EP. 219 — Overcoming Domestic Abuse with Chelsea Devantez

Jameela: [00:00:00] Hello, and welcome to another episode of I Weigh with Jameela Jamil, a podcast against shame. I hope you’re well, and I think you’re going to enjoy today’s chat. And even though it’s about a subject that is really, really dark, which is domestic violence and the survival process, uh, the way that my guest delivers it is so extraordinarily relatable, empowering, warm, human and, uh, at times hilariously funny because she can’t help herself. Um, Chelsea DeVantez is a comedian. She’s a filmmaker. She’s written for The Problem with Jon Stewart, Bless This Mess, Tina Fey’s Girls 5 Ever, Not Dead Yet, and she’s the host of the massively popular podcast Glamorous Trash, where she invites her famous Hollywood friends to dissect celebrity memoirs. It’s an exceptional podcast. Podcast. She’s so, so special. And she’s now written a memoir about her life called I Shouldn’t Be Telling You This, But I’m Going to Anyway. And it’s all the different trials and tribulations that she’s gone through. But I think a standout [00:01:00] subject that a lot of people want to talk to her about, and I wanted to talk to her about because so many of you have asked me to cover this subject is domestic violence. It’s something that she experienced when she was younger, having also grown up in a household that had domestic violence in it. We don’t really talk about what happened and she’ll explain why she can’t say the exact details, um, in this fascinating episode. But we mostly talk about the impact on your mind and what it does to you and your perception of the world and the perception of yourself and how you, how you grieve the time that you feel like you’ve lost and, and also so importantly, you know, whenever I do Ask Me Anythings, I get questions from a lot of you asking me, what do I do if my friend is in an abusive situation? How do I help them? How do I extract them? And I talk about that with Chelsea in this episode, which I think is so pivotal to hear it from a survivor as to what it is that she needed or would have needed from the people around her. I think it’s such a helpful, lovely chat. I’m so [00:02:00] grateful to her for sharing her story and for being so personable with it and and and being able to have the courage to speak about these things that women are made to feel. Women, especially, but all people are made to feel somehow stigmatized about it doesn’t make any sense. We should be talking about it out in the open all of the time. Until we do it will continue to happen in the shadows, so let me know what you think. Send me letters. I hope you take something away from this chat that feels meaningful to you, and we have done our best to not make this, um, incredibly triggering. And so I, I, I believe it is a safe listen, but these things are never easy for everyone. Um, but yeah, this is the excellent, excellent Chelsea Devantez.

Chelsea, welcome to I Weigh. How are you?

Chelsea: I’m well. I’m on a book tour, so I am both extremely filled with adrenaline and so tired, but I’m really happy to be [00:03:00] here.

Jameela: Oh, I’m so happy you’re here. I have been a long time fan, slipping into your DMs and uh, telling you that I think you’re great and funny for ages, and

Chelsea: We’ve been talking about mental health in, in just hot little DMs, I think for a few years.

Jameela: Yeah.

Chelsea: So this feels like, um, we’re finally here. We finally made it to our, our conversation.

Jameela: We have and we are here celebrating your book. You are known internet wide and podcast worldwide for the fact that you spend so much time and thought delving into the books and stories of all kinds of different public figures, especially the stories of women. Um, and now it must feel quite surreal that other people are probably doing that about your book.

Chelsea: I mean, just the audacity to have a podcast where I talk about female celebrity memoirs. I go through them page by page. I love them so much. And then to put out my own, um, definitely as I was writing it, I was like, Oh, interesting. This is what they’re feeling as they go through it.

Jameela: Yeah.

Chelsea: I, I [00:04:00] already, um, my podcast, like I really approach the books. I love them. I’ve always loved them. Celebrity memoirs have always been my favorite book genre. That’s what happens when you’re nearest bookstore growing up is a Walmart. And, um,

Jameela: Haha! That sounds like an early kink that you developed.

Chelsea: Yeah, exactly. I was just, so I’ve loved, I always loved them. I have a lot of empathy for them. I approach them with kindness and care, but I have even more of that now, now that I’ve put myself through the process. It just, it feels like peeling off your skin and then handing someone your gynecological exam and being like, what do you think?

Jameela: Haha, oh my god. Oh, my God, you have been especially brave with your book.

Chelsea: Thank you. Well, it is the women who came before me and, and did this before me and especially celebrity women who have so much more to lose, reputations, careers, their actual money, you know, putting it on the line and being willing to share their stories definitely gave me the courage to be like, you know, it’s like, listen, if Tina Turner can do it, surely I can get it together.

Jameela: Yeah. Haha.

Chelsea: And, and walk through this, [00:05:00] um, walk, walk through what she walked through in a, in a very, very much smaller way.

Jameela: Yeah. Both Tina and Brittany.

Chelsea: Brittany, uh, you know, her book, I’m so glad it made it to us because it had three ghostwriters, which is very, very rare for celeb memoirs, which means there was really a lot going on behind the scenes. Do you remember that article where they’re like, um, Brittany’s book has been pushed because there’s not enough paper? There’s not enough paper in the world for her book. Do you remember that? Yeah, I was like, wow, her PR team is just so desperate.

Jameela: Is that what happened to the Amazon? Yeah. Haha.

Chelsea: Yeah. I was like, no, I’m pretty sure we’ve been crushing trees. Uh, there is paper for Brittany’s book, but I think what was happening was the switching of ghostwriters, going through, I think, you know, she’s still going through traumas with you forever, and I think she, it was probably really hard to put together that book and, and they had to push it back so many times while trying to lie to everyone that it was because there wasn’t enough paper in the world.

Jameela: Oh man. Well, thankfully there was enough [00:06:00] paper for yours, and I want to know what it was that made you know that you were ready to write such a personal memoir.

Chelsea: Well, to be honest, I def I definitely wasn’t ready. I don’t know how you get ready, but I had read, I had read in the memoirs that, that sharing your life story will change your life. And some people are very direct about it, like Lonnie Anderson, Jane Fonda, Brandi Carlile, Dolly Parton. They say in the book, writing this book changed, changed my life. It healed my life. And separate to that, I’ve been in, um, trauma therapy for many years. And I know you talk about it, but one of the actual antidotes to healing trauma is to make meaning of it. And one of the antidotes to shame is sharing it. And I was just in so much pain my whole life. And I had read all these books and I’ve been to so much therapy. I believed, I believed that sharing my story would [00:07:00] uh, help heal me and that it would help heal someone else because that had happened to me through other books. And I just had trust in that process, but obviously it was very hard. And then I had to push myself through the process and it was extremely emotional, intense, but that’s kind of what brought me to the place where I thought I could do it.

Jameela: Yeah. 100% I totally get that. And do you feel like it has?

Chelsea: Oh my gosh.

Jameela: Changed you?

Chelsea: Completely. I will say the first few days the book was out, I was doing a lot of my trauma exercises. Everyone was like, Oh my God, your book is out, girl. And I was like, yeah, right. And then I was running into my hotel rooms and doing all these physical and mental exercises because I, I felt really sick. I was like, I’m actually not sure what I’ve done. Now, um, after being on the tour and, um, meeting people and reading letters and doing book signings where like the funniest little things will come up where they’ll say something that I’ve been through that happened to them. I feel, I feel just so happy. I feel so happy to be myself. And for a long time, I was just so ashamed [00:08:00] of myself.

Jameela: Yeah, and I think that there’s such a beauty in being able to have your story told in your own words, which not everyone, especially in this industry, will have the chance to do. There’s something very empowering, especially when you’ve been a victim or a survivor of abuse of any kind. You feel like so much of your, so much of you gets taken away, and put through someone else’s narrative and someone else’s lens and their decision for who you’re going to be. And so to reclaim that and, and to allow nobody to fill in the gaps for you, to be able to fill in all of your own gaps, I imagine must feel so satisfying and empowering.

Chelsea: Yeah, absolutely. And I think, you know, so, uh, my book has, I was in a domestic violence relationship when I was very, very, very young. And, um, the reason these relationships happen over and over and over again, and the statistics are one in four is because we don’t talk about it. We relegate that to lifetime movies and murder podcasts where the ending has already [00:09:00] been murder. You know, we, we, we, it’s hushed. It’s icky. It’s unknown. What crazy thing happens to this unknown woman? And it’s, you couldn’t possibly think that it’s yourself. And so I think getting to tell the story as much as I could, and, you know, I’m a comedian, so I was trying to put it in a new genre where there is some jokes to it because, because we should be able to laugh about anything. We should be able to talk about anything. And when you take a topic and you say, you’re not allowed to laugh about this, you’re not allowed to talk about this, that’s when it gets put in these shameful little corners. And that’s where we don’t have enough stories and culture to recognize ourselves in this relationship or others in this relationship.

Jameela: And you made a good point, um, about the fact that, you know, even when we do see more in depth stories about, uh, survivors that are fiction, it’ll be like a J. Lo film. You know, where, where, yeah, exactly, where, uh, which is not me shitting on J. Lo, but it’s like, she becomes a world class fighter.

Chelsea: [00:10:00] Absolutely, or

Jameela: In that film, you know, and then, you know, like, and is the bravest, coolest, slickest person alive. And so that’s also, that’s an amazing, amazing outcome, but that’s not going to be everyone’s outcome. And so if that’s the only representation you see, then you’re just giving survivors another thing to feel like a failure at, so we need, we need that in the world. But we also need, because I think it was very rousing and inspiring to see that, but we also need to not shy away from the reality that some people don’t ever get the opportunity to stand up for themselves.

Chelsea: And I think, you know, and I wrote this in the book and what I really wanted to impart is that domestic violence can be quite boring. It happens in the mundane. It happens in a moment that doesn’t even feel that dramatic. And I think because we’re taught to feel like domestic violence has a soundtrack and it’s dark and it’s crazy and there’s screams that you think, well, I’m not in that relationship, but it is. It’s at the 7/11, you know, when he shoves you just a little too hard, you kind of [00:11:00] stumble, but it’s, you don’t recognize it because it’s, it’s just this light moment.

Jameela: Well, also they’ve created a spectrum of abuse that now things that someone else might feel is too much, doesn’t feel that much to you, and that’s part of the game.

Chelsea: Yeah, because you’ve been manipulated out of noticing red flags from the start.

Jameela: Yeah. For someone who isn’t familiar with your story or who hasn’t yet read your book, I know that you are being delicate with how much of it you share, uh, which I really respect, um, and admire you for. Do you, what would you feel comfortable talking about regarding your situation just to kind of paint a picture for anyone listening?

Chelsea: So I, I wrote the whole book. I wrote, um, I wrote every word down and in the beginning, starts with this relationship I was in when I was very young that, um, escalated until it ended in three drive by shootings. He did three drive by shootings, um, two of my house and one of where my mom worked and my aunt, um, and my, my godmother. Um, not my aunt, my godmother, but, um, that’s kind of like [00:12:00] the climax of it, but there was obviously so much more that went into it, and we went to court. And I move away and then the book ended with, um, the last chapter, which is 10 years after that, 10 years to the day, not to the day, but to the month and the year was exactly 10 years. I was on stage performing at a comedy theater and this sheriff walks in because they’ve come to my place of work, which is this comedy theater where I make $100 a night and a discount on chicken fingers. And they go to my boss and the sheriff has a subpoena for me to revisit that case and reopen it and the book ends with what happened 10 years later. And I also took another decade after that before I was actually ready to talk about it and when I turned it all in, I was told to delete all of it because it was too dangerous to share. And I won’t go into how much grief and, um, what, how intense that was. It was like [00:13:00] three of the most recent, um, worst months of my life, but when I finally came out of it, I decided I would not delete it. I would black out just enough words so that I could still share it. And instead of telling my story, I would try and tell the story of how our systems are set up to silence victims in the name of protection.

Jameela: Yeah, and it’s so frustrating.

Chelsea: It’s painful.

Jameela: That you have to be in that situation. I can’t, I honestly can’t even, I can’t even imagine how that feels or what it must feel like to redact even those words, to feel as though you have to tiptoe when you’ve been trampled on

Chelsea: Yes.

Jameela: Is insanity I imagine.

Chelsea: It was so odd because I had to, I was physically going through and erasing myself and erasing my story. And as I was doing it, I just felt like, Oh, my God, this is this wild recreation of what keeps happening to me, which is this horrible thing happened to me, and as [00:14:00] I try and get out of it, I am set up to fail.

And, um, I have CPTSD and that comes from multiple things, but that process felt like what it’s like to have CPTSD. Where you’re just stuck in a never ending fog and you can never get out and listen, doubled my meds, started seeing my therapist constantly. I have a beautiful support group, but it it took me a while to get out of a very dark place and really, I was so angry. I relied on anger to get me through that book publishing. I was so mad. And only now that the book is coming out can I kind of feel the sadness again, because, you know, I like anger, very powerful emotion, very helpful. But, um, and sadness is a lot harder.

Jameela: Yeah, 100%.

You talk about, you know, the experiences you had as a child that you feel [00:15:00] like created a foundation for violence later on in your life?

Chelsea: Yeah, well, it’s interesting because, you know, statistically, if you grow up in a home that has abuse in it, you’re a million times more likely to become an abuser or participate in a, in an abusive relationship. And that, that is what happened to me. And I, but I think what I still can’t wrap my brain around is that when I was watching my mom in these relationships, I hated them. I knew it was wrong. I wanted her to stand up. I, you know, wanted her to divorce them. And I was just very aware of like, this is wrong. And then walked into one myself without even realizing it kind of the first chance I got. And so I think that’s, that’s also what’s really hard when you are in one of these relationships is because you feel smarter than this. So you’re like, this can’t possibly be what’s happening because I would never allow this.

Jameela: And then I don’t know if this is the case for you because this is the case for me [00:16:00] is that I was like if I can fix this, then I didn’t put myself in this position.

Chelsea: Yes. Absolutely. Then I am not embarrassed. I’m not humiliated. I’m not a gross woman who deserves something like this to happen, if I fix it.

Jameela: Exactly. Exactly. Just the mania of that, when you look back on it, and it’s as if you were just almost drugged or in some sort of a haze. I was, yeah, I think I was 22. when I started in that relationship. And again, like sort of obviously a baby, you know, and it’s only now in my late thirties that I can look back at that as a baby. Um, but, uh, you know, we just don’t know shit about fuck at 22, especially not my generation.

Chelsea: But you think you do.

Jameela: But you think you do. And you also do know enough, but you are in your, I feel like your entire twenties is just about overriding your gut instinct, and testing your limits. Like that’s what my 20s was like anyway, just constantly going against my gut instinct and just suppressing it and shoving it down with too much food or too much excess and not enough sleep and just constantly gaslighting myself, [00:17:00] uh, and kind of abusing myself in all kinds of different ways and an eating disorder and all these different things, uh, rather than ever doing the sensible thing. And, and there’s an element of that, that I regret because I’m still paying the price for that. But there’s also a part of it that I love because that’s how we learn and it shapes us to be who we are. Something you said that really struck me about one of the things that you mourn post a relationship like that. I mean, I don’t, I don’t even know if I’d call it a relationship, but the dynamic you were in, the abusive one is that you’ll never get to, like this person changed the trajectory forever of who you were going to be if you hadn’t met him. And I’ve never ever heard anyone say that before. And I’ve never thought about that myself, like the sliding doors element of that.

Chelsea: Yeah. Yeah.

Jameela: Uh, and, and what a huge thing that is to take away from someone. We always focus on the also very true person that you’ve become because of that thing.

Chelsea: Yeah.

Jameela: Who wouldn’t have written this book that’s going to go [00:18:00] on to change like the butterfly effect of of that is also very beautiful and positive, even though it’s fucking agonizing for you. But because I think, you know, going back to what you were saying at the beginning, because we don’t want to talk about the really painful bits that we can’t change. We don’t talk about that, about the person you were going to be if you hadn’t been fucked with.

Chelsea: Yeah. Uh, maybe one day I’ll be like, there’s a silver lining to this, but I very much, I very much feel like I wish it hadn’t happened. And I do think that I would be better off without it. I, if we are to believe, and I do think there’s some truth to this, that traumatic events can, can shape you into a better, stronger person, um, I’d already had enough. I’d already been through enough. I really did not need that. And, I just remember being at this bachelorette party for a friend of mine, and all of these girls were like singing these early aughts songs at the top of their lungs, and it was like so fun, and I was, you know, sitting in the corner with my like 19th [00:19:00] martini, and It’s just so hard for me to relax or be on vacation or have fun or let loose, and I’m watching them sing these songs, and I’m, and I, my first thought was, how do they know the lyrics? Why don’t I know the lyrics to this song? And I was like, oh, because I was busy, uh, fighting for my life. And I just mourn the person who’s like, also at the bachelorette party, like singing karaoke, who loves vacations, who isn’t constantly scanning the room. And I do want, and apart, I did make a joke in the book. Can I swear on your podcast?

Jameela: All the time.

Chelsea: Okay, good. I did make a joke.

Jameela: I hate, I hate any words that aren’t swear words.

Chelsea: Okay, good.

Jameela: The less, the less of those you use, the better.

Chelsea: Okay, good. I wrote this in the book, but I was like, you know, I, I don’t, and I’m going to try and do this without getting emotional, but it’s like, he didn’t, he didn’t kill me, but he did kill the person I was supposed to become. And listen, maybe she would have been a huge bitch. Who’s to say? What if she would, you know, order tequila and [00:20:00] Splenda? Maybe she tips 7%. Maybe she’s a monster. I hope not, but in my mind, it is someone who is just able to be a little lighter than I am able to be. And I do mourn than that.

Jameela: Yeah, that’s completely, it’s completely fair. And it is a pivotal thing that people almost feel like we’re not allowed to say because it’s too painful to hear.

Chelsea: It’s sad, very sad.

Jameela: Yeah. And also we go through all these, you know, I’ve spoken about it on this podcast before, but we go through these sort of like sweeping generational moments of like, I’m a victim. No, I’m a survivor. I’m a survivor and a thriver. I’m a victim. I’m a, and do you know what I mean? It’s like almost as often as we have to change our body type, we have to change our attitude towards the trauma that we’ve experienced.

Chelsea: Yeah, absolutely.

Jameela: And, and, and I feel as though, you know, during the Girlboss years we survived and we thrived and now we’re coming back to realizing that I’m, you know, I’m a victim of certain things and therefore this feels like a pivotal moment for you to be able to just say that and own [00:21:00] that. And for that not to be, there is something, there is a tragedy in it, but it’s not your full story. It’s just a part of your story that you’re not willing to hide to make other people comfortable. And I love you for that.

Chelsea: Yeah. Oh, thank you. That’s what my book editor said, by the way. She was like, this is not who you are. She was like, you don’t need to start with this. I used to start with saying, this is my origin story. She’s like, no, you’re more than this. And I was like, you know what? No, this did for me. I did, I don’t want it to have, but I really, really tried to hide this part of me for most of my life. To just be a fun, likeable, nice, cool comedian gal. And I really, really, really hid it. And, yeah, I’m not going to hide it anymore, even though they tried to have me delete it. I, I would have never written a memoir if I thought I couldn’t include that story. That story impacted every part of my life.

Jameela: Yeah. Again, being sensitive to what you can and can’t include, both of us entered into violent relationships ignoring red flags. And so was that the [00:22:00] case for you? Was it something that started immediately violent? Or was it a sort of slow burn?

Chelsea: No, slow, slow, slow burn. It was, um, well, listen, he cheated on me with just the coolest, most popular girl. And, um, and I confronted him about it and we did break up, and he begged for me back in ways that I thought were monumental because men don’t act like that. Men don’t cry, write letters, and send flowers. You know, he was an athlete. And, um, so it actually started with really big, beautiful, romantic gestures and then something little would happen or something big would happen and I would break up with him again and then he’d fight for me back in these big, beautiful ways and slowly that those romantic gestures, uh, turned into threats.

Jameela: Were they threats against you or himself?

Chelsea: Um, that’s, wow. Yes, you have been through this. Um, almost [00:23:00] all of them against me, but when he got very desperate right before the shooting started, he, uh, threw himself out of a car. What, um, and I was in the car behind, and went to the ER and of course I followed and went and he asked me to, uh, get back together with him or else he would have to do things like that again.

Jameela: It took me years to understand that, uh, the guy that was doing this to me was, um, he was testing my boundary when he would do that to see if I was willing to override my integrity towards myself for his well being, and I had no idea that that’s what he was doing. He was testing to see that if I threaten my life and she puts down her need for safety for my life, then she’s going to choose me over herself. And that’s how he would know he had me in that dynamic. And I was 22. He was fucking 23, by the way. So I don’t know how the fuck they get so advanced at that shit. [00:24:00] I didn’t know how to manipulate someone like that.

Chelsea: And I even wonder if they do know, like, it’s almost as if it’s so ingrained in our society, the power dynamic between genders, that these actions they take just kind of come naturally as this is how you get a woman to do what you want because I just can’t believe, I don’t think he got a hold of like a book or something.

Jameela: No, and actually, actually, is it that they’re so advanced or is it that they’re still a toddler?

Chelsea: Yes.

Jameela: Because that’s what we do. You know, I, you know, I, I, I’m, I remember like kids getting mad at school and then being like, I’m going to kill myself, and then they’re going to be sorry when they were sort of 9 or 10 years old about their parents. It’s like, we threaten all kinds of shit when we’re little. And it’s those who haven’t been socialized, like women are normally socialized out of childlike behaviors much younger than men are if ever.

Chelsea: Yeah. Well, I think also men are, especially in the years when it was happening to me and still, of course, but it was again, as we go back, it’s [00:25:00] just always worse. He was adored and, uh, he was given accolades for those types of behavior. Like, like when we, even when you think of athletes, you know, famous athletes now, like there are certain behaviors that give you a lot of respect from society, so you do them

Jameela: You mean aggressive behaviors?

Chelsea: Aggressive behavior, over-masculine behavior. Um, You know, it’s also why football players don’t feel like they can come out as gay because so much respect is given to this like straight aggro culture. And so I think it’s like that behavior is fostered in them, especially depending on like who’s parenting them and what community are you in.

Jameela: Yeah, and I think it’s very important to not process the shame. It’s funny, even just making that realisation that actually it’s a toddler dynamic makes me, suddenly makes that person feel smaller to me, because I’ve always felt outsmarted until literally this moment.

Chelsea: But it’s impossible! You’re so smart and yeah!

Jameela: And then being like, oh no, I was just, I was just such [00:26:00] an adult that I was entering into almost like a mother dynamic.

Chelsea: Yeah, you’re taking care of a child who’s hurting you.

Jameela: Yeah, totally, totally. Who’s not my responsibility. And it’s like an innate part of our sort of instinct to try to, but then obviously our childhood is going to shape us more in that, more in one direction than another. I also grew up in an abusive household. So I, you know.

Chelsea: You know, and also what you were just saying with the toddler thing and self harm, as a woman to walk away from your partner who is hurting and in pain and you have no heart and you are heartless, like you are judged on such a larger scale. No one would ever, not no one, but most people wouldn’t be like, she has a bound, boundaries are good. She’s doing her own thing. They would be like, you’re heartless. You’re a monster. How could you do this to him?

Jameela: We’ll look at every academy award winning film like normally women win like the oscar for the role they played putting up with the shit from the genius man.

Chelsea: Yes.

Jameela: The what was it the the Joaquin Phoenix one where he plays Johnny Cash.

Chelsea: Oh my [00:27:00] god.

Jameela: And Reese Witherspoon the amount of shit this woman carries him through.

Chelsea: Tippi Hedren and The Birds.

Jameela: Yeah.

Chelsea: Yeah.

Jameela: It’s, it’s endless. It’s stand by your man and the lyrics to that fucking insane song. You know, it’s, it’s, there’s so much subconscious conditioning of the, the noble, silent stoicism of the woman who saves the broken, broken winged man.

Chelsea: Of course. And like you said earlier, I think a lot for me is I just didn’t want it to be true. I didn’t want what was happening to be true. I was like, this, I don’t want this. I’m smarter than this. I’m better than this. I would have never let this happen. I don’t want to be someone who deserves this because that’s how I thought of it. Somehow I, I just,

Jameela: It’s so sad, yeah.

Chelsea: And so you just try and get, I mean, I was trying to get out of it till the last second until the bullets came through the window, and finally my mom called the cops, but I, I didn’t. You know, I still thought I could fix it.

Jameela: It’s extraordinary, isn’t it? I wonder how, I wonder how [00:28:00] that happens. Has your therapist explained to you how that happens, where you can get to a point where bullets come through your window and you still don’t have the instinct to call for help?

Chelsea: Well, dissociation’s just a beautiful drug and honestly, I miss it. Hahaha! Now that I’ve

Jameela: Oh my god.

Chelsea: I, um, you know, I have always been on the surface extremely high functioning. And I, I knew all of this happened to me, but truly felt like I am so powerful and strong, uh, it doesn’t matter. And I’m, and I’m okay with it. I’ve moved past it. And I got into trauma therapy. I tried many, many therapists. That’s also in the book until finally I find one. And also I was like, didn’t like therapists and, but I was just in such a bad place. This friend is like, please, for all of us, please go to therapy. And I finally knew to Google the words, uh, trauma therapist and identity therapist. And I find this, oh, and I had health insurance, very important. So before I [00:29:00] was always going to, you know, whatever free or low cost therapy, and I have health insurance. I go and see this expert and maybe like three months in, she is able to start saying, do you recognize that any time we touch something like this uh, your brain leaves? I was like, what do you, no, like, what are you talking about? And it went really, really slowly until finally I realized I had been spending almost my entire life sending my brain to the moon as another part of me took over and got life done. And it still happens to me now, but I’m so good at catching myself now. And now I know the difference.

Jameela: Can you explain what it feels like?

Chelsea: Yeah. It

Jameela: Just in case anyone else like me is doing it.

Chelsea: It’s interesting. I, I can’t catch myself.

Jameela: Asking for a friend called Jameela Jamil.

Chelsea: Hahaha! I still can’t catch myself on the way in, but now I can catch myself in it. [00:30:00] Um, it sort of feels like, um, sort of feels like there’s two of you and there’s one of you that’s very far away that’s watching through like water. Um, but there’s this very alive part of you that’s just going and going. It’s going really fast and doing these things and you have to sort of feel there’s this other part of you that’s kind of floaty and realize I’m not in my body. I’m not in my brain and you do things. Listen, I’ve been in therapy for so long. I think it’s your prefrontal cortex. You do things to bring your prefrontal cortex online because trauma scientifically shifts the size of your brain, though, what parts turn on and off. And the part that dissociates turns off the frontal lobe, um, so that you can start doing things that if you were fully active, you would not do so. I know that’s a very wobbly to explain, but. It’s a physical sensation. Trauma [00:31:00] is in the body. That’s why there’s that great book called What My Bones Know. It’s in the body. Trauma is not in the brain. It changes your brain, but trauma is in your bones. And so it’s sort of realizing that your brain is disconnected from your body.

Jameela: And so what do you do to bring yourself back in when you notice that?

Chelsea: Oh my God, so many things. So one is to turn and have a conversation with somebody. That’s the easiest one where like a, um, where you, where you have to actually just engage in the present moments. You can’t be living on the moon because you’re talking to someone. I do full body shakes probably every day, sometimes multiple times a day if things are really bad. I just go in the bathroom and that you fully shake like, um, just like, like, like you’re a dog who just got the, like, who just jumped in a lake and then he shakes off. I physically shake a lot.

Jameela: Why does that help?

Chelsea: So, uh, the way I learned it is that when animals get attacked in the wild, um, and, and survive and make it, you will see them physically shake for like five minutes and then they, then they go [00:32:00] about their day. And the understanding behind that is that they are like, uh, trauma is physical in your bones and that you are letting that energy release so it doesn’t get stuck in your nervous system. And so it, it is basically like shaking your nervous system out of its state where it feels like it’s panicked and it’s pain.

Jameela: You’re waking it up.

Chelsea: You’re waking it up and you’re getting centered. If I’m in a busy place and I’m like, I can’t, I can’t start shaking right now everyone’s going to look at me weird. I just start naming things. I’ll just pick a color and I’ll just name to myself all the red things in the room, all the blue things in the room, all the green things in the room. And you’re just trying to get your brain to come back to the present moment and not in whatever hell fear it has sent itself to.

Jameela: I find, uh, walking in nature is the thing that, just going to a park even is something that, and also my animals keep me very, very present.

Chelsea: Same here. Same [00:33:00] here. We, you know, when I read Ashley Judd’s memoir, I read it when I was really young and I remembered one thing from it, which is she said, whenever I’m getting really depressed, I rescue another dog because, and I, I remember like being like, remember this: get lots of dogs, um, because in caring for another species, it also connects you to this moment of caring for someone else. And have you read that study where in a retirement home, in rooms where they gave, uh, each person in the retirement home two parakeets to take care of it extended their life by 10 years.

Jameela: Wow. They, they started a program where they give, uh, prisoners, like men in jails who behave especially well, they get a cat that was due to be euthanized. So they rescue the cats and then they give them to any really well behaved prisoners who at first weren’t interested. And then within days of the cats being around, started to do more chores, started to turn up more regularly to see the counselor and started to become sort [00:34:00] of exemplary, uh, members of their community to be able to keep their cat and, uh, and it opened them up and made them softer and gentler with each other and they became more playful and they were able to reconnect to their humanity again because of these. So there’s kind of this mutual saving of, of these beings. It’s just like, it’s a very beautiful, it’s a very rare, but very beautiful story about humanity in a hellfire of the world. Yeah.

Chelsea: It’s like that very corny and cheugy meme that says, did I rescue my dog or did they rescue me? And honestly, it’s true.

Jameela: No, 100% 100%. So just to drag you back down to hell,

Chelsea: Yes, please, please.

Jameela: Uh, go back into the story. When you were going through all of this, were you sharing it with your friends? What was happening? Any of the red flags?

Chelsea: Um…

Jameela: And how were they responding? The reason I want to [00:35:00] know this is that a lot of people, when I do Ask Me Anythings, they write in telling me that they think their friend is in an abusive or problematic relationship and they don’t know how to tell them. And they’re scared that someone’s going to push them away. And I think it’s really helpful to hear it from someone who’s been the one in the abusive dynamic as to what happens and what helps.

Chelsea: Yeah, I had a best friend who went through all of it with me and really tried to stand up for me. In fact, we both knew it was not good at, but we both stayed participants in a way. Obviously it was mean more than her because we were both kind of cultured to believe it was normal. And so I did have that friend, but I did not tell people. Well, it’s interesting, there are adults who witnessed it, who didn’t say anything or do anything, um, or didn’t do enough.

Jameela: Wow.

Chelsea: And I didn’t tell the people who could have really helped me, who are my mom and my godmother, because I thought I was gonna fix it. And I think those questions you’re asked are so important because it often, you often do cut off [00:36:00] the person who has said something and dive harder into the relationship.

Jameela: Well, because you feel, you feel confronted by it and you might not be ready to hear it. And then you want to, you, you, you think you want to protect that person and maybe you do, but mostly you want to protect yourself from the judgment and the reality of the situation.

Chelsea: And also, you know, when you’re in like a domestically violent relationship, people always forget the word relationship. There’s love next to all of this. You love this person. You like them. You wanted to be with them. There are beautiful moments with them next to horrific moments. And so you want to protect those beautiful moments too. You’re thinking like, no, I love this person. Or yeah, exactly what you said. I don’t want them to think this.

Jameela: Um, it’s also that, um, Terry Crews quote of, give her two good weeks and she’ll spend three years chasing that two good weeks.

Chelsea: Hahaha! Ain’t that the truth.

Jameela: Oh my God. I’ve never felt more called out in my life.

Chelsea: You know what is so funny, I [00:37:00] remember, um, his older brother, this is so, I’ve never, I’ve never told this. I remember his older brother telling me, um, he’s like, you want to know how I, uh, you want to know how I pussy whip women? And I was like, yes, I do. I want to know.

Jameela: Are you talking about Terry Crews’ older brother or this person’s older brother?

Chelsea: No, this person.

Jameela: Just to be clear. Okay. I was like, wow, what a small world.

Chelsea: But maybe Terry Crews’ older brother used to say.. No, um, he was like, uh, you give them everything for a month. You’re just incredible for a month, then you take it all away. And I felt that and I mean listen and I was living it.

Jameela: That’s his like big brother and his hero who he’s probably either learned it from or alongside from their parents.

Chelsea: Absolutely, absolutely. So, but back to what you can do, um, because it can be very dangerous. I think the two things I would recommend most is start documenting it on behalf of your friend because if she ever needs out, she’s going to need a lot of documentation. And so you can just send emails to yourself of what you witnessed that day, [00:38:00] you can start just taking records and logs in case your friend is going to need to get out.

Jameela: Because they’re going to need to go to the police or because they’re going to need you to show them how crazy that list of things is?

Chelsea: In case they need to go to the police. And if you need to go to the police, to be a domestic violence victim is, uh, an impossible task because you are shattered. And the moment you’re there is probably the worst moment of your life and yet you have to be the best witness you’ve ever been when you have a traumatized brain and so having an advocate, having someone next to you in a typical he said she said situation documentation is what will save you, witnesses. Um, I’m, I’m of course speaking in the extreme sense. But you can also document it in case your friend gets out and is going to want to look back on her life and if she ever wants that. You’ll have these moments to share with her.

Jameela: The reason I said that is just because I asked a friend to document [00:39:00] the little unkind moments that are growing between her and a partner and I just said, I was like, it’s not up for me to tell you whether or not this is sustainable for you, but I just think you should write down a list so that you can either show him, but at the very least show yourself as that list adds up. Because when we don’t take stock of something months turn into fucking years before you even realize it. And it’s advice I have for anyone. It’s just write it down. Have a notes app. Keep a little list because even you know, not everyone’s going to go to the police. Not everyone feels safe to go to the police. Um, and so even just to give yourself the strength or to give your friend the strength to see it all because it’s so hard to zoom out when you’re in the middle of it.

Chelsea: And your brain will talk yourself out of anything. It’s that dissociation. It’s to see it all just stacked up in a list will help you realize you’re not crazy. You’re not making it up.

Jameela: Also, your brain’s [00:40:00] trying to keep you alive. Your brain’s worried what will happen to you if you leave. And so your brain is really trying to protect you.

Chelsea: Yes. And if you do tell a friend, you, if you do say something and that friend cuts you off, what I think is most important is to, on a daily or weekly basis, make contact with them. Say, I love you, and I’m always here because when they do need to get out, they need to know there is someone they can call who has not judged them, who is a safe space, who will help them get out. And you need to make yourself open and present, even when they’ve cut you off. Let them know you’re always there.

Jameela: And it’s pivotal because what a lot of people don’t understand is the lengths to which an abuser will go to pre isolate the friend so that they feel they have nowhere to go. Like that’s, that’s 50% of the game of how they get away with it, is that they, they isolate you till you feel like, well, no one will believe me or no one knows or I’ve got nowhere to go because I’ve alienated or pissed everyone off.

Chelsea: Yes, exactly, exactly.

Jameela: And so you have to like, you have to completely [00:41:00] destroy that narrative in your friend’s brain that there’s nowhere to go.

Chelsea: And to yourself, you’re like, wow, this friend’s being really mean to me. They’re cutting me off. Just a little note. I’m here. I’m here. I’m here. I’m always here. I think the final thing I would say is, um, it can be quite hard to hear information like eyes, like full eye contact. Hey, I think your relationship is abusive or problematic, which is why, um, your podcast, I try and do it on my podcast. Take your friend on a road trip and just be like, oh, I love this podcast. I haven’t caught up on something yet. Play them something else. Play them, Tina Turner’s audio book, play them a fun gossipy podcast that is going to very, in a very accessible way, get into abusive relationship dynamics, not in this big, scary, horrible way, but in a way where if they heard someone else talking about it, it could plant seeds inside them and you don’t have to directly confront them, just expose them to other art and other people who are talking about this so that they can [00:42:00] start to see another side themselves.

Jameela: That’s such good advice. That’s such, such strong advice. It’s such a great way to not make someone feel completely naked in the moment. I generally choose email as a form of most confrontation.

Chelsea: Yeah.

Jameela: I like to start it on text.

Chelsea: A written record?

Jameela: Yeah, yeah. No, no. Well, I mean, it’s a written record, but mostly it’s actually just because I think it’s so hard for someone to have to look you in the eye as you say something difficult for them to hear. And so I do it so that the other person has the privacy of their initial reaction.

Chelsea: And the time.

Jameela: Cause very rarely. Yeah, the time, also the time to think about it before they respond, but, but the giving someone, affording someone the privacy and the dignity of receiving bad news is something that I take very seriously because I almost never have a good reaction to bad news initially.

Chelsea: Of couse, of couse. Who does?

Jameela: Later, later, very reasonable. But I normally have, you know, an embarrassing reaction to bad news or rejection, you know, because it brings out a sort of inner baby. And I think most people [00:43:00] do. And so, you know, I, uh, I like, I’d always rather be sort of dumped on email because I don’t want someone to see the original, initial reaction.

Chelsea: The original reaction.

Jameela: I want them to see me 48 hours later when I’ve taken

Chelsea: Full face of makeup.

Jameela: I’ve taken some anti anxiety meds. I’m wearing a good red dress, you know, and I, you know, I have some time to, to, you know, I don’t think we need to see the raw emotion of everyone. It’s not, it’s not our business.

Chelsea: Yes. And you put on that red dress and you walk up to them and you say, I agree. I was thinking the same thing.

Jameela: Yeah, exactly. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. You get out of there shaking. Get in the tub.

Chelsea: Shake in the bathroom. Shake in the car.

Jameela: Yeah. You, you pay Keanu Reeves to be there at the door.

Chelsea: That’s right, that’s right.

Jameela: He should offer that as a service.

Chelsea: I bet he already does for free. He’s a good human. I think he’s out there doing the work.

Jameela: Is that why he doesn’t act that often?

Chelsea: Yeah, because he’s out here.

Jameela: He’s busy doing that.

Chelsea: Being in bars, waiting to wave to a girl [00:44:00] who’s just been broken up with like their old friends.

Jameela: Sure. So when we’ve spoken about this and we’ve had to sort of dance around the reality of what’s actually happened, of course, but it’s the aftermath that I think is the most important for so many people to hear about, because I think that’s the unknown for so many people. Once you’re in it, you’re just in it, but you have no idea what life looks like afterwards, and you’ve said that you had lots of therapy and it took you 10 years to even kind of process it and it’s taken you a while to learn how to stop disassociating. It was super helpful, the tips you gave, by the way, as to bringing your body back in.

Chelsea: Yeah.

Jameela: Um, and I’m sure disassociating looks and feels differently for everyone. So if you didn’t relate to that, it doesn’t mean you don’t disassociate, but I think it’s really helpful just to have someone try and verbalize how distanced it can make you feel from yourself. I’m on autopilot 85% of the time.

Chelsea: Yeah, oh yeah.

Jameela: I’m really not present almost ever, and it’s the saddest thing [00:45:00] about me, and I have a very activated nervous system that I have no idea. I went to an osteopath and he, uh, he said to me that my nervous system is very, very activated. He could feel it. And so he just sort of, I don’t know, pressed some sort of button in my back. Um, and, and I went to sleep for the first time without pills in ages and slept seven hours, had the deepest sleep. And I was like, wow, that means I am activated every night of insomnia I have. I’m just activated. And I don’t even know that I’m activated because I don’t feel stressed in my brain. I feel completely fine. Uh, Poppy Jamie was on this podcast recently, sort of describing humans like ducks where, you know, it looks like they’re just gliding along the water, but actually their little legs are just kind of going and going and going underwards. And we never see that part of a duck’s life or effort as to what’s happening beneath the surface. But that is me.

Chelsea: It’s, and especially with women, we hide our efforts, um, because effort is not cool. And I, you know, I never, ever, I wouldn’t have heard myself speaking and been [00:46:00] like, yeah, I have that feeling. The only, I mean, at all, cause like you said. Autopilot feels normal and real. You don’t know something’s wrong because everything’s going well, but

Jameela: Sometimes you actually pat yourself on the back on how well you handle life.

Chelsea: No, you’re like,

Jameela: Compared to other people.

Chelsea: Exactly, you’re like, and often, um, you know, uh, as you know this, CBTSD leads to a lot of overachievement and workaholism, because it feels so nice to put your brain anywhere, but inside your own mind, and so putting it on a project, a task, a this, you just go and go and go, and it feels so good, and everyone else is like, wow, how does she do it? Oh my god, she’s leaning in and having it all.

Jameela: Maybe it’s PTSD.

Chelsea: Yeah, exactly. And you’re like, oh, it’s actually, it is actually a brain dysfunction. However, You know, I was, I was working on The Problem with Jon Stewart, um, and I was the head writer. And so I was like, you know, you’re, you’re the boss, you’re in control of everything. We were doing an episode on gun violence and I knew I was going to get, uh, it was the most, I’m so proud [00:47:00] of that episode. It’s the best thing I’ve ever done, but I had to remember this quote, have no idea where I got it from, which is that we think that strength means having it all together and being powerful and stoic and in control, but true strength is being brave enough to feel. And I, I cried, you know, I was, I was, I was running the show and I’m crying on set, but that’s not because I’m weak. That’s because I, I am brave enough to not try and block it out. And I think if you are just crushing it, but happen to know there’s a lot of traumatic stuff in your past, but you’re like, but I’m crushing it. That’s something to look into with dissociation, like

Jameela: You’re also crushing yourself.

Chelsea: Yes. And it’s harder. It is harder to feel the pain. It is easier to not.

Jameela: Totally. For anyone who is listening to this, who is either in this situation, has just come out of this situation, came out of it years [00:48:00] ago, didn’t know, still hasn’t found a way yet to process it, or the friend of, what are some of the takeaways from your book that you most hope people receive?

Chelsea: Um, community will save your life. And community used to be very abstract to me. Like, yeah, community. And I did not know what community really was until I showed up as myself, because how can you find other people like you if you are busy hiding? But to show up as yourself, give someone else permission to show up too, and to join communities of women who identify as victims or survivors or just were in toxic relationships, which by the way, could be a therapy community, it could also be a podcast Patreon of the right podcast where you can feel open and safe. You know that this is a safe space. It’s probably not Reddit. It’s maybe just a good friend of yours where you’re going to talk with him, but put yourself in community. Your female friends will save you. If you are struggling with female friendships, go and find a [00:49:00] community and just start giving to it. Be a giver. Don’t be a taker and see where it takes you. Don’t be afraid to open up and tell someone what you’re going through so that they can be there for you because my biggest takeaway is that everything in life can be accomplished with one friend who is ready to fuck some shit up with you. And so go and link arms with other women. They’re not your competition. They are going, they are your heroes, they are your saviors and you are theirs. And link arms with them as you walk through this.

Jameela: That’s really beautiful. And also, I think you are offering people two things in, in which you, you are providing the fact that they have the permission, as we said earlier, to maybe forever grieve the person they never got to meet

Chelsea: oh yeah.

Jameela: In themselves. But you are also a, a wonderful example of survival and of being able to piece yourself back together as best you can. And you are happily [00:50:00] married to a wonderful, hilarious man now, and you have lovely friends, and you are so beloved by so many women, and it makes so much sense that you spend so much of your career focusing on the tiny little nuances and, and, and moments and bits of information from, from women telling their own stories, because it’s so clear that. You never felt like your full story got to be told. You never felt heard in your life at some pivotal moment. I’m sure you do now. But there was a time in your formative years in which you didn’t feel heard or seen, so you go out of your way to hear and see other women. And that’s very, very apparent in the work of yours that I follow. And I really appreciate that.

Chelsea: I mean, what you said to me was so beautiful. And I think, um, we can probably both relate to this, which is, I didn’t feel seen or now I feel seen and heard cause I’m screaming about it and I’m like, buy my book, listen to my podcast. Um, but [00:51:00] for most of my life, I feel like resilience is such a beautiful quality. It’s the quality we all look up to, but when you have a lot of resilience, it hides from others the pain you’ve been through, the tragedy you’ve been through and with women, especially, it makes people think, oh, she’s so confident. Let’s take a jab at her. She deserves it. Look at her just going and going and going and going. She must be so great. And it’s this resilience speed of like, I must make it through. And it makes other people think that you think so much of yourself because confidence is so gendered, you know, and if you’re high femme and you love makeup and people put this thing on you that you have never been through anything.

And, and I think to set resilience down for a moment is really hard, but letting other people know the nuance behind, what’s behind the bangs, TM, um, has been one of the best gifts I’ve given myself.

Jameela: Yeah, I agree. [00:52:00] And I don’t know about you, but, but a big part of me still uses the way that I dress and the way that I put myself together, it’s so cartoonish, uh, to me, I find, I deliberately try to kind of create almost like a character and she just makes me feel safe. And I’m not, she’s not trying to like pander to anyone. If anything, I get criticized for the fact that I’m not like cooler, you know, but I’m not trying to be cool and subtle. I’m trying to create a fucking armor that makes me feel safer in the world and that makes me feel nice.

Chelsea: I love that. Yes. Mariah Carey says her makeup is her armor. I wrote about this in the book, but I did drag for a little bit and that’s one of the most life changing things I’ve ever done. And my goal now every day is to be so femme that my femininity becomes scary. I want to make femininity violent. I want a bold lip, so intense you’re scared of me.

Jameela: Yeah. Haha! Well, femininity is terrifying that’s why it’s so [00:53:00] despised.

Chelsea: Yes, but I want it to be in the way of like, ah! Do those tits hurt?

Jameela: Yeah, yeah, you don’t want it to be. Yeah. Yeah. You don’t want it to be like sort of innuendo and nuance. You want it in your face. This shit is scary. It’s funny, a friend of mine also developed like a much healthier relationship with her body, with her face, with her confidence from doing drag.

Chelsea: Drag will change your life. It will heal you even just being a devoted, um, watcher and audience member. It will change your life through drag queens I saw something in femininity I had never seen before, which is power. And tapping into that allowed me to become myself for the first time. I started doing drag after I had this best friend breakup, which again, the best friend breakup is one chapter, doing drag is the chapter right after that, where I got out of this horrible place in my life by, you know, just a glitter palette and a Mariah Carey key change. And I worked my way back to itself.

Jameela: Not to be underestimated.

Chelsea: Yeah, seriously.

Jameela: 100%. Even, even just, uh, doing a show about ballroom, which is, you know, [00:54:00] incorporates drag within it, but it’s about ballroom, totally changed my confidence with the way that I did my hair and my makeup. And I learned how to walk in a, sort of sexier and more sort of, I don’t know, confident way than my normal Mr. Bean walk, which is still my default walk, unfortunately. I move my legs, but I never move my arms. Um, but at least I know how to strut, uh, from that community. And something about drag that I love so especially is that drag queens are not trans. These are men who are often dressing up as a woman and enjoying, like, a friend of mine is a drag queen and he loves his mother and his drag persona is such a homage to his mother and such a, like, like a kind of worship almost of his mother and he sort of plays a very exaggerated gorgeous version of her.

And, and I, I think that there’s something so emboldening for me as a woman to watch that, to watch, to watch women being so loved and emulating them being the highest form of flattery. [00:55:00] And there’s so much love for the things that I think, I imagine men envy about us. And that’s why they’re so mad. They envy our sensitivity and our ability to, you know, celebrate ourselves in certain ways.

Chelsea: And just so many accessories. And I think the beauty of drag is realizing that all gender is a performance. There are women as kings. There are trans women as women. Trans women as men. There are, um, you know, it can be non binary and your gender that you perform on stage could be that of unicorn monster. All gender is a performance. Even if you are not participating in drag every day, when you walk out of your house, gender is performance. Gender is nuanced. Gender is a spectrum. It’s it’s like the most beautiful revelation to have.

Jameela: 100% and even on top of that, the more I learn about neurodivergence and masking, the more I realize everyone’s masking. Everything’s a performance. Like, I think COVID was the only time I actually got a glimpse of who I really was, was lockdown.

Chelsea: When you were actually wearing a mask.

Jameela: But lockdown, when we were in [00:56:00] like lockdown and we weren’t allowed out, that’s the first time I think I’ve ever, that’s the first time I’ve met me since I was about nine years old.

Chelsea: Oh, I’m so, there were, there were little lights throughout this, little gems throughout this horrible thing we all lived through. And I think one of those, I, I too was like, interesting. I am, I am an introvert cosplaying as an extrovert. I am an introvert who wants to be liked so badly they have become an extrovert, but I love the couch. Ooh, what’s better than the couch? Nothing.

Jameela: Love a couch. Well, look, I’m going to let you get back to yours. I know you are so busy. You are still on this book tour. Thank you so much for talking to me today.

Chelsea: I am so honored to be here talking to you and just thank you for the work that you do.

Jameela: Thank you for the work that you do, for the work you’ve done, and for the work you continue to do, and I’m so happy for you that you’re on your journey, and I’m so thankful to you for being so vulnerable in this book, and everyone should go out and buy it, and read it, and ingest it, and share it with someone who really needs it.

Chelsea: Yes, and if, listen, if you’re like, listen, I’m [00:57:00] not gonna do the whole book. Go listen to an episode of the podcast. It’s called Glamorous Trash. Give one episode, then you can see if you’re ready for a full book.

Jameela: I think you will be. Um, thank you so much.

Chelsea: Thank you.

Jameela: Thank you so much for listening to this week’s episode. I Weigh With Jameela Jamil is produced and researched by myself, Jameela Jamil, Erin Finnegan, Kimmie Gregory, and Amelia Chappelow. And the beautiful music that you are hearing now is made by my boyfriend, James Blake.

And if you haven’t already, please rate, review, and subscribe to the show. It’s such a great way to show your support and helps me out massively. And lastly, at I Weigh, we would love to hear from you and share what you weigh at the end of this podcast. Please email us at voice recording sharing what you weigh at iweighpodcastatgmail.com. And now, we would love to pass the mic to one of our listeners.

Listener: I weigh my ability to challenge myself and still learn new parts of me I didn’t [00:58:00] know were there before. I weigh my ability to love people for who they are and not for what they can give me. I weigh the love I have for my cats, my constant companions, and I weigh my ability to acknowledge my anxieties but push forward anyway.