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Speaker 1: You're listening to a MoMA Mia podcast.

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Speaker 2: Mama Mea acknowledges the traditional owners of land and waters

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Speaker 2: that this podcast is recorded on. I'm Meya Friedman and

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Speaker 2: the team at Mama and Mea are bringing you over

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Speaker 2: one hundred hours of the very best of the podcasts

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Speaker 2: that we've made from across our podcast network. Do you

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Speaker 2: know that we have something like fifty six different podcasts

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Speaker 2: here at Mamma Mia And if you follow this one,

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Speaker 2: we have selected some others that you might like to

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Speaker 2: listen to as well. And we've also brought back some

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Speaker 2: of our most popular and most riveting stories from No Filter,

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Speaker 2: which is what you're going to hear today. If you've

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Speaker 2: been listening to No Filter for a while, you'll know

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Speaker 2: that I'm particularly interested in cults. But sometimes when you

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Speaker 2: say that word, people imagine like a cult leader and

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Speaker 2: a sect, and maybe it is a religious cult, and

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Speaker 2: religion can often play a part. But sometimes these cults

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Speaker 2: happen within families. Sometimes people are manipulated by their loved

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Speaker 2: ones or people who purport to love them, and Tara

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Speaker 2: Westover's story is exactly that.

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Speaker 1: Have a listen.

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Speaker 2: Just a warning, this episode deals with some adult content.

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Speaker 2: So if you have little years around, you might want

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Speaker 2: to save it for later or populary buds in from

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Speaker 2: the Mom and mea podcast network, I'm mea Friedman and

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Speaker 2: this is no filter, real stories. You won't be able

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Speaker 2: to stop listening to. It's every kid's dream not to

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Speaker 2: have to go to school, and Tara Westover lived that

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Speaker 2: dream for the first sixteen years of her life, but

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Speaker 2: it wasn't.

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Speaker 1: Actually her choice.

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Speaker 2: Tara was raised by fundamentalist Mormon parents who had some

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Speaker 2: pretty radical beliefs. They were survivalists, actively planning for the

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Speaker 2: end of the world, stop piling guns and food, making

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Speaker 2: their own medicine, and cutting themselves off from every aspect

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Speaker 2: of everyday life, including schools and even doctors who they

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Speaker 2: believed were evil and corrupt. Tara and her six brothers

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Speaker 2: and sisters grew up on a farm in rural Idaho,

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Speaker 2: where her dad had a junkyard full of scrap metal,

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Speaker 2: and all the children were forced to work there doing

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Speaker 2: wildly dangerous things each day instead of going to school.

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Speaker 2: It's not like they were homeschooled, they just weren't schooled.

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Speaker 2: For her entire childhood, Tara had no friends, had never

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Speaker 2: been to anyone else's house and knew virtually nobody outside

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Speaker 2: her immediate family. She didn't step foot into a classroom

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Speaker 2: until she was sixteen years old. She'd never heard of

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Speaker 2: Michael Jackson or the Holocaust. Today she's a doctor of

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Speaker 2: history at Cambridge University and how she got from there

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Speaker 2: to here is a cracking story that she's written in

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Speaker 2: a best selling memoir called Educated. She came into Mamma

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Speaker 2: Mia when she was in Australia recently and we sat

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Speaker 2: down to talk.

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Speaker 1: Here's Tara Westover.

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Speaker 2: I wanted to take you back to nineteen ninety nine

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Speaker 2: New Year's Eve. Some people listening to this will not

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Speaker 2: be aware of the significance of that date and what

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Speaker 2: everyone thought might befall the world on that day. Where

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Speaker 2: were you and how how did your family spend New

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Speaker 2: Year's Eve in nineteen ninety nine.

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Speaker 3: You know, my dad was he was a big survivalist.

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Speaker 3: He was always preparing for the end of the world.

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Speaker 2: And you mean that literally. He was like, oh, the

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Speaker 2: world's going to hell now.

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Speaker 3: He was like, the world is ending, and he wanted

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Speaker 3: he wanted a ten year supply of food because he

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Speaker 3: thought that part of the kind of second coming in

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Speaker 3: the apocalypse would be this sort of ten years of devastation,

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Speaker 3: and if you were left standing at the end of

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Speaker 3: that ten years, you were one of the chosen. You

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Speaker 3: were prepared, and then you would be one of the righteous.

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Speaker 3: And so that was the idea. So it was always coming.

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Speaker 3: And Y two K was a theory that a lot

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Speaker 3: of people worried about Y two K, that all the

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Speaker 3: computer systems would when it turned over to the year

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Speaker 3: two thousand and the computers that had been programmed with

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Speaker 3: a two digit year date wouldn't know how to function.

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Speaker 3: Of course, they'd taken care of that, you know, they

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Speaker 3: saw that coming and they fixed it. But my dad

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Speaker 3: was convinced I was gonna be the end, and you know,

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Speaker 3: that's what I read about in the book is y tuk.

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Speaker 3: But I mean it was kind of every couple of

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Speaker 3: years my dad found a date and thought that the

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Speaker 3: world was gonna end for my whole childhood.

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Speaker 1: Really but that night scary, Ah, you'd think so.

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Speaker 3: In a way, No, in a lot of ways, no,

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Speaker 3: because we were so prepared, you know, I mean we

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Speaker 3: had a lot of food, we had everything that we needed,

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Speaker 3: we had water, we had fuel. In a lot of ways,

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Speaker 3: you know, my family lived in this tiny town, and

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Speaker 3: we were we were radical, we were extreme. I'd never

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Speaker 3: had any friends who went to school, you know, mainstream friends.

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Speaker 3: I didn't have any the kids that I saw at

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Speaker 3: church on Sunday, I'd never been to their houses and

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Speaker 3: they'd never been to mine. So we lived in this

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Speaker 3: very you know, we were that kind of weird family,

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Speaker 3: that weird homeschool family, and this was gonna be reversal

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Speaker 3: of that. You know, when the world ended, we were

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Speaker 3: gonna suddenly be the people who people looked up to

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Speaker 3: because we would have food, we would have everything we needed.

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Speaker 3: So there was a kind of way in which I

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Speaker 3: anticipated it almost with eagerness, I think for most of

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Speaker 3: my life.

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Speaker 2: Was there also an aspect of sort of excitement and

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Speaker 2: adventure about it?

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Speaker 3: Yeah? Absolutely. I Mean we had this beautiful mountain that

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Speaker 3: we lived on, and I remember just thinking a lot

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Speaker 3: as a child when the end came, if we had

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Speaker 3: to hide from the Feds or something, Yeah, we'd had

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Speaker 3: on the mountain and we could survive on it forever

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Speaker 3: because we knew it so well and they didn't. And

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Speaker 3: so you know, we knewhere all these caves were, We

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Speaker 3: knew where the streams were we we knew, we knew

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Speaker 3: where the wild onions were. We'd be fine and they wouldn't.

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Speaker 3: That was a really pleasant thought to me as a child.

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Speaker 2: That sense of when you just talked about hiding from

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Speaker 2: the Feds. There's throughout your book and throughout your childhood

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Speaker 2: this real sense of an external threat. And sometimes it's

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Speaker 2: sort of bit existential, like the world's going to end,

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Speaker 2: and other times it's actually of sort of the infrastructure

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Speaker 2: of society, like doctors and law enforcement offices and even teachers.

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Speaker 2: How did your dad sort of explain that to you?

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Speaker 2: And was was your mom joined with him in this

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Speaker 2: idea or was it really just him.

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Speaker 3: I think he would usually start out with just him.

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Speaker 3: He would get an idea about something, and my mother

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Speaker 3: would often have a different idea. The thing about my

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Speaker 3: mother is she's a really complicated person. I've always felt

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Speaker 3: like there's two versions of my mother. There's the version

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Speaker 3: that she is when she's with you, and then there's

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Speaker 3: the version that she is when she's with my father,

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Speaker 3: and they're not the same person. And so I remember

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Speaker 3: I was about nine and we were visiting my grandparents

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Speaker 3: in Arizona. My father's parents when my dad kind of

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Speaker 3: first started saying these things about doctors and saying that

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Speaker 3: they're part of the Illuminati, and that if you took

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Speaker 3: a pharmaceutical that it would damage your standing.

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Speaker 1: With God, and what is all the Illuminati for people?

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Speaker 3: He do? For my dad, he had this idea that

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Speaker 3: all of these institutions had been infiltrated by some kind

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Speaker 3: of nefarious kind of Satanic not Satanic in the sense

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Speaker 3: of ritualistically worshiping Satan, but you know, almost on unaware

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Speaker 3: agents of Satan. You know that they were corrupt, and

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Speaker 3: they were money seeking, and the devil was in their

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Speaker 3: hearts making them do these things. And so they were,

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Speaker 3: you know, they were in the schools trying to trying

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Speaker 3: to lead children away from God, and they were They'd

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Speaker 3: even infiltrated the church, my dad believed. And so anytime

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Speaker 3: the church would have a doctrine that he didn't think

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Speaker 3: was right, he would think that, you know, the Illuminati

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Speaker 3: had infiltrated the church. And the church had a lot

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Speaker 3: of doctrines my dad didn't like, like vaccinations, and the

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Speaker 3: church is pretty pro doctor and schools even and so

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Speaker 3: there were all these things. But yeah, so he had

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Speaker 3: this deep paranoia of any institution that he didn't himself

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Speaker 3: have control over, and so you know, yeah, he kind

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Speaker 3: of wanted to keep us away from those things. And

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Speaker 3: I think it's because he really did worry. There was

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Speaker 3: a great fearfulness in him. I think of ideas that

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Speaker 3: weren't his ideas and not an I think for people

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Speaker 3: that sounds almost like I'm trying to say he was controlling,

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Speaker 3: and he was, but he wasn't controlling. I don't think

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Speaker 3: for control's sake. I think he was controlling because he

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Speaker 3: believed the world was dangerous. He thought that we needed

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Speaker 3: to be protected from it.

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Speaker 2: But when you say he had a fear of any

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Speaker 2: ideas or thoughts that weren't his, that's kind of megalomaniac,

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Speaker 2: it is.

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Speaker 3: But I think again, if you have the paranoia, I

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Speaker 3: think he really felt like these you know, ideologies were

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Speaker 3: coming from Satan, you know. And so when I say

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Speaker 3: that weren't his ideas, I don't mean that in a

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Speaker 3: megalomania where he had to have the good ideas. I

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Speaker 3: mean it in the way of if he didn't agree

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Speaker 3: with it, you know, like he wasn't annoyed about evolution

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Speaker 3: because he didn't think of it. He was annoyed about

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Speaker 3: evolution because he was afraid of it. Yeah, like he

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Speaker 3: wasn't like he wasn't against science because it wasn't his idea.

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Speaker 3: That's narcissism, right, he was. He was afraid of science

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Speaker 3: because it didn't comport with the beliefs that he had,

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Speaker 3: and he was afraid that it would threaten faith.

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Speaker 2: You say early in the book that with hindsight, you

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Speaker 2: think he is bipolar.

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Speaker 3: That's my suspicion. I'm not a doctor, but I just

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Speaker 3: mise it's the only thing. I It's a way that

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Speaker 3: I make sense of my childhood.

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Speaker 1: And what leads you to believe that just what.

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Speaker 3: I've read about kind of mood disorders, bipolar, schizophrenia. I

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Speaker 3: think when I was a child, I didn't I didn't

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Speaker 3: know anything about mental illness. I thought you could either

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Speaker 3: be sane or insane, and the idea that you could

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Speaker 3: be functional and something could still be a bit wrong

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Speaker 3: just didn't occur to me. It wasn't until I was

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Speaker 3: out of university taking you know, it's like one oh

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Speaker 3: one that this was explained to me, And for me

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Speaker 3: it was just a revelation I understanding what paranoia is

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Speaker 3: and how it comes about for me. Suddenly I was

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Speaker 3: able to make sense of my life in a way

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Speaker 3: that I hadn't I hadn't before, And how he could

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Speaker 3: believe so strongly and so fearfully in things that to

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Speaker 3: me were increasingly just looking really harmless.

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Speaker 2: So back in nineteen ninety nine it was one of

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Speaker 2: the times that he'd predicted that the world was going

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Speaker 2: to come to an end.

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Speaker 1: How did that night play out?

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Speaker 3: Well, I think I guess we just thought that midnight

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Speaker 3: would come and the world would end. And I remember

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Speaker 3: we had this TV, which my whole childhood we hadn't

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Speaker 3: had and recently had my dad allowed a TV. And

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Speaker 3: then because he's the kind of person who is really extreme,

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Speaker 3: you know, you can't have anything, and then when he

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Speaker 3: does get it, he goes all the way. So he

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Speaker 3: went from having no TV or radio or anything. There

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Speaker 3: was even a time we didn't have a phone, and

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Speaker 3: when he did get a TV, he was like cable,

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Speaker 3: you know, all the way. Yeah. So I remember it

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Speaker 3: was like they were doing a marathon at the Honeymooners.

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Speaker 3: I think that night and Night Love the Honeymooners, and

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Speaker 3: so he was just we were just watching TV and

219
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Speaker 3: we just thought the world's gonna end, and we waited

220
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Speaker 3: and it just didn't.

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Speaker 2: And midnight was their RELIEFE was their disappointment.

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Speaker 3: I think for me there was a bit of disappointment,

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Speaker 3: but then there was also, you know, just seeing my

224
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Speaker 3: dad's disappointment, and I remember feeling a little bit sad

225
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Speaker 3: and not angry with God, because I don't think I

226
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Speaker 3: was capable of that at that time, but sad and

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Speaker 3: frustrated that why why would God deny him this? Like

228
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Speaker 3: he'd been so faithful in preparing and it just seemed cruel, which.

229
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Speaker 2: Is a funny way to kind of grate the fact

230
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Speaker 2: that the world didn't it.

231
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Speaker 1: It's like buma.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, that was when you describe the scene in the book,

233
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Speaker 2: that's the sense you get that. It was just like

234
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Speaker 2: your dad was really bummed, and you kind of stayed

235
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Speaker 2: up with him because you felt sorry for him.

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Speaker 3: I was kind of confused, you know. That was the

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Speaker 3: time in my life I had been I was I

238
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Speaker 3: was singing. My dad really liked to hear me sing,

239
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Speaker 3: and he liked I was allowed to do things that

240
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Speaker 3: my siblings would never been allowed to do. I was

241
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Speaker 3: allowed to go over to town and be in plays,

242
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Speaker 3: just because he loved hearing me sing. And so I

243
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Speaker 3: had been allowed to go over to town and be

244
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Speaker 3: in this play. And I had, for the first time

245
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Speaker 3: in my life. You know, I had a conversation with

246
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Speaker 3: a kid who went to school, This this boy I

247
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Speaker 3: knew his name was Charles and he so I had

248
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Speaker 3: I'd kind of almost in my mind anyway, made a

249
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Speaker 3: friend who was mainstream and uh, and this is a

250
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Speaker 3: person that I mean, I remember what I remember about

251
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Speaker 3: the world as I was worried because we were going

252
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Speaker 3: to have all the food. And my dad had always

253
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Speaker 3: said that when we had all the food, people would

254
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Speaker 3: try to take the food from us because they'd be starving,

255
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Speaker 3: which seemed reasonable to me that they would want to

256
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Speaker 3: do that, and that we know we might need to

257
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Speaker 3: fight them off. We need to protect our food, which

258
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Speaker 3: is reasonable. This is a zombie apocalypse, people will probably

259
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Speaker 3: come try to eat your food or a normal apocalypse,

260
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Speaker 3: and an apocalypse people are gonna watch your people. So

261
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Speaker 3: you know, we had, you know, in true American fashion,

262
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Speaker 3: we had all of our guns. We were ready for

263
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Speaker 3: that and uh, and we'd bought some new guns, some

264
00:12:41,005 --> 00:12:45,045
Speaker 3: big ones, and I remember, I just remember that that

265
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Speaker 3: all had made sense to me, and I was really

266
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Speaker 3: comfortable with that as a scenario until I until I

267
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Speaker 3: had met this one person. And that was the first

268
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Speaker 3: time that in my imagination of having people come to

269
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Speaker 3: our house trying to take our food, that there was

270
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Speaker 3: a face on that person. And I suddenly it was

271
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Speaker 3: hard to imagine how that would really play out. And

272
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Speaker 3: I was just I was really I just didn't. I

273
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Speaker 3: still had a huge part of me that wanted the

274
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Speaker 3: apocalypse to happen, and because we were so prepared and

275
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Speaker 3: Dad wanted it and we had everything we needed and

276
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Speaker 3: that sense of adventure and all that childish all those

277
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Speaker 3: childhood kind of fantasies about it, and then and then

278
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Speaker 3: I had also this other part of me that was

279
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Speaker 3: starting to engage with the mainstream in this incredibly small way.

280
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Speaker 3: Like I said, I thought we were friends. You know,

281
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Speaker 3: I'm sure he was, like I talked to that girl

282
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Speaker 3: one time, but you know, I thought we were friends.

283
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Speaker 3: And so for me, it was it was complicated, and

284
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Speaker 3: I didn't I didn't know what I wanted to happen.

285
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Speaker 2: You were brought up within what you described as an

286
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Speaker 2: extreme form of Mormonism. Can you explain what the basic

287
00:13:50,085 --> 00:13:53,965
Speaker 2: principle of being mormony is and then how extreme your

288
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Speaker 2: version was.

289
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Speaker 3: Yeah, I tend to really deemphasize the Mormon Everyone likes

290
00:13:59,805 --> 00:14:03,005
Speaker 3: to talk about the Mormonism. I think to me, it's

291
00:14:03,045 --> 00:14:05,805
Speaker 3: the least relevant factor. I call my dad a survivalist,

292
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Speaker 3: I call him a radical survivalist. I call him all

293
00:14:08,805 --> 00:14:10,365
Speaker 3: kinds of things like that, because I think he, you know,

294
00:14:10,405 --> 00:14:12,285
Speaker 3: he just had radical beliefs, but I don't think that

295
00:14:12,325 --> 00:14:15,965
Speaker 3: they were particularly Mormon beliefs. He had been raised mainstream Mormon,

296
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Speaker 3: but wasn't really I mean, Mormonism was a huge part

297
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Speaker 3: of my childhood, but not really the typical kind of Mormonism.

298
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Speaker 3: And everyone in my town was Mormon. But they all

299
00:14:23,605 --> 00:14:25,485
Speaker 3: went to school, they all went to the doctor, they

300
00:14:25,525 --> 00:14:28,885
Speaker 3: all had birth certificates, they were they lived in mainstream life.

301
00:14:28,885 --> 00:14:32,165
Speaker 3: They were just Mormon. Whereas my dad, again, I think

302
00:14:32,205 --> 00:14:34,205
Speaker 3: the mental illness just comes into it. And it's long

303
00:14:34,245 --> 00:14:36,565
Speaker 3: been my view that the whatever was going on with

304
00:14:36,645 --> 00:14:38,685
Speaker 3: him mentally, you know, whatever mood disorder he had, and

305
00:14:38,725 --> 00:14:41,805
Speaker 3: that you know, my speculation about that. I think that

306
00:14:42,125 --> 00:14:45,125
Speaker 3: the mood disorder probably caused the religious extremism and not

307
00:14:45,205 --> 00:14:47,725
Speaker 3: the other way around. I think the extremism was just

308
00:14:47,765 --> 00:14:50,405
Speaker 3: a vehicle. My dad was fanatical about everything in his life.

309
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Speaker 3: You know. It wasn't just religion. I think that was

310
00:14:53,005 --> 00:14:56,765
Speaker 3: just one. It was just a It became a vehicle

311
00:14:56,805 --> 00:14:58,805
Speaker 3: for all the other forms of extremism that he had.

312
00:14:58,845 --> 00:15:00,965
Speaker 3: He would justify it in religious terms, but there was

313
00:15:01,005 --> 00:15:03,685
Speaker 3: nothing the church that wasn't coming from the church. It

314
00:15:03,725 --> 00:15:04,845
Speaker 3: was coming from his brain.

315
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Speaker 2: How did it impact upon you as a girl and

316
00:15:08,845 --> 00:15:12,365
Speaker 2: then I young woman in terms of his views and

317
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Speaker 2: the rules that he mandated the women and girls in

318
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Speaker 2: his house follow, well.

319
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Speaker 3: I think I grew up in a very gendered household.

320
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Speaker 3: Mormonism itself is quite gendered, but my dad, by which

321
00:15:24,645 --> 00:15:27,285
Speaker 3: I mean they have quite strong ideas about gender and

322
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Speaker 3: about the differences between men and women and the rules

323
00:15:29,125 --> 00:15:31,885
Speaker 3: that they're supposed to play. My dad definitely took that further.

324
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Speaker 3: You know. He was obsessed with modesty, and he did

325
00:15:35,725 --> 00:15:37,885
Speaker 3: not think women should work outside the home. And he

326
00:15:37,965 --> 00:15:39,765
Speaker 3: had a hard time when my brother made a decision

327
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Speaker 3: to go to college, but it was nothing compared to

328
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Speaker 3: how hard it was for him when I decided to go.

329
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Speaker 3: So I think there were there were definitely some serious

330
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Speaker 3: gender implications and really strong ideas about gender in my family.

331
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Speaker 3: I think when I was growing up, it just would

332
00:15:53,045 --> 00:15:56,085
Speaker 3: never have occurred to me that I wouldn't live the

333
00:15:56,205 --> 00:15:59,405
Speaker 3: same life as every other woman I knew as the

334
00:15:59,405 --> 00:16:01,525
Speaker 3: life that my dad, you know, it was just assumed

335
00:16:01,525 --> 00:16:04,605
Speaker 3: I would get married when I was eighteen nineteen, kind

336
00:16:04,605 --> 00:16:08,325
Speaker 3: of at the outer edge, and I would get a

337
00:16:08,365 --> 00:16:11,685
Speaker 3: house on the fire somewhere, and I would just have kids,

338
00:16:11,725 --> 00:16:13,365
Speaker 3: and I would probably have them at home. I've definitely

339
00:16:13,445 --> 00:16:15,445
Speaker 3: have them at home, definitely not in a hospital. My

340
00:16:15,525 --> 00:16:17,765
Speaker 3: mother would deliver them because she'd become a midwife, and

341
00:16:17,845 --> 00:16:19,365
Speaker 3: not a midwife in the sense that she went and

342
00:16:19,445 --> 00:16:21,085
Speaker 3: got a medical degree, of course, because we don't believe

343
00:16:21,085 --> 00:16:23,005
Speaker 3: in doctors. So she just kind of started doing it.

344
00:16:24,725 --> 00:16:26,925
Speaker 2: And your dad didn't believe in women working outside the

345
00:16:26,925 --> 00:16:28,525
Speaker 2: home until she started to earn money.

346
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Speaker 3: Well, I don't think he would have. He wouldn't have

347
00:16:30,685 --> 00:16:32,605
Speaker 3: considered it working outside the home. This is where people have,

348
00:16:32,765 --> 00:16:37,205
Speaker 3: you know. He wanted he thought that the medical establishment

349
00:16:37,325 --> 00:16:39,725
Speaker 3: was a part of this conspiracy, so he needed he

350
00:16:39,725 --> 00:16:41,965
Speaker 3: needed us to be independent of that. And so in

351
00:16:42,045 --> 00:16:44,205
Speaker 3: order for us to be independent of that, we you know,

352
00:16:44,205 --> 00:16:45,445
Speaker 3: we owned a junk yard, and it was a really

353
00:16:45,485 --> 00:16:47,245
Speaker 3: dangerous place. We got injured all the time. There had

354
00:16:47,245 --> 00:16:48,725
Speaker 3: to be a way for us to get to treat

355
00:16:48,725 --> 00:16:51,165
Speaker 3: those injuries somehow. So he wanted he needed my mother

356
00:16:51,285 --> 00:16:54,245
Speaker 3: to become a midwife so that when we had children

357
00:16:54,245 --> 00:16:55,805
Speaker 3: and he had grandchildren, that they wouldn't have to go

358
00:16:55,805 --> 00:16:58,165
Speaker 3: to the hospital because the hospital is evil. And then

359
00:16:58,285 --> 00:16:59,685
Speaker 3: when we were injured, we needed to have a way

360
00:16:59,725 --> 00:17:01,605
Speaker 3: to treat that. So I think I don't think he

361
00:17:01,645 --> 00:17:03,245
Speaker 3: thought of it as her working outside the home, but

362
00:17:03,245 --> 00:17:05,285
Speaker 3: it did become that because once she became a midwife

363
00:17:05,285 --> 00:17:08,765
Speaker 3: and once she started, you know, selling herbs, and then

364
00:17:09,085 --> 00:17:11,365
Speaker 3: she was pretty much working. She's working inside the home,

365
00:17:11,365 --> 00:17:12,125
Speaker 3: but she was working.

366
00:17:12,925 --> 00:17:14,685
Speaker 2: I wanted to ask you a little bit more about

367
00:17:14,725 --> 00:17:17,125
Speaker 2: that idea of the gendered household. Did you have to

368
00:17:17,205 --> 00:17:18,085
Speaker 2: dress a certain way?

369
00:17:19,885 --> 00:17:23,245
Speaker 3: Mormonism has kind of basic standards of modesty. You have

370
00:17:23,285 --> 00:17:26,125
Speaker 3: to cover the shoulders, you should be covered above the knee.

371
00:17:26,245 --> 00:17:29,085
Speaker 3: It's kind of the normal Mormon standard. My dad is

372
00:17:29,125 --> 00:17:32,565
Speaker 3: the usual. Uh took it further than that, And so

373
00:17:33,405 --> 00:17:35,645
Speaker 3: I remember him telling me he never he thought ankles

374
00:17:35,645 --> 00:17:37,885
Speaker 3: were Yeah, did not necessarily want to be seeing a

375
00:17:37,885 --> 00:17:41,565
Speaker 3: lot of ankle and there was a big fashion in

376
00:17:41,605 --> 00:17:44,165
Speaker 3: the nineties. Close capri pants were a big thing in

377
00:17:44,205 --> 00:17:46,445
Speaker 3: the nineties, and he wouldn't allow me to wear those. Yeah,

378
00:17:46,485 --> 00:17:48,845
Speaker 3: he was really against those, and so he had and

379
00:17:48,885 --> 00:17:50,485
Speaker 3: it was just it was it was just a lot

380
00:17:50,525 --> 00:17:54,805
Speaker 3: of I think the idea. I just remember when I

381
00:17:54,845 --> 00:17:58,645
Speaker 3: was fifteen, sixteen years old, feeling like I didn't understand

382
00:17:59,485 --> 00:18:02,365
Speaker 3: how it could be done, because it seemed like if

383
00:18:02,645 --> 00:18:05,165
Speaker 3: I remember hearing him lecture once we came home from

384
00:18:05,285 --> 00:18:07,365
Speaker 3: church and he was complaining about something a woman had

385
00:18:07,405 --> 00:18:09,245
Speaker 3: been wearing at church because it had been this really

386
00:18:09,565 --> 00:18:12,765
Speaker 3: fitting blouse and she leaned forward to pick up a

387
00:18:12,805 --> 00:18:15,645
Speaker 3: hymn book and he had gotten a view down her

388
00:18:15,685 --> 00:18:19,605
Speaker 3: shirt and and he was just he just wasn't gonna

389
00:18:19,685 --> 00:18:21,285
Speaker 3: let us go, and he was talking about it and

390
00:18:21,285 --> 00:18:23,645
Speaker 3: how terrible it was she was wearing and modest, and

391
00:18:23,645 --> 00:18:26,645
Speaker 3: I remember thinking, well, it's really loose. We're not allowed

392
00:18:26,685 --> 00:18:30,525
Speaker 3: to wear tight clothing because it's tight, it's form fitting,

393
00:18:30,565 --> 00:18:33,405
Speaker 3: and that's that's that's suggestive, So we can't wear that.

394
00:18:33,445 --> 00:18:37,085
Speaker 3: But if it's loose, And I just remember thinking, like,

395
00:18:37,125 --> 00:18:41,285
Speaker 3: what is the right amount of tightness and looseness, and

396
00:18:41,565 --> 00:18:43,925
Speaker 3: how do you move and do things and exist in

397
00:18:43,925 --> 00:18:46,685
Speaker 3: the world, and and never and never have it be

398
00:18:46,765 --> 00:18:48,485
Speaker 3: revealed that you have a shape and how do you

399
00:18:48,565 --> 00:18:50,725
Speaker 3: do that? But then you're also supposed to look nice,

400
00:18:50,765 --> 00:18:52,805
Speaker 3: so if you came out looking frumpy, then that would

401
00:18:52,845 --> 00:18:56,685
Speaker 3: also be commented upon. And I just remember feeling like

402
00:18:56,725 --> 00:18:59,445
Speaker 3: there just was not a way to kind of exist

403
00:18:59,525 --> 00:19:02,005
Speaker 3: or move through the world modestly. I just didn't know

404
00:19:02,045 --> 00:19:02,565
Speaker 3: how to do that.

405
00:19:02,965 --> 00:19:05,125
Speaker 1: So there were all these rules for you. How many

406
00:19:05,125 --> 00:19:05,685
Speaker 1: sisters did you?

407
00:19:05,805 --> 00:19:08,405
Speaker 3: Just brothers? One sister, so.

408
00:19:08,325 --> 00:19:10,525
Speaker 2: There were two girls and five boys in the family

409
00:19:10,925 --> 00:19:13,845
Speaker 2: and your mom. So in some ways he had different

410
00:19:13,925 --> 00:19:17,765
Speaker 2: rules and expectations for his daughters and his wife versus

411
00:19:17,765 --> 00:19:20,645
Speaker 2: his sons. But in other ways, in terms of the work,

412
00:19:20,685 --> 00:19:23,645
Speaker 2: you were expected to do this in the junkyard where

413
00:19:23,645 --> 00:19:26,005
Speaker 2: he how would you even describe what he did?

414
00:19:26,205 --> 00:19:29,485
Speaker 3: Well, he sold scrap medal, he was on a junk yard,

415
00:19:29,525 --> 00:19:30,205
Speaker 3: he sold scrap.

416
00:19:31,365 --> 00:19:34,645
Speaker 2: You were expected to really muck in there. There was

417
00:19:34,685 --> 00:19:37,525
Speaker 2: no sense of old tar as a girl, she can't

418
00:19:37,525 --> 00:19:40,445
Speaker 2: do this. Like the things that he had you do.

419
00:19:42,125 --> 00:19:44,125
Speaker 2: My jaw was on the floor as I was reading

420
00:19:44,165 --> 00:19:47,365
Speaker 2: your book, like things that were just so not dangerous

421
00:19:47,365 --> 00:19:49,165
Speaker 2: for anyone, whether they are a man or a woman

422
00:19:49,245 --> 00:19:51,845
Speaker 2: or a child, as you and your brothers were.

423
00:19:52,605 --> 00:19:54,565
Speaker 1: Extraordinarily dangerous things.

424
00:19:55,245 --> 00:19:58,725
Speaker 2: Did that make you sort of feel invincible or did

425
00:19:58,765 --> 00:20:00,045
Speaker 2: it make you feel scared?

426
00:20:00,765 --> 00:20:02,845
Speaker 3: You know, it's funny you say it, and I think, yeah,

427
00:20:03,085 --> 00:20:05,045
Speaker 3: it's kind of strange that my sister and I were

428
00:20:05,165 --> 00:20:07,165
Speaker 3: kind of allowed to work in the scrapyard. Thin it's

429
00:20:07,205 --> 00:20:10,245
Speaker 3: kind of weird, I know what that was. I think

430
00:20:10,245 --> 00:20:13,845
Speaker 3: some of that is just rural frontierness. I think I

431
00:20:13,845 --> 00:20:18,445
Speaker 3: think the West, the Mountain West, the frontier of the

432
00:20:18,525 --> 00:20:22,285
Speaker 3: United States had long ago, I think dispensed with this

433
00:20:22,565 --> 00:20:27,045
Speaker 3: nonsense that women are physically fragile, you know, not being

434
00:20:27,205 --> 00:20:30,085
Speaker 3: as strong as a man does. It's not the same

435
00:20:30,085 --> 00:20:33,445
Speaker 3: thing as fragility, you know, it's just not You can

436
00:20:33,485 --> 00:20:35,525
Speaker 3: do a lot of stuff even if you don't have

437
00:20:35,565 --> 00:20:38,325
Speaker 3: the exact up arm strength as a man. And I

438
00:20:38,325 --> 00:20:40,845
Speaker 3: don't know, I just I think women in that living

439
00:20:40,845 --> 00:20:42,645
Speaker 3: in that life and living in that place and living

440
00:20:42,685 --> 00:20:46,005
Speaker 3: on farms since they got there in the eighteen thirties

441
00:20:46,005 --> 00:20:49,725
Speaker 3: and forties and fifties have been doing that kind of labor.

442
00:20:49,765 --> 00:20:52,645
Speaker 3: And I just don't, no matter how gendered your ideas are,

443
00:20:53,645 --> 00:20:55,765
Speaker 3: I don't know that that weird idea of like, well,

444
00:20:55,845 --> 00:20:59,365
Speaker 3: women shouldn't do physically demanding things is you know, thankfully

445
00:20:59,845 --> 00:21:02,165
Speaker 3: just not been a part of that culture. So I think,

446
00:21:02,205 --> 00:21:04,605
Speaker 3: you know, for my dad, he had a scrap yard.

447
00:21:04,725 --> 00:21:07,645
Speaker 3: He when it was time to scrap, and scrapping is

448
00:21:07,645 --> 00:21:10,165
Speaker 3: one of those things where you kind of seasons that

449
00:21:10,205 --> 00:21:11,685
Speaker 3: you do at the price of model goes up and

450
00:21:11,685 --> 00:21:16,605
Speaker 3: then you sell everything that you have, and so you know,

451
00:21:16,645 --> 00:21:19,405
Speaker 3: there'd be seasons of it and you need and there's

452
00:21:19,445 --> 00:21:22,165
Speaker 3: a lot to do, and like any kind of farm work, right,

453
00:21:22,645 --> 00:21:25,285
Speaker 3: this is harvest time. Everyone works, and that's that's just

454
00:21:25,285 --> 00:21:25,805
Speaker 3: how it is.

455
00:21:34,485 --> 00:21:39,125
Speaker 2: You call the book educated, but in fact, you weren't educated.

456
00:21:39,165 --> 00:21:40,885
Speaker 2: Like it's not like that you were homeschooled.

457
00:21:41,885 --> 00:21:42,845
Speaker 1: You weren't really schooled.

458
00:21:42,925 --> 00:21:45,285
Speaker 2: So did you call it educated in terms of the

459
00:21:45,405 --> 00:21:48,445
Speaker 2: education you laid out for yourself?

460
00:21:49,285 --> 00:21:53,525
Speaker 3: I called it educated. Well, I called it it that's

461
00:21:53,525 --> 00:21:57,965
Speaker 3: something about a second. I called it educated because I

462
00:21:58,005 --> 00:22:01,205
Speaker 3: wanted to tell a story that would make people ask

463
00:22:01,245 --> 00:22:06,045
Speaker 3: that question, which is to say, you know, I think

464
00:22:06,085 --> 00:22:07,965
Speaker 3: a lot of times are ideas about what an education

465
00:22:08,045 --> 00:22:11,285
Speaker 3: is a very institutional and we think sometimes I think

466
00:22:11,325 --> 00:22:14,045
Speaker 3: we've confused what an education is with what a school is,

467
00:22:14,085 --> 00:22:15,925
Speaker 3: and I think an education in a school of very

468
00:22:15,925 --> 00:22:20,085
Speaker 3: different things. Education is the individuals pursuit of understanding. That's

469
00:22:20,125 --> 00:22:22,765
Speaker 3: all it is. It's very simple. Schools the means by

470
00:22:22,765 --> 00:22:24,725
Speaker 3: which we try to achieve that, and has all the

471
00:22:24,765 --> 00:22:28,165
Speaker 3: problems of any human institution. So I think, you know, yeah,

472
00:22:28,165 --> 00:22:30,765
Speaker 3: I didn't receive an education in the sense that I

473
00:22:30,765 --> 00:22:32,365
Speaker 3: never would an essay, when ever took an exam. I

474
00:22:32,445 --> 00:22:35,045
Speaker 3: never had any of these formal trappings of an education.

475
00:22:36,525 --> 00:22:40,445
Speaker 3: And then eventually I did get all those things. Eventually

476
00:22:40,525 --> 00:22:42,245
Speaker 3: I had this extreme experience of education. I had a

477
00:22:42,285 --> 00:22:44,685
Speaker 3: lot of ignorance, the extreme absence of education and the

478
00:22:44,725 --> 00:22:47,245
Speaker 3: traditional institutional sense. But then later in my life, you know,

479
00:22:47,285 --> 00:22:48,445
Speaker 3: I got to go to Harvard, I got to go

480
00:22:48,485 --> 00:22:52,445
Speaker 3: to Cambridge, I got a PhD. I had extreme institutional education.

481
00:22:52,645 --> 00:22:56,285
Speaker 3: And then I had a period in my life where

482
00:22:56,805 --> 00:23:00,685
Speaker 3: maybe I wasn't reading a lot of history. I was

483
00:23:00,765 --> 00:23:02,645
Speaker 3: kept at home. I was reading, you know, the Bible

484
00:23:02,685 --> 00:23:05,765
Speaker 3: in nineteenth century Mormon sermons because that was what was there,

485
00:23:06,325 --> 00:23:11,045
Speaker 3: and that was a kind of education, and in a way,

486
00:23:11,165 --> 00:23:15,165
Speaker 3: and then I had my parents kind of they had

487
00:23:15,205 --> 00:23:17,525
Speaker 3: their own interpretation of what an education was. And one

488
00:23:17,525 --> 00:23:19,125
Speaker 3: of the things they would say to us is you

489
00:23:19,125 --> 00:23:21,565
Speaker 3: can teach yourself anything better than someone else can teach you.

490
00:23:22,565 --> 00:23:24,165
Speaker 1: And I believe that's just not true.

491
00:23:24,685 --> 00:23:27,325
Speaker 3: I think it can be. I think, and this is

492
00:23:27,365 --> 00:23:32,045
Speaker 3: the thing I think John Dewey right, it's a great thinker

493
00:23:32,045 --> 00:23:35,405
Speaker 3: about education. He always said, he used to say education

494
00:23:35,965 --> 00:23:38,765
Speaker 3: is two. It has two components. There's the individual component,

495
00:23:38,845 --> 00:23:40,845
Speaker 3: or what an individual brings to their education, and then

496
00:23:40,885 --> 00:23:43,645
Speaker 3: there's the social component, what society brings. And you really

497
00:23:43,645 --> 00:23:45,165
Speaker 3: need both of those things. You have to have the

498
00:23:45,205 --> 00:23:47,725
Speaker 3: social element because you don't want to be inventing the

499
00:23:47,765 --> 00:23:50,205
Speaker 3: physics every time every person that comes into the world.

500
00:23:50,245 --> 00:23:52,205
Speaker 3: You want to start where the last person left off.

501
00:23:52,245 --> 00:23:54,725
Speaker 3: You don't want to start from the beginning. But equally,

502
00:23:54,765 --> 00:23:57,645
Speaker 3: you have to have buy in, for lack of a

503
00:23:57,685 --> 00:24:00,725
Speaker 3: better phrase, there's something that an individual brings in deciding

504
00:24:00,765 --> 00:24:02,005
Speaker 3: what they want to learn and how they want to

505
00:24:02,085 --> 00:24:04,445
Speaker 3: learn it, and you cannot have a real education without

506
00:24:04,445 --> 00:24:07,245
Speaker 3: those things. You know, my parents were fully devoted to

507
00:24:07,245 --> 00:24:11,245
Speaker 3: the individual side. They took it too far, but they

508
00:24:11,245 --> 00:24:13,005
Speaker 3: were really devoted to it. And then I think I

509
00:24:13,045 --> 00:24:14,285
Speaker 3: talked to some of my friends who had a more

510
00:24:14,285 --> 00:24:16,805
Speaker 3: traditional education, or I myself have now had some years

511
00:24:16,805 --> 00:24:20,325
Speaker 3: of traditional education, and I feel like the social is

512
00:24:20,325 --> 00:24:22,405
Speaker 3: is if my parents were too far the one way.

513
00:24:22,405 --> 00:24:24,245
Speaker 3: I think maybe the mainstream is too far the other,

514
00:24:24,285 --> 00:24:27,485
Speaker 3: because I don't think that I've never talked to anyone

515
00:24:27,565 --> 00:24:31,325
Speaker 3: who felt like they had any control over their education

516
00:24:31,485 --> 00:24:33,405
Speaker 3: or what they learned or how they learned it. I

517
00:24:33,485 --> 00:24:36,525
Speaker 3: don't know that I've ever heard anyone explain to me

518
00:24:36,645 --> 00:24:39,165
Speaker 3: their education in a way that made me think there

519
00:24:39,205 --> 00:24:42,005
Speaker 3: was any individual component at all. And it's an odd

520
00:24:42,045 --> 00:24:45,765
Speaker 3: thing if we think in education is the individual's pursuit

521
00:24:45,805 --> 00:24:48,005
Speaker 3: of understanding. Pursuit is an active verb, and there's nothing

522
00:24:48,045 --> 00:24:49,805
Speaker 3: that we do in schools that seems very active to me.

523
00:24:49,845 --> 00:24:52,445
Speaker 3: Sometimes when you say education to people, I think the

524
00:24:52,485 --> 00:24:56,685
Speaker 3: words that come to mind, or exam, worksheet, lecture, these

525
00:24:56,725 --> 00:25:02,325
Speaker 3: are all incredibly passive things. And so gah, I wouldn't

526
00:25:02,325 --> 00:25:04,285
Speaker 3: necessarily say, oh, my parents got it right, let's all

527
00:25:04,325 --> 00:25:06,925
Speaker 3: do that. But you know, I think that there was

528
00:25:06,965 --> 00:25:10,325
Speaker 3: something in terms of that that that thing they taught me,

529
00:25:10,485 --> 00:25:12,725
Speaker 3: you can teach yourself anything better than someone else can

530
00:25:12,765 --> 00:25:14,525
Speaker 3: teach it to you. I really do believe that. But

531
00:25:14,565 --> 00:25:16,205
Speaker 3: I believe it in the sense that if you want

532
00:25:16,245 --> 00:25:18,565
Speaker 3: to learn it, you will find the people that you

533
00:25:18,645 --> 00:25:20,365
Speaker 3: need to teach it to you, and you will be

534
00:25:20,365 --> 00:25:22,085
Speaker 3: a lot more receptive and you will learn a lot

535
00:25:22,125 --> 00:25:25,365
Speaker 3: faster than if you are waiting for someone to teach

536
00:25:25,365 --> 00:25:27,125
Speaker 3: it to you. Writing is one of those things everyone

537
00:25:27,165 --> 00:25:31,845
Speaker 3: says you can't you can't teach writing, and they're probably right.

538
00:25:31,885 --> 00:25:33,845
Speaker 3: I'm not sure you can teach writing. I'm convinced you

539
00:25:33,845 --> 00:25:36,725
Speaker 3: can learn it, but I'm not sure you can teach it.

540
00:25:38,565 --> 00:25:43,085
Speaker 2: You talk about knowing that your father loves you, but

541
00:25:43,165 --> 00:25:46,165
Speaker 2: when you're a child, he put you and your siblings

542
00:25:46,525 --> 00:25:50,005
Speaker 2: and your mom in the most incredible danger. Many times

543
00:25:50,605 --> 00:25:54,765
Speaker 2: you had a couple of horrific car crashes where pretty

544
00:25:54,805 --> 00:25:57,605
Speaker 2: much all of you were horrifically injured, and then he

545
00:25:57,605 --> 00:26:00,765
Speaker 2: wouldn't let you go to hospital to have those injuries treated.

546
00:26:01,125 --> 00:26:02,845
Speaker 2: And then every day when you had to go out

547
00:26:02,845 --> 00:26:06,565
Speaker 2: and work in the junkyard, you were also at risk

548
00:26:06,805 --> 00:26:09,845
Speaker 2: of horrible injury, and you and your siblings got injured frequently.

549
00:26:10,285 --> 00:26:13,325
Speaker 2: How do you reconcile those two things, because surely as parents,

550
00:26:13,685 --> 00:26:15,885
Speaker 2: we have two jobs knowing that, you know, making our

551
00:26:15,925 --> 00:26:19,725
Speaker 2: children feel loved and making them feel safe. What happens

552
00:26:19,725 --> 00:26:21,525
Speaker 2: when those two things go against each other.

553
00:26:23,845 --> 00:26:27,125
Speaker 3: This is a difficult question, I think. I think there's

554
00:26:27,325 --> 00:26:29,365
Speaker 3: two answers to it, and they're separated by a lot

555
00:26:29,365 --> 00:26:32,805
Speaker 3: of years. I think as a child, you know, my

556
00:26:32,925 --> 00:26:34,725
Speaker 3: dad would ask me to do things in the junkyard,

557
00:26:34,765 --> 00:26:38,005
Speaker 3: and my siblings too that we would just think we're

558
00:26:38,045 --> 00:26:41,085
Speaker 3: not probably gonna get through this. Like his method of

559
00:26:41,125 --> 00:26:43,565
Speaker 3: doing this, I mean, because it wasn't.

560
00:26:43,645 --> 00:26:45,045
Speaker 2: Can you paint a little bit of a picture for

561
00:26:45,085 --> 00:26:47,885
Speaker 2: people think that you were just like you know, rummaging

562
00:26:47,925 --> 00:26:50,205
Speaker 2: through rubbish and picking out little bits of tin.

563
00:26:50,445 --> 00:26:52,445
Speaker 3: There was a bit of that, but that was the

564
00:26:52,525 --> 00:26:56,205
Speaker 3: nice part. Yeah, No, I mean it was full of jagged,

565
00:26:56,685 --> 00:27:00,965
Speaker 3: heavy scrap, you know. I mean when I was about ten,

566
00:27:01,325 --> 00:27:03,565
Speaker 3: I filled a bin full of scrap iron. I was

567
00:27:03,565 --> 00:27:06,045
Speaker 3: about one town, about two thousand pounds. And what has

568
00:27:06,085 --> 00:27:07,445
Speaker 3: to happened then is the bin needs to be picked

569
00:27:07,485 --> 00:27:10,325
Speaker 3: up and needs by JCB an extendable boom and it's

570
00:27:10,365 --> 00:27:10,925
Speaker 3: raised in the air.

571
00:27:11,005 --> 00:27:12,365
Speaker 1: I don't know what any of Floyds woulds made.

572
00:27:12,525 --> 00:27:15,005
Speaker 3: Just a forklift. I got a forklift with an extendable boom,

573
00:27:15,005 --> 00:27:16,965
Speaker 3: and it'll pick it up, it'll go drop it into

574
00:27:16,965 --> 00:27:20,165
Speaker 3: a big semi trailer, you know, really big fifty foot

575
00:27:20,285 --> 00:27:23,485
Speaker 3: trailer with walls, you know, fifteen twenty feet high. So

576
00:27:24,005 --> 00:27:25,885
Speaker 3: this scrap had to be dumped, and then what the

577
00:27:26,045 --> 00:27:28,205
Speaker 3: ideally you climb in after and you kind of settle

578
00:27:28,205 --> 00:27:30,525
Speaker 3: the scrap so that more will fit in. And my

579
00:27:30,605 --> 00:27:32,405
Speaker 3: dad he didn't want to run the bin up twice.

580
00:27:32,445 --> 00:27:33,845
Speaker 3: He didn't want to pick the bin up and raise

581
00:27:33,845 --> 00:27:35,645
Speaker 3: it up and dump it and then have to you know,

582
00:27:35,965 --> 00:27:38,405
Speaker 3: go down and then run me back up again to

583
00:27:38,445 --> 00:27:40,085
Speaker 3: get into the trailer to settle a scrap. So he

584
00:27:40,125 --> 00:27:42,645
Speaker 3: had this great idea that what he would do is

585
00:27:42,685 --> 00:27:44,925
Speaker 3: have me ride the scrap up and then he would

586
00:27:44,965 --> 00:27:47,165
Speaker 3: just pause the bin by the trailer and I would

587
00:27:47,165 --> 00:27:48,845
Speaker 3: climb out and kind of run over and climb onto

588
00:27:48,885 --> 00:27:51,125
Speaker 3: the cab, and then he would dump the bin and

589
00:27:51,165 --> 00:27:52,645
Speaker 3: I would just climb back in and settle it. This

590
00:27:52,725 --> 00:27:55,405
Speaker 3: was his idea. Well, that wasn't such a great idea

591
00:27:55,405 --> 00:27:56,965
Speaker 3: because what happened when he picked up the bin and

592
00:27:57,005 --> 00:28:01,605
Speaker 3: whipped it around is a giant spear of some kind

593
00:28:01,605 --> 00:28:04,765
Speaker 3: of scrap just like went straight into my leg and

594
00:28:04,965 --> 00:28:07,365
Speaker 3: just pinned me there. And I couldn't move, and then

595
00:28:07,405 --> 00:28:09,445
Speaker 3: he had raised the he'd raise the bin and I

596
00:28:09,525 --> 00:28:11,405
Speaker 3: was shouting at him, but it's a loud diesel engine.

597
00:28:11,445 --> 00:28:13,885
Speaker 3: He couldn't hear me. And then he raised the bin

598
00:28:13,965 --> 00:28:17,045
Speaker 3: and he dumped it, which if I'd gone forward with

599
00:28:17,085 --> 00:28:18,885
Speaker 3: all the scrap, it would have just been like going

600
00:28:18,885 --> 00:28:21,685
Speaker 3: through a meat grinder. I mean, you wouldn't Yeah, it

601
00:28:21,685 --> 00:28:26,085
Speaker 3: would be bad. Luckily, the kind of the spike came

602
00:28:26,085 --> 00:28:27,685
Speaker 3: out of my leg and I was I was able

603
00:28:27,685 --> 00:28:29,405
Speaker 3: to kind of throw myself over the side of the bin,

604
00:28:29,685 --> 00:28:31,805
Speaker 3: so I felt I fell really far and I smashed

605
00:28:31,845 --> 00:28:33,325
Speaker 3: into the side of the trailer wall, and I was

606
00:28:33,325 --> 00:28:36,085
Speaker 3: definitely hurt, but I was I was okay, I was alive.

607
00:28:37,285 --> 00:28:40,205
Speaker 3: The way that I experienced that at the time, it

608
00:28:40,325 --> 00:28:42,685
Speaker 3: was kind of two ways. I think there was the

609
00:28:42,725 --> 00:28:45,685
Speaker 3: first feeling I had, which was kind of a bit

610
00:28:45,685 --> 00:28:47,605
Speaker 3: of shame. When my dad came over and asked me

611
00:28:47,645 --> 00:28:50,165
Speaker 3: what happened. I just felt like, Yeah, why couldn't I

612
00:28:50,205 --> 00:28:51,805
Speaker 3: do that? It was a simple thing. I shouldn't be

613
00:28:51,805 --> 00:28:54,125
Speaker 3: able to do it because I knew. I knew my

614
00:28:54,205 --> 00:28:57,565
Speaker 3: dad loved me. I knew that, so I thought the

615
00:28:57,605 --> 00:29:00,445
Speaker 3: failing had to be mine and then the other way

616
00:29:00,285 --> 00:29:04,605
Speaker 3: that you experience it is wondering, well, maybe he doesn't

617
00:29:04,885 --> 00:29:07,045
Speaker 3: love me, which is not a great alternative. And those

618
00:29:07,045 --> 00:29:08,565
Speaker 3: are the two ways. It's the only way that you

619
00:29:08,605 --> 00:29:11,765
Speaker 3: can if you fast forward a few years. I think

620
00:29:12,125 --> 00:29:14,765
Speaker 3: there's information that I needed that I did not have

621
00:29:15,085 --> 00:29:16,805
Speaker 3: to understand that to just shy what was happening to

622
00:29:16,885 --> 00:29:19,725
Speaker 3: me and for me. The missing piece of that, I

623
00:29:19,805 --> 00:29:23,045
Speaker 3: think is the mental disorder, is that bipolar, dischizophrenia, whatever

624
00:29:23,085 --> 00:29:27,605
Speaker 3: it is, that makes him so completely unable to evaluate risk,

625
00:29:28,005 --> 00:29:33,165
Speaker 3: to understand that the bad things can happen. And I

626
00:29:33,165 --> 00:29:35,445
Speaker 3: don't think my dad does understand that he has such

627
00:29:35,485 --> 00:29:38,005
Speaker 3: extreme beliefs. He thinks that kind of God is there

628
00:29:38,045 --> 00:29:40,125
Speaker 3: making sure everything is okay, and that if something happens,

629
00:29:40,125 --> 00:29:43,245
Speaker 3: it happens for a reason, especially injuries, and he doesn't

630
00:29:43,285 --> 00:29:47,125
Speaker 3: tend to learn from bad things to happen. And then

631
00:29:47,165 --> 00:29:48,805
Speaker 3: just the extremity of the way he would respond to

632
00:29:48,845 --> 00:29:50,845
Speaker 3: the situation. So you mentioned that he wouldn't give us

633
00:29:50,845 --> 00:29:52,525
Speaker 3: medical care, but it's not that he would give himself

634
00:29:52,525 --> 00:29:55,445
Speaker 3: medical care. I mean, the worst injury that happened in

635
00:29:55,525 --> 00:29:57,405
Speaker 3: my father's junk yard had happened to my father. He

636
00:29:58,445 --> 00:30:00,765
Speaker 3: did not remove the fuel from a car from a

637
00:30:00,805 --> 00:30:02,685
Speaker 3: fuel tank before he led a cutting torch and tried

638
00:30:02,685 --> 00:30:05,685
Speaker 3: to remove the tank, and what happened is the car

639
00:30:05,725 --> 00:30:10,965
Speaker 3: exploded because fuel is flammable. You know, it's an incredibly

640
00:30:10,965 --> 00:30:15,485
Speaker 3: predictable event. But he just wasn't able to evaluate that risk.

641
00:30:15,565 --> 00:30:17,645
Speaker 3: So it's not as though he put us in danger

642
00:30:17,685 --> 00:30:20,525
Speaker 3: and then kept himself perfectly safe. This was a flaw

643
00:30:20,525 --> 00:30:22,805
Speaker 3: in the way his mind worked. He wasn't able. And

644
00:30:22,885 --> 00:30:24,485
Speaker 3: it's not like he took himself to the hospital. He

645
00:30:24,565 --> 00:30:28,525
Speaker 3: was burned terribly, but they treated that at home. They

646
00:30:28,525 --> 00:30:32,525
Speaker 3: had no IV, they had no morphine, and he nearly

647
00:30:32,725 --> 00:30:35,925
Speaker 3: died and he never recovered. His hands are just kind

648
00:30:35,925 --> 00:30:39,325
Speaker 3: of almost claw like his right hand, and his face

649
00:30:39,365 --> 00:30:42,605
Speaker 3: is waxy. He doesn't have fingerprints, and it was terrible burn.

650
00:30:42,845 --> 00:30:44,885
Speaker 3: So I guess what I'm saying or trying to say,

651
00:30:45,005 --> 00:30:49,165
Speaker 3: is I didn't have the information that I have now,

652
00:30:49,365 --> 00:30:52,045
Speaker 3: which is I just didn't know that it was possible

653
00:30:52,805 --> 00:30:56,045
Speaker 3: that my father could love me and still be flawed

654
00:30:56,045 --> 00:30:57,725
Speaker 3: in that way. I didn't know that it was possible

655
00:30:57,725 --> 00:31:00,125
Speaker 3: that he could value my safety and be so completely

656
00:31:00,245 --> 00:31:04,685
Speaker 3: unable to keep me safe. And I do know that now,

657
00:31:05,285 --> 00:31:06,405
Speaker 3: but I didn't know it then.

658
00:31:08,165 --> 00:31:12,125
Speaker 2: Your mother is perhaps the most complex character in this

659
00:31:12,845 --> 00:31:16,045
Speaker 2: book and in your life, in that you don't believe

660
00:31:16,045 --> 00:31:19,965
Speaker 2: that she's mentally unwell, and you talk about her being

661
00:31:20,005 --> 00:31:22,245
Speaker 2: a different person when she's with your father as she

662
00:31:22,325 --> 00:31:25,045
Speaker 2: is with everyone else. She saw what was happening to

663
00:31:25,085 --> 00:31:28,365
Speaker 2: you and what was happening to your siblings, but she

664
00:31:28,405 --> 00:31:31,005
Speaker 2: didn't protect you, or she wasn't able to protect you.

665
00:31:31,165 --> 00:31:33,325
Speaker 2: How are you able to how do you see that now?

666
00:31:34,285 --> 00:31:36,685
Speaker 3: I've always felt like my mother was two people that

667
00:31:36,805 --> 00:31:40,405
Speaker 3: she is. There's the person she is when she's with you,

668
00:31:40,445 --> 00:31:42,125
Speaker 3: and then there's the person that she is when she's

669
00:31:42,125 --> 00:31:44,285
Speaker 3: with my dad, And I don't know which is the

670
00:31:44,325 --> 00:31:47,205
Speaker 3: real her. You know, when my dad first started developing

671
00:31:47,205 --> 00:31:50,525
Speaker 3: his kind of radical ideas about doctors, that's when we

672
00:31:50,565 --> 00:31:54,965
Speaker 3: had this really difficult car accident. You know, we drove

673
00:31:55,005 --> 00:31:57,485
Speaker 3: all night, which my mother didn't want to do, but

674
00:31:57,605 --> 00:32:00,005
Speaker 3: she didn't say anything to my dad, and he'd been

675
00:32:00,005 --> 00:32:02,365
Speaker 3: giving this lectures for weeks about how doctors are part

676
00:32:02,365 --> 00:32:05,005
Speaker 3: of the illuminati and they were terrible, and she would

677
00:32:05,045 --> 00:32:07,285
Speaker 3: privately disagree with him. She said to me that she

678
00:32:07,285 --> 00:32:09,365
Speaker 3: didn't agree, but she never said it to him, and

679
00:32:09,405 --> 00:32:11,725
Speaker 3: she never said to him, that's fine that you believe that, dear,

680
00:32:11,845 --> 00:32:13,965
Speaker 3: But should anything happen to me, I want to go

681
00:32:14,005 --> 00:32:16,605
Speaker 3: to the hospital. And then we got into this horrible

682
00:32:16,645 --> 00:32:19,085
Speaker 3: car accident. We drove all night and my brother was seventeen,

683
00:32:19,125 --> 00:32:21,485
Speaker 3: and he fell asleep at the wheel, and we crashed,

684
00:32:21,645 --> 00:32:24,005
Speaker 3: you know, bad crash, and her head hit the windshields

685
00:32:24,005 --> 00:32:25,485
Speaker 3: so hard there was a crack that ran the whole

686
00:32:25,525 --> 00:32:27,605
Speaker 3: length of it. And she was disoriented, and she had

687
00:32:28,525 --> 00:32:30,725
Speaker 3: raccoon eyes that are a sign of traumatic brain injury,

688
00:32:30,765 --> 00:32:34,925
Speaker 3: and she wasn't she was incapacitated, and my dad, because

689
00:32:35,405 --> 00:32:36,885
Speaker 3: of the beliefs he had, you know, we didn't take

690
00:32:36,885 --> 00:32:38,325
Speaker 3: her to the hospital. We didn't take her to get

691
00:32:38,325 --> 00:32:40,525
Speaker 3: a katska, and we didn't do anything like that. And

692
00:32:40,645 --> 00:32:44,245
Speaker 3: I don't know. I mean, I don't blame her for

693
00:32:44,285 --> 00:32:47,085
Speaker 3: that accident, obviously, but for me, the question is always

694
00:32:48,525 --> 00:32:51,085
Speaker 3: I guess I really do believe that if she had

695
00:32:51,125 --> 00:32:53,965
Speaker 3: said to my dad, if should something happen to me,

696
00:32:54,365 --> 00:32:55,765
Speaker 3: this is how I want it handled, I think he

697
00:32:55,765 --> 00:32:58,845
Speaker 3: would have taken her. But she hadn't said that. I

698
00:32:58,845 --> 00:33:00,725
Speaker 3: think he assumed. I mean, I know that he assumed

699
00:33:00,765 --> 00:33:03,925
Speaker 3: she agreed, and over the years she came into more

700
00:33:03,965 --> 00:33:05,685
Speaker 3: and more agreement with him, so that now she has

701
00:33:05,725 --> 00:33:08,645
Speaker 3: his exact same views about doctors. But the beginning she didn't.

702
00:33:08,765 --> 00:33:11,965
Speaker 3: But she didn't say. And I've always wondered about that

703
00:33:12,005 --> 00:33:15,085
Speaker 3: car accident. If it had been one of us that

704
00:33:15,165 --> 00:33:18,525
Speaker 3: was injured really badly and not her, what would she

705
00:33:18,645 --> 00:33:21,165
Speaker 3: have done. Would she have insisted that we go to

706
00:33:21,205 --> 00:33:23,965
Speaker 3: the hospital, or would she have continued to be passive

707
00:33:24,205 --> 00:33:28,325
Speaker 3: and just let him decide not to not to treat it.

708
00:33:30,525 --> 00:33:32,965
Speaker 1: Do you think she was abused by your father?

709
00:33:35,485 --> 00:33:38,445
Speaker 3: I don't know. I mean, I guess it depends on

710
00:33:39,085 --> 00:33:43,765
Speaker 3: I'm very sure that she wasn't physically abused, and I

711
00:33:43,845 --> 00:33:47,245
Speaker 3: never saw my father berate her in any way, or.

712
00:33:48,485 --> 00:33:50,205
Speaker 1: Was she scared of him.

713
00:33:50,885 --> 00:33:53,805
Speaker 3: She would never have been afraid of him physically. I

714
00:33:53,885 --> 00:33:56,045
Speaker 3: can't imagine that she would have been, because he wasn't

715
00:33:56,045 --> 00:33:59,765
Speaker 3: that kind of person. But I think she was someone

716
00:33:59,805 --> 00:34:04,365
Speaker 3: who was intimidated by him, and that's a different I guess.

717
00:34:04,445 --> 00:34:05,725
Speaker 3: I think a lot of people would look at their

718
00:34:05,765 --> 00:34:09,885
Speaker 3: relationship and say that it was emotionally abusive, And the

719
00:34:09,885 --> 00:34:11,685
Speaker 3: only reason I'm uncomfortable with that is I think when

720
00:34:11,725 --> 00:34:14,805
Speaker 3: you say relationship is abusive, I think people have a

721
00:34:14,845 --> 00:34:16,845
Speaker 3: stereotype in their mind of what that is. And I

722
00:34:16,885 --> 00:34:19,285
Speaker 3: don't think it was that. I don't think it was healthy,

723
00:34:20,485 --> 00:34:21,525
Speaker 3: But I don't think it was that.

724
00:34:22,045 --> 00:34:27,565
Speaker 2: I ask because you know, you talk about her beliefs

725
00:34:27,605 --> 00:34:31,085
Speaker 2: and hospital and stuff. But she watched you, and in fact,

726
00:34:31,165 --> 00:34:33,285
Speaker 2: she tended to your wounds when you would come back

727
00:34:33,325 --> 00:34:36,845
Speaker 2: from the junkyard and you would have a hole in

728
00:34:36,885 --> 00:34:40,365
Speaker 2: your leg and let yet she let you keep going

729
00:34:40,405 --> 00:34:43,325
Speaker 2: out there with him. And she never said, you know what, no,

730
00:34:43,445 --> 00:34:44,925
Speaker 2: my kids are going to go to school.

731
00:34:46,045 --> 00:34:48,445
Speaker 3: You can get used to anything. And I think I

732
00:34:48,445 --> 00:34:50,805
Speaker 3: think the thing about a crisis is it's a crisis.

733
00:34:51,365 --> 00:34:53,365
Speaker 3: And when someone comes in, you know they're missing a

734
00:34:53,405 --> 00:34:55,045
Speaker 3: finger or something. The last thing you think is I

735
00:34:55,085 --> 00:35:01,205
Speaker 3: wonder if we should reconsider our general policy on you. Yeah, like,

736
00:35:01,285 --> 00:35:04,005
Speaker 3: you deal with that thing, and then after it's over,

737
00:35:04,645 --> 00:35:07,765
Speaker 3: the crisis has passed and everything's okay and they're healing

738
00:35:07,805 --> 00:35:09,845
Speaker 3: and it's fine, and then you can harry on us

739
00:35:09,845 --> 00:35:11,125
Speaker 3: before and you do that a few times, and then

740
00:35:11,165 --> 00:35:13,765
Speaker 3: pretty soon the injuries are really normalized. Like I never

741
00:35:14,245 --> 00:35:16,165
Speaker 3: I didn't think about the injuries in the scrapyard. I

742
00:35:16,245 --> 00:35:18,365
Speaker 3: was writing the book, and I was writing all these things,

743
00:35:18,365 --> 00:35:20,525
Speaker 3: and it was only when my friends were reading it saying,

744
00:35:20,805 --> 00:35:23,605
Speaker 3: you cannot be serious. Yeah, these things happened, and I thought, oh,

745
00:35:23,605 --> 00:35:25,965
Speaker 3: scrap yards are just dangerous. This is just what they're like.

746
00:35:26,085 --> 00:35:29,765
Speaker 3: And other people I know, and then like other people

747
00:35:29,845 --> 00:35:32,245
Speaker 3: must have had scrap yards in there in there, you know,

748
00:35:32,445 --> 00:35:34,925
Speaker 3: did everyone have all of these injuries? Like, well, you

749
00:35:34,925 --> 00:35:36,805
Speaker 3: do hear about people getting a car accident, sure, but

750
00:35:36,845 --> 00:35:38,085
Speaker 3: not as many as we did. Do you hear about

751
00:35:38,125 --> 00:35:40,245
Speaker 3: people getting burned, but not the way we did? And

752
00:35:40,285 --> 00:35:42,885
Speaker 3: you hear about but yeah, there was a strange concentration

753
00:35:43,005 --> 00:35:45,005
Speaker 3: of bad, bad things happening.

754
00:35:45,125 --> 00:35:47,445
Speaker 2: Yeah, except it wasn't strange. It was kind of as

755
00:35:47,485 --> 00:35:48,365
Speaker 2: a consequence of.

756
00:35:48,325 --> 00:35:49,685
Speaker 3: You, of decisions that were made.

757
00:35:49,805 --> 00:35:52,085
Speaker 1: Yes, it was really bad choices.

758
00:35:52,285 --> 00:35:53,805
Speaker 3: Yeah, but you don't, like I said, I think when

759
00:35:53,845 --> 00:35:56,205
Speaker 3: the crisis happens is the exact moment. You don't have

760
00:35:56,245 --> 00:35:59,485
Speaker 3: the reflection that would enable you to see those things.

761
00:35:59,805 --> 00:36:02,645
Speaker 2: And you also talk about how isolated your upbringing was

762
00:36:02,645 --> 00:36:04,205
Speaker 2: and your family was. It's not like you went to

763
00:36:04,245 --> 00:36:06,205
Speaker 2: other people's houses or they came to yours, or there.

764
00:36:06,125 --> 00:36:08,565
Speaker 3: Was a lot of perspective on it. For all, everyone's

765
00:36:08,645 --> 00:36:09,245
Speaker 3: junk yard.

766
00:36:09,125 --> 00:36:11,645
Speaker 1: Was like someone else in your family.

767
00:36:11,685 --> 00:36:14,885
Speaker 2: Probably the character that shines most brightly or should I

768
00:36:14,885 --> 00:36:18,085
Speaker 2: say most darkly in this book is your older brother Sean.

769
00:36:18,805 --> 00:36:21,845
Speaker 2: You have five brothers, but he is the one with

770
00:36:21,925 --> 00:36:24,365
Speaker 2: whom you have the most intense relationship. And it's the

771
00:36:24,405 --> 00:36:28,565
Speaker 2: first time I've ever read a really detailed description of

772
00:36:28,605 --> 00:36:34,605
Speaker 2: an abusive relationship between siblings. He was so physically and

773
00:36:34,725 --> 00:36:39,205
Speaker 2: emotionally and mentally abusive towards you. Can you describe Sean

774
00:36:39,245 --> 00:36:41,765
Speaker 2: a little bit and what your relationship was like? How

775
00:36:41,845 --> 00:36:44,845
Speaker 2: much older than you was he he's ten years I

776
00:36:44,885 --> 00:36:46,285
Speaker 2: don't have a lot of memories of him. When I

777
00:36:46,325 --> 00:36:48,365
Speaker 2: was younger, he wasn't around a lot, and then he

778
00:36:48,445 --> 00:36:50,765
Speaker 2: ran away from home he was seventeen, and I didn't

779
00:36:51,845 --> 00:36:53,765
Speaker 2: really know him. My memories of him again when I

780
00:36:53,805 --> 00:36:56,805
Speaker 2: was about fourteen or fifteen and he moved home, and

781
00:36:57,645 --> 00:37:02,805
Speaker 2: you know, he was this incredibly kind, sensitive, attentive person.

782
00:37:02,885 --> 00:37:04,645
Speaker 2: He was aware of me in a way that nobody

783
00:37:04,685 --> 00:37:06,605
Speaker 2: in my life had been aware of me. He was

784
00:37:06,645 --> 00:37:09,885
Speaker 2: protective of me in a way that my life had

785
00:37:09,925 --> 00:37:11,845
Speaker 2: been protective of me. And like my father, he had

786
00:37:12,405 --> 00:37:15,765
Speaker 2: a grip on safety and if he was in the

787
00:37:15,805 --> 00:37:17,765
Speaker 2: scrap yard, a lot of the things that my dad

788
00:37:17,765 --> 00:37:20,765
Speaker 2: would suggest, these just crazy plans. He would just be.

789
00:37:21,045 --> 00:37:23,045
Speaker 2: He would just step forward and say we're not doing

790
00:37:23,085 --> 00:37:26,365
Speaker 2: it that way and uh, and then they would fight.

791
00:37:26,445 --> 00:37:28,925
Speaker 2: And so he took on this, He took on this

792
00:37:29,005 --> 00:37:30,925
Speaker 2: role for me as someone who looked after me, and

793
00:37:31,245 --> 00:37:32,085
Speaker 2: in a lot.

794
00:37:31,925 --> 00:37:34,485
Speaker 3: Of ways he really did, you know. I mean, he

795
00:37:35,165 --> 00:37:37,365
Speaker 3: saved my life. And we were breaking horses once and

796
00:37:37,525 --> 00:37:39,445
Speaker 3: I got in a really bad situation on a horse.

797
00:37:39,485 --> 00:37:41,325
Speaker 3: I lost control of the reins and the horse went

798
00:37:41,405 --> 00:37:44,405
Speaker 3: berserk and my foot was caught in the stirrup. And

799
00:37:44,525 --> 00:37:46,205
Speaker 3: if you know anything about horse riding, you know that's

800
00:37:46,205 --> 00:37:48,565
Speaker 3: a pretty bad situation. So you fall off, you fall

801
00:37:48,605 --> 00:37:50,205
Speaker 3: clean off, You're probably gonna be fine, but if your

802
00:37:50,205 --> 00:37:52,965
Speaker 3: foot's caught, you'll get dragged and your head will hit

803
00:37:52,965 --> 00:37:56,125
Speaker 3: a rock and that's it. You're done. And I thought

804
00:37:56,165 --> 00:37:57,885
Speaker 3: I was I thought I was a goner because the

805
00:37:57,885 --> 00:37:59,725
Speaker 3: only person that was around that could help me at

806
00:37:59,725 --> 00:38:01,125
Speaker 3: all was my brother Shawan, and he was on a

807
00:38:01,165 --> 00:38:04,925
Speaker 3: horse it's about twenty feet behind me, that had never

808
00:38:05,605 --> 00:38:09,685
Speaker 3: had a rider on its back ever. This was its

809
00:38:09,765 --> 00:38:12,485
Speaker 3: first time in fact, it hadn't even had a saddle.

810
00:38:12,525 --> 00:38:14,045
Speaker 3: We put the saddle on, and we thought, right, we'll

811
00:38:14,045 --> 00:38:15,445
Speaker 3: just put the saddle on and take it off because

812
00:38:15,685 --> 00:38:17,565
Speaker 3: but she was tolerating it pretty well, so we thought, right,

813
00:38:17,605 --> 00:38:19,005
Speaker 3: we'll just hop on her and see what happens. And

814
00:38:19,045 --> 00:38:21,285
Speaker 3: then this is when I got in this situation. And

815
00:38:21,325 --> 00:38:23,725
Speaker 3: so he's sitting on this twelve hundred pounds thorough bread.

816
00:38:24,765 --> 00:38:27,525
Speaker 3: I'm thinking, yeah, there's no way that he is gonna

817
00:38:27,805 --> 00:38:30,285
Speaker 3: whip the horse into a frenzy that he would need

818
00:38:30,325 --> 00:38:33,605
Speaker 3: to to catch the horse I'm on, which is going

819
00:38:33,645 --> 00:38:37,005
Speaker 3: completely crazy. You know, show me he's gonna risk that,

820
00:38:37,045 --> 00:38:38,685
Speaker 3: because he'll never be able to calm it down again

821
00:38:38,725 --> 00:38:41,325
Speaker 3: and then we'll both be dead. But that's exactly what

822
00:38:41,405 --> 00:38:45,045
Speaker 3: he did. And so he was capable of tremendous sacrifice

823
00:38:45,165 --> 00:38:49,645
Speaker 3: self sacrifice. But he also I think had more self

824
00:38:49,685 --> 00:38:52,365
Speaker 3: loathing than probably any person I've ever met, and that

825
00:38:52,405 --> 00:38:59,845
Speaker 3: would come out in ways that were yeah, degrading, violent, manipulative,

826
00:39:00,125 --> 00:39:04,565
Speaker 3: just all kinds of really unhealthy behaviors.

827
00:39:05,245 --> 00:39:08,765
Speaker 2: He would do things like force your head into the toilet,

828
00:39:09,765 --> 00:39:12,605
Speaker 2: twist your arm until it I think it broke. At

829
00:39:12,605 --> 00:39:15,285
Speaker 2: one stage, I think my wrist had either. I think

830
00:39:15,285 --> 00:39:16,885
Speaker 2: the bone cracked and it wasn't a cleaner.

831
00:39:16,885 --> 00:39:18,485
Speaker 1: Who knows you weren't allowed to go to the doctor.

832
00:39:18,605 --> 00:39:22,085
Speaker 3: That's true. Yeah, I think I think the bone probably cracked.

833
00:39:22,565 --> 00:39:27,165
Speaker 2: Yeah, I felt aware. Were your parents of what he

834
00:39:27,205 --> 00:39:27,765
Speaker 2: was doing to you?

835
00:39:28,405 --> 00:39:32,485
Speaker 3: That is a good question. I don't know. I know

836
00:39:33,005 --> 00:39:36,045
Speaker 3: when my sister wrote me and said she wanted to

837
00:39:36,045 --> 00:39:39,725
Speaker 3: confront my parents for one thing, I had no idea

838
00:39:39,885 --> 00:39:44,045
Speaker 3: that she had lived my life before I did. That

839
00:39:44,085 --> 00:39:47,245
Speaker 3: was an unwelcome revelation for me. But then I also

840
00:39:47,685 --> 00:39:51,245
Speaker 3: felt an incredible reluctance to do what she was asking

841
00:39:51,285 --> 00:39:53,325
Speaker 3: me to do, which is to confront my parents. And

842
00:39:54,325 --> 00:39:57,965
Speaker 3: I suppose that I was afraid maybe they wouldn't believe me.

843
00:39:58,005 --> 00:40:01,685
Speaker 3: But I think the bigger fear I had wasn't so

844
00:40:01,765 --> 00:40:04,125
Speaker 3: much that they that they wouldn't believe me, but that

845
00:40:04,125 --> 00:40:07,485
Speaker 3: I would just discover that they already knew and had

846
00:40:07,525 --> 00:40:09,925
Speaker 3: already decided that it didn't matter.

847
00:40:11,005 --> 00:40:15,245
Speaker 2: There was similar to so many abuses he did. He

848
00:40:15,325 --> 00:40:19,165
Speaker 2: gasled you in the sense that he kept telling you

849
00:40:19,205 --> 00:40:21,405
Speaker 2: that it was just a joke, that you were just

850
00:40:21,525 --> 00:40:25,525
Speaker 2: mucking around, and that worked quite well. Yeah.

851
00:40:25,565 --> 00:40:27,165
Speaker 3: I have a theory about that. I think all abuse,

852
00:40:27,245 --> 00:40:29,365
Speaker 3: no matter what kind of abuse it is, I think

853
00:40:29,365 --> 00:40:31,605
Speaker 3: it's an assault on the mind. And I think if

854
00:40:31,645 --> 00:40:33,365
Speaker 3: you're going to abuse someone, you have to re invade

855
00:40:33,365 --> 00:40:35,725
Speaker 3: the reality and you have to distort it, and you

856
00:40:35,725 --> 00:40:38,005
Speaker 3: have to simultaneously convince them a couple of things. You

857
00:40:38,045 --> 00:40:40,125
Speaker 3: have to convince them that what you're doing isn't that bad,

858
00:40:40,285 --> 00:40:42,725
Speaker 3: which is you have to rationalize it or normalize it.

859
00:40:43,405 --> 00:40:44,645
Speaker 3: And the other thing you have to convince mother is

860
00:40:44,685 --> 00:40:46,885
Speaker 3: that they somehow deserve what's happening. And my brother was

861
00:40:46,925 --> 00:40:49,965
Speaker 3: really good. I think the second thing happens naturally because

862
00:40:49,965 --> 00:40:52,525
Speaker 3: people tend to take on blame when they're hurting. I

863
00:40:52,565 --> 00:40:54,405
Speaker 3: think the first thing was something my brother was just

864
00:40:54,445 --> 00:40:58,165
Speaker 3: really good at. So, you know, he could he could

865
00:40:58,205 --> 00:41:03,045
Speaker 3: attack me. And there was one incident that happened where he, yeah,

866
00:41:03,085 --> 00:41:04,885
Speaker 3: he grabbed me by my hair and hauled me down

867
00:41:04,885 --> 00:41:06,565
Speaker 3: the hallway and shoved my head in a toilet, and

868
00:41:07,445 --> 00:41:09,405
Speaker 3: then we ended up. I was trying to get away

869
00:41:09,445 --> 00:41:11,365
Speaker 3: and he grabbed me again and I ended up we

870
00:41:11,405 --> 00:41:13,805
Speaker 3: both ended up falling into the bathtub and I broke

871
00:41:13,885 --> 00:41:15,525
Speaker 3: my toes he fell in it, and I had a

872
00:41:15,565 --> 00:41:17,685
Speaker 3: friend that was there I was seventeen and I had,

873
00:41:17,725 --> 00:41:19,925
Speaker 3: you know, this Charles person. I actually did become friends

874
00:41:19,925 --> 00:41:24,125
Speaker 3: with this person, and he was there, and you know,

875
00:41:24,245 --> 00:41:27,525
Speaker 3: after it was all over, I remember my brother Sean,

876
00:41:27,565 --> 00:41:30,205
Speaker 3: he comes into my room and he just explains to

877
00:41:30,245 --> 00:41:32,085
Speaker 3: me that it was a game and we were having

878
00:41:32,085 --> 00:41:35,005
Speaker 3: a really good time. And you know, next time things

879
00:41:35,005 --> 00:41:37,285
Speaker 3: are getting out of hand or I'm not having fun,

880
00:41:37,285 --> 00:41:39,445
Speaker 3: I need to make sure I say something. And I

881
00:41:39,485 --> 00:41:41,925
Speaker 3: took that perspective on one hundred percent, so much so

882
00:41:42,005 --> 00:41:43,525
Speaker 3: that I went to Charles and said, oh, it's just

883
00:41:43,565 --> 00:41:46,325
Speaker 3: a game. And he didn't buy it. He knew what

884
00:41:46,365 --> 00:41:48,525
Speaker 3: he'd seen. But I think, you know, he didn't really

885
00:41:48,565 --> 00:41:50,045
Speaker 3: try to reason with me either. I think he could

886
00:41:50,045 --> 00:41:53,685
Speaker 3: see how deeply under my brother's power I was, you know,

887
00:41:53,725 --> 00:41:56,605
Speaker 3: but eventually that would begin to shift. And you know,

888
00:41:56,685 --> 00:41:59,005
Speaker 3: it was only really a few weeks later that something

889
00:41:59,045 --> 00:42:00,765
Speaker 3: happened again with my brother. He attacked me in a

890
00:42:00,805 --> 00:42:03,165
Speaker 3: parking lot and when it.

891
00:42:03,125 --> 00:42:06,245
Speaker 1: Was all over, at the time, he laughed, didn't you At.

892
00:42:06,125 --> 00:42:09,645
Speaker 3: The time people started, you know, I was screaming and

893
00:42:09,405 --> 00:42:12,405
Speaker 3: and people started to look and I immediately started to.

894
00:42:12,405 --> 00:42:14,965
Speaker 1: Laugh, Why did you do that?

895
00:42:15,485 --> 00:42:17,885
Speaker 3: I think it was so much more pleasant to believe

896
00:42:17,925 --> 00:42:19,685
Speaker 3: it was a game. I definitely wanted other people to

897
00:42:19,725 --> 00:42:22,245
Speaker 3: believe it was a game. I didn't want other people

898
00:42:22,285 --> 00:42:24,765
Speaker 3: to know he was attacking me. It was humiliating, and

899
00:42:24,805 --> 00:42:26,605
Speaker 3: then the and then I think I wanted to believe

900
00:42:26,605 --> 00:42:29,805
Speaker 3: it myself a little bit. And uh, when it was

901
00:42:29,805 --> 00:42:32,365
Speaker 3: all over, I wrote this journal entry about it, which

902
00:42:32,405 --> 00:42:34,165
Speaker 3: is probably the first time in my life that I'd

903
00:42:34,165 --> 00:42:36,205
Speaker 3: written other journal entries where I'd been vague. I said

904
00:42:36,205 --> 00:42:38,085
Speaker 3: I was afraid of my brother had said something had happened,

905
00:42:38,085 --> 00:42:39,885
Speaker 3: but I wouldn't say what. But this was the first

906
00:42:40,005 --> 00:42:42,725
Speaker 3: entry that I just wrote what happened, and I wrote.

907
00:42:43,125 --> 00:42:45,005
Speaker 3: I wrote that I'd been terrified. I wrote that I'd

908
00:42:45,005 --> 00:42:47,005
Speaker 3: been afraid. I wrote that I would have torn him

909
00:42:47,005 --> 00:42:49,045
Speaker 3: apart if I could have in that moment, for what

910
00:42:49,085 --> 00:42:49,685
Speaker 3: he was doing to me.

911
00:42:50,485 --> 00:42:51,605
Speaker 1: And when and I.

912
00:42:51,605 --> 00:42:54,365
Speaker 3: Was wild I was writing it. He uh, he knocks

913
00:42:54,365 --> 00:42:57,085
Speaker 3: on my door and he comes into my room and

914
00:42:57,125 --> 00:43:00,445
Speaker 3: he says to me, Oh, whatever that thing earlier, that

915
00:43:00,525 --> 00:43:02,885
Speaker 3: was just a game and we were having fun. And

916
00:43:03,085 --> 00:43:05,205
Speaker 3: you know, next time things get out of hand, or

917
00:43:05,245 --> 00:43:07,845
Speaker 3: you're or something's hurting you, you really need to speak

918
00:43:07,925 --> 00:43:08,645
Speaker 3: up and say something.

919
00:43:09,125 --> 00:43:09,925
Speaker 1: Oh, was your fault.

920
00:43:10,165 --> 00:43:15,165
Speaker 3: And then he left, and I did not know what

921
00:43:15,365 --> 00:43:20,285
Speaker 3: to think. I didn't I didn't know whose experience was right.

922
00:43:21,445 --> 00:43:23,125
Speaker 3: For all, I knew it had been a game for him,

923
00:43:23,285 --> 00:43:26,245
Speaker 3: but I knew what my experience had been, and I

924
00:43:26,325 --> 00:43:29,885
Speaker 3: knew that I had not been having fun. And so

925
00:43:29,965 --> 00:43:33,045
Speaker 3: I wrote this slightly strange entry where I wrote both versions. Okay,

926
00:43:33,125 --> 00:43:35,445
Speaker 3: here's what he says happened, but this is what happened

927
00:43:35,445 --> 00:43:37,845
Speaker 3: to me. And I think it's probably the first time

928
00:43:39,205 --> 00:43:41,685
Speaker 3: that that happened, and that my brother had attempted to

929
00:43:41,725 --> 00:43:43,245
Speaker 3: dominate me in that way. And at the end of

930
00:43:43,285 --> 00:43:47,765
Speaker 3: that process, there were still two minds present, two distinct minds,

931
00:43:47,845 --> 00:43:50,565
Speaker 3: not one mind having gained control over the other.

932
00:43:51,525 --> 00:43:56,725
Speaker 2: You took it upon yourself to educate yourself, and you

933
00:43:56,765 --> 00:44:00,045
Speaker 2: had one brother that had gone to university and encouraged

934
00:44:00,125 --> 00:44:04,485
Speaker 2: you to go, and you went to BYU. Brigham Young University,

935
00:44:04,525 --> 00:44:09,005
Speaker 2: which is a Mormon orange college. I can't even imagine

936
00:44:09,005 --> 00:44:12,605
Speaker 2: the shock you must have had so many firsts living

937
00:44:13,285 --> 00:44:16,205
Speaker 2: the life that you did, and then moving because you

938
00:44:16,285 --> 00:44:18,325
Speaker 2: went to live on campus. You were sixteen years old

939
00:44:18,365 --> 00:44:21,125
Speaker 2: and yet you were at university. What were some of

940
00:44:21,165 --> 00:44:27,205
Speaker 2: the firsts you encountered and how did you interpret them.

941
00:44:27,325 --> 00:44:29,445
Speaker 3: There was a lot of learning about things I didn't know,

942
00:44:29,725 --> 00:44:32,405
Speaker 3: like the Holocaust, or I thought Europe was a country

943
00:44:32,725 --> 00:44:36,765
Speaker 3: it wasn't. Uh. And then there's a lot of social awkwardness.

944
00:44:36,845 --> 00:44:39,885
Speaker 3: I had never had friends my age. I'd never had

945
00:44:39,925 --> 00:44:42,205
Speaker 3: you had friends. You don't talk a lot about friends.

946
00:44:42,245 --> 00:44:43,045
Speaker 1: Even there was a.

947
00:44:43,365 --> 00:44:46,965
Speaker 3: Family a mile away that was like my family, and

948
00:44:47,005 --> 00:44:49,325
Speaker 3: they didn't go to school or believe in doctors. And

949
00:44:49,565 --> 00:44:52,765
Speaker 3: I mean it's funny, you know, she was my age

950
00:44:52,765 --> 00:44:55,245
Speaker 3: and I definitely saw her, but friends, not in the

951
00:44:55,245 --> 00:44:57,605
Speaker 3: traditional sense. You know, she was the oldest of I

952
00:44:57,605 --> 00:45:05,165
Speaker 3: think ten, and you know she grew up fast and no,

953
00:45:05,245 --> 00:45:07,805
Speaker 3: so not in the traditional sense. You know, she was

954
00:45:08,445 --> 00:45:10,405
Speaker 3: kind of a mother. She was kind of Yeah, she

955
00:45:10,445 --> 00:45:13,605
Speaker 3: was my age where she had ten kids and basically

956
00:45:13,645 --> 00:45:18,645
Speaker 3: she was the one raising one. And so no, not really, No,

957
00:45:18,685 --> 00:45:20,325
Speaker 3: I didn't have friends, not until I went to college.

958
00:45:20,485 --> 00:45:22,045
Speaker 3: And I was bad at it. Frankly, I just didn't

959
00:45:22,005 --> 00:45:22,765
Speaker 3: know how to do it. I didn't know how to

960
00:45:22,765 --> 00:45:25,365
Speaker 3: be around people my own age. I had terrible hygiene

961
00:45:25,365 --> 00:45:29,125
Speaker 3: and I just the whole you know, yeah, I was.

962
00:45:29,125 --> 00:45:32,245
Speaker 3: I was a weird person. You would would have seen

963
00:45:32,285 --> 00:45:35,005
Speaker 3: me in a crowd and thought, what is going on there?

964
00:45:35,165 --> 00:45:39,165
Speaker 1: Why what do you look like? I did dress in a.

965
00:45:39,125 --> 00:45:41,325
Speaker 3: Side I dressed. I wore a lot of my brother's clothes.

966
00:45:41,365 --> 00:45:43,365
Speaker 3: And when I already tried to dress and what I

967
00:45:43,405 --> 00:45:45,685
Speaker 3: thought was a female way, it was like way over

968
00:45:45,725 --> 00:45:47,365
Speaker 3: the top, you know, I just didn't know how to

969
00:45:47,405 --> 00:45:49,605
Speaker 3: do it. And then probably the bigger issue was just

970
00:45:49,645 --> 00:45:51,285
Speaker 3: I could not talk to people. I didn't know how.

971
00:45:51,405 --> 00:45:54,525
Speaker 3: I remember listening. I remember in classes, you know, I'd

972
00:45:54,565 --> 00:45:56,565
Speaker 3: have my notebook for notes, and then before the lectures

973
00:45:56,605 --> 00:45:59,485
Speaker 3: would start, sometimes I would just listen to people kind

974
00:45:59,485 --> 00:46:01,365
Speaker 3: of greeting each other, and I remember writing out some

975
00:46:01,365 --> 00:46:03,485
Speaker 3: of these conversations, Hi, Hi, how are you? What have

976
00:46:03,525 --> 00:46:04,885
Speaker 3: you been doing this weekend? Like I would just write

977
00:46:04,885 --> 00:46:07,245
Speaker 3: out what people were saying because I was just trying

978
00:46:07,245 --> 00:46:10,485
Speaker 3: to work out how does this like. I'd never had

979
00:46:10,525 --> 00:46:12,205
Speaker 3: to have a conversation like that. I'd talk to my

980
00:46:12,245 --> 00:46:13,045
Speaker 3: family and that's it.

981
00:46:14,365 --> 00:46:16,125
Speaker 2: Uh, yeah, you don't have a lot of small talk

982
00:46:16,165 --> 00:46:17,045
Speaker 2: with your family, do you.

983
00:46:17,005 --> 00:46:18,565
Speaker 3: Know it's not the same or yeah, we would meet

984
00:46:18,605 --> 00:46:20,325
Speaker 3: other families like I said that, we're like my family,

985
00:46:20,325 --> 00:46:23,485
Speaker 3: but they were very different conversations and the adults talk,

986
00:46:23,525 --> 00:46:25,565
Speaker 3: and as kids you just have a very different interaction.

987
00:46:26,365 --> 00:46:29,285
Speaker 3: And I just never I never that whole small talk

988
00:46:29,325 --> 00:46:31,445
Speaker 3: conversation here's how you talk to people. I was just

989
00:46:31,525 --> 00:46:33,285
Speaker 3: really bad at it. And I remember just just riding

990
00:46:33,285 --> 00:46:36,325
Speaker 3: them out, and then of course you try to memorize them,

991
00:46:36,325 --> 00:46:39,525
Speaker 3: and it ends up just going really badly because someone,

992
00:46:40,085 --> 00:46:42,165
Speaker 3: you know, maybe you know someone at church and they're

993
00:46:42,165 --> 00:46:44,085
Speaker 3: trying to be nice to you, and so they say, hi,

994
00:46:44,125 --> 00:46:45,685
Speaker 3: how are you know? They come over and they're like

995
00:46:45,885 --> 00:46:48,165
Speaker 3: and they're like hi, and then you say fine. You know,

996
00:46:48,205 --> 00:46:50,285
Speaker 3: you just kind of like you just skip a step

997
00:46:50,325 --> 00:46:52,445
Speaker 3: because they do something a little bit unexpected and you

998
00:46:52,485 --> 00:46:55,245
Speaker 3: can't deal with it. And so I had a lot

999
00:46:55,285 --> 00:46:57,685
Speaker 3: of conversations like that where they would say hey, nice day,

1000
00:46:57,685 --> 00:47:01,245
Speaker 3: and I'd be like, fine, it's fine. I mean, I'm fine. No,

1001
00:47:01,285 --> 00:47:04,485
Speaker 3: it's a fine it's a fine day. And uh and

1002
00:47:04,525 --> 00:47:07,165
Speaker 3: at that point, you know, they're just sort of like okay, right.

1003
00:47:08,565 --> 00:47:11,725
Speaker 3: So No, I wasn't. It wasn't not a smooth transit.

1004
00:47:11,765 --> 00:47:14,365
Speaker 3: Plus I thought everyone was, you know, I thought they

1005
00:47:14,365 --> 00:47:18,205
Speaker 3: were all gentiles and not not not good Mormons, because

1006
00:47:18,245 --> 00:47:20,125
Speaker 3: I thought our version of Mormonism was the right one,

1007
00:47:20,205 --> 00:47:22,525
Speaker 3: and theirs was the let's give you a slightly evil one,

1008
00:47:22,565 --> 00:47:24,685
Speaker 3: which didn't help of self isolating a lot of.

1009
00:47:24,605 --> 00:47:27,805
Speaker 2: The time, did it see you talk about looking around

1010
00:47:27,845 --> 00:47:29,765
Speaker 2: and feeling like everyone was going to go to hell

1011
00:47:29,845 --> 00:47:32,685
Speaker 2: because there were girls that were wearing short skirts.

1012
00:47:32,325 --> 00:47:36,245
Speaker 1: Or what else shocked you by the outside world?

1013
00:47:36,685 --> 00:47:39,205
Speaker 3: Oh? Everything, and the movies they watched, the clothes they wore,

1014
00:47:40,165 --> 00:47:42,085
Speaker 3: the fact that they went to the doctor shocked me.

1015
00:47:42,125 --> 00:47:43,565
Speaker 3: And I thought they were going to be punished for that.

1016
00:47:43,605 --> 00:47:44,845
Speaker 3: I thought they were going to be punished for going

1017
00:47:44,885 --> 00:47:48,125
Speaker 3: to school. You know, Yeah, there was there. There was

1018
00:47:48,165 --> 00:47:51,325
Speaker 3: a lot of just me choosing to be isolated. In

1019
00:47:51,325 --> 00:47:53,445
Speaker 3: addition to the fact that even on the rare occasions

1020
00:47:53,445 --> 00:47:55,005
Speaker 3: when I thought I wanted to be friends with someone,

1021
00:47:55,005 --> 00:47:56,045
Speaker 3: I had no idea how to do that.

1022
00:47:57,645 --> 00:48:01,965
Speaker 2: Did it take a long time to learn how to

1023
00:48:02,005 --> 00:48:02,765
Speaker 2: be a young woman?

1024
00:48:04,365 --> 00:48:06,045
Speaker 3: I don't know. Does anyone know how to do that? Yeah?

1025
00:48:06,325 --> 00:48:06,845
Speaker 3: What that mean?

1026
00:48:06,845 --> 00:48:08,285
Speaker 1: If you find out, can you let me know.

1027
00:48:09,005 --> 00:48:10,845
Speaker 3: I think it takes a long time to learn that

1028
00:48:10,925 --> 00:48:12,925
Speaker 3: the ideas of what people think you should be as

1029
00:48:12,925 --> 00:48:16,965
Speaker 3: a young woman are wholly made up, and that really

1030
00:48:16,965 --> 00:48:18,405
Speaker 3: you're just trying to learn how to be yourself. It's

1031
00:48:18,405 --> 00:48:20,565
Speaker 3: hard enough work. I'd have never thought what you really

1032
00:48:20,565 --> 00:48:22,405
Speaker 3: need to do is learn what other people think you should.

1033
00:48:22,845 --> 00:48:24,645
Speaker 3: There was that wonderful quote the other day I read

1034
00:48:25,805 --> 00:48:27,325
Speaker 3: and I wish I could remember the name of the writer.

1035
00:48:27,605 --> 00:48:30,365
Speaker 3: She's so great. But it was something like, the problem

1036
00:48:30,445 --> 00:48:35,085
Speaker 3: with gender expectations is that they tell you how you

1037
00:48:35,125 --> 00:48:39,405
Speaker 3: should be and not how you are. And I think

1038
00:48:39,445 --> 00:48:42,365
Speaker 3: that's exactly it. Maybe, yes, we think in general women

1039
00:48:42,405 --> 00:48:44,525
Speaker 3: are more like this, in general men are more like this,

1040
00:48:44,605 --> 00:48:47,525
Speaker 3: But it completely neglects the fact that individuals are not

1041
00:48:47,605 --> 00:48:48,125
Speaker 3: like anything.

1042
00:48:49,765 --> 00:48:52,245
Speaker 2: What about romantic relationships before marriage?

1043
00:48:53,605 --> 00:48:55,405
Speaker 3: What do you mean? You have to be more specific?

1044
00:48:56,165 --> 00:48:57,645
Speaker 1: Did you have sex in college?

1045
00:48:57,725 --> 00:49:03,685
Speaker 3: Now? Of course not, I was did like?

1046
00:49:03,725 --> 00:49:07,485
Speaker 2: What was the dismantling of your religious beliefs to the

1047
00:49:07,525 --> 00:49:11,205
Speaker 2: point where you were able to and I don't want

1048
00:49:11,205 --> 00:49:14,045
Speaker 2: to make any assumptions, but to the point where you

1049
00:49:14,085 --> 00:49:16,845
Speaker 2: were able to not feel that every decision you took

1050
00:49:17,285 --> 00:49:18,605
Speaker 2: would mean that you would go to hell?

1051
00:49:19,365 --> 00:49:20,885
Speaker 3: You know. I mean there's things that you that you

1052
00:49:20,925 --> 00:49:23,565
Speaker 3: internalized because you're told them explicitly, and then there are

1053
00:49:23,605 --> 00:49:26,085
Speaker 3: things that you internalize even though you're not told them explicitly.

1054
00:49:26,205 --> 00:49:29,285
Speaker 3: And I Yeah, the first boyfriend I got I was seventeen,

1055
00:49:29,965 --> 00:49:33,205
Speaker 3: and it was a completely unphysical relationship for a really

1056
00:49:33,285 --> 00:49:35,365
Speaker 3: long time, pretty much the whole duration of it, almost

1057
00:49:35,445 --> 00:49:39,165
Speaker 3: because I just could not do it. And you know,

1058
00:49:39,205 --> 00:49:42,365
Speaker 3: my older brother, Sean, he'd had this word for me

1059
00:49:42,445 --> 00:49:44,805
Speaker 3: that he'd been calling me since I was fifteen, and

1060
00:49:44,925 --> 00:49:49,765
Speaker 3: the word was whore. And again, I was a teenage girl.

1061
00:49:49,805 --> 00:49:52,565
Speaker 3: That really entered into my self conception in a pretty

1062
00:49:52,605 --> 00:49:55,405
Speaker 3: extreme way, In such an extreme way that when I

1063
00:49:55,485 --> 00:49:59,325
Speaker 3: was sixteen, I wrote this journal entry about my brother

1064
00:49:59,685 --> 00:50:04,165
Speaker 3: and it included the line, It's strange how you give

1065
00:50:04,205 --> 00:50:07,845
Speaker 3: the people you love so much power over you. But

1066
00:50:07,885 --> 00:50:11,045
Speaker 3: you know, in calling me that for so long, I

1067
00:50:11,045 --> 00:50:13,725
Speaker 3: think he had he had a lot more power over

1068
00:50:13,765 --> 00:50:15,405
Speaker 3: me than I ever could have understood, because what he

1069
00:50:15,445 --> 00:50:17,445
Speaker 3: had done is he had defined me to myself. And

1070
00:50:17,485 --> 00:50:19,565
Speaker 3: I'm really not sure there's a greater power than that.

1071
00:50:20,405 --> 00:50:25,645
Speaker 3: And so I was, you know, seventeen eighteen. That word

1072
00:50:25,925 --> 00:50:28,525
Speaker 3: was so strong and who I thought I was, that

1073
00:50:28,645 --> 00:50:30,685
Speaker 3: any attempt I made to have any kind of physical

1074
00:50:30,685 --> 00:50:34,885
Speaker 3: relationship just filled me with revulsion at my own self.

1075
00:50:35,125 --> 00:50:38,205
Speaker 3: And so, to be honest, though there were many years

1076
00:50:38,205 --> 00:50:40,685
Speaker 3: where it just was not something I was able to do.

1077
00:50:42,885 --> 00:50:45,125
Speaker 2: Did you need to be deprogrammed? Like, did you go

1078
00:50:45,205 --> 00:50:49,085
Speaker 2: to a counsel a lot? How did you dismantle this

1079
00:50:49,845 --> 00:50:54,205
Speaker 2: essentially brainwashing, A lifetime of brainwashing until you sort of

1080
00:50:54,965 --> 00:50:59,005
Speaker 2: got to college and started seeing the world through your

1081
00:50:59,005 --> 00:50:59,965
Speaker 2: own lens.

1082
00:51:01,405 --> 00:51:03,765
Speaker 3: Deprogramming de brainwashing. I don't know if there were words.

1083
00:51:04,045 --> 00:51:06,085
Speaker 3: I didn't feel like that at the time. I think

1084
00:51:06,885 --> 00:51:10,165
Speaker 3: I remember being in college and and I had these

1085
00:51:10,205 --> 00:51:13,645
Speaker 3: wonderful housemates, roommates my second and third year, and I

1086
00:51:13,685 --> 00:51:17,725
Speaker 3: remember really watching them and just becoming aware that there

1087
00:51:17,725 --> 00:51:20,245
Speaker 3: were huge differences between them and me. And I remember

1088
00:51:20,245 --> 00:51:22,845
Speaker 3: the first time I realized I had a real revelation

1089
00:51:22,925 --> 00:51:26,285
Speaker 3: of what the difference. One of those differences was is

1090
00:51:26,845 --> 00:51:29,805
Speaker 3: one of my housemates, she went on a bad date

1091
00:51:29,885 --> 00:51:31,325
Speaker 3: or something and he ended up calling her a name.

1092
00:51:31,325 --> 00:51:32,965
Speaker 3: I don't really I don't even remember the story, but

1093
00:51:33,005 --> 00:51:35,725
Speaker 3: I remember she came home crying. He said something mean

1094
00:51:35,765 --> 00:51:40,325
Speaker 3: to her. She was so upset about it, and I realized,

1095
00:51:41,005 --> 00:51:44,565
Speaker 3: I just knew if that had happened to me, I

1096
00:51:44,605 --> 00:51:46,845
Speaker 3: wouldn't have any feelings about it. That was a big

1097
00:51:46,845 --> 00:51:48,765
Speaker 3: difference between her and me. That was the biggest difference

1098
00:51:48,925 --> 00:51:53,525
Speaker 3: she was capable of being hurt by hurtful things and

1099
00:51:53,565 --> 00:51:57,085
Speaker 3: I was not. And you know, I could have been

1100
00:51:57,125 --> 00:51:59,085
Speaker 3: out with someone I've been called a whore or a

1101
00:51:59,125 --> 00:52:01,005
Speaker 3: slut or any other thing, and I would not have

1102
00:52:01,085 --> 00:52:03,445
Speaker 3: even I wouldn't even have felt it. And I thought

1103
00:52:03,445 --> 00:52:05,605
Speaker 3: that was a good thing. Since I was sixteen, I'd

1104
00:52:05,645 --> 00:52:07,005
Speaker 3: been telling myself that was a good thing. It was

1105
00:52:07,005 --> 00:52:09,765
Speaker 3: because I was really strong, because I was I was touchable,

1106
00:52:09,805 --> 00:52:11,525
Speaker 3: I was invincible. It was a sign of the fact

1107
00:52:11,525 --> 00:52:13,405
Speaker 3: that I could take anything and nothing would affect me.

1108
00:52:13,445 --> 00:52:15,325
Speaker 3: Nothing affected me, nothing could affect me. I said that

1109
00:52:15,325 --> 00:52:17,645
Speaker 3: to myself all the time, and it wasn't until that

1110
00:52:17,645 --> 00:52:21,125
Speaker 3: moment that I realized that it's not affecting me. That

1111
00:52:21,325 --> 00:52:23,805
Speaker 3: was its effect, That was the effect it was having.

1112
00:52:23,885 --> 00:52:25,965
Speaker 3: It was hauling me out. It was making me disconnected

1113
00:52:25,965 --> 00:52:29,485
Speaker 3: from myself. It was making me not able to connect

1114
00:52:29,485 --> 00:52:32,645
Speaker 3: with other people because I couldn't. I couldn't risk it.

1115
00:52:33,445 --> 00:52:35,565
Speaker 3: So I think it took me a long time to

1116
00:52:35,605 --> 00:52:39,245
Speaker 3: realize that her vulnerability. You know, she was gonna cry

1117
00:52:39,245 --> 00:52:41,525
Speaker 3: that night, but then later she was going to be

1118
00:52:41,525 --> 00:52:45,405
Speaker 3: a full, complete human being and I was not. So

1119
00:52:45,525 --> 00:52:48,285
Speaker 3: did you have therapy to help not then No, I

1120
00:52:48,285 --> 00:52:50,645
Speaker 3: think I went quite far without therapy. I didn't have

1121
00:52:50,765 --> 00:52:54,085
Speaker 3: therapy until I had a mental breakdown because my parents

1122
00:52:54,125 --> 00:52:57,085
Speaker 3: were telling people I was possessed. And then I had

1123
00:52:57,165 --> 00:52:59,325
Speaker 3: a mental breakdown, and at that point I got lots

1124
00:52:59,325 --> 00:53:01,685
Speaker 3: of therapy. And I'm a big fan of therapy now.

1125
00:53:01,765 --> 00:53:08,245
Speaker 3: But you know, i'd got over before that happened. You know,

1126
00:53:08,405 --> 00:53:10,605
Speaker 3: a lot of the issues i'd had, you know, with

1127
00:53:10,685 --> 00:53:14,005
Speaker 3: physical intimacy or or without vulnerability thing, these were things

1128
00:53:14,045 --> 00:53:15,765
Speaker 3: I'd noodled out myself, and I think I would have

1129
00:53:15,805 --> 00:53:18,245
Speaker 3: probably done it faster with a therapist. It seems like

1130
00:53:18,285 --> 00:53:20,085
Speaker 3: a great waste of time to just sit by yourself

1131
00:53:20,125 --> 00:53:21,685
Speaker 3: and do it. You can be helped with this, you know,

1132
00:53:22,045 --> 00:53:24,045
Speaker 3: But I had you know, I think I had kind

1133
00:53:24,085 --> 00:53:25,765
Speaker 3: of worked that out most of it.

1134
00:53:26,085 --> 00:53:30,165
Speaker 2: As you progressed further and further to the most extraordinary

1135
00:53:30,205 --> 00:53:34,685
Speaker 2: heights in terms of education, I mean, you certainly overcompensated

1136
00:53:34,845 --> 00:53:37,205
Speaker 2: for a lifetime not setting foot in a classroom or

1137
00:53:37,205 --> 00:53:38,325
Speaker 2: having any formal education.

1138
00:53:38,845 --> 00:53:41,085
Speaker 3: You started a university, did I think is the word

1139
00:53:41,085 --> 00:53:41,685
Speaker 3: you're looking for?

1140
00:53:41,845 --> 00:53:44,245
Speaker 2: But yeah, did I say undercompensated, No, No, you just

1141
00:53:44,245 --> 00:53:51,685
Speaker 2: a compensation overcompensated very much overcompensated ridiculously for your lack

1142
00:53:51,725 --> 00:53:55,165
Speaker 2: of formal education. You went from university to Cambridge and

1143
00:53:55,205 --> 00:53:56,245
Speaker 2: then Oxford.

1144
00:53:56,325 --> 00:53:58,085
Speaker 3: Oxford and went to Cambridge, and I had a year

1145
00:53:58,085 --> 00:54:00,605
Speaker 3: at Harvard, but I got my PhD at Cambridge, So

1146
00:54:00,645 --> 00:54:02,805
Speaker 3: that was a bit I think of an over compensation. Once,

1147
00:54:03,045 --> 00:54:04,925
Speaker 3: once I did make it to a school, I start,

1148
00:54:04,965 --> 00:54:06,925
Speaker 3: that's it, flag planted. I'm never leaving.

1149
00:54:07,405 --> 00:54:09,925
Speaker 2: I'm going to learn all the things now you're a

1150
00:54:09,925 --> 00:54:13,565
Speaker 2: doctor technically, yeah, in history, yes, all the things that

1151
00:54:13,605 --> 00:54:17,245
Speaker 2: you didn't learn before. And you moved to the UK

1152
00:54:17,365 --> 00:54:20,405
Speaker 2: and you got scholarships and you did extraordinarily well. Because

1153
00:54:20,405 --> 00:54:23,645
Speaker 2: obviously there was no family support for your pursuit of education.

1154
00:54:24,725 --> 00:54:29,205
Speaker 2: They must have been incredibly threatened by you leaving the

1155
00:54:29,245 --> 00:54:32,485
Speaker 2: family and striking out in this particular direction.

1156
00:54:32,925 --> 00:54:34,365
Speaker 3: No, if I would say they were threatened, I think

1157
00:54:34,365 --> 00:54:36,165
Speaker 3: it made it hard. It was hard on them. They

1158
00:54:36,205 --> 00:54:39,645
Speaker 3: had to negotiate. They had to watch me making decisions

1159
00:54:39,685 --> 00:54:42,485
Speaker 3: they didn't like. They had to watch me getting beliefs

1160
00:54:42,485 --> 00:54:45,365
Speaker 3: they didn't like. They had to a lot of parents

1161
00:54:45,365 --> 00:54:47,325
Speaker 3: have to do that, and my parents did, and they

1162
00:54:47,405 --> 00:54:49,285
Speaker 3: I thought they they handled it fairly well.

1163
00:54:49,325 --> 00:54:51,485
Speaker 1: Actually I don't know. I started saying you were possessed

1164
00:54:51,485 --> 00:54:52,045
Speaker 1: by the devil.

1165
00:54:52,245 --> 00:54:54,645
Speaker 3: Yeah, that wasn't about politics, and it wasn't about history,

1166
00:54:54,645 --> 00:54:56,525
Speaker 3: and it wasn't about the fact that I went to school,

1167
00:54:56,525 --> 00:54:58,085
Speaker 3: and it wasn't about any of that. I think what

1168
00:54:58,165 --> 00:55:01,005
Speaker 3: that was about it was about it, but not directly.

1169
00:55:01,285 --> 00:55:03,485
Speaker 3: I think it was only about those things because those

1170
00:55:03,525 --> 00:55:05,605
Speaker 3: things had changed me and I'd become a different person,

1171
00:55:06,045 --> 00:55:11,245
Speaker 3: and because I was different, that was hard for them.

1172
00:55:11,445 --> 00:55:14,085
Speaker 3: Me being a different person was hard for them. I

1173
00:55:14,125 --> 00:55:17,565
Speaker 3: think the negotiation of the actual differences, I think that

1174
00:55:17,565 --> 00:55:20,485
Speaker 3: they were really doing their best with that. I think

1175
00:55:20,525 --> 00:55:22,885
Speaker 3: we all were trying to just, you know, find you

1176
00:55:22,925 --> 00:55:24,565
Speaker 3: can half kill yourself and not go to the doctor,

1177
00:55:24,605 --> 00:55:27,045
Speaker 3: and I'm gonna pretend like that's all right, and you're

1178
00:55:27,085 --> 00:55:28,565
Speaker 3: going to pretend like it's all right that I'm going

1179
00:55:28,645 --> 00:55:31,085
Speaker 3: to this school in this country that you think is socialist,

1180
00:55:31,325 --> 00:55:33,405
Speaker 3: and we're all just gonna act like it's fine. And

1181
00:55:33,645 --> 00:55:35,365
Speaker 3: we were doing that, and I think, you know, what

1182
00:55:35,685 --> 00:55:38,765
Speaker 3: broke my family apart wasn't was an education in a

1183
00:55:38,765 --> 00:55:42,605
Speaker 3: direct way. What broke my family apart was me confronting

1184
00:55:42,605 --> 00:55:44,925
Speaker 3: them about my brother's violence and saying it was time

1185
00:55:44,925 --> 00:55:48,085
Speaker 3: to put an end to that and them saying that

1186
00:55:48,285 --> 00:55:51,045
Speaker 3: I was my father, especially saying that I was lying

1187
00:55:51,085 --> 00:55:52,605
Speaker 3: and that I was possessed.

1188
00:55:53,365 --> 00:55:55,685
Speaker 1: What might you decide to confront them about Chilen.

1189
00:55:57,605 --> 00:56:02,485
Speaker 3: I got a letter from my sister and saying things

1190
00:56:02,485 --> 00:56:04,805
Speaker 3: had happened with her, and she thought that it was

1191
00:56:04,805 --> 00:56:08,725
Speaker 3: time that we confront them, and I did not want

1192
00:56:08,765 --> 00:56:11,685
Speaker 3: to do that, and I asked her to give me

1193
00:56:11,725 --> 00:56:14,645
Speaker 3: some time to think about it. But I think she

1194
00:56:15,045 --> 00:56:17,605
Speaker 3: had been trying to convince my mother for some time

1195
00:56:19,005 --> 00:56:21,245
Speaker 3: to take it seriously. And I think when she got

1196
00:56:21,245 --> 00:56:24,365
Speaker 3: an email back from me basically saying, you're right, these

1197
00:56:24,365 --> 00:56:28,445
Speaker 3: things have happened. But let's think I think she. I

1198
00:56:28,485 --> 00:56:30,925
Speaker 3: think she felt this overwhelming need to just show it

1199
00:56:30,925 --> 00:56:33,165
Speaker 3: to my mother and say, look, I'm not I'm not crazy,

1200
00:56:33,885 --> 00:56:35,485
Speaker 3: And so she did.

1201
00:56:36,605 --> 00:56:40,485
Speaker 2: Sean was married by this time, and at one point

1202
00:56:40,565 --> 00:56:43,085
Speaker 2: you go home and you staying with your parents, and

1203
00:56:43,165 --> 00:56:47,765
Speaker 2: his wife comes over in enormous distress. How did that

1204
00:56:47,805 --> 00:56:48,725
Speaker 2: play out in the end?

1205
00:56:49,805 --> 00:56:51,525
Speaker 3: You know, it was a strange time. His wife was

1206
00:56:51,925 --> 00:56:53,685
Speaker 3: my age, she might even be a little younger than me,

1207
00:56:55,085 --> 00:56:59,565
Speaker 3: and it was difficult for me not to identify with her.

1208
00:56:59,925 --> 00:57:02,925
Speaker 3: And I was at Cambridge I was studying feminism. I

1209
00:57:02,965 --> 00:57:07,325
Speaker 3: was learning all these great things about gender roles and

1210
00:57:08,245 --> 00:57:11,485
Speaker 3: all this stuff. And then I went home and witnessed

1211
00:57:11,485 --> 00:57:13,445
Speaker 3: this scene of violence between my brother and his wife,

1212
00:57:13,485 --> 00:57:14,845
Speaker 3: where he had thrown her out of the house in

1213
00:57:14,885 --> 00:57:17,125
Speaker 3: the middle of winter without shoes or a coat, because

1214
00:57:17,165 --> 00:57:20,045
Speaker 3: I think she'd bought the wrong kind of food at

1215
00:57:20,045 --> 00:57:22,325
Speaker 3: the store that day and he'd locked her out of

1216
00:57:22,325 --> 00:57:25,205
Speaker 3: the house and she'd had to, you know, in December

1217
00:57:25,285 --> 00:57:28,205
Speaker 3: in Idaho, which is a really cold place with ice,

1218
00:57:28,285 --> 00:57:30,725
Speaker 3: and yeah, she'd had to run up the hill without shoes,

1219
00:57:30,765 --> 00:57:35,165
Speaker 3: got a coat and yeah, And I did nothing. I

1220
00:57:35,205 --> 00:57:38,445
Speaker 3: think I just deferred to my dad. I did the

1221
00:57:38,485 --> 00:57:40,965
Speaker 3: exact same thing I'd been trained to do my whole life,

1222
00:57:40,965 --> 00:57:43,965
Speaker 3: which is I I deferred to a source of authority,

1223
00:57:44,085 --> 00:57:46,565
Speaker 3: even kind of knowing that I thought the authority was

1224
00:57:46,765 --> 00:57:47,405
Speaker 3: probably wrong.

1225
00:57:49,645 --> 00:57:50,405
Speaker 1: She's still with him.

1226
00:57:50,805 --> 00:57:53,325
Speaker 3: Yeah.

1227
00:57:53,725 --> 00:57:56,125
Speaker 1: What's your life like now, Tara mine?

1228
00:57:56,285 --> 00:58:02,885
Speaker 3: Yeah, right now, there's a lot of travel, a lot

1229
00:58:02,885 --> 00:58:06,805
Speaker 3: of promoting the book. But talking about the book, you've

1230
00:58:06,805 --> 00:58:08,485
Speaker 3: stayed in the UK. Yeah, I've stayed in the UK.

1231
00:58:08,565 --> 00:58:10,805
Speaker 3: I've got a dog, I you know, I have a

1232
00:58:10,845 --> 00:58:15,445
Speaker 3: little house. I write. It's very different than the life

1233
00:58:15,485 --> 00:58:19,405
Speaker 3: that I had growing up, obviously, and I'm very different,

1234
00:58:19,925 --> 00:58:21,405
Speaker 3: and I think, you know, it's one of the things

1235
00:58:21,445 --> 00:58:23,445
Speaker 3: about the book. I think people a lot of people

1236
00:58:23,445 --> 00:58:24,765
Speaker 3: want to read this book, and they want to read

1237
00:58:24,765 --> 00:58:29,245
Speaker 3: it as a sociological kind of study of why some

1238
00:58:29,405 --> 00:58:32,125
Speaker 3: kids embraced education and others don't, or why some kids

1239
00:58:32,205 --> 00:58:34,325
Speaker 3: are resilient and others aren't, or they want it. That's

1240
00:58:34,325 --> 00:58:36,605
Speaker 3: what they want. And for me, I guess I think

1241
00:58:36,405 --> 00:58:39,845
Speaker 3: the questions that the book asks are less sociological and

1242
00:58:39,925 --> 00:58:42,565
Speaker 3: more psychological, because I don't feel qualified to write about

1243
00:58:42,565 --> 00:58:45,085
Speaker 3: any of that other stuff. But for me, are these

1244
00:58:45,125 --> 00:58:47,485
Speaker 3: psychological questions that are the heart of it. And I

1245
00:58:47,525 --> 00:58:50,085
Speaker 3: think that what it really, what the story asks, at

1246
00:58:50,125 --> 00:58:53,125
Speaker 3: least the way I see it is, is just about change.

1247
00:58:53,165 --> 00:58:56,605
Speaker 3: And it's about all the different versions of a person

1248
00:58:56,725 --> 00:58:58,645
Speaker 3: that can exist in the space of a life. And

1249
00:58:58,685 --> 00:59:03,085
Speaker 3: it's about whether your first self is your only true self,

1250
00:59:03,405 --> 00:59:06,685
Speaker 3: or whether you're allowed to change, and about what happens

1251
00:59:06,885 --> 00:59:11,125
Speaker 3: when the people who are close to you who won't

1252
00:59:11,165 --> 00:59:14,765
Speaker 3: allow you to change, or maybe just can't accept any

1253
00:59:14,805 --> 00:59:19,005
Speaker 3: other version of you. So that's you know, the fact

1254
00:59:19,045 --> 00:59:21,965
Speaker 3: that my life is so different now. I think that's

1255
00:59:22,005 --> 00:59:24,765
Speaker 3: the narrative. That's what it's about. It's about change, and

1256
00:59:24,765 --> 00:59:26,925
Speaker 3: it's about identity and how much can you change and

1257
00:59:26,965 --> 00:59:31,645
Speaker 3: still feel like yourself? And who gets to decide how

1258
00:59:31,725 --> 00:59:34,645
Speaker 3: much change is too much? And then, of course the

1259
00:59:34,845 --> 00:59:37,805
Speaker 3: argument's over the past, and who gets to control the

1260
00:59:37,885 --> 00:59:40,245
Speaker 3: narratives of the past, because all of these things are

1261
00:59:40,245 --> 00:59:41,005
Speaker 3: bound up together.

1262
00:59:42,245 --> 00:59:44,405
Speaker 2: What's your relationship black now with your family? And have

1263
00:59:44,405 --> 00:59:46,445
Speaker 2: they read the book? I don't know who else read

1264
00:59:46,485 --> 00:59:48,245
Speaker 2: the book. There's half my family. I'm really close to.

1265
00:59:48,765 --> 00:59:52,005
Speaker 3: Three of my brothers, and then there is a significant

1266
00:59:52,045 --> 00:59:55,405
Speaker 3: portion of the family from whom I mischranged.

1267
00:59:56,325 --> 00:59:57,325
Speaker 1: Is that your decision?

1268
00:59:57,885 --> 01:00:00,525
Speaker 3: It wasn't to begin with, you know. Initially, when my

1269
01:00:00,605 --> 01:00:04,885
Speaker 3: parents said I was lying, they told my brother what

1270
01:00:04,925 --> 01:00:09,325
Speaker 3: I'd said about him, and he disowned me, and they

1271
01:00:09,325 --> 01:00:11,205
Speaker 3: apported that decision. So there was a good year of

1272
01:00:11,245 --> 01:00:14,885
Speaker 3: the of the disownment. That was very much their choice,

1273
01:00:14,965 --> 01:00:17,605
Speaker 3: not mine. I call it phase phase one. Phase one

1274
01:00:17,685 --> 01:00:19,805
Speaker 3: was not my choice, and that lasted about ten months,

1275
01:00:19,845 --> 01:00:21,725
Speaker 3: and then I was offered a way back into the family.

1276
01:00:21,725 --> 01:00:23,165
Speaker 3: And the way that was offered to me was that

1277
01:00:23,205 --> 01:00:27,405
Speaker 3: my father, very bizarrely just came to Harvard which is

1278
01:00:27,445 --> 01:00:32,325
Speaker 3: not There's two things my dad hates, it's uh travel

1279
01:00:32,445 --> 01:00:37,245
Speaker 3: and liberals. So for him to come to Harvard was

1280
01:00:37,245 --> 01:00:40,205
Speaker 3: pretty extreme. So he uh he did, though. He came

1281
01:00:40,485 --> 01:00:42,485
Speaker 3: and and he offered me this blessing, which I think

1282
01:00:42,485 --> 01:00:44,445
Speaker 3: would have been tanto out to an exorcism where I

1283
01:00:44,445 --> 01:00:47,805
Speaker 3: could have accepted the blessing and then he would cast

1284
01:00:47,805 --> 01:00:49,525
Speaker 3: out this devil and I could sort of say, well,

1285
01:00:49,565 --> 01:00:52,565
Speaker 3: everything that I'd said about my brother had really been

1286
01:00:52,645 --> 01:00:54,885
Speaker 3: this evil spirit, and I could just deny it all

1287
01:00:54,925 --> 01:00:57,365
Speaker 3: and I could just have my family. And there was

1288
01:00:57,365 --> 01:00:59,525
Speaker 3: a period of several days where we were walking around,

1289
01:00:59,605 --> 01:01:02,045
Speaker 3: you know, sight seeing in Boston is the weirdest thing,

1290
01:01:02,605 --> 01:01:05,365
Speaker 3: and I was just wrestling with that decision, and there

1291
01:01:05,405 --> 01:01:06,885
Speaker 3: was a period where I thought maybe that was a

1292
01:01:06,925 --> 01:01:09,605
Speaker 3: deal I could make, and I was kind of trying

1293
01:01:09,605 --> 01:01:12,605
Speaker 3: to convince myself that there might be some dignity and

1294
01:01:12,645 --> 01:01:16,685
Speaker 3: what I planned to do, which is to surrender my

1295
01:01:16,805 --> 01:01:19,365
Speaker 3: own ideas about right and wrong, my own perceptions about

1296
01:01:19,405 --> 01:01:21,525
Speaker 3: what had happened. That I could deny things and say

1297
01:01:21,525 --> 01:01:24,645
Speaker 3: things didn't happen that I knew did, and that somehow

1298
01:01:25,045 --> 01:01:27,205
Speaker 3: that this was a defensible choice to make, that I

1299
01:01:27,205 --> 01:01:28,645
Speaker 3: could do that, you know, to win the love of

1300
01:01:28,685 --> 01:01:32,645
Speaker 3: my parents. And ultimately it was a decision I couldn't make,

1301
01:01:32,725 --> 01:01:34,325
Speaker 3: and I had to kind of come to terms with

1302
01:01:34,365 --> 01:01:36,845
Speaker 3: the fact when my dad did offer it the last

1303
01:01:36,925 --> 01:01:41,845
Speaker 3: night before they left, that the daughter that my dad

1304
01:01:42,045 --> 01:01:46,045
Speaker 3: had come to reclaim just no longer existed anymore. You know.

1305
01:01:46,165 --> 01:01:49,285
Speaker 3: She had she'd grown up, and she'd read a bunch

1306
01:01:49,325 --> 01:01:51,485
Speaker 3: of books, and she'd developed her own ideas about things

1307
01:01:51,485 --> 01:01:55,085
Speaker 3: and her own perspective on things. And you know, I

1308
01:01:55,645 --> 01:01:57,965
Speaker 3: was no longer in a position where someone could come

1309
01:01:58,005 --> 01:02:00,045
Speaker 3: along and say to me, oh, no, it had been

1310
01:02:00,085 --> 01:02:03,845
Speaker 3: a game. You were having fun, and next time, next time,

1311
01:02:03,885 --> 01:02:06,085
Speaker 3: make sure you speak out. I knew that that wasn't

1312
01:02:06,085 --> 01:02:07,885
Speaker 3: going to work, and I knew what was happening to me,

1313
01:02:08,605 --> 01:02:11,045
Speaker 3: and I had just become a person who had no

1314
01:02:11,165 --> 01:02:13,725
Speaker 3: tolerance for violence and couldn't really give way to it,

1315
01:02:14,485 --> 01:02:18,885
Speaker 3: and there really wasn't another decision to make. Really as

1316
01:02:18,925 --> 01:02:21,565
Speaker 3: heartbreaking it as it is, I'm so glad for you

1317
01:02:21,645 --> 01:02:24,245
Speaker 3: that you are able to stay with that other person

1318
01:02:24,605 --> 01:02:27,125
Speaker 3: and tell your story.

1319
01:02:27,565 --> 01:02:30,125
Speaker 2: You should be super proud. It's a wonderful, wonderful book

1320
01:02:30,165 --> 01:02:33,725
Speaker 2: and an extraordinary story. Thank you, Thanks so Much Tara.

1321
01:02:33,965 --> 01:02:36,285
Speaker 1: You can buy Tara's book at Apple dot co.

1322
01:02:36,525 --> 01:02:39,445
Speaker 2: Forward Slash Mama Maya Lots and Lots of People Have

1323
01:02:39,965 --> 01:02:42,965
Speaker 2: No Filter is produced by Eliza Ratliffe and if you

1324
01:02:43,045 --> 01:02:46,285
Speaker 2: have any guest suggestions, you can email us at podcast

1325
01:02:46,565 --> 01:02:51,005
Speaker 2: at mamamea dot com dot au. I'm Meya Friedman and

1326
01:02:51,085 --> 01:02:55,565
Speaker 2: I will see you on the homepage. If you're looking

1327
01:02:55,565 --> 01:02:58,445
Speaker 2: for something else to listen to, like and follow all

1328
01:02:58,485 --> 01:03:01,405
Speaker 2: of our Mamamea podcasts which are currently bringing you Hot

1329
01:03:01,445 --> 01:03:04,645
Speaker 2: pod Summer one hundred hours of summer listens, from spicy

1330
01:03:04,645 --> 01:03:09,205
Speaker 2: conversations to incredible stories, fashion beauty. We're the friends in

1331
01:03:09,325 --> 01:03:10,525
Speaker 2: Pores over Summer