Speaker 1: Hi Catherine, Oh, Hi Chelsea. I'm watching my whole entire
Speaker 1: crew that works with me at my house. I wouldn't
Speaker 1: say works, I say works with me instead of works
Speaker 1: for me, because I don't want to be a cunt.
Speaker 1: But let's be honest. I'm not doing fucking anything at
Speaker 1: my house. I am leaving so that they can move
Speaker 1: me into my new house.
Speaker 2: We really is happening.
Speaker 1: Well, No, I'm moving out of my rental because I'm
Speaker 1: going to be gone for pretty much the whole summer.
Speaker 1: Although don't worry, we have fresh podcasts coming every week.
Speaker 1: We've taken care of everything. We will not desert you.
Speaker 1: But they're packing everything up and then I have to
Speaker 1: basically pack everything that I want for the first leg
Speaker 1: of my trip, which is a month London, Portugal, Norway,
Speaker 1: and then I have to come back for Ben Bruno's
Speaker 1: wedding at the end of July, so I'm stopping down.
Speaker 1: So I was at my chiropractor yesterday for my neck
Speaker 1: not cracking my necks because I have some neck issues.
Speaker 1: So he's just doing bodywork on me and one of
Speaker 1: the guys there, I go, are you guys all going
Speaker 1: to Ben Bruno's wedding because everybody knows you're each other.
Speaker 1: And the one guy was like, no, I'm not going.
Speaker 1: You know, it's I've got kids. It's just too much,
Speaker 1: I go too much. What he goes, I'm like, you've
Speaker 1: got kids. It's on a fucking Saturday night. Like yeah,
Speaker 1: mean he goes, Yeah, I just told him, it's just like,
Speaker 1: you know, it's really hectic with the kids. I'm like,
Speaker 1: first of all, dick shit, it's Saturday night, okay. Are
Speaker 1: you too cheap to buy a present? Is that why
Speaker 1: you're not going?
Speaker 3: I mean, I'm like, I'm flying back from fucking Europe
Speaker 3: to go to bed Bruno's wedding and you're too lazy
Speaker 3: to fucking get in your car on a Saturday and
Speaker 3: drive over to the hotel where they're having the wedding.
Speaker 2: I mean, people get really offended if there's no kids
Speaker 2: at the wedding though, like if you're not a wedding,
Speaker 2: even if you have children, leave them home.
Speaker 1: But also it's kind of insulting to be invited to
Speaker 1: a wedding and you don't go unless you have a
Speaker 1: really good reason, not because you don't feel like it.
Speaker 1: It's just like what like I missed my girlfriend's Sophia
Speaker 1: Bush's wedding, for instance, but I was on tour, like
Speaker 1: you know what, I would love, have loved for much
Speaker 1: preferred to be with her than on tour.
Speaker 2: But I probably send a gift, yeah maybe hopefully hopefully
Speaker 2: somebody said a gift. Yeah, Oh my gosh. I but
Speaker 2: even you know, you bring up a good point, like
Speaker 2: maybe it doesn't it doesn't have enough money to buy
Speaker 2: a gift. Whatever, do a really nice card and be like,
Speaker 2: we'll take you to dinner. Not, how ever, can afford
Speaker 2: an expensive gift, but like you can go to the wedding.
Speaker 4: I do wedding.
Speaker 1: I don't even yeah, I don't even think people, Well
Speaker 1: I shouldn't say that because people are expecting gifts, like
Speaker 1: I shouldn't say I don't even think people are expecting gifts.
Speaker 1: I know people. If I got married, I would not
Speaker 1: want a gift, but I would also probably not get married,
Speaker 1: so I wouldn't expect Yeah, but so I wouldn't say that.
Speaker 1: I think they do want gifts this wedding. So I
Speaker 1: think I got very specific instruction it's about a gift,
Speaker 1: So hopefully somebody's doing that too.
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, if you wanted to be really shady
Speaker 2: for her, you could get her a bread box. But
Speaker 2: we like her because she's no bread. She's at no Bread.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, right, no bread, at No Bread. Nicole Kogan.
Speaker 1: That's her last name.
Speaker 2: And it's written free person.
Speaker 1: I appreciate her. Yeah, yeah, she's good. If you guys
Speaker 1: are looking for dietary if anyone has or is gluten
Speaker 1: free or all of these things, you can follow her
Speaker 1: at No Bread on Instagram. She'll like that shout out yeah.
Speaker 1: And then I come back. Well, I'm going on vacation
Speaker 1: and then I come back in the fall and do
Speaker 1: my debut performance, my fall debut performance at the Clubhouse
Speaker 1: in East Hampton on August twenty sixth. By the way,
Speaker 1: make sure you check out my tour dates everybody, because
Speaker 1: I'm taking the summer off and then I'm going to
Speaker 1: be back with a vengeance. Okay, guys, we have added
Speaker 1: more shows to my Little Big Bitch tour because I'm
Speaker 1: coming all over. We added a second show at the
Speaker 1: Pantagius in Los Angeles. So that's October twelfth and Friday
Speaker 1: the thirteenth, which is my favorite day of the week
Speaker 1: or the year, I guess we added a second show
Speaker 1: in Boston at the Waging Center September twenty ninth and
Speaker 1: thirtieth is two shows in New York. I also have
Speaker 1: a show in East Hampton, New York August twenty six.
Speaker 1: We added a second show in Portland, So Thursday, November
Speaker 1: tewod Friday November third, and Portland November fourth and fifth.
Speaker 1: In San Francisco, two shows there. We added a second
Speaker 1: show in Seattle November tenth and eleven. Two shows Boston
Speaker 1: are November sixteenth and seventeenth at the Bach Center at
Speaker 1: Wang Theater. And I'm also coming to Toronto and Montreal
Speaker 1: and Ottawa and so many other cities Columbus, Cincinnati, Detroit, Louisville.
Speaker 1: So I will see everybody at all of these shows.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Get your tickets at Chelseahandler dot com. So
Speaker 1: our guest is she has a new rum com actually
Speaker 1: it's called The Perfect Fine. It is out on Netflix
Speaker 1: June twenty third. She has a docuseriies called My Journey
Speaker 1: to Fifty, which debuts on Beet June fifteenth. She is
Speaker 1: the actress, producer, best selling author, and entrepreneur Gabrielle Union.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, she's there. You made it helliy Hi, Gabrielle,
Speaker 1: how are you beautiful? I'm good.
Speaker 5: Guy's a great. Where are you in the world.
Speaker 1: We're in the valley. Don't be jealous. Okay, we're right
Speaker 1: around the corner, say.
Speaker 5: Bitch, like I am deep in the fucking valley.
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh, I wrote how deep?
Speaker 5: Oh deep, deep deep. We're like hidden hills.
Speaker 1: We're like, oh, are you with the Kardashian Do you
Speaker 1: live with the Kardashians.
Speaker 5: I am right on the same street.
Speaker 1: Oh wow, lucky you not upon you.
Speaker 5: Of course it's a shooting residence.
Speaker 1: But still, oh, I see copy that, yes, copy on
Speaker 1: shooting residents. We need so many residences these days for
Speaker 1: everything that everybody's shooting, don't we Well.
Speaker 5: It makes us relatable and and that's really what's important today.
Speaker 1: Totally totally. As soon as you say hidden hills, we
Speaker 1: all know what's going on. It's so nice to speak
Speaker 1: with you, Gabrielle. This is my co host Catherine.
Speaker 2: Hi. Oh, are you very good?
Speaker 1: And I wanted to just dive right into things because
Speaker 1: one of the things I admire so much about you
Speaker 1: is how outspoken you are about everything in your life
Speaker 1: and everything that you've experienced with your family, with your career,
Speaker 1: and I guess I want to ask you first off
Speaker 1: about how your childhood impacted the way that you have
Speaker 1: your family now. And our experiences are so different when
Speaker 1: we become parents. So I'm curious because you're always learning
Speaker 1: and growing and you're dealing with a non traditional family
Speaker 1: that's blended, right, which is basically the new tradition. So
Speaker 1: tell me, like, how you learn and grow as the
Speaker 1: head of a family like that with you and your husband.
Speaker 5: Yeah, no, I mean, it's a process and it keeps changing.
Speaker 5: But my ability to sort of weather those changes in
Speaker 5: those constant evolutions comes from childhood. I come from a
Speaker 5: family on my mom's side, the larger family is called
Speaker 5: the Dozens of Cousins, and we have the largest black
Speaker 5: family in the state of Nebraska and one of the
Speaker 5: largest in the Midwest. And you're literally related to everyone,
Speaker 5: and your business is their business, and if somebody sees
Speaker 5: you on the street causing mischief, as one might say,
Speaker 5: they are completely within their rights to smack the shit
Speaker 5: out you. That was kind of how I grew up,
Speaker 5: where your village was large and vast, and on my
Speaker 5: dad's side, like both My parents are one of seven.
Speaker 5: My dad's the youngest of seven, my mom's the oldest
Speaker 5: of seven. And you are your brothers and sisters keepers.
Speaker 5: That's just what it is. And my brothers and sisters
Speaker 5: that could mean your actual siblings, siblings, or your extended family,
Speaker 5: your community. You have responsibilities that are much much greater
Speaker 5: than just you know, taking care of yourself. So that
Speaker 5: was what I grew up. And we always had cousins, aunts, uncles,
Speaker 5: everyone like would come to our house when they were
Speaker 5: having you know, some troubled times or whatever, and they'd
Speaker 5: stay for a couple of months. Or they'd send their
Speaker 5: kid who was having disciplinary issues to my dad and
Speaker 5: he'd straight them out, and you'd call it camp union
Speaker 5: and we're like, don't come to camp union.
Speaker 4: It sucks.
Speaker 5: But they've just kept sending kids. So you just kind
Speaker 5: of figured it out. You'd wake up and there'd be
Speaker 5: a couple extra cousins there, and you know, you had
Speaker 5: to figure out how to share service. Cereal and that
Speaker 5: I've just sort of taken that into life. You do
Speaker 5: what is necessary to cover as many people as possible.
Speaker 1: That's beautiful.
Speaker 5: That was so like controversial until oh.
Speaker 1: I tell you guys just talked about splitting shit fifty
Speaker 1: to fifty?
Speaker 3: Right?
Speaker 1: Is that the big thing?
Speaker 5: Oh my god, I hadn't. Honestly, it wasn't even that
Speaker 5: wasn't even the point of what I was talking about.
Speaker 5: It was how feeling like you need to take care
Speaker 5: of everyone can be fucking stressful, like incredibly stressful, not resentful,
Speaker 5: not anything else, though that has percolated in my body
Speaker 5: at times. But I was just talking about how it
Speaker 5: can be incredibly stressful when you are the answer to
Speaker 5: everyone's problems, and because you know, everyone's like, but your
Speaker 5: husband has money, and it's like, yeah, he has money,
Speaker 5: and he should keep his money. I don't need that
Speaker 5: part of him to make me complete. And maybe knowing
Speaker 5: that he could cover me if if need be makes
Speaker 5: it easier to then set a different boundary where I'm like, no,
Speaker 5: I'm paying half because that's what makes me comfortable. But yeah,
Speaker 5: I was talking about, like I'm stressed. It's hard being
Speaker 5: head of household for multiple households outside of the one
Speaker 5: you're living in. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Right, so you were talking about splitting Wait, what was
Speaker 1: the confusion? You were talking about splitting something fifty to
Speaker 1: fifty that you like to split your economics fifty to fifty.
Speaker 1: And then what were people saying? What was their problem?
Speaker 6: Now?
Speaker 5: They were outraged that I would even want to split
Speaker 5: a bill, that my husband isn't forcing me to allow
Speaker 5: him to pay my bills, or he just has so
Speaker 5: much more than I do. I'm a damn fool for
Speaker 5: even like looking at towards my purse or my checkbook like,
Speaker 5: I'm a stupid idiot for even wanting to pay half.
Speaker 5: And it was an eye opening conversation because I was like,
Speaker 5: it's like if someone said, yo, I write checks and
Speaker 5: somebody else was like, oh, I do direct deposit? No,
Speaker 5: why why write a track? I go into the bank myself?
Speaker 5: What the fuck? Wh what? Oh? You guys are legitimately
Speaker 5: this is week two of this show.
Speaker 1: It just speaks to the patriarchy such bullshit where people
Speaker 1: think that they're fucking with it and they know what's
Speaker 1: going on. Yet these ideas are so old and stagnated
Speaker 1: and stuck in their heads that the idea of a
Speaker 1: woman wanting to pay for herself is so anathema to
Speaker 1: so many people. It's like when I talk about not
Speaker 1: wanting children, the iyre the anger I receive for men
Speaker 1: who don't have anything to do with me. What the
Speaker 1: fuck do you care what I'm doing? Why would it
Speaker 1: make you so mad unless you had such a rock
Speaker 1: stuck in your head about a belief system that is
Speaker 1: starting to kind of you know shed.
Speaker 5: It was funny because we in our group chat, we
Speaker 5: had we covered your your comments and everyone was like,
Speaker 5: I don't really even see. It was the quickest debate,
Speaker 5: non debate that we had in our group chat. Everyone's like,
Speaker 5: I don't if she doesn't want to have kids, who cares?
Speaker 5: What does that have to do with me? And I
Speaker 5: was like nothing and they were like okay, moving on.
Speaker 5: So it was a very quick discussion that we had
Speaker 5: and it was like what you ate, don't make me shit?
Speaker 5: Literally literally, like it has nothing to do with anything.
Speaker 5: But what I will say is I remembered feeling very
Speaker 5: triggered in a cluster of moms who made other choices,
Speaker 5: different choices than I made, and feeling like them talking
Speaker 5: about their lives and their joys and their decisions somehow
Speaker 5: was an attack on me, and that I'm a bad
Speaker 5: mom because I work, or I'm a bad mom because
Speaker 5: I can't make it to you know, certain things and
Speaker 5: they weren't even looking in my direction. They weren't They
Speaker 5: could have given two foughs about me. It was everything
Speaker 5: I was taking in because I hadn't made peace with
Speaker 5: my choice. So that's what it sort of felt like
Speaker 5: with this. It was like, if you feel triggered to
Speaker 5: such a degree where you're going to do a whole
Speaker 5: TikTok or a stitch or a real child, what maybe
Speaker 5: that's not even that this conversation is between you and I.
Speaker 5: It's between you and yourself, because what about how I
Speaker 5: pay my bills even causes any kind of reaction for you?
Speaker 5: Then I don't think it has with me because I'm
Speaker 5: a faling stranger. But also, yeah, totally.
Speaker 1: It's also there's like the argument, you know, there's men
Speaker 1: and there's women, and there's this kind of dynamic that's shifting,
Speaker 1: and that's scaring a lot of old white guys about
Speaker 1: powerful women, people not having a nuclear family, women working
Speaker 1: God forbid, you know, everyone getting educated. But I also
Speaker 1: the discussion is of women supporting women right like they
Speaker 1: like to divide us too, and they've been very successful
Speaker 1: at dividing women. This whole system of patriarchy that has
Speaker 1: been in place since for so long, because before the patriarchy,
Speaker 1: there was a patriarchy where women were in charge, you know,
Speaker 1: and maybe if it had stayed that way, we would
Speaker 1: our planet would it be on fire? And women now
Speaker 1: are starting to understand, oh, it's not our job to
Speaker 1: judge each other either. We need to support each other
Speaker 1: if we're ever gonna win this quote unquote war. I
Speaker 1: hate to say the word war, but that's what it
Speaker 1: feels like. A culture clash and a culture war where
Speaker 1: things are evolving, but now women are, it feels and
Speaker 1: I know it too because I catch myself instead of
Speaker 1: judging someone, I'm like, oh, oh, that's another woman. I'm
Speaker 1: here for support. I'm not here to say she did
Speaker 1: the wrong thing. I would have handled that differently. Who
Speaker 1: gives a shit how you would have handled it? You're
Speaker 1: not her?
Speaker 5: And no one asked, Yeah, and not exactly, especially her,
Speaker 5: She didn't ask. But it's that feeling of wanting to
Speaker 5: be accepted through saneness right with me and everyone I
Speaker 5: know are making the exact same decisions, then we are
Speaker 5: right because just look at the sheer numbers of us
Speaker 5: doing the exact same thing. But if someone comes in
Speaker 5: to do something just different. There's billions of people in
Speaker 5: the world, which means there's billions of ways of getting
Speaker 5: from A to Z, right, so what about someone doing
Speaker 5: something different just makes us feel so fearful or judged
Speaker 5: or observed or surveilled or attacked when people are just
Speaker 5: talking about their choices and it really doesn't have anything
Speaker 5: to do with or it shouldn't have anything to do
Speaker 5: with how you walk into your home and how you
Speaker 5: and your family get down, Like that has literally nothing
Speaker 5: to do with me, and if you're making it about me,
Speaker 5: then let's lookay, let's have the conversation. This one dude
Speaker 5: was like, you know, a beautifully done stitch. I mean,
Speaker 5: the production quality was phenomenal, the music supervisor was amazing,
Speaker 5: but he was like, you know, at the end of
Speaker 5: this stitch was like, Gabrielle Union, no one cares. I
Speaker 5: don't care. And I was like, but look at you
Speaker 5: caring injury with this whole ass damn for real. And
Speaker 5: then for some reason it didn't send, and I was like, Okay,
Speaker 5: because perhaps I am getting triggered that I'm not comfortable
Speaker 5: with my decisions and I need to be in a
Speaker 5: place of complete comfort that no matter what anyone else
Speaker 5: says about anything that I do, it rolls off, and
Speaker 5: sometimes it rolls off and sometimes it doesn't. And I'm
Speaker 5: going to have a sassy little response.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and well that's I mean, that's part of it.
Speaker 1: And as you do as would I. I'm not going
Speaker 1: to lie there and not say anything half the time,
Speaker 1: you know, And then sometimes you got to I was
Speaker 1: sending the email this morning. I got an email from
Speaker 1: my attorney about this like lawsuit that I'm in. That's
Speaker 1: so annoying. And I reacted right away. I'm like, you
Speaker 1: know what, tell them forget mediation and this is what
Speaker 1: needs to happen. And I was writing, and I'm like,
Speaker 1: you're in a reactive mode. Why don't you just calm
Speaker 1: down and wait till you get home and see if
Speaker 1: you still want to send this. And you know, I
Speaker 1: get home and I look down and I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: what was I doing? Like it was only ten minutes ago.
Speaker 1: But you know, as you get older, we catch ourselves
Speaker 1: doing more and more when you're self examining and you
Speaker 1: have self awareness and you desire to get to know
Speaker 1: your inner self, and the work we do on ourselves
Speaker 1: really results when we're in our forties and fifties. I
Speaker 1: know you're celebrating. You just celebrated your fiftieth. Right, it's passed.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it passed. It's in October, right, Okay, so.
Speaker 1: You had a big party and you filmed it. Right,
Speaker 1: it's a two part docuseries on b ET Right that's
Speaker 1: coming out in June.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 5: I wanted to go back to Africa and take as
Speaker 5: many people as possible and hit as many countries as possible,
Speaker 5: as far as my little wallet could go.
Speaker 1: I think I got a bill for that too, and
Speaker 1: I think we're going three ways.
Speaker 5: Oh Jesus. But yes, we started. We hit the Zanzibar
Speaker 5: and Kraghana and we're in Namibia, and we went to
Speaker 5: joe Berg and Sueto and Cape Town in South Africa
Speaker 5: with just a roving band of my friends and family
Speaker 5: and extended family, immediate family, and it was incredible. And
Speaker 5: I was somewhere like as we were planning it, I
Speaker 5: was like, I kind of feel like we should document this.
Speaker 5: I don't know what we're going to do with it,
Speaker 5: but I want this footage. I want to see what
Speaker 5: my mom looks like growing up in Omaha, Nebraska, setting
Speaker 5: foot back in the motherland. Where you can actually create
Speaker 5: ties that had been denied us and had you know
Speaker 5: that we've been ripped away from the and I wanted
Speaker 5: to see that. I wanted to always have that. I mean,
Speaker 5: she's seventy six now. And then I was like, wait, well,
Speaker 5: I want to see what my daughter looks like. You know,
Speaker 5: at that time she was three three going to Africa
Speaker 5: and being embraced by a whole continent of people that
Speaker 5: look like her. And then that turned into a docuseries,
Speaker 5: two part docuseries for b ET plus.
Speaker 1: Well, that sounds like a lot of fun. I thank you.
Speaker 1: What is so obvious from your socials? You and your
Speaker 1: husband are so vibrant and so happy and at peace,
Speaker 1: and I think that speaks to an enlightening. You know,
Speaker 1: you can see when people are enlightened that they live
Speaker 1: with a different vibrancy, when you see that people have
Speaker 1: been challenged, have had their thinking challenged, and come out
Speaker 1: the other side, which is the way that the whole
Speaker 1: world would ideally operate. Instead of having any sort of discrimination,
Speaker 1: we just go at everybody with love. Everyone should be
Speaker 1: treated equal, not just a certain section of people. So
Speaker 1: I think that, like, what do you attribute the success
Speaker 1: of your relationship with because the two of you have
Speaker 1: have something great going obviously, what do you think about that?
Speaker 5: I think it's a choice every day. And I've heard
Speaker 5: this before and I'm like, fuck off, but it really
Speaker 5: legit is. It's a choice every day to show up
Speaker 5: and to be kind and to be there physically there,
Speaker 5: and to consider the other person truly and deeply and completely,
Speaker 5: not just when it's convenient for me, and to not
Speaker 5: look at our marriage or the moves in our marriage
Speaker 5: as pieces in a chessboard where one of us is
Speaker 5: going to win and one of us is going to lose, right,
Speaker 5: and I damn well better be the winner. We just
Speaker 5: make a choice to do better by each other every
Speaker 5: day than the day before. And it's somehow working. One
Speaker 5: of my therapists, it's hard to really discern which one
Speaker 5: it is, just a but one said, the greatest gift
Speaker 5: that we can give ourselves in each other is constantly
Speaker 5: modifying your expectations, right, And he's like, we have expectations
Speaker 5: of strangers we don't know, we don't know what their
Speaker 5: lives entail, but our expectations are huge expectations. And what
Speaker 5: you can do at any point is just bring those
Speaker 5: on down to a reasonable place, right where if there's
Speaker 5: someone that you work with or a friend, and you
Speaker 5: know they're quite consistent in their fuckery, but we still
Speaker 5: have these expectations that are this big for those people
Speaker 5: when we know, damn well, the only person's going to
Speaker 5: be disappointed and annoyed is us. So just constantly reshaping expectations.
Speaker 5: And the more we learn and the more we offer
Speaker 5: grace and consideration, you know, maybe now it's time for
Speaker 5: harder conversations that I'd never I would have never thought
Speaker 5: to have. I would have just been pissed. And then
Speaker 5: when my ragie rage goes, then the anxiety is up,
Speaker 5: and then everything is just like I wish them, we'll
Speaker 5: just stay in this place and it's exhausting. And at fifty,
Speaker 5: I'm tired. I don't want to I don't want to
Speaker 5: live like that. I don't want to love. That feels
Speaker 5: like a fierce competition, which is kind of goes back
Speaker 5: to the fifty to fifty thing. He said in an interview.
Speaker 5: I was I was listening, I was eavesdropping that was
Speaker 5: and he was talking about our house in Miami. Well,
Speaker 5: see how I said our house, And this man said oh, no,
Speaker 5: my house. And I was like, I picked out this house.
Speaker 5: I like like I was, I was instrumental in the
Speaker 5: way this house looked like even finding the damn house.
Speaker 5: And I was like, oh, never again, bitch, Like, never,
Speaker 5: never again will I be in this position, And I'm
Speaker 5: talking to myself, I'm the bitch here. Never again will
Speaker 5: I be in a position where someone can say our
Speaker 5: communal home is singularly owned. So after that, I mean,
Speaker 5: this is like maybe a couple of years into our marriage.
Speaker 5: So after that, anything else we bought, it was fifty
Speaker 5: to fifty. And if our budget has to go lower
Speaker 5: because of my black actress salary, then it's just going
Speaker 5: to go a little lower. So we can both contribute
Speaker 5: fifty to fifty. And I think the more he recognized
Speaker 5: the peace that I have in always wanting to offer
Speaker 5: fifty percent emotionally, you know, and a lot of relationships
Speaker 5: we've been one hundred and ten percent, and we wonder
Speaker 5: why we like I can't stand to see you come
Speaker 5: because I'm doing all of the emotional labor, the physical labor.
Speaker 5: No one's coming to save me from this situation. If
Speaker 5: you're supposed to be the prince, No I need a
Speaker 5: different fairy tale. This is not working for me. So
Speaker 5: in the second marriage, after that comment, I was like, oh,
Speaker 5: I can build my own fairy tale. They can look
Speaker 5: however the fuck I want it to look, and I'm
Speaker 5: gonna do that. And then he was like bet okay,
Speaker 5: uh how about And we just started communicating what the
Speaker 5: hell I've never done it? And the fact that like
Speaker 5: people say it and you're like okay, But to truly
Speaker 5: communicate and to hear each other and to listen and
Speaker 5: not listen for my witty comeback which I like to do,
Speaker 5: to really hear him and allow for a space of
Speaker 5: vulnerability that has never existed in my life. And I
Speaker 5: thought that was being strong. And I'm just trying new
Speaker 5: shit at this point because the old way is not working.
Speaker 5: Didn't work for my parents, didn't work for my grand parents,
Speaker 5: didn't work for their parents. So doing the same shit
Speaker 5: over and over again just sounds like madness. And I
Speaker 5: want PEACEE.
Speaker 1: What do you want peace? I could tell you want
Speaker 1: peace and you're and you're getting it. I feel like
Speaker 1: you're getting peace in parcels. I feel like we all
Speaker 1: are as we grow, you know, we start to understand
Speaker 1: that piece is from within, and then we start to
Speaker 1: understand our role and everything and how we can be
Speaker 1: calmer and braver and more loving and all of the things.
Speaker 1: And it's a nice awakening to keep happening, you know,
Speaker 1: as we get older. What do you have to say
Speaker 1: about a nine year age difference? What's that like?
Speaker 5: You know, at first it wasn't because he you know,
Speaker 5: he was a teen parent. You know, he had his
Speaker 5: first kid as a teenager. He moved out of his
Speaker 5: family's home at fifteen, so he was a different kind
Speaker 5: of twenty five year old when I met him, and
Speaker 5: I was a clueless, wild, wild animal that probably needed
Speaker 5: more nurturing than I was willing to admit, and he
Speaker 5: definitely needed more fun. So at the time, it was like,
Speaker 5: I'm going to bring the fun. We're going to have
Speaker 5: fun as adventures. But along with that fun, I was
Speaker 5: lacking in care. Someone to do that, to be caring
Speaker 5: and nurturing and compassionate, and we kind of provided that
Speaker 5: for each other. So the age range wasn't an issue
Speaker 5: until when the Big Three came together in Miami and
Speaker 5: Lebron's family sat in front of us, and so I
Speaker 5: was like the first time I really got to meet
Speaker 5: Glow Gloria Gloria James Lebron's mom, and I realized that
Speaker 5: she was a senior when I was like a sophomore. Yeah,
Speaker 5: and then when I realized I was older in fact,
Speaker 5: then a lot of his teammates' parents and I had
Speaker 5: a lot more in common with the coaches. In fact,
Speaker 5: one of the coaches was like, we had a basketball
Speaker 5: tournament in high school. We were at the same tournament. Yeah,
Speaker 5: So those kind of things are like, oh, I want
Speaker 5: to go to a concert. I want to go see
Speaker 5: Holland Oates and Earth Wind and Fire, the Whispers, perhaps
Speaker 5: the Spinners, And he wants to go to dre And I'm.
Speaker 1: Like, oh, that's funny. That would be my reaction too.
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh shit, I'm too old for this shit,
Speaker 1: Like I.
Speaker 5: Want jazz best, you know what I mean. And he's
Speaker 5: looking for like the Budweiser super Fast. So yeah, it's
Speaker 5: like musically, it kind of is a thing some of
Speaker 5: our friends and where we're at in life can be
Speaker 5: a little different, but when we're home. Yeah, I think
Speaker 5: he just experienced a lot in his childhood that I
Speaker 5: didn't even start to have any kind of understanding for
Speaker 5: until I was over forty that he had to intimately
Speaker 5: understand at six. So I think due to life experience,
Speaker 5: it kind of balance it out. But yeah, right now
Speaker 5: when I wake well, Now, first of all, the fact
Speaker 5: that sleep number has literally changed our lives, change our marriage.
Speaker 1: I'm so happy to hear that. What an easy thing.
Speaker 5: You know, hot it is like at night, and he's
Speaker 5: the lady.
Speaker 1: I know how fucking hot it is. I keep my
Speaker 1: air conditioning at six sixty six degrees at night. Now,
Speaker 1: oh my god.
Speaker 5: Well, like he's always hot, so he likes it super cold.
Speaker 5: I'm randomly hot and cold depending so like I can
Speaker 5: set my core temperature to like very chilly, but my
Speaker 5: feet toasty. And the fact that like I could have
Speaker 5: one side with my legs up, because you know, inflammation
Speaker 5: overnight is a killer. I got to reduce my risk
Speaker 5: of stroke and heart attack.
Speaker 1: Every night.
Speaker 5: He's in his forty one year old slumber. So those
Speaker 5: kinds of things where like, you know, he jokes, I
Speaker 5: thought I had more time when you know, I can't
Speaker 5: remember shit.
Speaker 1: You know, Okay, we're gonna take a quick break and
Speaker 1: then we're gonna come back and we're gonna take a
Speaker 1: couple of callers. Okay, and we're gonna give life advice
Speaker 1: to real people. Oh jesus, yeah, you better get your
Speaker 1: therapist cap on, girl, it's about to happen. All right,
Speaker 1: we'll be right back, and we're back.
Speaker 2: We're back.
Speaker 5: Well.
Speaker 2: Our first question deals with some fertility stuff. Ky, says
Speaker 2: dear Chelsea out, hoping you can give me a nudge.
Speaker 2: I'm forty three years old. Much like the gorgeous Monica
Speaker 2: Padman you had on a while back. I've been mysteriously
Speaker 2: single pretty much all of my life. I'm pretty funny, creative,
Speaker 2: a good friend, well traveled. I've had my own business
Speaker 2: for sixteen years, et cetera, et cetera. I've done all
Speaker 2: sorts of therapy around this singleness and can't seem to
Speaker 2: define it or move through it anyway. Three years ago,
Speaker 2: when I turned forty, I decided to try and have
Speaker 2: a baby on my own. My thinking there was I
Speaker 2: have plenty of time to fall in love and only
Speaker 2: a finite time to have a baby, which was really
Speaker 2: running out. I work for myself, have a strong support
Speaker 2: network and my own condo. If anyone can do it,
Speaker 2: I can.
Speaker 6: Well.
Speaker 2: The last three years have been grueling, many many, many
Speaker 2: rounds of unsuccessful IVF despite a good prognosis, three pretty
Speaker 2: devastating riskcarriages on top of the pandemic, living alone, paying
Speaker 2: for it all on my own, and having some pretty
Speaker 2: dark moments, I'm drawing a line in the sand. However,
Speaker 2: my younger sister, who has had a baby i e.
Speaker 2: Is fertile, has offered me her eggs. She's thirty eight.
Speaker 2: Has been on the table for a while, so I've
Speaker 2: processed the whole idea of this, and I'm fine with
Speaker 2: the potential baby not being from my exact egg. But
Speaker 2: I'm just so tired and traumatized and disillusioned and confused.
Speaker 2: On one hand, calling it quits on the baby IVF
Speaker 2: journey means I get my mind and my body back,
Speaker 2: and I can focus on building my business up again,
Speaker 2: being a good friend's sister, auntie daughter, work on creative projects,
Speaker 2: traveling and potentially living overseas part time, and working out
Speaker 2: why the fuck I'm single and trying to get over
Speaker 2: this massive block. But then the idea that I won't
Speaker 2: ever have a child just makes me so sad, and
Speaker 2: I wonder if my excitement about all of the above
Speaker 2: is just that idea of being released from three years
Speaker 2: of failure, money going down the drain, having invasive procedures
Speaker 2: every other month, all for nothing, and maybe I just
Speaker 2: need to give it one last push. It's also annoying.
Speaker 2: I see virtue and goodness and happiness and grief and
Speaker 2: sadness in both paths. Most decisions are like doorways. You
Speaker 2: can walk back through it if it doesn't work out.
Speaker 2: But this is not a door you can walk back through.
Speaker 2: My sister's getting older, too, so I can't sit on
Speaker 2: it for too long.
Speaker 5: Help.
Speaker 2: I'm really confused and tired. Lots of love.
Speaker 1: K fuck, that was like a journal entry.
Speaker 2: I know a lot going on.
Speaker 1: Okay, Well, Gabrielle, like, I'm gonna let you go first,
Speaker 1: because I know you have experience with this.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and it's heartbreaking and it's exhausting. It is financially
Speaker 5: incredibly draining. And I'm saying this as someone who has means.
Speaker 5: It is expensive and it can devastate your financial outlook
Speaker 5: for a while to come. I mean, I know plenty
Speaker 5: of people who have got the baby, but their finances
Speaker 5: never recovered from their fertility journey. First, I would say,
Speaker 5: are we sure it's your eggs. A lot of times
Speaker 5: they automatically just assume your eggs are just too old
Speaker 5: at forty three. But it could be some other factor.
Speaker 5: It could be your donor sperm. It could be how
Speaker 5: your egg and that donor sperm come together in your body.
Speaker 5: Your your uterus could actually be like a more of
Speaker 5: a hostile environment. So there's other tests that you can do.
Speaker 5: You can look into rheumatologists to see if there's other
Speaker 5: reasons for the miscarriages. There's other specialists that can also
Speaker 5: chime in outside of fertility specialists. So if you wanted
Speaker 5: to just for your own peace of mind, you know
Speaker 5: there's other medical routes you can go. But the way
Speaker 5: you kind of describe life, what life could be if
Speaker 5: you ought to let this go, that sounds like a
Speaker 5: really pretty high quality life where some of your other
Speaker 5: dreams are coming true and you're still being able to
Speaker 5: stay true to your heart and get it that. I
Speaker 5: like that she talked about wanting to like do some
Speaker 5: deeper self excavation and see what else is going on there,
Speaker 5: but also listen, if it's one of those things that
Speaker 5: you're just never going to be able to make peace with,
Speaker 5: then I say exhaust every option. But when you feel it,
Speaker 5: your body and your brain will give you that this
Speaker 5: is it. And if you already got that and now
Speaker 5: it's just a matter of having peace with it, there's
Speaker 5: so many great therapists that can help you make peace
Speaker 5: with moving towards whatever's next.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I would say, I would say to this woman,
Speaker 1: it sounds like you are so so married to the
Speaker 1: idea of having a baby. And to piggyback on what
Speaker 1: Gabrielle says, I think you should definitely take your sister
Speaker 1: up on her offer of an egg to see if
Speaker 1: you have a better situation and a better result from that.
Speaker 1: I think you should exhaust all possibilities if you want this.
Speaker 1: This is just one more thing. You're already so far
Speaker 1: down the road of it. I think you should give
Speaker 1: it one more shot with your sister's egg, because that
Speaker 1: could be a miracle waiting to happen, you know, and
Speaker 1: maybe there will be different for biochemistry physiology with that
Speaker 1: egg and the sperm and all of the other things
Speaker 1: that were just mentioned. And then if that doesn't happen,
Speaker 1: I don't think you should stay on this path interminably.
Speaker 1: I think you do want to get yourself together and
Speaker 1: get into therapy and start to really kind of capture
Speaker 1: all of the other beautiful things you're going to be
Speaker 1: able to contribute to this world by not having to
Speaker 1: raise a child, you know. But I wouldn't give up
Speaker 1: just yet. I feel like there's still hope left in
Speaker 1: your story. So that's my two cents.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And you just don't know what's coming down the pike,
Speaker 2: like she spent so much time focused on sort of
Speaker 2: why am I single? Like, you don't know if maybe
Speaker 2: that means you're going to meet someone who has a
Speaker 2: five year old that you then become like another mom too,
Speaker 2: or you know, maybe adoption or fostering is in her future.
Speaker 1: And also just you know, I know you've had multiple miscarriages,
Speaker 1: but that is a very familiar story too. A lot
Speaker 1: of women miscarry multiple times before they do get pregnant,
Speaker 1: and so it's not hopeless always in every situation. Obviously
Speaker 1: I don't know your medical history, but there are so
Speaker 1: many stories that happened to my sister, It's happened to
Speaker 1: so many of my friends. So don't give up hope
Speaker 1: until you're you know, you're you're ready to exhaust your
Speaker 1: hope and you're not ready. I can tell by the
Speaker 1: tone of your letter. So just keep trying and then
Speaker 1: you know, let us know what happens. Please, And you.
Speaker 5: And your sister need to go to therapy before you
Speaker 5: agree to take her eggs. Good idea, that old different
Speaker 5: set of sisterly bonding and who I don't even know
Speaker 5: what the right word is. You guys have to work
Speaker 5: through all of it because it can be a bit
Speaker 5: of a brain twister of mind. It's a mind fuck,
Speaker 5: you know. And your sister may have feelings once the
Speaker 5: child arrives that may not be in alignment with how
Speaker 5: you want to raise your children.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 5: Yeah, So all of this needs to be talked about
Speaker 5: ahead of you accepting her eggs. So everyone's clearly on
Speaker 5: the same page and there's a path forward in case
Speaker 5: there's any hiccups.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's good preventive and more prophylactic prophylactic therapy.
Speaker 2: Yes. Well, our first caller today is Stacy dear Chelsea.
Speaker 2: I'm a twenty seven year old woman getting married later
Speaker 2: this year. I got engaged in January and immediately started planning.
Speaker 2: I chose my bridal party the night I got engaged.
Speaker 2: For context, I moved to a new city a couple
Speaker 2: of years ago, and the friend in this scenario that
Speaker 2: she's talking about is one I made through work. We
Speaker 2: got closed pretty quickly. This friend was one that I
Speaker 2: contacted immediately to tell her I was engaged and asked
Speaker 2: her to be my bridal party. But over the last
Speaker 2: few months, I've come to realize that this woman is
Speaker 2: not someone I want standing at the altar with me.
Speaker 2: She's extremely judgmental and often in opposition to me whenever
Speaker 2: I have conversations with her about my career, finances, even
Speaker 2: my relationship. On three separate occasions, she's asked me, do
Speaker 2: you really want to get married to this man? Not
Speaker 2: because she has problems with my fiance, but just because
Speaker 2: she personally doesn't believe I'm old enough to get married.
Speaker 2: Time and again she makes it clear to me that
Speaker 2: she doesn't think I'm mature enough to make my own decisions.
Speaker 2: I believe that she thinks, because she's thirty one and
Speaker 2: I'm twenty seven, that she knows better than I do.
Speaker 2: But she, on more than one occasion, has told me
Speaker 2: I'm her therapist and will constantly treat the time we
Speaker 2: share together as if she's in therapy. She's always asking
Speaker 2: me for advice, but somehow thinks I'm not mature enough
Speaker 2: to make my own choices. I'm trying to figure out
Speaker 2: the best way to tell her she's not in my
Speaker 2: bridal party an wed.
Speaker 1: Fuck.
Speaker 2: I don't want it to seem like it's out of
Speaker 2: nowhere when I tell her, but I'm absolutely positive I
Speaker 2: don't want her in my bridal party, and I'm worried
Speaker 2: it will cause a huge argument. Any help you can
Speaker 2: provide is appreciated. Love the Show can't wait to hear
Speaker 2: what you think. Stacy.
Speaker 1: Hi, Stacy, Hi, Stacy. Hello, Hi, you're raised with Gabrielle
Speaker 1: Union today. She's our guest today.
Speaker 4: Oh my gosh, hello Gabrielle.
Speaker 6: Hi.
Speaker 5: Question, is that friend married?
Speaker 4: No, she's not surprised.
Speaker 5: Are you sure? She's just not afraid of being left
Speaker 5: behind in her mind that she's going to be left behind,
Speaker 5: which is why she suddenly had issues about your pending nuptials.
Speaker 7: You know, that's crossed my mind because then that kind
Speaker 7: of would make her like one of my only single friends.
Speaker 7: And you know, like people get scared that people get
Speaker 7: caught up in their relationships and kind of neglect their friendships,
Speaker 7: So I think that there may be some of that happening.
Speaker 5: Has she had any successful long term relationships?
Speaker 4: She's had one that I know.
Speaker 1: So she's going to be a part of the bridal party,
Speaker 1: but you're trying to demote her. So you want her
Speaker 1: to come to the wedding, but you don't want her
Speaker 1: to be in the bridal party. Is that accurate?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 7: I do because I would like her there, but just
Speaker 7: after everything she said and like being judgmental and like
Speaker 7: unsupportive in me wanting to get married, I just feel
Speaker 7: like that's not someone I want to up there with me.
Speaker 4: I don't know. And now I'm like, do I even
Speaker 4: want her at the wedding? Good question?
Speaker 1: So but well, I mean if you get her, if
Speaker 1: you if she do a season desist, she's not gonna
Speaker 1: be your friend anymore. Is that what you're looking for?
Speaker 1: Because it's really hard to make this move without ruining
Speaker 1: a friendship exactly.
Speaker 7: And that's something that I've gone over in my mind,
Speaker 7: and I think it would be okay if the friendship ended,
Speaker 7: just because like it hasn't made the longest friendship. I've
Speaker 7: only known her for a couple of years. We're close
Speaker 7: but not too close.
Speaker 2: Do you still work together kind of?
Speaker 1: So she very vague all this information, it's very vague.
Speaker 7: I know she like fills in at different clinics, So
Speaker 7: sometimes she'll fill in at my clinic. Sometimes she won't.
Speaker 7: She's in school right now, so she's not working a lot.
Speaker 7: But sometimes when she does work, she does fill in
Speaker 7: at my clinic, but it's not very often.
Speaker 1: Okay, Well, it sounds like if the relationship ends, you'll
Speaker 1: be okay with it. And with that knowledge, I think
Speaker 1: it's important for you. You absolutely do not want someone
Speaker 1: standing up next to you when you get married, right, Gabrielle,
Speaker 1: that feels that way about you.
Speaker 5: Ill, No, you don't want them in the building. Why
Speaker 5: would you want that kind of negative energy in the building.
Speaker 1: No, I've heard, Gabrielle. I've heard you talk about when
Speaker 1: people come over to your house, you have an energy
Speaker 1: and a vibe in your house, don't fuck it up
Speaker 1: when you come over, And that's how you should feel
Speaker 1: about your wedding.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's true. Absolutely.
Speaker 7: So I'm like you, guys, I wouldn't really want her
Speaker 7: at the wedding, you know, just with everything she said
Speaker 7: and how she feels.
Speaker 1: Well, I think you can give her an opportunity to
Speaker 1: recognize what she did. I think you can write her
Speaker 1: a really nice email and say, hey, listen, I've been
Speaker 1: thinking about my wedding and I've been really meditating on it,
Speaker 1: whatever your form of you know, reflection is, and I
Speaker 1: think it doesn't appropriate to have anyone that's not fully
Speaker 1: wedding positive and happy about our union to be standing
Speaker 1: up there with me. I would still love for you
Speaker 1: to come to the wedding if you want to support us,
Speaker 1: but I don't need you in the bridal party. And
Speaker 1: you know you can make this not nasty, you can
Speaker 1: make this loving, but that it's really coming from what
Speaker 1: you need on your wedding day. You want to feel safe,
Speaker 1: secure and surrounded by love and good vibrations, and that's
Speaker 1: what you're after. And if she can bring that, then
Speaker 1: she's totally welcome to come to the wedding, but she's
Speaker 1: not going to be in the wedding party.
Speaker 8: Here's a question for you.
Speaker 2: Has she bought her dress yet?
Speaker 4: I don't think so.
Speaker 7: She was telling me she has a dress that she
Speaker 7: wears to like a lot of weddings, that it just
Speaker 7: happens to fit the color and my color is burgundy.
Speaker 7: Then I'm having everyone wearing her dress is burgundy. She's like, oh,
Speaker 7: probably just wear that one. So she already has that
Speaker 7: in her closet. She's like, I'll probably just wear that one.
Speaker 1: Do you feel comfortable writing a letter like that. I do,
Speaker 1: because it seems like you kind of want to.
Speaker 4: I'm trying to.
Speaker 7: Get better at doing that and communicating with people like, Okay,
Speaker 7: this isn't working for me.
Speaker 4: We need to do something about this.
Speaker 7: So I think, yeah, communicating it in a loving and
Speaker 7: like I still respect you, like I don't want to
Speaker 7: buck shit to you or anything like that. But I
Speaker 7: think that's kind of the vibe I was going for,
Speaker 7: because yeah, I don't want to be rude or mean
Speaker 7: to her, but yeah, like you said, I don't want
Speaker 7: any negative energy.
Speaker 1: After wedding, and you have every right to say that
Speaker 1: to anybody.
Speaker 4: That's true. True.
Speaker 1: So write her a nice email and then you know,
Speaker 1: follow up with her, and if she can't take the feedback,
Speaker 1: maybe she'll surprise you, and maybe she'll be like, oh
Speaker 1: my god, I'm so sorry. I hadn't even been thinking
Speaker 1: about how negatively I've been coming across you know, And
Speaker 1: then that would be a nice surprise, little rainbow. But
Speaker 1: if that doesn't happen, you're already okay with the results
Speaker 1: of not having that friendship. So I think you should
Speaker 1: just be prepared and open minded for whatever happens. But
Speaker 1: speak your truth because that's the most important element here,
Speaker 1: is you saying what you need for on your like
Speaker 1: special day.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think preparing for Like you mentioned, you think
Speaker 2: it might be a blow up, which I love the email,
Speaker 2: so it's not like she can't get into it with
Speaker 2: you right then. But if she does have a negative
Speaker 2: reaction and sends you some like email with a lot
Speaker 2: of capital utters and all that sort of thing, maybe
Speaker 2: just agree with yourself now that you're not going to
Speaker 2: respond to it right away or maybe even at all.
Speaker 2: You know, maybe just like let it lie. She might
Speaker 2: have some big feelings about it, and like you don't
Speaker 2: need to take that on either and make it like
Speaker 2: a back and forth.
Speaker 7: Yeah that's true, because I definitely can be very reactive,
Speaker 7: So I think that sending it and then if she
Speaker 7: emails back, just like letting it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, don't get into one of those ping pong things.
Speaker 1: That's not ever good for anybody.
Speaker 5: Listen, or let her have it. Let her have it.
Speaker 5: I think maybe she seems at a little slick on
Speaker 5: the tongue there, and too many people have led her slide.
Speaker 5: So sometimes somebody needs a little emotional too, piece little
Speaker 5: pop pop.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Saying to someone who's getting married, are
Speaker 1: you sure you want to get married multiple times? Isn't
Speaker 1: supportive unless you're a fiance is an abuser, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean? Like, it's just not appropriate. So that's
Speaker 1: already negative.
Speaker 7: Exactly, And I that was just crazy that you would
Speaker 7: say that in the first place, after she had been
Speaker 7: appointed to a bridesmaid, Like, how are you gonna question
Speaker 7: this when.
Speaker 4: I've already asked you to be a part of it.
Speaker 5: How does she know him?
Speaker 4: So?
Speaker 7: And that's the thing that is also a little confusing.
Speaker 7: So she has met him maybe four times total.
Speaker 4: We've gone out for drinks once.
Speaker 7: She's just come over to the house before me and
Speaker 7: her going out somewhere, and he's been there and they
Speaker 7: talk and have a conversation and she is like, yeah, he's.
Speaker 4: A really personal guy.
Speaker 7: Like I like the way that you can leave the
Speaker 7: room and that we can have a conversation, and like
Speaker 7: he seems really nice and so I'm like, Okay, then
Speaker 7: why are you pressing me so hard about like when
Speaker 7: you're telling me that he's this great guy and he's
Speaker 7: great for me, Like, what's why are you pressing me
Speaker 7: so hard into why do you want to marry this man?
Speaker 7: It's very confused.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's just her own shit, you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: A little yeah she is. Anyway, write that email and
Speaker 1: keep us posted, let us know what happens.
Speaker 2: Okay, yes, I will, thank you Stacy and keep us posted.
Speaker 1: Okay, Thanks day, sat.
Speaker 5: Thank you, thank you, congratulations, thank you so much.
Speaker 1: I like when our callers are feisty and they're already
Speaker 1: ready to go, you know, because some people are just
Speaker 1: like not ready to have a confrontation or any conflict.
Speaker 1: They're very conflict of verse and they're scared to like
Speaker 1: make that point of entry where you have to have
Speaker 1: the discussion with someone. But she seems like she's ready
Speaker 1: to rumble.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and she's like ready to lose this girl.
Speaker 1: Yeah exactly, Yeah, a little nudge. Yeah, that's problem solved.
Speaker 6: Well.
Speaker 2: Our next caller is Sarah. Dear Chelsea, I love your
Speaker 2: advice on a situation I've found myself in with a friend.
Speaker 2: My friend, Becky, and I met in prenatal yoga class
Speaker 2: in twenty nineteen. Both of our sons were born in
Speaker 2: early twenty twenty, right before the pandemic started. We became
Speaker 2: very close and would text almost every day. We'd get
Speaker 2: together for stroller walks outside regularly for the first couple
Speaker 2: of years of our kids' lives. Now, both of our
Speaker 2: boys are three, and in the last year and a half,
Speaker 2: her son has had issues with being a little aggressive
Speaker 2: towards my son, pushing, etc. I've mostly brushed it off
Speaker 2: as toddler behavior, but it keeps getting worse. The final
Speaker 2: straw was recently when her son put my son in
Speaker 2: a headlock and body slammed him. Yeah. I had told
Speaker 2: her that we had to take a break from hanging
Speaker 2: out with the boys because of it. I reiterated that
Speaker 2: our friendship was important to me and that I'd still
Speaker 2: be open to hanging out without the kids. But I
Speaker 2: haven't heard back from her at all. Should I reach
Speaker 2: out or should I just accept that my boundary has
Speaker 2: ended our friendship. Thanks and love your show, Sarah. Tricky
Speaker 2: one mom's stuff.
Speaker 1: I know it is tricky, especially when they're three years old.
Speaker 5: Right, They all do weird some aggressive things. They all
Speaker 5: do it, whether they get your kid gets caught at
Speaker 5: it more often than not. It's just they all do it.
Speaker 1: Hi, Sarah, Hi, Hi, how are you?
Speaker 6: I'm good?
Speaker 5: Are you?
Speaker 1: We're good. This is Gabrielle. She's our special guest today.
Speaker 5: Hi.
Speaker 1: Hi. So your kid got it. You got thrown down
Speaker 1: with a headlock by the other kid and you said,
Speaker 1: whoopsie do it all. Let's take a break.
Speaker 6: Yeah, that's basically it.
Speaker 1: And you haven't heard from her. How long has it been.
Speaker 6: It's been about three months?
Speaker 1: Oh okay, Yeah. What do you think, Gabrielle.
Speaker 5: I think she's just embarrassed, because it's it's hard, like
Speaker 5: when your kid does something and you're like, they did it,
Speaker 5: like they just did it, and you know, especially if
Speaker 5: the other person is really as they should. All moms
Speaker 5: should advocate for their own kids and make sure your
Speaker 5: own child is safe. And when you have to create
Speaker 5: that boundary of like, I know, they're just kids, da
Speaker 5: da da dah, but you know it's the aggression is
Speaker 5: amping up, and I think we need to pump the
Speaker 5: brakes just for a while bit and you know, let's
Speaker 5: let them grow separately. Whatever you want to say, you know,
Speaker 5: I'm sure you handled it with you know a lot
Speaker 5: of tact and kindness, but it is it's embarrassing to
Speaker 5: come back from that. I've you know, when our older
Speaker 5: boys were younger, one of them did something that I
Speaker 5: was like and I was so embarrased, like they did it,
Speaker 5: like they just did it, Like there was I couldn't
Speaker 5: like try to get out of it. They just did
Speaker 5: it and I had to just sit there and take
Speaker 5: that l and I did not want to. I was
Speaker 5: trying to find someone else to like blame it on,
Speaker 5: to like shift the focus. You're just being harder my kid,
Speaker 5: But my kid did it, and it's sometimes it's really
Speaker 5: hard to see like your little loved one, your a
Speaker 5: little well chipbopy old block doing something that requires a
Speaker 5: hard boundary and it's embarrassing. But that's part of life.
Speaker 5: And I think you know you're in the right position.
Speaker 5: You did everything correct and just say hey, I know
Speaker 5: it was probably hard to hear, and it was even
Speaker 5: harder to say, and you know your kid, it was
Speaker 5: even harder for them to experience. But I think this
Speaker 5: could be a great learning lesson and how do we
Speaker 5: bounce back after poor behavior.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's nice.
Speaker 5: And can we work on it together like you and
Speaker 5: I and then you know, help apply that to our kids.
Speaker 4: But who sucks?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that's great advice. I mean there's no point.
Speaker 1: I mean you can totally reach out now it's been
Speaker 1: a while and send her a loving email or whatever
Speaker 1: however you communicate, call, text, whatever you feel comfortable doing,
Speaker 1: and if you don't hear back from her, then you
Speaker 1: don't hear back from her. But there's always a point
Speaker 1: in I think reaching out again to show people some
Speaker 1: grace too, Yeah, because of course I'm sure she's embarrassed.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and a specific invite might be helpful as well,
Speaker 2: especially since some water is under the bridge, like rather
Speaker 2: than let's get together sometime, like something that your boys
Speaker 2: would not naturally go to, so like, hey, do you
Speaker 2: want to catch a movie on Thursday? Or like you
Speaker 2: want to grab a drink or dinner or something like
Speaker 2: that that's understood to be mom time or like girls time.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 6: My other thing about it is with it being a summer,
Speaker 6: we live in like a small city, and I'm starting
Speaker 6: to feel like are we going to see them somewhere?
Speaker 2: Sure?
Speaker 6: So lately I'm like I need to reach out and
Speaker 6: see something. Yeah, if I do see them, it's fine. Yeah,
Speaker 6: you know, I don't want it to be awkward.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's the right thing, you know what you want
Speaker 1: to do? Yeah, just not Yeah what I'm.
Speaker 6: Not quite sure what to say. So I think asking
Speaker 6: to get together is probably the best thing. And if
Speaker 6: she doesn't want to, she doesn't want to, maybe.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and then if you do see her, go up,
Speaker 2: you know, give her a hug, say it's nice to
Speaker 2: see you, and like you can move on, but you
Speaker 2: can make it not awkward in that situation. But just
Speaker 2: like let her have her space after that, like.
Speaker 6: High end, right, Yeah, yeah, that's true.
Speaker 5: I always lead with something weird that Cop has done
Speaker 5: or one of the other kids have done Cop for
Speaker 5: whatever reason. She is just a glutton for punishment. But
Speaker 5: like when you had to have that, like, hey, get
Speaker 5: a little rough out there and you do the with
Speaker 5: the tchuble in trying to make everyone feel like this
Speaker 5: isn't the end of the world, but also handle your kid.
Speaker 5: My kid is kind of suffering out there. When it's
Speaker 5: time to kind of circle back. It's oh my god.
Speaker 5: I felt so embarrassed. I felt like when I was
Speaker 5: spoken to by the teacher, by whoever. I felt like
Speaker 5: I was indicted as a bad mom because my kids
Speaker 5: behaved poorly, And I just want you to know there's
Speaker 5: no correlation. Mommy is hard, parenting is hard, and at
Speaker 5: this age, they're testing their boundaries. And you know, I'm
Speaker 5: so glad that I have a friend who's understanding as you.
Speaker 5: So when are we gonna go get a drink?
Speaker 1: And you're gonna feel better after you reach out, regardless
Speaker 1: of whether you hear back, because you're acting on your
Speaker 1: higher path, you know what I mean. You're just acting
Speaker 1: out of love and grace and you do care about her,
Speaker 1: So there's nothing wrong with doing with reaching out at all.
Speaker 6: Okay, yeah, thank you. I think I just need a
Speaker 6: little push.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, no problem, Good luck with everything.
Speaker 6: Thank you. Nice to see you all today.
Speaker 1: Thanks so much, Sarah, take care, honey, bye bye.
Speaker 2: I definitely bit my cousin Timmy until he bled when
Speaker 2: I was two years old, and his mom didn't speak
Speaker 2: to my mom for two years.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, that's so stupid. If your mother's fault that
Speaker 1: you bid him, no, like she's training you to bite kids. No,
Speaker 1: just I mean, it's just so ridiculous.
Speaker 5: Look, it's hard because you want to be angry with
Speaker 5: the kid, but they're children. So then it's like, well,
Speaker 5: who made you.
Speaker 1: That Sue's really in trouble?
Speaker 5: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Yeah, Well let's take a quick break and we'll be
Speaker 2: back with one question to wrap up.
Speaker 1: Okay, okay, and we're back again. We all got just
Speaker 1: steam it along.
Speaker 2: This question comes from Quentin. He's in his thirties. I've
Speaker 2: been reluctant to write in as they carry a lot
Speaker 2: of shame when it comes to this topic. I'm a
Speaker 2: black queer musician and dancer from New York, now living
Speaker 2: in Los Angeles. I've been dancing professionally for several years,
Speaker 2: as well as developing a music project that merges me
Speaker 2: I work as a modern dancer and vocalist. During that time,
Speaker 2: I faced a lot of hardship, including two major surgeries,
Speaker 2: one for my vocal cords and the other due to
Speaker 2: a dance injury. Thankfully, I was able to produce and
Speaker 2: release my first album in the fall of twenty twenty.
Speaker 2: The work was well received. However, I'm still sort of
Speaker 2: struggling as someone who's an artist and creator. How do
Speaker 2: you remain resilient in your twenties and early thirties before
Speaker 2: finding success, After working so hard on my craft and
Speaker 2: putting in the work to break down barriers and gain access,
Speaker 2: I can't help but feel defeated and like all of
Speaker 2: my effort is fruitless. I have a great deal of
Speaker 2: friends and colleagues who are starting to actualize their dreams
Speaker 2: in major ways, and I hate being jealous of them.
Speaker 2: It's really shitty feeling envious of those close to you.
Speaker 2: How can I restore my faith and belief in a
Speaker 2: dream I've had since childhood? What mechanisms do you employ
Speaker 2: when you feel your talent is overlooked? And how do
Speaker 2: you stay positive? Quentin, good one, Quentin, Yeah, that.
Speaker 4: Is a good one.
Speaker 5: I mean, in anyone who's you know has had these
Speaker 5: moments of or years of self doubt.
Speaker 1: I think resiliency is actually the exact word, because being
Speaker 1: resilient is part of being rejected and not giving up.
Speaker 1: Being resilient is knowing that, Okay, while you're putting all
Speaker 1: this effort forward like it will result in something, it
Speaker 1: always does. It may not happen when you want it
Speaker 1: or exactly in the shape that you wanted or have
Speaker 1: envisioned it, but it is going to happen, and part
Speaker 1: of being resilient is accepting that there are going to
Speaker 1: be lows and that they're going to be highs, and
Speaker 1: neither one of those things are going to last forever.
Speaker 1: It's an ebb and flow, And in any creative career,
Speaker 1: anyone you talk to will have thought about giving up
Speaker 1: at some point, and it's the difference between the people
Speaker 1: who do give up and the people who persevere. Gabrielle,
Speaker 1: I'm sure that you feel similarly about rejection resilience, right.
Speaker 5: Oh, the sheer volume of nos hell knows hell No, not,
Speaker 5: you bitch, like there's just there's there's so many it's
Speaker 5: actually an unnatural amount of rejection that we experience in
Speaker 5: this industry. But you know, those bills and those bills
Speaker 5: need to be paid every month, and so I never
Speaker 5: let myself get too low where I thought, Okay, I
Speaker 5: have to stop even trying to do this now, Mike.
Speaker 5: I had to take some different lateral moves, you know
Speaker 5: what I mean, to just sustain myself financially. But I
Speaker 5: never gave up. And the art that I that I
Speaker 5: was able to create, that's ever green, that never goes away.
Speaker 5: You created something out of out of everything that is
Speaker 5: going to last a lifetime, and that is your fucking win.
Speaker 5: And if you look at like each little thing as
Speaker 5: a major accomplishment, it allows you to kind of put
Speaker 5: everything in perspective. If you look at your you know
Speaker 5: those moments where you're like, Okay, I'm going to take fountain,
Speaker 5: but I don't know if I'm going to get the
Speaker 5: lights right. Those days where you take fountain and it's
Speaker 5: just green light, green light, green light, that's a fucking win.
Speaker 5: That's a great day, like, and you kind of give
Speaker 5: weight to them. Similarly, some of those rejections aren't going
Speaker 5: to feel as massive. And also know that everyone you see,
Speaker 5: the biggest stars have been rejected way more than you
Speaker 5: could ever imagine. And it's just a matter, like Chelsea said,
Speaker 5: of resilience, but also recognizing where the line of resilience
Speaker 5: is and where self flagellation is and where abusive situations are.
Speaker 5: Those are different things, and you have to figure out
Speaker 5: with the therapist or trained professional where those different lines are.
Speaker 5: Because a lot of times we will be drinking curdled
Speaker 5: milk like it's fresh, and sometimes somebody we got to
Speaker 5: say to ourselves, is this milk is spoiled, and I
Speaker 5: need to move on to something that's not going to
Speaker 5: kill me.
Speaker 2: I love when you talk about the artwork you've created
Speaker 2: being evergreen, because we live in this culture of like, okay,
Speaker 2: it's up on social media, all right, your Netflix special
Speaker 2: came out, all right, what's next, what's next, what's the
Speaker 2: next thing? But like this stuff that Quentin's creating. I
Speaker 2: went to his website. It's gorgeous art. It's beautiful and
Speaker 2: it and it's there, and you know, it's made a
Speaker 2: little while ago, but that's okay, it's beautiful, So I
Speaker 2: love it.
Speaker 1: You said you want to give a shout out to
Speaker 1: his website totally.
Speaker 8: If you want to check out Quentin, you can find
Speaker 8: him at nolychildmusic dot com.
Speaker 2: That's his website.
Speaker 8: It's sort of a mashup of like dance and singing
Speaker 8: and poetry, and it's very ethereal and moody and really
Speaker 8: really lovely.
Speaker 1: Yeah. And I also think the other thing is, like,
Speaker 1: you know, when you get rejected, Gabrielle, I don't know
Speaker 1: how you face things like this, but if I if
Speaker 1: I don't get something that I want, I have a
Speaker 1: much different attitude than I did. When I was younger,
Speaker 1: I would, you know, stop my feet, and I was
Speaker 1: more of a brat and entitled. And now I'm like,
Speaker 1: what's meant for me? Doesn't pass me? Like? It doesn't.
Speaker 1: I don't look at it as a so defeatists or
Speaker 1: like and listen the comparison game. You're not alone. You're
Speaker 1: not the only person who feels envy. That is a
Speaker 1: natural feeling that human beings have. It's called envy. It's
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, Like, that's that's the human condition.
Speaker 1: As long as you're not acting on your end, it's okay.
Speaker 1: That's just a feeling. Don't let your feelings define who
Speaker 1: you are. That's not your sense of self. No one
Speaker 1: wants to feel jealous or envious, but that's the world
Speaker 1: we live in with the comparison and contrasting with what
Speaker 1: other people are doing. Try and really really focus on
Speaker 1: what you're doing and try not to look around at
Speaker 1: your competitors so much. It's just not a good equation
Speaker 1: and nobody comes out feeling great after that. So you know,
Speaker 1: take pride in which you work and really level it
Speaker 1: up so that you are beaming. You know what I
Speaker 1: mean that you're giving off vibes that everyone wants to
Speaker 1: be attracted to, and that when something doesn't work out,
Speaker 1: it's just the water off a ducts back, you know,
Speaker 1: and then you're closer to the next thing that is
Speaker 1: going to work out. And so I think you just
Speaker 1: change your philosophy.
Speaker 5: The things you're comparing yourself to may or may not
Speaker 5: be real just because just because somebody posts it, or
Speaker 5: just because there's an announcement. How many times have you
Speaker 5: announced a project and people don't understand that development can
Speaker 5: take vibors like and they're like, what, where's the where's
Speaker 5: the where is the thing? Where the bring it on sequel?
Speaker 5: Where do you guys been talking about it? It's like,
Speaker 5: just because they say it we're working on it doesn't
Speaker 5: mean that someone's so far out ahead of you. Or
Speaker 5: there's this artist I found on social media years ago
Speaker 5: and just again by chance, at least seven years later,
Speaker 5: an agency, a big agency in LA that represents talent
Speaker 5: has an artist kind of incubator and this artist work
Speaker 5: is going to be in the incubator of showing in
Speaker 5: Beverly Hills. And I was like, Mom, that girl that
Speaker 5: I've we've been following, that I send you her work
Speaker 5: she's going to be showing. So now I get to
Speaker 5: meet this girl that was just some you know, this
Speaker 5: internet artist that you know, I didn't think we were
Speaker 5: ever our world would ever cross. I just really love
Speaker 5: her work. You really have no idea how your work
Speaker 5: is touching people and where it will intersect later. And
Speaker 5: I'm going with a pocket full of cash ready to
Speaker 5: buy everything because I'm just that into this.
Speaker 1: Well fifty to fifty Gabrielle. Yeah, you never know.
Speaker 5: Your art may be working some magic that you cannot
Speaker 5: even fathom right now, but we'll pay off later in
Speaker 5: a tremendous way.
Speaker 1: Yeah that's very true. Yeah, Okay, well, thank you. So
Speaker 1: you are a queen, Gabrielle. I want you to know
Speaker 1: that I admire you. I love your energy, I love
Speaker 1: your marriage. You guys belong together, it's so obvious. And
Speaker 1: I love the family that you guys have and share,
Speaker 1: and I just wish you the best. Thank you so
Speaker 1: much for coming on and giving such sagacious advice.
Speaker 5: I am happy to be here, and thank you for
Speaker 5: always being a cool chick. Everyone always gravitates towards you,
Speaker 5: and there's a reason, and so I hope you owned it.
Speaker 5: You're a life.
Speaker 1: You're so sweet. Thank you for saying that. I love that.
Speaker 1: You made my day. You guys, this is so fun. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so fun. Thank you so much for making the time appreciated, Gabrielle.
Speaker 5: Hi.
Speaker 2: Guys, If you'd like advice from Chelsea, shoot us an
Speaker 2: email at Dear Chelsea podcast at gmail dot com and
Speaker 2: be sure to include your phone number. Dear Chelsea is
Speaker 2: edited and engineered by Brad Dickert executive producer Katherine Law
Speaker 2: and be sure to check out our merch at Chelseahandler
Speaker 2: dot com