EP. 157 — Porn, Drugs, Murder & Learning To Love

[00:00:00] [AD BREAK]

[00:01:10] CHRIS: Hello to all my pornographers with a good heart out there. It’s Beautiful Anonymous. One hour, one phone call, no names, no holds barred. 

[00:01:24] 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.

[00:01:34] CHRIS: Hi, everybody. It’s Chris and I’m back. Harry Nelson has been fired and I got my job back. No. Happy April Fool’s Day, everybody. Happy April Fool’s Day. We’ve been laying track on that one for a while and I’m not gonna lie, I giggled at the reaction when I woke up on Monday morning and saw dozens, if not hundreds of Facebook posts, tweets and Instagram comments asking me what was going on and why I had either lost this job here or left the job here. Everything’s fine. It was just a joke. An April Fools Day joke. This whole thing started, I just started doing a bit saying Harry was looking to take my job. And then we realized one day, Harry, Jared and I realized, oh wait, April first is a Monday. We can drop an April Fools episode, and then get right back into the swing of things on Tuesday. And so happy to see that most of you enjoyed it. Apologies to our overseas listeners. I woke up and felt very guilty as I realized that, you know, in places like Australia and Europe, you don’t have a holiday dedicated to relentlessly pranking each other. And many of you were quite concerned. Apologies there. Some people got very angry at me. And also poor old Harry Nelson took it on the chin in some of your comments. You guys don’t. Let’s not be Internet people who lash out in rage on the Internet. If you said something mean to Harry, please go back and apologize or say something nice. The guy’s the best. And he did a good job. At the end of the day you just got a free episode with a great caller. Thank you to our caller for offering up so much good stuff. And also, just being cool, playing along, it’s fun stuff. I’m here. I’m back. Not only am I back, I told you last week that I had big news about the podcast. A lot of you guys said, oh, that was just part of the setup of the April Fools joke. And it was.

But I’m also happy to announce that I’m in the final stages of signing a new contract that’s gonna bring Beautiful Anonymous back for two more years. Two more years of talking to people, two more years of hearing stories, of getting you guys on record, of having regular people be able to say their peace to the world in an environment that is safe and accommodates it and that actually wants to listen to you, put you on a pedestal for once. And if we do well enough in the ad sales, we automatically get a third year. So use those promo codes. I’m not kidding when I say that it matters, it will get us a third year, 2022. So nice to meet everybody in the southeast. Club owners consistently tell me that I have the nicest fans they have ever met, and that is you guys who listen to the show. Thank you everybody who came out in Huntsville, Nashville, Atlanta, the Carolinas. Thank you so much. OK. This week’s episode, we didn’t even know what to call this one. We had to put our heads together because there’s so much going on. This caller has lived a life. I mean, we’ve heard the phrase, you know, “dad issues” that some people’s parents can get them and dads can. I mean, this person has that beyond anything I’ve ever heard. This is a tale that involves sex and drugs and murder. And none of that is an exaggeration. And I just really thank the caller for opening up so much about what was, I would imagine, some of the most incredibly hard stuff a person could ever live through – told us all about it. Really fascinating call. Enjoy it. 

[00:04:52] Phone Robot: Thank you for calling Beautiful Anonymous a beeping noise will indicate when you are on the show with the host. [Beep]

[00:04:59] CALLER: Hello.

[00:05:00] CHRIS: Hello.

[00:05:02] CALLER: Hi.

[00:05:03] CHRIS: How’s it going?

[00:05:04] CALLER: Good. It’s going pretty good.

[00:05:07] CHRIS: That’s good.

[00:05:08] CALLER: Yeah. Yeah. It’s a beautiful sunny day where I am and I have the day off. And that’s a treat all in and of itself.

[00:05:17] CHRIS: Oh, yeah. See, it’s freezing cold where I am. And as you can tell, I’m here working my butt off.

[00:05:25] CALLER: Yeah. Tough stuff over there.

[00:05:26] CHRIS: Yeah.This is the easiest job in human history. Talk with people on the phone. Pretty sweet.

[00:05:34] CALLER: Can I start with an unpopular opinion, though?

[00:05:37] CHRIS: Okay.

[00:05:39] CALLER: I love winter.

[00:05:41] CHRIS: Wow.

[00:05:42] CALLER: I’m in winter similar to yours.

[00:05:45] CHRIS: Mhmm.

[00:05:45] CALLER: I love it.

[00:05:47] CHRIS: I’m done with it.

[00:05:49] CALLER: It’s like, are you done? 

[00:05:50] CHRIS: Well, I think it’s very pretty. I like winter, too. I think it’s very beautiful. I love when the snow falls. I don’t like Christmas music. It drives me nuts. But I think with Christmas decorations go up, it’s a special thing. But I am done. It lasts too long. 

[00:06:07] CALLER: I hear you. I hear you. When, ok, end of April, if it’s still snowing. I’m done, like, I am at my limit.

[00:06:13] CHRIS: Yeah

[00:06:15] CALLER: But right now, I’m I’m pretty happy. And also, I got to clarify, I don’t, like, you can’t not associate Christmas with winter,

[00:06:24] CHRIS: Yeah.

[00:06:25] CALLER: But I don’t really do Christmas.

[00:06:26] CHRIS: Ok.

[00:06:27] CALLER: So to me, that’s like a separate thing. Winter is just a season that is beautiful and part of life. Christmas is some some nonsense that I really don’t enjoy and don’t do anything with. 

[00:06:39] CHRIS: I mean, if I never hear Christmas music playing in a public place against my will again, I’ll be so happy. The month of March. That’s the real son of a bitch, isn’t it? The month of March. Because that’s when you think spring is coming and it never comes. It’s just cold for like three, full weeks longer than you expected. For some reason, we always think March is where it’s going to turn around and never does.

[00:07:05] CALLER: No, no, it never does.

[00:07:07] CHRIS: March.

[00:07:09] CALLER: Listen. Like, I’m a big fan of not complaining about the things I have no control over.

[00:07:14] CHRIS: Yeah, yeah.

[00:07:15] CALLER: So winter I can’t control. I can do nothing about it. So I’m not going to spend my time being upset about it. I’m going to dress warmer. I’m going to wear waterproof stuff. I even, I was sick one day and I went to the doctors and then coming home, and it was like, where I was, it was just, it was a huge snowstorm. Like, just slush snow everywhere. Hard to get around. And I’m standing there with my prescription in my hand waiting for the light to change and I’m feeling gross. And then head to toe, like, I’ve got snow pants and a big jacket. And this car goes by and just splashes slush all over everybody who’s waiting. And I’m just laughing because I’m like, well, underneath I’m great. Like, I’m not happy about what my what I look like right now. But everyone else is wearing, like, you know, their outfit for the day and they’re, yeah they look like shit now. Sorry Sally. But like, it’s you know, you’ve got to prepare. You gotta feel, you’ve got to try and make it good.

[00:08:12] CHRIS: Yeah.

[00:08:13] CALLER: If you don’t try, then you can’t really complain about it.

[00:08:16] CHRIS: It’s a good attitude. You know, what I’ll say? I think when people sign up for their entertainment options, what they hope for is two people chit-chatting about the weather. 

[00:08:29] CALLER: [Laughing] Yeah. Me getting cranky about other people complaining about the weather. That’s what everybody wants. 

[00:08:34] CHRIS: Yeah. You defending the weather and me having the most cliche opinion on the weather that one could have.

[00:08:43] CALLER: Oh, I have so many other entertaining things to tell you about if you want. 

[00:08:46] CHRIS: I can’t wait. I can’t wait. I was just going to say, just so everybody listening knows, I’ve been told that you left a voicemail years ago.

[00:08:56] CALLER: Years ago.

[00:08:57] CHRIS: And we’re just getting back to you. And I don’t know anything about what that voicemail was about. And Jared has expressed that he doesn’t even know where things stand compared to the voicemail you left years ago. 

[00:09:08] CALLER: Man, yeah. I think about that because there’s so much that I said. I used to, like. OK. So I would listen, like, avidly because I had a job that I was driving and I could listen to podcasts. And so I was, like, I listened to every one that came out. I’d listen on that day it came out. And I was always prepared. I was like, well, you know, I would have an interesting show. And then, like, I realized in the same way that you do when you listen to other people’s stories in real life, you know, everyone’s got a story. So, and mine is kind of sensational, but it’s not that different. Like, we all are blessed and cursed with really, kind of, like, unreal things that happened to us that we believe are, like, out of the norm. But just the norm is really weird. I think anyways. Yeah. I left a really, like, sensational sound bite, I guess. Like, two years ago? Two years ago. Yeah.

[00:10:03] CHRIS: Ok, uh-huh.

[00:10:06] CALLER: Where I started off probably with the things that are the biggest things that ever happened to me, which was, I was born into a very dysfunctional family. My father was abusive in every way possible to all of us kids and my mom. And he ended up being, you know, fleeing the country with millions of dollars from his financial investment corporation and kidnapping my sister. And then was later found in another country. Found because he murdered somebody by hitting them over the head with an anchor and throwing them over the side of a boat. And that’s like a part of who I am. But it’s not, like, it’s a piece. But my whole life has been kind of like this one, long, major fucked up event where-

[00:11:01] CHRIS: -What?!-

[00:11:01] CALLER: -I am constantly trying to find ways of being kind of still happy and finding good things in life because it’s true, there is so much good. 

[00:11:10] CHRIS: What are you even talking about right now? What are you even talking about? You started off where you’re like, yeah, two years ago, I thought this story was sensational, but listening to this show, everybody’s got a story. I’ve learned that. Anyway, my father fled the country, stole millions of dollars, kidnapped my sister and murdered someone. That’s OK. We gotta, I don’t, like you said, so much more has happened in the past two years. I want to hear the well-rounded version of who you are, as you keep indicating there’s more to it than this. We gotta know some details on this, though. That can’t just be the bullet points at the top. We’re seven minutes in. If that’s the bullet points. And you can get 53 minutes that tops what you just said?

[00:11:53] CALLER: It will expand on it, but I don’t know if it’ll top.

[00:11:56] CHRIS: OK.

[00:11:57] CALLER: It’s just, it’s been a weird life, Chris. Like, and it never stops. Like, I used to want to achieve a normal life and I definitely, like, strive for that. You know, I look pretty normal and I act, like, I seem pretty normal. But I can’t stop this weird life. Like last year I was a curator and, you know, event coordinator for a porn film festival. Like, My life just never stops being this bizarre event. Just one thing after the other. 

[00:12:31] CHRIS: What are you talking about? What are you talking about? How do we do all this in 52 minutes? Because we could talk for 52 minutes about the porn festival.

[00:12:45] CALLER: We sure could.

[00:12:46] CHRIS: Or we could talk for 52 minutes about your dad. So what would you say we do? 

[00:12:52] CALLER: Oh, man. I don’t know. It’s tough. I think maybe just the overarching theme that seems to keep coming back to me, despite all the weird stuff is, like, learning how to be loving is, like, the most important thing to talk about, because people can talk about sensational like bad dads and dysfunctional families all day long. But, like, what’s the important thing to talk about? What are people gonna get value out of this show? I think, like, learning in a society and in a world and in families where there’s no actual love, there’s, like, talk of love. Like, my whole life has been learning how to be loving. And I was never taught how and I was never shown, and I didn’t get any love. And I’ve tried really hard. I’ve, like, suffered in the name of figuring out how to be loving to others and to myself. And I think, I think I got there. And that’s, I think, one of the most important things in my life.

[00:13:48] CHRIS: That’s amazing. That’s amazing to hear that you got there. I would imagine when when you say you were never taught that, it does sound like that does go directly back to your father, at least in some sense, I’d have to imagine.

[00:14:01] CALLER: Yeah. And the sad fact is that I had a shit mom too.

[00:14:04] CHRIS: Bah.

[00:14:05] CALLER: It’s unfortunate, but yeah, I know. It’s really, and I didn’t know that until later. You know, when I was just, you know, it was just her. I kind of was just okay with how she was. And then it took years of therapy and lots of things later to be, like, oh, like you weren’t very loving. And again, not fully her fault. We just. People don’t know how to be loving, but like there was no loving touch. Like, she only held my hand across streets, like there wasn’t like hugs or, you know, rubs on the back or even saying, I love you. Like, that was just. There was none. 

[00:14:40] CHRIS: How many siblings do you have?

[00:14:43] CALLER: I have three.

[00:14:44] CHRIS: Three siblings.

[00:14:47] CALLER: Mhmm.I am the youngest.

[00:14:49]  CHRIS: Do you think on some level that being in what sounds like a really scary, tumultuous, brutal situation, do you think that, I’m not trying to be an armchair analyst, just asking, do you on some level would you say your mom was just like, man, this family represents the ways in which I’m kind of trapped or dealing with horror? Or was it just, nope, the personalities of both your parents were not built or equipped from the start to raise kids?

[00:15:24] CALLER: I think built from the start, she just wasn’t, like, I don’t think, you know. So I went through 12 steps for dysfunctional families because in my early 20s I ended up becoming quite the addict because I didn’t know how to process all the feelings that I had from not being loved, being, you know, having so much violence in the home, my family being torn apart, poverty, because we were, once my dad left, we were poor. Like dirt poor country living, thought the house is going to get taken away. Kind of shit. And yeah, like, when you go through 12 steps for, you know, dysfunctional families, you realize that dysfunction is just passed on. And, you know, as much as she is at fault for not being loving, she is also a product of her childhood, which was probably very unloving as well. And that’s, like, it’s an age thing too, right? Like kids from the 40s and 50s and 60s, their parents, that was the whole, you know, not being loving to your kid was giving them the best childhood possible. Spare the whip, spare the rod, spoil the child kind of thing. Just like, that was their, that hat was that was them trying their best.

[00:16:43] CHRIS: Yeah. I think about that a lot too. And I certainly did not have a situation with nearly as much pain as yours. But I think a lot about that, about how even when I was growing up in the 80s, there was this, like, premium put on the idea of being tough. That toughness was this prized thing.

[00:17:04] CALLER: Yeah.

[00:17:05] CHRIS: And then you think back to your childhood, and at least in my case, I’m like, oh, there were so many moments where it would have served me to drop that shit. To not be tough. Why be tough when you don’t have to be? Be tough when you have to be. But we made it this, like, brass ring toughness. At least where I grew up. 

[00:17:23] CALLER: Oh, yeah.

[00:17:24] CHRIS: I wanna, I do not want to pass that on to my my kid when he comes. I don’t want that. 

[00:17:29] CALLER: Oh yeah. Dude, one sec. Congrats. I’m so happy for you.

[00:17:33] CHRIS: Thanks.

[00:17:34] CALLER: I’m so happy for you. This kid is very lucky. 

[00:17:37] CHRIS: We’ll see. We’ll see. Or he’ll be raised by a notoriously anxiety ridden man. And he’ll have to hilariously unwrap that as he grows older. But I think I’ll give him a lot of love. 

[00:17:48] CALLER: Well, you know. That’s why this is an important conversation, just talking about what love really is.

[00:17:53] CHRIS: Yeah, exactly.

[00:17:54] CALLER: All part of what raising good, being good at raising children is because, like, you can fuck up and you can be anxious and you can make mistakes and you can forget them at the mall and all sorts of things. But if you’re loving, you’ll get through it. 

[00:18:06] CHRIS: Now forgetting him at the mall sounds awfully specific. Were you forgotten at the mall? 

[00:18:11] CALLER: No, I was forgotten somewhere else. That was just, that just came up because other people have malls in their upbringing. I didn’t have a mall.

[00:18:18] CHRIS: Where were you forgotten? 

[00:18:22] CALLER: The worst one was at a soccer game. She just never showed up to pick me up. And then when I got a ride home from the coach an hour after we finished, she was like, listen, I gotta drive you home. You know, I gotta go home. And then when she finally showed up at home, she yelled at me for not being at the game when she, or not being at the soccer field. And I was just like, I don’t know what to do with this right now.

[00:18:46] CHRIS: Yeah.

[00:18:47] CALLER: Like, I understand that you’re upset. But also I, like, I wanted to be upset with her and I couldn’t. We, none of us, could ever be upset with her because she suffered because my father was so bad.

[00:18:58] CHRIS: Right.

[00:18:58] CALLER: But really, I would have loved to have been really mad at her so many times. She was terrible.

[00:19:03] CHRIS: Of course. Yeah, but she’s standing on this platform where you guys were there to see it. That’s a lot to unwrap. So you’re dad. I don’t want to dwell on the abuse because even through what you’ve already told us, it was clearly very bad for you and your siblings and your mom. And it breaks my heart. And I first want to just say I wish you did not have to go through any of that. I do, I would love just because it is the sensational story. What is this business about your father fleeing with these millions of dollars and kidnapping your sister and murdering someone? I do feel honor, bound to ask more about that. 

[00:19:44] CALLER: You know what’s funny is that this is all so super identifying and I maybe shouldn’t have started with all that or, like, maybe, like, omitted some of the details, but it shot myself in the foot. It just, because it was so public, I’ve always had to talk about it. So I have always been very, very comfortable because you can’t have someone fleeing with millions of dollars and kidnapping and killing somebody without being attractive to, you know, the media. Right? So it’s just been something I was forced to get really, really comfortable talking about. So I’m sure there’ll be some identifying factors and I’m sure some will be like, oh, shit, I know this, I know this guy.

[00:20:23] CHRIS: Well, I’ll go ahead and offer this up too, to our listeners. A rule that I’ve put out there before. Hey, be cool. Don’t Google. It’s anonymous for a reason. So be cool. Resist the urge. Let this project be what it’s supposed to be. 

[00:20:37] CALLER: Thanks.Yeah. So what did you want to know about the crazy, sensational part? The fleeing, the money, hat stuff? 

[00:20:44] CHRIS: So I would imagine fleeing. You said it was a business thing. So was he a shady business person?

[00:20:50] CALLER: Yeah.

[00:20:50] CHRIS: And he got caught. The government tracked it down, it sounds like. Is that the dots I’m connecting?

[00:20:54] CALLER: He’s a sociopath. He’s a full on sociopath who pretended to have business savvy and financial sense when he had none. Not even an education. He’s a Grade 9 dropout. 

[00:21:06] CHRIS: Did he run the fyre festival? Is that that guy who ran the Fyre Festival? He sounds a lot like him. 

[00:21:13] CALLER: Do you know what’s funny? No, but I am a promoter. I’m a party promoter. And watching that documentary made me sick. Oh, my God. Oh.

[00:21:22] CHRIS: Strong opinions on the Fyre Festival. I’m going to take down that note in case we run out of things to talk about. But I have a feeling that ain’t happening.

[00:21:32] CALLER: Yeah. Chris, no, I’m a Gemini, that’s never going to run out of things to talk about.

[00:21:36] CHRIS: I am too.

[00:21:36] CALLER: A Strong Gemini

[00:21:38] CHRIS: I’m Gemini on the Taurus border. Anyway, so your dad’s a sociopath. He’s convincing people he has business acumen. And he’s got, like, millions of dollars to steal. That means people are giving him millions of dollars. These people can’t be happy.

[00:21:51] CALLER: No, no, no, no, no. They’re not happy. No. And they never got it back. There was never any, they didn’t, they searched for the money. And I think they only found some of it and the money that they used in order to search for it was so much that it became not worth looking for the rest of it. 

[00:22:08] CHRIS: Right. Right. So is he physically hiding cash or is it, like, stashed in all sorts of weird, shady offshore accounts? 

[00:22:17] CALLER: If I knew, I would go get some of it. 

[00:22:21] CHRIS: I guess that’s fair, what a dumb question, for you to go,  no one ever found it, and me to go on, my question was effectively, okay, where is it? 

[00:22:29] CALLER: Yeah. Where is it, and in what form?  Can we go get it? I have a child coming I’d love to afford. No, I have no idea. I have no idea. You know, I was really young when all of that happened. And, you know, I just. All I know is that, like, he had lots of money with him when he left, like a couple million, which back when he left was a lot, like, that was big money back then. Right now, I don’t think a couple million would be seen the same way. 

[00:23:02] CHRIS: Most of us would, I think a couple, I know what you’re saying, but a couple million is still a big deal. So back then it was a huge deal. 

[00:23:09] CALLER: Yeah. To you and me. It would be a big deal. But yeah. Back then it was a huge deal. So. And then I don’t know. I don’t know. Like, I can guess that he probably spent a ton of it because he did seem like a bit of an idiot. Like, we went from, so I was very young. I just remember us, like, just spending a lot of money at one point. Like, we got a pool, we got a Jaguar, we, like, we would be taken, you know, we got Gap clothes as kids and we were, like, from the countryside, like, you know, like we just, something shifted. But again, I’m young, so I don’t know. I’m like, okay, great. 

[00:23:47] CHRIS: How young are we talking? 

[00:23:50] CALLER: Like six, seven? So I don’t really get what’s happening. Right?

[00:23:54] CHRIS: Mhmm.

[00:23:55] CALLER: And then the stark contrast was when he left. And we were left with my mom. And so we, you know, there was no more of any of that. There was no more clothes shopping for probably the next five to eight years. It was, like, maybe going to a secondhand, like a charity place, to pick up some clothes. Like, no more gap, no more, like, the pool kind of went badly. Like, it was just like everything just started to, like, really crumble and fall apart. And it became a really dark time. My sister is missing. My other sister, you know, doesn’t live with us. We’re all torn apart. We don’t talk about it. You know, the heat is barely on. We don’t have any food. I’m like, I’m eight. And I didn’t know at the time, but I was depressed. I figured it out a couple of years later, but I was depressed, at eight, heavily. 

[00:24:57] CHRIS: Let’s go ahead and pause it there. I rarely meet people who were depressed at a younger age than I was. That breaks my heart and I think it’s worth pausing and reflecting on it since we’re going to pause anyway, check out the ads. They support the show. It’s how we make the show exist. Use the promo codes if you’re so inclined. We’ll be back after this with more phone call.

[00:25:19] [AD BREAK]

[00:27:12] CHRIS: [music transition] Thanks so much to our advertisers. Now let’s get back to the phone call. 

[00:27:18] CALLER: I’m, like, I’m eight and I didn’t know at the time, but I was depressed. I figured it out a couple of years later, but I was depressed, at eight, heavily.

[00:27:29] CHRIS: Yeah, and it sounds like, your father took your sister as he fled? It wasn’t a thing where he came back and kidnapped her later? It was, he was out the door and took one of your siblings?

[00:27:45] CALLER: Yeah. So here’s here’s the weird part. So as a sociopath, he’s incredibly charming, incredibly charming. Charmed, like, charmed everybody out of their money. He didn’t even have, like, no one looked at his degrees and saw none. Like, people just believed him because he was charming and he charmed even us kids. And he was just, like, you don’t want to live with your mom. Your mom’s a horrible person. All he had to say to me as an eight year old was like, your mom doesn’t like cats. Do you wanna live with your mom? And I was like, no. I want to live with someone who likes cats. Like, I just. So he knew how to play all of us and he turned us all against our mom. And none of us wanted to live with her. So when he was leaving, all he had to say was, like, do you want to leave with me and my sister left. It’s far more complex than that. Like, I’m really oversimplifying. But it goes to show the charm of a sociopath that he can, like, so many people, their inheritance, their money, their, like, their savings is gone. He’s ruined so many lives. Like, hundreds of people’s lives.

[00:28:46] CHRIS: Wow.

[00:28:47] CALLER: Yeah.

[00:28:49] CHRIS: And weird question. When your sister left, did he try to take all of you or did he target her specifically for some reason?

[00:29:00] CALLER: I think he would have taken us all if he could. He took, he did take us, I think the year before. Again, very hazy memory, very young. He took us on a trip without telling my mom. And I remember being in Scotland and he gives me the phone. And he’s like. say hi to your mom. And I’m like, hey mom, and she’s like, where are you? And I’m like, Scotland, ha ha ha. And like, I’m having a great time. I didn’t realize that she didn’t know where we were. 

[00:29:28] CHRIS: Whoa.

[00:29:31] CALLER: Yeah. 

[00:29:32] CHRIS: That’s evil. That’s evil. Messing with a mom through her kids. That’s evil. 

[00:29:39] CALLER: I found out later, too, that he almost, that he hired, he was about to hire a hit-man to kill her, even though she was my and my brother’s sole caregiver. He does not give a shit. 

[00:29:50] CHRIS: He was going to do that from his overseas hideout. 

[00:29:54] CALLER: Yep.

[00:29:57] CHRIS: This is bad. This is a bad one. This is a bad story. I’ve heard some bad stories over the years on this show. And this is about as brutal as it’s been. I’m really sorry. 

[00:30:11] CALLER: Hey, man. It’s OK. I’ve done a ton of healing work. The sad part about all of this is that I’m kind of alone in my family now. My mom never really did the work to kind of work through a lot of it. She’s still very angry, very bitter, does not admit to a lot of her part in it. Which makes it fit for some very strained relationships with her. My siblings won’t talk about it either and how it’s impacted them. And it kind of, you know, dysfunction changes people and if left undealt with, it makes you into, you know, can make you into a really terrible person. Because you don’t know how to treat people properly. You’ve only been treated horribly. And you will eventually do that to other people if you don’t, if it remains unchecked.

[00:31:03] CHRIS: Mhmm

[00:31:05] CALLER: So it took a long time. But I actually I don’t talk to my siblings anymore because of how difficult it is to be around them without them kind of treating me, treating others poorly. And to watch their dysfunction get passed onto their kids has been incredibly painful. And as much as I love them, like, I love them so much and me not talking to them doesn’t mean that I don’t love them, but it just means that it’s incredibly hard for me to be around them. And to do all of the work that I’ve done to heal. Yeah. So I, it’s been about two, maybe almost three years now where we haven’t really spoken. And it’s so painful. 

[00:31:49] CHRIS: That’s really sad. That’s really sad. I would have to imagine coming from a background where you were raised by someone, who eventually reveals himself to be a murderer level of a messed up human, at a certain point, you do have to prioritize taking care of yourself. 

[00:32:08] CALLER: Yeah. Well, yeah. And I, like. I don’t know. I guess I kind of grew up thinking that I was going to, I was, like, the black sheep of the family, the pink sheep of the family, like, I’m queer and they know it. And that was always weird or not always weird, but it was kind of weird. And I was just kind of framed oddly in my family as, like, because I was the youngest, I got kind of the least amount of abuse just because I had the least amount of time with them. And because when you’re younger, you’re kind of cuter and more innocent, so they would like throw me into situations where it was, like, ask dad if we can watch TV when he’s in a bad mood. I would go in with my pigtails and be, like, I’d like to watch TV. And he would say, yes, because I was cute. And, you know, I think that there’s a lot of resentment towards me for the fact that I got less abuse than all of them. Which is fucked up.

[00:33:09] CHRIS: Yeah, yeah.

[00:33:09] CALLER: Like, that’s not a okay thing to hold against somebody. And it’s not like it didn’t affect me. Like I didn’t turn out to be a cocaine addict and an alcoholic for no, just for the fun of it. It was really hard to process the emotions that I felt, especially because. here’s the really, this is one of the sadder parts about all this, is that my dad was more loving than my mom. And I loved him. And I loved how much he loved me. And there was no room to process that in our home and in my family. Because I missed that. I missed being loved as a child. And that’s really tough. 

[00:33:54] CHRIS: Yeah. That’s horrible. It’s beyond tough. It’s one of those things. Where you talk about it in conversation and then you wind up saying something like, it’s really tough and everyone knows there’s, what else can you say? Because there’s not really a word that encapsulates what it really was. So you say something like that, but it’s beyond tough. It’s way beyond tough.

[00:34:21] CALLER: Yeah.

[00:34:22] CHRIS: I do have to ask-

[00:34:23] CALLER: -no-

[00:34:24] CHRIS: -just because it would, I’d wonder forever if I didn’t ask, and again, I really do respect and appreciate the fact that you’re thinking proactively, letting this be a platform and you keep saying that this is about figuring out how to love, figuring out how to be yourself, figuring out how to take care of yourself. And I do want to focus on that. Just so that I’m not wondering forever. So your dad, you said, eventually you said murdered someone on a boat and details are up to you. I do just want to know, is he in jail? Did he pass away? At the very least..

[00:34:58] CALLER: Oh man, I wish he’d die.

[00:34:59] CHRIS: Oh wow.

[00:35:00] CALLER: Yeah. Well, it would be easier for all of us. [laughter]

[00:35:04] CHRIS: [laughter] Oh man, I hate to laugh. You can feel that that is a laugh of sympathy where it’s like, oh, it’s it’s really that simple. It’s really that simple.

[00:35:13] CALLER: Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, It’s OK. You can laugh and it’s OK. He’s in jail. He’s alive. There’s a chance he’ll get out. But, you know, fingers crossed that he dies first. 

[00:35:27] CHRIS: Wow. Was your sister there? Was your sister on the boat or had she been, had she made her way back?

[00:35:34] CALLER: She was not on the boat. She wasn’t on the boat. She was not on the boat. She was, actually I don’t know where she was. It again, this was, like, when I didn’t know them. And the other thing is, like, we don’t talk about this time period. I can’t even decipher what is true and what isn’t from that time period and from her. And it’s pretty, I gotta admit, there’s a lot more deep dysfunction and abuse that happened to some of my older siblings than what happened to me as far as I know. I don’t have a lot of memories of my childhood. I have, like, a couple of standalone memories from, like, you know, first memory to, like, eight when it all went down. But I do have to acknowledge that, like, there’s a lot worse stuff that I know of that happened to my siblings. And then, so I can’t, I don’t want to under undermine or take away from that for them. So, yeah, she was not there and I don’t know what she was doing, but I also, you know, I feel for her. And the fact that she has so much of this. Like, this is, for that to be part of someone’s history, for that to be part of someone’s, like, formative years? I don’t even know what to, like how that would, like fully how that would fuck someone up. 

[00:36:59] CHRIS: Yeah. Yeah. Especially as you, as you’ve said, I think, pretty graciously a number of times. You were the youngest, you endured the least of it. Maybe you were still in a very cute phase where it didn’t, you know, it didn’t, you didn’t have to take it on the chin as hard as them, and you still have mentioned that you wound up an addict. I would imagine, at least in part, in an effort to sort out or suppress or deal with all these feelings and all this trauma. So I can’t imagine how hard it is to have been the sibling who was actually there as all that stuff unfolded close up.

[00:37:37] CALLER: Exactly. Exactly. Exactly. That’s the stuff that’s so hard to even try to understand. Like, that, like, I want to and I would like to really be there for my family in that way. And I’ve, like, tried to encourage the healing. And I’ve tried to encourage talking about it and like, you know, normalize therapy and, you know, be honest about my own stuff. And I’ve really tried to make this an okay thing to do together. And to remind each other that this is important, because as I said, with dysfunction before, if we don’t deal with it, it’s going to just keep getting passed down. And that has been definitely one of the hardest things is to watch my siblings ignore that process for their own, like, I want to be honest, I don’t fault them. 

[00:38:30] CHRIS: Yeah-

[00:38:30] CALLER: -It’s a lot to unpack. That’s a huge amount to unpack. I’m sure there’s a lot of people out there that would rather die having not unpacked it and just pretended that everything was OK then to go through the, like, the shame, the grief, the sadness, the loss, everything that comes with understanding that you had one of the most fucked up childhoods and nothing’s ever going to make that go away. 

[00:38:56] CHRIS: Yeah. Yeah. 

[00:38:59] CALLER: So I don’t blame them for not doing the work, but I had to put up boundaries on the fact that like I am doing the work. And when I see you and talk to you and you haven’t. And you kind of put that on me or bring, try and bring me down to where you’re at, it’s, I can’t keep doing it.

[00:39:18] CHRIS: Right. It, on, for whatever reasons, and I’m sure, again, their own damage, I would have to imagine they are not intentionally setting out to undo your work, but it has that effect nonetheless, if you get dragged back into it. 

[00:39:33] CALLER: Yeah, that’s well that’s what, that’s what dysfunctional families do. Everyone has their role. And there’s you know, I’m a scapegoat. You know, I’m a lot of different things in my family and I’m kind of here to make them feel a little bit better about themselves because they’re doing their best to be normal with their regular jobs and their marriages and their children. And I’m over here with my drug addiction and my multiple partners and my queerness and my porn festival, and all my fucked up things that I’ve done. And I’m a way for them to feel better about themselves. When the truth is that, you know, yeah, I’m fucked up. And yeah, I live a really weird life, but I’m actually pretty happy. Like I have real moments of happiness. 

[00:40:23] CHRIS: Right.

[00:40:24] CALLER: And I didn’t have that until, it took me ’til 30 to experience actual happiness because it been sucked out of my life. 

[00:40:34] CHRIS: So yeah, they’re looking at you living maybe what, maybe by the mainstream, would be viewed as some more fringe lifestyle choices. And they’re judging that. And you’re sitting there going, well, I’m the one who’s living free. I’m the one who broke out. So there’s two sides to every coin, is what we’re saying-

[00:40:52] CALLER: -yeah, and it’s living authentically like –

[00:40:55] CHRIS: -Yes, yes-

[00:40:56] CALLER: -I feel all the pain. I feel that stuff. I cry often. Crying is very easy for me. I also have a Pisces moon. It’s very watery. I feel all my emotions very viscerally. So, like, I’m not going to recommend this path because it’s full of happiness. My life isn’t full of, you know, nonstop happiness, but I get some of it. And those moments are really precious and worthwhile. They’re worth all the work and it’s worth all the difficulty and the moments of feeling alone and empty. And, like, there’s some real difficult moments there sometimes. Like, I told you, I don’t like Christmas. Guess why? Christmas is fucking tough for us. Like, that’s when my dad left. That’s when we realized we were dirt poor. That’s when my family fell apart. And it’s never really been reclaimed as like a fun, beautiful thing. It’s always been kind of gross to me since. 

[00:41:57] CHRIS: Right. Who knew that the weather chitchat was actually just laying a lot of track for the discussion of the fallout that comes from a dysfunctional childhood. And that’s stating it lightly. Now, you said-

[00:42:14] CALLER: -Aw, dude, it’s all like this.

[00:42:17] CHRIS: I can’t imagine, I mean, yeah. There’s, you, we could have a ten part series that was just calls with you, I think. And I say that with love. I say that with love. So you fell –

[00:42:27] CALLER: -yeah, I feel the love in that. Don’t worry. 

[00:42:29] CHRIS: You fell into. You said cocaine, alcohol abuse. You also said, you said something that I thought was interesting because you mentioned being in a 12 step program, but it didn’t sound like it was, and again, I’m very, very respectful of the anonymous side of these programs, didn’t sound, you didn’t, you said you were in a 12 step program for abuse. So it didn’t sound like you went to AA or NA for the-

[00:42:54] CALLER: -no, yeah, I had. OK. So I was, I was 26 and I was deep in, like, knee deep in cocaine and MDMA and ketamine and yeah, red wine and-

[00:43:15] CHRIS: -a little further down the list of concerns. I will say red wine, a glass of red wine, at dinner is a little different than saying you are knee deep in cocaine.

[00:43:24] CALLER: Maybe some cocaine and red wine. Which, some people were like, that’s a great life. What are you talking about? But it was, it was rough. It was what I was doing was I was intaking as much as I possibly could so that I would stop feeling everything that I was feeling because it was just welling up. It was not ever going away. And I got to 26 and it was, it was like, it was, that was the height of it. It was just nonstop. Like, wasn’t sleeping, wasn’t eating, was just doing all that kind of stuff and then never, you know, taking care of myself. I did not know how to take care of myself. At all. I didn’t cook, you know, kept an okay apartment. But like, I was not a functional human being. And I started dating somebody at the time who after a couple months of being together, sat down with me. And he was like, listen, I’m not gonna be your drug buddy. He’s like, I care about you. I, you know, I want to be with you. But if this is where you’re going and if you’re going and he’s like, you know, pointing downwards, he’s like, if you’re going down, I’m not going with you. And this was the first time anybody had been so frank with me about my addictions. And my brother knew how addicted I was. We lived together for a little while and he saw how bad it was getting. Like, I was doing cocaine at home on nights off, like I wasn’t even a full on party thing. This is just a, I don’t want to feel, like, let’s just get fucked up anyways.

[00:45:04] CHRIS: Right. I’ve never done cocaine, but the sense I get is that if you’re, like, doing it alone at home, it’s it’s gone way beyond what people are usually looking for with the cocaine experience. 

[00:45:19] CALLER: Yep, yes, yeah. Yeah. This was, this was a, you know, it was clearly I don’t want to feel.  And the thing was, here’s the interesting thing, is that like, I had to come out with my addictions and everything. But like, you know, I was having nights at home with my brother where we were drinking way too much, doing cocaine. Like,  it wasn’t, you know, it wasn’t just me. And I, you know, and I know people who have had similar level of addictions who have never come out and said I was an addict, just because the assumption is, when you’re, like, if you’re an addict, you are on the streets. You are, you know, you’re losing a limb. You know what I mean? You’re just, you’re so far gone. And it’s like, no, I’m an addict. I kept, you know, I paid rent and I bought some groceries and I held a job. But I still, I’ve got to be honest, like, that was real addiction for me. I just think that people don’t want to admit even the lowest level or like even a moderate level. 

[00:46:23] CHRIS: Yeah.

[00:46:24] CALLER: Yeah. 

[00:46:25] CHRIS: Can I ask a weird, tangential question that might be very inappropriate? Because I don’t want to explore drugs as a positive thing at all, let alone with someone who’s overcome addiction. I’ve never heard anyone talk about ketamine in a way where it actually sounds fun. You only hear that it can get super dark and super fucked up.Let’s pause the call. Not a very rousing endorsement for ketamine from this guy, but you know what? I will give rousing endorsements to? The many products and services that our advertisers have to offer. We do have ads on this show. Check them out. Use the promo codes. It’s what helps the show survive. Be right back after this.

[00:47:07] [AD BREAK]

[00:48:37] CHRIS: [music transition] Thanks so much to all the advertisers who helped this show exist. Now let’s finish up the phone call. I’ve never heard anyone talk about ketamine in a way where it actually sounds fun. You only hear that it can get super dark and super fucked up. 

[00:48:52] CALLER: Dude, I hate ketamine. Like, I know lots of people that love it. They love, but I don’t do well with dissociatives. I need to, and it’s probably because my upbringing, I need to be in control. I like drugs where I can stay in control because my life is already so fucked up. And if I’m not in control, guess what’s going to happen? All that horrible stuff is going to come up from my childhood. You know, I mean? Like, I need to be functional. I need to be in control. I need to be able to get, like, get myself home if I need to get home. So when I was doing ketamine with friends, it was. That’s a, that’s a sign that I was really in a bad place. I hated, I hated ketamine. And I did some, I like, I injured myself really badly on ketamine. I still have a huge scar from it.

[00:49:34] CHRIS: Woah, What happened?

[00:49:35] CALLER: Yeah, I, everyone is like, it’s one of those things that people do at the end of the night, it, like, brings you down. You just get to, like, lay there and just feel good. I’m using air quotes right now because I don’t like that feeling. But I don’t, like, not being able to control my body or, you know, anything that puts me so out of control. So I tried to get up and leave because I want, I was like, I want to go home, I wanna go home. I get myself all the way down the hallway, get out the front door. I’m at the top of the small staircase, like small, like porch stairs. And I just go right fucking down. And I just tore my knee open and I was just I was totally passed out. They found me there and, like, pulled me back in and I woke up. My knee was attached to the sheets with blood and. Oh, it was bad.

[00:50:24] CHRIS: Yeesh.

[00:50:26] CALLER: Yeah

[00:50:27] CHRIS: It sounds, and from what you’re saying, this is a part of your past, the drug use and the alcohol. 

[00:50:33] CALLER: Yeah. So the twelve step group. So OK. So the twelve step group was introduced to me by that partner that I was with. And I want to make sure that I am very clear about this. That partner was a horrible person, but they gave me a lot of gifts. And one of the gifts was this group. And it’s called Adult Children of Alcoholics and Dysfunctional Families, ACA. And it was, I owe so much of who I am to that group. It was incredible how much it helped me to be able to understand how much my dysfunctional past shaped me. You know? From being afraid of authority figures to, you know, being, you know, having trouble committing, choosing partners who were very similar to my dysfunctional family members. You know, it’s just it explains a lot. And it was so incredibly helpful. And that’s why I’ve always been so humble. That’s partially why I’m so humble about my story, because you go to those meetings and you’re sitting there and you’re like, OK. Like, I don’t have so much to complain about. Some nights you hear stories where people are like, my parents don’t love me. That’s it. And you’re like, cool. Good to know. Like, it’s, it ranges. There’s people who had it really rough and people who didn’t. But it doesn’t matter because at the end of the day, if you weren’t loved, you are now unable to be loving because you don’t know what it looks like. And then you will go out in the world and be unloving in the name of love, because you’ll keep saying the word and you’ll keep telling people that’s what you’re doing, but you’ve no clue what you’re doing and it fucks people up. And then we just keep perpetuating it. 

[00:52:15] CHRIS: That’s really… that’s really… that, that hits me in the gut, what you just said. Hits me in the gut in a very real way

[00:52:25] CALLER: It happens to everybody, yep.

[00:52:27] CHRIS: Was there a moment, was this a process where it built over time? And at some point you realized, oh, I’ve turned a corner. I can feel positivity, love, happiness? Or was there a profound moment that you can remember that was the turning point?

[00:52:45] CALLER: It was really tough, actually. So that relationship where he introduced me to that group, so he told me, you know, I don’t want to be your drug buddy. I’m like, OK, I’m going to quit that. You know, no big deal because I’m like, I’m not an addict. It’s not a big deal. Tried to quit, couldn’t do it. He went away for one weekend to some conference and I went on a bender. And it was just like, oh, shit, I am. I am. I’m addicted. I can’t stop. And it shocked me. It really shook me to the bone to realize that because I didn’t know that. But I thought, you know, I was having fun. I thought I was just like everyone else I knew, which was true, because I was surrounded by addicts who were full of problems and trying to numb themselves. So it took a while. I, like, you know, I know when I did it, too. It was like the second week of May and it’s been 10 years. I’ve been, like, my version of sober. My version of sober is very specific because ACA is very different than an NA or AA. And I decided to quit everything. Everything completely, 100 percent. Like, no smoking cigarettes, no smoking weed, no drinking alcohol, no coke, no MDMA, no ketamine, no nothing. And I just quit everything, which was terrible for my body. My body hated me after that for a while. And it was really tough. And I eventually had to quit my job too, because I was just, I’m also, I am a workaholic. And I’m actually still a workaholic, which is part of what happens to dysfunctional kids from dysfunctional backgrounds is that we tend to take on work as a way of, you know, pretending like we’re surviving or that we’re doing really well or to kind of replace our other habits. So I still struggle with workaholism for sure. And that group, it was a long process of, you know, working the steps and going to meetings. And the unfortunate part was my partner at the time, this one who, you know, wasn’t my drug buddy, was also incredibly abusive. He went through the same group because he had abusive parents and he turned into an abuser himself. And he, you know, financially abused me. He, you know, wanted half my income, he wanted more than half my income. And I was working minimum wage, job and providing for both of us. And he would yell and threaten and punch the wall beside my head and scream in my face. And, you know, he told me I was cold and unsexual. And we didn’t have sex for, we were in a five year relationship and didn’t have sex for four years. Didn’t even, like, no, nothing.

[00:55:26] CHRIS: Wow.

[00:55:27] CALLER: It was. Yeah. This guy really messed my entire world up, in a way, and I was already super messed up. So I did all this healing work and I did the twelve steps and I, like, worked on myself. But my sense of self was really skewed because of who this person was telling me I was. You know, I’m worthless. He’s a genius. I should always be, you know, supporting him. He’s important. I’m not that important. You know, it was just, it was, it was a mind fuck from day one. But that’s why I gotta say, like, he gave me a lot of gifts. Like, I didn’t know about ACA and I wouldn’t have known about ACA without him. I know about, you know, listening to my body and,  like, listening to the signals that my body gives me because he taught me a bit about Daoism and the, you know, energy and Chee. And like, he gave me a lot of things that I took and made my own. But that guy’s a piece of shit. And he, I’ve been very vocal in my community about how abusive he is because I found out a couple of years after I left him, because I left him one day. Just one day. I was just, I had, he was screaming at me in public for something and I couldn’t even hear it. My mind just completely tuned out and it was just like, you’re done. My mind was just kind of kept telling me over and over, like, you’re done, this is done. We’re done. It’s over. And when he finally stopped yelling, I asked, are you, is that everything? He’s like, Yeah. And I was like, OK, I’m done. And I went home and I sat there. And he, like, tried to apologize the way that he did and tried to, like,  make it better. And then I, you know, I just said, yeah, yeah, yep, yeah, yeah. And he’s like, OK, I’m gonna go to this movie thing tonight. We’ll talk about it more when I get back. And I was like, yeah. Yeah. And so he goes and the second the door shut. I like sprung up. It was like my body was possessed. I wasn’t really thinking clearly in all this. But I sprung up, packed a bag, kissed my cat and cried because I loved her so much, but packed a bag and left and I just never went back. And it was only after leaving that relationship that I started to feel what happiness and joy and the effects of all the work that I had been putting into my life and therapy. I was in therapy every week for, I have been in therapy for eight, nine years. Yeah, that’s when it turned a point. But I had to leave that relationship for me to actually feel all the effects of the work that I was doing.

[00:58:03] CHRIS: Wow… That’s another… That’s another story that stopped me in my tracks, and that doesn’t happen so often anymore.

[00:58:17] CALLER: Yeah, you’re particularly quiet. I was like, oh, god did I lose him?

[00:58:20] CHRIS: I mean, I’m just sitting here thinking about… You have a really amazing way of talking about how all these aspects of your life added up and led to stuff. And also how you had to choose to have some personal sense of agency, about not settling for that being your whole life. Even as other people around you did. And I find it extremely inspiring.

[00:58:51] CALLER: Thank you. Yeah.

[00:58:53] CHRIS: So what’s up with the porn festival? 

[00:58:55] [laughter] CALLER: Oh, man, that was such a shit show. 

[00:59:02] CHRIS: In what sense? That could mean a lot of things when we’re talking about a porn festival. 

[00:59:07] CALLER: It really could, it really could. I didn’t know that I was in charge of the entire fucking thing. No one told me. It was like, it was this entity that existed before I showed up on the job. My job was to run a sex shop. I was a sex shop manager for the last year. I just left recently. Thank God. Another dysfunctional organization. And yeah, I just kinda like, they, I knew it existed as an event. I didn’t know who was behind, like who was running it. What went into it. And as I said, I’m a party promoter. So I can do, I can throw events. I know what goes into it. I’ve been doing it for five years. I can figure it out. I had to watch 100 submissions of porn. So I like sat there for days on days and just watch porn. And it is, it can really desensitize you. You’re just like, meh, like. None of this is, none of this is doing anything for me eventually.

[01:00:05] CHRIS: So there were submissions. So like Sundance, this was like the Sundance of pornography.

[01:00:10] CALLER: Yes, yeah

[01:00:11] CHRIS: So there’s filmmakers really hoping to break into the porn festival circuit. 

[01:00:16] CALLER: Yeah. Well, yes. Yeah. And there’s like a, there’s a really good porn fest in Berlin. And then another one, I think, in Paris. And like, because there’s a lot of independent porn makers that really want to step away from what porn looks like  mainstream. And kudos to them because that shit is terrible. And there’s some really beautiful stuff. I definitely recommend, like, there’s some really beautiful work happening out there. And I, like I, yeah. I think, you know, there’s like pink and white TV down in I think L.A. and there’s just some really good people out there, that are doing really good work that includes all different types of bodies and all different types of genders and all different types of, you know, sex. It’s just, it’s really inspiring because you’re just like, OK. It’s not even just a way to get off. It’s like a way to inform yourself that, like what I see in regular porn and what I see sometimes in my life, because, you know, I don’t know if you can tell, I’m a white person. And, you know, if my life only reflects back to me just other white people who look like me, you know, there’s something wrong with what I’m doing. Like, I need to, especially as a white CIS person, I need to be aware of the fact that there’s a lot of different people out there and the world doesn’t look just like me, you know? So I definitely commend a lot of those independent pornmakers for doing, like, for doing some incredible work and making it artful and beautiful and hot. Like, I really. Yeah. I think I think it’s important for people to go there and check out some different independent porn.

[01:01:55] CHRIS: You turned me around on this. First I thought this was gonna be like a funny ha ha you wound up in a porn festival thing. No, it’s actually got some good, some good goals and good ethics and morals behind your porn festival. 

[01:02:08] CALLER: Yeah, man, I can’t do anything if it’s not got good ethics. I’m like, that’s probably another outcome of, you know, dysfunctional upbringing. I can’t, if I don’t care about something, if I don’t find it, like it’s got purpose in the world. I can’t do it. Like the only reason I throw parties is not to make money, because I’m going to tell you right now, doesn’t make a lot of money when you’re, when you have ethics, because I don’t, like, sell drugs at my parties. I just throw parties. And, you know, I’ve been doing it for five years. They’re pretty good. But I do it for the love. I do it because people being in a room connecting with one another. Dancing. Being sweaty. Meeting new people in their community. Finding love. Finding relationships. You know, getting along. Just feeling good and shaking off the grossness that is our world? Like, that’s so beautiful. You know, I only do things, I can only do things that I really, really care about. It’s like, it really makes life difficult because it’s not made to do things that you care about and survive. 

[01:03:12] CHRIS: I love what you just said. And you know what? Every once in a while, this show gives birth to a little catch phrase. There’s been a handful over the years. The idea of shake off the grossness of your world is beautiful and very realistic to me. This is not, this is not a cone or like a guruism thing. Shake off the grossness of the world, I think is a goal probably of many people who listen to this show. And I thank you for phrasing it such a succinct way.

[01:03:48] CALLER: Yeah. Oh, you gotta man. Like you can do all the therapy you want but physically you have to get the stuff out of your body. It’s in there. Like I used to be a person who had pain in my body for no reason. I would go to doctors and they would tell me, they would like, do you want pain killers. No, I want to know why my back hurts. I wanna know why my leg hurts. Like. I want to know why. And abuse and, you know, all of the abuse. Like not being loved by people who tell you that they love you. That’s abuse and it’s not violent, and we want to believe that abuse is always violent. But abuse is a lot of different things. It’s a huge spectrum. And it lives in our bodies. And we have to physically get it, get rid of it in the same way that we have to talk through our emotions. Those two things go hand-in-hand. So if you just go to therapy and you don’t physically do something, you’re, it’s going to be in there. You’re physically doing something, getting your ass handed to you in martial arts.

[01:04:46] CHRIS: Yeah. I was gonna say my jujitsu is my version of that. Keeps you humble. Let’s you get the rage out. Allows me to be a pretty grounded person in the other areas in my life, not let my emotions overtake me. Some-

[01:04:59] CALLER: -exactly-

[01:04:59] CHRIS: -someday will have a Beautiful Anonymous fan convention where we’ll do live calls. We’ll have a Thomas’ English muffin eating contest. We’ll do all sorts of stuff and it’ll end in a big dance party that you promote. And it’ll be the shake off the grossness of the World Dance Party to end our fan convention. And it’ll be beautiful. All these people will come together. All these people I’ve met out on the road will come together. What else should it be besides a live call and we’ll eat some Thomas’ English muffins. I don’t know. Harry Nelson will probably try to make it about himself at some point. We’ll see how that goes. I’m just kidding. Question. I don’t know if Jarred or Harry typed this over to me, but I thought it was really fascinating. You know, we’re podcasters and we work out of one of the big podcasting companies and the big trend these days, like, the very, I think the hottest thing in podcasting is true crime. And I know I listened to a lot of true crime. Is there, is that weird for you, that true crime is becoming such a massive force as a genre and you’ve lived a story that probably would be ripe for. One of those shows are podcasts to explore? Is that weird for you to see everybody treating crime as entertainment?

[01:06:27] CALLER: No, that’s not weird for me. It was weird for me when someone made a play about my family and then they, like, it was, that was weird.

[01:06:35] CHRIS: Were you portrayed in the play? 

[01:06:37] CALLER: No. It’s too much money to do extraneous cast members like me. [laughing]

[01:06:43] CHRIS:  [laughing] We cut the youngest kid. The youngest kid had the pigtails. Let’s leave the pigtails out. Focus on the grim stuff.  

[01:06:50] CALLER: Yeah. Don’t pay the child actors. No. And then they do weird shit, you know, in the name of more sensationalizing. It’s like, as if our story isn’t sensational enough. But they’ll just like add weird shit to it to make it seem like we’re even weirder. And it’s just like, just come on. So that stuff’s weird to me. The true crime genre? Meh, like I don’t follow a lot of trends per say so I guess like, I kind of know that true crime thing that everyone’s really into, but I don’t really follow it. I guess, I have a lot of sympathy for the people. Like, when I hear about these things because of what I’ve been through. I can’t help but be like, oh man, how’s the mom? Or like, how’s the family doing? Or like, you know. Are they okay with all of this kind of attention? Because here’s the thing. Journalists are, ugh, I want to swear so bad. Journalists are fuckwads sometimes man. Like, they’re really mean. Like, really, really mean. Like, they cornered us in our home and did not leave us alone for two weeks. I couldn’t leave the house. Like, they would bombard us everywhere we went. They, you know, and for months, for months, like, they would come onto our property, take pictures of me when I was, like, swimming. Like they had, and they would just call us, and harass us. And it was really, it was a really negative experience. And the things that they’ve written about us and the things that they’ve said, it’s just, you know. I don’t have a lot of love for, you know, journalists who behave like that. There’s a lot of good journalism out there. I can tell the difference. But, man, when you treat families and innocent people like just entertainment, commodities, you’re a gross human being.

[01:08:32] CHRIS: It’s eye opening. And I tell you, if I go down the true crime road I’m going to really think hard about it because I think podcasting, too, I wonder if you guys in the booth agree, like, it, it doesn’t even have the journalistic integrity. And you say that, you’re saying that even with that, journalists cross lines and you can feel it when you’re listening to some podcasts that are just like, now we’re gonna tell you about the most fucked up shit you ever heard.  And thinking about, yeah, but what about a family trapped in their house because we can’t show up. Eye opening.

[01:09:06] CALLER: Yeah.

[01:09:07] CHRIS: We have 30 seconds left. Please sum up your opinions on the fyre festival in 30 seconds or less.

[01:09:12] CALLER: Aw man. People who [laughing].. ugh, so many feelings. Just. Yeah. People who try to exploit people for money especially, you know, marginalized populations are gross. And any promoter who’s out there not protecting the people who come to their events and put them in place with predators are horrible people. That’s it.

[01:09:33] CHRIS: You did it. It’s been amazing talking to you. I thank you for sharing your story. It’s really incredible, really inspiring. And, the fact that you’ve wound up dedicated to the things you’re dedicated to really, really impresses me and inspires me.

[01:09:52] CALLER: Thanks, Chris. You’re an inspiration, too, and I really appreciate all the work you do. 

[01:09:55] CHRIS: I’m just the guy on the phone. [ring] [transition music] Caller, thank you for calling. That’s, I would imagine that even just recounting all of that might turn up some of the pain a bit and the fact that you were willing to put it all out there. I can’t thank you enough for sharing your story because I bet a lot of people got a lot out of it. Hey, listeners, thank you for listening very sincerely. I will just reiterate. Let’s, let’s resist the urge to out this person in any way. Why do it? Why do it? It’s not nice. She’s dealt with enough of us acting like junior detectives. Okay, let’s move on. Thank you to Jared O’Connell and Harry Nelson in the booth. Thank you to Justin Lynnville for all your help in my life. Thank you Shellshag for the music. You guys are the best. If you wanna know more about me and when I’m getting on the road Chrisgeth.com has all my tour dates. Go on Apple podcasts, rate, reviews, subscribe.  Really helps the show when you do. Thanks so much for listening. See you next time.

[01:11:00] THEME MUSIC Kiss me face-to-face

[NEXT EPISODE PREVIEW]

[01:11:13] CHRIS:  Next time on Beautiful Anonymous. Money struggles can be real. And our callers ready to tell us about it. [transition music] What’s it really like being broke in America in 2019? 

[01:11:24] CALLER: You know, when I was doing all those gig jobs, it was really hard to find time to do school and still make a good amount of money. And like, getting like, Medicaid and unemployment. It’s like such a huge process. Like, you’re not coasting off of it. Everything feels like running in place all the time. And it’s so hard to get everything that you need. Sometimes it feels like I’m never going to get out of it. 

I just don’t know what to do to, like, to get above water sometimes.

[01:11:53] CHRIS: That’s next time on Beautiful Anonymous.