Speaker 1: I hope I do cringe it some of the things
Speaker 1: I say today because I hope that I keep growing
Speaker 1: and changing. You know, this is who I am today,
Speaker 1: with the information I have today, with the experiences I
Speaker 1: have today. I love that quote that we just heard
Speaker 1: from my friend Lonnie. She is so comfortable with changing,
Speaker 1: and yet while she says that, she's also incredibly grounded
Speaker 1: in herself in the present. I think that's one of
Speaker 1: the most beautiful things about Lonnie is that she's constantly
Speaker 1: allowing herself to grow. Lonnie and I met back in
Speaker 1: about two thousand seventeen while I was performing a solo
Speaker 1: piece and she was photographing the event. When you see Lonnie,
Speaker 1: she's like one of the coolest people in the room
Speaker 1: kind of thing. She is not that tall, but feels tall,
Speaker 1: you know, like she's got that energy that's super tall,
Speaker 1: super present. She's tattoos on her arms, on her legs,
Speaker 1: she's got a couple of face tattoos. Even the moment
Speaker 1: I got off stage, she came up to me and
Speaker 1: introduced herself. I make friends very easily because I'm willing
Speaker 1: to just say, hey, I like you, we should be friends.
Speaker 1: And I have literally said that to adults. In the
Speaker 1: last year, probably in the last month. You were one
Speaker 1: of the first people who I met who was just
Speaker 1: like super direct. Yeah, and I like to give that.
Speaker 1: I love giving a compliment to somebody on the street.
Speaker 1: There's so much joy in that, and it's free, and
Speaker 1: we can just be loving and kind to people. I
Speaker 1: was just like, WHOA, this person just lives very authentically,
Speaker 1: or at least that's what I perceived even early on.
Speaker 1: I think sometimes we think of confident people and loving
Speaker 1: and outgoing people and we don't necessarily consider everything that's
Speaker 1: led them to that place. And some of the most
Speaker 1: brilliant lights have been through the darkest times. Something that
Speaker 1: jumps out to me is Lonnie not only dealt with
Speaker 1: a lot of outward forces of perception, but she was
Speaker 1: also often unseen and had to make decisions for herself
Speaker 1: in order to move forward in her own life. No
Speaker 1: one was going to save her. You're going to hear
Speaker 1: things from her youth, from her teenage years, and her
Speaker 1: adulthood and all the things that have made her who
Speaker 1: she is in her strength, her power, and her joy.
Speaker 1: Just as a warning, we are going to talk about
Speaker 1: abuse and sexual violence. Briefly in this episode, So please
Speaker 1: take care of yourself the way you need to. Welcome
Speaker 1: to When You're Invisible. My name is Maria Fernande. In
Speaker 1: today's world, we love to tell stories about people who
Speaker 1: have reached the top, like people who have achieved positions
Speaker 1: of cloud wealth power. On this show, I won't be
Speaker 1: doing that. When You're Invisible is my love letter to
Speaker 1: the working class and others who are seemingly invisible in
Speaker 1: our society. Helped to build a community here that will
Speaker 1: inspire you to have generous conversations with others that are
Speaker 1: different from you, conversations that might help you see life
Speaker 1: in an entirely different way. What was young Lonnie like?
Speaker 1: Where did she come from? This is like an incredible,
Speaker 1: full human who has this pursuit of authenticity with kindness
Speaker 1: and generosity that I'm like, what was the origin? My
Speaker 1: grandparents on my mother's side are Southern Baptist Christian missionaries.
Speaker 1: My mother she was in Korea from the time she
Speaker 1: was four until she was fourteen with my grandparents. She
Speaker 1: was the oldest of six. They adopted to have Korean boys.
Speaker 1: Then they came back to the States and she went
Speaker 1: back at twenty four and was there from thirty four.
Speaker 1: She's white. The background is like Irish Scottish, but she
Speaker 1: was raised with so much Korean culture, spoke Korean fluently.
Speaker 1: She was a midwife and Korea. She worked with expats there,
Speaker 1: She dated Korean men, and she got pregnant with me
Speaker 1: at eight and had me at twenty nine, and she
Speaker 1: knew the person that she was having me with was
Speaker 1: not going to be a part of my life in
Speaker 1: that way. They had dated whatever casually. I think I'm
Speaker 1: like a diet for him. Fail I expeculate this is
Speaker 1: what happened. No, I think she told me at some point.
Speaker 1: I just don't remember for sure. I could be wrong,
Speaker 1: but anyways, she didn't put him on the birth certificate.
Speaker 1: She knew that it was not going to be something
Speaker 1: that was okay in his world. It was a very
Speaker 1: big deal that I wasn't going to be fully Korean
Speaker 1: and that he had gotten a white woman pregnant. Basically,
Speaker 1: and still to this day, there's only one person that
Speaker 1: knows about me in his world, one person in forty
Speaker 1: years wild that's it. Have you met his sister? Have
Speaker 1: you met him? I have met him. He has children
Speaker 1: that are probably late teens, early twenties. Now he got
Speaker 1: married later, so you know, it was weird. I was like,
Speaker 1: how am I supposed to grow up and look like anybody?
Speaker 1: Because there's nobody that looks like Race played a huge
Speaker 1: part in my life, Like, right off the back, had
Speaker 1: I been Korean, it might have been very different, right.
Speaker 1: It was a very big deal that I wasn't going
Speaker 1: to be fully Korean and that he had gotten a
Speaker 1: white woman pregnant basically, and so did you grow up
Speaker 1: in Korea? So I lived there till I was about six.
Speaker 1: Then we moved to d C. And we lived there
Speaker 1: for a couple of years. My mom had a boyfriend there.
Speaker 1: I traveled all over Asia as a kid. I had
Speaker 1: an incredible childhood in the sense that I lived so
Speaker 1: many places before I was even ten years old. I
Speaker 1: got to see so many different cultures. I got to
Speaker 1: see true poverty and be a part of life in
Speaker 1: such a different way than we live it in America.
Speaker 1: I got to see like a dentist on the side
Speaker 1: of the street in Pakistan doing dental work and that
Speaker 1: was just normal. And I was left alone a lot
Speaker 1: to like play and imagine, and I wasn't heavily guarded.
Speaker 1: I just did ship, and that's something I feel like
Speaker 1: we miss out on as children here because of like
Speaker 1: safety concerns and this and that. So I got to
Speaker 1: live in Hawaii on a farm. I got to live
Speaker 1: in Pakistan during the Gulf War. It was that like.
Speaker 1: I was there with my grandparents. They were on a mission.
Speaker 1: It was beautiful. I remember the way that the lightning
Speaker 1: would hit the mountains and they would all light up.
Speaker 1: I got to see really incredible things. I can't speak
Speaker 1: for all people. I just know that I don't believe
Speaker 1: in going to other countries and telling them that their
Speaker 1: culture and their religion is wrong and that they're going
Speaker 1: to go to hell, you know what I mean. It's
Speaker 1: their job. That was their job, and they believed deeply
Speaker 1: and passionately about it. Do I agree with how I
Speaker 1: got there or why I was there, No, of course not.
Speaker 1: Even as a small child, it was very confused by
Speaker 1: all of it. I would get left with my grandparents
Speaker 1: for three months at a time, which is unusual at
Speaker 1: seven eight years old, and I think with all of
Speaker 1: that ability to travel and see the world, I'm grateful
Speaker 1: for in some ways, but it also left me with
Speaker 1: the desire first stability, a home base. I have never
Speaker 1: lived in a place for more than three years. To
Speaker 1: this day, I've lived in New York for eleven years,
Speaker 1: but I have never lived in one dwelling, one space
Speaker 1: for more than three years. So having that experience as
Speaker 1: a kid, whether it was changing schools constantly, having to
Speaker 1: make new friends constantly, which all gave me personality traits
Speaker 1: that I have today, I relate to that a lot
Speaker 1: because I spent summers with my family in Mexico. My
Speaker 1: parents would ship us partially because they are like, we
Speaker 1: don't know about our visa situation, so if you ever
Speaker 1: had to leave with us to go to Mexico, we
Speaker 1: don't want you completely fish out of the water struggling.
Speaker 1: So I spent time in Mexico, and then we moved
Speaker 1: from Ithaca. And in Ithaca we had three different spaces,
Speaker 1: so I was there until always seven. We moved around
Speaker 1: three times and then always apartments, and then when we
Speaker 1: moved to Minneso, it was another three homes. And then
Speaker 1: I moved to New York, and then in New York,
Speaker 1: I've had like how many places, which is an adult right?
Speaker 1: As an adult, it's insane and so like something to me,
Speaker 1: I've always been like grateful for like the ability to
Speaker 1: have seen some of the world in a different way,
Speaker 1: But there's a feeling of being more of a nomad
Speaker 1: than having roots. And I think there's also for us,
Speaker 1: there was a lot of financial insecurity, and so even
Speaker 1: though there was a lot of travel, some of it
Speaker 1: was work for my mom, some of it was childcare
Speaker 1: for my mom, And I think that anxiety that she
Speaker 1: felt definitely came down to me too. And at some
Speaker 1: point she built her business in Seattle and she's done
Speaker 1: actually really well for herself now and it's amazing to see.
Speaker 1: But yeah, I think that definitely affects that feeling of
Speaker 1: like are we going to be okay versus just we
Speaker 1: know we're okay. And I think that that has played
Speaker 1: and does play into how we manage money and live
Speaker 1: our lives as adults. Remember travel, laying as an adult
Speaker 1: for the first time and only being able to like
Speaker 1: afford ninety nine cent bread and tomatoes for nutrition, and
Speaker 1: being in hostile and then realizing I'm like my parents
Speaker 1: made it seem like we were super stable and like
Speaker 1: we had spam sandwiches every single day of the road.
Speaker 1: Trip and cereal. My grandmother was notorious for stealing like
Speaker 1: bread and having a jar of nutella in her purse.
Speaker 1: I remember one time I was thirteen, we were in
Speaker 1: Amsterdam and we split one piece of pizza between the
Speaker 1: three of us, and then my grandma had this packet,
Speaker 1: like the sugar packet of like soup with hot water. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Getting to talk to Lonnie about our economic situations felt
Speaker 1: really good because there's some similarities between our upbringings that
Speaker 1: I haven't really vocalized too many people before. Both of
Speaker 1: us also relate on the facts that depending on where
Speaker 1: we were, our race was perceived differently and our ethnicity
Speaker 1: was perceived differently. Honestly, we wouldn't have thought about our
Speaker 1: race the way we do had it not been for
Speaker 1: other people putting their perceptions on us. So just thinking
Speaker 1: about it too, I'm like, you grew up with like
Speaker 1: your white side of the family, and then they were
Speaker 1: from the South Mobile Alabama, So what is that like
Speaker 1: being biracial with that? The race thing is weird because
Speaker 1: it's both sides. Like I was rejected from my Korean
Speaker 1: side and then I was fetishized and sexualized and abused
Speaker 1: by my white side. For my Korean side. My grandfather
Speaker 1: fetishized half Korean kids, so that was a thing. So
Speaker 1: I do not speak to anybody on that side of
Speaker 1: my family except for my mother. At this point in
Speaker 1: my life. I want to take a moment to acknowledge
Speaker 1: the fact that Lonnie does mention her abuse. We don't
Speaker 1: get into it, and I think it's important sometimes to
Speaker 1: give people the space not to dwell on it. We're
Speaker 1: just going to allow it to breathe and just acknowledge
Speaker 1: that it's part of the fabric of who she's become
Speaker 1: as a person, and ultimately she's connecting it back to
Speaker 1: how she perceived her identity around race. It's really interesting
Speaker 1: because I don't feel my race here in New York
Speaker 1: City super often, like I just exists amongst our people.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of mixed people in different ways and
Speaker 1: capacities here, But when I travel in the flyover States,
Speaker 1: I do feel it more. But I felt it most
Speaker 1: heavily as a child, and I didn't have the tools
Speaker 1: or anybody working with me as to why I was
Speaker 1: different and why I felt the way I felt and
Speaker 1: why people were talking to me the way they were.
Speaker 1: I also recognize, like the huge amount of privilege I
Speaker 1: have in many intersections. Yes, I'm not a percent white,
Speaker 1: and I definitely don't look white passing in any capacity,
Speaker 1: but I'm also not black, and I'm also not dealing
Speaker 1: with a lot of those stereotypes that are so insidious
Speaker 1: in our culture. But as a kid, it was like,
Speaker 1: we're did you get her? My mom would be like
Speaker 1: where do you think? You know? But like, I look
Speaker 1: nothing like my mom. I'm darker than my mom and
Speaker 1: my dad, Like I just came out like a little
Speaker 1: brown I don't know, well, yeah, so toasty side up.
Speaker 1: And then you know, being in the South, like what
Speaker 1: is she Mexican? You know, like people just wanting to
Speaker 1: know what I was and you know why I was
Speaker 1: with them, So you know, in that way, yes, I
Speaker 1: was treated differently than my cousins. And eventually, you know,
Speaker 1: that all came out at some point when I was
Speaker 1: about fifteen, and that's why there's a huge divide in
Speaker 1: our family and I don't speak to you know. And
Speaker 1: then I was very confused and thought that I was
Speaker 1: just going to grow out of my little brown body
Speaker 1: and hair, and I would draw pictures. I really thought
Speaker 1: that I was going to grow up and like I
Speaker 1: was going to be like a blonde, green eyed teenager,
Speaker 1: you know, because nobody really talked to me about it.
Speaker 1: And then I ended up in public school, which was
Speaker 1: so good for me, you know. I was able to
Speaker 1: have a variation of people again. And we lived in
Speaker 1: a predominantly Native American not predominantly Native American, but a
Speaker 1: lot more Native and Indigenous people than in most parts
Speaker 1: of the country right in Seattle, and so I would
Speaker 1: school a lot of Native kids, and like I was
Speaker 1: very Native passing, that was what people assumed when I
Speaker 1: was younger, more so than Asian. And so then that
Speaker 1: felt good to just have people that looked like me
Speaker 1: around and my representation because again, remember it was early nineties,
Speaker 1: late eighties, there was nothing on TV that looked like me.
Speaker 1: There was nothing on a magazine that looked like me.
Speaker 1: My like little cousin got like a Hawaiian barbie and
Speaker 1: was like, oh my god, it looks like you. That
Speaker 1: was my first moment of representation. Representation is super important,
Speaker 1: it's necessary, and then there's the lifestyle of being constantly
Speaker 1: like doing the work internally, but like even representations, when
Speaker 1: you think about a child and how they mimic behavior
Speaker 1: and then we as adults, like you were saying, with bias,
Speaker 1: we place our bio or what we even think is possible.
Speaker 1: You know when you look at like docmic Stuffin's the
Speaker 1: Little Black Doctor. Yes, you know what I mean, and
Speaker 1: like the difference and how many little girls decided they
Speaker 1: might want to be doctors because of that TV show.
Speaker 1: There's just crazy statistics to show that when we show
Speaker 1: women and women of color or people of color in
Speaker 1: roles that they don't usually see, then they start to
Speaker 1: see themselves in those roles and start thinking I've got shows,
Speaker 1: start thinking it's possible to do some of these things.
Speaker 1: And I also just love the idea of just having
Speaker 1: representation in fantasy worlds and also where we don't have
Speaker 1: to talk about our struggles. We can just succeed or
Speaker 1: we can live out these crazy lives. And getting to
Speaker 1: talk to Lonnie about representation helped remind me of how
Speaker 1: much we make those choices for ourselves and that we
Speaker 1: can decipher what others are saying and be like, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's what you think, but this is who I am.
Speaker 1: And I'm really lucky to have met Lonnie I did.
Speaker 1: It's incredible to be her friend, not only because we
Speaker 1: get to explore ourselves in a safe space, but also
Speaker 1: because she's constantly on a journey and going through a
Speaker 1: lot and so open with where her life is today.
Speaker 1: So we'll talk about how she is as an adult
Speaker 1: in this present moment. After this break and we're back,
Speaker 1: I'm pregnant. I'm like burping. I keep thinking I'm going
Speaker 1: to cry. You are building and creating another human being,
Speaker 1: and even if you weren't. As you all heard, Lonnie
Speaker 1: is pregnant after a very difficult miscarriage last year. She's
Speaker 1: having a baby boy, and with that comes a lot
Speaker 1: of joy, but also some complicated emotions. I'm really in
Speaker 1: tune with my body, you know. I've had a lot
Speaker 1: of health stuff that I think makes me even more
Speaker 1: like in body mind awareness. It took me a while
Speaker 1: to get did about the pregnancy, which surprised me, especially
Speaker 1: after having a miscarriage. I was like, Oh, why am
Speaker 1: I not over the moon? You're really wanted to get
Speaker 1: through this summer. We got married, this summer, his mom
Speaker 1: passed this summer. It was just a lot, and I
Speaker 1: was sick, like I wanted a little bit more time
Speaker 1: with my partner before stepping into this next spot. You know,
Speaker 1: but I also believe in the magic that is whatever
Speaker 1: is happening is happening, and that's okay. But it's like
Speaker 1: you're human being who had plans and ideas, and I
Speaker 1: think that's something too, to like allow space for so much.
Speaker 1: I do want to talk about your Only Fans and
Speaker 1: all of that into for those who don't know. Only
Speaker 1: Fans is this app that started off for artists to
Speaker 1: post behind the scene footage for their followers and then
Speaker 1: eventually became or always was, in tandem, an app for
Speaker 1: sex workers to share their work and create a following
Speaker 1: in subscription base. Lonnie's Only Fans is pretty spicy and
Speaker 1: sixy you are mom, You are an incredible woman, and
Speaker 1: like this is also a world that you wouldhabit and
Speaker 1: that I think not a lot of people talk about
Speaker 1: that intersection. Yeah, and it's so like weird because like
Speaker 1: I like how to Creampie and got pregnant? Come on, right,
Speaker 1: it's so weird, like we literally have sex to make
Speaker 1: babies and then all of a sudden, you make a
Speaker 1: baby and you're supposed to like not be sexualized, but
Speaker 1: then you better keep having sex with your husband or else,
Speaker 1: you know, like this weird fucking thing. Right. We started
Speaker 1: the Only Fans last year and I stay a week
Speaker 1: because he was definitely helping behind the scenes for me.
Speaker 1: And we did it because I thought I was pregnant
Speaker 1: and I was like, let's make some money. I've been
Speaker 1: toying around with the idea for a long time, so
Speaker 1: we did and it was really fun, and then it
Speaker 1: was hard when I had the miscarriage and like keeping
Speaker 1: up with it, but I like dropped off when I
Speaker 1: got pregnant. This time, it's a lot of work, right,
Speaker 1: and I love making making content, but there's all the
Speaker 1: other steps like editing and posting and you know, and
Speaker 1: then I still have another job and other responsibilities. And
Speaker 1: then if I'm not feeling sexy or sexual or whatever,
Speaker 1: it gets harder emotionally to get into that headspace and
Speaker 1: create that content and do that work. Wow, that isn't
Speaker 1: really interesting to think about, yeah, because it's like it
Speaker 1: is emotional labor in a big way that I don't
Speaker 1: know that I realized before the sex work I had
Speaker 1: done previous too Only Fans was I danced my way
Speaker 1: through photo school, so I was a stripper. I just
Speaker 1: like weird foot fetish porn before I was even eighteen.
Speaker 1: Not so healthy situation. That was like literally like recording
Speaker 1: stuff and putting on VHS tapes, building an HTML site
Speaker 1: and the mailing people there VHS tapes like that just
Speaker 1: dated me. I love how Lonnie talks about her sex
Speaker 1: work and her sexuality and everything under the sun in
Speaker 1: regards to that. Because I grew up Mexican Catholic, which
Speaker 1: means it's super conservative, we may or may not talk
Speaker 1: about sex. My sex talk was sex as fund but
Speaker 1: only with the person you marry, and kind of implied
Speaker 1: that the person I should marry should be a man,
Speaker 1: and so like that was it. While that's changed, I
Speaker 1: realized there was a lot of difficulties when it came
Speaker 1: to learning how to love and respect your body and
Speaker 1: its own pleasure, and it wasn't something that was ever
Speaker 1: talked about, especially for women. Hearing Lonnie talk about how
Speaker 1: she enjoys her work and the work she's done, and
Speaker 1: the way she talks about all of this so matter
Speaker 1: of factly is super free. I grew up very sheltered.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I was on the run. What is that like?
Speaker 1: I don't know anything other than that, right, so like
Speaker 1: I was out of the house at fourteen and then
Speaker 1: back for a minute, and then I left at fifteen
Speaker 1: or sixteen with my thirty year old boss from Seattle
Speaker 1: to Florida. My mom has like a going away party
Speaker 1: for me, like by I was like, okay, looking back,
Speaker 1: it's very bizarre. She's sorry. I mean, like she does
Speaker 1: some work too, right, but yeah, And that was super
Speaker 1: controlling and definitely abusive and definitely staged for a rape
Speaker 1: to We were like living with his mom. We moved
Speaker 1: his mom to Florida, and she was like, okay with
Speaker 1: this teenage child that wasn't I wasn't allowed to drive
Speaker 1: or have a job. We lived in this like cul
Speaker 1: de sac in Florida, and I didn't leave that cul
Speaker 1: de sac for like a year, So what made you leave?
Speaker 1: He and I moved to South Beach and I could
Speaker 1: get a better paying job than he could, as like
Speaker 1: a cocktail server, and so I saved up. I knew
Speaker 1: I wanted to leave. One night, he got drunk enough
Speaker 1: that he like actually hit me, and he hadn't hit
Speaker 1: me before. But I knew a cop and I was
Speaker 1: able to call that cop and they put him in
Speaker 1: holding for three days, which gave me time to move
Speaker 1: out of the apartment, and I got my first apartment
Speaker 1: in South Beach under someone else's I D and then
Speaker 1: worked at Opium, like a big nightclub, as a bottle
Speaker 1: service girl under somebody else's I D. Wow. I was
Speaker 1: a mess. I ended up in rehab more than once.
Speaker 1: It was rough, but I like, you know, my childhood
Speaker 1: was rough, like it was beautiful in some ways, but
Speaker 1: it was also like really dark. Even at a young age,
Speaker 1: Lonnie was able to make really important decisions to move
Speaker 1: her life forward and herself out of bad situations, and
Speaker 1: I admire her for that, and so it makes sense
Speaker 1: to me as an adult woman now, I was scratching
Speaker 1: for anything to fill the void and make me feel whole.
Speaker 1: I remember that first rehab journey at nineteen and the
Speaker 1: counselor being like, if you don't fix your ship with men,
Speaker 1: you're never gonna stay sober, and I was like, fuck you.
Speaker 1: And it took a long time. I don't have a
Speaker 1: part in the abuse, but I have a part in
Speaker 1: figuring out how to heal the parts of me that
Speaker 1: want and seek out the abuse, if that makes sense.
Speaker 1: After that, I saw myself getting to another relationship that
Speaker 1: wasn't necessarily abusive but was still controlling. You know. I
Speaker 1: was like, wow, I'm lying constantly. Two people, please to
Speaker 1: prevent discord, to keep the peace. I like, not just
Speaker 1: two men to friendships in every part of my life.
Speaker 1: And I was like, WHOA. Then, like I swung really
Speaker 1: hard the other way, and we're talking about that brutal honesty,
Speaker 1: Like I got kind of brutal. I was honest, but
Speaker 1: without any kid gloves, without any like ability to see
Speaker 1: what was appropriate. But in doing so, I started to
Speaker 1: like really honor myself and see, like what the fund
Speaker 1: do I want? What do I like? I started realizing, like,
Speaker 1: if I get rejected right and I've showed up as
Speaker 1: my whole self, that's such a blessing because it's not
Speaker 1: about like me not being good enough for great or whatever.
Speaker 1: It just means that they know something about themselves and
Speaker 1: they see something in me that they know isn't a
Speaker 1: good fit. Awesome, cool, how great? Oh? I sincerely very
Speaker 1: much relate to what you're saying. I'm not for everybody,
Speaker 1: but my whole life before that I needed men to
Speaker 1: be like it makes not like vomit, but like she's
Speaker 1: like girl from material. She's wife the material. I needed
Speaker 1: to be seen as like the prize, the one that
Speaker 1: you like, work hard to get and whatever, you know,
Speaker 1: And you know, I shifted and contorted and twisted myself
Speaker 1: in ways to make myself that and then was miserable
Speaker 1: in that role. I was like, why am I doing everything? Ye?
Speaker 1: Why am I doing everything? You are drowning me. But
Speaker 1: I literally asked for that. I literally set it up, like,
Speaker 1: look at me, I'm fucking superwoman. I'm gonna do everything
Speaker 1: in my current relationship. I'm like, I'm doing shit, I'm tired,
Speaker 1: I'm pregnant. What are you doing? And I know, like
Speaker 1: you saying that you're still a generous person doesn't mean
Speaker 1: you don't show up and do the work. Oh of course,
Speaker 1: it's just you're like, I'm also acknowledging the realities of
Speaker 1: my boundaries and my abilities, yeah, and my desires, Like
Speaker 1: I feel like cooking tonight, I don't feel like cooking tonight.
Speaker 1: I don't force myself out of some stereotype that I'm
Speaker 1: supposed to, which I did for fucking years of my life.
Speaker 1: I did things I didn't want to do, seemingly nice things,
Speaker 1: loving things that I did not want to do. I
Speaker 1: was resentful. I was angry. Yeah, you know, and I
Speaker 1: I don't do that now. This morning, I was like,
Speaker 1: if I finished loading the dishwasher, I'm going to be late.
Speaker 1: I will come up. I said, Hey, can you finish
Speaker 1: loading the dishwasher before you leave? Okay? Bye? I love you?
Speaker 1: You know what I mean, Like I didn't take that
Speaker 1: extra step. I completely connect with Lonnie on this point
Speaker 1: because it's something I've had to learn and untangle, and
Speaker 1: it's partially due to culture. Right for me, I feel
Speaker 1: like the expectations and the layers placed on women, both
Speaker 1: on my Mexican side and the American side I have
Speaker 1: been so clear and we don't always think about the
Speaker 1: walls we put up in order to be loved, but
Speaker 1: that ultimately make us invisible. I'm thirty nine right now,
Speaker 1: like this should hit me like last year. Not only
Speaker 1: is Lonnie growing and discovering her boundaries in her personal life,
Speaker 1: but she's also thinking about what her work life looks like.
Speaker 1: She is also a photographer, and she's worked with Playboy,
Speaker 1: She's worked at Fashion Week and various others. She built
Speaker 1: an incredible career in her twenties and thirties and is
Speaker 1: now reflecting on that. I love photography, don't get me wrong, right,
Speaker 1: but I also had so much of my self identity
Speaker 1: and ego came through my work. I had this hustle
Speaker 1: in to work because it was what I wanted people
Speaker 1: to see in me. And now I'm a good friend, right,
Speaker 1: I'm a loving partner. I take an ability for myself.
Speaker 1: What do I care about if you saw I did
Speaker 1: this shoot for this brand like American culture, and like
Speaker 1: the identifying with your career so huge, and then you
Speaker 1: are also very talented at what you did or do that,
Speaker 1: plus your work ethic got you to where you were.
Speaker 1: But then it's yeah, there's a whole world outside of that.
Speaker 1: Like my brother this weekend, I saw him and I
Speaker 1: was like, very overwhelmed with all the work I was doing,
Speaker 1: and he was like, I just want you to know
Speaker 1: you can get off this train at any point in
Speaker 1: time and you can get on a bike and ride
Speaker 1: through a field and that will be just as valuable.
Speaker 1: And I was like, this is so important and so beautiful.
Speaker 1: And I think as women, as women color, as Americans,
Speaker 1: as all of these added layers of trying to prove
Speaker 1: yourself ends up feeding into some sort of external especially
Speaker 1: capitalistic Western perception of valid having success young and having
Speaker 1: a lot of commercial success. And I might still be
Speaker 1: on that train had I not needed major surgery in
Speaker 1: two thousand and sixteen. I have something super rare called
Speaker 1: appropriate spinal my colonists super rare. It's in the like
Speaker 1: movement disorder family, which is like Parkinson's is a movement disorder.
Speaker 1: It's not degenerative, so it's not something that I have
Speaker 1: to worry about getting worse and worse like Parkinson's or MS.
Speaker 1: But it's not coming from the brain like epilepsy. So
Speaker 1: I was undiagnosed for ten years and in and out
Speaker 1: of hospitals trying to figure it out. I have a
Speaker 1: lot more control over it now. I would say that
Speaker 1: my body was so dangerous for me to live in.
Speaker 1: It grounded me. I don't mean grounded in like this beautiful,
Speaker 1: earthy way. I just mean like I was no longer
Speaker 1: allowed to fly. Um, you know, it was like, sit
Speaker 1: your ass down, you're not doing anything. Because it's a
Speaker 1: chronic condition, she has to make sure she's doing little
Speaker 1: things every day to manage it. So it includes eating well,
Speaker 1: making sure that she's getting enough rest and things like
Speaker 1: stretching every day and knowing how much weight to carry
Speaker 1: on her when she's out and about. Because there was
Speaker 1: such a break in my career, I would have had
Speaker 1: to work really hard to get back to where I
Speaker 1: was at after a few years of being home. There's
Speaker 1: nothing wrong with it, and it's beautiful and I'm glad
Speaker 1: I did it for all the years they did it.
Speaker 1: I love a lot of the things they did. I
Speaker 1: also see a lot of the things I did and
Speaker 1: how stereotypical they are to like body stuff and all
Speaker 1: of the things. Right, But I want to do something
Speaker 1: that means something to me now as who I am today,
Speaker 1: and this going back to the only fans thing, and
Speaker 1: I'm trying to decide what I want to do about
Speaker 1: that right now. I always thought that I would want
Speaker 1: to make pregnancy porn, like I think pregnant women are
Speaker 1: so hot. I do not feel how. I do not
Speaker 1: feel sexy, I do not feel in my body. It
Speaker 1: was something I feared about motherhood, was losing my sexual
Speaker 1: identity and also all the repercussions with society about my
Speaker 1: sexual identity as a mother. Yeah, like I'm curious as
Speaker 1: to how do you reconcile that internally and then to
Speaker 1: have something that's like such a public forum of it,
Speaker 1: and then now how you're perceiving yourself and then wondering
Speaker 1: how the world perceives you. There's stuff. It's terrifying. I
Speaker 1: think what I want to do is, well, haven't announced
Speaker 1: my pregnancy online. We want to find a fun way
Speaker 1: to do it. But I really want to start making
Speaker 1: content and start talking about this stuff, you know, and
Speaker 1: that like vulnerability hangover is so real and so big.
Speaker 1: I wanted to ask. We've talked about a little bit
Speaker 1: of like the craziness of perception and then needing to
Speaker 1: be seen. When do you feel most seen? Currently? Right now,
Speaker 1: I think I feel most seen with my closest people.
Speaker 1: My partner is very good at hearing me and seeing
Speaker 1: me and not having to fix it or me and
Speaker 1: just holding speed for I have a wild set of
Speaker 1: emotions right now. I'm like everything is like Toddler big,
Speaker 1: feeling like I feel very seen by our couple's therapists
Speaker 1: and she'll point things out and that is really good
Speaker 1: for me. My closest friendships, those are the places where
Speaker 1: I feel perceived accurately, and I feel like that's really
Speaker 1: lacking on my social media. I feel like there's very
Speaker 1: little depth of who I actually am there, and I
Speaker 1: want to be brave and show that more. Lonnie speaks
Speaker 1: of this dissonance between social media and the self, and
Speaker 1: it's also surprising because me, myself, I got caught up
Speaker 1: in the I think this is, you know, a solid
Speaker 1: presentation of a part of Lonnie, and she was like, no,
Speaker 1: it's actually still a watered down version of even that
Speaker 1: side of me. This is a good reminder of what
Speaker 1: it means to look at someone's content and also what
Speaker 1: it means to actually look at the person when I
Speaker 1: post that miscarriage thing at the miscarriage video was my
Speaker 1: partner's letter to the baby that we had lost. Because
Speaker 1: I have mostly a male following, so a lot of
Speaker 1: men reached out and shared their grief and their experience,
Speaker 1: and you know, we don't really hold a lot of
Speaker 1: space for men in those ways. I think something about
Speaker 1: you is you're very accepting of all people. More. When
Speaker 1: we come back from a break, welcome back to the show.
Speaker 1: Lonnie is about to become a melf with a baby,
Speaker 1: and she's excited and so confident and leads with so
Speaker 1: much intentionality. It's been great to get to talk to
Speaker 1: her about what the future looks like to her and
Speaker 1: what it means to be a mother and what kind
Speaker 1: of mother she wants to be with her full range
Speaker 1: of humanity. How do you feel like as a woman
Speaker 1: who has experienced abuse and not great situations with men,
Speaker 1: how does that factor in when you raise him? I
Speaker 1: think the biggest component to that is how me and
Speaker 1: his dad interact. We have a very healthy relationship. I'm
Speaker 1: very grateful I waited this long to have a baby. Yes,
Speaker 1: I love him, Yes he's great because he's very cute.
Speaker 1: But at the end of the day, even when things
Speaker 1: are hard, we are not unkind or abusive, and so
Speaker 1: I think that starts out with the way he sees
Speaker 1: us interact, even if we choose not to stay together
Speaker 1: in a romantic capacity. I really do believe that he
Speaker 1: and I both have the capacity as people individually to
Speaker 1: show up and be kind and loving and be each
Speaker 1: other's friends. And I think it's impossible for me not
Speaker 1: to want to talk about everything with him as it
Speaker 1: becomes aga appropriate. And also big stuff is like starting
Speaker 1: off with his own body autonomy, like he doesn't have
Speaker 1: to kiss anybody, or hug anybody, or or be held
Speaker 1: by anybody. Even as an infant. A baby can lean
Speaker 1: towards you and tell you that they want to be
Speaker 1: held or not held, and we don't respect that. And
Speaker 1: we can also with me, Hey, this is my body.
Speaker 1: I don't want to be touched right now. I love you.
Speaker 1: We can kiss and cuddle and whatever in a little while.
Speaker 1: Right now, Mommy doesn't want to be touched like stuff
Speaker 1: like that just being the norm in our home. He's
Speaker 1: going to have that out in the world where he
Speaker 1: gets to use his voice and say no. And I
Speaker 1: think little boys that also get body autonomy are less
Speaker 1: likely to disrespect somebody else. I want to learn a
Speaker 1: lot more and obviously move my content towards like sex
Speaker 1: positive parenting and all of that stuff too, which I
Speaker 1: think is like really important because I don't have some
Speaker 1: body positive sex positive like it was just absent. Sex
Speaker 1: is normal, and our kids should know about sex and
Speaker 1: the fact that we have sex and why we have
Speaker 1: sex for pleasure, for connection, for release, for like all
Speaker 1: of these reasons for making more babies, for not making
Speaker 1: more babies again, age appropriate information and normalization of these things.
Speaker 1: Do you have any reservations of having your only fans
Speaker 1: out there and having a kid. No, I don't know
Speaker 1: that it will be like up and running when they're older.
Speaker 1: I barely know if it's going to be up and
Speaker 1: running like next month. Again, that comes to that place
Speaker 1: of authenticity and honesty and just being like, yeah, it
Speaker 1: was something fun that me and daddy did and it
Speaker 1: was good for us, and we made money and we
Speaker 1: enjoyed it, and that's it. You're gonna want to watch porn,
Speaker 1: and you might want to make porn like cool good
Speaker 1: a model release, like I really want to continue to
Speaker 1: have my full range of sexuality as a grown up
Speaker 1: person and be his mom and be able to hold
Speaker 1: both beautifully because is I'm meant to. I was built
Speaker 1: this way. I was literally built too have great sex
Speaker 1: and orgasm and pleasure and then also derive similar pleasure.
Speaker 1: That's also oxytocin, same hormones that we get when we
Speaker 1: have an orgasm, or the same hormones we get when
Speaker 1: we breastfeed. What do you feel like I would make
Speaker 1: the world a better place. Authenticity just being able to
Speaker 1: feel safe enough to show up as themselves, because that's
Speaker 1: really what it's about it. Just stop fucking judging everybody.
Speaker 1: So that's what I would wish on people. But that's
Speaker 1: a big wish, right, is that they feel safe enough
Speaker 1: to be themselves. And then when we are ourselves, we
Speaker 1: give other people permission to be themselves too. We create
Speaker 1: that safety by leading by example. When I'm a big
Speaker 1: fan of leading by example. I think we all know
Speaker 1: we're living in some really dire times and hearing her
Speaker 1: talk about raising the next generation was inspiring. This whole
Speaker 1: conversation honestly reminds me that there are incredible people out
Speaker 1: there who are living with intentionality and a desire to
Speaker 1: learn more and to grow and to connect. And to me,
Speaker 1: that's what community and change is all about. And so
Speaker 1: this conversation really made me feel in love with being
Speaker 1: alive and being able to be in community and in
Speaker 1: pursuit of community. That like, even though I might be
Speaker 1: invisible at times, even though people might perceive me wrong,
Speaker 1: there are people out there leading with generosity and we
Speaker 1: can all be that way. Next up on, when you're invisible,
Speaker 1: it's getting up close and personal with a new member
Speaker 1: of my family. Jen is my sister in law, sister,
Speaker 1: and we're very different, but we also do share some
Speaker 1: really important things. She happens to be from a white
Speaker 1: role working class background, and it was a really interesting
Speaker 1: melding of the two families. This was a growing moment
Speaker 1: for me in a different way of realizing what life
Speaker 1: looks like in a part of the world that I
Speaker 1: know very little about. Tune into the next episode to
Speaker 1: learn more. Thank you so much for listening to one
Speaker 1: Year Invisible and for joining me on this journey. Don't
Speaker 1: forget to like, comment, and subscribe. You can find this
Speaker 1: episode and future ones on the I Heart Radio app,
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm your
Speaker 1: host and creator Maria Fern, with executive producers Anna Stump,
Speaker 1: Nikki Ittour and producer Dylan Hoyer, with associate producer Claudia
Speaker 1: Martha Corena and post production producer Daisy James. Original theme
Speaker 1: music by Tony Bruno. When You're Invisible is an I
Speaker 1: Heart podcast Network production in partnership with Michael Toura Podcast Network.