Speaker 1: While we get doctor Guardier America's psychologists, and there's a
Speaker 1: couple of things we want to talk to him about.
Speaker 1: But as we get him adjusted up here, we absolutely
Speaker 1: wanted to take questions from you guys. I think it's
Speaker 1: a small enough room that you all can shout them out.
Speaker 1: So by all means, can we get doctor as we
Speaker 1: get him up here, anybody got a question, you all
Speaker 1: toss it out.
Speaker 2: We need to talk.
Speaker 1: Oh, by goodness, yes, this happened in a in a
Speaker 1: crowded public place. People were all around us at the time, loud,
Speaker 1: pardon good time, and we were sitting there the only
Speaker 1: and I may say, hey, so are we going to talk?
Speaker 1: Why aren't you acknowledging what's happening? So do you just
Speaker 1: want to keep going the way we're going, because if
Speaker 1: you want to, we can and I will drop it
Speaker 1: and we're done. If not, we need to have a
Speaker 1: conversation about what's happening and a way forward because we
Speaker 1: are working together every day. We're together every day together
Speaker 1: all the time. So either we address it and drop it,
Speaker 1: or address it and figure out what we're going to
Speaker 1: do about How wasn't this aggressive when I did?
Speaker 3: But but yeah, it was. It was a crowded room,
Speaker 3: which actually was probably best because I said, can I
Speaker 3: think about that? And then I think we talked about
Speaker 3: it the next day, and then we kept talking about it.
Speaker 3: But I was so shocked that he brought it up
Speaker 3: that you, like, I think you maybe had a little
Speaker 3: liquid courage, but I was not prepared for you to
Speaker 3: call me out. And that was a moment when I thought, oh, wow,
Speaker 3: we actually have to acknowledge this.
Speaker 1: Anybody else, Gret, I'm curious, how are your colleagues that work?
Speaker 3: So we went back to work for two days after
Speaker 3: that tabloid that shall not be named release those photos
Speaker 3: of as we pointed out, just discovering us in a
Speaker 3: private relationship. They did not catch us cheating. That was
Speaker 3: not what happened. They found us in our private relationship.
Speaker 3: But when we came back for those two days, we
Speaker 3: were surrounded with support. My dressing room was full of
Speaker 3: all of our colleagues.
Speaker 1: Some of it fake, some of it fake absolutely, some
Speaker 1: of it was bs.
Speaker 3: But once it was clear that we weren't coming back,
Speaker 3: I never heard from most people again.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and we get that to a certain degree, right,
Speaker 1: everybody's trying to hold onto their job. They don't want
Speaker 1: to be seen as being an ally of the two
Speaker 1: people that ABC News doesn't like, and we get it
Speaker 1: to a certain degree. And for us, even we stayed
Speaker 1: away from some of our former colleagues because we were
Speaker 1: worried about them. I don't think you would mind us
Speaker 1: saying this. We had lunch with Stray what last week
Speaker 1: before last last week. You wouldn't believe the effort we
Speaker 1: put into it with straight hand, just that Okay, you
Speaker 1: arrive at this time and then we'll come in and
Speaker 1: you can come in after. And we sat down with
Speaker 1: him and we were being a politic dude wish sar
Speaker 1: and he said, you idiots stop, just you have to
Speaker 1: stop being that way and thinking that way that we
Speaker 1: are trying to protect you straight hand from us. That
Speaker 1: is the shame I'm talking about with. This is a
Speaker 1: guy we've been very close to for ten years now,
Speaker 1: and even we didn't want to get whatever our stank
Speaker 1: is on him for some reason, and we struggled to
Speaker 1: get out of that mindset. But friends like that do help,
Speaker 1: and time helps.
Speaker 3: I used to say, it's not like I murdered someone,
Speaker 3: but I definitely felt like that's how it seemed if
Speaker 3: you read comments anywhere from all of these articles. I
Speaker 3: will say when we did walk down the street, which
Speaker 3: we didn't often, we got a lot of people yelling support,
Speaker 3: like we support you, we love you. Love is love,
Speaker 3: Like I want to definitely say that we like. No
Speaker 3: one came up and said anything horrible to our faces.
Speaker 3: But it was just all the comments and all the
Speaker 3: commentary and all the headlines. It just it weighs you
Speaker 3: down to the point where you think I'm the worst
Speaker 3: person in the world, and you do feel like you've
Speaker 3: committed a crime. It's bizarre. But yes, I mean, I
Speaker 3: co hosted twenty twenty. I dealt in death and destruction,
Speaker 3: you know, and so yes, it was strange to me
Speaker 3: to suddenly, you know, be this just hated horrible person
Speaker 3: for loving someone. It was frustrating too, because the narrative
Speaker 3: was not true, and so it was frustrating.
Speaker 1: We lost the narrative off the top. Is the problem, Yeah,
Speaker 1: is that once people were told what it was and
Speaker 1: we didn't come out and make a statement, even though
Speaker 1: we drafted statements that day that ABC News said, uh right,
Speaker 1: we were encouraged to write these statements, and we had
Speaker 1: statements to put out explaining much of the things we
Speaker 1: said tonight. Once we lost that ability to speak and
Speaker 1: to control the narrative, it was done. And in social
Speaker 1: media age, nothing we could do.
Speaker 3: Perception becomes reality.
Speaker 1: And it's simple as that. I see hands going up now, doctor,
Speaker 1: doctor Gourdia, come on and go ahead and have a seat.
Speaker 1: You'll know, doctor, this is doctor Jeff Gardier here. He's
Speaker 1: gonna help us. So I see a lot of hands
Speaker 1: going up you all.
Speaker 4: So, yeah, I wanted to ask you made the you
Speaker 4: mentioned controlling the narrative. Did either of you ever consider
Speaker 4: going to ABC.
Speaker 3: Before the photos room?
Speaker 5: Yes?
Speaker 3: And okay, how did that go?
Speaker 1: We decided not to. We were We've said this, I
Speaker 1: think we've already said this publicly, but we were threatened.
Speaker 1: We were directly threatened that if we didn't do what
Speaker 1: was being demanded of us, that we were going to
Speaker 1: be outed. We were threatened, and two days after that threat,
Speaker 1: photographers were seretitiously following us. So that is what happens now.
Speaker 1: Even before I think even before that threat or certainly
Speaker 1: after it, we said, you know what, let's just go
Speaker 1: give ABC News the PR department. A guy, a friend
Speaker 1: of ours, there who we were close to, just the
Speaker 1: heads up to say, hey, we are going through divorce proceedings,
Speaker 1: this is what happened, and we're dating now and leave
Speaker 1: it at that. We we absolutely.
Speaker 3: Had those We almost did. I mean in November, I
Speaker 3: believe it was maybe the week before the pictures. We
Speaker 3: had a long discussion back and forth about whether or
Speaker 3: not we should just give them a heads up. And
Speaker 3: what we decided was, let's just wait till after the
Speaker 3: first of the year, so let's get through the holidays
Speaker 3: and in January we will go and explain to them
Speaker 3: what's happening.
Speaker 1: Even we talked to an executive. I love this line,
Speaker 1: he said, he said, So I'm not saying we saying this.
Speaker 1: He said, ABC News. They're idiots. All they have to
Speaker 1: do is take you guys, now, move you to the
Speaker 1: entertainment side and print money, is actually what he said.
Speaker 1: But we lost a net. Look, we worked at a
Speaker 1: this was a company. This is a network, a network
Speaker 1: owned by a company Disney. That I mean, it's iconic,
Speaker 1: right image is a cute little mouse Disney. And that
Speaker 1: cute little mouse has been with the same girl mouse
Speaker 1: for one hundred years. For divorces. That ain't work.
Speaker 6: A follow up question to that piece about what two
Speaker 6: to three years ago, when you all were in that happy,
Speaker 6: healthy place in your careers and you're still very early
Speaker 6: stage in both of your professional careers. I would imagine
Speaker 6: that you have milestones, professional milestones, goals that were in
Speaker 6: your line of sight, and knowing that there are only
Speaker 6: such limited, high visibility platforms that exist in the world
Speaker 6: that you are in, do you still believe that those
Speaker 6: goals are achievable for you?
Speaker 3: Are they still in cable or network news?
Speaker 1: They've changed. Absolutely. We sit here now with the idea
Speaker 1: of going back to network news and doing that. It
Speaker 1: doesn't appeal to us in the least bit. Did I mention?
Speaker 1: Those jobs almost killed us, literally almost killed us. So
Speaker 1: we think we're doing great, but we talk about a
Speaker 1: cost of us being together. We don't ever talk about
Speaker 1: the cost of being in those gigs in the first place. Oh,
Speaker 1: look at what you guys lost. You had these great Yeah,
Speaker 1: I should have maybe given that gig up a long
Speaker 1: time ago.
Speaker 3: Agreed, I have zero desire to go back to network
Speaker 3: news and the grind. And you know, we know how
Speaker 3: the sausage is made, and it got more and more
Speaker 3: frustrating to me the more I got to a higher
Speaker 3: level and I saw it. Look media bias. It does
Speaker 3: not exist with how we tell stories as much as
Speaker 3: it is the story we don't tell. And I was
Speaker 3: very frustrated and I had moments where I wanted to
Speaker 3: leave before any of this happened, just frustration with the industry.
Speaker 3: It is a business, so I wanted to be a journalist,
Speaker 3: and sometimes those two don't don't work well together. So
Speaker 3: as hard as it was to lose our jobs, I
Speaker 3: mean like they were lucrative and they were fairly easy,
Speaker 3: like we could do it in our sleep. It was
Speaker 3: we were we were printing money, but it wasn't challenging,
Speaker 3: and it wasn't really what I wanted to do. So
Speaker 3: we're hoping and we're hopeful that we can actually start
Speaker 3: doing things we really want to do. So trying to
Speaker 3: look at it as an opportunity now. And because we
Speaker 3: never would have left those jobs, Like don't like we
Speaker 3: would have never left, we would have stayed. And so
Speaker 3: now we have to look at this as the street
Speaker 3: we were supposed to be on, and we're gonna we're
Speaker 3: gonna walk down it and see what happens.
Speaker 1: And doctor guard. Dear, can I ask we love it.
Speaker 1: I cannot say it enough how much we love his brother.
Speaker 1: But this love you love you Black when when you
Speaker 1: can speak on us, sure, But for everybody else in
Speaker 1: this room, the idea of that private shame causing you
Speaker 1: to behave in ways that aren't really who you are.
Speaker 7: So we grow up with this fairy tale of your
Speaker 7: life is really about pairing up with someone or you're
Speaker 7: not successful. And so we achieve all these incredible things,
Speaker 7: but it's never enough until we feel that we're in
Speaker 7: that romance or in that family or that pairing that
Speaker 7: really is the cherry on top, and it comes in time.
Speaker 7: But when we're in relationships, and I would think every
Speaker 7: single one of us have been in relationships that haven't
Speaker 7: worked out.
Speaker 1: And I don't say so much failure.
Speaker 7: Because I'm a psychologist and I'm a positive thinker, but
Speaker 7: when they don't work out, it's the shame that we're
Speaker 7: not being successful at everything that we've learned, all the
Speaker 7: pairing fantasies that we've learned as part of our culture
Speaker 7: here in America, in the world, but especially in America.
Speaker 7: So we live with a lot of that shame that
Speaker 7: it's not working out, that there's nothing we can do
Speaker 7: to really change that relationship, that we've failed at this thing,
Speaker 7: and our friends will look at us in a different way,
Speaker 7: and we have to get new friends and possibly new
Speaker 7: family and so on.
Speaker 1: So that shame is very real.
Speaker 7: But I think in a lot of ways it plays
Speaker 7: into a lot of the criticisms that you all experienced,
Speaker 7: because one thing is we have to look at what
Speaker 7: COVID it has done to the world, and what it's
Speaker 7: done to America. We have unprecedented anxiety depression PTSD, and
Speaker 7: so a lot of what I saw and I looked
Speaker 7: at it, even though we've known each other for many,
Speaker 7: many years, I looked at it psychologically, Why are they
Speaker 7: attacking these two people who are just trying to live
Speaker 7: their lives, who, according to many people, made these mistakes
Speaker 7: and so on. And they went from this you know
Speaker 7: this most loved you know TV pairing as co anchors
Speaker 7: to you know, all these tabloid stories. And I think
Speaker 7: a lot of it had to do with the fact
Speaker 7: that we're all emotionally ill still from COVID, and we
Speaker 7: were looking to project a lot of the anger and
Speaker 7: the shame and a lot of the grieving that we
Speaker 7: had as part of COVID, as part of what we're
Speaker 7: going through coming through COVID. And I think you all
Speaker 7: see this. And I'm not going to get into the politics,
Speaker 7: but with the tribal politics, the hate that's out there,
Speaker 7: the venom that's out there, it's not fashionable to say
Speaker 7: I'm sorry. And you all have said I'm sorry, and
Speaker 7: you all have said how you're grateful, which is an
Speaker 7: amazing catharsist, this amazing walk that you're taking. And so
Speaker 7: a lot of what we see is with this splitting
Speaker 7: we're okay, you're bad, projection I'm okay, you're bad. I
Speaker 7: think a lot of this played into what you were
Speaker 7: going through. So we have to acknowledge and take responsibility
Speaker 7: for our own shame instead of projecting it onto other people.
Speaker 7: Number one and number two, we have to do the
Speaker 7: hard work of realizing sometimes relationships don't work out, and
Speaker 7: it's really important for us to learn as to what
Speaker 7: it is that we can all do better instead of
Speaker 7: pointing fingers at one person or just ourselves, but taking
Speaker 7: the responsibility together of learning and going on to more
Speaker 7: positive relationships. And I'll just end by saying, yes, I
Speaker 7: hear you thinking, ABC News because you are on this
Speaker 7: very very fascinating journey of pain and love and still
Speaker 7: some shame. I think it still takes time to work
Speaker 7: through that. But you're also helping so many other people
Speaker 7: who experience life and experience that shame.
Speaker 1: And so.
Speaker 7: These two folks need a round of applause y'all for
Speaker 7: the incredible work that they're doing.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Jeff, Thank you doctor Guardier. I think we
Speaker 3: have a question back here, Hi, Hi Amy, Hi TJ.
Speaker 8: You know me, we did conversation together with black men
Speaker 8: and you facilitated that. Yeah, And I find it really
Speaker 8: interesting that this is kind of like reflecting in a
Speaker 8: weird way, like the experience I had before getting on
Speaker 8: set where I was like, oh, like I am like
Speaker 8: this like queer person who's coming in talking about my
Speaker 8: black maleness, and they're like, don't go this far, because like,
Speaker 8: if you go this far, that's not what like Disney
Speaker 8: wants to hear, That's not what ABC wants to hear.
Speaker 8: But I again, I just want to thank you because
Speaker 8: you allowed me to like push those things in a
Speaker 8: space that probably wouldn't allow me to do.
Speaker 1: So that is that is one of the greatest compliments, right,
Speaker 1: I remember that, but that you took something away right
Speaker 1: in that moment. I didn't know if I'd ever see
Speaker 1: you again. That is the greatest compliment to hear that
Speaker 1: in that moment I made you that kind of not
Speaker 1: something I thought I wasn't trying to impress, but my
Speaker 1: brother that that that that feels great to have you
Speaker 1: stand up here and say that to me.
Speaker 8: And I guess, like my question is, it's like it
Speaker 8: seems like there's a lot of like same similarities between
Speaker 8: like coming out and like shame and like depression and
Speaker 8: suicide and like also like new familial like structures. And
Speaker 8: I'm like here, I'm like here with like this like
Speaker 8: white man, that's my date.
Speaker 1: And I'm like, oh, white man, Like does white man
Speaker 1: have a name? And we're just gonna go with white
Speaker 1: white man Leodo.
Speaker 8: His name is Leto, all right. But I'm like, oh
Speaker 8: my god, Like if my dad, if I told my
Speaker 8: dad this when I was like sixteen, he'd be like,
Speaker 8: you've done like ruined the whole family line.
Speaker 1: You've married. You're like you're going to like marry a
Speaker 1: white man. That's crazy.
Speaker 8: But it's like, what do you guys feel like you
Speaker 8: guys have like some sort of like alignment to kind
Speaker 8: of like a queer experience. Have you been able to
Speaker 8: talk to your like queer and LGBTQ like family or
Speaker 8: friends about how there is kind of that.
Speaker 3: That's cool, Well, I have my two queer friends right here,
Speaker 3: Joe and Preston right love that I called you out.
Speaker 3: I'm sure, But you know, I think anytime you feel
Speaker 3: like you're an outlier or you're not like the others,
Speaker 3: or other people can look at you and say you're bad,
Speaker 3: you're wrong, I think there is a shared experience, for sure.
Speaker 3: I don't. We haven't had that conversation, have we. I mean,
Speaker 3: it's I'm not even getting any feedback from you, Joe
Speaker 3: at all. Okay, Preston saying no, but I do. I do.
Speaker 3: We appreciate that I hadn't thought about it like that,
Speaker 3: but I love to hear that there's a connection there,
Speaker 3: because because anytime you feel like your relationship is viewed
Speaker 3: to be morally wrong, there is a shared connection. So
Speaker 3: we appreciate that, and I hadn't thought of it that way.
Speaker 3: But I'm happy that in some way maybe you feel
Speaker 3: seen or heard or just like you're not alone, because
Speaker 3: not all relationships are put on a pedestal and appreciated
Speaker 3: or even welcomed. So and I really hadn't thought about that.
Speaker 1: And again, we for a while thought we were the
Speaker 1: only two people in America who ever experienced a divorce.
Speaker 1: Like we felt that way, like we were maage to
Speaker 1: feel like we were the only ones who had a
Speaker 1: failed marriage and then started dating again. But we to
Speaker 1: your point there, and again all this talked about everybody's
Speaker 1: throwing barbs at you online on social media and whatnot.
Speaker 1: You wouldn't believe the number of people that have come
Speaker 1: up to us and said, who you think you guys?
Speaker 1: You should hear my story, like who can relate to
Speaker 1: life relationships, love, marriage, being complicated, being messy. It's not
Speaker 1: a perfect package. But again, when you work where we worked,
Speaker 1: you got to have the perfect package there. It has
Speaker 1: to look perfect. We know it's not perfect, but oh,
Speaker 1: I used to say this all the time. The network
Speaker 1: would never tell us they expect us to be perfect.
Speaker 1: But you better make damn sure nobody ever finds out
Speaker 1: just how imperfect you are. That got us. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: doctor GARDI does that make I haven't thought about it
Speaker 1: that way? Before does this, But does that make sense
Speaker 1: the parallels that were just described.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I think I think so. I mean, certainly feeling alone,
Speaker 7: feeling like you may not you were fortunate and that
Speaker 7: you had the support of family. But as we know,
Speaker 7: many of our brothers and sisters, and you know, our
Speaker 7: trans people in the LGBTQ I plus community feel very
Speaker 7: much alone. That's why suicide is the third leading cause
Speaker 7: of death in the LGBTQ community. And I was concerned.
Speaker 7: I'm very concerned as to the lack of support that
Speaker 7: we see to that community, to our community. But I'm
Speaker 7: also and I was also concerned, and I said this
Speaker 7: to the two of you on one of the podcasts.
Speaker 7: I was concerned about the two of you in that,
Speaker 7: you know, keeping that stiff upper lip and you know,
Speaker 7: we're getting through this, and you know, we're going to
Speaker 7: be strong, and we're gonna robot, We're.
Speaker 1: Gonna do this.
Speaker 7: And and I said, you guys are really hurting you guys,
Speaker 7: you guys are in pain. You know, there's a lot
Speaker 7: of embarrassment that you all felt and that was projected
Speaker 7: onto you. And it was important that you talk about
Speaker 7: the experience and dissect the experience and emote the experience together.
Speaker 7: And so every time you have one of these talks,
Speaker 7: I keep hearing an invisible psychologist, not necessarily this one.
Speaker 7: I'm invisible at home, don't get me started, but an
Speaker 7: invisible psychologist saying yes, yes, say more about that, be
Speaker 7: able to support one another, talk about that pain. The
Speaker 7: catharsis is so important, and it's not about solving a problem.
Speaker 7: It's not about putting a bow on it or a
Speaker 7: cherry on top, but it's about letting out that pain.
Speaker 7: And that's what you do each and every time. And
Speaker 7: this thing about being that perfect you know, TV couple,
Speaker 7: you better be the perfect TV couple. I think you're
Speaker 7: giving a new definition that you better be a real
Speaker 7: person on TV because that's what we need, not what
Speaker 7: we're seeing on social media where everyone pretends as right,
Speaker 7: you know, to be that person, because it's not authentic.
Speaker 7: It's about living authentic lives. And so this is something
Speaker 7: that I think we all need to learn the importance
Speaker 7: of being authentic because if you're not, that's what leads
Speaker 7: to illness, leads to strokes, heart attacks, Depression, anxiety can
Speaker 7: contribute and put one at risk for other illnesses, including cancer,
Speaker 7: and so on, which we know may be genetic environmental also,
Speaker 7: but it's important that you're authentic in order to be healthy.
Speaker 7: So continue to be authentic.
Speaker 1: Thank you. This one thing I don't want people to.
Speaker 7: Miss here is the friendship that will building over the years.
Speaker 7: And I can tell you sure you know you can
Speaker 7: meet someone one night stand or you know you you
Speaker 7: know online dating, you meet someone very quickly, you get married.
Speaker 7: I've seen these marriages last for years and years. It
Speaker 7: happens in a different way for everyone, but one of
Speaker 7: the tried and true formulas, and you know this too,
Speaker 7: of a strong, strong, strong relationship is building that friendship,
Speaker 7: getting to know each other in a way where sex
Speaker 7: does not get in the way of knowing one another,
Speaker 7: understanding each other's vulnerabilities, being there for one another, and
Speaker 7: taking the time to truly know one another.
Speaker 1: And that's important.
Speaker 3: Thank you.
Speaker 2: Hey friends, I'm Jessica Capshaw and this is Kamila Luddington
Speaker 2: and we have a new podcast, call It What It Is.
Speaker 2: You may know us from Gracelawn Memorial, but did you
Speaker 2: know that we are actually besties in real life.
Speaker 9: And as all besties do, we navigate the highs and
Speaker 9: lows of life together. When one of us sends out
Speaker 9: the distress signal, the other one always answers the call,
Speaker 9: big or small. We are there, and what does that
Speaker 9: look like?
Speaker 2: A thousand pep talks a million. I've got yous, some
Speaker 2: very urgent I'm coming.
Speaker 9: Overs, laughter through tears, no judgment, problem solving over glasses
Speaker 9: of rose. Sometimes it takes tequila.
Speaker 1: Because I don't know.
Speaker 2: Let's face it, life can get even crazier than a
Speaker 2: season finale of Grey's Anatomy.
Speaker 9: And now here we are opening up the friendship circle
Speaker 9: to you.
Speaker 2: Someone's cheating, We've got you on that. In laws or
Speaker 2: in lawe.
Speaker 9: Let's get into it.
Speaker 2: Toxic friendship, air it out. We're on your side to
Speaker 2: help you with your concerns about ours and every once
Speaker 2: in a while bring on an awesome guest to get
Speaker 2: their take on the things that you bring us.
Speaker 9: While we may be a license to advise, we're gonna
Speaker 9: do it anyway.
Speaker 2: Listen to call it what it is. Starting June third
Speaker 2: on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get
Speaker 2: your podcasts.
Speaker 1: There's a guy in a red jacket. I'm sorry, the
Speaker 1: guy Charles yelling at me.
Speaker 10: Here.
Speaker 1: Oh, God, my boy, Charles, I was telling you about
Speaker 1: he Oh my word, this isna go. Yeah.
Speaker 11: So seriously, though, at what point did you guys decide
Speaker 11: to just come out to the public and try to
Speaker 11: even live normal lives. Tell us tell me about that
Speaker 11: experience doing normal.
Speaker 1: Basically, man, I mean, Charles, we went into hiding d
Speaker 1: No November thirtieth when an article came out. We were
Speaker 1: in two places, either her place or my flat, taking
Speaker 1: trains back and forth, but we were not out and
Speaker 1: public doing anything. When we finally got we took a
Speaker 1: trip in February thanks to Howard. I can't remember when
Speaker 1: we ever actually got comfortable enough to go to a
Speaker 1: Knix gang together, to go to a restaurant together to go.
Speaker 1: We were absolutely shut down, in lockdown.
Speaker 3: When we went to Mexico, we thought we were in
Speaker 3: the clear, and we had drones following us the entire time,
Speaker 3: and four days into the into the into the vacation,
Speaker 3: we oh, it was everywhere and it was just Remember
Speaker 3: we shut the curtains and we like pretty much cried
Speaker 3: and said, we can't go anywhere in the world where
Speaker 3: we have to go back into hiding.
Speaker 1: Charles, I'm serious, we don't know when the Mexico thing,
Speaker 1: we thought we were okay and safe, and we saw
Speaker 1: the pictures later, but we ended up dipping. Like we're
Speaker 1: sitting on the beach having lunch, picked up our food
Speaker 1: and ran inside because it was a drone overhead taking
Speaker 1: pictures of us. We had a nice place we were
Speaker 1: staying with the open looking out to the ocean, and
Speaker 1: one morning she said, is that a drone looking ind
Speaker 1: to the bedroom of where we were staying. This was so,
Speaker 1: this was February of twenty twenty three. This is all
Speaker 1: so now we're a couple of months into it. I
Speaker 1: can't remember how far into it to where we got
Speaker 1: comfortable enough. I mean, I do not know.
Speaker 3: I think, I honestly believe it wasn't until the podcast.
Speaker 3: So our podcast launched December fifth, and once we started speaking,
Speaker 3: because we had not spoken, we had not released a statement,
Speaker 3: we had said nothing. And once we started speaking, the
Speaker 3: tabloids cared a lot less because it was there was
Speaker 3: a vacuum. There was a void, so they could fill
Speaker 3: it and anytime they saw me walk out or you
Speaker 3: walk out, they could create a story about our facial
Speaker 3: expression or what we were doing. If we smiled we
Speaker 3: were gloating, we were rubbing it in people's faces. We
Speaker 3: weren't being respectful. If we had a sad look on
Speaker 3: our face, we were breaking up, we had a fight,
Speaker 3: we were doomed, and so it got to the point
Speaker 3: where I didn't even want to walk my dog. So
Speaker 3: it wasn't until we started speaking in our podcast. So
Speaker 3: I really feel like it's just been in the last
Speaker 3: three months where we now feel like we can hold
Speaker 3: up our heads and then walk down the street and
Speaker 3: the photographers went away for the most part once we
Speaker 3: started talking.
Speaker 1: No, Charl's crazy, you asked that quite haven't thought about that.
Speaker 1: We I guess it was almost a full year that
Speaker 1: we weren't comfortable even going to lunch together. There's a
Speaker 1: spot around the corner from us downtown that has a
Speaker 1: We go in there to eat. We don't sit at
Speaker 1: the bar. There is a wooden booth that we can
Speaker 1: close the door and the only person that can see
Speaker 1: is is the bartender who can come to us and
Speaker 1: take like this. That was our place to do it.
Speaker 3: It was like we were in a confessional.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so we were high. We were finding places to
Speaker 1: be safe and to hide out, and so yeah, I
Speaker 1: guess it did.
Speaker 3: Sol House was one of them. Actually, yeah, membership hit
Speaker 3: we go in here, but there was a chase in Manhattan.
Speaker 3: We had to get police involved to get into Soho House.
Speaker 3: I mean it was crazy. I was like, it was
Speaker 3: the most bizarre experience. Even having been in the media
Speaker 3: and seeing how other celebrities have dealt with things, you
Speaker 3: don't know what it's like until you're in it, and
Speaker 3: you just think, this is the most bizarre, like like
Speaker 3: crazy experience I couldn't have imagined. But it beats you down.
Speaker 1: It's funny. We literally, guys one day we were imagine
Speaker 1: this day, full daytime, daylight out, the two of us
Speaker 1: running down this street right here to get to get
Speaker 1: into Soho House because we're being chased walking. We were
Speaker 1: sprinting and running down the street trying to get into
Speaker 1: this building. So yeah, I guess it took a full year. Bro,
Speaker 1: I know ed I got in the red jack. They're
Speaker 1: waiting for a minute, go ahead, rather.
Speaker 10: Yeah, thank you.
Speaker 1: Quick.
Speaker 10: Two part question. The first is, so, one thing they
Speaker 10: don't teach you in like school is how relationships can
Speaker 10: affect your career. So it's interesting that your personal relationship
Speaker 10: that's private ended up having an impact on your career.
Speaker 10: But say you were a doctor or a lawyer or
Speaker 10: so many other professions, it's like no one cares. So
Speaker 10: it's interesting to me, And I don't know how you
Speaker 10: would like structure that and like and for someone who's
Speaker 10: like growing up and thinking about these things and how
Speaker 10: you could go about it. So I think you too,
Speaker 10: are in a position to help lead the way for
Speaker 10: people to like create a structure for thinking about this
Speaker 10: for someone, because if you are thinking about your career
Speaker 10: in journalism or I think like acting politics and like
Speaker 10: journalism are the only ones who really care about this stuff,
Speaker 10: others it's like no one cares, right Like, So that's
Speaker 10: the first I would just love to hear observations about
Speaker 10: that one. The second is you two were such fantastic journalists,
Speaker 10: and you know, the country needs you, the country needs
Speaker 10: your voice, And I just wonder, you know, no one
Speaker 10: really watches I don't really watch network news like that anymore.
Speaker 10: A lot of people aren't I And I know you
Speaker 10: don't want to get back into that grind, but when
Speaker 10: you see people like it's not a best example of
Speaker 10: like Tucker Carlson on X or people choosing alternative, alternative
Speaker 10: ways to reach the people, or even John Stewart going
Speaker 10: back to Comedy Central, was there has there ever been
Speaker 10: a thought, I know you're doing the podcast.
Speaker 5: Has there ever been a thought of saying like we
Speaker 5: don't need ABC anymore? Like it's a new game now,
Speaker 5: people are watching TV in different ways. We're going to
Speaker 5: reach the people in another way because they need our
Speaker 5: they need us there.
Speaker 3: Cool. So I'll take the first part, yes, and you
Speaker 3: can take the second. The first part is you know,
Speaker 3: I love what you said because how many people actually
Speaker 3: meet their spouses at work? I mean a lot of
Speaker 3: people do. That is a huge source of relationships because
Speaker 3: you spend most of your time with your coworkers when
Speaker 3: you get to a certain age, so it would make
Speaker 3: sense that you would likely hang out, go out after work,
Speaker 3: and potentially fall in love with your coworker. And I
Speaker 3: think that was our frustration. Because there was no power structure.
Speaker 3: We were in the exact same position. No one was
Speaker 3: a boss over the other. So the truth is they
Speaker 3: had to we we yes, we got fired because of
Speaker 3: the distraction, but they had to honor our contracts because
Speaker 3: they could not fire us with fault because we didn't
Speaker 3: technically do anything wrong.
Speaker 1: And they said that that we're not just saying that
Speaker 1: to you.
Speaker 3: We put that is absolutely their word. So we didn't
Speaker 3: do anything technically wrong. People fall in love at work
Speaker 3: every day. It's what happens. The only issue is typically
Speaker 3: if it's a boss and someone who has power over
Speaker 3: someone else. That I understand. So it is incredibly frustrating
Speaker 3: that to me, well, we've said this that that a tabloid,
Speaker 3: a tabloid could actually take away our careers, and that
Speaker 3: is what happened. So that is frustrating. But I would
Speaker 3: I think it's insane and silly just to think that
Speaker 3: you couldn't or shouldn't consider work being a place where
Speaker 3: you'd meet somebody. That is something that's been happening for
Speaker 3: the you know, since the beginning of time, and it's
Speaker 3: not going to stop. So I just think as long
Speaker 3: as you know that that's someone who's your equal, that
Speaker 3: you don't have power over that person, there's absolutely nothing
Speaker 3: wrong with it. Now, you do always have to consider
Speaker 3: if you break up and you still have to work together,
Speaker 3: what that's going to look like. So that would be
Speaker 3: the only cautionary tale I think is you know, if
Speaker 3: you can still be friends afterwards, or at least tolerate
Speaker 3: working next to one another. That's probably the only legitimate
Speaker 3: concern you should have about dating somebody who you work with.
Speaker 1: Yeah, our podcast contract is more solid than any marriage
Speaker 1: license we will ever sign, because that's the thing that's
Speaker 1: going to keep us together. But my the guy you're
Speaker 1: dealing with, Martin is a good friend of mine. Well,
Speaker 1: he's a We went to University of Arkansas together and
Speaker 1: he helped us put this together tonight. But he said
Speaker 1: something that goes to your point about the second part,
Speaker 1: which is you talk about the other outlets, and you
Speaker 1: talk about the networks and being in journalism and your voice.
Speaker 1: People are over it. They are over looking at something
Speaker 1: that is inauthentic, that isn't relatable. And as soon as
Speaker 1: you're able to relate, soon as you're able to be authentic.
Speaker 1: I tell students this all the time. The only are
Speaker 1: they're trying to be like this gualan TV or that
Speaker 1: gallant TV. I'm gonna emulate that anchor. The only way
Speaker 1: you can stand out is to be yourself. And we
Speaker 1: have struggled to find our way, our footing and our voice.
Speaker 1: I think as soon as we nail that, and we
Speaker 1: are getting closer and closer and closer and getting out
Speaker 1: of that shame we're talking about. When people see there
Speaker 1: are more people that relate to they might not shout
Speaker 1: it from the rooftops like yeah, I was I had
Speaker 1: this issue in libraries, but they know it, they feel it,
Speaker 1: they hear it, they relate to it. And if we
Speaker 1: are speaking about it so openly and freely, I think
Speaker 1: that is a freedom we now have that we didn't
Speaker 1: have before. That we relish and having that taken away
Speaker 1: again is not something we are interested in at all.
Speaker 1: So I appreciate what you're saying about our voices and
Speaker 1: lending to through the conversations going on out there, But
Speaker 1: the type of conversations we want to have now at
Speaker 1: this stage in our lives and careers are not happening
Speaker 1: on network news.
Speaker 3: All right, And Martin's Got one and I see you
Speaker 3: in front two.
Speaker 12: Hi Tej and Hi Amy. I'm Kyla. I'm not a
Speaker 12: Jewish mom, but I am a divorcee and I can
Speaker 12: relate in a lot of ways. The first part is
Speaker 12: the comment, which is a quote from Obrah where she
Speaker 12: says there's no wrong roads in life, that everything had
Speaker 12: to happen a reason in life, for a reason for
Speaker 12: you to get to where you are. So you might
Speaker 12: take the wrong career, you might be in the wrong relationship,
Speaker 12: but you had to kind of go on that path
Speaker 12: to be where you are. So although maybe ideally you
Speaker 12: didn't want to go in this direction, but I feel
Speaker 12: like if it didn't go this way, you probably wouldn't
Speaker 12: be here right now. The second but my question is, though,
Speaker 12: do you feel like proximity has a lot to do
Speaker 12: with relationships and especially as we get older in life,
Speaker 12: when you start realizing who you really are and what
Speaker 12: you have in common with people connecting with someone who
Speaker 12: has a similar background or has a similar you see
Speaker 12: where I'm going with this question.
Speaker 1: We've said this so many times that if we met
Speaker 1: in our twenties, we would have hated each other. We
Speaker 1: met in our thirties, maybe we wouldn't have hit it off,
Speaker 1: but she and I have. You wouldn't believe the trajectories
Speaker 1: of our lives and careers that are so paralleled. We
Speaker 1: from where how we grew up, where we grew up schools,
Speaker 1: we went to the paths that we took to go
Speaker 1: from this market to that market to cable news to
Speaker 1: network news and ended up in the same spot. The
Speaker 1: parallels were just unreal.
Speaker 3: And a blackmail version of me.
Speaker 1: We'll edit that out as well, But that sounds yeah,
Speaker 1: I know she said that before. I do believe that
Speaker 1: timing is absolutely everything. And I wasn't ready for her
Speaker 1: or this relationship ten years ago. I was wasn't ready
Speaker 1: to receive a lot of the help she was giving
Speaker 1: me when we started working there. I just wasn't there.
Speaker 1: So to anybody. And again, you live enough life, you
Speaker 1: know this and understand it. Sure, proximity can have a
Speaker 1: lot to do with it. But we had so much
Speaker 1: in common, and so many things in our lives had
Speaker 1: to happen exactly the way they did before we ever
Speaker 1: met for us to end up in this position. Our
Speaker 1: second marriages, both of us. This is freaky. This will oh,
Speaker 1: this is so free, This is freaky. We didn't know
Speaker 1: each other in twenty ten, but we got both of
Speaker 1: us individually, got married, didn't know each other, got married
Speaker 1: two weeks and two days apart in twenty ten, didn't
Speaker 1: know each other, but both of our weddings took place
Speaker 1: two weeks and two days apart. Both of our divorces,
Speaker 1: and the ends of our marriages took place three weeks
Speaker 1: apart all those years later, so weird the exact same now,
Speaker 1: some people universe talking to you, sending you a certainty.
Speaker 1: You don't believe that. I believe in that, and I understand.
Speaker 1: I know better now, I've lived enough to know when
Speaker 1: the universe is giving you every signal. She likes to
Speaker 1: call it, what you say, a lighted runway, lighter runway.
Speaker 3: Just as we were realizing how we were feeling, ABC
Speaker 3: was sending us every week to just these unbelievable destinations
Speaker 3: doing all of these things together. I was like, how
Speaker 3: I've never been sent around the world with one person
Speaker 3: for a solid eight months straight. Right when all of
Speaker 3: this was happening, it just felt like it felt like
Speaker 3: a lighted runway. It really did.
Speaker 10: It was.
Speaker 3: It was a bizarre thing. But I do agree that
Speaker 3: when you can find somebody that it's just easy with.
Speaker 3: Not to say we don't fight, but we can be
Speaker 3: silly together and we don't judge each other and we
Speaker 3: like the same sh that makes it so much easier.
Speaker 3: You don't have to be like that, but it's just
Speaker 3: it's nice to just be able to fully.
Speaker 1: Be yourself and we are we going to have to
Speaker 1: write there was somebody you were pointing to.
Speaker 3: In this moment.
Speaker 8: How you feel right now after sharing it?
Speaker 11: Oh?
Speaker 3: Lighter? I mean he was so nervous before we came
Speaker 3: on the stage. I was a little I've never seen
Speaker 3: you so nervous, like genuinely, but how do you feel now?
Speaker 3: I feel lighter, you.
Speaker 1: Know, Mann? I was to be honest. We rode here
Speaker 1: with my daughter, Sabine in the car with us, and
Speaker 1: she actually said to me, yeah, you why are you
Speaker 1: so nervous? And I asked, have you seen me nervous before?
Speaker 1: She says she couldn't really come up with said maybe
Speaker 1: one other time. And I was so nervous, because guys,
Speaker 1: we are this is the first time for two people
Speaker 1: who have spent twenty five plus your careers being in
Speaker 1: front of people. This is the first time that we've
Speaker 1: come face to face with an audience. That's a little
Speaker 1: nerve wracking, you don't know. And I'm kind of jokingly
Speaker 1: about the tomato in the back, but we always still
Speaker 1: have that in the back of our minds that somebody
Speaker 1: is after us. And I did. I said, Hey, if
Speaker 1: this happens if somebody rushes the stage. I actually said
Speaker 1: that if somebody, some YouTuber in here is trying to
Speaker 1: make a point, get something to go viral and gonna
Speaker 1: threaten us in some way, try to get we have
Speaker 1: to prepare for. We actually did, and that sucks and
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, but doing it now. And this is why
Speaker 1: it was so important for doctor Garder to be here.
Speaker 1: It was so important for we have so many friends
Speaker 1: over here. You can't get to them because they're behind
Speaker 1: the red velvet rope. But to have Sabine here, my daughter,
Speaker 1: and to have her daughter, an Elysea in the room,
Speaker 1: and what we've wanted and wanted and wanted is to
Speaker 1: make sure our kids were exposed to us. We hang
Speaker 1: out all the time, but to be exposed to us
Speaker 1: and see that, oh wow, they do have support, Like
Speaker 1: there are other people who love mom and dad, there
Speaker 1: are other people who are supporting them. Was very important.
Speaker 1: So do I feel lighter? Maybe the second Manhattan has
Speaker 1: something to do with how light I'm feeling. But thank
Speaker 1: you for that question. And yes, you all are part
Speaker 1: of absolutely therapy for us, and we do sincerely thank
Speaker 1: you for that.
Speaker 3: Thank you, thank you for being so kind and warm
Speaker 3: and we appreciate it.
Speaker 1: We were given this to wrap. Thank you again and
Speaker 1: again you all hand for doctor Guardier. Thank you, Amen JJ,
Speaker 1: thank you doctor Guardia. Give them a closing thought. Anybody
Speaker 1: who's thinking about their life now and the choices they're making,
Speaker 1: give them a closing thought.
Speaker 7: So what we see here very quickly is that it
Speaker 7: is not just the retelling of a story, but looking
Speaker 7: for the meanings in the things that have happened and
Speaker 7: understanding that everything is in divine order. We have a
Speaker 7: lesson to learn each and every day. But to tell
Speaker 7: your story, you have to be courageous and not own
Speaker 7: the pathology of those who criticize all the time, because,
Speaker 7: as I like to say, how can you criticize the
Speaker 7: splinter in another person's eye when you have a plank
Speaker 7: in your own. Don't own their stuff, Do your thing.