checking in with you and all that, right?
I'm good at acting.
Well, of course, but every parent knows that that's a possibility, right?
It's the parent's job to figure out what's going on, right?
Well, with me, a lot of times I just was stoned or something, and I just got away with it.
Stoned?
You mean like drunk?
Smoking weed and then high.
Wait, sorry, you didn't tell me about the weed smoking, because I thought your parents told you not to smoke weed and that was a benefit.
I'm not accusing you, I'm just a little surprised.
So you did smoke weed, and from what age did you start smoking weed?
I smoked weed from...
My neighbors had cannabis.
So I started smoking weed when I was 12 years old.
Okay.
Something like that.
Again, around the time your sister died, right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Okay.
So are you saying that your parents didn't know that you'd started abusing alcohol and drugs at the age of 12?
Or maybe it was a little later.
Alcohol was a little bit later, it was like 14 years old.
So your parents didn't know that you were abusing marijuana, abusing a drug, at the age of 12?
No.
So, and you say that's because you're such a good liar and it's so easy for you to fool people, right?
I promise, yeah.
Okay, so if you're such a good liar and it's so easy for you to fool people, then who can ever trust you?
And if who can ever trust you, how can you fall in love?
Listen, bro.
I've been a dad now for close to 16 years, alright?
Kids are really shitty at trying to fool their parents.
They're terrible at it.
You see?
I mean, you may not know exactly what's wrong, but you absolutely know something's wrong.
And how do you react on that?
Sorry, how do I react to that?
Yeah, do you react to that, or sometimes you just let it... Do you always react when you see something bad in your child, or something is going on?
Or do you sometimes just say, well, today is maybe a better time to leave it?
I mean, I try and deal with it as quickly as possible, but I'll certainly give the child room to come to the explanation on her own, like to say what's going on.
But, if the child doesn't say what's going on, then I'll go in and sort it out.
No, that didn't happen with me.
Right.
So, your parents decided not to investigate what was going on?
No.
It's not because you're a genius liar and you can just pull the wool over everyone's eyes?
No, that's... no.
And I'm really sorry for that.
I'm really sorry for that, because your parents should have tried to figure out what was going on with you.
And they should have known.
I'm sure they did, right?
That you weren't genuinely feeling the pain of your sister's passing.
Which reinforces that maybe they felt guilty.
It doesn't prove, obviously, but it reinforces that maybe they didn't inquire
As to how you were feeling, because they didn't want to explain in more detail how your sister died, because they felt guilty themselves.
I mean, I'm just saying, if I had a child who was immunocompromised, and I took that child to the beach, and the child died shortly thereafter, I would feel like I couldn't even tell you.
How bad I would feel.
Yeah, what's somebody to do with that?
Like how do you live, if that's your, if you did that, how do you live with that?
Well, the important thing is that you bend, you try and learn from your mistakes, right?
And so the important thing is that you talk about what happened with your son to make sure that he doesn't take on any unearned guilt.
Now, maybe you don't confess everything,
But you say, yeah, your sister was immunocompromised, she picked up a germ, and she died because of that, and we did not do everything we could to keep her safe.
I feel very aware of what you're doing.
I'm sorry?
As a parent.
If you're very aware of what you're doing as a parent, but I don't think that a lot of people are very aware of what they're doing as a parent.
They are just doing something.
Well, you went off the rails, though.
You went from a God-fearing child to a dope fiend heading towards alcoholism at the age of 12!
So you don't have to be some super-duper sensitive parent to know that something's going on, right?
Quite obvious.
Right, completely obvious.
Any parent who says, I don't know the difference between my child not on drugs and my child on drugs, particularly when that child is starting out and is 12, is a liar.
Is a complete and total liar.
So, you can talk about, well, it was maybe difficult and there were some challenges in terms of, they'd have to be super aware.
Okay, after your sister died, you went completely off the rails, right?
Yeah.
Okay, so are they responsible for dealing with that?
Yeah, I think so.
Sounds to me like they didn't hugely take care of your sister, and they sure as hell didn't take care of you.
See the pattern?
And I'm really sorry for that.
And you absolutely deserved better.
You absolutely deserved someone who could help you process the grief, but guilty people can't help you process grief.
Because they can't process their own grief.
So now I'm also like that.
What do you mean?
Well, I'm also like that.
I'm sorry, have you done something that might have caused the death of a child?
Have you watched a child of yours go completely off the rails and done nothing to help him?
No, I didn't do that.
Okay, so you're not just like them.
But without this kind of knowledge, maybe you're concerned that you might end up like them.
And maybe that's one of the reasons you haven't gotten married.
One of them, yeah.
Yeah.
One of them.
So I think that's the challenge.
And I'm really, like, I'm really, really sorry about what happened with your family.
I'm obviously incredibly sorry about what happened with your sister.
That's really, really tough.
And if there's guilt involved, it makes it infinitely tougher.
I'm really sorry that your parents didn't save you and didn't intervene and didn't interfere, which, you know,
Cost you a lot.
It cost you 15 years of sobriety, right?
15 years of sobriety.
I don't know what that means.
Well, from 12 to 27, you were high or drunk a lot of the time, right?
Yeah.
So that's 15 years.
You weren't sober.
A lot.
Yeah.
Yes, yes.
And that was your parents' job to make sure that didn't happen.
Yeah, that was our responsibility.
And I think that you blamed God, or yourself, or the universe, or prayer, or Jesus, when that's not right.
You gave every sign to your parents that you were not able to deal with your sister's death, and they did not intervene.
Any more than they intervened when you said, hey, I'm dating a married woman and breaking up a marriage.
And they're like, yeah, all right.
Yeah, maybe not, but whatever.
These are not particularly careful or caring people, in my humble opinion.
And I'm sorry for that.
Because, of course, every child needs to be deeply cared for.
But I think until you can come to a different decision about yourself, it's going to be kind of tough for you to fall in love.
Because if you don't know why you did what you did, then you just believe that you're flawed, or strange, or whatever, right?
Oh, you just have trouble communicating?
Well, how has communication with your parents gone?
Not particularly well, right?
No, not well at all.
Not well at all.
And I don't know that you've had the experience of being truly cared for.
And loved for who you are.
Well.
I had, I had.
I had.
When I was with my aunt, I had.
That was.
Oh, your aunt, right?
Okay.
So, but did your aunt notice that you were doing drugs?
At 12?
I don't, I don't think it was, it was their responsibility.
I didn't ask whose responsibility it was.
I asked, did your, did your aunt notice?
That I went off the rails.
They noticed that.
Okay.
So your aunt noticed that you went off the rails and what did she do?
I think she did nothing.
She did nothing too, too much because she wants to keep good relations with my, with my mother.
Okay, so she put keeping good relations with a bad parent over helping you, the child who was going off the rails.
That's not truly loving you.
Sorry, that's just not truly loving you.
I know, that's how people are.
Okay, so if you're just going to keep making excuses, there's really not much point in having a conversation.
Like, I'm trying to get you to raise your standards here.
Right, so you say, oh, well, my aunt truly loved me.
Well, but she didn't interfere with you going off the rails.
Yeah, but she was trying to maintain relations with my mom.
Well, that's not a good plan.
Well, but that's just how people are.
So you just keep lowering your standards, right?
I keep saying raise your standards, and you keep making excuses and lowering your standards.
Well, my parents didn't intend this, and they didn't intend that, and maybe they didn't notice, and I was a really good liar.
And I fooled them, right?
So I'm, we're in this wrestle.
I'm trying to get you to raise your standards because you say, I want to fall in love and be loved, right?
Can you fall in love and be loved and get married if your standards are in the shitter?
You can, uh, you can, uh, but you're going to lower, you're going to have some, you're going to have some weight.
That's, that's.
Can you love and be loved?
Can you love and be loved if you keep making excuses for terrible behavior?
I think no.
No.
Alright.
Can you get high pay if you're willing to settle for low pay?
If you want $50,000 a year and you're willing to, you say, I'm happy to accept $25,000 a year, will you get the $50,000?
No.
No.
So I'm trying to get you, you say, I want to fall in love and be loved and I want to get married and I want to have kids.
I'm saying, well, you got to raise your standards.
And all you keep doing is lowering your standards.
And I'm like, okay, listen, I'm not going to fight you on that.
I'm just saying that the price of you getting married and being in love is you got to raise your standards and not just say, well, my parents were better than their parents, or that's how people are, or that they did the best they could or whatever, right?
If you keep making excuses, you can't fall in love.
But you know that the only people I, I'm not going to generalize, but the most people that I know, I've just, I'm just stuck with people that are of low standards.
Okay.
So, so then what you need to do, hang on.
So then you need to not waste my time.
So then you need to email me and you need to say, Steph, I can't change a damn thing about my life.
I refuse to raise my standards, but let's have a call-in show.
And what would I say about that?
That's not worth my time.
I would say, like, I'm sorry that you feel that way, but I'm not going to waste my time.
Yeah.
Right?
So with the call-in show, like, you know how these, you told me you've listened to a bunch of these shows before, right?
Yes.
So the call-in show is raise your fucking standards, all right?
You know that's the case, right?
Yeah.
And what do you do?
You're saying, Steph, please let me keep my shitty standards.
Please let me keep my low standards.
Please let me continue making excuse for bad people.
These are the people I'm stuck with.
I can't do any better.
Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, right?
Now, do you think that's going to work?
I'm just out of curiosity.
I say this with great affection.
I'm not mad at you.
I'm just, it's kind of cute.
Like, do you think this is going to work?
No.
Right.
Your parents might have ignored what's better for you, but I won't.
Only way to be loved, you gotta raise your standards.
That's it.
Now, if you don't want to raise your standards, I'm sorry, I really am.
I think that's a shame.
But then, you're choosing to not be loved.
You're choosing to not get married and be happy.
You're choosing to not be a father who's good, right?
I just want to be clear about that.
Right?
If you choose to continue to defend the bad decisions of bad people, okay, I mean, I can't get in your head and force you to do anything, and I wouldn't even if I could, right?
But the result of these low standards is, you're going to wake up every day, unloved, unloving, bereft of meaning, wondering, why the hell am I going to work?
Now, just out of curiosity, do you think Jesus came along to say it's really important to lower your standards?
I don't know.
No, no, no.
It was like you have to... Did Jesus die on the cross that you could make endless excuses for bad people?
No, not at all.
I don't think so.
Not at all.
I'm no priest, but I don't think so.
Jesus gave us superhuman standards, right?
Standards we can almost never meet, but we should strive for anyway, right?
Yeah, that's right.
So, what are you doing?
Betraying Jesus by lowering your standards?
I don't understand your Christianity!
Am I missing something?
I was not aware of like... I was not aware of like...
I just don't know any better.
No, you know better.
Of course you know better.
You're a Christian.
You're supposed to raise your standards, right?
You raise your standards for yourself and you raise your standards for other people.
Is it Jesus or the devil who wants you to lower your standards and excuse bad behavior?
I think it's the devil.
I'm not telling you anything you don't know.
You've got the answers right there.
Right?
This isn't a mystery.
I'm not asking you to solve quadratic equations or know the capital of Tunisia.
Right?
When I say, is it Jesus or the devil who wants you to lower your standards, you say, oh, it's the devil.
Right?
This isn't anything you don't know.
Right?
Well, it's simple.
It's simple.
And when, when you, you, but to bring that really to concrete reality, that's, that's a challenge.
Well, I agree with you there, but I'm just saying it's not a huge mystery and I'm not saying anything that you don't already believe.
Why is there this disconnect?
I'm sorry?
Why is there this disconnect between people knowing these high standards, but then not following them?
Well, your parents don't want you to raise your standards because they're afraid they won't meet them, or they don't want to meet them.
So your parents don't want you to raise your standards, right?
I mean, it benefits you to raise your standards, but it doesn't benefit the bad people around you, or at least the people who are not great.
It doesn't benefit them for you to raise your standards, does it?
No, probably not.
I mean, didn't Jesus say, I've come here to set son against father, daughter against mother, child against parent?
Yeah, yeah.
So Jesus is saying, listen, you've got to raise your standards.
Oh, and by the way, your parents won't like it.
Probably.
Yeah, that's what he said.
Right.
And you know, of the two of us, like, yes, I listened.
Yeah, but you can also find like very high standard people because you're a high quality.
What?
High quality person.
Okay, but how do you think I, how do you think I found the high standard people?
Do you think I always had high standards?
Well, you raised your standards.
Yeah, look at that!
I raised my standards and high quality people came around.
Because high quality people don't want to be around people of low quality.
Because it's exhausting and pointless.
And a waste of our precious life.
Yeah, that's true.
It's very exhausting to be around people that are immoral or have low standards.
Right.
So don't be one of those people.
And I don't mean the immoral part, I just mean the low standards part.
Don't make excuses for people who do wrong.
You don't help them.
It's not helping people to give them excuses, is it?
But you have to sometimes make things livable.
You cannot, you cannot talk to everybody.
You cannot say to everybody, like you, you have low standards or you, you, you are acting not good.
Oh, I don't know.
I don't know what I'm saying.
Well, I, you know, are there downsides to raising your standards?
Well, of course, otherwise everyone would do it.
Of course, there's challenges to raising your standards, right?
I understand that.
I mean, you don't need me to tell you that, right?
I mean, do you think Jesus faced a couple of challenges for raising his standards?
Nailed to a cross for three days.
I think you could say yes.
I think I'm already there, trying to raise my standards.
Good.
Good.
All right.
So I'm going to stop here, if that's all right with you.
I actually have a show at seven and I need to get a little food in the 19 minutes until then.
So I really do appreciate the conversation, man.
You did fantastically.
I just really wanted to point that out.
I'm really sorry.
That you weren't helped more as a kid.
And I'm really sorry about what happened with your sister.
And I really, really deeply sympathize with all of that.
And, you know, you can have a great life.
You really can.
You got to ratchet up the standards, but you don't need me to tell you that.
You know that already.
But I just wanted to point out that you did a fantastic job in this conversation.
Thank you.
And, uh, I wanted to thank you for like the, that you, that you set up two hours for me.
Uh, I hope, I hope I've been somewhat of value.
Yes, you're very welcome.
Thank you very much.
Yes, you're absolutely welcome, and I hope you'll keep me posted about how things are going.
