June 16, 2021 • 26 mins
Anney and Samantha open the virtual mail bag and share listener messages about parity in Chile, parentification, legal cannabis, and asexuality.
Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Hey, this is Annie and Samantha, and welcome to stuff
I've never told you production of iHeart Radio. All right,
any Yes, I think I've talked a little about this before,
but just kind of follow up. Did you love or
did you participate in penpile programs? I did participate in one.
(00:32):
I won't say I loved it, but there was a
sort of like intrigue, like a mysterious Even as a kid,
I was kind of suspicious though, where I was like,
I'm not sure Rule is a real guy, maybe somebody.
I don't know why, but I was very suspicious of
(00:52):
the whole thing. And that's that's what I remember the most,
is that I was being told I had to do
this thing. I kind of liked it. I liked the
mystery behind it, but I also thought I was being catfished.
I guess old for you. This is in fifth grade,
so I thought you made in the fifth grade. Wow.
(01:14):
I thought I was like some class was messing with me.
I wonder if I can find those I'd love to
read them and see what we were talking about. Like
that's the whole other level. I feel like when you
think you're being catfished in the fifth grade, yeah, I
had a pin pal. I think it was in the
third grade, and we wild send pictures and I really
had a lot of fun talking to her. I think
(01:34):
she lived in Indiana, I want to say. And then,
for like weirdness of my youth, like my first three
best friends all moved and one of them ended up
moving in to also Indiana randomly, and she and I
were pin pals for a long time because we couldn't
see each other, of course we were really young, and
then we lost touch I think two years later, because
I'm really bad about keeping in touch apparently. But yeah,
(01:58):
so I really loved the idea of pen pals. I
think I actually sent letters to soldiers at one point,
trying to be, you know, all about that patriotic level.
But yeah, I kind of miss not having that. I
guess we could probably still do that today, but it's
as weirder as we get older. I'm all for it
(02:18):
to you, you're all for it. I'm all for it though.
I think that could be cool. Yeah, I think it
would be fun too. I know, those conversations like people,
because that kind of was what chat rooms were, right, Uh, definitely, yeah, yeah,
they could be And I communicated with people in different
countries for a while on chat rooms because it felt
(02:39):
so like, tell me what it's like where you are,
you know, and yeah my ms in days. Yeah I
was gonna say my a O l oh yeah yeah days.
So that's that's that level. But there's something to be
said when we get the notifications. I know, one of
my favorite things when I was on these chat rooms
or having pals is to see that note of vacation,
(03:00):
so so it's online and you know, or that you've
got a new message. I love that. I still love that. Actually,
like my friends, I don't know what's up. I have
to go back and check it. I'm like, Okay, a
new message. I feel like that's the thing. And because
we're talking about this, why are we talking about this?
We first and foremost it's because we have some amazing
pen pals. I think, what do you think? Yes, the best,
(03:24):
the absolute best, the best pen pals. And that's you, guys,
the listeners. You all who have continued to support us
and have stuck with us and or have joined us
and our fairly new and are sending us messages. It's
so rewarding. It's just so exciting to know someone's actually listening.
I'm still in shocks that people are listening. I'm like,
(03:46):
what people hear me? Oh no, oh no. But we
do want to say thank you to all of you
who continue again to stick with us, uh and just
tolerate us whichever it's fine, We'll take it. And also
just taking the time time to send us messages, and
we love it. We love love reading your messages, and
it is us, it is us. We may be a
(04:08):
little slow and getting back because we are constantly recording
and doing things, but we definitely read your messages and
it is us who are writing back, whether it's through
the social media stuff or through emails, and uh, we
love to hear from you and your your insights are fantastic.
And because they are so fantastic, we wanted to share
some of the emails that you guys have been sending
(04:29):
to us. Yes, yes, And we thought we would start
with a message from Patty. Patty wrote, I have an
update on the political situation here in Chile. I know
it's a long email, so I don't expect you to
read the whole thing, mistake, um, but I thought you
might be interested in what happened regarding gender parody. Last
weekend we had municipal elections mayor, governor and counselor and
(04:52):
constituent elections. Sorry I don't know the word in English,
but a constitution is a member of the Member Assembly
that will be in charge of drafting the new constitution.
The voting method to choose constituents was the don't method,
and apologies if I mispronouncing all of this. I try UM,
which consists of a list of candidates. There are twenty
eight districts in Chile. Each list has an amount of
(05:14):
candidates that depends on the seats each district is granted.
I live in district of five, which translates into six
seats in the Assembly, so each list was made up
of six people. This is where the gender parity condition
voted in parliament last year plays a key role. Each
list had to be fifty percent women and fifty percent men,
except for districts with an odd number of seats where
the difference couldn't be more than one, like four men
(05:35):
and three women. For example, in each district there was
a list that represented the right wing coalition and a
list from the central left coalition. Those two have been
the most important coalitions in Chile's history since the return
of democracy in nineteen. In addition, there was a list
made up by another left wing alliance that was the
result of the union of the Communist Party and Frente Amplio.
Frente Amplio is a relatively new left wing coalition of
(05:58):
mostly young people dissatisfied with the send were left. There
were also a list of independence, most of them with
left wing values but tired of the traditional political parties
from both right and left and the insufficient work they've
done during the last thirty years, which is what led
to the protest in tween nineteen. In the first place,
if a list had a lot of votes, then more
than one member could make it into the Assembly. This
(06:18):
is also where gender parody was important. If a list
had enough votes so that those two people could make it,
they had to be one man and one woman, even
if one of them didn't get the second majority of
votes within the list. Let's say a list of three
men and three women had enough votes for two of
them to make it. If the two most voted people
on the list were women in the third was a man,
only the first one wouldn't make it because of the
(06:39):
gender priority condition. The first men third majority overall would
take the other seat instead of the woman within the
second majority of the votes. There are one members in
the Assembly, including seventeen seats reserved for Indigenous people from
ten different indigenous groups. For bills to pass, two thirds
of the one and five members have to agree, so
(07:00):
the main concern was if the right wing candidates were
going to make it to one third, because the right
didn't want a new constitution, so if they got the votes,
they'd be able to block new legislations. The results showed
a lot of important things. The right got thirty seven seats,
so they didn't get the fifty one seats they needed
to reach one third. The traditional center left only got
twenty five seats. The other left wing coalition, Communist Party
(07:22):
and Front Day Amplio got twenty eight seats, and the
biggest upset came from the Independent list, which combined got
forty eight seats. The biggest losers were both the right
and center left, so everyone's talking about the new left
and the importance of independence, which clearly shows that people
are over traditional politicians. The Assembly will be made up
(07:42):
of seventy seven women and seventy eight men. The gender
parity condition ended up benefiting four women and seven men. Yes,
if it weren't for the gender parity condition, there would
actually be more women than men. But if it weren't
for it, most parties would have had only men in
their list. The average age of member is forty four
years old, seventy eight is the oldest and twenty one
(08:04):
the youngest. Fifty nine of them are lawyers, which was predictable,
but the exciting part is that twenty of them are teachers,
so hopefully we get proper laws when it comes to education. Also,
six members of the Assembly are part of the l
g b t Q plus community, four gay men, one
lesbian I voted for her, and one pan sexual woman.
Sadly at none of the two trans candidates made it.
There were also some shocking upsets in the elections for
(08:25):
mayors and governors. Few young female candidates for mayor from
the Communist Party in front day Amptio one in big
cities where the incumbent mayors are right wing men. I'm
not going to go into details about that because this
is already an extremely long and probably boring email. No,
the Assembly starts working on the new constitution in July.
The whole process is supposed to take one year. In November,
(08:46):
we have presidential elections. The results of this municipal and
constitutent days elections show that anything can happen. Hopefully the
amount of different left wing coalitions doesn't divide the votes
too much and then the right ends up staying in office.
I guess we'll have to wait and see. Thank you.
Thank you so much for sending that. We it's so
great to hear when we talk about something in a
(09:08):
different country where we're getting kind of the research that
we can find, it's so great to hear from someone
from that country and this is fantastic information. So we
really appreciate you taking the time. Definitely not boring. We
love long emails. We all love all kinds of emails.
I've never apologize for sending a long email. We love
all the emails. We love it. Yes, and you taught
(09:29):
us a lot about the government of Chile, and that's
amazing and it's really hopeful. Yeah, we love seeing things change,
especially when it's looks so dark. Here going on to
(09:53):
some more emails about the term hoser and I was
really excited, So Steph wrote it is the most Canadian
and friendly insult one can make invented or made famous
by Rick Morannis, Yes, and Dave Thomas as Bob and
Doug mackenzie too lovable stereotypical Canadian bozos anyway, continues to
be a friendly tease. We used to make fun of
(10:14):
our fellow Canucks, which I had a hard time saying prebviously.
Just so you know, the maple syrup in the Hoser
cocktail suggests this Canadian conduction. So thank you, Steph. I
like that, and I love Rick Morana's so come on,
that makes sense, Okay, I love that. And then we
have a couple of anonymous ones. Here's one from a
Colorado listener. Hello, y'all, Thank you all for the hard
(10:36):
work you do, which has really helped me stay grounded
and never feel lonely as I can always count on
the team to get these episodes out each week. Thank you.
I remerged in Colorado during these special times, and I
can agree how strange it is to buy cannabis in
a store for the first time or every time. The
shops i've been to have an online orto system so
you can pick out what you want beforehand, but are
still cash only. I drive by one that has an
(10:58):
led sign that switches between Maska require and now taking cards,
so I'm not sure if that is a locality controlled issue,
like delivery are having shops within city limits. One strange
thing I enjoy is the variety of vibes that each
shot can have. One near me is covered a mural
and has a chill stone ReVibe. And I even got
to chat about video games and dogs with the white
(11:18):
male butt tender after I asked my questions about bath
bombs and skin patches because Vinci's, which he couldn't answer,
but lamented how the only woman who worked there moved on.
Another shot that only sells what they are their partners
make was more closed off and nondescript, no displays, but
two windows you can chat at. They had more women
working there. I saw a fifty split between the fourth
(11:40):
staff that day, and while they were adamant about their
dedicated hours to vulnerable people, they were very friendly and
wanted to make sure I was going to not mess
myself up and had answers to all my questions. One
more that I haven't gone in, but I've seen pictures
of looks like a high end skincare or jewelry boutique
with all white decor, glass displays on the walls and counters.
(12:01):
I am a little scared to go in because of that,
but who knows what the future holds. Another joy is
the variety of people you'll see, from young professionals in
their suits picking something up on the way home, to
old hippie types with the long hair and colorful clothes,
maybe a fringe bag, to the tight laced dad looking
guy with a short buzz cut and flannels. I am
still very awkward when I go, and especially if I
forget to get cash, behoror and but most people working
(12:23):
at these places are nice, patient and want to make
sure you have a good time. Thank you again, and
do not let anyone give you gruff about getting too stoned.
It happens to everyone at some point. You never know
your dose until you have some thank you. This letter
made me feel better, so we really appreciate it. Yeah,
we'll have to come to Colorado soon check out all
those places. Yes, that sounds really cool and we appreciate
(12:47):
all of the information. It's strange that we're in the
same country, but to me that seems like such a
distant foreign idea. You know right, but yeah, yeah, I
love it. I would love to visit Colorado and check
these places out us. We're gonna try. We got some
emails about our pronification episode, and so we wanted to
share because I think they point on some things that
(13:07):
we did not highlight as well and or we just
skimmed over. So from one listener, I wanted to start
with the fact that I love your podcast and I
enjoyed the perunifications of girls and women one but you
guys missed address or maybe you didn't have time to
who knows. Uh. The immigrants story my case is a
lot like of many other women and girls I know.
(13:27):
My parents are immigrants. They brought me to the States
when I was eight years old. Neither spake English, and
after a long year of coming home from crying from school,
I learned English. That's when my perunification started. Out of necessities,
some may say my parents were just trying to make
a better life for myself and the siblings that came along.
Did I forget to mention I'm the oldest of six. Wow.
(13:48):
I quickly became my parents interpreters everywhere we went, bills, schools, governments,
and doctors everyday lives. I was there to know everything
and interpret for them. I was making calls for them
to pay bills and even shot upping. At a twelve,
I became sick, diagnosed with juvenile rumatoid arthritis, mixed connected
tissues disease, and Reno's phenomenon. Because by then I already
(14:10):
had baby siblings, my mom couldn't go and she didn't drive,
and my dad took me to my appointments, which felt
like I was alone. And I forgot to mention he's
my stepdad and he's a functioning alcoholic and smoker. He
was abandoned by his mom and stopped going to school
in fifth grade, so he's pretty ignorant in a lot
of things, and I was pretty much on my own.
(14:30):
He would take me to Lomalanda Hospital and he would
just say whatever the doctor says to do. He never
asked questions. We didn't have conversations regarding anything. It was
as if it was just the doctor and me, and
he was a provider, not a father. Eventually, when I
learned to drive, I started taking myself to my appointments.
My mom was too busy with my other siblings and
I was dealing with medical conditions and deciding things I
(14:52):
shouldn't have to. At that age, I was driving without license,
shopping for groceries, paying bills, and even picking up my
siblings from school. And there is no her stops with
my siblings had school meetings and doctor's appointments. If there
weren't translators, I had to go. And at that time
I didn't know better. It was my normal. I just
had to help. I'll learned to sign their signature, and
I became the one who signs fills all the pain
(15:13):
works for my siblings at school to my stuff. In
high school, I started skipping school and signing my absences
and they never knew. I got out of everything that
was hard for me, like math, and I didn't learn much.
And now my fifteen year old daughter knows math more
than I says she was in the fourth grade. I
didn't go to college. I started working in the sixteen
to help the household because my dad had a stroke.
(15:34):
I didn't know or cared to find out about free
college because my parents were ignorant in the subject and
had more things to worry about. I know they didn't
do it on purpose, but it has affected me. I
love my siblings sincerely. They're like my kids, and they
considered me a mom. But I feel like I didn't
have my childhood, so as I grew up, I tried
to encourage my siblings to do good in school and
(15:54):
go to college. Well, my parents weren't able to give
to me. I wanted that for them. I'm there seven now,
and I'm proud to say my siblings are doing great.
One is in nursing school, the other one works first
senator in California, and my parents have grown a lot,
but the dependency hasn't gone away. I got married, moved out,
and I'm still doing things for them. My other siblings
(16:15):
took my role of sorts when I left, and a
lot of things you mentioned in the episodes I have.
I needed to be in charge. Things have to be
in order. I'm just bentle. I've had depression for a
long time. I never wanted kids, and I got pregnant
on the pill, and even though I love her profoundly,
I changed the story with her. She's had a childhood
and does not worry about bills, money, drugon dad's vice
(16:35):
or interpreter. I don't ever want any more kids. My
siblings feel like my kids. I used to put my
sister to sleep at age ten. She was my actual
live doll. Kids are hard emotionally. I'm always having a
battle within myself if every decision I make is going
to her life. I loved her so much that sometimes
I feel like maybe I shouldn't have been a parent.
(16:56):
I have this inner battle and so much self doubt
and judgment towards myself, my husband, then sometimes even her
when I catched myself thinking things like at your age,
I knew everything to run a household, forgetting that I
chose to have her be a child and not want
her to go through what I did, and questioning am
I doing enough? Am I doing too much? Being a
mom is hard and it sucks, especially with all the
(17:17):
internal baggage I have. So yeah, this is a little
bit of my family's immigrants story where I became parentified
and absolutely correct. We didn't mention at all of that status.
And one of the things that I had said previously,
because I got this email it's like she's right on,
is that, of course, within the system, there's not a
(17:39):
lot of research. As we talked about protification, and it
is very minute and very focused, and it shouldn't be,
because we need more research, and immigration is definitely one
of those things, especially when we talk about people with
English that's not their first language, and how often times
I saw it so many times in the social work
field that we had to have them bring an older
child along to translate for us because the younger child
(18:03):
may who may have gotten in trouble with us, wasn't
able to do that, or because the lack of funding
that the people are refusing to pay to have interpreters
in the state. It's difficult. And you talk about small
areas too. If you go to a small town, how
bad that is, And you're right, and in the school
system it's even worse. They let them kind of just
go under the radar and then blame that whatever it
(18:24):
might happen on the fact that they're bad kids instead
of actually seeing the problem. And yeah, it's such a
big issue. Thank you so much for sending that to us,
because we do need to talk about that more often
than loudly. Yes, yes, thank you. Another listener wrote in
(18:51):
about this motification. Not very often, if ever, have I
heard this conversation. I have therapy tonight and will unpack
some of this with my therapist. I greatly appreciate you
pointing out that poverty plays a huge role in this.
I am the closest child in age to several disabled
siblings and in divorce, poverty and you have the show
that was my childhood. I had parent like responsibility from
(19:13):
the age of twelve on in caring for my disabled
younger sister, you know, so my mom could work. She
needed twenty four seven supervision, was not potty trained, and nonverbal.
She would eat things that weren't food and would escape
the house if you didn't keep an eye on her.
She wore diapers until she was eighteen. Some of the
compounding traumatizing events for me were I spent a long
weekend alone caring for her when my mother took a
(19:35):
trip when I was twelve and she was ten. We
lived in an extremely impoverished gang neighborhood and I had
no adult support. There were long chunks of time I
had to come home right after school every single day
to get her off the bus and take care of her.
I think before my parents divorce, I had taken a
back seat to my disabled siblings needs. And I totally
get why. None of this was malicious, but I still
(19:56):
suffered nonetheless, Mostly what I took from this was I
don't have a right to have means and shame and
one hell of an attachment injury. I just was not
wired to caregiving or was particularly good at caregiving at
that age. Anyway, I just wanted to bring to this
discussion the disability piece a little more highlight. Thanks, ladies.
I admire and like you both a lot. Oh, thank you,
(20:19):
thank you, yes, and thank you so much for we
do and we appreciate so much everyone taking the time
out to share their experiences with us and add to
this conversation, because yes, there is so much missing. And yeah,
until Samantha told me about it, I didn't know what
proonification was either. So I think this did resonate with
a lot of people, right, Yeah, and here's another one. Hello.
(20:41):
I just finished listening to your episode of pronification and
deeply connected with it and wanted to share my experience.
My mother was an active addiction until about five years ago,
meaning that for the first eighteen years of my life,
I was a primary caretaker for my younger sister throughout homelessness,
physical abuse, for my mother's partners, and Raylar kiss stuff.
I took care of my sister and myself. Therapy has
(21:04):
helped me tremendously with the consequential self destructive behaviors, and
even past that, it helped me recognize my age regression.
I am a little quote not in a sexual sense
that's d D slash lge and the two are often
mistakenly lumped together, but in every other sense. When I
have time to myself, I'm holding stuffed animals, watching cartoons,
(21:24):
and wearing fuzzy clothes. I don't take a pacifier or
wear a diaper or not that there's anything wrong with it,
but it's still a part of myself that I'm embarrassed about.
It brings me the comfort that I didn't have as
a child. And she suggests that if you could talk
about age regression, which we will in an episode, I
would be extraordinarily thankful. I love the show. I've been
listening for years. You guys are the most fun host yet.
(21:46):
Yeah that made me feel good. But yeah, you're not alone.
This is not uncommon at all, as in fact, there's
kind of like that too, hard sets that happens as
adults where either if you don't have that child, do
you go where you can't understand childish things, so let's
say lack of imagination maybe, or just being all about
the reality of you have to be right now, you
(22:08):
have to take care of yourself and this is what matters,
or you do regress in trying to embrace that, which
is not a bad thing. It's actually very therapeutic unless
it is, like, becomes a point that it inhibits you
from living daily life, So of course that could be problematic,
but typically this is so it's not abnormal. I've had
many of friends who have had hard childhoods like this
(22:30):
or have had to be adults to regress and find
joy in that. And I think one of the big
stigmas as adults as we kind of call that out
too much and make jokes of that, and we shouldn't
because you should be able to enjoy these things, and
having uh, stuffed animal is not a bad thing. Having
in a vivid imagination is not a bad thing. Enjoying
(22:51):
child things like cartoons not a bad thing. But yeah,
it does feel. It does feel like you're failing sometimes
because you're like, is this normal, which there's no such thing,
But yeah, you're not the only one. And thank you
so much for sharing and being vulnerable with us with that,
because that is a lot. That is a lot to
have to dig through. Yes, and I certainly Samantha knows.
I always show up with a stuffed animal so I
(23:13):
can relate. I get panicked if I don't know, then
my dog wants to take well and I refuse never
have ruby. Yeah, and I have a very active imagination too,
So we wanted to wrap this one up with a
message from Twitter from at dr jess wits. I hope
I'm not butchering that completely. That's our handle. Yeah, that's
(23:37):
our Twitter handle. Happy Pride Month and what better way
to start than being super vulnerable here and seeing you
all something I'm coming out. I want the world to
know a sec will time for me to be proud
and not hide anymore. Sorry, I guess it was meant
to be saying, but I have a terrible voice, so sorry.
(23:58):
I loved it. It's been a difficult and freeing realization
for me, one that came two years ago after many
years of believing that there was something wrong with me.
I was depressed, feeling like a terrible wife and person,
and then I listened to the app Moms of podcast
episode the a bcs of being ace. I cried as
I was driving home that day, as what they were
talking about was me. I wasn't strange, I didn't have
(24:20):
anything wrong with me. I found a part of myself.
It was and still is a journey to discovering and
defining me, but this helped place a very important puzzle
piece down and lock it in. Now. I'm adding hetero romantic,
a sexual to mom, genetics, PhD, anime, fan of video gamer, wife,
and more yet to be discovered to my definition. I
share this in case someone else may feel the same,
(24:41):
and no, you are not alone. It sucks when you
can't understand yourself, but it can feel so liberating when
you finally find that meaningful fragment. Keep searching and you'll
get their piece by important peace. That's so beautiful. Thank
you so much for sharing that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, and
I totally totally agree, Like I love thinking of our
continuing work in progress, continuing self discovery and the importance
(25:05):
of finding those pieces and feeling like there's nothing wrong
with you right. Yes, it's very beautiful, very very beautiful.
Thank you so much, and thanks to all of the
listeners who wrote to us. To all of you for listening.
Please keep contacting us, sending us things, your stories, your experiences.
We love it, We love it all. We love hearing
(25:25):
from you. You can email us at stephaniely A, mom
Stuff at I heart media dot com. You can find
us on Twitter at mom Stuff podcast or on Instagram
at stuff I've Never Told You. Thanks. It's always for
our super producer, Christina, Thank you, and thanks to you
for listening. Stuff I Never Told You production too. I
Heart Radio. For more podcast on my heart Radio, visit
the iHeart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you listen
to your favorite shows.
Hey, this is Annie and Samantha, and welcome to stuff
I've never told you production of iHeart Radio. All right,
any Yes, I think I've talked a little about this before,
but just kind of follow up. Did you love or
did you participate in penpile programs? I did participate in one.
(00:32):
I won't say I loved it, but there was a
sort of like intrigue, like a mysterious Even as a kid,
I was kind of suspicious though, where I was like,
I'm not sure Rule is a real guy, maybe somebody.
I don't know why, but I was very suspicious of
(00:52):
the whole thing. And that's that's what I remember the most,
is that I was being told I had to do
this thing. I kind of liked it. I liked the
mystery behind it, but I also thought I was being catfished.
I guess old for you. This is in fifth grade,
so I thought you made in the fifth grade. Wow.
(01:14):
I thought I was like some class was messing with me.
I wonder if I can find those I'd love to
read them and see what we were talking about. Like
that's the whole other level. I feel like when you
think you're being catfished in the fifth grade, yeah, I
had a pin pal. I think it was in the
third grade, and we wild send pictures and I really
had a lot of fun talking to her. I think
(01:34):
she lived in Indiana, I want to say. And then,
for like weirdness of my youth, like my first three
best friends all moved and one of them ended up
moving in to also Indiana randomly, and she and I
were pin pals for a long time because we couldn't
see each other, of course we were really young, and
then we lost touch I think two years later, because
I'm really bad about keeping in touch apparently. But yeah,
(01:58):
so I really loved the idea of pen pals. I
think I actually sent letters to soldiers at one point,
trying to be, you know, all about that patriotic level.
But yeah, I kind of miss not having that. I
guess we could probably still do that today, but it's
as weirder as we get older. I'm all for it
(02:18):
to you, you're all for it. I'm all for it though.
I think that could be cool. Yeah, I think it
would be fun too. I know, those conversations like people,
because that kind of was what chat rooms were, right, Uh, definitely, yeah, yeah,
they could be And I communicated with people in different
countries for a while on chat rooms because it felt
(02:39):
so like, tell me what it's like where you are,
you know, and yeah my ms in days. Yeah I
was gonna say my a O l oh yeah yeah days.
So that's that's that level. But there's something to be
said when we get the notifications. I know, one of
my favorite things when I was on these chat rooms
or having pals is to see that note of vacation,
(03:00):
so so it's online and you know, or that you've
got a new message. I love that. I still love that. Actually,
like my friends, I don't know what's up. I have
to go back and check it. I'm like, Okay, a
new message. I feel like that's the thing. And because
we're talking about this, why are we talking about this?
We first and foremost it's because we have some amazing
pen pals. I think, what do you think? Yes, the best,
(03:24):
the absolute best, the best pen pals. And that's you, guys,
the listeners. You all who have continued to support us
and have stuck with us and or have joined us
and our fairly new and are sending us messages. It's
so rewarding. It's just so exciting to know someone's actually listening.
I'm still in shocks that people are listening. I'm like,
(03:46):
what people hear me? Oh no, oh no. But we
do want to say thank you to all of you
who continue again to stick with us, uh and just
tolerate us whichever it's fine, We'll take it. And also
just taking the time time to send us messages, and
we love it. We love love reading your messages, and
it is us, it is us. We may be a
(04:08):
little slow and getting back because we are constantly recording
and doing things, but we definitely read your messages and
it is us who are writing back, whether it's through
the social media stuff or through emails, and uh, we
love to hear from you and your your insights are fantastic.
And because they are so fantastic, we wanted to share
some of the emails that you guys have been sending
(04:29):
to us. Yes, yes, And we thought we would start
with a message from Patty. Patty wrote, I have an
update on the political situation here in Chile. I know
it's a long email, so I don't expect you to
read the whole thing, mistake, um, but I thought you
might be interested in what happened regarding gender parody. Last
weekend we had municipal elections mayor, governor and counselor and
(04:52):
constituent elections. Sorry I don't know the word in English,
but a constitution is a member of the Member Assembly
that will be in charge of drafting the new constitution.
The voting method to choose constituents was the don't method,
and apologies if I mispronouncing all of this. I try UM,
which consists of a list of candidates. There are twenty
eight districts in Chile. Each list has an amount of
(05:14):
candidates that depends on the seats each district is granted.
I live in district of five, which translates into six
seats in the Assembly, so each list was made up
of six people. This is where the gender parity condition
voted in parliament last year plays a key role. Each
list had to be fifty percent women and fifty percent men,
except for districts with an odd number of seats where
the difference couldn't be more than one, like four men
(05:35):
and three women. For example, in each district there was
a list that represented the right wing coalition and a
list from the central left coalition. Those two have been
the most important coalitions in Chile's history since the return
of democracy in nineteen. In addition, there was a list
made up by another left wing alliance that was the
result of the union of the Communist Party and Frente Amplio.
Frente Amplio is a relatively new left wing coalition of
(05:58):
mostly young people dissatisfied with the send were left. There
were also a list of independence, most of them with
left wing values but tired of the traditional political parties
from both right and left and the insufficient work they've
done during the last thirty years, which is what led
to the protest in tween nineteen. In the first place,
if a list had a lot of votes, then more
than one member could make it into the Assembly. This
(06:18):
is also where gender parody was important. If a list
had enough votes so that those two people could make it,
they had to be one man and one woman, even
if one of them didn't get the second majority of
votes within the list. Let's say a list of three
men and three women had enough votes for two of
them to make it. If the two most voted people
on the list were women in the third was a man,
only the first one wouldn't make it because of the
(06:39):
gender priority condition. The first men third majority overall would
take the other seat instead of the woman within the
second majority of the votes. There are one members in
the Assembly, including seventeen seats reserved for Indigenous people from
ten different indigenous groups. For bills to pass, two thirds
of the one and five members have to agree, so
(07:00):
the main concern was if the right wing candidates were
going to make it to one third, because the right
didn't want a new constitution, so if they got the votes,
they'd be able to block new legislations. The results showed
a lot of important things. The right got thirty seven seats,
so they didn't get the fifty one seats they needed
to reach one third. The traditional center left only got
twenty five seats. The other left wing coalition, Communist Party
(07:22):
and Front Day Amplio got twenty eight seats, and the
biggest upset came from the Independent list, which combined got
forty eight seats. The biggest losers were both the right
and center left, so everyone's talking about the new left
and the importance of independence, which clearly shows that people
are over traditional politicians. The Assembly will be made up
(07:42):
of seventy seven women and seventy eight men. The gender
parity condition ended up benefiting four women and seven men. Yes,
if it weren't for the gender parity condition, there would
actually be more women than men. But if it weren't
for it, most parties would have had only men in
their list. The average age of member is forty four
years old, seventy eight is the oldest and twenty one
(08:04):
the youngest. Fifty nine of them are lawyers, which was predictable,
but the exciting part is that twenty of them are teachers,
so hopefully we get proper laws when it comes to education. Also,
six members of the Assembly are part of the l
g b t Q plus community, four gay men, one
lesbian I voted for her, and one pan sexual woman.
Sadly at none of the two trans candidates made it.
There were also some shocking upsets in the elections for
(08:25):
mayors and governors. Few young female candidates for mayor from
the Communist Party in front day Amptio one in big
cities where the incumbent mayors are right wing men. I'm
not going to go into details about that because this
is already an extremely long and probably boring email. No,
the Assembly starts working on the new constitution in July.
The whole process is supposed to take one year. In November,
(08:46):
we have presidential elections. The results of this municipal and
constitutent days elections show that anything can happen. Hopefully the
amount of different left wing coalitions doesn't divide the votes
too much and then the right ends up staying in office.
I guess we'll have to wait and see. Thank you.
Thank you so much for sending that. We it's so
great to hear when we talk about something in a
(09:08):
different country where we're getting kind of the research that
we can find, it's so great to hear from someone
from that country and this is fantastic information. So we
really appreciate you taking the time. Definitely not boring. We
love long emails. We all love all kinds of emails.
I've never apologize for sending a long email. We love
all the emails. We love it. Yes, and you taught
(09:29):
us a lot about the government of Chile, and that's
amazing and it's really hopeful. Yeah, we love seeing things change,
especially when it's looks so dark. Here going on to
(09:53):
some more emails about the term hoser and I was
really excited, So Steph wrote it is the most Canadian
and friendly insult one can make invented or made famous
by Rick Morannis, Yes, and Dave Thomas as Bob and
Doug mackenzie too lovable stereotypical Canadian bozos anyway, continues to
be a friendly tease. We used to make fun of
(10:14):
our fellow Canucks, which I had a hard time saying prebviously.
Just so you know, the maple syrup in the Hoser
cocktail suggests this Canadian conduction. So thank you, Steph. I
like that, and I love Rick Morana's so come on,
that makes sense, Okay, I love that. And then we
have a couple of anonymous ones. Here's one from a
Colorado listener. Hello, y'all, Thank you all for the hard
(10:36):
work you do, which has really helped me stay grounded
and never feel lonely as I can always count on
the team to get these episodes out each week. Thank you.
I remerged in Colorado during these special times, and I
can agree how strange it is to buy cannabis in
a store for the first time or every time. The
shops i've been to have an online orto system so
you can pick out what you want beforehand, but are
still cash only. I drive by one that has an
(10:58):
led sign that switches between Maska require and now taking cards,
so I'm not sure if that is a locality controlled issue,
like delivery are having shops within city limits. One strange
thing I enjoy is the variety of vibes that each
shot can have. One near me is covered a mural
and has a chill stone ReVibe. And I even got
to chat about video games and dogs with the white
(11:18):
male butt tender after I asked my questions about bath
bombs and skin patches because Vinci's, which he couldn't answer,
but lamented how the only woman who worked there moved on.
Another shot that only sells what they are their partners
make was more closed off and nondescript, no displays, but
two windows you can chat at. They had more women
working there. I saw a fifty split between the fourth
(11:40):
staff that day, and while they were adamant about their
dedicated hours to vulnerable people, they were very friendly and
wanted to make sure I was going to not mess
myself up and had answers to all my questions. One
more that I haven't gone in, but I've seen pictures
of looks like a high end skincare or jewelry boutique
with all white decor, glass displays on the walls and counters.
(12:01):
I am a little scared to go in because of that,
but who knows what the future holds. Another joy is
the variety of people you'll see, from young professionals in
their suits picking something up on the way home, to
old hippie types with the long hair and colorful clothes,
maybe a fringe bag, to the tight laced dad looking
guy with a short buzz cut and flannels. I am
still very awkward when I go, and especially if I
forget to get cash, behoror and but most people working
(12:23):
at these places are nice, patient and want to make
sure you have a good time. Thank you again, and
do not let anyone give you gruff about getting too stoned.
It happens to everyone at some point. You never know
your dose until you have some thank you. This letter
made me feel better, so we really appreciate it. Yeah,
we'll have to come to Colorado soon check out all
those places. Yes, that sounds really cool and we appreciate
(12:47):
all of the information. It's strange that we're in the
same country, but to me that seems like such a
distant foreign idea. You know right, but yeah, yeah, I
love it. I would love to visit Colorado and check
these places out us. We're gonna try. We got some
emails about our pronification episode, and so we wanted to
share because I think they point on some things that
(13:07):
we did not highlight as well and or we just
skimmed over. So from one listener, I wanted to start
with the fact that I love your podcast and I
enjoyed the perunifications of girls and women one but you
guys missed address or maybe you didn't have time to
who knows. Uh. The immigrants story my case is a
lot like of many other women and girls I know.
(13:27):
My parents are immigrants. They brought me to the States
when I was eight years old. Neither spake English, and
after a long year of coming home from crying from school,
I learned English. That's when my perunification started. Out of necessities,
some may say my parents were just trying to make
a better life for myself and the siblings that came along.
Did I forget to mention I'm the oldest of six. Wow.
(13:48):
I quickly became my parents interpreters everywhere we went, bills, schools, governments,
and doctors everyday lives. I was there to know everything
and interpret for them. I was making calls for them
to pay bills and even shot upping. At a twelve,
I became sick, diagnosed with juvenile rumatoid arthritis, mixed connected
tissues disease, and Reno's phenomenon. Because by then I already
(14:10):
had baby siblings, my mom couldn't go and she didn't drive,
and my dad took me to my appointments, which felt
like I was alone. And I forgot to mention he's
my stepdad and he's a functioning alcoholic and smoker. He
was abandoned by his mom and stopped going to school
in fifth grade, so he's pretty ignorant in a lot
of things, and I was pretty much on my own.
(14:30):
He would take me to Lomalanda Hospital and he would
just say whatever the doctor says to do. He never
asked questions. We didn't have conversations regarding anything. It was
as if it was just the doctor and me, and
he was a provider, not a father. Eventually, when I
learned to drive, I started taking myself to my appointments.
My mom was too busy with my other siblings and
I was dealing with medical conditions and deciding things I
(14:52):
shouldn't have to. At that age, I was driving without license,
shopping for groceries, paying bills, and even picking up my
siblings from school. And there is no her stops with
my siblings had school meetings and doctor's appointments. If there
weren't translators, I had to go. And at that time
I didn't know better. It was my normal. I just
had to help. I'll learned to sign their signature, and
I became the one who signs fills all the pain
(15:13):
works for my siblings at school to my stuff. In
high school, I started skipping school and signing my absences
and they never knew. I got out of everything that
was hard for me, like math, and I didn't learn much.
And now my fifteen year old daughter knows math more
than I says she was in the fourth grade. I
didn't go to college. I started working in the sixteen
to help the household because my dad had a stroke.
(15:34):
I didn't know or cared to find out about free
college because my parents were ignorant in the subject and
had more things to worry about. I know they didn't
do it on purpose, but it has affected me. I
love my siblings sincerely. They're like my kids, and they
considered me a mom. But I feel like I didn't
have my childhood, so as I grew up, I tried
to encourage my siblings to do good in school and
(15:54):
go to college. Well, my parents weren't able to give
to me. I wanted that for them. I'm there seven now,
and I'm proud to say my siblings are doing great.
One is in nursing school, the other one works first
senator in California, and my parents have grown a lot,
but the dependency hasn't gone away. I got married, moved out,
and I'm still doing things for them. My other siblings
(16:15):
took my role of sorts when I left, and a
lot of things you mentioned in the episodes I have.
I needed to be in charge. Things have to be
in order. I'm just bentle. I've had depression for a
long time. I never wanted kids, and I got pregnant
on the pill, and even though I love her profoundly,
I changed the story with her. She's had a childhood
and does not worry about bills, money, drugon dad's vice
(16:35):
or interpreter. I don't ever want any more kids. My
siblings feel like my kids. I used to put my
sister to sleep at age ten. She was my actual
live doll. Kids are hard emotionally. I'm always having a
battle within myself if every decision I make is going
to her life. I loved her so much that sometimes
I feel like maybe I shouldn't have been a parent.
(16:56):
I have this inner battle and so much self doubt
and judgment towards myself, my husband, then sometimes even her
when I catched myself thinking things like at your age,
I knew everything to run a household, forgetting that I
chose to have her be a child and not want
her to go through what I did, and questioning am
I doing enough? Am I doing too much? Being a
mom is hard and it sucks, especially with all the
(17:17):
internal baggage I have. So yeah, this is a little
bit of my family's immigrants story where I became parentified
and absolutely correct. We didn't mention at all of that status.
And one of the things that I had said previously,
because I got this email it's like she's right on,
is that, of course, within the system, there's not a
(17:39):
lot of research. As we talked about protification, and it
is very minute and very focused, and it shouldn't be,
because we need more research, and immigration is definitely one
of those things, especially when we talk about people with
English that's not their first language, and how often times
I saw it so many times in the social work
field that we had to have them bring an older
child along to translate for us because the younger child
(18:03):
may who may have gotten in trouble with us, wasn't
able to do that, or because the lack of funding
that the people are refusing to pay to have interpreters
in the state. It's difficult. And you talk about small
areas too. If you go to a small town, how
bad that is, And you're right, and in the school
system it's even worse. They let them kind of just
go under the radar and then blame that whatever it
(18:24):
might happen on the fact that they're bad kids instead
of actually seeing the problem. And yeah, it's such a
big issue. Thank you so much for sending that to us,
because we do need to talk about that more often
than loudly. Yes, yes, thank you. Another listener wrote in
(18:51):
about this motification. Not very often, if ever, have I
heard this conversation. I have therapy tonight and will unpack
some of this with my therapist. I greatly appreciate you
pointing out that poverty plays a huge role in this.
I am the closest child in age to several disabled
siblings and in divorce, poverty and you have the show
that was my childhood. I had parent like responsibility from
(19:13):
the age of twelve on in caring for my disabled
younger sister, you know, so my mom could work. She
needed twenty four seven supervision, was not potty trained, and nonverbal.
She would eat things that weren't food and would escape
the house if you didn't keep an eye on her.
She wore diapers until she was eighteen. Some of the
compounding traumatizing events for me were I spent a long
weekend alone caring for her when my mother took a
(19:35):
trip when I was twelve and she was ten. We
lived in an extremely impoverished gang neighborhood and I had
no adult support. There were long chunks of time I
had to come home right after school every single day
to get her off the bus and take care of her.
I think before my parents divorce, I had taken a
back seat to my disabled siblings needs. And I totally
get why. None of this was malicious, but I still
(19:56):
suffered nonetheless, Mostly what I took from this was I
don't have a right to have means and shame and
one hell of an attachment injury. I just was not
wired to caregiving or was particularly good at caregiving at
that age. Anyway, I just wanted to bring to this
discussion the disability piece a little more highlight. Thanks, ladies.
I admire and like you both a lot. Oh, thank you,
(20:19):
thank you, yes, and thank you so much for we
do and we appreciate so much everyone taking the time
out to share their experiences with us and add to
this conversation, because yes, there is so much missing. And yeah,
until Samantha told me about it, I didn't know what
proonification was either. So I think this did resonate with
a lot of people, right, Yeah, and here's another one. Hello.
(20:41):
I just finished listening to your episode of pronification and
deeply connected with it and wanted to share my experience.
My mother was an active addiction until about five years ago,
meaning that for the first eighteen years of my life,
I was a primary caretaker for my younger sister throughout homelessness,
physical abuse, for my mother's partners, and Raylar kiss stuff.
I took care of my sister and myself. Therapy has
(21:04):
helped me tremendously with the consequential self destructive behaviors, and
even past that, it helped me recognize my age regression.
I am a little quote not in a sexual sense
that's d D slash lge and the two are often
mistakenly lumped together, but in every other sense. When I
have time to myself, I'm holding stuffed animals, watching cartoons,
(21:24):
and wearing fuzzy clothes. I don't take a pacifier or
wear a diaper or not that there's anything wrong with it,
but it's still a part of myself that I'm embarrassed about.
It brings me the comfort that I didn't have as
a child. And she suggests that if you could talk
about age regression, which we will in an episode, I
would be extraordinarily thankful. I love the show. I've been
listening for years. You guys are the most fun host yet.
(21:46):
Yeah that made me feel good. But yeah, you're not alone.
This is not uncommon at all, as in fact, there's
kind of like that too, hard sets that happens as
adults where either if you don't have that child, do
you go where you can't understand childish things, so let's
say lack of imagination maybe, or just being all about
the reality of you have to be right now, you
(22:08):
have to take care of yourself and this is what matters,
or you do regress in trying to embrace that, which
is not a bad thing. It's actually very therapeutic unless
it is, like, becomes a point that it inhibits you
from living daily life, So of course that could be problematic,
but typically this is so it's not abnormal. I've had
many of friends who have had hard childhoods like this
(22:30):
or have had to be adults to regress and find
joy in that. And I think one of the big
stigmas as adults as we kind of call that out
too much and make jokes of that, and we shouldn't
because you should be able to enjoy these things, and
having uh, stuffed animal is not a bad thing. Having
in a vivid imagination is not a bad thing. Enjoying
(22:51):
child things like cartoons not a bad thing. But yeah,
it does feel. It does feel like you're failing sometimes
because you're like, is this normal, which there's no such thing,
But yeah, you're not the only one. And thank you
so much for sharing and being vulnerable with us with that,
because that is a lot. That is a lot to
have to dig through. Yes, and I certainly Samantha knows.
I always show up with a stuffed animal so I
(23:13):
can relate. I get panicked if I don't know, then
my dog wants to take well and I refuse never
have ruby. Yeah, and I have a very active imagination too,
So we wanted to wrap this one up with a
message from Twitter from at dr jess wits. I hope
I'm not butchering that completely. That's our handle. Yeah, that's
(23:37):
our Twitter handle. Happy Pride Month and what better way
to start than being super vulnerable here and seeing you
all something I'm coming out. I want the world to
know a sec will time for me to be proud
and not hide anymore. Sorry, I guess it was meant
to be saying, but I have a terrible voice, so sorry.
(23:58):
I loved it. It's been a difficult and freeing realization
for me, one that came two years ago after many
years of believing that there was something wrong with me.
I was depressed, feeling like a terrible wife and person,
and then I listened to the app Moms of podcast
episode the a bcs of being ace. I cried as
I was driving home that day, as what they were
talking about was me. I wasn't strange, I didn't have
(24:20):
anything wrong with me. I found a part of myself.
It was and still is a journey to discovering and
defining me, but this helped place a very important puzzle
piece down and lock it in. Now. I'm adding hetero romantic,
a sexual to mom, genetics, PhD, anime, fan of video gamer, wife,
and more yet to be discovered to my definition. I
share this in case someone else may feel the same,
(24:41):
and no, you are not alone. It sucks when you
can't understand yourself, but it can feel so liberating when
you finally find that meaningful fragment. Keep searching and you'll
get their piece by important peace. That's so beautiful. Thank
you so much for sharing that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, and
I totally totally agree, Like I love thinking of our
continuing work in progress, continuing self discovery and the importance
(25:05):
of finding those pieces and feeling like there's nothing wrong
with you right. Yes, it's very beautiful, very very beautiful.
Thank you so much, and thanks to all of the
listeners who wrote to us. To all of you for listening.
Please keep contacting us, sending us things, your stories, your experiences.
We love it, We love it all. We love hearing
(25:25):
from you. You can email us at stephaniely A, mom
Stuff at I heart media dot com. You can find
us on Twitter at mom Stuff podcast or on Instagram
at stuff I've Never Told You. Thanks. It's always for
our super producer, Christina, Thank you, and thanks to you
for listening. Stuff I Never Told You production too. I
Heart Radio. For more podcast on my heart Radio, visit
the iHeart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you listen
to your favorite shows.
Stuff Mom Never Told You News
Hosts And Creators
Anney Reese
Samantha McVey
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang
Ding dong! Join your culture consultants, Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang, on an unforgettable journey into the beating heart of CULTURE. Alongside sizzling special guests, they GET INTO the hottest pop-culture moments of the day and the formative cultural experiences that turned them into Culturistas. Produced by the Big Money Players Network and iHeartRadio.