WEBVTT - Fainting Goat Syndrome 0:00:00.200 --> 0:00:11.280 Family Secrets is a production of I Heart Radio. That 0:00:11.520 --> 0:00:15.320 was it the anti climax of my whole parented life. 0:00:16.520 --> 0:00:19.599 Mom reacted as expected. She kicked her mistake under the 0:00:19.640 --> 0:00:22.759 couch and kept moving. If I wanted to keep a parent, 0:00:22.920 --> 0:00:25.360 I needed to forgive and accept her as she was 0:00:25.920 --> 0:00:28.800 a sixty year old woman with an enormous capacity to 0:00:28.880 --> 0:00:32.800 love in the present but never reconcile the past. I 0:00:32.880 --> 0:00:38.720 cut my losses and moved forward. That's Nicole J. George's. 0:00:39.600 --> 0:00:46.000 Nicole is an illustrator, writer, zinster, podcaster, and educator. She's 0:00:46.040 --> 0:00:49.640 also the author of the graphic memoir calling Dr Laura, 0:00:50.159 --> 0:00:53.360 a story about discovering a secret hidden from her all 0:00:53.400 --> 0:00:56.160 her life that had to do with the bedrock of 0:00:56.200 --> 0:01:12.920 her identity. I'm Danny Shapiro and this is family Secrets, 0:01:13.400 --> 0:01:15.720 the secrets that are kept from us, the secrets we 0:01:15.800 --> 0:01:18.919 keep from others, and the secrets we keep from ourselves. 0:01:23.360 --> 0:01:29.920 I grew up everywhere. I was born in Ohio. I 0:01:29.959 --> 0:01:35.039 was raised with my mom's side of the family, which 0:01:35.080 --> 0:01:39.319 is all Syrian, and I had a Lebanese stepgrandmother, and 0:01:39.360 --> 0:01:42.080 so I grew up with a big family and a 0:01:42.160 --> 0:01:45.640 lot of Lebanese food. I lived with my mom, and 0:01:45.680 --> 0:01:48.800 I lived with my two sisters, who were ten and 0:01:48.880 --> 0:01:51.680 twelve years older than me, and we quickly moved from 0:01:51.760 --> 0:01:55.840 Ohio to Maryland, and then from Maryland we moved to Florida, 0:01:55.920 --> 0:01:58.200 and then we moved to Kansas. And so at a 0:01:58.200 --> 0:02:00.880 certain point, my sisters moved away and it was just 0:02:01.040 --> 0:02:04.280 me with my mom and at that point various step 0:02:04.360 --> 0:02:09.280 dads and I just really communed with animals. I stayed 0:02:09.320 --> 0:02:12.600 home all the time. I never went to school. I 0:02:12.680 --> 0:02:17.440 watched TV, made clothes for my stepped animals, trying to 0:02:17.440 --> 0:02:20.240 teach my turtle how to read, trying to you know, 0:02:20.360 --> 0:02:24.120 dress the dogs and clothes. I was like watching Phoebe's 0:02:24.160 --> 0:02:27.639 playhouse and then living my Pope's playhouse fantasy. What was 0:02:27.680 --> 0:02:32.000 the reason for all the moving? We moved a lot 0:02:33.200 --> 0:02:37.359 for men. My mom was always kind of orbiting around 0:02:37.680 --> 0:02:41.520 whatever man was my stepfather or was, you know, was 0:02:41.560 --> 0:02:44.880 auditioning to be my next stepfather, And so we moved 0:02:44.919 --> 0:02:49.000 for other people's jobs. Generally, my extended family all lives 0:02:49.000 --> 0:02:50.960 in Ohio, you know, so that's that was where we 0:02:51.040 --> 0:02:52.760 kept coming back to, or that's where and that's where 0:02:52.800 --> 0:02:55.200 I was born. But then everywhere else we moved was 0:02:55.280 --> 0:02:58.280 for a step dad or someone my mom was with. 0:02:59.639 --> 0:03:03.200 Tell me a bit about your mom of your childhood. 0:03:03.720 --> 0:03:07.760 What was she like. My mom's very charismatic, you know, 0:03:07.880 --> 0:03:11.720 she smiled all the time. She was a motivational speaker. 0:03:11.760 --> 0:03:15.600 At some point, she was also an eighties businesswoman. She 0:03:15.720 --> 0:03:18.200 had a huge life with a lot of things. When 0:03:18.240 --> 0:03:23.639 I was growing up, her temper to me was unpredictable, 0:03:24.840 --> 0:03:28.240 and she was always trying to keep it together and 0:03:28.360 --> 0:03:33.079 keep various secrets together from my stepdad's or whoever I 0:03:33.120 --> 0:03:36.640 was dating. There was always something that we had to 0:03:36.720 --> 0:03:40.320 be conspiring about to keep from people, whether it be 0:03:40.400 --> 0:03:43.040 something about money or like don't tell your stepdad you 0:03:43.080 --> 0:03:45.760 haven't been to school this week, or things like that. 0:03:46.520 --> 0:03:48.840 You know, my mom was very warm. I've never had 0:03:48.880 --> 0:03:50.880 a home where, you know, someone didn't say I love you, 0:03:51.000 --> 0:03:53.600 or didn't give me a hug, or didn't you know. Food, 0:03:53.640 --> 0:03:55.640 I think is one of my original love languages. My 0:03:55.680 --> 0:03:58.840 mom was like always like rolling grape leaves and making 0:03:58.880 --> 0:04:02.520 me food. And when I went vegan as a teenager, 0:04:02.600 --> 0:04:04.640 her trying to figure out how to make vegan food. 0:04:04.880 --> 0:04:07.400 She's always more than willing to do all of that stuff, 0:04:07.920 --> 0:04:10.960 and yet I always had this feeling of being de 0:04:11.080 --> 0:04:15.240 prioritized in favor of the men that were around, and 0:04:15.240 --> 0:04:17.440 feeling like I just really wanted some time alone with 0:04:17.440 --> 0:04:20.400 her and I couldn't get it. Her dance card was full. 0:04:21.320 --> 0:04:25.599 When she would ask you to keep her secrets or 0:04:26.120 --> 0:04:28.440 you know, not tell the truth in the service of 0:04:28.640 --> 0:04:32.679 some kind of secret, was it an attempt to kind 0:04:32.680 --> 0:04:36.240 of kind of bond with you, like you and she 0:04:37.240 --> 0:04:42.520 were this team. What do you think that was? Absolutely, 0:04:43.120 --> 0:04:47.159 we were co conspirators. We were a team. There was 0:04:47.240 --> 0:04:50.760 some kind of the thing of, you know, us together. 0:04:50.800 --> 0:04:52.880 It was almost like we were embattled, like us together 0:04:52.960 --> 0:04:56.800 against Bill in the blank so against the truancy officer, 0:04:57.000 --> 0:05:00.960 against my stepdad, against whomever from the outside wanted to 0:05:00.960 --> 0:05:02.720 look into our home and we didn't want them to 0:05:02.760 --> 0:05:06.200 know what was going on. There was kind of like 0:05:06.240 --> 0:05:09.719 a best friend quality, and there was also a co 0:05:09.720 --> 0:05:13.920 conspirator bonding sort of vibe. And also some of these 0:05:13.960 --> 0:05:17.720 secrets were positioned to keep me safe or to keep 0:05:17.760 --> 0:05:19.360 me out of farms, like I had done something wrong, 0:05:20.320 --> 0:05:23.840 Like I had horrible stomach problems as a kid, and 0:05:23.880 --> 0:05:29.280 I had stomach problems in particular ways that like there 0:05:29.320 --> 0:05:30.840 was like I had the kinds of things that I 0:05:31.120 --> 0:05:32.960 feel I could have been cleared up very quickly, but 0:05:33.040 --> 0:05:36.559 lasted for a decade and I never went to school, 0:05:36.600 --> 0:05:39.279 And so my mom would basically be like, Okay, well, 0:05:39.560 --> 0:05:41.400 well since you didn't go to school all week, we 0:05:41.440 --> 0:05:42.960 have to hide this from your step dad so you 0:05:42.960 --> 0:05:45.080 don't get in trouble or just it was like I 0:05:45.120 --> 0:05:47.159 had to keep myself as secret. I had to keep 0:05:47.720 --> 0:05:51.599 you know, the fact that I was like soiling myself secret, 0:05:52.040 --> 0:05:54.719 or the fact that this problem was happening secret. I 0:05:54.760 --> 0:05:57.960 had to keep like the financial situation of our home secret. 0:05:58.680 --> 0:06:00.360 There was just a lot of things is to keep 0:06:00.400 --> 0:06:04.719 track of. It isn't until Nicole is an adult that 0:06:04.800 --> 0:06:07.520 she comes to realize that there is a term, a 0:06:07.600 --> 0:06:11.600 true medical definition for the crushing symptoms that plagued her 0:06:11.640 --> 0:06:15.400 as a child, and co priceis which is often caused 0:06:15.440 --> 0:06:21.360 by emotional distress or separation anxiety. The hallmark of it, 0:06:21.560 --> 0:06:23.560 at least as I was understanding it, is, you know, 0:06:23.600 --> 0:06:29.000 you had this terrible stomach trouble and just trouble going 0:06:29.040 --> 0:06:33.159 to the bathroom. Really like serious stuff that seems like 0:06:33.200 --> 0:06:36.560 it comes up most often with children who are like 0:06:36.880 --> 0:06:41.360 really dealing with something that they don't understand. I don't 0:06:41.360 --> 0:06:44.640 mean the physical part. I mean the psychological and emotional part, 0:06:44.680 --> 0:06:49.000 Like there's something about what's going on that's just hidden 0:06:49.720 --> 0:06:52.160 and I don't know. I mean, does that make sense 0:06:52.160 --> 0:06:56.719 to you? Yeah, it makes perfect sense. It feels like, 0:06:56.920 --> 0:06:59.360 you know, as far as I can tell, And from 0:06:59.440 --> 0:07:03.719 researching it and being in therapy for a very long 0:07:03.760 --> 0:07:07.320 time and talking to people, it feels like, either you 0:07:07.360 --> 0:07:10.360 know something, it seems like a psychological problem, and it 0:07:10.440 --> 0:07:14.320 was being treated like a physical problem. It was being 0:07:14.320 --> 0:07:17.080 treated unreliably, so we would never see the same doctor twice. 0:07:17.800 --> 0:07:20.960 It was treated unliably as a physical problem or a 0:07:21.000 --> 0:07:23.080 failing on my part, like why don't you just go 0:07:23.200 --> 0:07:25.720 to the bathroom. But I think it was a psychological 0:07:25.760 --> 0:07:28.920 issue that started happening when I was a toddler. I 0:07:28.960 --> 0:07:31.320 mean it interests me in terms of the subject of 0:07:31.400 --> 0:07:35.840 this podcast two, because there's so much that I think 0:07:35.880 --> 0:07:42.000 happens to children when something really significant is being kept 0:07:42.080 --> 0:07:45.720 from them and they don't know it. You know, they don't. 0:07:46.240 --> 0:07:48.880 I shouldn't say they, I should say we, you know, 0:07:48.920 --> 0:07:51.720 we we don't know it. But yet it's kind of 0:07:51.760 --> 0:07:54.120 in the air all around us, like some sort of 0:07:54.120 --> 0:07:59.640 like invisible poisonous gas. And when that happens and there's 0:07:59.640 --> 0:08:02.560 no ex pla nation for it, the child, even like 0:08:02.680 --> 0:08:05.960 really young children, just start feeling like there must be 0:08:06.000 --> 0:08:08.560 something really really wrong with them, and they turn it 0:08:08.960 --> 0:08:11.880 against themselves. And that's like it's one of the most 0:08:12.480 --> 0:08:20.640 toxic elements of a secret being withheld. Tell me also 0:08:20.640 --> 0:08:24.360 a little bit about your relationship with your too much 0:08:24.400 --> 0:08:28.360 older sisters, like both when you were a child and 0:08:28.400 --> 0:08:30.960 then once they left home and you were left to 0:08:31.000 --> 0:08:33.839 send kind of for yourself, was your mom, and they 0:08:33.840 --> 0:08:35.400 were out of the house by the time you were, 0:08:35.880 --> 0:08:40.040 you know what, like eight years old. Yeah, my sisters 0:08:40.080 --> 0:08:42.240 went to college when I was six, and then when 0:08:42.280 --> 0:08:46.559 I was eight, my middle sister, Meg, she pretty much 0:08:46.640 --> 0:08:50.920 raised me. It was kind of like my sisters had 0:08:50.960 --> 0:08:54.320 like a teen pregnancy. When my mom had me, she 0:08:54.440 --> 0:08:56.880 was very preoccupied with other things, and so my sister, 0:08:57.000 --> 0:09:00.280 who was ten years older than me, ended up, you know, 0:09:00.360 --> 0:09:02.360 taking me to the grocery store with her, picking me 0:09:02.440 --> 0:09:05.440 up from school, making sure I brushed my teeth, putting 0:09:05.440 --> 0:09:09.600 me to bed. She was entirely responsible for me more 0:09:09.679 --> 0:09:12.440 or less, and my mom kind of drilled into her 0:09:12.440 --> 0:09:15.280 that she was a big drag and drilled into me like, 0:09:15.400 --> 0:09:17.720 I just my mom will let me do whatever I wanted. 0:09:17.760 --> 0:09:19.360 So if I wanted to eat a bunch of candy, 0:09:19.520 --> 0:09:22.120 if I threw a fit, if I was being a 0:09:22.160 --> 0:09:24.120 brat about something, my mom would be like, oh God, 0:09:24.120 --> 0:09:26.120 just give it to me. Who wants to hear that. 0:09:26.400 --> 0:09:28.280 But my sister Meg was the one that had to 0:09:28.280 --> 0:09:29.840 be kind of the uptight one and be like, no, 0:09:30.000 --> 0:09:33.400 this is here structure, here's rules, here's boundaries. And so 0:09:33.559 --> 0:09:37.640 when my sister's left, it was devastating. It's actually something 0:09:37.679 --> 0:09:41.720 I'm still processing and therapy, is how heartbroken I was 0:09:42.320 --> 0:09:45.400 when my oldest sister Liz went to college and when 0:09:45.400 --> 0:09:49.839 my middle sister Meg went to college, and Meg had 0:09:49.880 --> 0:09:52.320 to be both of them had to be convinced to 0:09:52.360 --> 0:09:55.760 go to college. They both had survivor's guilt, and Meg 0:09:55.840 --> 0:09:58.600 in particular almost didn't go to college because she didn't 0:09:58.600 --> 0:10:00.880 want to leave me behind as I was. You know, 0:10:00.920 --> 0:10:03.839 at the time, I had a pretty horrible stepdad who 0:10:03.920 --> 0:10:06.480 was emotional, who was abusive to my mom, and my 0:10:06.559 --> 0:10:10.439 sister just couldn't bear to as my guardian, my longtime guardian. 0:10:10.480 --> 0:10:12.880 She couldn't bear to leave me there, but somebody convinced 0:10:12.880 --> 0:10:16.200 her that she needed to save herself. How many step 0:10:16.320 --> 0:10:21.079 dads did you have? In all you know, I only had. 0:10:21.120 --> 0:10:23.920 I had two step dads from what I can put together. 0:10:23.960 --> 0:10:27.120 My mom left my dad to date a Saudi Arabian prince. 0:10:27.679 --> 0:10:29.800 They did not get married. He was around for a 0:10:29.840 --> 0:10:33.720 couple of years with his entourage, and then she whenever 0:10:33.760 --> 0:10:36.600 he left. I had a stepdad in Florida, and then 0:10:36.600 --> 0:10:39.720 I had a stepdad directly after that, who my mom 0:10:39.800 --> 0:10:42.920 was still with to this day. Where was your father? 0:10:43.040 --> 0:10:46.000 What had happened to him? It was my understanding that 0:10:46.040 --> 0:10:48.679 he had died of colon cancer when I was a baby, 0:10:49.320 --> 0:10:51.200 and this kind of got fleshed out by my mom 0:10:51.200 --> 0:10:53.160 over the years that he died when I was a 0:10:53.240 --> 0:10:55.800 year and a half old. He was thirty three years old, 0:10:55.840 --> 0:10:59.240 and it was very sad. But side note, he was 0:10:59.280 --> 0:11:03.400 a con man, and he was very funny, and he 0:11:03.480 --> 0:11:06.400 came from maybe a bad home. Those are all the 0:11:06.440 --> 0:11:08.320 things I knew. So every time as a kid, when 0:11:08.360 --> 0:11:11.720 I had stomach problems and I would go see a gastronologist, 0:11:11.840 --> 0:11:14.640 I would lead with that. My mom wouldn't say it, 0:11:14.640 --> 0:11:16.760 but I would be like, oh, and by the way, yeah, 0:11:16.800 --> 0:11:19.440 my dad died of calling cancer. It's like a you know, 0:11:19.480 --> 0:11:21.000 an eight year old to be like, maybe that's what's 0:11:21.040 --> 0:11:23.240 wrong with me. That was my understanding for a very 0:11:23.240 --> 0:11:27.640 long time, and you're much older. Sisters also backed that 0:11:27.720 --> 0:11:32.840 story up. Yes, my sisters and my mom back that 0:11:32.960 --> 0:11:38.960 story up. And essentially people just really didn't talk about him. 0:11:39.000 --> 0:11:42.320 My mom once mentioned we were an a vintage store 0:11:42.360 --> 0:11:44.559 and she grabbed like a black hat with a veil 0:11:44.600 --> 0:11:46.280 and said, I wore a hat just like this to 0:11:46.320 --> 0:11:49.560 your dad's funeral. It was so sad. I think she 0:11:49.640 --> 0:11:53.160 was just freestyling there. And no one in my family 0:11:53.200 --> 0:11:57.160 ever mentioned my dad. Ever. There was one time I 0:11:57.160 --> 0:11:59.800 can remember in my entire life where anyone else mentioned him, 0:11:59.800 --> 0:12:02.680 and it was an old woman at my grandfather's birthday party, 0:12:02.760 --> 0:12:06.440 because ninetieth birthday party, and she came up to me 0:12:06.520 --> 0:12:10.040 and she said, oh, you're you're David's daughter. And I 0:12:10.120 --> 0:12:11.960 had not even heard his name come out of a 0:12:11.960 --> 0:12:15.960 different person's mouth aside from my mom pretty much ever, 0:12:16.160 --> 0:12:18.400 and so I was fascinated, and she quickly got shooed 0:12:18.440 --> 0:12:35.040 away from me. We'll be right back. When Nicole is 0:12:35.080 --> 0:12:38.280 twenty two years old, a woman she's dating named Verona 0:12:38.559 --> 0:12:41.920 gifts her as a belated birthday present with a palm 0:12:41.960 --> 0:12:45.320 reading with a psychic who she finds where all good 0:12:45.320 --> 0:12:48.520 psychics can be found in the back of the local newspaper. 0:12:50.200 --> 0:12:53.520 I went to the palm reader, and she said, you 0:12:53.600 --> 0:12:56.120 don't get along with your mother, I can tell from 0:12:56.160 --> 0:12:59.600 your hand, and you should talk to your father more often. 0:13:00.320 --> 0:13:02.200 And I said, I can't talk to him more often 0:13:02.240 --> 0:13:05.880 because he's dead. And she said, maybe the man you 0:13:06.040 --> 0:13:09.000 think is your father is dead, but your real father 0:13:09.400 --> 0:13:15.480 is very much alive. And everything else she had said 0:13:15.720 --> 0:13:19.280 had been such nonsense. She had said so many things 0:13:19.320 --> 0:13:22.600 about me marrying an older man and having three pregnancies 0:13:22.600 --> 0:13:25.120 with two children, and she said, all this stuff, that's 0:13:25.120 --> 0:13:27.920 it seems fantastical, like you would imagine. And then she 0:13:28.000 --> 0:13:30.960 said this thing, and it just rung a bell that 0:13:31.040 --> 0:13:35.280 I couldn't unring. All the pieces, all the things that 0:13:35.360 --> 0:13:37.200 I had worked so hard in my life to kind 0:13:37.200 --> 0:13:40.520 of try and figure out, like why is everyone kind 0:13:40.559 --> 0:13:43.040 of looking at each other over my heads? Why is 0:13:43.080 --> 0:13:45.960 everyone talking around something? Is there something wrong with me? 0:13:46.640 --> 0:13:49.280 There were so many things that I had supposed that 0:13:49.400 --> 0:13:53.199 it was that people weren't telling me that this Tom 0:13:53.200 --> 0:13:56.480 Reader saying this, it felt entirely plausible, Like it was 0:13:56.520 --> 0:13:59.520 crystal clear that I was like, this is very possible. Yeah, 0:13:59.559 --> 0:14:02.120 that's such an amazing that's such an amazing thing, right, 0:14:02.200 --> 0:14:04.080 Like there's you know, you grew up in a house 0:14:04.120 --> 0:14:06.000 where there were all of these secrets, but they were 0:14:06.040 --> 0:14:09.280 like secrets in a minor key. They were not big, 0:14:09.320 --> 0:14:12.040 gigantic secrets. They were don't tell your stepfather this, or 0:14:12.200 --> 0:14:15.560 tell the truant officer that, or they were not like 0:14:16.320 --> 0:14:21.359 the secret. And and then suddenly, now there's this possibility 0:14:21.440 --> 0:14:24.320 that I guess really only occurs to you for the 0:14:24.400 --> 0:14:27.840 first time. I mean, why would one ever have the thought, 0:14:28.200 --> 0:14:30.880 you know, maybe my father, who I've been told died 0:14:30.920 --> 0:14:32.200 of colon cancer when I was a year and a 0:14:32.240 --> 0:14:34.400 half old, is really alive. You wouldn't have that thought. 0:14:34.440 --> 0:14:39.200 Because we believe what we're told as children, then that 0:14:39.240 --> 0:14:42.000 forms our identity, Like those just become the tent poles 0:14:42.040 --> 0:14:44.480 and the pillars of the way that we grow up, 0:14:44.600 --> 0:14:47.360 and we sort of form ourselves around that, even if 0:14:47.360 --> 0:14:50.760 it doesn't really make sense. The fortune teller also tells 0:14:50.800 --> 0:14:55.040 you two not tell anyone, to keep it to yourself, 0:14:55.160 --> 0:14:58.280 right m hm? She said, yeah, whatever I tell you 0:14:58.280 --> 0:15:01.000 in this room, it's nothing personal, and you need to 0:15:01.080 --> 0:15:05.600 keep it to yourself for twenty four hours. And that 0:15:05.960 --> 0:15:08.320 my friend and I we kind of exploded out the 0:15:08.360 --> 0:15:10.720 door of this woman's place. It was a two for one. 0:15:10.840 --> 0:15:13.160 So my friend also got her palm read and we 0:15:13.200 --> 0:15:15.360 exploded out the door, and just as soon as we 0:15:15.440 --> 0:15:16.640 hit the street, we were like, oh my god, what 0:15:16.680 --> 0:15:18.880 does she tell you? And we told each other everything, 0:15:18.960 --> 0:15:21.880 all of her like funny predictions about us being straight 0:15:21.920 --> 0:15:24.280 and marrying these men and all this stuff. But I 0:15:24.320 --> 0:15:27.160 didn't tell her. I didn't tell Verona about my dad. 0:15:27.200 --> 0:15:29.400 I didn't tell anybody about it for a really long time. 0:15:29.960 --> 0:15:33.040 I couldn't. It was too big. It was what was 0:15:33.080 --> 0:15:35.120 like a Shortinger's cat. It was just like that box. 0:15:35.200 --> 0:15:38.680 I just couldn't touch it right away. How did that 0:15:38.760 --> 0:15:42.520 sit with you during that like nearly a year where 0:15:42.520 --> 0:15:46.800 you didn't tell anyone that this had happened. Were you 0:15:47.640 --> 0:15:50.480 thinking about it? Were you like lying awake at night 0:15:50.720 --> 0:15:52.720 and wondering about it? Or did you kind of pack 0:15:52.760 --> 0:15:55.680 it away a little bit? Of both. I kind of 0:15:55.680 --> 0:15:59.680 would only allow myself to entertain it here and there, 0:16:00.800 --> 0:16:03.360 because you know, I had just started going to therapy 0:16:03.520 --> 0:16:05.600 I think the year before for the first time in 0:16:05.640 --> 0:16:08.120 my life, and I had even started I had only 0:16:08.160 --> 0:16:13.680 even started acknowledging that my upbringing was not normal very recently. 0:16:14.280 --> 0:16:16.760 I was very young, and so I would think about 0:16:16.760 --> 0:16:20.280 it sometimes at night or when I was alone. Otherwise, 0:16:20.760 --> 0:16:24.480 I just kept myself very busy. I kept I felt 0:16:24.560 --> 0:16:26.560 very busy with a lot of friends. I lived in 0:16:26.560 --> 0:16:29.680 a house with a lot of roommates. I did volunteer work. 0:16:29.840 --> 0:16:32.600 I had like two jobs at nonprofits. I hosted karaoke, 0:16:32.720 --> 0:16:35.560 I just did There were so much I just packed 0:16:36.240 --> 0:16:41.080 my days so full that there I really only processed 0:16:41.080 --> 0:16:44.920 it a little bit in my diary. I've always kept 0:16:44.960 --> 0:16:47.800 a diary, and sometimes it's the only place where my 0:16:48.400 --> 0:16:50.920 reality has been reflected back to me. Especially when I 0:16:50.960 --> 0:16:53.440 was growing up in such a chaotic way, that was 0:16:53.480 --> 0:16:55.440 the only place where I dared to even talk about it. 0:16:57.080 --> 0:17:01.840 Did you go back and revisit that diary later? I have, Well, 0:17:02.000 --> 0:17:05.639 you know, a weird thing about me is that I 0:17:05.720 --> 0:17:09.040 have the compulsion to publish everything, and so at that point, 0:17:09.080 --> 0:17:12.240 I was doing a zine that was essentially just photocopy 0:17:12.320 --> 0:17:15.200 diary entries. So I actually was just looking the other 0:17:15.280 --> 0:17:18.240 day back at a zine I did in my early twenties, 0:17:18.640 --> 0:17:21.200 like a fancy and a diary comic, and it has 0:17:21.920 --> 0:17:25.880 me writing kind of cryptically about this secret and kind 0:17:25.920 --> 0:17:29.040 of this like deep melancholy I felt. And everything was cryptic, 0:17:29.080 --> 0:17:32.040 everything was kind of vague, everything was kind of sad. 0:17:32.119 --> 0:17:35.439 But it just was like past, present and future, like 0:17:35.560 --> 0:17:37.960 all here in the same moment as how I felt 0:17:37.960 --> 0:17:40.800 about it. I felt overwhelming. And I had drawn some 0:17:41.080 --> 0:17:43.880 picture of a vintage like a woman from the forties 0:17:43.920 --> 0:17:45.480 that I had found in a magazine. I had drawn 0:17:45.520 --> 0:17:47.919 this picture of her with kind of like a like 0:17:47.960 --> 0:17:50.240 a scar across her head. I was very into drawing 0:17:50.280 --> 0:17:53.360 people with like scars across their heads, like visible scars, 0:17:53.480 --> 0:17:57.240 visible sewn up wounds. And that's how I expressed it 0:17:57.280 --> 0:18:01.520 at the time. Wow, that's so interesting without knowing that 0:18:01.520 --> 0:18:04.480 that's what you were doing, right, Yeah, it was the 0:18:04.760 --> 0:18:07.800 you know, the outer expression of something that was so 0:18:07.920 --> 0:18:10.879 internal that you couldn't really touch it, sort of like 0:18:10.920 --> 0:18:16.679 a live wire inside of you. So you then end 0:18:16.760 --> 0:18:21.040 up as happens like as one does when a secret 0:18:21.040 --> 0:18:23.560 has been Like in this kind of pressure cooker of 0:18:24.040 --> 0:18:27.320 being unspoken, you end up blurting out the story to 0:18:27.600 --> 0:18:31.280 pretty much a stranger. Yeah. I didn't talk to anyone 0:18:31.320 --> 0:18:33.120 in my life about I didn't talk to my sisters 0:18:33.160 --> 0:18:36.119 about it. I didn't talk to my closest friends who 0:18:36.200 --> 0:18:39.399 had known me. I just I was on essentially a 0:18:39.520 --> 0:18:43.720 first date with a stranger, and I it was so 0:18:43.800 --> 0:18:47.080 awkward that I just and I just was looking for 0:18:47.119 --> 0:18:51.280 something to say, and so I told her this. I said, oh, 0:18:51.359 --> 0:18:53.399 you know, I have a crazy story. A poem reader 0:18:53.440 --> 0:18:55.520 told me my dad was alive what I've been told 0:18:55.560 --> 0:18:58.600 he was dead my whole life, and she was like, what, 0:18:59.400 --> 0:19:02.320 I feel like I told her almost to avoid emotional accountability, 0:19:02.400 --> 0:19:04.040 because it's the kind of thing if I told one 0:19:04.040 --> 0:19:08.480 of my friends, they would pause and reflect back how 0:19:08.560 --> 0:19:11.119 hard they must be, and I would have to have 0:19:11.160 --> 0:19:14.399 a feeling and before very vulnerable. And so it was 0:19:14.920 --> 0:19:19.800 telling a stranger who doesn't have that relationship or reflection 0:19:19.880 --> 0:19:22.040 of you. There was something about it that felt like 0:19:22.080 --> 0:19:23.960 I was I don't know if I if I I 0:19:24.000 --> 0:19:26.399 was almost removed from it, like trying to use it 0:19:26.440 --> 0:19:29.200 as like a parlor trick instead of a very deep, 0:19:29.840 --> 0:19:36.080 sad possibility. So how how long is it then before 0:19:36.800 --> 0:19:41.960 you end up approaching one of your sisters and asking, 0:19:42.640 --> 0:19:45.520 you know, so his dad really dead? And it was 0:19:45.560 --> 0:19:48.639 at least another year, I think. So that person and 0:19:48.680 --> 0:19:53.080 I ended up dating seriously, and she kept urging me 0:19:54.200 --> 0:19:57.520 to ask about it. She was holding me accountable to 0:19:57.760 --> 0:20:01.040 ask about it and to think about it, and that, 0:20:01.240 --> 0:20:04.000 you know, maybe it was something I should consider finding 0:20:04.000 --> 0:20:05.920 out if it was nagging at me that it might 0:20:05.920 --> 0:20:09.359 be true, which it was, and so I asked my sister. 0:20:09.480 --> 0:20:12.000 I asked my oldest sister, Liz. She had been kind 0:20:12.000 --> 0:20:16.199 of cryptically telling my girlfriend that she had something she 0:20:16.240 --> 0:20:18.159 really wanted to tell me and that she loved me 0:20:18.200 --> 0:20:21.679 a lot. This was happening simultaneously. She didn't know that 0:20:21.760 --> 0:20:24.600 I knew, but she was like, I love Nicole so much. 0:20:24.640 --> 0:20:27.119 I have something I really need to tell her, and 0:20:27.160 --> 0:20:28.679 I was giving me a lot of anxiety, and so 0:20:28.720 --> 0:20:31.240 I really just I blurted it out. I went to 0:20:31.320 --> 0:20:33.840 visit her in San Francisco on tour with my band, 0:20:34.480 --> 0:20:38.320 and after our show, you know, it was probably like 0:20:38.400 --> 0:20:40.560 twelve thirty in the morning, and I had like one 0:20:40.600 --> 0:20:43.119 sip of one beer and was like, oh, so was 0:20:43.200 --> 0:20:47.240 my dad really dead? And she just immediately broke and 0:20:47.359 --> 0:20:53.320 was like, no, no, he's not. And she immediately just 0:20:53.359 --> 0:20:55.880 dissolved into tears, and I was like, I'm so sorry. 0:20:55.920 --> 0:20:58.160 I you know, please don't hate me. I've always wanted 0:20:58.200 --> 0:21:00.880 to tell you, and I you know, I it really 0:21:00.920 --> 0:21:03.960 never crossed my mind to hate my sisters. It had 0:21:03.960 --> 0:21:06.560 crossed my mind to hate my mom over the secret, 0:21:06.720 --> 0:21:11.720 but I knew that they were hostages basically to my 0:21:11.760 --> 0:21:14.879 mom's reality, just like I was. And it was so 0:21:14.920 --> 0:21:17.159 hard to see how much pain the secret had caused 0:21:17.200 --> 0:21:20.960 them to keep all this time. What did it feel 0:21:21.000 --> 0:21:25.399 like at that moment to have that confirmation there was 0:21:25.480 --> 0:21:29.440 really overwhelming. I mean every step of this process has 0:21:30.720 --> 0:21:35.720 just completely, um like overwhelmed my nervous system. I felt 0:21:35.960 --> 0:21:41.040 very sad for my sisters, and I felt it kind 0:21:41.040 --> 0:21:44.000 of just blew my mind that it was true. And 0:21:44.000 --> 0:21:45.879 I think on some level I knew it was true, 0:21:46.680 --> 0:21:49.160 or else I wouldn't have asked. But I think part 0:21:49.200 --> 0:21:52.320 of the reason it felt overwhelming is because there wasn't 0:21:52.320 --> 0:21:55.960 a place in my household for that kind of emotional 0:21:56.480 --> 0:22:00.679 raw vulnerability and honesty. That wasn't how our house was 0:22:00.720 --> 0:22:03.440 where we grew up, and so I was really we 0:22:03.440 --> 0:22:06.520 were both very vulnerable of each other for my whole life. 0:22:06.520 --> 0:22:10.919 So us just communing in this way felt very particular. Well, 0:22:10.960 --> 0:22:17.040 I think it's also being an unwilling secret keeper is 0:22:17.280 --> 0:22:21.920 its own kind of hell. I can only imagine because 0:22:21.960 --> 0:22:24.359 now as an adult, any time I have a secret 0:22:24.400 --> 0:22:28.320 from somebody, any kind of secret, even if I only 0:22:28.400 --> 0:22:30.720 keep it for ten minutes, it will give me a migraine. 0:22:30.760 --> 0:22:32.760 It will tear me, it will eat me up. It 0:22:32.840 --> 0:22:36.359 makes me so uncomfortable. So to think about, like my 0:22:36.440 --> 0:22:40.280 sister Meg, being ten years old or eleven and a half, 0:22:40.480 --> 0:22:43.840 you know, raising an infant, and then having your mother 0:22:44.359 --> 0:22:46.520 implicate you in this secret and having to hold it 0:22:46.560 --> 0:22:48.480 for your whole life from somebody who you care about 0:22:48.520 --> 0:22:51.919 that much. I feel devastated for both of them that 0:22:52.040 --> 0:22:55.119 they had their child, that piece of their childhoods and 0:22:55.160 --> 0:22:59.680 that ability to bond with me taken away. Regular listeners 0:22:59.680 --> 0:23:02.760 of this podcast, no that trauma lives in the body. 0:23:03.480 --> 0:23:06.480