EP. 171 — I’ve Never Told Anyone

[00:00:00] CHRIS: Support for today’s show comes from the Life is Good Ping podcast. Join co-founders of Life is Good Burton John Jacobs. They talk to influential musicians, athletes, business leaders and everyday people about the role of optimism in their lives. They’ll also end each episode with a ping pong charity challenge where the winner gets to donate to their charity of choice. And as a lifelong Ping-Pong enthusiast. I’m all for that. Life is good. Ping podcast kicks off Thursday, June 13th with the legendary Ringo Starr! That’s a get for your first guest! Subscribe now and stitcher Spotify or I tunes and add some good vibes to your day.

[00:00:40] CHRIS: Hello to everybody out there who’s definitely strong enough to get the help they need. Beautiful Anonymous one hour, one phone call, no names, no holds barred.

[00:00:52] THEME MUSIC: I’d rather go one on one, I think it’ll be more fun, and I’ll get to know you, and you’ll get to know me.

[00:01:04] CHRIS: Hi, everybody. Chris Gethard. Welcome to another episode of Beautiful Anonymous. Before we get into anything else, I want to warn you that this episode is going to be hard for some people. We have a very in-depth and frank discussion of eating disorders, and I know that that can be a real head spinning discussion for a lot of people out there. So just know that if you’re not ready to hear that or you’re in the midst of any personal struggles with that particular issue, that this one might not be for you or it might very much be the one for you if you are ready to hear it. But if you’re not ready to hear it, it is all good. And you may want to just wait till next week’s episode. Touch back with the show. Talk more about this week’s episode momentarily. I do want to say thanks to everybody who listened to last week’s episode, which was a no guidebook to grief. Of course, our British caller reconciling her relationship with her deceased father had to come to terms with unresolved stuff and also quite a discussion of a three legged cat. There were a bunch of people in the comments on Facebook, the Beautiful Anonymous Facebook community, a lot of people saying, you know, I had a similar situation with my parents, with her and are offering some some some shoulders to lean on for the caller in a way that I couldn’t. Having not been through it. So thank you again to everybody in the Facebook community who who steps up and helps each other out. And it’s become such a and a warm place for conversations about the calls and things surrounding the calls and means a lot that you just stepped up. Also, like this comment from from David: Caller, as a fellow Essex resident, your faux posh phone voice is very, very impressive. So you’re also inhaling the various english accents with a big thumbs up from your countrymen. Thanks again, Carl. Thanks to everybody who’s been listening to the new Chris Gethard PRESENTS the podcast. That’s been very fun. Not sure if I’m going to get to keep doing more, but it means the world that you guys been supporting, the ones that are out there. This week’s episode, we want to warn you, it’s a very hard one to navigate for me as a facilitator of the call. I’m sure there will be moments for you as a listener specifically because the caller makes clear she hasn’t really opened up about this with anyone in her real life. This show is the most in-depth she’s talking about it. That’s hard to know how to handle, I did my best, I think, at the end of the day. The thing that makes me feel very hopeful for this caller, proud of this caller on some level is that I think there are other people out there who might get something out of it. There’s people who who maybe have people in their lives who deal with similar issues. You might understand them a little bit more. There might be people out there who are who are struggling with something similar in their own personal experience, and maybe it will help them feel motivated to go and get help on their own. So. Caller, I just want to say, if you’re listening back to this one, I am so impressed at your bravery in sharing this. I am really, really hoping that you get help. If there’s anybody else out there who needs help, understand that there’s resources out there from trained professionals who sit down with you one on one to the many resources you could find with a quick Google search online. Find that help you can get through it. I’m not going to say enjoy this call. It’s a tough topic. I will say I really hope you get something out of it, even if it’s as simple as some empathy for other people.

[00:04:29] PHONE ROBOT: Thank you for calling Beautiful Anonymous a beeping noise will indicate when you are on the show with the host.

[00:04:37] CHRIS: Hello. 

[00:04:38] CALLER: Hello.

[00:04:41] CHRIS: Hi. How’s it going?

[00:04:44] CALLER: It’s okay. It’s good. Hey, how are you?

[00:04:51] CHRIS: I’m very happy, but I am so, so exhausted, so tired.

[00:04:56] CALLER: Okay, why are you tired?

[00:04:59] CHRIS: Well, I have a nine week old son and he’s kind of calling the shots on when I get to sleep. And I think I the past three nights, I haven’t gotten more than four hours of sleep.

[00:05:08] CALLER: Oh, my God. But it’s so worth it.

[00:05:11] CHRIS: It’s the best. He rules so hard. But I’ll tell you what. Last night, it was my fault. Last night, he woke up about 2:00 in the morning. He needed a diaper change, and then he went back to sleep pretty quickly. And I realized I now have a mental block where I was unable to go back to sleep, even though he did. And I was so mad at myself, I was up til five. I was so mad at myself. He’s sleeping, you have to sleep!

[00:05:38] CALLER: Oh, my God.

[00:05:39} CHRIS: And then as soon as you think to yourself, “you have to sleep!” You ain’t sleeping.

[00:05:45] CALLER: Yeah. I don’t have kids, but I am a nanny and a babysitter. I work at a daycare, I do all that stuff. So have my fair share of cute kids with explosive diarrhea, but for watching them sleep I know it sounds crazy, but I love watching them sleep, especially when they’re so tiny. There’s just something about that.

[00:06:08]CHRIS: It’s pretty cool. It’s pretty cool.

[00:06:13] CALLER: Yeah, so how’s it feel to be a dad?

[00:06:15] CHRIS: Feels really good. I tell you. Feels really good. It’s pretty awesome. He laughs now. Yeah, once he started smiling and laughing that was a game changer. It was like, now I can connect with him. He’s the best

[00:06:34] CALLER: Is it always like the farting laughs where they get gas and end up smiling? 

[00:06:40] CHRIS: That was in the early days. Yeah, now, right around like week six or seven, it started to be a thing where I could be like, oh my God, look at his outfit and I have like a giraffe on his onesie. I’ll be like “Damn, you know you look good, right?!” And he’ll start laughing. And I’m like, I made a joke. And he laughed at the joke. And it’s like the best he can hear in my tone of voice that it’s a joke and he’s laughing and great!

[00:07:02] CALLER: It’s at 12 weeks you can try out new material on him.

[00:07:08] CHRIS: Yeah, it’s true, it’s true. I can start telling him funny anecdotes about what it was like growing up in New Jersey. We’ll see if he digs it.

[00:07:14] CALLER: Yeah, he’d be a good sounding board.

[00:07:16] CHRIS: See if he likes it. But anyway.

 [00:07:20] CALLER: Yeah, has he gone with you to meet the family at all?

[00:07:21] CHRIS: Yeah. He’s he’s met his uncles and some of his cousins and his grandparents. He’s doing good. I feel like people, people are probably sick of hearing me rant and rave about this kid. People are probably tired.

[00:07:34] CALLER: No, babies are the best.

[00:07:37] CHRIS: It’s pretty cool. It’s pretty cool. Yeah. I wish we weren’t using the cloth diapers. I know they’re better for the environment, but in every other way, they’re a goddamn nightmare. Outside of that, no complaints.

[00:07:48] CALLER: Yeah, they’re they’re a wreck. I, I tried to use them once for my nephew and they were a nightmare. So props to you. I’ve just kind of decided to trash the environment on that one.

[00:08:00] CHRIS: Yeah, it’s just that the second he pees he’s like “Get this thing off me, It’s a wet rag.” And I’m like, I get it. I get why you’re mad about this man. Let’s get some of those absorbent, absorbent cotton, things that sit in landfills and never biodegrade. Let’s get some of those. Anyway, tell me about you. Help me, take me to a place where I’m not uber focused on baby stuff because it’s all I think about, so this is an opportunity for me to hear what you have to say and that’ll be a nice hour of my life.

[00:08:33] CALLER: All right. Well, right now, I’m sitting on a living floor of a house in an undisclosed location in the USA, with my dog on my lap. I’m a college student. So I’ve got one more year to go until I’m out of there and the student loans hit, but I’m home for the summer. I don’t know, I feel so weird, I’d listen to the podcast all the time and you feel like you know what you’re going to say until you have to say it and then I don’t know what to do anymore. But. Yeah, I’m in school for music and performance. So that’s been… It’s been really great to pursue my passion, and I have a mother who’s supportive of me doing that, which is really rare in this field, but it’s also hard not to compare yourself to everyone, which I automatically do. Even though I tell myself not to. I’m sure you understand a lot of that, being in the entertainment industry. It’s hard when your job isn’t just, you know, knowing Excel spreadsheets and running numbers, and it’s more about person to person comparison. And so that’s one of the things that I’ve really struggled with. And I know I do it to myself, it’s not just the industry. But starting in high school, I actually started a pretty bad eating disorder, my junior year of high school and it’s still alive and kicking. Unfortunately. And I can’t blame it all on the industry that I’m in because it started before then, but it is hard to be surrounded by people who look the way you want to be because there’s something really aspirational about an eating disorder. I don’t think I’m articulating it very well, but I know that every time I listen to an episode of your podcast, I’ve been really interested in the things that people had to say about their personal lives or their mental health, and that’s one thing that’s really weighed on me since I’ve never told anyone in my personal life about this. So since I’m anonymous, I figured, why not?

[00:10:59] CHRIS:  Yeah. Well, I’ll do my best to keep this an environment that feels safe to talk about it. I thank you for your trust in opening up. As always, with topics like these, I want to just say both for you and anyone listening. I am aware I’m not a professional and I’m here to listen, but I’m not qualified to help. Oftentimes my first question, when, when when things in this sphere come up is, are you… You say you haven’t been talking to people in your personal life about it. But have you… Have you talked to professionals about it?

[00:11:32] CALLER: That’s another thing. I do see a counselor and she doesn’t know about it. And I know it’s like self sabotage, but I’m just… there’s this nagging fear in me that if I tell anyone like this image that I’ve built up, there’s just going to crash right down. And I don’t like that. I mean, I know I have anxiety and she knows about that and she’s been very helpful in getting me to face the issues that I have there and I’m on medication, that’s really helpful. And she’s provided me a lot of insight and techniques so that when I do get anxiety, I know how to handle it better. But to the separate issue of the eating disorder is just something that I’ve never… felt safe enough to approach, and I don’t know why that is.

[00:12:28] CHRIS: Wow. Well, this is, uh. This is a touchy one then, because, I mean… and, you know this is coming from me… If you’ve listened to the show is I really hope you let the counselor in on this. And it’s one of those things where I’m sure you are are intellectually aware that that needs to happen at some point, even if emotionally you’re not ready yet.

[00:12:57] CALLER: Wow. Yeah.

[00:13:02] CHRIS: Because I’ve yet to… I mean, because I would have to imagine, again, I don’t really know what I’m talking about, but I would have to imagine that there’s some… Some… I’ve always gotten the sense that there’s some element of an eating disorder that’s about being in control and maybe you’re not ready to give that side of it up yet. I don’t know. But you also, I think, you also have to know that it’s not healthy and it doesn’t end well.

[00:13:34] CALLER: Yeah, I… I’m aware of that for sure. And it’s so frustrating because I feel like I’m still on top of it and I’m so aware of it. And then at the same time, I’m not. I’m making stupid choices by not telling people and by continuing the same pattern of habit because, you know, there’s… there’s that line from people who have addictive behaviors by saying, you know, “I can stop whenever I want.” And I feel like that’s the place that I’ve been for years now and it’s not OK. And I know that it’s not OK. But knowing doesn’t mean doing. That’s been difficult and, yeah, I mean, people have briefly known about it. My best friend found out maybe two months into me doing it when it began in high school, and she pulled me aside and talked to me. And so I stopped for a brief amount of time. Then I just saw the way my body is changing again and I felt… like you said, like there’s such a loss of control about my image and what I could do to look a certain way and be perceived a certain way that I just picked it right back up again. And there were spurts where it did stop. The longest was maybe four months and I felt really good and I felt so much lighter mentally and I felt more productive. Like, if my mind wasn’t constantly overtaken with what am going to eat today and where am I going to hide it and when am I going to throw up? And it was more about: what can I create? What work can I do? What can I put in to my community? And then, at that time, I was working at a theater in Nashville and I really loved it and I felt so fulfilled. And then at the end of my internship there, I saw a picture of myself. And instead of looking at the smile on my face or the joy of the people around me or the work that we just created, I saw how much weight I gained and it was like 20 pounds. And I just lost it. And I spiraled again. And since then, it’s been… a really nonstop. process of just waking up in the morning and my first thought is to see what my body looks like in the mirror. And then, you know, putting my hand around my wrist, making sure the fingers touch. Go downstairs. The only meal that I usually end up keeping down is breakfast, because it’s something healthy and then the rest of the day, it’s just this constant battle of back and forth of like eating all these foods that I’ve labeled in my mind as bad or restricted. So I hide away and eat them and then hide the evidence and then purge. And I feel really ashamed of it. And I feel like saying this out loud is really nice to someone who doesn’t know me because I feel like if I said this, these exact words to any of my friends in the detail that I’m telling you, I would feel crazy. And I also would feel like they would be monitoring me from now on, like, which I know it’s good to have somebody to be accountable to, but at the same time, I would feel almost like a burden, but more like they couldn’t treat me like me any more, like they would have to tiptoe around me. And that’s not something I want it. I don’t want to be fragile or damaged. So I just don’t say anything. And I keep hoping that I’ll be able to work this out on my own. Even though I’m clearly not able to.

[00:17:38]  CHRIS: Well, there’s a lot to unpack and what you just said. It’s a lot to talk about. So it’s not… just so I’m clear you said purging. So you’re… this is this bulimia? Like my understanding that that’s when you you’re so you will eat in front of other people and then you kind of go off in private and you bring it back up.

[00:18:00] CALLER: Yep. 

[00:18:01] CHRIS: Can I ask what kind of music you do?

[00:18:05] CALLER: It’s actually musical theater. Off Broadway jazz hands stuff.

[00:18:08] CHRIS: So you’re singing?

[00:18:09] CALLER: Yeah.

[00:18:12] CHRIS: Well, that’s a thing right there. First of all, I’ll say, because one of the things I’ve always heard about, bulimia in particular, is you’re bringing up all the stomach acids and you can really screw up your vocal chords. So this is… this is counterproductive, not just health wise, but also part of this is fueled by… by your desire to, you know, in a career where I mean, as someone who who performs publicly, I understand like you… you… you kind of glance that side eye towards that next person and go, “I gotta.. I got to feel like I’m matching whatever I see in them that other people might be admiring in them “for whatever reason. But this is also something that’s counterproductive because this could really damage your instrument at the end of the day. Right. 

[00:18:52] CALLER: Yeah.

[00:18:35] CHRIS: Have you felt those effects, have you ever felt like… Because it sounds like if this started… based on you told me you have a year college left started… what, about four or five years ago? Pretty consistently this has been happening?

[00:19:05] CALLER: Yeah, four years.

[00:19:07] CHRIS: So four years doing it. Are you feeling those physical effects because that’s, that’s, I mean… if you’re doing this for your career in some sense, there’s some counterproductive thinking there. Because… because you’re gonna you’re gonna hurt… You’re gonna hurt your long term ability to sing and do this anyway.

[00:19:26] CALLER: Absolutely. I mean. I haven’t felt too much of an effect on my vocal cords. Thankfully. I don’t know why, but I haven’t. But I’ve seen the effect in other ways. If I eat a lot at one point and then I just purge it all and then don’t get something back in me in the next half an hour, I will start shaking. I’ll feel lightheaded. And so I feel those effects very strongly. For a while in high school, I would be very intensely throwing up and I’d sit there, I don’t think it’s like burst blood vessel, but there would be white spots on my forehead from how hard I was forcing myself. And it’s had an impact on my teeth.

[00:20:36] CHRIS: Yeah.

[00:20:41] CALLER: Which is horrible, but… I think it’s beyond like I’m doing this for my career at this point. It’s just… I’m doing it for me and my need for control, a need to project a specific image to anyone.

[00:20:56] CHRIS: Yeah. I hear ya. You’re in, at this point, you’re in over your head. It’s beyond that justification. Let me say a couple other things, too, based on what you said when used when you were sort of laying out what’s going on. Couple of things I just want to say, just my opinions here, is at one point, you said something along the lines of, you know, people might think it’s crazy. And I just want to say. It’s not. A lot of people deal with it. And. I don’t think… I don’t think it’s crazy. I think it comes from somewhere and there’s a lot of people who work hard to push through it, and it would be like saying that any other disease is crazy. It’s not crazy, it’s thing you’re dealing with. And the other thing you said is that sometimes it might tempt you to feel shamed. And I would just say I don’t think that that’s necessary either. I don’t think there’s any shame in having an uphill battle in terms of stuff like this. I don’t think you need to feel any shame and I don’t think you need to feel crazy. I want to put that out there right away.

[00:22:01] CALLER: Thank you. There is a lot that I understand intellectually about it, and again, that it’s an addictive behavior. And I’m in over my head and I know that this is a form of mental illness and that it’s something that other people go through. And I’m very much a hypocrite where I can give out advice, but I can’t take my own. And in that same vein, I love my friends and I support them. And I think they’re beautiful no matter what their body size. And I see them and I just think they’re so special and so unique and so beautiful, I don’t want any of them to change, but I cannot apply that same view to myself. So I know that there’s a layer of, you know, self-hatred or whatever you want to call it. But. I don’t even know where this tangent is leading, but it’s so hard to take in what you’re saying and apply it to myself because I think on a level I just can’t believe it about myself.

[00:23:07] CHRIS: Well, I get it and I identify with that because I tell you, I never had an eating disorder, but I’ve had some mental struggles. And what you just said… I think it’s one of the harder things to explain to people, which is this idea of, like you said, like, I can intellectually understand a vast array of dangers and our vast array of bad endings to this, like, intellectually, I get them all. But emotionally, my response to that is to almost double down and keep it more of a secret and sort of bet on that and kind of… I don’t know if it’s the same with an eating disorder, but I know that with my depression, when it’s at its worse, it kind of convinces me that it’s my only friend. And even though I intellectually understand that I should be fighting out of it, I almost dive in deeper because it’s sort of the only thing I trust, even while understanding on a very cerebral level. It’s the last thing I should trust. This ends poorly. But that’s part of, I think, of why it’s a sickness and why there’s doctors that help you unwrap it. So I say I get it. I get what you’re saying. And I’m not even sure what to say because I identify so greatly with what you’re saying, and I know that anything I say, you’re gonna go, “Yup, I hear ya. That doesn’t change the fact that the sort of maelstrom of emotions inside my head are not gonna let me act on what I know is a healthy thing to do, intellectually.”

[00:24:39] CALLER: Yeah, you kind of hit the nail on the head there. It’s not something that we can talk ourselves out of or just rely on ourselves to take care of even though we want to. And, well, I don’t expect you to say anything, like, that’s life changing. I don’t want to put that burden on you.

[00:24:59] CHRIS: No, that’s not the gig. Thanks for taking that weight off my shoulders that I don’t have to save every individual caller. That’s always good to know that you’re not expecting that. But I do want to be someone you can lean on. I do want to be someone you can bounce ideas off of for the next 40 minutes. I would love to provide that. I do also wonder… This started when you were in high school and I wonder what it’s like to be a high school student today. I had a cousin who was in high school to graduate a year or two ago and like she was on Snapchat all the time. And Instagram, like all these things that are just, all these visual mediums where it seems like kids communicate and sort of judge each other. Do you think that it’s… Is that something that’s putting kids more in their heads based on your experience?

[00:25:55] AD BREAK

[00:29:23] CHRIS: Instagram, like all these things that are just, all these visual mediums where it seems like kids communicate and sort of judge each other. Do you think that it’s… Is that something that’s putting kids more in their heads based on your experience?

[00:29:37] CALLER: I think so, yeah. I mean, I used Instagram and Snapchat since maybe eighth grade. So that was a part of my my life and my daily routine since then, I was pretty well integrated into my life throughout high school. So I don’t want to put all the blame on there because it didn’t start until junior year of high school. But even from a young age and maybe it is because, you know, I am interested in the performing arts field. But from a young age, I looked at a lot of celebrities and a lot of influencers and their bodies and really took note of how they looked. And I really internalized that because looking back, even at the things that I tried to replicate, like in middle school or something like trying to find the exact outfit that I saw a model where at a paparazzi shot, not because I really love fashion, but because I was trying so desperately to look like her. But my body didn’t look like that because I’m 14 and I’m 5 foot nothing, and I’m a hundred and twenty pounds and I’m going through puberty. Look, I’m not a Victoria’s Secret model, but it felt again and again like that was what I should be. And I wasn’t one of the popular girls at school, and that’s fine, but they did seem to all have that similar body type. And you feel like over time, at least for me, that you start to correlate that social status or popularity or individual worth to be something that’s equal to the size of their body or the shape of their body. And so I think I just began to associate with that and think that for like a specific guy to like me or my friends to like me more or to feel better accepted by groups of people or to be thought of as a better person, I had to look a certain way. And if think that’s something that I still hold, even though I know it’s not necessarily true. But that stuff is so pervasive through magazines and that led to Instagram and Snapchat being like the same kind of things, especially Instagram. So we follow all these celebrities and they’re constantly promoting, like, detox teas or these ridiculous fitness plans that people with a 9 to 5 job can’t follow or face-tuning the hell out of their pictures. And then someone like me not understanding why I can’t look like that. That was something that that began impacting me for sure.

[00:32:38] CHRIS: I hate that. I hate that so much.

[00:32:42] CALLER: Me too.

[00:32:43] CHRIS: So much. It’s fake those people don’t even look like that 30 seconds after they take their picture either because people are…

[00:32:50] CALLER: Oh, yeah, I know. All my friends and I would..

[00:32:56] CHRIS: Your friends and you would what?

[00:32:57] CALLER: Yeah. Oh. Even in like 9th or 10th grade, we would get together and, like, get dressed up, like, on a Saturday afternoon and we’d just find a place to take pictures so that we could get pictures of ourselves to, like, post on Instagram and stuff like that. Like, we’re just casually hanging out with, like, four inch heels and lipstick on. Even though we’re 15 on like a Saturday afternoon in the Midwest against the brick school of an elementary school building. Like, that’s it. That’s all we did. We spent three hours there taking pictures of one another until we found the three that we liked most about ourselves and then posted those online. And that… that was like a very common thing and super habitual to, like, get yourself working your best and then spend a ridiculous amount of time trying to take the perfect picture so you could project this image of yourself and that’s a lot of social media, but especially Instagram. And that was a huge thing in high school. So maybe… maybe that definitely did impact how I tried to carry myself in the real world because you can’t bring that picture to life… But I wanted to.

[00:34:18] CHRIS: Man, it’s not easy, I tell you two things, it’s not easy to be in 2019. Young, and female. Neither one of those things is made easy.

[00:34:29] CALLER: Yeah.

[00:34:30] CHRIS: None of that is made easy, and that sucks. And historically, I think it’s never, you know, it’s always been made harder… for as long as I can remember… and it seems like well before that it always has seemed like, you know, women get the raw end the deal compared to men with body image stuff. And it seems to me like even within the past 20 years, we haven’t realized how hard it is for young people right now. Because we sit here and we judge them and roll our eyes at them? And then also there’s all these technologies that rear up and then put them in these positions where it’s having a mental effect that people might even my age, 39 years old. I didn’t grow up with that stuff. I don’t know the effect it had. And I think… I don’t think people… I don’t think people totally understand that effect. And it sucks, sucks to be young and it specifically sucks to be young and female, or young and female identifying because there’s so much pressure. There’s so much pressure. That sucks. That sucks.

[00:35:36] CALLER: There really is. And I feel like so much of it is internalized now. It’s not a blanket statement. You don’t watch a TV show and have somebody like break the fourth wall and look directly to a camera and say that, you know, you only matter based on the size of your body. But for the people that we see represented in TV and movies, that seems to be the case. And even one thing that really gets me is like these teen dramas like the CW shows, all those, are like these 26 year old ripped actors playing 15 and I remember in high school and that would kill me. At the time, Glee was pretty popular, so I even went so far as to get like the Rachel Berry bang because I thought maybe that would make me look more like her. And instead, I was like a coconut head. But all of us were just trying to emulate these adult version of kids. And so we never really got to be kids. And now that we’re becoming adults, it just kind of seems like a lot of people are… Kind of floundering, I don’t know, because we again, it’s just like a lot of media stuff. But we’re shown bodies that aren’t real, and then the versions of ourselves that we’re given aren’t attainable until we’re in our mid 20s, and so I feel like we’re just chasing after a lot of ideals that we’ve been told are possible, but they’re not. It leaves us feeling really confused and anxious about ourselves and our own words.

[00:37:17] CHRIS: It’s not attainable in your mid 20s, what you just said was beautiful and profound and and wise beyond your years. I do want to just jump in and say when you when you’re going, “Eh, you can’t really get that until your mid 20s.” Can’t get it then. Because maybe you can, maybe you can become you know, maybe you can go and hit the gym more often and you know, now you’re an adult setting your own schedule 100 percent without school in the way, scheduling in the way, whatever. But the thing that I find over and over again when it comes to insecurities is that you could wind up, you could wind up with a 12 pack and as, you know, sculpted muscles where you’ve managed to shape your body in every way you’ve dreamed of and you’re going to look in the mirror and go shit. It didn’t put out any of the fires. Now, what happens? And I can tell you that happens because that’s happened to me so many times and I bet so many listeners would vouch for that, that their version of whatever makes them insecure and, and that’s… Something I really hope that maybe sticks in your head, which is that this idea that we’re chasing an ideal and that we’ll get there and then we’ll be at the top of the mountain and feel like that victory came. That’s one of the biggest fallacies. I think that there’s, you know, we’re always taught to be dreamers who can go out and conquer things and accomplish our goals, especially as American kids. It’s not real. It’s not real. I wish I’d learned that earlier in my life. It’s not real! I made… so much of my anxiety is driven by career, and I’ve realized so many times. I have, I have had my own TV show. It didn’t fix a thing about me. I had a special on HBO. That’s the mountain top for a comedian. Didn’t fix the thing about me, as little Geth said, at least two or three times a week through a concerning degree. Nothing’s going to fix it. So you gotta learn to live with who you are and you got to learn to embrace who you are and let this chase go because it’s exhausting mentally for what you’re dealing with even more than most of us. It’s exhausting physically. And I, I know you know this. So why even say it? But it’s not worth it because it’s getting in the way of who you could really be. You’re sitting here trying to shape yourself into something that, you know, has been kind of installed via society’s bullshit expectations of what a young lady needs to look like. But you also know in your heart it’s not even real. And you could get there… is not… because at the end of the day… It doesn’t… That doesn’t matter, and you might get there someday and you’re going and… But you know this! You already know this. So what? What am I saying? I’m not trying to judge because it’s a thing that we both know.

[00:40:05] CALLER: It is.

[00:40:08] CHRIS: How do you hide it? Like, you mentioned that it’s affected your teeth. So what do you say to the dentist? Like, I’m sure you’ve gone and gotten physicals in the past four years from doctors. I’m sure when you put on, you know, when you were working in Nashville and you put on a healthier amount of weight and then it went away very quickly, your family has to notice that. So how are you justifying this to people?

[00:40:31]CALLER: Thankfully, the thing about Nashville… well, not thankfully, thankfully from the disordered mind. But after Nashville, I jumped into a different internship that, again, was away from home. And I spent a couple months there and a lot of my commute was on foot. So when I came back home, I was able to just say, you know, I was moving a lot. A lot of my job was physical, which was true. Again, I was working on a stage and I was working long days, really long hours. And so I could just say, like, I didn’t get to eat a lot, you know, and, you know, just make up excuses like half truths, half lies and then kind of change the subject. And, you know, make a joke about Southern soul food and how it really got to me and now I’m eating clean again, you know.

[00:41:35] CHRIS: Mm hmm. And what about what about…

[00:41:38] CALLER: It’s, unfortunately, easier than you think.

[00:41:40] CHRIS: What about the doctors and the dentists? What about the, what about the medical professionals that… Because you have to have seen a doctor, you have and you have to have seen a dentist. What about the people who you would think are maybe a little more equipped through their training to red flag some of this flag?

[00:41:59] CALLER: Well, I would get horribly anxious going to the dentist, especially. It didn’t start affecting my teeth until last year and last summer, one of my front teeth chipped. And I went to the dentist and said that I chipped it on a really stale bagel. They didn’t ask any questions and it was fine. So it’s fixed. And then as for the doctor… I only go like once a year just to get checked up, make sure everything’s all good. So by the time that I had lost a bunch of weight the first time, it had been over the span of a year to them. So they didn’t notice anything ridiculously out of order, even though I had lost over 30 pounds. So, when I regained about 20 pounds after Nashville, I hadn’t gone to see a doctor just because I was jumping from job to job. So the time that I saw a doctor again, I was back down to the disordered weight.

[00:43:09] CHRIS: And it’s you know, because I did… you did catch yourself. Well, thankfully, the dentist… And then you went, no, not thankfully. Which I think is, again, one of those things that I think is true of a lot of mental illness. This idea of like, OK, am I going to be able to pull off hiding this so I can keep it going? You know, your own unhealthy behaviors that you’re aware of. Is, is there any part of you that is hoping one of them calls you out some day? Is there a part of you that when you go to your counselor or your dentist or whomever or you see your family? Is there any part of you that that wants to get caught so that the weight can come off your shoulders? Or are you not there yet?

[00:43:47] CALLER: Almost. I, I wouldn’t necessarily be opposed to my counselor finding out just because I’m under 26. I’m still my mom’s health care. I’m on her insurance. And if it happened at the dentist or the doctor. I think I’d be way more scared if they were to find out, because I really don’t want my Mom to find out. And not in a way, because I think she’d try to punish me or get mad. But I think that she’d be very hurt and upset with herself for not seeing it, and I don’t want that. So if it were a friend or my counselor, I think I’d be fine with that. But yeah, although this this past semester I had two roommates and we were very close friends going into the semester and then by the end we’d become kind of distant because we were going through our own individual things. So we got together one night to talk and kind of clear the air about what’s going on individually and how we can support each other. And I broke down and cried and I said that my self image and my thoughts about my body had just been on a severe downslide and that I had become bulimic and that I was counting every calorie that I took in and I would wake up thinking about what I was going to eat and where I was going to eat it. And, you know, I’d lived the whole day, just like in a fog of hating myself. But even then, as I was like being the most open and raw that I’ve been with anyone in a while, I still lied and said that it was five weeks ago. And that it was mainly because of seeing myself on camera in this one specific class, and that’s why I hate that class and, you know, now I’m OK, but it’s still hard and I still, like, think this way. But I’m not doing it because, again, I didn’t want them to start tiptoeing around me or anything like that and even telling you as much as I did, I was terrified. But they were really kind about it and they were very supportive. But I just. I don’t know if it’s because I don’t already stop, or if it’s because I’m worried about a deeper sense of shame. If they know that it’s a current issue.

[00:46:33] CHRIS: Yeah. So you almost, you almost sort of let, you almost sort of let the cat out of the bag and then found a way to reframe it so it would go back in a little bit.

[00:46:41] CALLER: Yep.

[00:46:43] CHRIS: Yeah, I’ve been there. I want to react to something you said and it might be, might be tough. But again, we have not walked the same path. But I have my version of it. You mentioned your mom, and it sounds like, it sounds like your mom really cares about you because you said you would feel so bad hurting her for not noticing.

[00:47:05] CALLER: Mmhm.

[00:47:08] CHRIS: Would you say that’s true, that your mom has your back? In life?

[00:47:14] CALLER: Yeah. Yes, she does.

[00:47:16] CHRIS: So I’m gonna tell, you just on my end… Again, judgment free. Just, just something for you to think about. My number one regret, absolutely, probably in my whole life, is that I underestimated my parents when I was dealing with my own mental illness. Because it did scare them. And they weren’t sure how to handle it. And all those things that I thought I was sparing them from, I had to look them in the eye as I watched them deal with those thoughts. But I severely underestimated how much they would be able to put all those emotions aside and start taking actions to help me. And they did that. And I’ve probably mentioned this on the show. I know I… It was a conversation we actually had on This American Life, so people have heard it, but… My father once asked me why I didn’t ask him for help, and I told him because I didn’t want to scare him and I didn’t think he’d not help and I’ll never forget. He said “I would not have known how to help, but I would have run through a wall to find the person who did.” And judgment free. Not try and put any weight on your guilt on me. I’m sorry, I use the word weight that was unintentionally loaded. I know that that’s probably not fuckin cool. You know what I meant. I meant emotionally, but it sounds like if your protective of your mom, that also means your mom’s protective of you, and my guess is that your mom is going to find out someday. Because like I said before and like you agreed, things like this don’t end well. It’s going to hit a breaking point where you have to deal with this. And my guess is that your mom, your mom is… you’re, you’re going to be surprised at how much your mom is willing to help and you’re going to see that there’s some backwards logic in trying to protect her because it’s… it’s probably going to, it’s… it’s probably going to hit her emotionally that she… that your fear of that is part of what kept this a secret if that makes sense. I’m not saying that in any way to put pressure on you or make you feel bad. Just letting you know in my experience, I had the same feelings towards my parents and they wound up being warriors who did whatever it took to get me out.

[00:49:59] CALLER: Do you mind if I ask you something?

[00:50:00] CHRIS: Yeah, of course.

[00:50:05] AD BREAK

[00:51:38] CALLER: Do you mind if I ask you something?

[00:51:36] CHRIS: Yeah, of course.

[00:51:47] CALLER: Once your parents kind of… kind of jumped those hurdles with you, help you to get to the other side as much as there is another side, was there a moment where they finally got to catch their breath? And that’s when the emotion came out? Were they… did they feel guilt or like they needed to ask you why you hit it or did they feel any sort of shame. I know that’s a very personal question, but it’s something that I’m so full of.

[00:52:28] CHRIS: I, I think they felt… it’s hard it’s hard to put words in their mouth… I would say I think they felt confusion. I think they… I think they maybe did feel a little guilt that they missed. I think that maybe… You know, I think my dad asking me why I never went to him and confided in him maybe reflects that he kind of struggled with wondering why I couldn’t go to him if he had put up some kind of wall there. So, yeah, it was a hard conversation at the end of the day. You’re kind… the broad umbrella of what you’re asking is, was that a terrifying and hard series of conversations to have and yeah. Yeah, they were. But yeah, any level of difficulty and any level of fear was outweighed by the fact that they were so ready to be my safety net. My mom sat with me and looked up doctors who were under our insurance plan, sat there with me while I called them, and sometimes when I was getting scared, she called them for me. They would ask me how I was going. They would make sure I left to get there on time. They would ask me how it went when I got back. They also respected my privacy. They didn’t sit there and pry. They went into being my support system because they love me. And. It was scary. It was not easy. And every day, every day that I made up an excuse or dodged it and every day that I told them, no, I’m just exhausted. Every day that they would ask too many questions and I’d get really angry to sort of scare them away from asking the questions. Every day that went made the conversation harder. But when the conversation came, all the fear…. It’s funny that the fear, I would say the fear was simultaneously warranted because I did have to watch them deal with all those feelings that you’re scared seeing them. But also at the same time it was almost like. It was almost like a very warm blanket got wrapped around me and all of a sudden there were other people rallying to my cause and it was such a pressure release that I didn’t have to deal with all this shit on my own and it was such a pressure release that someone else was going to be there to know about it. And to be able to help take action and help hold me accountable for my own self care. So, yeah, it was scary. I’m not going to bullshit you, it’s horrible. That waking up my mom in the middle of the night to tell her I was feeling suicidal… what a horrible conversation. The look on her face is burned into my memory, I never want to see it again. I never want to see my mom that scared again. But the next day when she sat with me and we started picking up the phone… That’s one of the most beautiful memories I have of my mother. So, I don’t get the one without the other. You know, the pendulum swung really dark to how scary it was. And yeah, you’re gonna have those moments. It’s gonna suck. But that pendulum is also going to swing back in the other direction where you’re gonna see these beautiful things that help it happen, where the people that love you act on that love and make every effort they can to help you. And that’s helped that you can’t give yourself right now. And it’s help that you deserve. And. I hope it helps you ask for. Because it’ll be there. And you deserve it.

[00:56:41] CALLER: Thank you.

[00:56:57] CALLER: Sorry, I don’t really know where to go from here. That was good. Heavy, but it was good.

[00:57:04] CHRIS: That’s a lot of life. That’s a lot of life. It is, but I know it’s not… you’re not crazy. You’ve got nothing to be ashamed of. It’s a shitty, image conscious world. I know it… tell you something about me… I had TV show that had… the public access days were full of such joy. And once we went to cable, the pressure was on. We had 47 episodes on cable television. Do you know how many I watched? Zero.

[00:57:43] CALLER: Yeah.

[00:57:45] Zero. I don’t want to see myself. I want to look at myself and hear my voice. See my big upper teeth and my big giant forehead and all the nervous eating I was doing because I had such anxiety about if the show was gonna get cancelled. I didn’t wanna see it. I didn’t want to look at myself. I get it! I get it. I understand that vast insecurity, but. I also think, I bet that you have your own version of what I have to, which is that beyond all that, one place you can get to is that inside yourself as a fucking fighter and that and that, that person deep inside is probably pretty pissed off at how much this conversation is dominating your life right now. And I bet that when you can figure out when you can figure out how to empower, empower that version of yourself, that voice that is like, fuck this. Like when you can empower that person, that person is going to take you farther. And accomplish more things and kick the shit out of life and your dreams. Way more than the part of you that’s that’s that’s buying into the sickness can. That person is fucking ready to go and pissed off and ready to kick the shit out of life. And I hope I hope that, again, I hope you ask for the help you need, because maybe you get some of these roadblocks out of the way. You can unlock that person in there who’s a fucking badass fighter because you just said, yeah, that, you know, that person’s in their right.

[00:59:28] CALLER: Yes, it’s such a fucking waste of time. It’s such an enormous waste of time. **Dog barks in background**

[00:59:34] CHRIS: See, even your dog agrees. So even your dog is like there is hope for your dogs like hearing this part and goes fuck yeah, it’s a waste of time! Even your dog knows!

[00:59:50] CALLER: I look back at pictures of myself from 4 and 3 and 2 years ago, and I remember the day that each picture was taken and I know what was going through my mind when it was taken and how much I hate it myself. When I took that picture and I just think it was like all the things that dominated my life at the time and it was this… and it’s still pointless… And I really, I really don’t want to be old and dying and looking back at a photo album of my life and seeing that 80 percent of my days were wasted on this shit.

[01:00:26] CHRIS: Yeah, I know that feeling too. Again, I told you one of my biggest regrets, probably my biggest… I didn’t go to my parents when I convinced myself of that backwards logic that I had to protect them from protecting me. Big regret. Here’s another regret! I wasted my fucking 20s. The decade were… that decade where you have this beautiful window where you are an adult with freedom, but you still are allowed to fuck up. I sat around scared and pissed. And I look back and I’m like, man, I wasted my 20s! What a waste of time. And that’s what you’re saying as well. You look at these pictures and you go on that day was ruined by this shit. That day was ruined by this shit. And I hope… you got time. You said you’re entering your senior year of college.

[01:01:26] CALLER: Yes.

[01:01:27] CHRIS: Imagine. Just imagine a year of college where you don’t give a fuck about any of this shit. And you can go out and you can go fucking stay out late and just walk down the street and be like, oh shit, I think that’s a house party. Let’s go inside and not worry about what everybody is thinking and not worry about “is this fuckin regular beer or light beer” and fucking leave and find some people who are like, fuck it. Let’s, let’s go fuckin listen… I’m sober. I’ll be designated driver. Let’s just drive to the fucking beach and stay out all night and wake up on the fucking beach because we’re young and nothing fucking matters. And let’s have some epic nights that we’ll remember forever. Three years of college where you haven’t given yourself those cause you can’t let your guard down. Give yourself this year. Do it. You got to do it. You can do it.

[01:02:27] CALLER: You’re right, I’m about to turn 21 this summer and I don’t want to waste 20s.

[01:02:34] CHRIS: Do not waste your 20s. Holy shit, I could I could have I could have done so much cool shit in my 20s. I look back and there’s so much… I was doing so much cool stuff. It was all tinged with fear and worrying about if people were noticint these things I didn’t want them to see about myself.

[01:02:59] CALLER: Yes.

[01:03:00] CHRIS: Listen. I’m going to ask something of you. But I want to be clear. I’m not… I’m not asking you to just give me the answer that I want. How often do you see your counselor?

[01:03:21] CALLER: I only see her in the summer and then it’s about once a week.

[01:03:28] CHRIS: So does this count as summer? You done with school? Like are you in this once a week rotation?

[01:03:32] CALLER: Yes, yes. Yeah, I am.

[01:03:34] CHRIS: So you have a date on the books next time you’re seeing your counselor.

[01:03:38] CALLER: Yeah. Next Thursday.

[01:03:39] CHRIS: So next Thursday. So. I’m going to ask you. To make me a promise. But I’m going to say, if you are not ready to make this promise, don’t make it. Just say, “Chris, I’m not ready to go there yet. I can’t make you that promise.” But if you make me the promise, I’ll just ask. Keep the promise. Thursday. Tell your counselor. You can tell me “I’m not ready. I appreciate it. I know it’s gonna take more time, dude.” You can tell me that. But if you make the promise. Keep the promise. 

[01:04:20] CALLER: I want to. If you told me this to my mom, I would have said thanks, but I’ll wait.

[01:04:27] CHRIS: [laughs] I get it!

[01:04:30] CALLER: Yeah, I want to tell my counselor. And thank you for talking to me, because this whole time I’ve had all these thoughts in my head and I can journal about them or I can know what I know. But getting it off my chest and just saying it. and being able to talk with you as someone who is not going to be in my life every day. Or that I feel like I’ll get a weird stare from. It’s been good to just not use as a sounding board, but to get all these feelings out. And now great. They’re all out. But that doesn’t fix things. So the next step is I want to fix things.

[01:05:10] CHRIS: I’m glad to hear that.

[01:05:12] CALLER: I want to. I want to tell her. Yeah. 

[01:05:15] CHRIS: That’s good. You didn’t quite say you’d promise and I’m not going to force it, but you put it out there in a way that I really appreciate.

[01:05:21] CALLER: No, no, I promise. Pinky swear. Everything.

[01:05:24] CHRIS: Pinky swear is even more. That’s the next level. I didn’t even ask for a pinky swear because I thought that was too extreme. So now we pinky swear…

[01:05:30] CALLER: I mean we could take it to blood oath, we can do that.

[01:05:36] CHRIS: Blood oath?! Wow! Well, let me say, that’s hugely flattering and use me as a sounding board. It’s flattering to hear that it helped to get it out. And I’ll tell you something else that I think might motivate you, which is, I think, back to how fuckin horrible some stretches in my life were. And I go, well, was there any value in going through all that pain? And if there’s any, it’s that I think it makes me an empathetic person who doesn’t judge other people’s pain. And one thing, one thing, I think might maybe be motivating for you is you go, you talk to your counselor, and it’s not going to be easy. It’s going to take years. It’s going to take years to fix this. There might be relapses. There might. It might feel like Sisyphus pushing the rock up the mountain, right? But maybe someday you get on the other side of it. Five years from now. And you’re fucking, you’re this cool person in your mid 20s, you’re getting all the jobs in theater, your touring around the country doing regional shit. Maybe you wind up in one, you know, Chicago or New York, one of these theater towns and you’re doing it and maybe you’re in a position where now you’re 26, 27 and you realize that there’s other, there’s 13 year old girls out there who are, who are being brainwashed, feeling like they need to be whoever that generation’s Kardashian are, and maybe you can be someone who stands up and goes, fuck that and maybe you can take what’s happening right now… the way that you’re constantly in your head that you’re hiding. And maybe you can help to help guide that next generation towards a healthier place.

[01:07:25] CALLER: I would love that.

[01:07:26] CHRIS: You’ve got to fix yourself. Because I bet. Here’s the thing, you’re perpetuating what you’re going through and you know, you’re caught in this nasty cycle. And I bet that you would not wish where you’re at upon anyone else.

[01:07:42] CALLER: No.

[01:07:43] CHRIS: I bet if someone came to you. I bet if someone came to you and described the problems you have and said they had them, you would be like, fuck that. That sounds awful. I want to help.

[01:07:54] CALLER: Yeah, absolutely. Even when I hear people talk about themselves, their bodies, in a way that I used to hear myself talk about myself before this really started, I stop it in its tracks because I don’t want people getting this mentality. It’s sick and it’s fucked up and you can’t stop it even if you want to. It takes a lot of time and a lot of effort and it’s never a guarantee. And I don’t want people feeling like this.

[01:08:25] CHRIS: Well, everything you just said, all those feelings of compassion you have towards other people where you feel like other people deserve to hear that. You deserve that, too. You deserve to tell yourself that you deserve it.

[01:08:39] CALLER: I know. Okay.

[01:08:43] CHRIS: So we got a minute left. This was a hard one. It is hard for me to hear about young people who fall into the traps of a world full of unfair judgment. But you opened up in a way that I really appreciate that I beat out a lot of people. And all you got to do now… Take that first step. Get to Thursday. Let that counselor know right out of the gate in the session. “Hey, I’ve been hiding something from you. Help me.”

[01:09:20] CALLER: I can do that.

[01:09:21] CHRIS: I know you can. You got it. You can do it.

[01:09:25] CALLER: And I will.

[01:09:27] CHRIS: I hope so. I hope so, because you seem like a smart person. You seem like a, like many of the mentally ill people, you seem smart and empathetic and kind. And I hope that all those things. I think that’s real and I hope that the help you start pointing those things inward, because I know you can do this.

[01:09:55] CALLER: Thank you.

[01:09:57] CHRIS: Listen that’s all the time we got. And I wish that you and I could talk even longer. But I really, I really, I really believe in you and I really hope that, yeah, I hope that you lean on your, counselor, and then I hope that leads to leaning on your family and your friends and that many years from now this all see… Here’s another thing just from my experience. I look back at how sad I used to get, and I can remember being that sad, but it’s hard for me to actually remember what that feeling was. And that makes me, it makes me smile so hard that it’s such a distant memory. And I hope someday this is a distant memory for you as well.

[01:10:39] CALLER: Thank you. Can I say one more thing?

[01:10:41] CHRIS: Absolutely.

[01:10:43] CALLER: OK. I just want to say thank you to you because, not to give too many locations away, but… I moved to New York a couple of years ago, and one of the first shows I saw was your Career Suicide show. And I met you very briefly after. And you said a few words to me and you were really helpful. It was kind of like a catalyst for me in a new city. And then again, when I moved out to the West Coast, I saw you in the fall and we met again. And you were incredibly kind and said some things that were really meaningful to me that I don’t need to say again. But. I just think it’s interesting that each time as I’m going in a new step in my journey, you’ve been here to impart a few words of wisdom to me, and I hope that this is the step in a new journey. So thank you for that. Thank you for your words.

[01:11:46] CHRIS: My pleasure. I’m happy to be of any help. And I hope one of the main things that you’ve taken away from those interactions is that, legitimately, I am just some person who’s been through some shit, and that’s fine. And you’re going through some shit and that’s fine. And you’re going to get where you need to go.

[01:11:47] CALLER: I will.

[01:11:48] BELL RINGS

[01:12:11] CHRIS: Caller, thanks so much. Thanks for being honest. Thanks for being brave. Thanks for being vulnerable. I know that being vulnerable is not the easiest thing when you are in the middle of the situation you find yourself in. And I understand how much fortitude that took. And I hope you’re proud of yourself. Because, again, it’s going to help, it’s going to help some other people. And I just really hope that you keep that promise. Talk to your counselor, I’m here begging you. I hope that that’s the direction that this one goes. I hope that we can do a follow up some day where maybe you let me know if is anything beyond that. Thank you so much to Jarred O’Connell and Harry Nelson in the booth. Thank you to Justin Linville for helping with so many aspects of my life. Thank you for Shellshag for the music. Thanks to all of you for listening. If you enjoyed the show and you want to help, go to our podcast rate, review, subscribe. It really helps when you do. Thanks so much. And we’ll see you next.

[01:13:08] THEME MUSIC: Catch me, face to face.

[NEXT EPISODE PREVIEW]

[01:13:22] CHRIS: Next time on Beautiful Anonymous, one of the strongest people I’ve ever had the pleasure of talking to tells us about a series of events that would wreck anyone but she’s not letting them wreck her.

[01:13:35] CALLER: I actually carry a knife on my belt at all times now. I am the most unlucky person in the world and I’ve had some incidents, and so, people say that I look like a mix of Moana and what’s that Angelina Jolie movie… I can’t think of it…

[01:13:49] CHRIS: Tomb Raider?

[01:13:50] CALLER: Yeah, yeah, her, I get that a lot, yeah.

[01:13:53] CHRIS: Moana and Tomb Raider?

[01:13:55] CALLER: It’s a funny mix, but I’m gonna take it

[01:13:58] CHRIS: And you walk around town with a knife?

[01:13:58]: CALLER:  I have not used it, if that’s what you’re going to ask. Technically, it’s a fruit peeler.

[01:14:03]: CHRIS: A fruit peeler? So you carry a fruit peeler around? Have you gotten trained, taken classes on how to brandish this knife? 

[01:14:11] CALLER: No siree bob!

[01:14:12] CHRIS: I have to say, this is a topic that I think is more serious than a “No, siree, Bob!” 

[01:14:12] CHRIS: That’s next time on Beautiful Anonymous.