Making An Escape Plan with Chelsea + Catherine

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Good afternoon, everybody. I don't know why I say good
afternoon when us start days. I'm Chelsea, Hi, what's happening?
What's happening, Catherine? So many shit is happening on my
end of things. I just can't even keep up.

Speaker 2 (00:13):
Okay, I need a little bit of advice. I am
finding that I'm having such a hard time making a
decision on stuff for my house, and I think it's
because I just feel like I have to search the
depth and breadth of the Internet for every possible choice
of something, whether it's like new dog crates for the dogs,
or a new sofa or whatever it is that I

(00:35):
need next. I'm just having such a hard time with
the limitless possibilities before I can make a decision. What
do I do?

Speaker 1 (00:44):
Listen, when you make a decision, when you are decisive,
I'm very decisive. I don't like really. I go to
my design meetings for my new house and I am
in and out of there in forty minutes. I pick, Tyle,
I pick because Listen, whatever you buy is gonna make
your You're gonna forget about all the other options.

Speaker 2 (00:59):
That's true, and it's to be fine. It's gonna be
the right.

Speaker 1 (01:01):
One, and unless you make a huge mistake, which you
can't with a doggy crate. It's not like you're picking
out marble. Yeah you know what I mean. Yeah, you're
not gonna make a big mistake. So when you're ever
you're indecisive. I always feel like, just make a decision
and then that decision becomes the right decision and commit
to it.

Speaker 3 (01:17):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:17):
I all of the decisions of the Internet are really
troubling to me.

Speaker 1 (01:20):
When you're letting the internet run you, I.

Speaker 2 (01:22):
Am and I need to run the internet, so.

Speaker 1 (01:24):
I don't go online. That's actually for the w I
don't have any Wi Fi at my house, so I
can't even look.

Speaker 2 (01:30):
I've been deleting Instagram. I just like during the week
for the most part, I just have it deleted because
if it's on my phone, Chelsea, I just pick it
up and then I get.

Speaker 1 (01:38):
Lest oh that's smart, how do you delete it? So
you delete it and you take it down and then
for the week.

Speaker 2 (01:44):
Yeah, and so your your Instagram is still there. But
I just like have the app off of my phone,
so like if I need to look at it, like
look something up for work, I've got it on my iPad.
But I don't have my iPad sitting next to me
all of the time. What I find is, even when
I don't have it on there, without even thinking, I
do it all.

Speaker 1 (01:59):
The time too. Just do it, Okay, so you can
delete it and then you get back your app like okay.
So I think that's smart and you should apply that
to your shopping.

Speaker 4 (02:06):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (02:06):
I think I need to set myself like a timer
and be like, you can look for an hour and
then it's.

Speaker 1 (02:10):
Talking cret like what what what?

Speaker 2 (02:12):
But it's like it's a it's a symptom of so
many different things.

Speaker 1 (02:15):
It is a symptom. But then you're being run by that,
you know what I mean? The Internet is running you.

Speaker 2 (02:20):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (02:20):
Are you gonna let that happen?

Speaker 5 (02:21):
Now?

Speaker 2 (02:21):
I'm not gonna let it happen.

Speaker 3 (02:22):
Chelsea.

Speaker 1 (02:23):
We've added second shows. Second shows now to Portland, Los Angeles,
the Pantagious, Boston Backwang Center, and I've added second shows
New York, Seattle, DC. Go to Chelsea Hammler dot com.
This tour has been the most fun. It's so fucking silly.
Wait till you see me showing you how I masturbated
when I was eight years old.

Speaker 2 (02:44):
Do you bring a ladle on stage.

Speaker 1 (02:46):
I don't bring the label on stage, but I demonstrate
what I did for about a year of my life
when I found out about my Pikachu and all of
the pleasure it could offer me. Oh and one city,
I want to do a special shout out for is
Long Island because we added a show at this It's
a little show. It's only a thousand seats called the
Clubhouse in East Hampton. So I want to promote that
in case anybody here is in the Hampton's over the summer,

(03:07):
because that is going to be a nice intimate show.

Speaker 2 (03:09):
Oh that sounds so lovely. I love a small show.

Speaker 1 (03:12):
I do too, and I do it. I mean it's nice,
you know, for your ego to have bigger crowds. So
I like that as well. But I do like intimacy,
like I love when I wore my show up at
comedy clubs, Like that's always fun, you know, when you
can talk to people like upfront, you know, when you're
on a theater or in a like an amphitheater and arena,
like you can't really it's just like people, yeah, because

(03:33):
nobody else can see them, right, And yeah, so there's
a little bit more of like a barricade between you
and the audience, if you will, Yes, I want to
recommend that book, The Covenant of Water.

Speaker 2 (03:44):
Oh yes, you were starting to read this.

Speaker 1 (03:46):
It's really really transportive. It takes you to another place.
It's it's mystical, it's beautiful, and it makes you just
appreciate the world we live in and that people can
write these stories that are so beautiful.

Speaker 2 (04:00):
Just finished reading Malibu Rising, which is by the same
author of Daisy Jones on the sixth, but I loved it.
You just see her setting up all these different characters
and all these different scenarios and then like halfway through
the book, she just starts knocking them down like Domino's
and it's fantastic. It's a really fun read. It's an

(04:20):
easy read, and it's nice before bedtime reading.

Speaker 1 (04:23):
I finished that book Lucky You, which I think I recommended.
That was a good book.

Speaker 2 (04:29):
That's where I'm reading about.

Speaker 1 (04:30):
That was about this woman, this Kenyan girl. She grows
up with a very overbearing mother and she lives with
her like three aunts and I don't know why I
said aunts, aunts is how I say, and her grandmother
and she doesn't know anything about her father. She finds
out something about her father later in life that her
mother kept from her, which is very disruptive to her
because she kind of felt like nobody told her the truth.

(04:51):
Then she gets accepted to Barnard College in New York.
She moves there, and she comes from Africa and then
goes to the United States. The whole different in racism
and being African versus being African American. She has to
kind of come up against and she has a couple
of relationships. And it's very beautiful too. It's fiction and

(05:14):
it's a short book. And then she kind of, you
know how her family plays a role in that. Her
mom really wants her to go do one specific thing,
be a doctor, be a business person, and she wants
has cravings to do other things. It is just the
story about a coming of age story and your how
you deal with your responsibility to your family versus your
responsibility to yourself.

Speaker 2 (05:36):
I love that. I love that. Yeah, Okay, so a
few years ago I decided not to waste my one
precious life finishing books that I wasn't enjoying. What's your
benchmark for that?

Speaker 1 (05:46):
Do you like always.

Speaker 2 (05:46):
Finish a book? Do you give a book like fifty
or one hundred pages.

Speaker 1 (05:50):
I like to give it one hundred pages. I recently
did put a book down. I won't say what it
is because that's not nice, but it was just chick lit,
and I don't like that. I like a little bit
more elevated. I want to be learning stuff. I want
I need to be looking up words when I'm reading. Yeah,
I need to see words that I don't know the
meeting of, and if it's historical, I will never not
finish it because I feel like I owe that to society.

(06:14):
I owe that to everybody to be as well educated
and versed in every topic that I can.

Speaker 2 (06:18):
Yeah, and to yourself too. You know you are loves
continuing education.

Speaker 1 (06:23):
Yes, I do. I do.

Speaker 2 (06:24):
I do well, Chelsea. I have some updates speaking of
continuing the conversation A from way back in our Jamie
Greenberg episode.

Speaker 1 (06:35):
She had shout out to Jamie. She listens every week.

Speaker 2 (06:38):
I love her so much.

Speaker 1 (06:39):
Now I haven't seen her in weeks though I'm going
through withdrawals.

Speaker 2 (06:42):
I feel like she is the person that like every
person who meets her is probably like I could be
besties with her. She's just so fun by the way.

Speaker 1 (06:48):
I like your nails. You don't have the pointy ones now? No,
I like that.

Speaker 2 (06:52):
I'm flat.

Speaker 1 (06:52):
Yeah, I wish Jamie would do that. That's why I
haven't seen her actually, because of her nails. I have
a restraining order against her until she starts going oh
natural again.

Speaker 2 (07:01):
I feel like I accidentally gave myself like like nineties
alien nail.

Speaker 1 (07:05):
No, I like them, Okay, I like them. I mean
the twenty one I find tricky. Yeah, how do you
give a hand job like that?

Speaker 2 (07:14):
Very carefully?

Speaker 1 (07:17):
I like that you guys are still giving each other
hand jobs.

Speaker 2 (07:21):
No one's doing that, that's true, though, I mean I
don't know.

Speaker 1 (07:28):
He's blushing, she's blushing, and I'm single as usual.

Speaker 2 (07:33):
So a from our Jamie Greenberg episode, she had sort
of like self medicated with self help and hadn't seen
a therapist ever and was wondering how to start therapy
as an adult. Is how she had praised it. This
is a long overdue follow up, but it took me
a few months to get started with therapy, and I
wanted to have a good number of sessions under my
belt before sending this to know that I've truly committed.

(07:56):
Since hearing the episode. I've started to meet with a
therapist weekly. It has already been life changing, and I
cannot thank you both enough for all of your encouragement
and giving me the push that I desperately needed. It's
definitely been really, really hard, and I'm still feeling the
growing pains of beginning therapy as an adult. But being
able to be completely honest and say things out loud
to another person that I've only ever been in my

(08:18):
head for years has lifted such a weight from my
chest in mind, I'm learning so much. Chelsea's words, specifically
be brave and also when she said do you want
to be brave or do you want to be a
pussy have become my internal mantras what I'm feeling afraid
or hesitant before a session or about bringing up a
specific topic. Ps. My therapist gave me an audiobook to

(08:40):
listen to after one of our first sessions, and within
the first few minutes, the author quoted Dan Siegel a
little signed from the universe. I guess thanks again, A.

Speaker 1 (08:49):
Oh, that's cute. You know, That's what everybody needs is
like a witness. Sometimes you just need somebody to witness
what happened to you. And you just have to tell somebody.
And the therapeutic value of that is so underrated. And
by the way, it's starting therapy as an adult who cares.
When you started, it doesn't matter. It's an adjustment, of course,
like as she mentioned in her letter. But the other
thing to remember is I heard Brene Brown say this.

(09:13):
Every person has been through trauma. Everyone at some point.
The degree of trauma varies from person to person. But
something has happened where you've been neglected, traumatized, ignored, or abused.
You'll fit into some bucket of it. And that when
we reach adulthood, specifically the age of forty, which people
like to call a midlife crisis, is when the barriers

(09:36):
that you build around you start to weigh off. Your
protective layer and your protective coding, the way that you
learn to deal with this trauma or abuse or whatever
happens to you or neglect. At a certain age, it
starts to shed and it doesn't work for you anymore.
And that's why people at that age most commonly start

(09:56):
to go, wait a second, what's going on here. I'm
having all these feelings. I'm not comfortable with the feelings
I'm having I'm having self assurance issues or insecurity, and
she put it in such a beautiful way, because that
is what it is. Yeah, we get to an age
where you have to become self actualized in order to
grow and without delving into the work of what happened

(10:20):
to you as a kid. And it's not to say
that everybody had some terrible childhood. It doesn't mean that.
It just means that you've developed coping mechanisms, coping mechanisms
to situations that weren't fun for you.

Speaker 2 (10:32):
A family friend of ours who she had been in
her childhood through like worst case scenario like parents were
in a cult. There was tons of sexual abuse, like
really awful, awful stuff, and she said the same thing,
like when you get to your thirties, everything you have
to protect you grumbles, like none of it works anymore.
And for her, she had gotten into like such a

(10:55):
state of you know, sort of reliving these traumas that
she was almost inconsolable for a long time, and she
actually started equine therapy, she started working with horses, and
for her, because she had such an acute level of damage,
that was something that like she didn't at first have
to talk to anybody. It was just about like being

(11:17):
with an animal, taking care of another being, and that
was sort of her entree into dealing with all of
the trauma that she had been through. But I think
it's true, whether it's like being teased in school or
whether it's you know, big che traumas like that, we've
all got something that we're covering up.

Speaker 1 (11:33):
Yeah, like when my parents didn't pick me up from
Haber School or regular school or from any functions really,
and we're just I remember telling Dan Siegel about it
and him saying, that's a neglect, like that you were abandoned.
And I'm like, well, no, it's not that serious. He goes, No,
you've convinced yourself it's not that serious. He goes, it
is serious. You're a little girl waiting for your father
to pick you up from school and he did show

(11:54):
up multiple times. That's trauma. And I kept thinking, no,
that's just too like, but he was. Because the way
that I am now about being left behind is the
same as I was when I was a kid. Panic,
you know, like I have to read. That's why i'm early.
Even when I try to be late. I have to
be on time because I don't I just have this
like internal clock that has developed from all of those

(12:16):
times where I was left waiting. Yeah mm hmmm, so
I definitely don't like to be kept waiting.

Speaker 2 (12:21):
Yeah. Well, this is a follow up from Dana. I
remember who had the creepy.

Speaker 1 (12:25):
Steps ahah yeah yeah yeah, yeah yeah yes.

Speaker 2 (12:28):
And we had read on the podcast a follow up
from someone else who was like, this could be the
beginning mental health stuff as well. So Dana says, thank
you so much for sharing the follow ups from other callers.
I actually agree that it's possible this is the onset
of mental illness in my steps on. After thinking about
it some more, I remember that his maternal grandmother was

(12:48):
mentally ill, as well as one of his uncles, which
is why it's so important to talk about this stuff
in families. I'm disheartened, as I was hoping my step
son's relationship with my son would be one of the
strongest bonds in their lives. As time goes on, though
his behavior becomes increasingly odd and worrisome, they have less
and less contact. Thank you again both for your advice
and for being awesome all my best, Dana. So it

(13:10):
sounds like they're sort of like phasing out alone time
with her son and that's probably for the best. And
our next email fall up is this one I think
is so interesting. So Corey had written in during our
Laurel and Jackson episode and Corey was in a relationship
with someone who he was like thinking about getting married to,

(13:31):
and his boyfriend was from another country and they were
thinking about doing sort of a green card marriage but
also like being in love. And Laurel and Jackson kept saying,
I see three months, three months keeps coming up, and
the caller kept being like, oh, Corey kept being like,
oh no, no, no, you know nothing's gonna happen in three months. Well,
Corey says, y'all wanted an update to pass on, and
I got one for you. He bailed on me. He

(13:53):
and I dated for another month or two after the podcast.
I told him how I felt and that I wanted
to be his boyfriend, try the marriage that he had
brought up, et cetera. He said he had too much
going on to commit to any sort of relationship, despite
having said otherwise. While we were dating. He started calling
me buddy friend dude, and then bailed on every plan
I tried to make. We finally went to dinner and

(14:15):
I told him I won't date someone who won't communicate
with me or show basic respect of my time and effort.
We spoke a tiny bit here and there afterward, but
I'm done with him. On the right side, I got
some solid jokes out of it. I appreciate your time
with me during the podcast despite how it turned out.
It was really cool to chat with you, Chelsea and Laura.

Speaker 1 (14:32):
Thanks Corey exactly, and I did the math of like
when he emailed in, and I was like, I think
it was exactly like three mins.

Speaker 2 (14:41):
That's what I think from just doing the math.

Speaker 1 (14:44):
Oh that's funny.

Speaker 2 (14:44):
Yeah, yeah, Well, Chelsea, we're going to head into our
calling in backup segment with Betterhelp, who was sponsoring this segment,
and today Courtney Cope is joining US licensed marriage family
therapist and principal clinical operations manager at Betterhelp. Hi Courtney, Hi, Courtney, Hi,
great to see you both. Hi well, Angela writes dear Chelsea.

(15:07):
Before I go any further, I just want to point
out that I love my mother in law dearly, but
I really could use some advice on how to deal
with her in certain situations. I need to rewind a
bit before I was in the picture. My partner, who's
now thirty seven, lost his sister to cancer when she
was just fifteen and he was ten. As anyone can imagine,
this broke them as a family and changed them completely.

(15:29):
We have a one year old little boy, and since
having him, I have so much more empathy for what
they all went through. However, every time we're together, his
mum breaks down in tears. The crying isn't always about
her late daughter. Of course, I will always comfort and
listen when she speaks about her. This will never be
an issue for me, but it can be over anything.
It can be over casual conversation about the weather, about

(15:50):
what books were reading, even what we may be having
for Tea that evening. A lot of the conversations we have,
I find she often puts a negative, debbie downer spin on.
It'll cry and get emotional at other people's problems too,
even people she barely knows. But lately, I just feel
like every time we're due to see her, I instantly
start to feel miserable. It's like I'm anticipating the emotions

(16:12):
that are about to come, and I feel like the
life and happiness has been drained from me when I
leave her. She also has a tendency to make everything
about her, which is extremely annoying. I completely understand why
she has this dark side to her, given everything that's
happened in the past. I'd never want her to feel
like she can't talk about her daughter to me. I'll
hold her hand and cry and laugh on the occasion,

(16:34):
but I can't deal with the constant downing of everything else.
So do you have any advice on how I can
handle this going forward. I always try and make light
of the situations, but it rarely works. Thanks for taking
the time to read this, Angela.

Speaker 6 (16:47):
Well, Angela, I can't tell you how many therapy sessions
I've had that started off with. First of all, I
want to point out that I love my mother in law.

Speaker 3 (16:54):
Dear relief but.

Speaker 6 (16:56):
So super common. I don't think this is a question
about grief. This is really a question about this woman
is feeling trapped and not like she can do anything
about the situation, or that her efforts to change it
in the past had been unsuccessful. And ideally, in a
situation like this, I would love to see husband and

(17:17):
wife sit down together discuss this as a unit, and
perhaps even take two to three sessions with a couple's
therapistics or some solutions, because this is really about the husband,
the wife, and now their new one year old child
as a unit, deciding how they want to move forward
with the relationship with his parents in a way that

(17:38):
works for their family unit.

Speaker 1 (17:39):
Yeah, I think that's good advice because you do need
like a team member because she does feel so trapped,
like the idea of having to hang out with somebody
that's such a debbie downer and knowing that it's an
obligation of yours by way of marriage isn't fair. It's
just not only to a degree and you've reached your limit.

Speaker 6 (17:54):
It sounds like right, And the general consensus among most
couples therapy experts is that it's really important that an
adult child, when they're now engaging in an intimate adult
relationship like a marriage, a domestic partnership, they have to
choose their partner over their parent. And what I mean
by that is if something isn't working for their partner

(18:16):
or something's affecting their partner, they have to prioritize their
partner's feelings over their parents in order to be able
to move forward. And have not only a healthy relationship,
but a healthy adult experience, because no adult should be
under the thumb of their mother or father's will imperpetuity, right,
that would just hinder them as an adult for the

(18:38):
rest of their life. So that would be what I
would say about that. But also I just of course
have to say losing a child is of course considered
one of the most ultimate tragedies, and of course is
going to impact somebody for the rest of their life
in some way or another. That being said, it is
not this person's job to be their mother in law's therapist,

(19:00):
to sit down and find solutions specific for their mother
in law. So this is really I think about the
husband and wife having constructive conversations here.

Speaker 1 (19:10):
Yeah, absolutely, because it is his responsibility to get the
situation started. You know, it's his mom.

Speaker 2 (19:16):
When that moment comes and you're like sitting around the
table talking about literally the weather, and she breaks down
in tears, what's the move? I mean, my instinct is
to be like, I'm going to give you a couple minutes,
like they're there, I'm going to give you a couple
of minutes and walk away. But like that also feels
a little icy cold from me, what's the move to,

(19:38):
like break the cycle that she knows is coming.

Speaker 3 (19:41):
Right?

Speaker 6 (19:41):
In an ideal world, we would have husband and wife
ahead of time, deciding, like, hey, if mom starts crying
or mother in law starts crying at this visit, husband
is going to step in and he's gonna take over
say something. Wife can excuse herself whatever it is, but
let's just say it's just her and mother in law, right.
I don't think there's anything wrong with deciding ahead of time.

(20:05):
What do I have capacity for if I don't want
to go down this road for more than fifteen seconds
or thirty five seconds? Doing exactly what you said, Catherine
is totally appropriate, Like I hear you, and I'm gonna
step outside and get some fresh air. You know, I'm
gonna go pour another cup of tea. Anything to pattern
interrupt would be really useful. But the other thing I

(20:25):
would also encourage is to have husband and wife ahead
of time maybe start looking at the ways they're spending
time with mother in law and if there's ways they
can redirect that quality time together into avenues that maybe
won't bring it about as much. Now I want to
acknowledge they might be limited. They have a one year old,
so it's not like they can take the one year

(20:45):
old and just like go to theater or movies with
the mother.

Speaker 1 (20:48):
Yeah, have you thought about taking your mother skiing?

Speaker 6 (20:51):
I hear Chelsea's good at that. So they definitely want
to do things that are not just sitting and staring
at you each other across from their cup of tea, right,
because that's going to invite probably conversations that they don't
want to have. So thinking ahead of time of what
they could do, having a plan with her husband that
if it does come up, what's he going to do

(21:12):
to step in? And then the last thing I'll say
is if someone is going to speak directly to the
mother in law about her behavior or her grief or
how anything she's doing is impacting anyone, it has to
be from the husband. I would say it would be
very difficult for that conversation to go well if it
came from the wife. And if it comes from the husband,

(21:33):
him and his mom have a shared experience of grief.
They both lost a loved one, and so I think
even for him to be able to say, you know,
I get it, it's so hard we lost this person
that we love, and I'm working to be more in
the moment, and I'd love for you to be more
in the moment with me. Just something that relates to
her instead of shaming her, blaming her, I think would

(21:55):
be really important here.

Speaker 2 (21:57):
Courtney Cope, thank you. Courtney is a licensed marriage and
family therapist and principal clinical operations manager at Betterhelp. And
of course, thank you again to Better Help for sponsoring
calling him back up.

Speaker 6 (22:08):
Thanks so much for having me.

Speaker 1 (22:09):
Thanks Cording.

Speaker 2 (22:10):
Thanks Well, let's take a quick break and we'll be
back with some callers.

Speaker 1 (22:14):
Okay, and we are back.

Speaker 3 (22:20):
We are back.

Speaker 1 (22:22):
I've decided to start changing the way I say we're
back because it's starting to annoy me.

Speaker 2 (22:25):
That's all right, someone wrote in They're like, you know,
you guys don't have to announce it. I'm like, but
it's the bit for the people who are in the room.
There's no actual break.

Speaker 1 (22:33):
Tell that person a file a lawsuit. If I don't
like it, I will, I will.

Speaker 4 (22:37):
So.

Speaker 2 (22:38):
Our first email comes from Zach. Zach says, I first
want to say how much of a fan I am
of your podcast and all that you do. I loved
seeing I read Rocks Chelsea. Now onto my question. I
just turned thirty three, recently married my husband, and have
an overall great life. However, now that I'm getting older,

(22:59):
I realized that I I still do not really know
who I am. I tend to come off timid, self conscious,
and doubtful in my life and my career. Although I
have a great job and perform well in my role.
I want to be more confident and display more presence.
What are some actionable things you've done in your life
to better understand yourself, your purpose, and grow into the
confident person you are? Mushrooms, who better to ask than you?

Speaker 6 (23:22):
Too?

Speaker 2 (23:22):
Kindest regards, Zachary Reading.

Speaker 1 (23:25):
I reading is an answer to everything that It tells
you what you're interested in, what makes you learn. It
shows you your aptitude for growth and interest in other
cultures and situations that are different than you. And it
really doesn't matter what you read, but you should read
stuff that isn't like your life like. It doesn't matter

(23:46):
if you're reading fiction or nonfiction, or magazines or newspapers.
It's just good to take you out of yourself. I
feel like the biggest growth that could happen is from learning,
and how can you learn more than by reading?

Speaker 2 (23:56):
Yeah, I love that. I love that, And there's a
certain lont of like fake it till you make it too.
I think confidence is something that when you walk into
a room and even if you just tell yourself like
I'm confident I deserve to be here, I think that's
really helpful. One thing that I came across the other
day as I was going through some emails was a
specific task that an old mentor of mine had given me,

(24:18):
and he said, I want you to write to you know,
your ten closest people, whether that's family, friends, and ask
them what do you think are your unique capabilities or
about yourself? So you would say, what do you think
are my unique capabilities? What do you think I do
better than anybody else? Or some of my best qualities?
And I kind of was flipping through. I had done

(24:39):
this like ten years ago, and these unique capabilities that
people reflect back at you, that they've experienced you doing,
become so fascinating because it's stuff you don't necessarily even
see in yourself. But having people who you know, you
can trust, who care about you telling you.

Speaker 3 (24:55):
I love that.

Speaker 1 (24:56):
Yeah, that's a great idea. I could never get away
with something like that because my whole world revolves around me.
So my family would be like, are you fucking kidding me?
More with you? But that is a great exercise for
anybody to do, because I would love to get an
email like that from one of my.

Speaker 2 (25:09):
Friends totally, and you'd be like, here's all the things
are great at because other people's experience of us sometimes
sometimes there's a lot more positive than what we have
going on inside or the timidity we might have going
right outside.

Speaker 1 (25:21):
Right and expanding your knowledge as always, Like when I
talk about reading so much, it's because a it gives
you something to discuss, right, You can always bring that
up in a conversation, so it's a conversation starter. You know,
sometimes our brains shut down when we're low or depressed
or tired. We don't have a lot of growth happening, right,
So if you want your brain circuitry to always be electric,

(25:45):
there is that is the best way to do that
is to engage and not by being online and watching Instagram.
That's not going to do it. That's dead energy. Watching
TV can also be dead energy unless you're watching a
documentary and there's a lot of learnings in there. But
active energy is you know, filling yourself up with so
there's just so much value in it. And I love

(26:07):
to know things that I don't know about so that
I'm not so harsh to judge things that are not
familiar to me. And I think reading is a great
vehicle for that. And it does instill confidence in you
because you get a better command over the use of language.
You understand differences better.

Speaker 3 (26:27):
I know.

Speaker 1 (26:27):
I just I should just go to a biblioteca and
register myself as as a permanent librarian. That's what will
make me happy. Maybe I'll do that in Spain in
my old age. I'll become a librarian at a bibliotecha
when I finally get command over the Spanish language.

Speaker 2 (26:42):
Reading in Spanish is a whole other thing. I always
have to look up a lot of things. Yeah, it's,
you know, different than conversation. Our first caller today is Beth.
She is forty one. She's a personal trainer. She says,
I met a guy four months ago on a dating app.
There were red flags at first, like him being in
prison a decade ago for two years for trespassing supposedly

(27:04):
which didn't make sense to me, and that he didn't
have any friends However, we connected quickly and things moved
very fast. I was vulnerable, looking for love and a
real connection. He told me he loved me after a
month and was even talking about moving in together. He
wanted to be with me all the time, which I liked,
but now knows a red flag him being needy and

(27:24):
very codependent. Every weekend he would buy molly and cocaine
and said it was just a weekend thing. He would
also drink and get angry over nothing and block me
for days at a time, and then come back and
tell me he was seeking out other women but missed me.
At the end, he told me he cheated on me
and he was sorry, but he needed to break it

(27:46):
off to work on himself. Our relationship lasted about three months.
Less than a week after he ended things, I came
to find out he made friends with people in my
apartment complex, most of whom I know do drugs as well,
including a friend of mine. Then I heard from our
mutual friend that they are now dating, and he's already
told her he loves her, love bombing her like he

(28:06):
did to me. It's been a little over a week
now and I see his car in my parking garage
twenty four to sevens.

Speaker 1 (28:13):
It's a gross person.

Speaker 2 (28:14):
Yep. It seems like he's already moved in. I even
saw him when he was going to his car in
my garage and I was in my car leaving for work.
We made eye contact as I drove by. He's technically
not even allowed to be parked in my garage because
he's not a resident, but my complex doesn't do anything
about it, even though I reported him. I've also seen
him from a far walking her dog in the complex.

(28:34):
I've realized he's a manipulator, compulsive liar, and possibly a
con artist who probably tries this with every girl he meets.
But it's been getting pretty hard to get over the
whole situation. I've blocked him in this now former friend,
but I'm finding myself looking over my shoulder in my complex.
I don't want anything to do with him or her,
but now I feel like I need to move. My
lease is up in about three weeks, but I also

(28:56):
have rent control and I love the area I've been
living in for seven years, and no, I won't find
a place I can afford where I want to live.
My friends keep telling me this won't last. Should I
move or should I stay and wait it out? Bath?
Hi Bath?

Speaker 1 (29:08):
Now, Hi, sorry that you had to deal with such
a scumbag. He's so disgusting.

Speaker 6 (29:13):
I thank you.

Speaker 4 (29:13):
I'm still dealing with it.

Speaker 3 (29:14):
I know, I know.

Speaker 1 (29:16):
I have two thoughts. I don't think you should move
because this relationship is not going to last. He's unstable
and he's just siphoning off of whomever is available. But
do you feel like he could potentially be a dangerous person?

Speaker 4 (29:29):
I don't think so.

Speaker 1 (29:31):
What was he in prison for?

Speaker 5 (29:32):
Again? He says trustpassing, but I mean he's in prison
for trustpassing for two years.

Speaker 4 (29:36):
I don't know. I think I think he's lying.

Speaker 1 (29:38):
I think you should look that up and find out.
There's got to be a public record of what he
served time for.

Speaker 5 (29:43):
Yeah, I tried, but it's I think it's over ten years,
so I'm not sure if I can get those records.

Speaker 4 (29:49):
I don't think he's dangerous. I think he would have
done something by now.

Speaker 5 (29:53):
I did put like a ring camera on my door,
and I have a tesla of the records. You know,
if you go near my car. Oh good, I feel
safe in that respect.

Speaker 1 (30:01):
Okay, Yeah, I mean, if he's getting Molly on the weekends.
That usually doesn't lead to danger, but I mean, who knows,
you know, I mean alcohol cocaine does. So I don't
think you should move. Okay, it doesn't sound like you're
in danger. You're just it's very irritating for you to
have to deal with this. And then, but you know
what kind of person he is, he will definitely do
the same thing with this woman. It will happen and

(30:23):
he will be gone.

Speaker 4 (30:24):
Used to be my friend.

Speaker 5 (30:25):
I mean she lives in my complex too, and she
was my friend for like two years. I hear from
other people she's saying, I mean, I know this just
make herself feel better. Then we were never friends.

Speaker 2 (30:34):
Oh yeah, so she's not open having a conversation with you, right.

Speaker 4 (30:38):
Yeah, I don't think so. I mean I blocked her.
I don't want to deal with her, but I still
have to.

Speaker 5 (30:41):
Also, she lives in my complex too, so it's like
I'd risk running into her as well.

Speaker 1 (30:45):
I think, just we really play the high road on
this one. Do not interact with them. You don't have
to have any business with them. Who cares what she's saying?
Who cares what she'll have us to be singing a
different tune when she gets sucked over by him. I
assure you that she will be knocking on your door
to commiserate about the idiot that you both dated, but
it'll be too late by then. Just I know, it's
an icky situation, but it's not permanent. It's not gonna

(31:08):
last for very long. And don't disrupt your life because
of some idiot and be grateful that you only spent
three months with him.

Speaker 4 (31:15):
Yeah right, I'm hoping. I'm hoping that's the case. Everyone
says it's not gonna last.

Speaker 5 (31:19):
It's just like it's like he's been I just see
his car in my garage and it's not supposed to
be there, but my complex is not doing anything about
it all the time.

Speaker 4 (31:26):
It's just always there.

Speaker 2 (31:28):
It does feel very con artist, like I'm glad that
you said that. Did he ask you for money or
like have you pay for stuff or that sort of thing.

Speaker 4 (31:36):
It seemed like he was getting there.

Speaker 5 (31:38):
But I think also that he knew he couldn't scam
me like that, so that's why he stopped it with me.
And he knows like she's more vulnerable, uh huh, and
he can get away with it with her. That's what
it seems like, I mean, he was also talking about
moving in with me too it right away.

Speaker 2 (31:54):
Yeah, I think I feel like this guy is like
doesn't have a home, and he's just like moving in
with whatever girl will have him.

Speaker 4 (32:00):
It seems though.

Speaker 5 (32:01):
I mean I've been to his apartment, I mean before,
but I don't know.

Speaker 4 (32:05):
It could be.

Speaker 1 (32:07):
But I mean, if there is any danger, if there
at any point you feel like you're in danger, you
really have to engage the police. Yeah, you can't take
a risk like that and think, oh, if somebody's not dangerous,
that's what a lot of people think that about a
lot of people, and with his record and not knowing
why he was in prison and his drug use and
all of those things. Like obviously you don't have to

(32:28):
do that prematurely, but if something starts to happen that
you feel unsafe, like I don't want you running around
being like get his car out of the parking lot.
Who gives a shit? Like let them go fucking be
idiots together, Good riddance. It's unfortunate you have to see
your ex. You know, nobody wants to see their X
all the time. But I wouldn't make it, you know,
I have a huge impact on your life and where

(32:49):
you move right right, I don't want to move.

Speaker 4 (32:51):
I don't think it's to go that I have to move.

Speaker 2 (32:53):
No, no, don't do it.

Speaker 1 (32:55):
Don't talk.

Speaker 2 (32:56):
I agree with Chelsea, like if you do start feeling
unsafe where he's approaching you or threatening you, then like
it's time for a restraining order. But like that isn't
necessarily going to keep him away, but it would be
something you could bring to your apartment complex and say, like,
I have this legal document he can't park here, da
da da. But that's I think down the road.

Speaker 1 (33:13):
Other than that, I think you're not gonna have to
deal with him in a couple of months. I hope.

Speaker 5 (33:17):
So. I mean, it's been like two weeks and I'm
like just hoping that this falls apart soon.

Speaker 2 (33:23):
Go on a vacation, get out of here.

Speaker 4 (33:26):
At break. Thank you.

Speaker 1 (33:28):
Yeah, if you can, all right, we'll keep us posted.

Speaker 2 (33:30):
Yeah, let us know what happens.

Speaker 1 (33:31):
I will take care.

Speaker 4 (33:33):
Thank you so much. Love you guys.

Speaker 1 (33:36):
You love me too.

Speaker 2 (33:39):
Bye Bye.

Speaker 1 (33:41):
That's unfortunate, I know, isn't that creepy?

Speaker 2 (33:44):
I'm like, oh awful.

Speaker 1 (33:46):
Yeah, I don't know how i'd feel about having to
see somebody all the time, but when you know somebody
is such a loser, it kind of takes the sting
out of the breakup. Yeah, dated an idiot.

Speaker 2 (33:57):
Like you said, It's just like, thank goodness, she figured
out what was going on soon enough and got away
from him. Because I don't know people like that. They're
pretty scary.

Speaker 1 (34:07):
I mean, cocaine and Molly on the weekend is like
maybe one weekend. Like the casualness of saying that is ridiculous.

Speaker 2 (34:17):
Clearly not every weekend. Maybe not every weekend.

Speaker 1 (34:20):
I mean, Molly's fine, but cocaine is another story. I
speak from experience.

Speaker 2 (34:29):
Britney says, Dear Chelsea, my younger sister and I have
always been very close, even though we've lived in different
states for six years. We talk every day and tell
each other everything cute. She's my best friend. Here's the problem.
She has a shit husband.

Speaker 1 (34:45):
She's gonna happen right.

Speaker 2 (34:47):
He's a cheating, gaslighting narcissist. They got married when they
were eighteen, when he enlisted in the army. They moved
out of state and had their first kid when they
were nineteen. They're now twenty four and have three kids
under four. Before she got pregnant with her first kid,
she found out that her husband was active on dating websites.
She confronted him, they quote worked it out, and continued

(35:09):
on with their relationship. Fast forward, when her second kid
was six months old, she found out with hard proof
that her husband had cheated on her countless times over
the previous two years. She began the process of leaving
him and figuring out what their new lives would look like.
Then somehow he talked his way back into a relationship
with her. This has repeated itself in different forms a
few more times since then. Every time shit hits the fan,

(35:32):
he plays the victim, makes her feel crazy, then professes
his guilt and love, and says he's willing to change.
Needless to say, it's obvious he will never change. I
know that the main reason she stays is because she's
terrified of how difficult of a process it will be
to divorce him and to figure out how to support
herself financially. I told my sister a while back that

(35:52):
I'll always be there for her, but I'm done hearing
about all the shit he puts her through. If she's
not going to do anything to change her situation, true
truly heartbreaking and mentally taxing for me to watch my
sister willingly stay in this toxic marriage and continually be
treated this way. Our relationship has slowly been affected by
this because there's this huge elephant in the room whenever
we talk. We don't have any resentment toward each other

(36:15):
or anything like that, things just aren't the same. How
can I help my sister realize that she needs out
and will be so much happier on the other side
of an inevitable, nasty divorce, Or how can I just
come to terms with the fact that I need to
let this all go, not stress about something I can't
change and risk losing my close relationship with my sister.
Help me? Brittany.

Speaker 1 (36:34):
Hi, Brittany Hi. So what's the rest of your family?
Do you have other siblings parents?

Speaker 5 (36:41):
Yeah?

Speaker 7 (36:41):
I have an older brother, a younger brother, and then
my sister's the youngest.

Speaker 1 (36:45):
And is there any talk of maybe all of you
having some sort of like a quasi intervention with her.

Speaker 7 (36:53):
No. I mean we're all really close, but nobody else
besides me really gets involved in her situation. She doesn't
really tell anybody anything, So I'm kind of the middleman
within the whole situation. So she's kind of told my
parents a little bit of what's going on, but they
don't know in detail because she's embarrassed frankly by the
whole situation, So they only know bits and pieces. But

(37:15):
they know she needs out as well. But I'm really
the only one who speaks out on it.

Speaker 1 (37:19):
And do you think that you could corral your brothers?

Speaker 7 (37:22):
They just honestly don't really care that much. I think
they know, like they want her to get out and
they want her to be happy, but I think they're
just more reserved and quiet in that sense. And Okay, honestly,
I don't think she values their opinion enough to really
make a difference.

Speaker 1 (37:35):
Well they're men, so that makes sense, right right, Yeah,
no offense, Brad. I think maybe you should have a
conversation with your parents right to try and do something together,
like sit her down with the three of you, like,
we can't watch you go through your life like this,
and the impact that this relationship, the damaging impact that
this relationship is going to have on her children and
they self esteem that these kids grow up with, and

(37:58):
the way they see their mother tree and remaining in
a relationship is going to have far reaching negational if yes,
it's going to be trauma for all of them, and
she is allowing her children to be traumatized by her
inability to get out of a relationship that is negative
and toxic and controlling.

Speaker 3 (38:18):
Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Speaker 2 (38:19):
You know, cheating, You can make an argument that that's
abusive or not, but the gas lighting like that is
straight up but.

Speaker 1 (38:25):
Repetitive cheating is.

Speaker 2 (38:27):
Yeah, it's absolutely And I wonder if she understands it
in that context of like you are being abused. It
takes someone seven times to get out of this relationship.
I know you know, you and I had even talked
about like having her potentially common move in with you,
and that that's something you've expressed you would be open to,
right exactly.

Speaker 7 (38:47):
That's just a heart scenario because she does have three children,
and they would have in Washington State and I'm in California.
So the custody thing is a huge issue. I think
he would make that a living hell for her because
he's even threatened in the past like you're not going
to see your kid, you don't make any money. I
make all the money there, Like there's no way you'd
get custody, which is bogus. I mean that he just
doesn't know what he's talking about, but it terrifies her.

(39:08):
She doesn't want to go through it. So I know
if she were to leave him, she would stay up there.
And then she just doesn't have a strong support system
up there, which is why I think she's done the
back and forth so many times, because he just weels
his way back in that way.

Speaker 1 (39:20):
Yeah, and so she doesn't.

Speaker 3 (39:22):
Have a job, right, No, she's stay home mom.

Speaker 1 (39:26):
And is there any possibility of you being able to
move up there?

Speaker 4 (39:30):
No?

Speaker 7 (39:30):
My husband right now, he's we're locked in where we're
at for at least another five years. So we've talked
about it in the past, but it's just not a
possibility right now.

Speaker 1 (39:37):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (39:38):
I do you think it's important to have a plan
because you know this is not going to not happen again.
It's going to happen again. And I think because you
know what's going to happen again, you can have a
plan and maybe that is when this happens again. I
fly up, I go get her. She stays with us
for two weeks, having a plan in place where it's
like a specific amount of time that's enough for her

(40:00):
to sort of like get her head a little bit
right and see, oh, there are other options for me.
You know, I have a support system. Maybe mom and
dad will help with some of that stuff as well.
Whether that's financial or are.

Speaker 1 (40:12):
They in a position your parents to help financially not
so much, but they would do anything for her.

Speaker 7 (40:17):
There was even a situation, I think a couple years
ago where my dad was about to sign a lease
for an apartment for the town I live, so she
was going to come down here and figure out this
stuff with the kids later, and he was about to
sign it and figure all that out, even though he
can't really afford it. And then a few days went
by and she's like, oh, no, we're good. Now, we're
working on it. We're going to go to therapy and
all that, and then therapy never happens, and it's just

(40:38):
a cycle. So we've had that situation where she'll come
to visit me during an event that something like this happens,
and she's all on board, she knows everything I say,
she's responsive and understands, and she agrees with me that
she needs out, and then she goes home to pack
her things literally, and then I don't here for a
couple of days, and then she calls me back and
she's like, we're working on it. So we've tried it all.

(41:01):
I mean, we're all so supportive of her and want
her out and trying to help her financially, and I
think that's not even the issue for her. I think
it's the whole custody battle, her having to start her
life over. She's scared, even though she's so young and
so beautiful, she's scared that nobody's going to want her
in the future and she's going to be alone, a
single mom the rest of her life.

Speaker 2 (41:21):
I guess what she here is a home. Nobody else
is going to want you, like you can ever find
anybody as as me.

Speaker 1 (41:26):
She needs to read Untamed by Glennon Doyle or read
one of Brene Brown's books about the value that you
have in yourself. I mean, this guy is just I
can't understand why you're so upset. It's like, it's upseting
to see your sister diminished in this way and to
be devalued in this way, and not to have confidence
in her ability. She has her whole life ahead of her,
and she's choosing to remain in this instead of taking

(41:49):
the you know, a brave leap, and she needs information.
You have to figure out a way to get her
the information so that she understands what happens in divorce.
She can't just be exposed to his narrative because obviously
he's going to make her scared of everything and she
needs distance from him. So yes, I don't know how
to approach that for you. Like if it were me,
I would get as involved as possible.

Speaker 3 (42:10):
Yeah, right, which is what I've tried.

Speaker 7 (42:12):
And honestly, he's kind of a scary human, like I
don't know what he's capable of, and like I said,
he's super narcissistic. He was in the army for four years.
He wants to be a police officer eventually, and she does.
He just feels like he's of this high importance. Yeah,
and he doesn't ever talk down to her in that
way like I'm better than you or anything like that,
but it's well known, like he thinks he runs the

(42:33):
show around there, and I'm just kind of afraid, Like
he's never been physically aggressive towards her at all, But
I don't.

Speaker 3 (42:40):
I wouldn't put it past.

Speaker 1 (42:41):
So it doesn't it sounds it sounds to me, like
that's in the future, Like that's a definite possibility.

Speaker 7 (42:47):
Yeah, Especially he's just so controlling of her, and he
thinks he can kick her out whenever he wants, and
he's just the ruler of her life. So like it's
only a matter of time before things get physical in
my mind, you know. And I've told her that too,
and she's like, yeah, I know, I don't ever think
he would, But I'm like, you never, you never think
they would, you.

Speaker 2 (43:05):
Know, Yeah, does he kick her out on a semiregular basis.

Speaker 7 (43:09):
So this last time they had a tip a couple
of weeks ago, was because she went out with a
friend and ended up going back to this friend's house
and her boyfriend's roommate was or something. Her boyfriend's friend
was there, so he thought she was cheating, even though
she never would. And he's like projecting all these things
he's done to her.

Speaker 3 (43:26):
Right that he thinks she would do back.

Speaker 7 (43:29):
And so that whole situation, he drove like two hours
or something to go pick her up in the middle.
Then I dragged her home, threw a suitcase at her,
said pack your shit. You're getting out of my house,
and you're not going to see your daughters for a
few days. So he's just like he thinks he controls everything,
even though.

Speaker 3 (43:44):
And did she go, She yeah, she left.

Speaker 7 (43:46):
She stayed with my brother actually lives a few miles
from her, so she stayed with him for a couple
of nights. She actually went to see a lawyer and
figure out what her rights are and what her next
step should be. And the lawyer was so confident that
he could never take the kids away from her because
it's just not factual. Yeah, and then yeah, she had
the divorce papers ready to be filled out and everything,
and just once again he's like, I'm so sorry. I'm

(44:08):
starting to believe you you didn't cheat on me, And
he just grabbles his way back in and he makes
all these empty promises.

Speaker 1 (44:14):
No, no, no, no, this is somebody that is going
to abuse your sister for sure. This has all the
writing on the wall, like what it's leading up to.
That example right there is all you need to know. Like,
you have got to get her to believe that it
is time to move out for her safety. And she
already got she already had a lawyer, Like you have

(44:35):
to do everything you can to get her out of
that situation.

Speaker 2 (44:38):
Yeah, yeah, and continuing to let her know like we're here,
will do whatever. You know. Maybe it's not like your
parents will be in with a bunch of money because
that's not possible for them, but will do whatever we
need to do to make sure you and your kids
are supported.

Speaker 1 (44:50):
I mean if even if you guys can all pull
money together, you know, everyone makes whatever contribution they can
in order for her to afford rent for like the
short term until a divorce is happening. But this is
a man who is abusive, that example, is crazy and
three children. He's going to try and turn them against her,
like she's the sooner she gets the fuck out of there,
the safer everyone is going to be.

Speaker 3 (45:11):
Yeah.

Speaker 7 (45:12):
And I've told her that numerous times, especially within the
last couple of years, because everything just it keeps progressing,
It keeps getting worse. He keeps doing crazier things that
I never thought he'd be possible of. So it's only
a matter of time. And when I express these things
to her, she's like, yeah, I know, like really soft
spoken about it, but agrees with me. And then she
turns right back around like yeah, but you don't know

(45:32):
how good it is when it's good, and I'm like, no,
I do, because I understand he's actually a great dad,
which is great for the kids because they don't have
to experience what my sister's experiencing. But I think she's
clinging on too that, like she sees how great he
can be.

Speaker 1 (45:46):
Yeah, but he's not a great dad because he's being
abusive to his wife, like him going and picking her
up two hours away because he's convinced she's cheating on him.
That's abusive. Yeah, that isn't a good father. That's disrespecting
their mother. He's not a good father. She thinks that
he's a good father because that's how she's rationalizing it.

Speaker 2 (46:04):
And also, like, this is what abusers do. When it
is good, it feels you're over the moon, and then
they take you into the depths of despair. This is
what they do. And this is also a person who
it sounds like probably has access to guns and other
things like this is this is it's important to get
her out and she may not want to go right away.
And I know you're exhausted from having the same conversation

(46:27):
over and over with her, but like you just have
to keep telling her I'm here and it's not her
who needs to go pack her stuff. Like when she
goes back, she doesn't, she can't be in the same.

Speaker 1 (46:36):
But what am I even saying he needs to get out,
she needs to kick him out, But she doesn't seem
like she has the tenacity.

Speaker 3 (46:41):
To do that.

Speaker 2 (46:42):
I just mean, like you mentioned, like she goes back
to like get her stuff, and he convinces her, like, no,
if she's gone, if she's away from him, you got
to keep her away from him and be like, I'll
go get your things or somebody one of the brothers
goes and gets her things whatever, Because when she has
he has access to her, that's when he's going to
convince her to come back.

Speaker 3 (46:59):
Yeah, exactly, I know.

Speaker 1 (47:00):
Is there a way for you? What's your work schedule? Like, like,
is there a way for you to go up there
and spend like two weeks so that you can actually
get her out of the house.

Speaker 7 (47:09):
Not at the moment, I just can't afford it right now, unfortunately,
And I have a two year old son too, so
it's hard for me to pike that time.

Speaker 2 (47:17):
What about mom and dad or or a best friend?
Is there a best friend in the picture who could
maybe do that?

Speaker 1 (47:21):
I'm sure he's isolated all of her friends.

Speaker 7 (47:23):
You're right, Yeah, I mean, I don't know if he
single handedly has, but just her her situation over the years.
I think her friends who have gotten kind of close,
they see this roller coaster like I'm leaving him.

Speaker 3 (47:35):
I'm not. I'm leaving him. I'm not. So I think that.

Speaker 7 (47:37):
I mean, I'm still here because I'm her sister. But
I feel like if I was kind of a close
semi close friend, I probably wouldn't be still, you know,
just because she's so wishy washy with that, and like
you think you're helping her and then she just does
the opposite, and yeah, it's just really hard to continually
be there for this.

Speaker 1 (47:54):
Yeah, and are you what about your brother's living situation? Like,
is that somewhere she could live and move into.

Speaker 7 (48:00):
Yeah, So she stayed there for a couple of days
a couple of weeks ago, and he's like, he has
an ex small extra room, like not room for the kids,
but at least for her. And it's only like twenty
minutes from where her kids would be, so she has
that option too, And he even, you know, he's like,
as long as you need, you can stay here. And
she just like up and left, and she's like, I'll
come get my things tomorrow or going back home. So

(48:21):
everybody's one hundred percent all in there for her, in
supportive of her leaving him, and she just keeps getting
spooked by the thought that either nobody will want her,
she it's going to be a hard restart of her life,
or he's going to make her life a litle Yes,
all that is enough to scare her back in along
with his sweet talking whatever he says to her.

Speaker 2 (48:38):
But it doesn't compare to the freedom you feel when
you leave an abuse her.

Speaker 7 (48:43):
I know, I keep trying to tell her that once
all that's said and done, like that divorce process isn't
going to be forever, and once it's all done and
your custody is all settled and everything it's going to be,
she's going to be so much happier. But she just
doesn't see it that way. She'll agree with me in
the moment, and then of course it all goes out
the window.

Speaker 2 (48:59):
This is a person who's under the influence of what
is basically mind control, So you know, you do have
to kind of take that into consideration that like her
mind is being controlled by another person. But I do
think it's worth going back to Chelsea's idea of like
having your whole family sit down with her and be like,
we want to help you in any way possible. Here
is a potential plan. We love you, this isn't okay

(49:20):
that you're being treated like this, and tell her what
the plan is and will be here if it's not now.
If it's you know, we're here to may no plan
with you.

Speaker 1 (49:29):
We're here to make a plan if she needs to
leave the house, and because he's obviously not going to
probably listen to her to get move out. But if
she needs to leave the house, she can go in
the interim, stay with your brother while she gets on
her feet, gets the divorce proceedings going, she will get
custody of her children most likely, and then she can
figure out what she's going to do for work, or

(49:49):
if she's gonna work, or what that dynamic is going
to be. But you have to be indefatigable with your
efforts with her. You have to, yeah, and you have
to impress it upon your family and your brother, so
maybe they care a little bit more about how dangerous
the situation is. Yeah, I agree, because no one in
your family, including your brothers. I know men don't love
to get involved in this kind of stuff, but they

(50:11):
are never going to be able to forgive themselves if
something happens to her.

Speaker 3 (50:14):
Yeah, I agree.

Speaker 1 (50:16):
So I'm sorry that we can't be of more help,
but like please.

Speaker 3 (50:19):
Just no, no, no, it's great.

Speaker 7 (50:20):
I mean, I appreciate the help that you have given
me because I've been kind of juggling this, like do
I just kind of bite my tongue and let it
write itself out and she'll finally realize, Like maybe the
next time she'll finally realize and actually leave him because
she's been so close. But at this point, it just
doesn't seem like it's going to happen. So I'm like,
I either need to go all in and say something
like you said, or I just need to kind of

(50:41):
fall back and let it come in between us and
maybe she'll realize on her own. But yeah, I don't
think that's going to happen.

Speaker 2 (50:47):
And you know, I wonder also, is she in therapy
by herself?

Speaker 7 (50:51):
No, you're willing to, and they have they have talked
about it and not have him, don't go with him,
just her Okay, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 (51:00):
It's some self esteem and self worth and an outside
person being like, I am brand new to this situation
and it's really bad and you need to get away
from it.

Speaker 3 (51:09):
Right, Yeah, Okay, I'll talk to her about that.

Speaker 1 (51:11):
Yeah, it's really hard.

Speaker 2 (51:13):
What you're going through is really really hard.

Speaker 3 (51:16):
Yeah, it's really hard.

Speaker 7 (51:17):
I mean juggling like all my life stresses and everything
I'm going through and then help her with hers too,
And obviously that's way more serious than anything I'm going through,
but it's it's just hard to be there and just
watch her continually do it.

Speaker 3 (51:29):
It's exhausting.

Speaker 1 (51:31):
Yeah, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry that you're dealing
with this. But keep us posted if there's any way
we can help in any way, you know, let us
know how it goes. And please just do not give
up on your sister.

Speaker 3 (51:43):
Okay, I won't.

Speaker 1 (51:44):
Okay, Senny, that's love, honey.

Speaker 2 (51:46):
Thanks Brittanyekay, thank you guys so much.

Speaker 3 (51:49):
Nice to meet you.

Speaker 1 (51:50):
Bye O.

Speaker 2 (51:52):
That one got me.

Speaker 1 (51:53):
That is very upsetting.

Speaker 2 (51:54):
It's really tough.

Speaker 1 (51:55):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (51:56):
When I was in an abusive relationship in college, it
took every single one of my friends from college who
knew this person, well, every single one of my girlfriends
from high school who didn't know him well but had
met him. Everyone in my family separately, all of them
saying he's not good for you. This is not a
good situation, this guy's no good. And it wasn't until

(52:19):
I had this realization of I think I love this person,
and if every single person in my life who loves
me is saying this isn't good for me, then maybe
I need to take a leap of faith and get
away from this.

Speaker 1 (52:31):
It's not even a leap of faith, though, you know.
I know it feels that way when you're subjected to
that kind of like a controlling behavior. But you have
to listen to the people in your life that love you.
You have to listen to them when they're saying, hey,
red flag, red flag. I wish my family would say
stuff more often. They don't. They're like, who could you
imagine giving you advice? You would never listen to us.

(52:52):
I'm like, actually I would. If you're concerned about my
well being, I want to know about it. Yeah, I
might blow you off, but especially with regard to of
like a romantic love interest, I would absolutely listen to
my family.

Speaker 2 (53:03):
Yeah, And I do think You're right, like being indefatigable,
being persistent with love and support, but also saying like
there's something better for you is you know, maybe you
wouldn't listen the first time, but you might listen the
second time or the third time. You know, people do
warm up to.

Speaker 3 (53:20):
Ideas, you know.

Speaker 2 (53:22):
Well, let's talk to Rachel. Rachel's thirty two, and she says,
Dear Chelsea, I'm having a hard time getting over a
good friend that recently ghosted me. I know she decided
to start back up an affair with a married man
and stop talking to all of her close friends. Now
it seems that she's resumed her normal life and she's

(53:43):
let everyone back in except for me. I was one
of the few people she spoke to about the affair before,
and for a very long time, she held the shame
of this affair by herself without telling a soul. My
suspicion is that she's let all of her friends back
in that didn't really know about the situation or won't
hold her accountable. She knows that what she's doing is wrong,
but she doesn't want to face the difficulty of ending

(54:04):
the affair for good. My question is related to the
anger that I'm holding on to. It's been about five
months and she's completely ghosted, and at this point, I
don't think our friendship is salvagable, nor do I want
to salvage a friendship with someone that acts like this.
But I can't help but feeling really angry that she's
resuming her other friendships and quote getting away with her behavior.

(54:24):
I feel like I'm being punished for being the type
of friend to hold people accountable. Do you have any
advice for how I can let this go and try
to not hold on to so much anger. We have
mutual friends and it's possible I'll have to cross paths
with her in the future, and I don't really want
to hold on to any more bad energy from the situation.

Speaker 1 (54:40):
Rachel Hi, Rachel Hi, Hi.

Speaker 2 (54:45):
So we just heard about your friends. It's been about
five months, right since you guys have talked, or has
been a little longer.

Speaker 4 (54:50):
Now, yeah, almost six months.

Speaker 1 (54:52):
I can relate to the anger that you're holding on to,
and I think the first step A is you acknowledging
that you are angry and that you want to let
go of it.

Speaker 3 (55:01):
Right.

Speaker 1 (55:01):
You don't want that running you, and you don't also
want your friend her choices, like you saying how you
feel or having judgment towards her about it. You know,
you could deal with that in one of two ways.
You can be like, oh, it's not my place to judge,
or you can have very strong opinions. I also have
very strong opinions. I also share my very strong opinions

(55:23):
with my friends all the time, and many times it
ends a friendship. Yeah, but it is more important for
me to be truthful and to be direct because we
live in a universe where there is a dearth of
directness and honesty. And so I think you did the
right thing by being true to yourself. You're not there
for her, you know what I mean In this instance,

(55:43):
you're there for yourself to say, Hey, this is icky.
I don't want to see you like this. If this
is her reaction to that, there's nothing to be angry about,
then you just have a clearer picture of what the
situation was to begin with. So any of the anger
is like you feeling rejected or you feeling devalue or
not valued enough, that's your stuff. Yeah, she's not giving

(56:04):
you any reason to be angry. She's not actively pursuing you,
engaging you gaslighting you. You're just mad, and either you
have to stand by your behavior and understand that that
sometimes will be the result when you are very honest
with people and be okay with that, or don't share
your honesty.

Speaker 4 (56:22):
Yeah.

Speaker 8 (56:23):
I kind of suspected also that my anger. Anger is
a little bit easier of an emotion to feel sometimes,
Like I think I'm choosing to feel angry when it's
just hard to face how sad of.

Speaker 4 (56:37):
A situation is.

Speaker 8 (56:38):
I mean, it's incredibly sad to lose a good friend,
So I suspect that that's kind of part of it too.

Speaker 1 (56:45):
Of course, of course, anger is just like a cover
for sadness or her. You know, that's exactly what it is,
and you're right to believe that. But I also you know,
there's a time, you know, you're morning of friendship. It's
been five months and might be another five months, but
there's the anger isn't going to serve you. You have
to start thinking about her in a loving, kindful way.

Speaker 6 (57:04):
You know.

Speaker 1 (57:04):
We talk about this loving kindness meditation that I've done.
I've done for people with friendships that have ended because
I don't want to have any ill will towards them
and I don't want that in my body. So it's
this thing. I don't know if you do you meditate
at all.

Speaker 8 (57:18):
I don't, but that sounds interesting.

Speaker 1 (57:20):
This is a good meditation for you to start with,
because this is an active meditation. You sit and you
think about somebody that's just random in the world, and
you send them It's like, I wish you a life
of ease, I wish you a life of safety, I
wish you a life of love, and you send them love.

Speaker 3 (57:37):
Right.

Speaker 1 (57:37):
You don't have to mean it, but you just practice it.
And then you think about someone who's really close to you,
like maybe your mother or a sibling or somebody you
really love. And then you think about a neutral person,
someone that you have no connection with, you know, like
somebody at work that you don't care what happens to
them either way. And you practice this and it's I
send you ease, I send you love, I send you

(58:00):
and I send you. May you have a life of ease,
May you have a life of joy, May you have
a life of safety. You send all of these messages
right to all the people, and then you go to
the difficult people, and this person is that difficult person,
and you hit that person, and if you do this
every single day, your anger will lift. Because it's a practice.

(58:22):
And it sounds like you're stuck, and that's very common
we all are, and the only way to get yourself
unstuck is to take the steps to do that. So
while this sounds maybe weird or you've never done anything
like this, please don't knock it until you try it,
because you'd be amazed that just sending healing energy out
into the world will shift your energy and will diminish

(58:43):
your anger.

Speaker 8 (58:44):
Yeah, that sounds like something that would really help. I mean,
I also think I'm frustrated because I don't feel like
I'm an angry person, so this is it. I've kind
of been stuck on it, but I think that that
could really help.

Speaker 1 (58:57):
It could, And sometimes we just have to shake ourselves
up out of a rut. And that's what you're in.
You're hurt and you're disappointed, and that's totally normal, and
guess what, that's part of life. It's going to happen again,
probably at some point, and you can't just bemoan the
situation over and over again, because then it starts to
eat away at you and then you're not giving out

(59:19):
your best vibes either, and you want to be available
for the people in your life that you are having
friendships with and relationships that are meaningful. And unfortunately this
happened with her, but you don't know what the future holds.
She could be back around in six months or two years.
And you saying it's unsalvageable. Nothing's unsalvageable unless there's murder involved,
you know, or rape. Like everything is salvageable. So that's

(59:43):
a defense mechanism as well. It's just better to be
at ease, like, Okay, she's living her life. It didn't
work out, She's for some reason is holding you know,
our friendship hostage or doesn't want to be friends with
me anymore. That's something you have to accept and now
you're going to move on.

Speaker 2 (59:59):
Yeah, and I think you are on the right path.
Like even recognizing sing that it's really hurt your feeling
that this anger is covering up. I think that's really good. Yeah, Chelsea.
Any advice for when you know, on the eventuality that
she does run into this friend.

Speaker 1 (01:00:15):
I think again, you know, you go to every if
you don't feel love towards someone, you have to like
fear hate, sadness, all of it. The opposite is love.
So if if you just look at her in a
loving way, like this is a girl that's going through
a really bad time having an affair with a married
man that's breaking up getting back together, that that's not
a good situation. So you have to kind of take

(01:00:36):
pity on her and say, oh, wow, like that's sad
that she has to live her life this way, not
in a judgmental way, in a kind of there's nothing
you can do about her life choices, right All you
can do is make sure you're making good choices. And
your good choices are going to include how to kind
of get past this and try to actively move past
this and just instead of just waiting for the feeling

(01:00:58):
to pass, because that's so many times what we do.
We're like, oh, it's important to have your feelings, and
then it's important to actively move on from them so
that you can move to the next thing. And you're
just feeling like this right now. Also, you won't feel
like this forever, I promise you. I've had breakups with
friends that were really painful, really disappointing. I didn't think
i'd ever get over them, and I'm sitting here today,

(01:01:19):
and you know, and I'm probably the healthiest time in
my entire life. So don't beat yourself up for any
of the feelings that you're having, but just always move
towards love and grace and kindness. And if she does
resurface in six months and she's not in that relationship anymore,
then you can receive her with love and grace.

Speaker 4 (01:01:37):
Yeah. Yeah, I think that's really helpful.

Speaker 1 (01:01:39):
And even if she is in that relationship and she resurfaces,
you can still receive her with love and grace, except
you have boundaries. You're not going to be in that
relationship with her because it's too hard for you to watch.

Speaker 2 (01:01:49):
Yeah, like I think you can see her, you can
say hi to her, you can give her a hug
at whatever this event is that you might run into her,
But then you know, you just dripped off and you
talk to other people. You know, you don't have to
have to get into anything.

Speaker 1 (01:02:00):
Yeah, you don't have to get anything. I think it's
always good to just be your best self so that
the next time that person sees you, they see, oh wow,
I miss that person, or she's doing great, she's not
hung up in my situation, she's you know, you know
what I mean. It's good to set an example and
it elevates you. Also inside, you feel better about yourself
when you can handle things with a plum and grace

(01:02:23):
instead of reactive or you know, icing somebody out and
all of that stuff. I've had a lot of experience
with all of those things. So you're young and growing
and smart, so I think you'll be You'll be just fine,
and hopefully she will be too.

Speaker 4 (01:02:39):
Yeah, I think that.

Speaker 8 (01:02:40):
I mean, I am kind of like centering myself in
my reaction to it, like ultimately, she's still maybe in
the midst of this very painful situation. So just trying
to remember that as well, and I forget that when
I get angry about it, because it's really like my
reaction to it.

Speaker 1 (01:03:00):
It is it is because you could have no reaction
to it. And also another thing is don't bound about her.
Don't talk about her at all, not to the friends
that have, you know, reconvened with her, Like, don't talk
shit about her. That's negative energy as well.

Speaker 4 (01:03:14):
Yeah, definitely, all right, Rachel.

Speaker 2 (01:03:17):
Was that helpful?

Speaker 5 (01:03:19):
Yes, very helpful.

Speaker 4 (01:03:20):
Thank you.

Speaker 1 (01:03:21):
Okay, honey, you'll be fine. Just start that meditation though,
do it every morning.

Speaker 8 (01:03:24):
Okay, I'm definitely going to That sounds great.

Speaker 1 (01:03:27):
I wish you a life of ease and then fill
it in with joy, safety and love. Thank you, okayans.

Speaker 2 (01:03:34):
Rachel Right, Oh, she's a sweetie. Yeah, let's take a
quick break and we will be right back to finish up.

Speaker 1 (01:03:45):
And we're back.

Speaker 4 (01:03:45):
We're back.

Speaker 1 (01:03:46):
Do you see how many different variations I'm trying.

Speaker 2 (01:03:49):
It's so many, Chelsea. Our last email comes from Melanie.
She says, I'm a thirty year old American woman from Colorado,
originally American woman. I recently moved to New Zealand for
a year long research fellowship. I was born to be
an ex pat and I've lived in Europe a couple
of times already. Though I've only been here in New

(01:04:09):
Zealand a couple of months. I am very happy here
and feel in my outdoorsy heart I could stay for
a long time. I booked a room in an Airbnb
for the first month in hopes that it could turn
into a longer term solution if all was going well.
My room is one of three in the owner's home,
and it turned out to be just perfect good price
for my very tight budget. Walking distance to work, and
just really lovely all around. The host is a kind

(01:04:31):
kiwi man, probably in his late forties, so twenty ish
year's difference. We instantly clicked in what I initially thought
was a brother sister type of way. He's physically not
who I'm typically attracted to, and while I've always thought
I'd be better off with an older guy, he initially
seemed a little too far out of my age range,
and being my landlord, of course, a romantic connection just

(01:04:52):
wasn't in the realm of possibility for me. Boy did
that change. We spent a lot of time together. I
found myself thinking about him a lot, and I recently
found that I'm very attracted to him. The forbidden nature
probably has something to do with it, but I also
think there might be more here. He seems to understand
me in a way I haven't experienced with most guys
closer to my age. If he also feels a romantic connection,

(01:05:13):
it's not obvious. He's been good about keeping it professional. However,
he did invite me on an upcoming trip to Asia.
Initially it was more of a i'll fit you in
my suitcase joking kind of way, but then it became
a real request, and now I've got a ticket to
join him later this year. Worth noting is that the
accommodation situation has yet to be discussed. My friends say
that if he's into me, he's unlikely to make a

(01:05:35):
move given the power dynamics, and I agree. The question
is do I make a move and how or do
I continue to let it play out and hope it
evolves organically. Something about this just seems right, Melanie, make
a move.

Speaker 1 (01:05:47):
Mane, make a move. But this is the only life
you get unless you believe in reincarnation. But even then
you don't even know what the fuck's going on.

Speaker 2 (01:05:54):
So yeah, according.

Speaker 1 (01:05:55):
To us as we speak, this is the only life
you've got. Yeah, make a move. What do you think
to lose?

Speaker 4 (01:06:00):
Do you?

Speaker 2 (01:06:01):
How do you do that?

Speaker 3 (01:06:01):
Do you just kiss him?

Speaker 2 (01:06:02):
Do you talk to him about it?

Speaker 1 (01:06:03):
I did you send like a flirty text or you
can say it in person? But like you definitely should
do it before Asia so you can find out what
that trip's going to be and how can that trip
Because also if he's not into you, which I doubt
he isn't, he sounds like he is. Usually when there's
chemistry it's reciprocated. If a woman feels it anyway, I
should say not this doesn't apply to straight men, but

(01:06:27):
it's usually reciprocated. Like you know, the chemistry is called
chemistry because it's going back and forth between two people
or electricity or however you want to describe it. But
you should go for it. You could send him a
flirty text and be like, hey, I was just thinking
about you and I realized I've been thinking about you
a lot. M h you. You know, like it can

(01:06:48):
be as innocent as that, or you can be flirty
and more sexual about it or whatever. But you or
you can lay it out and go, hey, as you
may know, we have a cute little relationship going. I
know that I'm the renter and you're the rentee, or
he's the renter, she's the rent.

Speaker 2 (01:07:03):
The landlord like that she's a landlord.

Speaker 1 (01:07:05):
I used to do it one of my landlords. And
I know that it might not be appropriate for you
to ever make a move on me, so I'm just
putting it out there. I'm open to a move being
made on me.

Speaker 2 (01:07:15):
Uh huh. I love that.

Speaker 1 (01:07:16):
That's cute.

Speaker 2 (01:07:17):
I honestly, I think it's more because he's older than
her rather than the landlord thing. The power dynamic language
kind of makes me talk.

Speaker 1 (01:07:23):
About the power dynamic because he's the landlord. Yes, that's
not a power dynamic. First of all, you.

Speaker 2 (01:07:30):
Know, he probably feels like a little bit of like,
oh she's too young for me sort of thing. Yeah,
he's a nice guy. That's probably exactly what.

Speaker 1 (01:07:37):
But I guess that is. You know, I shouldn't say
it's not a power dynamic, because it is for many people,
you know, a power dynamic, the landlord thing, the landlord thing,
because that's somebody who's like you're paying rent to.

Speaker 2 (01:07:46):
But he's an ARABNB host, all right.

Speaker 1 (01:07:52):
I just think power dynamic in age. I think that's
true unless you're an employer. I mean, unless you have
a hold over on one. That's why. Okay, whatever, we
can parse what a power dynamic is at another time.
But anyway, make your move, sister, Yes, go after it.
And that's today's episode. Dear Yelseye. Okay, guys, we have

(01:08:13):
added more shows to my Little Big Bitch Tour because
I'm coming all over. We added a second show at
the Pantagius in Los Angeles, So that's October twelfth and
Friday the thirteenth. We added a second show in Boston
at the Wayne Center. September twenty ninth and thirtieth is
two shows in New York. I also have a show
in East Hampton, New York August twenty six. We added

(01:08:35):
a second show in Portland, So Thursday November tewod Friday
November third, and Portland November fourth and fifth in San Francisco,
two shows there. We added a second show in Seattle
November tenth and eleventh. Two shows Boston are November sixteenth
and seventeenth at the Bach Center at Wang Theater. And
I'm also coming to Toronto and Montreal and Ottawa and

(01:09:01):
so many other cities Columbus, Cincinnati, Detroit, Louisville. So I
will see everybody at all of these shows. Thank you.
Get your tickets at Chelseahandler dot com.

Speaker 2 (01:09:12):
Courtney Cope's input is general psychological information based on research
and clinical experience. It's intended to be general and informational
in nature. It does not represent or indicate an established
clinical or professional relationship with those inquiring for guidance. Courtney's
feedback is in response to a written question, and therefore
there are likely unknown considerations given the limited context. Also,

(01:09:35):
just because you might hear something on the show that
sounds similar to what you're experiencing, beware of self diagnosis.
Diagnosis is not required to find relief, and you'll want
to find a qualified professional to assess and explore diagnoses
if that's important to you. If you or your partner
are in crisis and uncertain of whether you can maintain safety,
reach out for support like crisis hotlines and local authorities

(01:09:57):
have a safety plan that can be done with a
therapist too. If you'd like advice from Chelsea, shoot us
an email at Dear Chelsea podcast at gmail dot com
and be sure to include your phone number. Dear Chelsea
is edited and engineered by Brad Dickard executive producer Catherine
Law and be sure to check out our march at
Chelseahandler dot com

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