Knowledge Fight Interactive Search Tool

All Episodes

Previous Next

Jan. 10, 2025 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux

02:30:27

I HUGGED MY HUSBAND AND WENT TO JAIL! Freedomain Call In

Large

Audio Only |

Scroll

Time	Text
	Hi there, this is Stefan Molyneux.
	So just a note, this is the second part of a two-part conversation.
	The first is with the husband.
	That is the previous show to this one.
	And this one is with his wife.
	So don't listen to this one without listening to the husband's one first.
	I think the context is very important.
	So just go one show back if you're listening to this without listening to the husband's one before.
	And if you have listened to that, let's get started.
	Nice to meet you.
	I'm glad we're getting a chance to chat.
	Always good to hear, I guess, both sides of the tale.
	So, yeah, what was it like for you listening to the last convo, and how do you think I did, and what do you...
	I'm sure there's tons to add to it, so what do you think?
	I think your question of why did you call me was a very good one, because I'm not entirely 100% sure what...
	My ex-husband was looking for as far as an outcome from your guys' conversation.
	I've listened to it probably three separate times now.
	There was a lot for me to take away from it.
	I think that you speak a lot about relationships in a way that I need to hear.
	Obviously, my ego was offended at certain points and my feelings.
	But I think ultimately what you had to say was true.
	All right.
	Yeah, it's a funny thing to hear other people talking about you, right?
	I mean, I've had this a couple of times in my life just by accident where people didn't know.
	And so I guess that is a bit of a surreal thing to go through.
	So when you say ex-husband, has there been a big change?
	Did I miss something?
	Well, he's moved out and we're not speaking.
	We've gone through all the terms of divorce, so as far as I'm concerned, we're on the pathway.
	Okay, and when did he move out?
	He moved out the 23rd of November.
	He spoke with you.
	You know that, right?
	No, no, of course.
	I'm aware of that.
	I was just trying to place it in the...
	Because I think when he first sent me the email, he's like, I'm on the brink of divorce.
	But that, of course, was before I talked to him.
	So I'm sorry.
	I haven't obviously re-listened the whole three-hour thing, though I did read the AI summary of it.
	So I think I remember it fairly well.
	But yeah, I just wanted to know where things were.
	So that's where we're at as far as right now.
	He's still moved out.
	I am at the condo that my parents own.
	I am paying the mortgage.
	I believe we're on the path towards divorce.
	Right.
	And what are your feelings about all of that?
	It's extremely disappointing.
	I feel like I have a lot to look at myself for.
	It's more about how do I not repeat the same mistakes in the future.
	It clearly did not work for me in the past.
	That's where I'm at right now.
	Yeah, what's your analysis about how things went in the relationship?
	Obviously, there was enough that went right to keep it going, but what for you were the things that went wrong?
	Right away, having to hide or minimize details about each other's past.
	My experience.
	My ex-husband was very judgmental and unreceiving of difficulties.
	So, I mean, you're hedging a lot, and the terms are not, I don't know what you mean by judgmental, because judgmental can be a good thing, right?
	You know, having judgments, moral judgments, and so on.
	I'm not saying his were correct or perfect or anything, but, you know, as a philosopher myself, you know, the gig is all about judging things.
	You know, is this true?
	Is this false?
	Is this good or bad, right or wrong?
	So, judgmental, it's sort of like, it's one of these words women sometimes say controlling when he was, like, trying to give you good advice.
	So, what do you mean by judgmental?
	In general, I prefer it to have concrete examples rather than your interpretation, if that makes sense.
	Yes.
	For example, judgmental of my accident and jumping to conclusions as far as what our intentions were and why we left my current boyfriend at the time's apartment.
	It was a very painful thing for me to go through and to be able to talk about it openly.
	Vulnerably with my partner would have helped me tremendously with my healing.
	Okay, so sorry, judgmental about your accident, what does that mean?
	It means that if I tried to speak on what exactly happened, he would have an opinion that was negative towards it.
	What aspect of what happened was he negative towards?
	The aspect of...
	My friend and me leaving my boyfriend at the time's house and going to my house.
	Okay, sorry.
	I feel like I'm asking for open-ended questions and getting very short things in response.
	So just tell me the story of what happened the night of the accident, and then you can tell me where he had his issues, if you don't mind.
	I was 18, just graduated high school.
	We all were, by we I mean my stoner crew that I hung out with all through high school, about five or six of us.
	Drinking, listening to music, having fun.
	My boyfriend at the time lived with one of our very close friends.
	And I spent a lot of my time over there.
	That close friend did not drive.
	I did not drive.
	My partner at the time was the only one who had a car.
	So how is partner different from boyfriend?
	Boyfriend at the time.
	My boyfriend at the time, sorry.
	And he had work the next morning.
	So we were all hanging out as a group.
	My boyfriend at the time went to bed because he had work.
	We all stayed up till about 3am in the morning.
	I'm going to derail.
	I blacked out, obviously, through the night.
	So a lot of what I know about what happened is from people telling me.
	Sorry, when you say you blacked out, you mean not from any partying, but because of the head injury with the accident?
	No, from drinking alcohol.
	Oh, you drank to blackout?
	Yes, I drank to blackout on alcohol that night.
	All right.
	Yeah.
	I was told that the last friend who stayed, we were trying to order an Uber.
	There were no Ubers at 3 o'clock in the morning.
	The last friend that stayed didn't want to drive us back because he would have had to cross a really busy street in our area.
	So we decided to walk home and went against the signal.
	I don't believe that we understood what danger we were in because At this point, I do have memories of what happened.
	Oh, you crossed against the lights while heavily drunk, right?
	Yes.
	And I do remember being in the middle of the street and laughing and not really recognizing the danger and then looking forward and seeing my friend illuminated by the headlight.
	And he was hit full impact and died.
	Instantly at the scene, my right leg was taken by the car's tire and it threw me to the ground.
	I smashed my glasses into my right eye and had some pretty bad bleeding on my wrist from that and broke my leg in two places, my hip.
	So what is he judgmental about with all those details that we left the party together and we're going to go hang out at my parents' house that, Thank you.
	I don't know.
	I think it just made him very uncomfortable to hear me talk about it.
	Well, what are you...
	Judgmental or...
	What are you critical of about that night?
	What would you have done differently if you could go back in time?
	Well, I would have just slept there.
	I would have not drank as much.
	I would have not been so careless and reckless.
	I do have a lot of bad decision-making in my past.
	I'm willing to cop to that.
	Well, I think of the poor driver.
	Oh, no, no, no.
	Oh, no, sir.
	No, sir.
	I don't blame him one bit.
	No, no.
	I think of the poor driver.
	Oh, you mean like, yes, yeah.
	I mean, he's now killed someone and maimed someone else.
	Yes.
	Like, that's a trauma that he's going to have to live with for the rest of his life.
	Absolutely.
	And I've tried to reach out to him personally, and that did not.
	Succeed.
	I got contact from his lawyer once because my friend who passed away's mother was pursuing a lawsuit.
	Oh, God, really?
	So he had this trauma of a bunch of drunk people crossing against the lights in the middle of the night, and then he got sued.
	Yes.
	And I didn't have the opportunity to speak with him directly, but when I did speak with his lawyer, I did say, you know, there's no ill will on my part.
	I feel absolutely horrible for him in terms of what he has to live with now.
	And I'm just so sorry.
	And I don't think that my friend who passed away, his mother, was in the right by any means.
	I think that that was quite despicable of her.
	Oh, gosh.
	Yeah, that's terrible.
	Do you know whatever happened with that lawsuit?
	Oh, no.
	I assume that it just fell apart.
	I hope that it fell apart.
	Right.
	Because it was unfounded.
	And yeah, no, no, God, no.
	And that's a part of my accident that I've never really enjoyed is that people kind of like assume that I did get money from it or something along those lines.
	And I push back against that hard because money won't make that right.
	Right.
	And what was your recuperation like?
	I spent a total of five days in the hospital, three of which I was unconscious for.
	And was that induced or just what had happened?
	Yes, yes, yes.
	They medically induced me.
	And the surgery went for six hours.
	Everything was very successful.
	I was walking within my first day of being awake.
	Walking?
	You had broken into two places.
	Yes.
	I was walking within my first day of being awake, not far, just down the hallway and back.
	And it was a lot of having to put things aside and focus on me.
	It was a lot of willful blindness.
	What do you mean?
	The entire time I was there.
	I wouldn't think.
	I would think about my boyfriend at the time and how work was going.
	I would think about what my parents were doing and how they are.
	But if my brain went to my friend, I wouldn't allow myself to think about him at all.
	I ate all my food.
	I used the bathroom.
	They don't let you leave until you do that stuff.
	My voice was hoarse because they had me on the feeding tube for three days or two days or whatever, so I couldn't really speak above a soft grumble.
	That was extremely frustrating.
	My parents were very scared, very emotional, very shooken up.
	And how else did my healing go?
	Before I left the hospital, they told me that my friend passed away.
	I just told him that I knew.
	I knew, but I didn't know.
	I knew, but I wouldn't allow myself.
	You saw him get hit, and obviously it was a rough one.
	I just went, I know.
	Four months of bed rest because of the broken hip.
	I did talk therapy for a year.
	I wish I would have searched for somebody a little bit more intently because I didn't necessarily click with that individual as well as I wish I would have.
	But he did bring up some good points.
	He brought up the marijuana.
	He's the only therapist I've ever talked to that brought up the marijuana as a problem, and I agree.
	Sorry.
	So you were drinking and doing marijuana that night, is that right?
	Yes.
	And possibly cocaine, too.
	Let's throw that in there.
	Who knows?
	Why would you say possibly cocaine?
	Because just based with that time frame and that friend group and the way that things laid out, it feels like it fits.
	Oh, did you not get a toxicology at the hospital?
	I don't know.
	Maybe I did.
	I don't know.
	I've never seen that.
	Okay, I was just wondering.
	I would love to see that, though, because I am very curious.
	I have all my medical records right here, but I never thought to look for that.
	Okay, so maybe cocaine and how much?
	Marijuana?
	Grams.
	A lot of marijuana.
	And how much alcohol, do you think, would you estimate?
	Oh, God.
	We drank like an entire gallon of Tito's at night.
	A gallon of what?
	Tito's vodka.
	Okay.
	I'm not familiar with alcohol very much, so okay.
	Sorry.
	So an entire gallon.
	And so, yeah, you were blackout.
	Now, when did you first start drinking and doing drugs?
	Oh, too young.
	Way too young.
	Eleven.
	Eleven?
	Okay.
	I mean, 18 is too young, but all right, 11. And so how did that come about?
	My father's very intense, and I think that I seeked escape through means of substances.
	I think that I had a very...
	Abusive and tumultuous and anxiety-provoking childhood.
	And then I came across alcohol and for some reason it made things feel better.
	And then weed was more my thing, personally.
	And I've always been around it.
	Escape.
	I guess that's my answer, escape.
	And was it alcohol at 11?
	When did the weed start?
	I started alcohol, I started sneaking alcohol probably before middle, like right at middle school.
	And you know, now that I'm thinking about it, this is also the time that I moved away from my...
	My home that I lived in my entire life.
	Yeah, sorry, if you can stay off places, no biggie.
	Oh, I'm sorry.
	No, that's fine.
	Don't worry about it.
	Don't worry about it.
	Okay, so...
	I think that I'm realizing that possibly I felt isolated.
	No, no, I get that.
	I mean, it's not necessarily moving.
	I mean, kids move a lot.
	So, alcohol, you said middle school, so what age is that?
	11?
	12?
	Actually, it might be a middle school.
	How old are you in sixth grade?
	I don't even know.
	I think sixth grade is 11. 11?
	Okay, then 11. And when did I start smoking pot?
	I started smoking pot freshman year of high school.
	Sorry, I'm not American.
	15. 15, I think.
	15 or 14. 14. I'm going to land on 14. 14. And what was your alcohol consumption from?
	From 11, you said you'd sneak it, but how often?
	How much?
	Oh, I would say twice a month with friends, just enough to get us drunk.
	Whatever my parents had around the house, we weren't getting anybody to buy it for us or anything like that, but it was reckless behavior, and I wish my parents would have handled it differently.
	We'll get to the parents.
	I'm sure there's a lot to talk about with regards to that.
	And when you started weed at 14 or so, what was your consumption like there?
	How much?
	It started off more innocent.
	It started off the same boyfriend I had at the accident is the same boyfriend I had at the beginning of high school.
	We dated all through high school together.
	So you met him when you were 14?
	I met him when I was 14. Okay.
	And did he introduce you to weed?
	Yes.
	And how old was he?
	He was 15, but we were in the same grade.
	Okay, so he'd been held back a year.
	Something about his birthday being in August or whatever.
	Oh, okay.
	Yeah, yeah, yeah.
	I get it.
	That's kind of freaky stuff.
	Okay.
	Do you know how long he'd been doing weed for?
	He started around in our relationship.
	When we first started being a couple, he was not smoking, and then I want to say...
	Four or five months into us dating, he started smoking with his friends and then invited me to do so as well.
	Did he do alcohol from an early age in the way that you did?
	No, not like I did.
	And when did the booger sugar show up?
	When did cocaine start to become part of the equation?
	I don't know.
	I can't even say 100% because...
	Just roughly.
	Let's say senior.
	Senior year.
	So, 16, 17?
	No, senior year, you're 18. 18, okay.
	Sorry, I'm not familiar with these terms.
	No, no, you've got nothing to apologize for.
	I just, it's my ignorance.
	Okay.
	I want to be clear.
	No, no, I appreciate that.
	Okay.
	And did you, after the accident, did you return to this unholy trinity or like the weed alcohol?
	Cocaine stuff, did you stay off it, or how did that go?
	I stayed away from alcohol.
	I have a difficult relationship with alcohol.
	Weed, I relied on heavily to get me through my emotional pain, my physical pain.
	I'm very proud of myself in terms of the medication they gave me.
	I was in a lot of pain, and I only took, I think, maybe one and a half of the oxycodone that they gave me, only when I was literally crying out.
	And of course, I took the antibiotics and everything that I had to take, but I am very, very proud of myself for relying on weed to get me through that time and not losing what they gave me.
	And would you...
	Was it daily weed?
	Oh, yes.
	From the moment I wake up to the moment I go to bed.
	Every hour.
	Okay.
	Hourly.
	Okay.
	Very, very, very often.
	I am most certainly a pot addict.
	Sorry, remind me how long...
	Sorry to interrupt.
	How long ago was the accident?
	Oh, 2017. July of 2017. Okay.
	So, seven years and change, right?
	Okay.
	Years.
	Okay, so since then, you've been a daily, like, on-the-hour weed user, is that right?
	Yes, yeah, absolutely.
	But no cocaine, is that right?
	No cocaine.
	And no booze or just less booze?
	It was no...
	My ex-husband was not a drinker.
	I was happy about that.
	I don't see myself as a drinker, even though I do enjoy alcohol.
	Clearly, it doesn't sit well with me.
	I don't make good choices on it.
	So I think that the best decision is for me to avoid it.
	So I enjoyed that being with him made it easy to avoid alcohol.
	But now I have been drinking a little bit, trying to socialize with friends and coworkers and connect with people, but I still feel like it's something I should avoid.
	I really do.
	Over the course of the accident and your recovery, when did the medical professionals, did they talk to you about brain injury?
	Did you have any scans or any exploration or rehab about all of that?
	Oh, absolutely.
	I did a full CAT scan.
	I did, I forget what it's called, where they put all the wires on your head and have you fall asleep in a room.
	I'm not sure, but I'm sure, okay, with that sleep thing, yeah.
	It's another kind of brain scan, a little bit more intense than a CAT scan.
	It's like a CAT scan.
	I'm not a doctor.
	I'm going to roughly say what I think.
	A CAT scan will give you a map and actual patches or placements or plaques.
	They give you surface of an area that's an issue.
	And then the other test was more like electrical impulses if things are firing and triggering the way that they are meant to.
	So I did both of those and no negative results.
	The brain bleed that I had was a 3mm brain bleed.
	It was very mild.
	It dissipated on itself in a matter of weeks.
	Okay, so there was no official report of your brain's gone dark here, there, or someplace like that, so things came back relatively normal?
	Yes.
	Physically, yes.
	Okay, so there's another category, right?
	Physically, so tell me about the other category and what's been going on with that.
	Well, then there's emotionally.
	And I'm sure you're familiar with the...
	I don't even know what you would call it.
	Then no, I'm not.
	I'm sure you're familiar on Voldemort, the thing that has no name.
	I am not, in fact.
	In psychology, I learned about a case study where a gentleman was a railroad worker and he was trying to stuff a piece of dynamite into a rock.
	Oh, the spike through the head guy.
	The spike through the head guy.
	Yeah, yeah, I know that one, yeah.
	Yes, sir.
	And the case study behind that is just how, you know, emotions can be impacted by trauma.
	So I did, when I learned about that and I learned about the brain and I learned about...
	Hitting the right side of your frontal lobe, that kind of, like, enlightened me a lot.
	Well, but he did have a spike through the head.
	But I see personality changes in myself after I hit the right frontal lobe, which is the personality side, if I am to be understanding correctly.
	But also, at the same time...
	I just encountered a near-death experience.
	Yeah, I mean, that could affect the personality too, right?
	I'm right.
	I just lost my friend.
	Yeah, I was a little bit more stern, a little bit more cold, a little bit more hurt.
	Well, I mean, you were taking life a whole lot more seriously, right?
	Oh, God, yes.
	Absolutely.
	And in that...
	And that's not an injury.
	That actually is an improvement, isn't it?
	I would hope.
	Thank you.
	I've had to cut a lot of people out because of it, but I do think it's for the best because you've got to push forward.
	Right.
	Okay, so let's talk about the old childhood.
	What the living heck was going on that you were pilfering booze at 11?
	Right.
	And I don't mean, I don't, look, I'm sure you know this about the way that I approach these things.
	Children are not at fault.
	Thank you.
	My children are just trying to survive, usually, an extraordinarily horrible, difficult, or even evil situation.
	So, what were you self-medicating for?
	My father is an abusive man, physically, mentally, emotionally, more so emotionally than physically.
	But my childhood was walking on eggshells, scared of explosions, being a good girl for the sake of not triggering my being a good girl for the sake of not triggering my Yeah.
	Thank you.
	A lot of fear.
	My mother, very passive, very cold.
	I had a lot of feelings of...
	Anger towards her growing up that she didn't step up and protect me.
	Or I remember saying things like, why do you let him talk to me like that?
	She'd say like, oh, why don't you tell him that you don't like it?
	I'm five.
	Oh, you would tell her at five, why do you let him talk to me like that, right?
	Yeah.
	I have a distinct memory in my brain that I can recall.
	And so, yeah, it got to be like, okay, well, now I see how this is.
	He's the tyrant.
	She's copiable for allowing him to behave the way that he does, and I'm stuck in the middle of it.
	And so, what sort of things would your father do and say?
	Well, he would say, He would do things to make me feel small and weak.
	The times that he hit me were, I want to say, five or six times.
	Usually over things that I really feel like you could just talk to a child and explain to them what you felt like they did wrong.
	Hitting me was never warranted, especially towards a child.
	And he just was a very emotional man who didn't know how to handle himself well by any means.
	And he would say, just name-calling.
	He would just say, what would he say?
	Stupid, pathetic, shrimp, loser.
	Minimizing and demoralizing things.
	Call me a whore.
	Call me very painful things that I try not to think about.
	I mean, I have a daughter myself, and she is almost 16. It shocks and appalls and horrifies me what parents do.
	I mean, I've never raised my voice at her.
	I've never punished her.
	I've never Called her a name.
	I've, you know, and it's great.
	I mean, we do shows together, right, on this.
	She's going to benefit from that.
	Well, I just, I can't imagine, like, what vile shit is going on in someone's soul.
	Like, how ugly and nasty and corrupt you have to be to, you know, brain stamp this kind of language on your child's mind.
	There was a time, it was...
	After I broke up with my high school sweetheart and things weren't going well at home, my mother came in my room and asked me to do the dishes.
	And I threw a fit because they never rinse anything and it was disgusting.
	And the reason why I have to do them is because I got caught being arrested at 12 and here I am at 19 and it just felt so stupid.
	Wanted to talk about it with them, and it just turned into yelling and screaming and crying.
	And my dad came in my room.
	He was in his underwear and tried to put his hands on me.
	I still, to this day, don't know what he was trying to do.
	I just remember...
	You mean in a violent way or a sexualized way?
	In a violent way.
	Okay.
	And I just remember putting my leg up and slapping his hands away until he stopped.
	And then I grabbed my phone and I was wearing PJs, like fleece PJ bottoms.
	I had no bra on.
	I had on like, you know, just a long sleeve shirt.
	I left the house with my phone and my ID. And I didn't come home for four days.
	So, like, blow-ups like that just over nothing.
	Nothing.
	Oh, no, yeah.
	I mean, and here's the thing.
	There is no something that would make any of that justified anyway.
	Yeah.
	But what happened?
	You said you got arrested at 12?
	Even at times where I've had grown men trying to physically come at me, I'm not going to kick them in the balls.
	I'm not going to, you know, poke them in the eye.
	I'm just going to do my best to just keep myself safe.
	I'm not going to revert to, like, I just don't know.
	What was your question?
	You said you got arrested at 12?
	Yeah, I got arrested for shoplifting at the mall when I was younger than 12, when I was like 11, because I couldn't do the community service that they wanted me to do because I had to be 14 to volunteer anywhere.
	Right, and what happened with that?
	I was at the mall with my friend whose mother is extremely religious and she wanted to get things that her mom wouldn't approve of so we were stealing them instead of buying them and that's really all it was.
	Just some kids being goofy.
	Right, right.
	And I assume that that was pretty bad in terms of what happened with your parents after that because of that?
	Actually, my mom kept it a secret from my dad for me.
	And my dad found a letter in the mail.
	And I was visiting my family.
	And he picked me up at the airport.
	Oh, you were visiting grandparents?
	What do you mean by visiting your family?
	I was visiting grandparents.
	Got it.
	And I just remember being terrified when he was coming to pick me up because he just handles everything so poorly and explodes to the highest extent that he possibly can.
	But he actually was really calm and strangely eerie.
	And the only advice that I remember him giving me is him being upset with me for complying with the police and telling them I did what I did.
	Yeah.
	Right.
	Bad advice, I think.
	But they did.
	They asked me what happened and I put my hands up and I said, yeah, you caught me.
	I'm sorry.
	I'm a stupid 12-year-old kid.
	What do you want from me?
	Right, okay.
	Okay, and so you've only hit a couple of times?
	A handful of times.
	I'm sorry?
	I said a handful of times, yeah.
	Only a couple.
	How often would your father lose his temper?
	Roughly.
	Weekly, daily, monthly?
	Daily.
	Yeah, daily.
	Daily.
	Yeah.
	All the time.
	Especially at work.
	And I worked with him for four years.
	Right.
	Okay.
	Do you have any siblings?
	No.
	Right.
	I despise being an only child.
	I know that you have an only child and I'm not speaking to you.
	Oh no, I mean, we had as many children as nature allowed, so I don't have any control over that.
	That's perfectly natural.
	And me, you know, my situation, my perceptions, my family, I'm disappointed in them for not getting me somebody to fucking confide in, or somebody to protect, or somebody else to guide, or somebody else to talk to, or just anybody.
	They wanted to continue to party and have fun and go on vacations and live this lifestyle that they lived for seven years before having me.
	And then I'm just an afterthought.
	And I'm just like, I'm just there and along for the ride.
	But it's like, no, what about my future?
	What about my needs and my wants?
	I really, I really, I had a nice childhood, but it could have been better.
	Sorry, what now?
	I said I had a, you know what I mean?
	What?
	All right, you're going to have to step me through this reasoning because I'm not seeing it.
	You had a nice childhood?
	I had a nice house and nice things.
	No, no, that's just stuff.
	That is just stuff.
	So what do you mean?
	You're telling me about literal horror here.
	You're right.
	That's good.
	I wasn't.
	That's just me coping.
	It wasn't good.
	God, no, this is horrible.
	So yes, I'm an only child, and I get on them about that often.
	Well, listen, I was not an only child, and sometimes having a sibling is not a magical plus at all.
	Absolutely.
	I mean, the parents are pretty good at turning siblings against each other, right?
	Oh, the grass is always greener on the other side, and there's that too.
	I never even considered that fact, because my father tried to turn me against my mother.
	I've watched him do it multiple times.
	You know, Lord knows what he would have done.
	Good point.
	Well, not even Lord knows, but we know.
	You know.
	I'm learning.
	I'm learning.
	I'm 26. I don't know people.
	I'm realizing this very freaking fast that I am very naive.
	Well, I wouldn't necessarily go straight to insult land, but...
	Okay, so...
	Did your parents...
	Give you any particular guidance, or is there any things that they give you of value utility that you use to this day?
	Sorry, you finished that before I even...
	So, I guess not, right?
	What?
	I mean, the answer to that is no, right?
	Like, they just didn't give you...
	Because I'm trying to figure out, like, why are you having a boyfriend at this age and, you know, all this sort of stuff.
	No, their opinion towards sex was just...
	She's just going to do it when she wants to do it anyways, so why talk to her about it or instruct her on it or do anything with it at all?
	Let's just ignore it.
	The only thing they told me is when you choose to start having sex, just let us know so we can put you on birth control.
	I think that's horrible advice.
	Yeah, I'd agree with that.
	Yeah.
	And that's exactly what they did.
	And then I've been on birth control from 12 until 23. 12?
	Yes, from 12 until 23. Wow.
	And I still to this day don't know what it's done to my body or my brain or my...
	We're still learning what the long-term effects of birth control are.
	And it sure has had an effect on society and the way that we treat each other, the effects from that are...
	So you said to them at the age of 12, I'm going to have sex.
	Yep.
	And, I mean, you had a boyfriend at the time and so on, and that's the way things were going?
	Yep.
	Yep.
	And did they ever say maybe 12 is a bit young to have a boyfriend?
	I mean, I'm guessing not, right?
	That's not a thing that they would do.
	No, it was just no boys, no boys, no boys.
	And then all of a sudden, okay, I guess, fine.
	Okay, fine, boys.
	Instead of like, okay, you can have boys over, but let's keep a healthy relationship happening here.
	Let's mediate things.
	It was just...
	So they were okay with me smoking pot.
	They were okay with me having underage sex with my boyfriend at the time, so long as I was on birth control.
	They were okay with me just so long as I went to school and didn't cause too much trouble at home.
	Basically, that was about all my standards.
	Right.
	Okay.
	So, what happened after you finished high school?
	Oh, well, I graduated.
	I got ran over by a car.
	I'm sorry, you did what?
	I graduated, and then I got ran over by the car.
	Yes.
	Okay, sorry.
	So, at the time, I was working at a bank.
	I was an intern.
	I was a paid intern at a bank.
	Sorry.
	They were going to transfer me to a different branch, but the accident happened.
	After high school, it would have been wonderful to get ready for college and think about the future.
	What do I want to do?
	What do I want to be?
	Instead, I was just trying to walk again.
	And hoping that I would be able to have my cognitive abilities once more.
	And so they just wanted me to get into any kind of school.
	I was doing classes at just the basic associates.
	I was taking a few things for fun.
	Art.
	I did very well.
	I won two awards my first year in art.
	I was enjoying it a lot until COVID happened and everything went to being online.
	Oh, at this time, I was also doing handyman work with my father, which I also did.
	I like using my hands.
	I like working with material objects.
	I like building things.
	I like constructing things.
	I like problem solving.
	I like figuring out what tools are going to be best for what thing.
	I enjoy that.
	I liked the physical aspect of it.
	I enjoyed a lot of what I learned with my father, but it was not getting me anywhere.
	So, yeah, that's my answer.
	After high school, I focused on college for a little bit up until COVID happening, and then I dropped out.
	Right, okay.
	And just remind me how old you were when you met your ex-husband?
	19. Right, okay.
	20. 20, okay.
	All right.
	He was 30. I just turned 20. He just turned 30. Right, okay.
	And what was it that drew you to him at the beginning?
	Very attractive.
	I found him on Bumble.
	I still remember.
	Exactly where I was and what I was doing and what my first thought was.
	My first thought was, he looks like he could destroy my life.
	I love it.
	So you've got some good instincts.
	I do.
	I do have good instincts.
	But for some reason, I don't listen to the Jiminy Cricket on my shoulder.
	It's right there.
	He's screaming at me.
	And I just choose not to listen.
	Maybe a good old Jiminy got hit by the car.
	Who knows, right?
	We'll figure it out over the course of the combo.
	But go on.
	He's got to come back, man.
	My first instinct towards my husband was this guy looks like a god.
	He's extremely physically attractive.
	He's extremely dynamic.
	We started talking through the app and we talked for about two weeks on the app.
	I enjoyed our conversations.
	He listened to punk music.
	He listened to Jordan B. Peterson.
	He listened to you.
	I thought he was into philosophy.
	I thought that he was oriented towards marriage.
	He'd just gotten out of an engagement.
	That was a red flag, too.
	The way he spoke about that was a red flag.
	I didn't want to hear it, I suppose.
	What do you mean?
	I wanted to believe that she was the problem.
	I wanted to believe him and believe that what he was laying out, the way that he was laying it out, was reality.
	But as the course of time went on, I don't think that it was really reality.
	We both are guilty of mimicking the other person.
	I will say that.
	We are both guilty of telling the other person what they want to hear.
	I've done that to him, and he has done that to me, and it worked.
	And it left both of us very confused.
	Right.
	Okay.
	Oh, and of course, I just wanted to get out of my parents' house.
	I just wanted to go out and have fun.
	When I met my husband, I wasn't looking for a husband.
	I wasn't thinking about a husband.
	I just got out of a five-year-long relationship, and I was kind of in the zone of, fuck it.
	It's not a good zone to be in.
	I wouldn't recommend it, but honest, I'm honest.
	That's where I was.
	Right.
	Okay.
	Were there any particular virtues?
	I mean, you know, my sort of formula, I don't know if you know, my formulation is love is our involuntary response to virtue, if we're virtuous.
	And were there any particular virtues that...
	He's hardworking.
	When he puts his mind towards something, he could get it done.
	He can accomplish whatever he sets his mind to.
	It's just that he doesn't really orient himself to many things.
	He's not very ambitious, I suppose, but he's very charismatic.
	He's very fun to be around.
	He can make you laugh.
	He can make you be very on the edge of every word, very enthralled in the story or whatever he's speaking about.
	I was absolutely enamored with him.
	It was the first time I felt that sexually strong towards somebody.
	My first partner I wasn't necessarily that physically attracted to.
	I just kind of stayed with what you know.
	Right.
	Okay.
	And how long were you guys dating before you got engaged?
	Three months.
	Three months.
	And then after the engagement to the marriage?
	A year and four months.
	Oh, wow.
	Engagement and a half.
	Right.
	And it was a long engagement for multiple reasons.
	The main reason being that...
	Well, you already got out of your house.
	Sorry, go ahead.
	Right?
	Well, no.
	I wasn't out of the house.
	Oh, you didn't live together when you were engaged?
	No, we didn't live with each other when we were engaged.
	It was a really long engagement.
	He didn't help with any of the wedding in terms of financial.
	I paid for the whole wedding myself from working with my dad.
	It took me a lot of time to work and save up the money and get it all together.
	In the end, we had our wedding.
	It was like a campground.
	It was like a trailer park campground hybrid where they had cabins and a big open outdoor.
	Like, we kept it relatively inexpensive, but I loved it.
	I loved every piece of it, and he wasn't really as involved as I wish he would have been.
	And I don't know why we couldn't have gotten married sooner if he would have gotten more involved, I think.
	I would have liked that.
	Hmm.
	Okay.
	Was he not working?
	Is that why he didn't pay?
	No, he worked.
	The deal was supposed to be I would pay for the wedding because I wanted the wedding to be what I wanted it to be.
	He didn't care.
	We could have went to a courthouse or whatever.
	The deal was he would pay off his credit card and I would focus on the wedding.
	And that never happened.
	We got married.
	We moved in with each other.
	The condo is a whole other thing that I took care of.
	And then here we are, three years or two years married, living in the condo for two years, and I'm still helping him pay his credit card.
	So that was very disheartening.
	The broken promises.
	So how was the relationship over the year and four months between engagement and marriage?
	Were things going fairly well, or how did it go that way?
	Things went well so long as no one stirred the pot, and that's not a good answer.
	Things went well so long as I didn't ask any questions.
	He didn't ask any questions.
	We just enjoyed the 24 hours that we had with each other, and then we went and lived our separate lives.
	And really, honestly, we got along.
	Up until the point where we started living with each other.
	Well, I mean, but there must have been some conflict over the wedding and the cost of the credit card bills.
	I'm not trying to stir the pot here, but there were differences of opinions about that, right?
	There was conflict about expenses and money, and it was mostly avoided.
	Right.
	Okay.
	All right.
	So then you get married.
	And if I understand this rightly, it started to go not super well after you got married.
	And how long did it take for things to start to be like, oh, not good?
	Well, we moved in.
	Let me look at the calendar really quick.
	August.
	Oh, my gosh.
	Not even a month.
	All right.
	Oh, wait.
	Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.
	I'm lying.
	I'm lying.
	I'm sorry.
	I'm sorry.
	I'm just mistaken.
	Yeah, it's all right.
	It's a year, a year to the date.
	Oh, so for the first year of marriage, things were good?
	Pretty much.
	Well, the first, no, the first year of marriage, things started to crack.
	The first year of marriage, it was, okay, why are you texting somebody at 10 o'clock at night?
	Why are you coming home at 10 o'clock at night?
	Why are you...
	Taking so long to get to the gym when I'm not at home, but when we're together, you get there instantly.
	You got married, and you dated and married a super good-looking guy, and then you were concerned about other women.
	Yeah, after he got married.
	To some degree, that's one of the prices, right?
	I was telling myself that for a long time.
	But I'm also very good looking.
	Is it the same thing on his end?
	One of the prices is all the men?
	Yeah, but he needs to be confident in that I'm going to be constantly telling people no.
	Well, no, but the problem is, and I obviously don't want to tell you about your marriage because I'm just learning about it, but I think that the problem is that if you choose someone mostly because of their looks, then you are concerned that the Connection is shallow and is replaceable.
	It is.
	Whereas if you choose someone for their core, their essence, who they really are and their virtues and so on, then that's a bond that a good-looking person can't just elbow you aside and get it, if that makes sense.
	It does.
	Okay, so he was behaving in a suspicious manner.
	Now, he wasn't doing that or behaving in that suspicious manner before you got married.
	Is that right?
	Not that I've seen directly.
	I did find a condom in his backpack while we were dating before, and I asked him why he had it.
	I asked him why he had it.
	He said nothing.
	I asked him to get rid of it.
	He said, what if I want to sleep with somebody?
	What?
	Yes.
	Okay, hold the phone.
	Back up, back up.
	You find a condom.
	In his backpack.
	And he says, well, I can't get rid of it because I might want to have sex with somebody.
	Yes.
	And when was this?
	This was as we were dating, when we were engaged.
	Okay, but roughly, I mean, near the beginning, middle, end of the engagement, or?
	Middle of the engagement.
	Okay.
	I mean, that's more than a red flag, isn't it?
	Yeah.
	No, 100%.
	He's saying that the relationship, if I'm attracted to someone enough, the relationship is open.
	It's an open relationship.
	Yes.
	Okay.
	And extremely hurtful.
	It shattered me.
	Not enough.
	No, not enough.
	You guys spent six more years, right?
	Yeah.
	I went through a lot of different mental hurdles to try to make this toxic mess work, but it's not supposed to work.
	Okay.
	I mean, let me ask you this.
	Just, you know, person to person, right?
	Yeah.
	Were there no nice guys around?
	They weren't fun enough.
	They weren't exciting enough.
	Okay, so tell me, because this, you know, this thing where it's like, oh, the guy who treats me like crap gets me all hot and tingly, but the guy who shows up with flowers on my door gives me the ick.
	Like, help me understand that with regards to women.
	I... I don't know if it's true for all women.
	I know that it's true for me in those circumstances.
	Let's just talk about you then.
	Why do you think it is?
	Because it was exciting and fun and maybe even there is a little bit of masochism to it.
	Maybe women do enjoy that woe is me, weepy bullshit, but you chose it.
	You put it on yourself.
	I mean, this is a guy who's saying, I'm not going to be faithful.
	I have no monogamy in me.
	Yes.
	Okay.
	And I chose to stay, and I chose to put up with it because some...
	No, I mean, sorry, but tell me how that conversation goes.
	He says, well, I need the condom in case I want to sleep with someone.
	I just, I got upset and insisted that he had to throw it away.
	And then I'm sure that he just thought, oh, well, I'll just hide him better, you know?
	Well, no, no, no, but didn't you have a conversation about we may have different opinions on what monogamy means?
	I should have at that point.
	Oh, so your issue was that he had the condom, and if he didn't have the condom, the problem was solved.
	The condom wasn't a manifestation of his lack of commitment.
	The issue was that I thought we were in a monogamous relationship from the very beginning.
	Well, did he say that you were?
	He implied.
	Okay.
	And what did he say?
	And I'm not disagreeing with you.
	I just want to know what the communication was.
	And then me finding that condom was a huge, you know, like, I can't.
	Sorry, but how did he, and I'm not disagreeing with you, I just want to know what he said that you got as we're monogamous.
	Well, he asked me to be his girlfriend, and he said to me explicitly that, you know, like, I expect you to only sleep with me, and vice versa, I expected him to only sleep with me.
	Okay, so he made that commitment, right?
	He made that commitment.
	Okay, so I just want to make sure I understand.
	And then, you know, six months or eight months or whatever it is into it, he's saying, I could sleep with whoever I want, should I feel like it.
	That's what he was.
	Yeah, that's what he said.
	Okay.
	I mean, how good looking is this guy?
	Very good looking.
	Okay, so you chose the looks.
	I did.
	And you were willing to put up with him being a jerk because he was handsome enough.
	Yes, he was.
	Okay, so that's just a trade, right?
	That's like saying...
	I'm going to have dessert instead of salad.
	It's like, okay, well, you enjoy the taste, but you might gain weight, right?
	Yeah, you're going to get the diabetes.
	Yeah, okay.
	So you very consciously walked into this guy is not trustworthy.
	I did.
	He's a liar, right?
	From what you're saying.
	And he's a liar in the most foundational aspect of things, which is sexuality and monogamy, right?
	Yes, and unfortunately, because of how my father is.
	That felt familiar and normal.
	Well, that doesn't mean that you do it, though, right?
	No.
	That could be like, oh my god, this guy's like my dad.
	I know where this leads.
	I better have nothing to do with him.
	That's how it should be.
	That's how it should be.
	That's where I would like to get myself to be.
	But you were 20, right?
	Yes, and I've talked a lot with my current therapist about giving myself grace.
	And I hope that I have learned from my experiences, and a lot of what has kept me in this relationship is the fear of how I behaved outside of relationships, that I did lose my sense of self, I did lose my virtues, and just my sense of who I was.
	And I was scared of who I was going to be outside of the relationship, but I've done the work now, and I feel like I can stand on my own two feet, and I know who I am.
	And it's going to be okay.
	Was he a high-status guy for you?
	Like, you're on his arm and people are like, wow, you know, that's a good-looking couple.
	Was it something like that?
	Yeah, of course it was.
	Yeah, I had a little arm candy.
	And was, yeah, a nice himbo.
	Did your father, was he very good-looking as well?
	Was that his sort of ticket in the world?
	He was his own little rock star.
	He was in a punk band, sold drugs, ran around.
	He's ruined everybody and anybody.
	Him and my mom dated for seven years.
	Seven years of torturing each other and hurting each other.
	He's disgusting, quite frankly, in the way that he looks at women.
	It's all just a matter of use.
	I've heard stories of him saying when my mom was pregnant with me, of like, oh, are you guys going to have another kid?
	And him being like, oh, if I ever touch her again.
	There was no genuine love or connection there.
	It was...
	It's circumstantial.
	Poverty, poverty bonded them together.
	They had to stay together because they didn't want to work to fight away out of it.
	Sorry, what do you mean?
	They chose each other even though it hurt and it was hard because at least they could be comfortable.
	Familiarity for them too, right?
	Familiarity, that's what I mean.
	Okay, but the poverty thing that they didn't want to work to get out of it, what does that mean?
	Yeah, well...
	They kind of did work to get out of it.
	They both were from single mothers, you know, government food homes.
	And they worked hard to get out of the neighborhoods that they were at, but still there's a lack of commitment to each other and the greater good.
	Right, okay.
	Got it.
	Alright, so you get married to this guy and you have suspicions about him and fidelity, right?
	Yes.
	And was there proof that you found?
	Anything incontrovertible?
	Did he admit or not?
	Pictures or anything like that?
	No.
	Text messages?
	Did he ever admit?
	No.
	Okay, and what percentage probability would you give that he was cheating?
	Although it's hard to say it's cheating when he announces ahead of time that he's going to feel free to sleep with other women.
	I'd give him a solid 80%.
	Okay.
	Got it.
	And did you cheat?
	No.
	And no one believes that, and I was tortured throughout this whole thing.
	There's a bit to this that I'm...
	Skipped over that might, like...
	Well, let's skip back.
	Because it is, like, that's a good question.
	Like, how, if this relationship has been as toxic and tumultuous as it has been, has it lasted five years?
	That's a good question.
	Oh, some of them last 50. And our first big blow-up was a year after we moved in.
	And we're living with each other.
	It was August 2nd, 2022. It's the night that my ex-husband mentioned with your talk where he tried to kick me out of my parents' house or kick me out of our condo.
	And so...
	We had been fighting for four or five days.
	I found some things on his phone and was not comfortable having sex with him unless he wore a condom.
	Oh, so like cheaty stuff?
	Yes.
	You mean like nudes?
	I guess I don't know.
	I've been married way too long to know what the hell you're talking about.
	It's my ignorance.
	I found text messages that led me to believe that he was having a sexual relationship with another woman.
	It made me extremely upset.
	It made me extremely uncomfortable.
	And all I could do was set my own boundaries and tell him that if he wants to have sex with me, he needs to wear a condom because I do not trust him.
	I do not believe him.
	And I do not want him close to me.
	And he did not like me drawing boundaries and getting upset with him.
	We have some gym mats.
	I laid them out on the floor in the living room because we don't have a couch.
	And I slept on that.
	He found the condoms in the drawer that I told him we would be using.
	And that upset him very much for some reason.
	What do you mean, for some reason?
	Well, I told him that we would be using them.
	So you were still going to have sex with him, just only with a condom?
	Yeah.
	Okay, just that.
	No, it doesn't make sense at all, but you'll come to find that I am a very nonsensical and not logical...
	No, I didn't say that.
	Look, there's a logic by which these things make sense.
	I'm just not sure exactly what it is.
	Well, the logic was, I still want sex.
	I don't cheat.
	I only have my husband.
	I still want to sleep with my...
	I still want sex, right?
	Oh, so you still want sex, just not an STD. Okay, got it.
	Pretty much.
	I don't know.
	No, no.
	You do know.
	I mean, I don't know because it's your conversation, right?
	So...
	And I'm not...
	This isn't...
	I'm not...
	You know, it's not a critical thing.
	I'm just trying to understand.
	That's where my mind was.
	Of course, I still wanted to have sex with my husband, but I can't trust him, and I didn't want an STI, and...
	Yeah, yeah.
	That's terrifying, so...
	He found the condoms.
	He comes out in the living room.
	He's yelling at me to get out of the house.
	He grabs me by my ankle, pulls me to the door.
	I kick his shins and run back to the corner.
	He grabs me by the leg, pulls me to the door again.
	I do the same thing.
	And once again, I didn't kick him in the balls.
	I didn't try to escalate the situation at all.
	I just simply did not want somebody.
	To put their hands on me.
	And he was very adamant about me leaving the house that night.
	I said, you need to calm down.
	I have work in the morning.
	Just go lay down.
	Go back to bed.
	I was telling him whatever he wanted to hear just to make him go away.
	I completely dropped all the things I was pressing him on and all the women.
	And I just needed to be safe.
	The next morning, I went to work, and I worked at the place that we live at, at the condo complex we live at.
	I do janitorial work.
	I did janitorial work.
	I cleaned the laundry rooms, cleaned anything that was outside.
	And one of the women that live on property ran into me, and she's a friend.
	And she could see that I wasn't okay.
	And so she asked me what happened and I explained to her.
	And so she said, you know, you can come stay at my house.
	You can come stay with me.
	I did.
	I got CASA involved.
	I got an order of protection.
	And with the order of protection, my husband had to leave our condo.
	And when we left our condo, he went to go stay with my parents.
	And that whole situation, my parents didn't necessarily...
	I didn't feel like they were seeing my side.
	I didn't feel like they cared about what happened to me.
	I sent my father pictures of bruises, and he basically told me to deal with it.
	And they think it's okay because that's what they've done to me my whole life.
	Well, not hit you, but not cause bruises directly.
	What?
	You said that's what they've done to me my whole life, but it's not.
	They only hit you, which is of course bad, but they only hit you like half a dozen times or so, right?
	Not your whole life, right?
	Yes.
	They think that abuse is okay.
	Right.
	Okay, got it.
	Okay, and then...
	Okay, got it.
	And if you need to take a moment, that's fine, of course.
	Well, and then...
	And then from that point, I really felt like I had...
	To figure my own shit out.
	And I had to play this game a little bit safer.
	and openness and transparency doesn't always fucking work with everybody.
	And, um, the marriage never recuperated after that.
	Sorry, but didn't he end up going to jail at some point?
	No, actually, I went to jail.
	Okay, sorry, go ahead.
	He's just...
	With that situation, we're going to be jumping all around.
	Okay, the first situation, August 2nd, 2022, where I move out, then I get an order of protection.
	It gets granted.
	We spend 10 days not talking to each other.
	Then it's lifted.
	And I want to talk to him again.
	Sorry, just because I don't know this sequence, how is the order of protection?
	Order of protection is a 10-day restraining order between two people where both parties cannot violate it.
	Oh, like a cool-off period?
	Yes.
	It is the first portion of a restraining order.
	You need to get an order of protection before you can get a restraining order.
	And I did not necessarily want a restraining order against my husband, but I did need the legality of you cannot talk to me for 10 days.
	So with that, it's lifted.
	We're trying to reconcile.
	We're texting, and he's still staying at my parents'.
	I'm not responding.
	He drives down to our condo, climbs up the balcony.
	Breaks through the screen, comes inside.
	I'm at the bar with my girlfriends.
	I come back home.
	He comes out of the bedroom, puts his hands up, says, don't freak out.
	My girlfriend saw his car outside, called the cops.
	The cops came.
	I told them, no, it's fine.
	Everything's good.
	Please just go away.
	There have been many times where if I wanted to use the cops...
	I should have had him arrested at that point.
	I should have, but I didn't.
	And then their next large blow-up is 17 months later.
	And this is where I get myself arrested.
	So...
	Before I get into this, can I mention a little bit about my ex-husband and I's drug history?
	It's your call.
	I am awaiting your next phrase with anticipation, so whatever you want to talk about is fine with me.
	So we would do MDMA together.
	And it was usually on the weekends, those kind of things.
	He asked me if he could start spiking my drinks.
	He thought it would be fun if we're hanging out.
	And, you know, I take my vitamin drink, I always take every morning, and then all of a sudden, you know, I start to feel the molly come on.
	Sorry, help me.
	He asked you if he could spike your drinks, and you said yes.
	And I said yes.
	Okay, what on earth is the point of that?
	Sorry to be incomprehensible, uncomprehending, sorry, but what's the point of him spiking your drinks?
	Then you're just getting dosed and maybe you've got to go to work.
	That's actually what happened.
	The point was it was supposed to be when we are together just enjoying each other's time and then all of a sudden it would come on.
	I think it was a control thing for him.
	What did I get out of it?
	Not a lot.
	I didn't like it necessarily to say.
	It was something that excited him and I thought it was harmless and I'm open to trying it.
	And then we did a few times and it was fun a few times, but these things end.
	So we have a day where I'm going to go to the gym and I take my protein drink and I'm at the gym and I don't feel good.
	I feel funny.
	So I call him and I ask him, you know, why do I feel this way?
	He said, oh, did you drink your drink today?
	I said, of course I did.
	Why wouldn't I? Oh, you have to come home right now.
	I spiked it.
	And that was very scary to be out in public like that and not anticipating it.
	And I drive.
	Oh, I can't say that.
	Never mind.
	I'm on like a motorbike.
	So it's dangerous.
	Even more so to be driving around like that.
	When I came home, I was very upset.
	Wait, you drove home?
	Yeah.
	You say, yeah, like it's no thing.
	It's a big thing.
	No, I don't think it was good.
	Well, I did.
	I drove home.
	And I was very upset with him, to say the least.
	I mean, you can get people killed?
	Yeah.
	Well, like I said, I'm on a motorbike.
	No, but you don't have to be.
	You just take an Uber or a cab or ask for a Lyft.
	Well, I should have had him pick me up, but...
	Well, no, maybe he was drugged too.
	I don't know.
	But, I mean, why are you driving home on a motorcycle when you're drugged?
	Bad decisions.
	Okay, but why?
	Help me understand.
	You're not down.
	It felt like I had to get home.
	Okay, so get home, but...
	I should have done it a different way.
	I agree.
	Okay.
	That was dangerous.
	I agree that was dangerous, but that's what I did.
	And I came home and I was very upset with him and I said, I need a break.
	You are not thinking.
	You're just being reckless with this and it's affecting me.
	So please stop spiking my drinks.
	I said it very clearly to him.
	I gave him permission in the first place and now I am withdrawing permission.
	Well, fast forward a few weeks.
	I have another gym day like that day.
	I come home and I tell him I'm 95% certain that he spiked my drink.
	But I asked very calmly.
	I just said it simply.
	Hey, did you put anything in my drink, please?
	Did you?
	And he denied it.
	And I asked him one more time before he went to bed.
	And he denied it.
	And then the next day...
	I pressed harder as he was making my next round of drinks.
	And he freaked out, threw the vitamin jar that we had, dumped out the protein or the vitamin drink he was making, cleaned out the container, which I thought was strange.
	And I just don't trust that he was respecting what I wanted with that.
	Because he doesn't respect what I want with anything.
	So why did I think that he would listen with that?
	It was very naive of me in that time.
	I'm sorry, how long ago is this spiky stuff?
	The spiking stuff?
	This is a couple months ago.
	This is like...
	This exact fight was January...
	2024. Okay.
	I mean, almost a year ago.
	Oh no, 10 months, 11 months.
	Yeah.
	Alright.
	So he had been spiking my drinks for, I assume, I don't, I assume that he had been spiking my drinks for a few months prior to that.
	And then after that, do you have to answer your question?
	I can't remember what the question was because you said that you wanted to talk about something else, which was the spiking or the repetitive spiking.
	So, okay, so...
	I wanted to get to how I got arrested.
	Oh, yes.
	But I needed to do the tangent about the drug use for it to really make sense.
	So...
	We...
	We are arguing...
	Non-stop.
	I came home from the gym at 11 o'clock, like noon, 11 o'clock, and we fought until 11 at night.
	And then once again, I had work the next day.
	So you fought about the drugging?
	Yes, yes.
	He was very adamant that he didn't do it and that I'm crazy and that I need to go get a drug test and do the drug test to prove it.
	If it does come back positive, he'll spend forever apologizing.
	If it doesn't, I need to apologize.
	He just had a lot of bizarre behavior.
	I go to work and I'm talking with my friends about what's happening with me.
	They're horrified.
	They tell me that I need to take drugs to the police station.
	And give it to them and tell them what's been happening.
	Oh, I skipped over a part two.
	So we were fighting all night long, and the night's coming to an end, and I'm trying to calm things down and reconcile with him.
	I go to give him a hug.
	He pushes me off of him, says, don't touch me.
	I go to give him a hug.
	He pushes me off of him, says, don't touch me.
	I try to hug him again, and then he kicks me off the bed.
	And that's how we end the night.
	Next day, talking with my friends.
	They're terrified.
	Tell me to go to the police.
	That's what I do.
	I get off work.
	I go directly to the police station.
	I bring the Molly with me.
	I tell them what happened last night.
	I tell them about hugging him and him shoving me off of him.
	I tell them about, I've been using these drugs.
	I don't want to use these drugs anymore.
	I'm disappointed in myself for...
	Doing so.
	And they took the bag with the molly in it to the back.
	And they did not charge me for that.
	I am very, very grateful because that could have been a felony.
	But they did charge me for domestic battery.
	I have a piece of paperwork right here on January 24th.
	It says, actually, potentially touch or strike a person.
	Her husband, against the will of husband, repeatedly wrapping her arms around him, repeatedly wrapped her arms around the victim, kept pushing her away, telling her to stop grabbing him.
	She did not listen.
	He kept trying to wrap her arms around him.
	Yeah, so then...
	I spent 24 hours.
	Sorry, and that was just based upon your testimony.
	This is not something that your husband had any involvement in, right?
	No, this is just me.
	And then after they took the baggie back and came back, they read me my Miranda rights, and they were giving me the opportunity to keep my mouth shut.
	But then they asked me, you know, did you wrap your arms around your husband with him not wanting you to?
	And I said yes, because that was the truth.
	I did do that.
	I did try to hug my husband and make things better.
	And they read me my rights, and I knew I should have just kept quiet and not said anything.
	But that was the truth.
	So I said it, and they arrested me.
	For hugging your husband against his will?
	Yeah.
	That doesn't make much sense to me, but I'm no lawyer.
	But all right.
	Okay, so you got arrested?
	It's great.
	I just read it to you.
	Yeah, yeah.
	All right.
	Right here.
	They could have arrested me for drugs.
	They could have arrested me for possession.
	I could tell that the female cop that arrested me, she didn't want to, but it qualified with my state's domestic violence charges.
	We have very strict, no tolerance laws in my state where if you If anybody puts their hands on anybody, you're going to jail.
	Well, if the other person doesn't want you to, yeah, yeah.
	Yes, if the other person doesn't want you to, yes.
	No holds barred, and I see that now.
	I did it.
	I did it.
	So if they feel like I needed to go to jail for it, then I did, and that's fair.
	So I spent 24 hours there, and it was definitely okay.
	I'll make a note of that.
	Sorry, go ahead.
	I'm so sorry.
	I'm sorry.
	Just like, okay, you don't want to be in this space.
	You don't want to be in this place.
	You need to change your behaviors.
	You need to change your actions.
	You need to stop doing the same things that are getting you in this position.
	So when I... Get out of being arrested.
	I have an order of protection placed on me now.
	Right?
	Yeah.
	So, that means I cannot be at the condo, I cannot contact my husband, and I cannot come near my husband in any way, shape, or form.
	If I do, I can be arrested again.
	And how long does that last for?
	10 days.
	Okay.
	I have the paperwork for that as well.
	And so it was 10 days.
	So at that point, I am out of jail.
	I am in my work clothes from the night before.
	I'm kind of panicking.
	I go home.
	My condo.
	I go back to my condo.
	I Uber.
	I take an Uber back to my condo.
	I ate some food.
	I slept the night there.
	But then I just kept remembering what the judge told me that, you know, do not go back to your place of residence.
	Do not go back to your place of residence.
	I don't care what the other person said.
	Listen to what I am telling you.
	And I was scared and I left.
	So I packed all my shit and I stayed in the hotel room for four days.
	And I didn't tell my husband, obviously, because I couldn't talk to him.
	And I didn't tell my parents because I didn't trust them with how they sided with him the first time that he hit me.
	And I didn't trust any of them, quite frankly.
	None of them.
	And I spent...
	Four days separate from everybody and then...
	Oh, fucking hell!
	I'm sorry.
	That's fine.
	Make another comment.
	I'm sorry.
	I don't want to do it again.
	Oh, I don't care if you swear.
	I don't care if you swear.
	Don't worry about it.
	No, I said a name.
	Oh, okay.
	Okay.
	Then my husband got me Baker Acted.
	Got you what?
	Baker Acton.
	Okay.
	That's institutionalized, is it?
	It's where the police will take you to be for a psychiatric evaluation for 24 hours.
	You are involuntarily institutionalized.
	Yes, sir.
	Which is the most horrible thing.
	And he knows that.
	This is my third day in the hotel room.
	I finally feel comfortable enough to call my parents.
	I call them.
	They inform me that I successfully got me.
	Okay, can you please stop with the names?
	Come on.
	Oh, I'm sorry.
	Come on.
	Come on.
	Don't give me this much work for a free call.
	I know.
	I know, Stefan.
	Okay, this is fourth or fifth time.
	I'm just begging you.
	I'm begging you.
	I'm sorry.
	I'm sorry.
	I'm getting up.
	I'm going to a different spot.
	Maybe that will help.
	Okay, go ahead.
	I'll get more focused.
	I'll get more focused.
	All right.
	No more.
	My bad.
	They informed me that my husband had successfully gotten me Baker Acted, and they were trying to instruct me to turn myself in.
	And I did not want to do that for, one, I have a job to do at my work.
	It's more important to me than ever.
	I need to have my duties and responsibilities covered.
	Two, I didn't trust them.
	I didn't know if what they were telling me was true or not.
	I didn't know if they were just trying to get me to go and institutionalize myself because they just didn't like my behavior.
	I didn't like any of it, so I told them no.
	The sheriff picked me up at my place of work.
	At the end of my shift, I was cooperative and kind, went along with him.
	My parents are...
	I do appreciate this.
	They drove all the way down and talked with them before they took me so they would take me to a better facility.
	And the facility that I went to was very nice.
	It took me...
	Gosh.
	It took me until six o'clock in the morning to get to my final hospital.
	Um, well, yeah.
	Oh God.
	I mean, At this point, don't worry about it.
	Just use the names.
	I'm sorry.
	I'll do AI afterwards.
	Okay, go ahead.
	He got me back-reacted for all the same things that he was mentioning to you, freaking out about.
	And the doctors at the institution said, I probably do have some borderline tendencies.
	I probably do have some abandonment issues.
	I probably do have some relationship issues.
	I definitely have PTSD and survivor's guilt.
	From the accident?
	From the accident, yes.
	And they encouraged me.
	They gave me some specialized facilities and support groups and top groups to go work with.
	And honestly, I just tried to make the best of the situation.
	But in the end, my partner, my husband, was very adamant on me getting a diagnosis that never happened.
	Sorry, what do you mean?
	I mean that he was telling my parents and telling my therapists and telling people around me that he believes I have borderline schizoaffective disorder.
	Yeah, amateur diagnosis stuff is usually not very helpful, but anyway.
	And me, amateurs can't diagnose, but anyway, go ahead.
	They can't, and it's just...
	They just want big scary words to, you know, make...
	I mean, if you have all of these mental health issues, and he's been with you for seven years, despite meeting you when he was 10 years older, what does that say about him?
	Oh, it says that he does not have good judgment, doesn't he?
	Well, it's more than that.
	I mean, in a sense, all mental health issues are not good judgment.
	That doesn't clarify much, right?
	Yeah.
	But there has been a lot of crazy-making, and a part of me does feel crazy.
	Okay, let me ask you this, because this is the general thesis that I came into this conversation with.
	So a general thesis doesn't mean that I'm right.
	How crazy do you feel while you're talking to me?
	I don't feel very crazy at all.
	Right.
	So disturbed people amplify craziness with each other.
	Yeah.
	Right.
	So that's my general thought.
	Because, look, I'm sure you've been around people occasionally in your life who are going through some significant, let's just say, I don't know, be as nice as possible, some significant cognitive crisis, right?
	Like, I remember meeting a guy sort of many years ago, and he was just like rambling, and nothing made any sense, and you could sort of see this sort of mental disintegration going on.
	And it didn't matter.
	Whether it was private or public, like it was just, this was a crisis that was going on in his mind.
	And I couldn't, I mean, I'm pretty good at talking people out of some dysfunctional thinking, but I couldn't, like, I don't know if it was something biological or whatever, I couldn't do a thing with this guy.
	So, if you're crazy, like, I don't know, genuinely crazy, I mean, like, I mean, I know that's a pretty amateur term, but let's say that you're going through some hallucinogenic, schizophrenic, whatever, whatever, right?
	Yeah.
	You can't be talked out of that.
	You can't be more reasonable when you're with somebody more reasonable.
	When a schizophrenic person thinks that someone on the radio is talking to them, you can't convince them otherwise.
	I do believe that a true delusion is a delusion.
	Yeah, I talked to this guy on my show many years ago.
	Who believed he was being gangstalked.
	And the reason he believed that was that he heard some sounds coming from his cupboard, which he shared a wall with with someone else in a duplex, I think it was.
	He heard some sounds coming from his cupboard, and I'm like, you know, that really is not proof.
	There's no correlation.
	It didn't matter, right?
	Yes, it didn't.
	So one of the reasons I was curious to have this conversation, I mean, other than it's nice to chat with people about interesting topics, but...
	Was, okay, so if she's crazy, right, then she should be crazy when she's talking to me.
	And my theory, my thesis, was that you would not be crazy when you were talking to me.
	Do you think I'm crazy?
	Well, if I'm talking to you, obviously you've got some upset and you've got some challenges and, you know, decisions are not ideal and you are a self-described weed addict.
	So, yeah, you've got some stuff to work on.
	But in terms of, like, I've been with a really, like, I've known really crazy people.
	I mean, I was raised by a kind of crazy person.
	So I would say that...
	I'm sorry about that.
	And I'm grateful that you share as much as you do.
	You're very vulnerable.
	You're very open.
	And it's a hard thing to do.
	And I appreciate that.
	I appreciate that, too.
	Thank you.
	I appreciate your appreciation.
	So in terms of this conversation, though, I mean, do you feel crazy?
	No, it's been helpful to kind of lay it all out.
	If I felt crazier listening to the conversation you had with my husband, so many of the details were wrong, so much of the times even, the structures, and I guess that bothered me more because that can't be argued, that's reality.
	Well, and of course, I know that I'm just hearing one side of the story.
	Okay, so I don't feel that you're crazy in this conversation.
	That's not my experience.
	Thank you.
	Yeah, so for me, I'm always curious, is it just that crazy people make each other crazier?
	I think crazy people make each other crazier.
	It's like a virus that you share back and forth.
	It just gets worse every time you cough in each other's vicinity, right?
	Because I do.
	When I'm around...
	My husband, he brings out the worst in me, and I'm not proud of that, and I would like to get away from that.
	How much of that is the relationship and how much of that is how I handle relationships, you know?
	Well, you can't be more sane than the people around you, fundamentally, because we're social animals, which means that a lot of our mental processing is shared with others.
	And you can't really think unless you're...
	Right, yeah, but that's why we invent language.
	This is why we have a culture, civilization, books, conversations.
	You can't, like, if you want to be sane, you have to have sane people around you.
	Like, there's no other way to do it.
	You can't dive in and try and make crazy people sane, because they'll just win.
	Because they'll do things that you won't do.
	Right?
	Like, crazy corrupt people, and I'm not talking about you or your husband here in particular, right?
	Because I know it's both sides of the story.
	And all that, right?
	But what I'm saying is that really, really disturbed people, like dangerously disturbed people, corrupt people, immoral people, the reason you can't win against them is that they'll do things that you won't do.
	They'll lie, they'll gaslight, they'll manipulate, they'll shamelessly accuse you of things, they'll project, they'll do all of these things.
	It's kind of like going into a boxing match where you've got the gloves on.
	And you've got the mouth guard and you can't hit below the belt and there's lots of moves that aren't allowed.
	And then there's someone else who will just shoot you or drug you or something like that.
	And it's like, well, that's not a fair fight anymore, right?
	It's like if you try to play chess and someone says, oh, yeah, all my pawns can move as well as my queen, which is the most powerful character.
	It's like, you can't win that game because they will...
	Yeah, you can't win the game because then you're not playing the same game.
	They're playing win no matter what and you're playing follow the rules.
	And when you are trying to play a game with people who are like, win no matter what, and you're trying to play the rules, you'll lose.
	And so if you and your husband have certain dysfunctional elements, which we all have, right?
	Yeah.
	And you guys amplify each other.
	Yes.
	Then it's good you're out.
	It is.
	It is good.
	And it's not just good for you guys, it's good for society.
	I agree.
	I just started your relationships book.
	Oh yeah, real-time relationships.
	Real-time relationships book.
	And I'm only two hours into it, but it's really looking at myself, looking at how we just set each other off and point fingers.
	It's not useful, it's not helpful.
	And like you said, to the greater of society.
	Well, yeah, because, I mean, you guys are going to hurt not just each other, but somebody else probably along the line.
	Especially if you got pregnant or something.
	Absolutely.
	Okay.
	So then the question is, why do you make these bad decisions?
	To get involved with a guy, to stay with a guy, to, you know, with this relationship.
	I mean, did you have a feeling it was about to start working out, this seven-year slugfest?
	Nope.
	It felt like it was only going to get worse.
	It felt like I was going to turn into him.
	It felt like eventually...
	My morals and inability to hold to my own was going to be chipped away, and I would just sink down to his level, and then I wouldn't be able to look at myself in the mirror.
	Okay.
	So why were you in pursuit of that?
	I was in pursuit of that because I was stuck on being married, because I was stuck on being a victim.
	No, no, because you knew him for...
	A year and seven months before you got married.
	Because I was stuck on being a victim.
	Because I was stuck on...
	Yes, but that doesn't explain why you were stuck on being a victim, right?
	That's my M.O. is what I'm used to, is what's familiar.
	No, but what's familiar can be exactly what you avoid.
	I'm sure you know the one guy, the twins, right?
	No.
	One of them says, oh man, I never...
	Touch alcohol.
	Because my father was an alcoholic and I saw how bad it is, right?
	Like Dr. Phil doesn't touch alcohol because his brother died of alcoholism.
	Oh, I didn't know that.
	Yeah, so one guy could say, oh man, I don't touch alcohol because I saw what it did to my dad, right?
	And the other guy, his brother, says, oh, I'm a drunk because my dad was a drunk.
	It's all I'm used to.
	That's what I'm used to.
	So what I'm used to doesn't explain.
	Okay.
	So, would you like to know why you make bad decisions?
	I would love to know why I make bad decisions.
	All right.
	So, the reason you make bad decisions is you won't hold your father accountable.
	I do not.
	Now, how do I know that you don't hold your father accountable?
	Because I'm choosing men that are similar to him?
	No, that's an effect, right?
	So, the reason that I know directly is you've told me that.
	How do you?
	Oh.
	You've given your father a lot of excuses, and you also said to your father he couldn't control his temper, he wasn't in control of his behavior, and all of that, right?
	Yes.
	How do you make excuses?
	No, that's false.
	Okay, well, maybe it's not.
	It is false.
	Let me ask you this.
	Let me ask you this.
	When he called you these horrible words, stupid, lazy, whore, I'm sure he threw a couple of bitches in there.
	So when he called you these horrible words, did he ever do it at a mall where other people could hear?
	No.
	No?
	Did he ever do it at a parent-teacher conference?
	Did he ever do it when there were policemen around?
	Did he ever do it in a situation where he would get criticized or ostracized or blamed in public?
	No, he was always very pleasant when the people were watching.
	Right.
	So he is in perfect control of his behavior?
	Absolutely.
	So if somebody has epilepsy, they have epilepsy no matter what, right?
	Okay, yeah.
	They can't turn it on or off.
	Right.
	So your father is 100% completely and totally responsible and was never out of control at all.
	Let me ask you this.
	Was there ever a time where he was fucked up on his own anger juice and then ding dong, right?
	The doorbell rings and he's like, oh, hi, you know, just turns it right off.
	Or the phone rings and he's pleasant.
	Yes, there have been times where we're at work and he's yelling at me about something and then a customer comes and all of a sudden it's fine.
	Right.
	So that tells you that your father is 100% in control of his temper.
	So he's using it.
	He's a bully.
	He uses it knowingly.
	He turns it on and off to get what he wants.
	He's not a rage guy.
	He's not out of control, right?
	Because out of control people can't suddenly switch their behavior.
	If some guy's got a giant tumor on his neck, it doesn't vanish where the doorbell rings.
	Yeah.
	Right?
	Yeah.
	He has full autonomy and ability to conduct himself in a different way, and he chooses not to.
	Right.
	So he's a bully.
	Because he'll be an abusive asshole to his daughter, who's helpless and dependent upon him.
	But anyone like a customer that he wants something from, he turns on the charm and would never in a million years do anything like that, right?
	Yes.
	Now, do you feel that your mother was out of control of her life or the situation?
	Out of control of her life?
	Yes.
	Okay, and in what ways was she out of control of her life?
	She was out of control of her life in the ways that...
	She was a very...
	Why am I having such a tough time answering this question?
	She was out of control of her own autonomy, her own sense of taking care of herself.
	I don't know.
	Don't give me word salads and psychobabble.
	I'm trying.
	No, I'm just saying that that's not an answer.
	Tell me, tell me, how was she out of, look, if your mother was kidnapped, right, let's say you didn't see your mother for two weeks and it turns out she was kidnapped, right, and held hostage, is she responsible for not calling you for two weeks?
	No.
	Okay, so there's someone who's out of control of their life.
	They've been kidnapped.
	They're locked up in a basement.
	They've got no phone, right?
	Oh, then she wasn't out of control.
	Okay.
	She had complete control.
	That's why I was having a tough time finding that, because there was no answer to that.
	The answer's no.
	Well, I'm not trying to trick you.
	I'm really not.
	I mean, if there was something...
	I was looking for it.
	I couldn't find it, because it wasn't theirs.
	Okay, so your mother had perfect responsibility and autonomy.
	She did.
	You're right.
	Right?
	And your father had perfect responsibility and autonomy.
	Now, if your parents had had some sort of, like, let's say your father, it turned out he did have a brain tumor, right?
	That destroyed his executive functioning and turned him into kind of a lizard-brained feral ape or something like that, right?
	Okay, then we would say, look, that's really traumatic and that's really awful.
	But, I mean, he had a brain tumor, so we're not going to hold him 100% morally responsible.
	Now, there may be some responsibility in that his behavior got worse and worse.
	He didn't go see a doctor.
	Yeah.
	Right?
	But he doesn't have a brain tumor, right?
	He does not.
	Because you gave me, well, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
	And this is why I said earlier, the guy did have the railway spike through the head guy, right?
	Yep.
	So, how has your relationship been like with your parents over the past?
	Moving out was very helpful.
	My relationship with my father has become more distant, less enmeshed since I stopped working for him.
	I am closer with my mom now that I don't live at home.
	I feel as if I'm harder on her and I should be harder on him.
	He's hurt me a lot more than she has, but I feel like I can talk to her better.
	So I give her the opportunity because she has apologized and wished that she had done better.
	Sorry, are they still together?
	They are.
	So tell me about the apology thing.
	When did that happen?
	How did that come about?
	We went on a trip together, just the two of us.
	I wanted to make it a point to try to connect with her more and speak my mind and give her the opportunity to reconcile.
	And she did.
	She did to the best of her ability.
	She's not very...
	Oh, Lord, will you stop it?
	To the best of her ability?
	What do you know the best of her ability is?
	It's excuses.
	I'm not God.
	I don't know what her abilities are.
	Okay, so...
	I'm just, I'm going to be, I hope not annoying.
	I'm sure it is a little annoying.
	Go ahead, push back.
	But I'm going to be pretty blunt, right?
	Yep.
	Right?
	So, you don't know to the best of, to the best of her ability is just a coping phrase.
	For sure.
	Right?
	You don't know.
	The best of her ability would have been the first time that your mother mistreated her or you to make an absolute demand that he never do it again, that he go to anger management, that he get counseling, that he figure this shit out.
	Or she's out.
	That would have changed my life entirely.
	Absolutely.
	And it might have actually helped your father.
	Maybe he would have gone to therapy, got anger management, and learned a better way.
	Oh, done better.
	Yeah.
	And that would have been good for everybody.
	How long was your mother with your father before they had you?
	Three years.
	Oh, well, no.
	Seven, eight, nine, ten years.
	Ten years.
	Ten years.
	Ten years, your mother is with a guy who's horribly abusive.
	Is that too hard a phrase?
	No.
	What they did, he was way more abusive with her than he was with me.
	So horribly abusive with them.
	Okay, so she is with a guy for ten years.
	Yes.
	Who's horribly abusive.
	And then she not only gives him a child.
	But keeps that child in his orbit decade after decade, year after year.
	She served him up voluntarily.
	Your mother served your father up, a brand new helpless victim, and kept that brand new helpless victim in his orbit where he called her a whore.
	Year after year after year after year.
	And you're telling me the best she can do is a half apology?
	No, no, she could have done better.
	You're right.
	I don't...
	That's...
	That's not enough.
	So...
	Can you put it like that, I mean...
	Well, I'm not trying to put it any way.
	I'm trying to be as accurate as possible.
	Okay, who is a girl, a little girl in your life that you care about the most?
	My cousin.
	Your cousin.
	Okay.
	And how old is your cousin?
	Twelve.
	She's twelve?
	Mm-hmm.
	You know where I'm going with this, right?
	Go ahead.
	All right.
	So, your cousin, let's call her Sally.
	All right?
	So, Sally is twelve years old.
	Innocent as the day is long.
	Eager, positive, optimistic, happy, curious, creative.
	All the good things that kids generally are.
	Let's say that...
	Kathy...
	Sorry, let's say that...
	Sorry, I just went off in six million different directions in my brain.
	What did we agree to call her?
	Sally, right?
	Sally?
	Did we agree to call her Sally?
	Is that right?
	Sally.
	Okay, so what's Sally's mother's relationship to you?
	She's...
	No, no, I mean genetically.
	Oh, oh, sorry.
	My mother's brother's daughter.
	Mother's brother's daughter.
	Okay, got it.
	All right.
	So, let's say that Sally calls you up and she's in tears because her mother hired a babysitter who called her a whore and stupid.
	And maybe even a bitch.
	And she's told her mother, and the mother is like, deal with it.
	He's the best babysitter, or he's the best babysitter we've got.
	He's going to keep coming over once or twice a week.
	That would make me very upset.
	Okay, that would make you very upset that Sally, your precious cousin, was being called a whore and stupid by a babysitter that her mother had promised to keep hiring, right?
	Yeah.
	Now, if Sally's mother calls you up, what would you tell her?
	I would tell her that she's being cruel and uncaring, that she needs to listen to her daughter.
	What would you say to her about keeping to hire the babysitter who called Sally a whore?
	There are other options out there.
	Why would you allow your child to be around anybody who would diminish them like that?
	You're saying it's okay.
	You're saying it's okay by allowing it to happen.
	Right.
	Do you think that that's okay?
	By keeping the abusive babysitter in your family, you're doing wrong.
	It is.
	Right?
	Okay, let's step it up one more notch and then I'll ask the final question.
	The next notch is you have a daughter.
	What's your favorite female name?
	Lily.
	I'm sorry?
	Lily.
	Lily.
	It's a lovely name.
	Okay.
	So, let's say that you have a lovely daughter, Lily, and Lily is three years old.
	And your father babysits Lily.
	You come home and Lily tells you in halting, sobbing tones that your father, Has abused her?
	Yes.
	Verbally, physically, whatever, right?
	Yes.
	What happens?
	He's still there.
	I would probably fly into a rage, which is not useful.
	Let's not judge what happens, but what would your impulse be?
	What would happen, impulse-wise?
	Impulse-wise, if my daughter told me that my father hit her, hurt her, called her a name, would be to rip her away from him as fast as possible and create a wall between the two.
	So would your father be welcome as a babysitter on his own again?
	No.
	Okay.
	So you would cut off your daughter from your father if your father abused her?
	I would.
	Okay.
	So why is your father in your life?
	I live in his house.
	That's not an answer.
	I'm too scared to face what he did to me.
	Why is your daughter, Lily, Worthy of protection for one shred of abuse by your father, but you somehow are not, despite the fact that it's been going on for decades.
	I am.
	I am, but I haven't been holding myself to that.
	No, no.
	And the reason is, the question is why?
	Why, when I talk about another child being briefly abused by someone, are you absolutely outraged?
	But when you look at your own abuse of many decades...
	You make excuses for your father.
	Now, if you had your daughter Lily be abused by your father, would you say, oh, you know, his heart's in the right place, but sometimes he just knows he's not in full control of his temper and blah, blah, blah, right?
	He'll be back.
	I would never put that on her.
	Okay, then why are you telling me this nonsense about you and your father?
	You know, I'm a universal moral guy, which means if you would be outraged, And cut off a child from your abusive father, why are you in his house?
	Why is that an option?
	And don't say it's just because of the divorce, because the divorce and the marriage occurred because of your lack of these standards.
	You create, and I'm not blaming you for this at all.
	I'm not blaming you.
	I really want you to hear that.
	I'm not blaming you.
	These are survival mechanisms that all victims of child abuse have to create, which is to create these magical portals.
	Of opposite morality, wherein the people who abuse us are just not responsible.
	It's the only way we can survive.
	The only way we can survive, because if we try to hold people responsible who have abusive and sadistic power over us, we're screwed.
	Because they'll use it.
	Well, they'll escalate.
	Yeah.
	They'll escalate.
	To very extreme levels.
	Oh, you don't know where that's going to end.
	But it's not going to end well.
	So we evolved to appease powerful abusers when we couldn't escape them, right?
	Yeah.
	So as a kid, you had to make excuses for your mother and your father because otherwise you would have confronted them on their wrongdoing.
	You would have gone to the police.
	You would have gone to a teacher.
	You would have gone to a relative.
	You would have gone to a priest.
	And you would have said...
	My father keeps calling me a whore.
	And then, you know, atomic mushroom cloud explosion over the household, right?
	Yeah.
	God knows where that would have gone.
	Or, rather, the devil knows where that would have gone, right?
	Yes.
	So this was an absolutely essential survival mechanism that I'm very, very, very glad you did.
	Good for you.
	Well done.
	Excellent.
	That's primo survival.
	But I'm not in that circumstance anymore, so now it's time to develop out of that survival.
	So the excuses for your father is where your husband got through.
	Absolutely.
	Because you make excuses for him, your father, you make excuses for him, your ex-husband, and you make excuses for yourself.
	Yes.
	I do.
	Why are you still on hourly marijuana 12 years after the accident?
	It's to numb yourself to the consequences of these excuses, in my humble opinion.
	I agree.
	If you stop having excuses...
	See, the excuses keep you in perpetual danger because you have abusers around you, unrepentant abusers.
	So the excuses keep you in perpetual danger.
	And in order to numb the terror of that perpetual danger, you do daily marijuana.
	Hourly marijuana.
	Wake and bake, right?
	Absolutely.
	Absolutely.
	It's a numbs mistake.
	It's a friend.
	And my view, any parent who says to their 12-year-old daughter, we're putting you on birth control, should be in jail.
	I don't think that that's proper guidance or structure.
	It's beyond horrifying.
	A 12-year-old child cannot consent to sex.
	They shouldn't.
	I don't feel like I was able to.
	And it is kind of a cruel joke of nature to get young women to be developing so early on when they don't even have the mental capacity to...
	Well, that's evolutionary stuff, right?
	But a 12-year-old child cannot consent to sex.
	A cruel joke of nature.
	Yeah, a 12-year-old child cannot consent to sex.
	So they're basically making sure that you, as a rape victim, don't get pregnant.
	It is evil almost beyond words.
	It's not anything I plan on reproducing or advocating for.
	Okay, let's do it again.
	Your father gives your 12-year-old daughter, Lily, birth control.
	Hell no.
	Saying, yeah, go for the sex, but just don't get pregnant.
	And you find out that your father is giving your precious daughter at the age of 12 birth control.
	Okay, that's messed up.
	Would he be welcome in your house?
	No.
	So why are you welcoming your heart?
	I'm trying to rouse you to have the same defense of yourself as you have for an imaginary daughter.
	Like, you're very real.
	Yeah.
	And I want to be here.
	I enjoy being me.
	I need to create boundaries from these people that...
	Look, at the age of 18, you should not have been drinking, drugging, maybe cocaine, wandering around the streets.
	Yeah.
	But you started drinking under your parents' tutelage and care at the age of 11. I mean, I've heard some messed up time in my almost 20 years of doing these shows.
	This is one of the most messed up ones.
	I'm telling you straight up, you had it really, really, really bad, my friend.
	And I am so sorry for that.
	Thank you.
	It was bad.
	When was the last time you were truly sober?
	That's a good question.
	Which means a couple of months off drinking drugs.
	Yeah, I went three months, no pot, no drinking, no anything.
	I want to say a few months after the second blow up.
	And then I slipped up.
	somebody at my job had a bait pen, a weed bait pen, and I hit it, and then it was all downhill.
	I let a slip become a slide, and it was all downhill from there.
	Okay, so in the almost 20 years that you've been drinking and drugging off and on, right, for the most part, I know it was 11, and then 14 for marijuana, right?
	So in the 15 to 19 years, you've been sober for a couple of months.
	Yeah, since I was 14. I'm 25 now.
	The longest I've ever gone without pot is three months.
	Yeah.
	And it was once, right?
	Just once.
	Just to see if I could do it.
	And then I failed myself.
	Okay.
	Why?
	Okay, let me ask you this.
	Have your parents sat down with an intervention?
	For you?
	They support my pot use.
	If I run out, they offer to buy me more.
	They offer to get my card.
	They want me smoking pot.
	Okay.
	Why do they want you smoking pot?
	Because my dad smokes pot and they think that it's a healthier option and they think that I need to be on some sort of substance.
	So if I do choose one, they're glad that it's pot.
	Okay.
	At what age did your parents start giving you pot?
	Like, 15?
	16?
	I could go and ask my dad.
	Okay, no.
	Just trust your memories.
	Okay, so let's say that your 15-year-old lovely, beautiful daughter, Lily, you find out that your father has been giving her pot to smoke.
	At 15?
	Yeah.
	Yeah, no.
	When you put things like that, it's so much more fucked up.
	Well, I'm trying to denormalize the living shit out of this stuff for you, my friend.
	I'm trying to seriously denormalize all of this.
	It's gotten so normal.
	It's gotten so normal that your husband seems sane.
	Or normal.
	No, he, I'll, yeah, 100%. 100%.
	No, if my father came to me and said he just gave Lily, my 15-year-old daughter...
	Oh, no!
	He didn't tell you.
	You just found out about it.
	Oh, I just found out about it.
	No.
	Absolutely.
	That's...
	That's disgusting.
	And you find out that your father's been giving you, giving your lovely daughter Lily, marijuana at the age of 15, and then you also find out...
	He's been giving her birth control pills since she was 12. Is he welcome back in your house?
	No, I don't think that he loves her, and I don't think that he cares for her the way that he should.
	Okay, and let's say that your mother knew all about this and never told you.
	Would she still be a victim out of control of her life and owe the poor dear?
	No.
	No, she's not dumb.
	She's not an idiot.
	She knows what's up.
	Did your mother know, or did she participate in the supplying of marijuana to you when you were 15?
	Yep.
	She knew.
	She was okay with that.
	Okay.
	So, you don't have to tell me where you live, but in most places, in fact, I think just about every place, your parents are criminals.
	Yeah.
	Right?
	Supplying drugs to underage, even if the drugs themselves are legal, you can't give them to 15-year-olds.
	No, no, because their brains aren't developed.
	That's why we have these laws in place that are supposed to keep people from hurting themselves.
	Right.
	And if your parents are encouraged you have sex at the age of 12 when you can't consent, then they're enabling, well, we can come up with a bunch of different words.
	I'm sure it's pretty clear, right?
	Yeah.
	Okay.
	They were enabling.
	What is the prize?
	Okay.
	What's your favorite male name?
	Victor.
	Victor.
	All right.
	Hopefully his middle name is Yellow.
	So it's Victor Y. Victory.
	All right.
	Oh, that'd be cute!
	That'd be cute, right?
	There you go.
	That's your son's name.
	All right.
	So, Victor.
	No, that was the last one we picked up.
	Okay, so Victor is a great guy.
	He's moral, strong, self-assured, confident, virtuous, all kinds of stuff, right?
	Now, Victor sees you across a crowded gym past the giant tripods of cameras, right?
	So Victor sees you and he's like, wow, she's really, she's cool.
	She looks like she's got a great laugh.
	She's pretty, you know, whatever, right?
	And he comes over and starts talking to you and you chat with him and you find out that you have, you know, a decent amount in common and...
	You like the same things and all of that, right?
	Uh-huh.
	And you go on a couple of dates, and then, of course, he's going to ask you about your childhood and your family and so on, right?
	Right.
	I would hope so.
	I would be so happy to have that.
	No, he would ask you.
	Someone has genuine interest in me?
	No, he would ask you because he's a moral guy and a careful guy, so he doesn't want to get involved in somebody who's embedded or enmeshed in a corrupt family situation.
	Understood.
	Because Victor is dating like every intelligent person dates or any wise person dates when they know this factor.
	He's dating not for his balls, but for his future children.
	Yes.
	Right?
	So he's going to say not, is she pretty?
	Which is not unimportant.
	It's not unimportant.
	But he's going to say, will she be a good mother?
	Yes.
	Because that's what marriage...
	I mean, that's why there are men and women.
	It's to be mothers and fathers, and that's why marriage exists.
	So there's a stable place for children to be raised.
	To grow and become a baby.
	So he's going to look at you and say, will she be a good mother?
	Yes.
	Right?
	As he should.
	All right.
	Now, being a good mother means that his children are going to be in a good environment to be raised, right?
	Yes.
	Right.
	I mean, you can't be a good mother necessarily in wartime.
	You can just maybe not.
	You can take some of the edge off the disaster, right?
	Okay, so he's going to say, oh, okay, so this is your father and this is your mother and you tell him all the things you've told me, right?
	What is the price of having your parents in your life in the eyes of Uber Chad Alpha Victor?
	What does he look at?
	When you say, oh, I'm still living with the people who abused me.
	He would scan my father and say I can get away with everything that he has done to her because she has not drawn any boundaries.
	She has not...
	No, no, no.
	He won't want to do that.
	Oh, I'm so sorry.
	I have to denormalize that too.
	No, he's going to say that's really sad.
	That's really sad, but I can't have these people as in-laws.
	I can't have these people around my kids.
	I can't have these people around my family.
	Not, oh great, I can get away with that.
	That's, you know, that's dysfunctional.
	He doesn't want that.
	He will have sympathy.
	This is a healthy person.
	Yeah, yeah.
	This is a healthy person.
	A good guy and all of that, right?
	Okay, I'm sorry.
	A healthy person is, no, they're not going to want their children anywhere near that.
	They're not going to want...
	No, not that they wouldn't want it.
	They wouldn't allow it.
	It wouldn't happen at all, which means that I'm canceling myself out.
	Okay.
	Now, and then you say, oh, by the way, I do drugs every hour.
	Is he going to be like, hmm, that's going to be great.
	I'm sure that babies raised on milk THC are fantastic.
	Well, no.
	Firstly, that's not cute.
	It's not a cute look at all.
	I don't think that being a stoner is sad, even though it's been normalized.
	It's just as sad as being any other kind of drug addict.
	And absolutely not do I think that it's okay to be consuming marijuana while you are pregnant or while you're breastfeeding.
	No, it's while you're dating.
	It's while you're dating.
	Because you don't get to the pregnancy or breastfeeding if the guy won't touch you with a 10-foot pole if you're a stoner.
	Yes.
	Because he's going to be like, I haven't even met this woman.
	I don't know what she's like.
	I just know what she's like on drugs.
	Oh.
	I don't know who she is.
	That's totally fair.
	I am two totally different people when I'm lying.
	Well, and even if I like her a lot, I mean, and even if she's fine off drugs, we've got to go through the whole quitting thing.
	Yeah.
	Now...
	The quitting thing is a pretty hard burden to put on a new relationship, isn't it?
	Yeah.
	I mean, it's a burden to put on the other person of like, oh, I'm quitting for you.
	That's not cool.
	You should be quitting.
	Yeah, in general.
	Yes, it is.
	Because, I mean, I think my general theory, I'm not saying I have any proof, my general theory is that emotional development tends to stop when the drugs are used.
	Oh, so I have some arrested development, and when I stop smoking pot, I'm going to kind of be like a 12-year-old again?
	Well, I think it was 14 or 15. But okay, so the reason I say that is if I look at your attraction to your ex-husband, it was like teenage girls screaming at the Beatles.
	He's so pretty.
	Oh, yeah.
	Oh, 100%.
	Right.
	And then that's why you stayed, right?
	Yeah.
	I mean, if he had put on 50 pounds, the marriage wouldn't have lasted.
	He knew that.
	That's why he took the gym so seriously.
	Right.
	So he's going to say all of the emotions that are buried by the drugs are going to come out and have to be dealt with.
	Yes, they should.
	And dreams, too.
	I can't wait to have dreams again.
	I feel like there's so much in my subconscious that can't talk to me because I don't remember them.
	Right, right.
	And I want to hear it.
	I want to find...
	I'm sorry.
	I want to find myself again.
	I want to...
	I do think that I've buried myself under marijuana use and I've used it as a band-aid to not face the pain that I went through.
	Sure.
	And your parents prefer you drugged so you don't judge them.
	Because I'm way more compliant and...
	Yeah, yeah.
	Yeah, for sure.
	That's not...
	That makes me so sad.
	Well, and angry.
	I mean, because, you know, it's not like you're not participating at this age, right?
	It's one thing if you're 14 or 15 or 20 or whatever.
	But, okay, so let's do some math here, right?
	Do you want to have kids?
	I do.
	Okay, you're 30, right?
	I'm 25. Sorry, 25, 25. My apologies.
	I'm sorry, I got that math completely wrong.
	So let's backtrack some of that math out and let's not pretend that I can...
	Count with my shoes on.
	Okay, so you're 25 years old, so how long do you think it's going to take you to emotionally recover from your six-year relationship with your ex?
	Probably, like, two years.
	Yeah, I mean, it's, you know, okay, something like that.
	So, you might be emotionally available, potentially, at 27, right?
	Yeah.
	Okay.
	Now...
	How long is it going to take for you to get off the drugs?
	And please talk to an expert, and please talk to your doctor, and please talk to, you know, I'm just a podcast guy, right?
	So, like, whatever you're going to do, make sure you take it up with a trained professional rather than just some guy ranting in his house, right?
	So, just talk to a doctor, talk to addiction counselors, specialists, whatever you need to do.
	But if you want to get off the drugs, how long do you think that will take to get off and stay off and feel like you can have it in the past?
	Now?
	I could start now.
	Okay, but how long would it take?
	It would take me...
	The first three days are the most uncomfortable.
	That's where I'm having cravings and it's just behavior.
	It's just repetition.
	So I have to break those things that I'm used to doing.
	But after those three days, I've done it before.
	I replace...
	It's so silly, but I replace it with lemon water.
	It works a lot because squeezing the lemon on the little jigger is kind of like using my grinder.
	It's silly, but...
	No, no, things I didn't know.
	Okay.
	And then drinking the lemon water through a straw kind of makes me feel like that hand-to-mouth action thing.
	And then just the zingy taste of something different.
	Yeah, a lot of people don't realize just how much addiction is based upon the rituals as well as the actual thing, right?
	Yeah.
	Oh my gosh, yes.
	And then, of course, there are triggers that come along and, you know, like you hit a bump and you're like, oh man, the impulse comes.
	Oh, I just want to smoke.
	That would make me feel better instantly.
	But that's not the hard part for me.
	I think the hard part for me is the habitual.
	I do it so often every day.
	It's just like almost an impulse or like a...
	Yeah, just a default.
	Once I break out of the default, it's really not...
	I don't miss it.
	I really don't.
	Yeah, you have to break all the associations, right?
	Like a friend of mine used to write when he was smoking.
	And in order to change that, he actually went...
	I think he went to a coffee shop and wrote there where you couldn't smoke just so that he wouldn't continue to...
	And then he broke the association of smoking and writing.
	So there's things that you can do for those kinds of things.
	But yeah, once you break the habits and so on, right?
	But then, of course, I assume that the emotions that the drugs are covering up will come up.
	Now, that's going to take a lot to unpack, for sure.
	Well, yeah, maybe.
	I mean, but generally, the most difficult thing with the emotions is the moral side of things.
	Okay.
	And if you have moral clarity, which is kind of what I'm trying to be providing in the last quarter of this conversation, if you have the moral clarity...
	Mm-hmm.
	Right?
	So it doesn't mean the emotions just immediately vanish, but it means that it's not this weird chaotic anger that you, oh my gosh, am I like my dad?
	You know, like, it's not this big blob that you have to kind of parse out.
	It's like, oh, okay.
	You know, it's like if you have a bruise and you don't know where it came from, that's kind of alarming, right?
	But if you're like, oh yeah, I remember walked into the kitchen counter or something, then you're like, okay, I know what the bruise is, right?
	I know where it came from.
	Right.
	So...
	The moral side of things makes, I think, recovery from childhood trauma so much easier.
	Okay, like I was battling a kind of evil.
	I was helpless.
	I had adaptation strategies to survive evil called compliance and appeasement, which everyone does.
	All children do who make it.
	Children who don't end up in jail are dead, so good for you.
	And so you say, okay, well, I was kidnapped, right, in a sense, right, as a kid.
	So I was controlled by evildoers.
	And I had to conform and comply in order to survive.
	And maybe that went on a little bit too long, but that's, you know, when you stop covering things up or you stop the drugs or whatever, then these feelings are going to come up, but they won't be completely baffling, incomprehensible, and that's what's going to make you dive back to the drugs, in my view.
	It's not because the feelings come up, it's because it's like, I don't know what's happening to me, it's scary, so I need the drug again.
	As opposed to, well, look, I was raised in an evil situation.
	By very corrupt people who did me a great harm against my will when I had no power to manage or control it.
	So these feelings are a natural response to the evils I suffered.
	And therefore, you don't need the drugs because although the feelings can be uncomfortable and difficult, they're not incomprehensible and baffling, if that makes sense.
	It does make sense.
	You're saying that once I unpack everything and I'm able to look at it with more clarity, then it won't be as anxiety-provoking, it won't be as emotional.
	Like, it has been in the past, and it has driven me to smoke or do other things.
	Well, it's not, again, it's not the emotions that are bad, it's the incomprehensibility of the emotions.
	It's the not being able to understand them.
	Like, if I'm walking in the woods at night, and I think I hear something walking behind me, I don't sit there and say, I have baffling anxiety.
	Yeah.
	I'm like, oh, I think there's something walking behind me, right?
	It's a good thing that you have that anxiety.
	Yeah, that's healthy, right?
	That's healthy.
	You don't want to live without that anxiety, right?
	Absolutely.
	Right.
	I mean, if you wake up in the middle of the night with night terrors for no reason, that's kind of baffling and frightening, right?
	But if you wake up in the middle of the night and, you know, you realize, you know, something rolled off your cabinet and shattered on the ground, and that's why you woke up thinking there was something in the room, then your fear is still there, but it's not like baffling and incomprehensible, like existential, like I'm afraid of nothing kind of thing, right?
	Absolutely.
	You have at least a sense of what it could be.
	Right.
	So I think that emotional healing is vastly accelerated with moral clarity.
	That's sort of the...
	Sorry, that's the short version of the long speech, if that makes sense.
	It does.
	So if you want to have kids, then you've got to work backwards from that.
	Okay.
	So if the drugs are not serving you...
	They're not.
	...having kids with a quality man, okay, then you've got to work to get off the drugs.
	And if being around your parents is going to drive away a quality man...
	Because a quality man isn't going to date you.
	He's going to date your extended family because he's going to realize how important your extended family is in the raising of his children.
	Yeah.
	Right?
	So he's going to look at your parents and he's going to say, do I want to spend the next 40 years with them?
	Do I want to give them power over my children?
	Do I want them part of my family?
	Do I want to fight with them for influence over my wife?
	I'm so sorry.
	Go ahead.
	No, no, I was agreeing with you.
	Oh, sorry, I thought you were.
	Okay.
	So a quality man is going to look at you and the people around you.
	This includes your friends.
	We haven't talked much about them other than it sounds like they've given you some great support, so that's good.
	But he's going to say, these are the people who are going to come over on birthdays.
	These are the people who are going to come over.
	These are the people who might be taking care of my kids.
	And he's going to look at them with a cold and calculating eye as to whether they will be good for his children to be around.
	And that's what I would want from my partner.
	I would want him to create a space that's safe for children.
	Right, so then he will say, sorry to interrupt, he will say, which of your friends moved heaven and earth to get you away from your ex-husband?
	Yeah.
	And if the answer is, well, they said a couple of things here and there, he'd be like, sorry, not good for me.
	Because the more he cares about you, the more he's going to dislike anyone who harmed you.
	Or through indifference allowed harm to accrue.
	Like, you can't love someone and also love the people who did them the most harm.
	So he can't love you and your unrepentant, abusive parents.
	I mean, your mother a little bit, but...
	Right?
	So you understand.
	In the same way that you can't love your precious daughter, Lily, and also love the babysitter who abuses her.
	Love means disliking the people who harm those you love.
	So he can't like your parents.
	if they're the ones, and I think it's fair to say, that your parents did you the most harm of any two individuals on this planet, and are you going to sit there to your victor, your potential husband-to-be, and say, you have to love me and also the people who did me the greatest harm?
	That won't work.
	Thank you.
	He's like, there's only one of me here.
	I can't do both.
	If that makes sense.
	It does.
	It does make sense.
	I wouldn't want him to make himself uncomfortable or be in a position where our children are going to be uncomfortable.
	No, he won't.
	He won't.
	He just won't do it.
	He just won't date you.
	You keep thinking he's just going to go along and it's on you.
	No, he will choose not to date you.
	And he will choose not to date you not because he thinks you're a terrible person.
	He can do that with great sympathy.
	But he can say she's not in a place.
	Like, the men that most women want have their choice.
	And you're in competition with all the women who don't have abusive people in their lives.
	That's fair.
	It's worse than being a single mom.
	It is.
	Yeah.
	It's definitely...
	It's definitely already been a hurdle.
	Clearly.
	Well, I mean, you had a stoner boyfriend in junior high and high school who got you on drugs.
	We haven't talked about other relationships, but then at the age of 19, you met the guy who's 10 years older, and that's been a disaster for six years, right?
	Absolutely.
	Right.
	So you can't get quality guys because quality guys see the mess that surrounds you, which is not your fault.
	When you were a kid, right?
	Nobody chooses the family they're born into.
	Unfortunately, you rolled snake eyes in the old family dice, right?
	I'm really sorry for that.
	But he's looking at you, and there's no good guys in this entire circle.
	Like, in your entire environment.
	It's like same planet, different worlds.
	The good people, the quality people, the moral people, don't tend at all to be in this kind of environment.
	No, we're not.
	So when was the last time you met a guy who you would consider not just pretty or handsome or whatever, of course you know that, right?
	But when was the last time you met a guy who was like, this is a really, really good guy?
	Just like in work?
	Anywhere.
	Yeah, at work I suppose would be the last person.
	Not even because I really know them that well.
	Okay.
	Now, what about in your social circle?
	I don't have a social circle.
	You told me you had friends.
	Don't backtrack on me now, sister.
	Don't do it.
	Well, okay.
	I have acquaintances from work, but I don't have any girlfriends.
	I don't...
	I don't have any friends.
	Okay, well, that's a big plus.
	Because it means there aren't people that you have to ditch in order to get to a better place.
	No, there's not.
	It's just me, right?
	It's just me and my stupid fucking parents.
	Right.
	Right.
	So, that's a plus.
	So, you know, with regards to what to do, as you know, I don't tell people what to do.
	I generally don't know.
	You know, I mean, if you said, I want to go...
	I'd say don't do that, right?
	But as far as what to do, I think that basically the thing is, I mean, hopefully keep reading real-time relationships and work on, you know, getting off the drugs and urine therapy, which is great.
	I think that's wonderful.
	I like my therapist a lot.
	I'm going to keep working, especially with, I don't know how much experience she has with addiction, but I'm sure she has some.
	Well, she may be able to refer you to someone who's an addiction expert.
	Yeah, yeah, yeah.
	Now, with regards to, I mean, I'm a big one for having honest and open conversation with parents.
	However, you say that your parents are still, your father, is your mother still doing drugs or is just your father?
	Just my father.
	Okay, so I don't, you know, I don't think that there's much point having conversations with people who are on drugs.
	I mean, I think, as far as I understand it, if you show up drunk to a therapy session, the therapist will say, go home.
	If you show up stoned, you say, well, we can't do therapy if you're stoned, right?
	So you can't have meaningful conversations with people who are on drugs.
	Yeah.
	Now, your mother is still with your father, right?
	So she's still giving him the greatest gift of physical, emotional, and sexual intimacy.
	So she's clearly not that bothered by anything he's done.
	No, she's not.
	She also hasn't said, you know, our daughter is unhappy.
	She had a conversation.
	She's unhappy about the way...
	She was raised, you really should go and have a conversation with your daughter.
	She hasn't said that, we assume, to her husband, right?
	No, no.
	So, I think just the moral clarity and the denormalization is what is most essential.
	And I think the moral clarity and the denormalization of this truly, truly messed up childhood that you had, which has nothing to do with you, you just had to survive.
	You just had to find a way to survive.
	And personally, I think you did a pretty good job.
	Thank you.
	I think you did a pretty good job.
	I mean, there's stuff to clean up, but so did I. I still had that in my 30s.
	Now, that's not going to be the case for you.
	I kind of had to discover a lot of this stuff on my own, so there wasn't that kind of accelerationism that's going on with, I think, good philosophy around.
	Yeah.
	Yeah, work your way backwards.
	You want a quality guy and a quality guy, like, think of opposing magnets, right?
	Quality people.
	And what I call Trash Planet, right?
	Which is just where people are manipulative and act out and do drugs and yell and bully and then play all nice to people in authority.
	Just, you know, it's just Trash Planet.
	Good people in Trash Planet, there's no overlapping diagrams.
	There's no Venn diagram where those two overlap.
	Yeah.
	Trash Planet.
	And you were born there, it sounds like.
	And that's not your fault.
	You can't own that like that was some mistake you made.
	There wasn't like some airship where you could have dropped into a good family and said, no, no, no, I want the trashy one.
	Yeah.
	It's just luck of the draw, man.
	It's just luck of the universe, so to speak, right?
	And, you know, you rolled snake eyes, I rolled snake eyes, or snake eyes were rolled for us or whatever, and then we just have to find a way to get to a better or higher place.
	That's what I desire.
	I really am.
	That's my biggest fear.
	Is giving my child the childhood that I experienced.
	And until I unpack my childhood, that's what I'm headed towards.
	Just think about your childhood being inflicted on a child you love because you should be the child that you love.
	And that's a way to kick in your immune system to get rid of sentimentality because sentimentality will keep you trapped in a bad place.
	Sentimentality is basically when we get misty-eyed over evildoers and call them good, or mistaken, or out of control, or in the grip of their own childhoods.
	Sentimentality is when we take free will away from evildoers, and that means that we have no immune system to kick back against their corruptions.
	So that's what I most want for you, if that makes sense.
	It does make sense.
	All right, will you keep me posted about how things are going?
	I'm all Stefan.
	Do you want to tell me everyone's name now at the end?
	No, I'm just kidding.
	I'm just kidding.
	I'm sorry about that.
	No, that's fine.
	Don't worry about it.
	I made a lot of work for you.
	I really do appreciate your time today.
	I really hope you will keep me posted.
	I wish, of course, you and your ex the best.
	Again, I know it's a brutal story.
	It doesn't sound like it was the right thing for you guys to be together, but I'm sure much, much better things are to come, and I really do appreciate your time today.
	Thank you.
	I appreciate you, and I hope the same for him.
	I hope we both.
	We can find a pathway to happiness and health and can heal from our painful childhoods.
	Excellent.
	All right.
	Well, keep me posted.
	Thanks for your time today.
	Yes, Stefan.
	Thank you so much.
	Have a good night.
	Bye.

▲